At Any Price (Gaming The System) (17 page)

The kindness of those simple words took my breath away.
You’re worth waiting for
. It was so opposite of what I’d known from my only serious relationship—if a self-involved high-school boyfriend could even be considered serious. Zack hadn’t wanted to wait. Had decided to force the issue when I told him I wasn’t ready. That wasn’t the answer he’d wanted, so he’d taken what he wanted anyway.

I shivered against Adam and he pulled me to him. “Thank you,” I said, voice trembling with an emotion I couldn’t fully explain.

When he turned on his phone shortly thereafter, there were four text messages and a missed call. Adam swore under his breath, but took the time to answer each one of them while I sat beside him huddled under the blanket.

His car took me home soon after. Restless yet depleted, I reclined against the leather bench in the backseat, mind wandering over the evening’s events. Hopefully things would come to a conclusion tomorrow. But that shard of desire came with a double edge—because it meant that tomorrow night together would be our last. And as much as his hands on me were driving me to new undiscovered countries of pleasure, I suddenly realized how much I would miss him, beyond just his magic hands. His conversation, his boyish smile, his caring consideration, his keen perceptiveness, his clean, ocean smell. I tried my best to ignore the ache at the center of my chest that hadn’t gone away since he’d said that simple sentence,
You’re worth waiting for.

But I had to remind myself that a relationship with someone like Adam would be impossible. I would not allow myself to entertain that dream. On the outside, he seemed perfect. But on the inside, he was a man, just like all the rest of them. And they couldn’t be trusted.

Once home, I checked my messages. Heath had called, instructing me to call him the minute I got home. Alex had left two, demanding the
chisme
immediately. I glanced at the clock. It was just after midnight so I opted out of calling.

Instead, I wandered the apartment—cleaned a few dishes, picked up my study guide and threw it down just as quickly. Going to bed didn’t even cross my thoughts. I knew it would only lead to hours of tossing and turning.

I was too wound up by the thoughts of Adam’s hands and the delicious sensations they had awoken in me. Of the memory of his voice commanding me to come to climax, to say his name. Shivers slithered all through me at the memory.

So I did what I always do when I couldn’t sleep. I logged on to the game to while away a few hours. Heath had not logged in, nor had my other two game buddies, Persephone or FallenOne. Fallen hadn’t been on since the last time we’d played together, three weeks before. An hour later when I was about to log off, my in-game message screen flashed.

*Magnus tells you, “Why are you still awake?”

Magnus. The one and only. I ran a command to find out Magnus’s class and level.
/whois Magnus

The game obediently told me:
Magnus is a level 75 Fire Mage.
Because of course he was a Fire Mage. Fire Mages were the most overtly powerful character class in the game. They had the element of fire at their command, could throw fireballs and command flame to dance on the heads of their enemies, or burn them slowly down with heat damage. I bit my lip, trying not to giggle at the irony—the thought of his hot hands still burned in my memory. How appropriate.

*You tell Magnus, “A Fire Mage? Really? No wonder you have magic hands.”

*Magnus tells you, “At your service.”

*You tell Magnus, “It begs the question…what are *you* doing up so late? Working still?”

*Magnus tells you, “Turn on your headset.”

*You tell Magnus, “It doesn’t work right. Makes the game lag when I’m on voice.”

*Magnus tells you, “How are you playing on that ancient rig of yours?”

*You tell Magnus, “Don’t insult my Franken-puter, the trusty little box that could.”

*Magnus tells you, “Get some sleep or you are going to be exhausted tomorrow. I want you well rested.”

A thrill of anticipation sliced through me. Tomorrow would finally be the night.

*You tell Magnus, “Bossy. I was just about to log off. Enough lag for tonight.”

*Magnus tells you, “I’ll pick you up at 11 sharp.”

I lay down with a nice, dry study book to lull me to sleep, trying hard to get my mind off of all that would happen the next day. It took an hour, but it finally worked.

Chapter Eight

Adam appeared at my door at exactly eleven a.m. Somehow I knew he’d be the type to be ultra-prompt, despite his tardiness at our first meeting. He wore khakis, white deck shoes and a casual button-down, short-sleeved shirt. And, of course, those same sexy designer shades.

