Blow Me Down (11 page)

I made a vague gesture that made Corbin’s left eyebrow twitch. “No, he’s not, although you’re not in his best graces at the moment. Loo has forgiven you for kicking him in the knee, though, claiming you’re a saucy wench who just needs a firm hand to tame your wild spirit.”

“I suppose you think you’re that firm hand?” I asked.

He grinned. “The thought did go through my mind. Right now Loo is talking to that black storm cloud you insisted on bringing, comparing amputations.”

“I told you, his name is Bas, he’s my cabin boy so I’m responsible for him, and what amputations? That is, what amputations does Leeward Tom have? He looked fine to me.”

“Toes,” Corbin said succinctly. “Four of them altogether. Drink?”

He moved behind the captain’s desk, rustling around in a drawer before he pulled out a silver flask.

“Please.” I all but licked my lips as he flipped open the flask and handed it to me. The rum in it burned a fiery path down my throat, ending up in a warm pool in my stomach. “What’s the second thing?”

“Hmm?” Corbin took a swig from the flask.

“The second reason why reporting you wouldn’t do any good.”

He looked momentarily surprised, an oddly pleased look quickly replacing the expression. “You aren’t a lawyer, are you? You have a wonderfully persistent mind.”

“I’m a financial analyst, as a matter of fact. We are just as persistent. What is the second reason?”

“There’s no one to report me to,” he said simply. “I own Buckling Swashes.”

“Corbin, you’re just a computer character—”

“My name is Peter Corbin Monroe. I was born in 1965 in a small town in Idaho. I am divorced, and I have two children whom I see far too seldom and no known diseases or ailments beyond fallen arches. I went to school at the University of Wisconsin, where I got a master’s in information science. My likes include Thai food, women who can beat me in a duel, and pirates. My pet peeves are people who act without regard for anyone else, commercial television, and the color pink.”

I stared at him, starting to wonder which one of us was real, and which wasn’t. Could he be what he said he was? If so . . . hope sprang to life in me as I stared at what could well be my way out of this virtual world.

“You own this? All of this?” I asked, waving my hand around to encompass everything in the captain’s cabin. “You created this?”

“Well, I didn’t do it single-handedly. I programmed the first version of the game in an office in my garage, but later I had a partner, and now I have two teams of programmers—one that works on the Internet version, and the new crew working on the VR side. You met the art director, Holder McReady.”

“Holder is real, too? The guy with the monk delusions?”

“Yes. He is in charge of all the artwork you see around you. Everything from the clothing on down to the pattern of the rug. My partner was in charge of the VR technology, but he left me a few months ago to form his own company. Still,” Corbin said, looking around the cabin with satisfaction, “I’m happy with how it turned out. I think people are going to enjoy it, don’t you? We’ve worked hard to make it as realistic as possible.”

“Oh, you’ve done that all right,” I said, relief mingling with the irritation that he’d written a program that would trap unwary players. “If you don’t mind, though, I’d like to get the hell out of here.”

“Why? Aren’t you having fun?”

“No. I want out.”

He frowned. “I can’t believe anyone wouldn’t have a blast here, but if you aren’t enjoying it, why don’t leave?”

“I’m stuck, that’s why,” I said in a half snarl. “Your game is a trap! It won’t let go of me!”

“No, no, that’s impossible,” he said, setting down the knife to take another swig of rum. “I had the programmers write in all sorts of safeguards against the program locking. It’s impossible.”

“Look deep into my eyes,” I said through gritted teeth. “Do I look like I’m having so much fun I never want to leave the game?”

He took me at my word, setting down the flask before striding over to where I stood next to a tiny window. He took both my arms in his hands, leaning forward until our noses were almost touching. “You look . . .”

“What?” I asked on a breath, all the air suddenly having been stripped from my lungs. Standing so close to him was making me a little dizzy, the scent of leather and man teasing my nose in a way that had dark, secret parts of me coming to life and starting to take interest in the proceedings. “What do I look?”

