Page 41 of Love's a Glitch
“Good call. That’s quite the decanter set.”
The glasses were etched with the continents, same as the bourbon-filled globe. “My parents gifted it to me for my twenty-first birthday, and I refilled it with the good stuff my dad keeps around. I think the set was supposed to satisfy my traveling obsession, not escalate it, but here we are anyway. Since it’s one of the first gifts where they took into account what I would want instead of what they wanted me to have, it’s my favorite.”
“Guess I can’t mock it then. Not that I have the clearance, because it’s way classier than my unicorn and hot pink obsession. As for drinking the bourbon, I’m more about the sugar buzz when I solve computer issues. Candy, ice cream, or soda. Sometimes all three.”
“And if I told you that I make an amazing hot fudge bourbon milkshake?”
“I’d ask why you’re still standing here. Haven’t you heard? Men belong in the kitchen.” She snorted at her own joke, which made me laugh at it, and then I left her to it.
The buzz of the blender helped drown out my whirring thoughts, equal parts my unretrievable photos and my desire for Ellie. After piling on the whipped cream and fudge, I returned to my bedroom with the boozy milkshake.
Ellie’s brown eyes went wide, like a kid at a carnival being handed a giant cotton candy. She took a sip, and I got lost in the swipe of her tongue across her lip. Before she’d shown up at the front door, all I could think about was the photos I might never get back.
Now I was thinking about other regrets, and how this time with Ellie might be something I’d never get back, either. I knelt next to her and studied her profile instead of the screen. “How’s it going? Any luck?”
She interlaced her fingers, pushed them out to crack her knuckles, and then returned to typing and clicking. “Almost done, actually. I try not to make promises, because technology can sometimes be a hateful bitch—and as the poster child of a phone update gone wrong, I can fully attest to that. But I’m fairly certain this is just a matter of updating drivers.”
“Sure,” I said, because even that was beyond the extent of my knowledge. With the alcohol warming my veins, and my worries about the photos fading to the background, Ellie rushed up to flood my thoughts.
The tip of her tongue came out, similar to when she’d been concentrating on the ropes course. She talked to the computer, too, alternately scolding it and praising it. I teased her and she flashed me a smile that shot me right through the heart. Over the past decade, I’d seen incredible places and natural wonders that’d robbed me of breath with their beauty, and Ellie’s smile struck me just as powerfully, every damn time.
The way her hand curled around the mouse also had me longing to have those fingers gripping me with the same intensity.
Her golden-brown hair hung in loose waves over her shoulders, brushing the tops of her breasts, taunting and tempting me. Keeping my touch in the respectful range, I drifted my fingertips through the silky strands, pausing to rub the ends between my index finger and thumb. “Thanks for this—for dropping everything to help me with my files.”
“No problem.”
“Did I interrupt anything? Were you out on one of your dates with your reconditioned exes?”
She cocked her head as her gaze moved to me. “Why? Did you want to hear all about it?”
“Not particularly.” I wound a lock of her hair around my finger, and seconds stretched out and became longer as I debated how to respond.
A chime from the laptop stole her attention away from me. Without taking her eyes off the screen or her fingers off the keyboard, she leaned over, wrapped her mouth around her straw, and sucked at her milkshake.
The move sent a jolt straight to my dick, leaving my pants tighter than they were a moment ago. Having her here in my room, mere feet from my bed, and even less distance than that from me, was torture.
Then, like magic, my photos flashed across the screen, one after another, snapshots of my time in Zhangjiajie and the Tianzi Mountain Nature Reserve. The spires of the mountains shot up through thick cloud cover. A photo of the quartz-sandstone pillar that’d been part of the movie Avatar came up, followed by my favorite shots of the terraced, unconventional farms that led up to chasms and protruding sheer cliffs.
I sat up on my knees to take a closer look. “Holy shit, you did it.”
“Don’t sound so surprised,” she said with a laugh and a light shoulder shove.
“I had faith that if anyone could fix it, it’d be you, but I worried I’d already screwed it up beyond repair.” I pulled her into a side hug, jostling her more than completing some smooth move. “You’re amazing, you know that?”
She beamed at me, and I got swept away by her beauty and sunny demeanor all over again. “Thank you. Speaking of amazing”—she lifted her milkshake and took another drink—“this is delicious.” She tipped the straw my way. “You should have some.”
I bent my head right as she lifted the glass higher and ended up with whipped cream coating my nose and upper lip.
“Oops.” Ellie giggled, leading me to believe she wasn’t very sorry, and then set aside the shake and swiped at the mess it’d left on my face. She sucked the whipped cream off her thumb, and if this kept up any longer, I’d have the imprint of my zipper on my cock for the rest of the night. “You’ve got some fudge on your upper lip, too. Here…”
She pressed the thumb that’d just been in her mouth to my upper lip and dragged it to the right corner. She lifted the fudge-covered pad, and I caught her wrist, midair. I guided her finger into my mouth and this time, I did the sucking.
Her lips parted, and her eyes locked onto mine. The intensity inside them caused my heart to lurch, and I suddenly understood the term “locked and loaded.” We were on a precipice, a trigger-pull away from an explosion. One bound to get the both of us in trouble.
I should care more.
I didn’t.