He had his ubiquitous cell phone in one hand and a cardboard box under his arm. I jerked open the door. “I’ll be right out. Wait here.” I said, leaving the door ajar to grab my backpack from my room.

When I got back, he was standing in the middle of my living room, opening up the box. Of course.

“Dude, what are you doing? The place is a mess. I told you to wait outside.”

“Is it?” he said, sounding preoccupied. “I hadn’t noticed.”

I swatted his hard arm with the back of my hand, stunned that it felt like smacking my knuckles against a rock. “Very funny. What the heck are you doing?”

“Your rig is a piece of shit.”

“Thank you,” I answered acerbically.

“I had this lying around. Figured you could use a loaner.”

He pulled out a sleek new laptop that immediately made my heart palpitate with toy-lust. It was ultrathin, made from a matte dark metal.

“What…? What do you mean ‘loaner’?”

He spoke slowly, as if to a toddler. “I mean that I lend it to you and you use it for a while and then you give it back to me when you no longer need it.”

I made a face at him. As if I’d give that luscious thing back. Like,
ever
. He’d just opened it up and booted it. It was already loaded with everything. The palpitations turned into out-and-out fluttering. My God. It was a work of art. It was a gamer’s rig, fully tricked out with all the essentials and a seventeen-inch high-definition screen that was as clear as looking through a window.

“This looks just like the notebook you were using in Holland.”

“It’s close. Not quite as mighty. It’s my backup but I never use it.”

Nevertheless, I noticed there was no log-in for him. He’d already reconfigured everything for me, even created an account. “What password did you set?”

He shrugged. “
Magnus rules
. You can change it later, if you must.”

I smirked. “Oh, I think I must.”

The machine was gorgeous, and easily came with a several-thousand-dollar price tag. I knew I should refuse it. After all, if we were never going to see each other again after tonight, how would I even return it to him?

So I asked him. “How would I get this back to you?”

He paused and I couldn’t tell whether he had no answer for the question, didn’t wish to answer the question or hadn’t even heard the question. His fingers were flying over the sleek backlit keyboard.

I was just about to repeat myself when he said, without looking at me, “Just give it to Bowman. He can bring it down to the complex. I promised him a tour, anyway.”

Shit, a tour of Draco Multimedia headquarters? Lucky bastard. “That asshole didn’t even tell me,” I grumped.

He glanced at me. “You can have one, too.”

Our gazes held and my heart pounded. That couldn’t be possible. If tonight we were going to—then I shouldn’t go anywhere near his workplace after that.

I swallowed. He must have known what I was thinking. I think he was waiting for me to say something, maybe expecting me to back out of tonight. I straightened. I wasn’t going to back out. I couldn’t. So I just shook my head.

He looked away, features clouded, but I couldn’t tell whether he was troubled or just preoccupied. I was starting to feel both—troubled about our inevitable farewell after this evening and preoccupied with how everything would go, finally, tonight.

If things had gone according to plan, this would have been over with a week ago and by now, we’d be strangers once more. And before, I’d felt like that was absolutely the right thing to do, but now…It was weirdly illogical. I wanted to know all about him before we never saw each other again.

Alex showed up just as we were descending the stairs to leave less than an hour later. When she looked up and saw Adam, her jaw dropped and her gaze shot to me, eyes rounding. Subtle she was
not.
I wondered how she’d managed to get over here so fast from her apartment in Fullerton once her mom had called to tell her he was here.

I sighed and made introductions. “Good to meet you,” Alex smiled, leaning to shake his hand and bat her big eyes at him. “Mia’s told me so much about you!”

My lips pursed. What a little liar. Adam smiled and shot a sidelong glance at me. I shrugged, throwing my hands up. “We gotta get going.”

Alex watched us go and when I looked back, she waved her hand in front of her face to fan herself—a clear indication that she found him hot. Then she put her hand to her ear, mimicking holding a phone and mouthed an exaggerated
Call me.