“Sexy,” he answered, his voice a rumble deep in his chest, his fingers hard on my arms as he pulled me toward him.

My hands unfisted, but rather than pushing him away from me as I thought they would, they slid up the front of his leather jerkin in a caress that gave me as much pleasure as it gave him, if not more. Beneath the warm leather I could feel the contours of his chest, my fingers skimming lightly over the jerkin as if they were mapping out terrain.

“Really? I don’t think anyone has ever called me that,” I finally managed to say. Croak might be another description—my voice was suddenly very hoarse.

“Then you have not met the right man,” he answered, his breath fanning across my mouth as he spoke. “Because I think you have all the qualifications. Would you mind if I kissed you now?”

“Mind? Well . . .” I said slowly, pretending to think about it. My body knew better. It was all but throwing itself on him. I let my fingers wander up to his neck, tangling them in the short curls of his hair. “I have this policy against kissing murderers and kidnappers, and you’re both.”

“Says who?” he asked, his hands sliding up my arms to my shoulders, then down my ribcage. Even through the barrier of my clothing, little rivulets of molten pleasure followed his touch.

His mouth was hot. Hot and spicy and tasting of rum, his tongue flicking across my lips in a polite request for admission. I tried to tell my lips to stand firm, reminding them of my rules of sexual engagement (
caution
had hitherto been my byword), informing them that I wasn’t about to suck the tongue out of a man I’d just met a few days before, but my lips were traitors. They parted without the slightest display of modesty, allowing the kiss to deepen and change from an act that seemed pleasing to something much more profound.

I shivered a shiver of blatant excitement as his lips parted from mine, my thoughts so muddled I couldn’t seem to hold on to one for longer than a second or two. “Um? What were we talking—oh, the crew. They aren’t real people, are they? I mean, you know they’re not real. Before, when I thought you were one of them, that bothered me because from your point of view, that poor crew was real, but you’re not, and you know they’re not, and now that I know that you know they’re not, it’s all different.”

“Amy, I haven’t the slightest idea what you’re talking about.”

He didn’t want to discuss it. That was fine with me—I’d much rather pursue more entertaining avenues. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t despise you now, although I’m going to have to knock off a couple of points for the kidnapping.”

“It was the only way I thought you would listen to me,” he answered, his lips brushing against mine. The hands that had been counting my ribs slid around to meet on my belly, then started an upward climb. My breasts, not normally given to thinking for themselves, suddenly came to life and decided that more than anything in the world, they wanted out of the thin blouse and leather bodice, and into Corbin’s hands. “I knew you’d joined Bart’s crew, and with the bounty on my head, I half thought you might be after my blood.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, too distracted by the sudden throbbing in my breasts to do more than mentally flinch from his words about the bounty on his head. “I seem to be having some difficulty with my breasts.”

His brows pulled together as we both looked down to where my cleavage was front and center. His hands were just below them, poised to scale the linen-clad impudent mounds. “Difficulty? What sort of difficulty? They look perfectly fine to me. Positively tasty, in fact.”

“They’re unruly,” I admitted, then gasped when Corbin’s thumbs swept across my straining nipples. “Hoocheewawa! Don’t do that again, you’ll make them revolt or something!”

“No? They look like they need mouth-to- . . . er . . . breast resuscitation. Would it help if I did this?”

Before I could try to force air back into my lungs, Corbin’s head dipped to my cleavage, his tongue snaking out to caress the valley between my breasts.

My knees buckled.

“It’s not really helping, no,” I said, clutching his shoulders for support.

“Maybe I’m not resuscitating them well enough,” he murmured into my chest, tugging down the linen blouse until one (extremely happy) breast was exposed to his attention. “Maybe I should . . .”

A wave of undiluted pleasure rippled from my breast to all points on my body as his mouth closed over my aching nipple, setting my skin tingling, my bones melting, and my brain into shutdown mode. I couldn’t even form words; I just whimpered encouragement at him. Oh, the random thought popped into my head that I was not behaving in a discreet manner at all, that I had never been one for throwing myself into intimate acts with men I hardly knew, and that I really should be focused on getting out of the game rather than enjoying myself with the man who was currently making me mindless with the tongue swirlies that were laving my breast, but I pushed that thought down just as easily as I pushed the others.

