His eyes fall to my lips, and as if pulled by a magnet, he slowly leans toward me.
Holy Kobe Cow.
Is Vlad about to kiss me?
Chapter Eleven
My heart drums a battle hymn in my chest, and my skin feels like it’s burning all over. All I can see are his lips, so beautifully shaped, so soft-looking. All I can think is leaning forward and closing that small remaining distance so that—
The car rips forward, jerking us both out of the moment.
“Buckle up,” Vlad says, his voice hoarse as he scoots a few inches away.
Moving like a zombie, I buckle up while he barks something at Ivan in Russian.
The car slows down.
Vlad raises the partition and turns to face me. “So, you wanted to talk.”
I take in a deep breath and gather my courage. “As I said earlier, I’m doing the testing, and you can’t stop me.”
The amusement that touched his eyes the last time I made this ultimatum is there again. “Didn’t you have someone else lined up for this testing originally? Sandra mentioned something along those lines.”
I shake my head. “She flaked.” There’s no way I’m going into the whole succubus-turned-nun debacle with him.
He sighs. “Fine then. Test it yourself if it means so much to you.”
I peer at him to make sure he’s not kidding. “That’s it? You’re just okay with it?”
He folds his arms across his broad chest. “You’ll have to convince me you can do it safely, of course.”
My cheeks burn. “I can be safe. That squirrel thing was an honest mistake. Going forward, I’ll do more due diligence and learn about the… err… hardware before using it. My plan is to break it all up into male and female batches, and obviously, I’ll make sure to test only the female toys from now on.”
He cocks his head. “Who will be testing the male batch? Or did he flake too?”
“It was the female’s boyfriend, so yeah, I lost him when I lost her. My new plan is to either create an ad on Craigslist or a Tinder—”
“Absolutely not.” The thunderous expression on his face must be what gave someone the idea of calling this man the Impaler.
My heart skips a beat, but at the same time, I feel my hackles rising. “No?”
The car halts.
“We’re here,” Vlad says through his teeth. “Do you want to wait for me in the car, or would you like to see the offices of a video game company?”
“The latter,” I say, mostly to show I wasn’t cowed.
In sullen silence, he holds the limo door for me, then leads me into a high-rise building, past security (where I learn he’s a consultant for the video game company we’re about to visit), and into the elevator.
“Look.” His tone turns conciliatory as the elevator starts moving. “Getting a random guy off the street is extremely dangerous. I don’t want you washing up in the New York Harbor because of this job.”
He might have a point.
Before I can reply, the doors slide open and he gestures for me to come out.
“To be continued,” I say and exit.
He gets us in with his ID, and I stare at the décor around us with unabashed curiosity.
The plaque on the wall is in a fun font reminiscent of comic books. It proudly states: 1000 Devils.
That sounds vaguely familiar. I think I’ve played a game they made, maybe even two.
In contrast to the rather sinister company name, there are bright colors all over, and the distant laughter makes it feel like a children’s playground.
This is a corporation? It almost seems like someone tried to design the exact opposite of the oppressively boring grays of our own silent-as-a-tomb office.
“First things first.” Vlad leads me into a walk-in closet to the side. “Gear up.”
Huh?
There are no clothes here, just Nerf guns.
Lots of Nerf guns.
Alrighty then. War it is.
Vlad grabs two rifle-shaped ones, then opens his trench coat and stuffs a handgun-shaped toy into the belt of his pants.
Lucky gun.
Shrugging, I pick out a two-handed white-and-orange blaster that reminds me of the Tommy Gun they show in old gangster movies.
“Stay back to back with me,” Vlad says, no hint of a smile on his face.
I do as he says, though when our backs touch, my hormones go haywire.
I bet there’s a drooling grin on my face.
We walk like that onto the main floor, like a pair of cops storming a mobster hideout.
Suddenly, an orange projectile smashes into my fake eyebrow.
“Hey!” I rub the spot before I recall that I have to be careful not to smear the drawing. “Not the face.”
“Sorry,” someone says.
I spot the assailant—a forty-something redheaded dude with a beer belly—and squeeze the trigger to unleash a cloud of darts into his chest.
Someone leaps out of the corner.
Vlad lunges in front of me and takes the next dart in the chest.
This time, the shooter is a lady a little older than Sandra, but I don’t let that stop me from unloading the rest of my darts into her torso.
Two more attackers join the fray.
Vlad is out of darts, and so am I.
Dropping his weapons, Vlad ushers me against the wall, so that the swarm of projectiles that are meant for me smash into his back.
Wow.
He’s right up against me, and it’s intoxicating. I can smell the sensual notes of bergamot and citrus and feel the warmth coming off his big body.
He looks down, and our eyes meet. His pupils are dilated, his high cheekbones edged with a hint of a flush. Slowly, he bends his head and—
“Leave my brother alone,” a voice booms over the sounds of the Nerf guns firing. “He’s here to help.”
Chapter Twelve
Brother?
My hormone-addled brain recalls a mention of a sibling who inspired Vlad to go into computer science.
Vlad steps away from me, rounding on the newcomer with a string of Russian.
Now that there are no delectable muscles blocking my view, I scan the speaker.
Yep. Has to be a brother. They look so alike they could pass for the same person—except the older sibling is a scruffy, laidback-looking version of the two.
“This is Fanny,” Vlad says, switching back to English. “We work together at Binary Birch.”
Work together—that’s a nice euphemism. He could’ve said “works under me.” No, wait, that would make me sound like a hooker.
The brother extends his hand. “Alex.”
No Mr. Chortsky here, interesting. Oh, and I get the 1000 Devils reference now—Alex owns his last name, it seems.
“Nice to meet you,” I say as I give his hand a professional shake.
“Step into the war room,” Alex says and leads me and Vlad into a large conference room with a view of Central Park.
A bunch of people are already here, and unlike the exuberant gun-toting colleagues we left outside, they look subdued, even haggard.
“We have a problem with Squirrel Simulator,” Alex says, but he makes it sound like there’s a double “w” where the double “r” should be in Squirrel, and a “w” instead of “r” at the end of simulator.