“I’m not sure they’ll make an offer,” she answered finally. “But that’s why I’m here.”
“Tell me about it,” he said, looking actually interested.
Lark always hated this part. Sketching ideas, building prototypes, and watching people’s kids interact with them was so much fun she never felt time passing. Pitching her creations to people who understood investment, marketing, and sales—and Trip looked like he came from that world—always made her feel dry mouthed. Like a kid who really didn’t know how the world worked.
On the other hand, this was perfect preparation for tomorrow.
“It makes science fun for middle schoolers,” she said after taking a deep breath. “I designed it specifically for girls, because I always wanted to be a scientist, but I struggled with math and science in school.”
“So you created the tools?”
“I worked with some grad-student friends at UCLA who are studying how girls learn and came up with a board game that’s also a chemistry set.”
“Interesting concept.”
He was doing a perfect job of listening even if his main goal was to get into her pants—the thought of which didn’t sound nearly as bad to her as it should.
“There are very basic, nontoxic agents that combine in different ways to create different outcomes. The game itself is kind of like Life, where you’re navigating a career, only here you’re trying to become a successful scientist. At key points you win things you get to pour into your beaker. And when you complete the game, you get the activating ingredient that does something simple but cool, like making the solution change color, or give off a puff of smoke, or suddenly crystallize.”
She liked the way Trip waited until he was sure she was done before he spoke. And when he did say something, it was another question, not a piece of advice or an excuse to turn the conversation back to himself.
“Can you play it more than once? Seems like it might be one and done.”
One and done. Lark felt a pleasant shiver with the thought.
“There are different possible outcomes each time, and enough supplies for four players to play six times before you have to order a replacement pack or an upgrade. Most board games are only played several times after they’re purchased anyway, so some parents may feel satisfied even if their kids only play once or twice.”
“What do you call it?”
“Activate! There’s probably a better name. I kept playing with the word solution, but I couldn’t figure it out.”
“Does it work?”
“Every time.”
He tipped his beer bottle back and swallowed, then picked at the label while nodding thoughtfully. “I don’t really know the market, but it sounds like a terrific idea. And from the sound of your voice, I sense you might have a hard time letting it go.”
As if she had the financial freedom to turn down a reasonable offer. Now she was getting nervous about pitching, and she really didn’t want to think about that right now.
“What do you do?” she asked.
Finally, he locked eyes with her. His brown irises were warm. “I could tell you, but I think we’d both be bored. And bored is the last thing I’m feeling right now.” He paused. Smiled. “How about I tell you in the morning?”
Lark woke panicked, her mouth dry and her head faintly throbbing: Was it her room or his? How much time did she have before her meeting?
A glance at her phone reassured her she had plenty of time, and a look around told her they were in her room. Her carry-on, never unpacked, lay neatly across the luggage caddy.
And Trip, whose last name she still hadn’t learned, lay next to her, his breathing light and even. His clothes were draped over the chair on his side of the bed.
She had friends who would have felt a stab of shame: they may have proudly worn pink Pussyhats but still had internalized the patriarchal preaching that girls didn’t do one-night stands. Lark was different. Her mom, a freethinker who’d written a book in the 1980s about feminist theory—a mostly forgotten tract for an academic press, but still a book—had told her since age sixteen that there was nothing wrong with having sexual desires and acting on them, as long as it was safely done. Which it had been. Twice.
What she’d expected to feel was a sense of having completed a dare in service of a story she might tell her roommate, Callie. She’d fucked a handsome salt-and-pepper guy in a hotel in Buffalo, of all places, and it was awesome. Anonymous hotel-room sex and the guy had actually been a considerate—no, incredible—lover.
What she was actually feeling was something different. Kind of—god, don’t think it—a glow. A tingly combination of satisfaction and the lust for more.
She rolled onto her side so she could study him more closely.
He opened one eye. “Morning, Lark,” he murmured, shifting toward her.
And not that a guy deserved credit for remembering her name, but at least he wasn’t afraid to use it.
In the gray light seeping around the edges of the drapes, he looked a couple of years older than he had last night, and she could see there was a lot more salt in his stubble than there was in the hair on his head. His hair was flat on one side and wild on the other. But those eyes, crinkled around the edges.
That smile.
He threw back the covers and, with his fingers, traced the tattoos visible just over her left hip, then nudged her onto her stomach so he could see the full-color scene on her back. The whole thing—Mauna Kea and the rolling waves of the Big Island, done by an artist who specialized in the Japanese style—had cost three years and thousands of dollars but had been worth every sting and every cent. Trip, as far as she could tell, was uninked.
“I didn’t get a good look at this last night,” he murmured. “It’s amazing.”
“My dad grew up in Compton, and my mom grew up in Hilo,” she told him, rolling back on her side. “I was born in Honolulu, but we moved to LA when I was little. A piece of my heart will always be in Hawaii, but I’m a California girl.”
He grinned. “You’re not like any California girl I’ve ever met.”
She didn’t even answer, just worked herself toward him, felt his insistent stiffening, and plucked another condom from the nightstand before climbing on top. Lark was not usually one for morning sex, for kisses laced with morning breath and for sheets smelling of sweat and alcohol. And they didn’t kiss. Where last night’s sex had been hot and frantic, despite his consideration, this morning they started slow, continued slow, and kept it going until she thought she was going to lose her mind.
If she was being honest, the thing that put her over the edge was the eye contact. Those penetrating brown eyes locked on hers and never looked away, never gave her a moment to suspect he was thinking about another girl or the meetings he had to have scheduled this morning. His eyes, his smile, and the achingly slow crescendo as they moved in unison.
He finished first but she was close, riding him, grinding against him, gripping his arms tighter and tighter until she finally came, surprising them both with a cry of relief and delight that quickly became happy laughter as she collapsed against his chest.
“Morning, Trip,” she whispered.
They ordered room-service breakfast and Trip signed it to his room, explaining to the bellhop that yes, he knew which room he was in at the moment. Wearing robes, they set the tray between them, fluffed up the pillows, and reclined while they worked their way through coffee and orange juice, toast, and mixed fruit, with a side of eggs and bacon for Trip. The toast was cold and the fruit was hard and flavorless, but Lark wolfed it down, hungrier than she’d been in months.