We hit the road and I breathed a sigh of relief. That had been a close call. The more I kept Adam separated from my friends, the fewer awkward questions I’d have to answer later. When I glanced over at him, he had a grin on his face.

“What?” I asked.

“You’ve told her all about me, huh?”

I looked away, cheeks heating. “She’s a hopeless liar,” I muttered.

The day was truly beautiful. I was convinced there was no more gorgeous weather on this planet than what we enjoyed in Southern California in May. The smells of the white jasmine bushes that were planted everywhere combined with the blossoms on the orange trees and imbued the air with a honey scent. It was too early for the June Gloom, where mornings were overcast until they burned off into hot afternoons. In May, every day was fresh, crystal clear and sunny.

And in his convertible—a dark blue vintage 1950s Porsche—we zoomed down the freeway in the carpool lane, bypassing Saturday beach traffic.

I’d bundled my long hair as best I could into a ponytail band, making a messy bun. Still errant strands of hair whipped around my face and into my eyes as I squinted through my cheapo drugstore sunglasses, tapping my foot in time with Depeche Mode’s “Pleasure Little Treasure” on the stereo. So he liked his music like he liked his cars—classics. I was beginning to realize that Adam was the rock star of computer geeks. And apparently a lot of the tech magazines agreed with me.

Adam parked at a small underground garage a few blocks away from the bridge and we walked the rest of the way—he insisting on carrying my bag, which wasn’t heavy at all. I resisted at first, but he practically yanked it out of my hands.

“Your mama raised a very nice boy,” I said and then immediately regretted my words when I saw his jaw tighten. How could I have forgotten? I stopped, placing a hand on his rock-hard bicep. “I’m so sorry.”

He shook his head. “No worries, Emilia.” But those dark brows creased over his sunglass-veiled eyes.

I cleared my throat, still feeling terrible. Taking a deep breath, I started walking again. I decided to ease the awkwardness by talking about a subject I hated as well. “No, I know how it feels whenever someone brings up my dad or asks me about him. I never had a dad. I don’t even know his name so I call him the Biological Sperm Donor because that’s all he is to me.”

He glanced at me sidelong. “You were never curious to meet him?”

I shrugged. “He didn’t want me so why would I want him?” And we kept walking, past the park gardens of Bay Island, alive with bright pinks, vivid yellows—all of spring in a flowerbed. “He was married with a family and he never bothered to reveal that little detail to my mom before he got her pregnant. When she told him she was going to have a baby, he paid her a big sum of money to shut up and ‘go take care of it.’”

“Ah. A right bastard, then.”

“Yep. So I don’t give a shit who he is.”

He glanced at me again. “But he’s well off. You could have, you know, tried to get the money you need from him.”

Now it was my turn to tighten my jaw. “Why ask from him what I can do for myself?”

And I could tell he wanted to say more but cut himself off with a slight shake of his head, his grip tightening on my bag. Was he actually angry?

I paused, watching him carefully. This wasn’t the first time I’d gotten the impression he had torn feelings about the auction—this entire arrangement. I remembered the insults he was slinging around when we first met—and some of the other offhand comments he had made during our brief time in the Netherlands, always questioning my judgment and reasons for entering the auction in the first place.

If he didn’t approve, why had he even bid?

Though I wasn’t about to question him now. In truth, I was glad he did bid. But I was getting this weird tight feeling at the pit of my stomach. It felt like a cold rock sitting there and never moving. It had something to do with the fact that I was allowing feelings to get involved. As much as I wanted the money, yes. As much as I wanted
him,
yes. I found myself not wanting this to be over yet.

There was too much to find out before that. I wanted to know what drove him. What his fears were. What his goals were. Had he already arrived at the ripe age of twenty-six or was he striving for more and if so, how much higher could he go? And what about a personal life? Why was he driven, after being so successful, to still spend ninety hours a week in his office and half his life on airplanes and in hotels?

Then there were the personal details. Had he ever been in love? Who was Sabrina? Why did he have her name permanently inscribed on his heart?

These were things that I would never know, ever, if we slept together tonight.