Level Up (7 page)

"Unless you've got some crazy art skills I don't know about, and a lot of time for rendering, the deadline's just too tight..."

"I can draw." Kyla, the blonde, smiled, but looked a little nervous. "I mean, sort of. I draw designs for my cosplay, and I do a lot of sketches. It's nothing professional, just fan art, but...""

"Oh, that's fantastic!" Rachel said, clapping her hands.

"You should see her drawings," Hailey added. "They are frickin' incredible."

"They're not bad," Kyla demurred.

"Don't listen to her," a girl with short hair and a sharp smile said. He thought her name was Mallory, but with the sheer number of women he'd met at once, he wasn't quite sure. "They're fucking incredible."

"Can you email some to me tonight?" Tessa said. "We have to move it on this if we're going to make deadline."

Kyla nodded. "Okay, sure."

Adam nodded, jotting it down in his notebook. "All right. I'm going to come up with a project plan on this, and get familiar with this show," he said. "Our first step is..."

"Hello, Rachel," a new voice interrupted, pitching a little loud to be heard over the crowd.

Adam noticed immediately that Rachel tensed at the voice and that the other girls were glaring. Adam looked up to see a thin guy with stringy unkempt hair glaring at them. He was wearing a Seahawks shirt, which wasn't that unusual--but he was wearing what looked like a sports coat or something over it. Very
Miami Vice
.

Combined with the smarmy grin and the way he was leering at Rachel, Adam was pretty sure whoever the guy was, he was a douchebag.

"Harold," Rachel said, her voice arctic.

"Girls' night out, huh?" Somehow, his voice managed to sound both whiny
and
 patronizing. "How's that little used bookstore of yours doing? Heard you might be having some financial trouble."

Kyla frowned at him, while the others stared daggers.

"What brings you downtown, Harold?" Mallory asked, through gritted teeth. "I thought that you didn't like leaving your gated community."

"Oh, I like to head downtown now and then," he said, his eyes never leaving Rachel's annoyed expression. "Unlike others I know, I don't mind slumming it from time to time."

Adam could sense the tension jump up at that. The guy was an obvious asshole, but he couldn't quite tell what the beef was between him and Rachel and the others. Obviously that line stung, though, since Rachel went a little paler.

He rested his hand on the back of the seat, just behind Rachel's head. "Let me know if you ever want me to take you someplace a little more upscale, Rache."

"Sorry. I don't slum. Ever," Rachel said.

"Beat it," Hailey said in a low, dangerous voice, "before I beat
you
."

He just laughed. "You say that now, but what happens when that bookstore full of bodice rippers goes belly up? Bet you'll remember my number then, huh?"

If Hailey didn't kick the guy's ass, Adam thought, he'd be happy to step in. ""Maybe you should just leave," Adam said sharply.

Harold turned his attention to Adam, surprised. "I didn't know they'd gotten a guy in their crew," he said. "Or maybe I didn't realize you were a guy at all."

Adam started to stand up, but Tessa held his arm.

"What are you, anyway? Just one of the girls?"

Before Adam could leap over the table and give this guy the beat down he deserved, Tessa shocked him by laughing.

"Oh, sure," she purred. "He's just one of the girls.""

And with that, she turned, put her hand at the nape of his neck, and pulled him forward, planting a kiss on his lips.

Holy crap, I'm kissing Tessa!

Adam was stunned into stillness for a second. His mind went blank. Then, without thinking, he reacted, leaning in a little, kissing a bit more than he intended. Her lips were soft, and he felt surrounded by almond and roses and the taste of her.

Which may have explained why he traced her lips with his tongue, just for a split second. Just to confirm. And when she parted her lips ever so slightly and tasted him...

Oh my God
. Then his body went into launch sequence and he didn't think at all.

Without warning, she pulled away just as quickly. His head was still reeling.

Tessa turned to Harold, cheeks flushed, eyes bright and mischievous. The guy looked irritated.

"Look, mister, why don't you run along home," she said, her tone dismissive. "We're busy."

