2. Logan
2
logan
She doesn’t know who I am…
I know I should be worried about ten other things. Like actually rebooking my flight so I can get back to Nashville after the hellish week I just spent at pointless parties, in board meetings, and talking with developers. Or alerting my assistant that my flight is delayed so she can move meetings around.
But no, all my brain can focus on is the brunette sitting next to me at the bar who doesn’t know me from Adam.
It’s been four years since I could just be Logan, a man in a bar wanting to strike up a conversation with a beautiful woman. Four years since I started to lose my cloak of anonymity. These days it seems wherever I go it’s people wanting to shake my hand for hopes of a possible business connection or women who checked out a popular magazine’s most eligible bachelors issue and saw my face.
But not Maeve. She didn’t have a clue who I was the entire time we spoke at the bar. I was already drawn in by her beauty. Her poise and directness intrigued me.
Then she said she didn’t know who I was, and somehow that passed any other test there could be.
Because now, tonight, whatever this night turns into, I can just be Logan. Not Logan Matthews, video game developer of SpaceCraft, the hottest game to come out in decades. Not Logan Matthews who went from eating ramen to having ten figures in his bank account seemingly overnight. Not the man who was in a sexiest man alive magazine issue this past year.
No, tonight I’m just a man at a bar talking to a beautiful woman.
A woman who looks like she wants to be anywhere but here.
“Relax,” I say, trying to calm her nerves as she checks the hotel check-in counter for the thirtieth time. “They said they’d call us when our rooms are ready.”
She turns back to me, but her shoulders are still tense. “I thought you said we were going to somewhere calm. This is not calm.”
She’s right. I did promise that.
“Sorry,” I say as I look back at the bar bustling with customers. “Maybe we weren’t as smart or ahead of the game as I thought.”
My attempt to lighten the situation doesn’t work. She turns back to look at the check-in counter, as if anything changed in ten seconds.
“I’m going out on a limb to say that you’re not good at being patient or not being able to control situations.”
Her eyebrow is raised as she turns back toward me. “Am I that transparent?”
I don’t know if she’s any more relaxed, but at least she’s distracted from the growing bustle of angry travelers. “Yes. But also, my best mate Kat is like that. I think there’s a picture of her in the dictionary next to ‘control freak.’”
“Sounds like my kind of woman,” Maeve says as she sips on her martini. “My siblings call me ‘Mama Maeve’ because of my need to not only plan everything, but also to try and fix their problems.”
“Oh, you really need to meet Kat,” I say with a laugh. “I swear she derives far too much pleasure from controlling my life.”
“Well, I don’t know about pleasure. I think the only pleasure I’d get is that of relief if my siblings figured out, say, the holiday schedule without me.”
I quirk a brow. “Really? You’d be fine giving up control and letting others figure it out for themselves? No one knows who’s bringing the Christmas crackers…the Secret Santa wasn’t perfectly arranged so three people got themselves and never said anything…Or! Maybe they didn’t plan an itinerary. Or worse…they would say things like ‘come over whenever.’ Put that together with Grandma putting too much booze in the Christmas pudding and you have a day of disaster.”
She starts to speak, but stops herself as she visibly shudders. “No. You’re right. It would give me hives.”
I pick up my drink and tip it to her. “That’s what I thought.”
We share a smile and take sips of our drinks when her mobile vibrates on the bar.
“The hotel?” I ask as she looks at it then shakes her head.
And I let out a breath of relief. If it’s the hotel she’s gone. And I’m not ready for this night to be over yet.
“No. My sister,” she says, starting to type something back. “With the delay, I needed to mobilize the team to watch my son for the night and get him on the school bus tomorrow morning.”
“You have a son?”
“Yes. In first grade.”
I start to ask her if he’s a video game fan, but I don’t. I want to remain invisible as long as I can. “Is everything straightened out?”
She nods and puts her phone down. “Yes. My sister is going to spend the night at my house. Just so his routine can be somewhat normal in the morning.”
“Does your son also like things nice and organized?”
She shrugs. “I mean, he’s six. He understands the concepts of bedtime, school time, play time, and screen time. And he’s pretty good about staying on it when he’s with me. But I think that’s also because he knows when he’s with his dad that it’s a free-for-all. I swear, when he’s with him, it’s just a video game binge session.”
I fight the smile that’s threatening to pop. I wonder if he’s a SpaceCraft fan. He’s the perfect age range for it.
“Mom is the strict parent?”
I meant the question to be so we didn’t accidentally fall down talk of video games where I’d say something revealing, but the sigh she releases signals that I hit a nerve.
“My ex-husband is many things. Strict is not one of them.”
The way she clips the end of that sentence, I can tell she’s done with this line of questioning. Which is fine by me. I have a feeling if I hear any more about her ex I’ll want to do something like track him down, hack into his computers, and make his digital life very uncomfortable.
You don’t become a video game developer and not learn some hacking skills along the way.
Plus, the silence in conversation lets me take her in. Not that I haven’t done it a dozen times tonight, but every time I look at her, I swear she gets more lovely.