Tara told me I needed to play more. Well, Corbin was here, I was here, and we were playing. End of story.

Only it wasn’t, of course. I knew that as Corbin raised his head, his eyes liquid silver with arousal. “I think it’s going to make it.”

“It might, but I may just die if you don’t do the other one.”

His lip, which I deemed from firsthand experience delectable, curved in a smile. “We wouldn’t want that, now, would we? Shall we continue this discussion somewhere more comfortable? Say . . . my bed over there?”

I looked from the dark cherry captain’s bed snuggled up against a wall in the cabin to Corbin. His words acted like a bucketful of seawater splashed in my face. “Whoa, now. You wouldn’t be hinting not so subtly that you’d like to have sex, would you?”

His eyes went even more molten. “You didn’t seem to me like the sort of woman who likes playing verbal games about natural desires, but yes, as a matter of fact, I would very much like to make love to you. I’m not ashamed to admit that I wanted you the minute I realized you weren’t a computer-generated player.”

“It was the fact that I don’t play—verbal games or anything else—that got me stuck here in the first place,” I said, tucking myself back into my blouse. “I like you, Corbin, I really do. I enjoyed kissing you, and while I admit that allowing you to . . . er . . . resuscitate my breast might be considered leading you on, sex, actual sex, is out of the question.” I paused for a moment, something he said striking a chord. “You wanted me the minute you knew I was real?”

“Yes.” His frown was back. He let go of me and crossed his arms over his chest.

I took a step closer to him. I couldn’t help myself, I seemed to be drawn to him by some strange, magnetic force.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

“When was that?”

“When you mentioned being willing to trade away your PDA. The computer characters lack contemporary references in their dialogue array. Only other players, real people, would know what a PDA was, let alone mention it. As soon as I heard you say it, I knew you were a real person.”

“Wow. I figured you, as the game master or whatever you call yourself, would be able to see that I was a real player.”

He shook his head. “The in-game admin panel was too buggy, so we removed it while it’s being recoded. The only way I can tell which players are real and which aren’t is to access the admin panel, and I can’t do that while I’m in the game.”

“Hmm. Back to the other thing . . . are you always instantly attracted to women?”

“No.” His frown deepened, the lovely melty look in his eyes turning cold.

“I see.” I didn’t really, but I wasn’t about to admit that he had me confused as well as bemused. “Always Be the One to Remain in Control”: that was my motto (I’m a firm believer in a motto for every situation), and it had served me well for many a year.

“Are you trying to say that you don’t feel an instant attraction?”

“No, of course not. I might have a physical response, but there’s much more I look for in a relationship than someone who chimes my bells,” I said, my eyebrows pulling a little frown of their own.

“As do I,” he answered, his hands on his hips now.

“Well, then, I guess we’re in agreement.” My eyes strayed to the bed as my brain decided to indulge in a little fantasizing about what it would be like to romp with him in it.

“If we were in agreement, you would be naked at this moment, and I would be resuscitating your other breast.”

Another shiver of excitement zipped through me at the image his words drew. I squelched it down, reminding myself that there was more at stake here than a fling with a handsome computer genius. “Look, Corbin, I appreciate the offer, and I’m sorry if I gave you the wrong idea about me, but I prefer some sort of emotional commitment before I jump into bed with someone. That said, I’d like to see you. In person, I mean. In real life. Maybe you could come over for dinner one night?”

His frown cleared as if by magic. “I would like that.”

I smiled, happy that I had taken charge of the situation and turned it around to one that was more reasonable. “Good. Now, if you’ll just tell me how to get out of this game, I will give my calendar a look-see, and we can pick a night.”

The look he gave me was an odd one. “Amy, all you have to do to log out of the game is to turn the glasses off. There’s a button near the hinge. Just press that, and the game will be saved, and you’ll be logged out.”