He glared at her. "I could do a lot better than some skanks like you."

"I can only imagine what sort of date you've got waiting for you," Tessa drawled. "Who's the lucky gal tonight? Left hand, or right?"

Adam goggled. Was this really Tessa?
His
Tessa?

Now Harold flushed, anger in his eyes. "Who the fuck are you?"

"I'm Tessa," she said. "I'm a friend of these girls. And I could ask who the fuck
you
are, coming over here, trying to be intimidating, and throwing your pitiful masculinity around like it's something to be either proud or afraid of, which is a joke. Since you obviously can''t threaten anybody physically--I'm fairly certain Hailey here could pound you into a crimson stain on the pavement in a hot minute--you're trying to overcompensate by making veiled sexual and financial threats, acting like homosexuality is somehow an insult, and basically being an asshole."

Harold was staring at her. So were the girls. Hell, so was
he
.

"I
could
 ask who the fuck you are," she repeated, with a smile as sharp as a razor, "but I've known a million guys just like you, and frankly, I just don't care."

"You couldn't even handle a man like me," he spat out.

"Please. The only sizeable thing on you is your inferiority complex," she shot back. "So why don't you use that needle dick of yours as a compass, and find the door?"

He took an angry step forward, looking ready to lunge. Adam stood up, hands fisted, but Tessa moved faster.

"You want to try something?" she said, standing next to him, chin up.

To his obvious surprise, the other girls stood up, as well.

A waiter quickly rushed to the table, eyes stern. "Is there a problem here?"

Harold glared at all of them, including the waiter. "Fuck you," he said to all of them, then turned on his heel and left.

The women watched him go.

"That was sexy as hell," Adam said, before he could think. "The speech, I mean. Well, the other thing, too, but I meant, erm..."

Tessa blushed, shaking a little as she sat down. "I
hate
guys like that."

"I hate that particular guy," Rachel said, leaning over and giving her a hug. "You were brilliant."

"Seriously," Hailey said, high-fiving her. "I kind of love you right now."

"I just wish Cress was here to see it," Kyla said, beaming.

"Don't worry," Hailey said. "I got the whole thing on my iPhone. I'll have it uploaded to YouTube in...ah, there we go."

The girls laughed. Adam still stared at Tessa, who seemed to be shaking.

"You okay?" he murmured, under the cover of the girls' laughter.

"Adrenaline rush," she said. "I haven't been that mad in a long, long time."

She leaned against him for a second and he reflexively put his arm around her shoulders. "Well, thanks for defending my honor," he said. "Not that there's anything wrong with being gay, obviously. But I'm not, actually..."

"Oh, I know," Tessa said, then blushed.

His body tensed. Was it that obvious? His body was still fairly stirred up.

"I mean, I knew
before
," she clarified, blushing harder.

"How long have you two been a couple?" Mallory asked.

Adam blinked, quickly releasing Tessa. "What? No, we're not..."

"Oh, no! No. Sorry for the misunderstanding," Tessa said, looking a little aghast. "We're not a couple. We just work together."

"You must have some interesting company off-sites," Hailey said, eyebrows raised.

Kyla started laughing again, and Rachel chuckled.

"No, really," Tessa said, a little desperately. "He's totally single. He's looking to date, actually."

Adam buried his head in his hands. "Not helping," he muttered, the words muffled by his palms.

Her voice went up an octave. "And...um, I can tell you he's a great kisser!" she blurted out.

Now the girls were laughing hysterically.

"Sorry," Tessa whispered to him. He felt her breath on his ear, his neck, and his body tightened--not out of embarrassment this time. He cleared his throat, then straightened.

"Right. The
game
," he said, turning back to the notebook and ignoring the burgeoning hard on that was threatening and trying to at least salvage something out of this situation.

"Tessa, I just don't see how this can work out," Adam said, frowning.

Tessa crossed her arms. They'd been trying to hash out the details of the game for the past hour, since they got back from dinner with the girls. They sat at the large dining room table, which was covered with a blizzard of paper...sketches, notes, and crumpled missteps. Both of their laptops were out and up. They had a few sketches from Kyla's DeviantArt profile up, as well as Tessa's own foundation for a game----the engine she'd been working on for about two years.

"It can," she said, tapping a few keys.

"Not with this level of detail and this deadline," he said, leaning forward, his expression firm. "Trust me. This is my job. I match work to progress. There's no way you can do a fully realized seven level game with an additional boss level, with full three-dimensional figures, in the next two weeks, with just you and me."

She grumped. "Watch me," she said, leaning forward herself, feeling pugnacious.

He stood, and so did she. They were practically nose-to-nose.

Which was probably what reminded her of that damned kiss. Why, oh why, had she done that?

She refused to back down--this game was too important. More to the point, proving that she was more than ready to take on that engineering slot was important.

Unfortunately, her hormones seemed to have missed the memo, as they were now cheering madly for her to do a repeat of the dinner kiss. Her heart started pounding in her chest, and unfortunately, it had little to do with anger.

He sighed. "We're going to have to compromise here a bit," he said, clicking open a new tab on his browser. "Instead of the full drawings, we'll go with the
 
chibi
...those small, cute sketches."

She frowned, initially unwilling to buckle--but the combination of feeling light-headed with hormones, as well as the reluctant admittance that yes, this was going to be an absolutely metric ton of work, had her grumbling her assent. "They're recognizable. And the audience would love them," she agreed.

"Let's just make it one big level," he said. "Maybe a few puzzles."

"That's lame," she shot back. "I'll back it down to four levels."

His blue eyes shone. "How about three levels and the boss level?"

She sighed. It wasn't the grand plan she had in mind, but he was right: she had to be at least a bit more realistic. Better to knock it out of the park on three levels and a boss than have a grand plan and screw the pooch. The girls needed this. Hell,
she
needed this. "Deal," she said, holding out a hand.

He took it, shaking it...and then holding it for just a second too long.

"The fire's really warm tonight," she murmured, pulling away. It had been chilly out, and since they were going to be talking for a while, he'd loaded the fireplace up. Now, the room was as toasty as southern California.

"Too hot for you?" he asked.

You certainly are.

She blinked in surprise. "No, no," she said quickly. "It's nice."

"I may have overdone it," he said. Then she watched as he peeled off his sweatshirt, leaving him only in a plain grey raglan with navy sleeves. The movement mussed his hair and the thin fabric pulled taut over his shoulders. It had a small hole by the neck, signs of a clearly well-loved, over-worn shirt, which should've made him look ratty. Instead, it just made him look devilishly, casually male.

She cleared her throat. "That's good progress. Now about those levels..."

"You're going to have to come up with that," he said. "I've never even seen this show. I still think a first-person shooter would be better. What sort of puzzles are you thinking of doing, anyway? Match three? Hidden object?"

She frowned. "There's actually a really funny episode where they're trapped in this tomb...very
 
Indiana Jones
, with a twist. You'd probably like it, actually," she said.

He shrugged.

"No, seriously. If you want to get a feel for the show, you should watch it."

Now he grimaced. "I don't know. It sounds like a chick..." He stopped abruptly.

"A
 
chick 
show, huh?" she said, raising an eyebrow.

"You know what I meant," he muttered. "What the hell am I going to do, watch a show with 'hot guys' all being angsty?"

"Just watch it," she said.

"What, right now?"

Determined, and equal parts irritated and amused by his reaction, she nudged him to the couch. "It'll take, what, forty minutes? Don't be a baby."

She turned on the TV, then sat on the end of the couch, while he took up the middle, stretching out his legs on the coffee table and sighing heavily. "The things I do for you," he said, winking.

As the opening credits started, she felt the familiar happiness.
 
Mystics
 
was one of her favorite shows. This episode in particular was funny, with plenty of repartee, humor, and some great action. Still, she felt like she had in high school, when she desperately wanted one of her acquaintances to get as excited about something as she was.