Her slender face has sharp features, but somehow she’s still soft despite the edges. Her hardness is only doubled down with her brown hair being slicked back into a tight bun. Her blue eyes are a sapphire that radiate against her ivory complexion.
The woman screams in control and in charge, both in conversation and appearance.
And as a man who thrives on a challenge, it only makes me want to crack that exterior even more. Call me crazy, but I’d wager my first-edition Pac-Man arcade game that somewhere in there is a softness she doesn’t let out often.
Because the conversation has paused, Maeve takes the opportunity to look back to the lobby desk. The line might be longer than it was before.
“Can I ask you a question, Love?”
She turns to me, a little bit of fire in her eye. “Can we be done with the ‘Love’ stuff? I’m not a nicknames kinda gal.”
Now I’m all for consent. No means no, and the women always call the shots. But pushing her buttons a little is getting a bit of a rise in me. Just that one little word, which until tonight was as generic a word as anything, is making this pretty terrible travel day a most enjoyable one.
“Would it feel better if you had a nickname to call me?” I ask. “I feel it’s only fair, since I have a habit of calling you that.”
I see the wheels start to turn in that beautiful head of hers. She bites her lip slightly, clearly thinking. Is she doing that on purpose? Can she tell that with that little action my pants are tightening in a way that is not conducive to sitting on a bar stool in a suit? I try to subtly adjust, but to no avail.
“I’ll admit, I did call you James Bond in my head when we first met.”
“I like that,” I say, sitting up a little taller at the mention of one of my favorite action heroes of all time. “The martini feels even more fitting.”
She nods, but the glint in her eye tells me she’s not done.
“You are. But I don’t know… I don’t know if James Bond is fitting.”
“What do you mean?” I gesture to the custom suit I’m wearing. “This is one step away from a tuxedo. I have the accent. Not to brag, but I’m no stranger to a gym. And I have a definitive order of who was the best actor to ever play Bond. I feel I’ve earned the name.”
She shrugs coyly. “I don’t know. If you’re not going to use the name I’d like, which is Maeve, because that’s my name, I shouldn’t use the one you want either.”
I know she’s about to fry me, but seeing the sparkle in her eye, I’m ready to get burned.
“What are you thinking?”
“I think asshole has quite the ring to it.”
I throw my hand over my heart and let out a dramatic gasp. “You wouldn’t. That’s just cruel.”
She gives me a wicked smile before signaling to the bartender for another martini. “That’s what you get.”
Any other man would be insulted. And it might say something about me that I’m not. But more than anything right now, I not only want to crack that shield she has firmly in place, but I want to hear her scream my name while I do it.
Hell, she can scream asshole for all I care, as long as I’m feeling her against me.
“Okay, if that’s how it’s going to be, how about we make a little wager?”
She slowly turns her head toward me, that sparkle still in her eye. Is she competitive? Oh that could be fun…
“What kind of wager?”
I signal to the front desk. “If your room is ready first, I’ll quit calling you Love and you can forever call me an asshole. But if my room is ready first, it’s Love and Bond.”
She thinks about it for just a second before extending her hand. “Bet.”
I return the gesture, and it’s probably the alcohol talking, but I swear a dash of heat just crossed between us.
Maeve looks back to the lobby, which is now packed to the gills with people trying to get rooms, before looking back to me. “So what do we do until then?”
The bartender sets two martinis down in front of us. “We drink.”
“What do you think about them?”
I point to a couple sitting across the bar from us who are our next contestants in the game we’ve dubbed, “Hooker, Homewrecker, or Housewife.”
We tried to be politically correct first, but Sex Worker, Mistress, or Wife didn’t have the same ring.
And we’re quite drunk.
So far we’ve decided that we’ve spotted one woman working hard for her money, two housewives who look like they’d rather be anywhere but in a hotel bar, and three couples likely having an affair.
I know I am one, but men are truly horrible beings.
“Oh for sure home wrecker,” Maeve says, tilting her head to the side for better examination. “He didn’t even bother taking off his wedding ring. And no way she bought that dress herself.”
I look again, and damn if she isn’t right. “Good eye.”
She tips her drink to me, and she must be getting drunk, because she didn’t chastise me or call me an ass for using the nickname. “I’m undefeated in this game. I can spot a cheating man a mile away.”
“Is that what happened with your ex?”
I probably shouldn’t have asked it, but I’m dying to know what kind of man would let a woman like this go. Much to my surprise, she shakes her head.
“No. To my knowledge, he never cheated.” She pauses to take a sip of her martini, and at this point, I’ve lost count of how many drinks we’ve consumed. “My job unfortunately deals with men who have no qualms about cheating. And while I think they are scum and should never get hard again, their money is green, and I have a kid to feed.”
“And what is it you do?” I ask as I polish off my martini.
“I’m an interior designer, specializing in home design and decor for men.”
“Fascinating,” I say.
“It’s not, but thanks for the enthusiasm.”
I shake my head. If she only knew the battle I was having about decorating my new home with Kat, my publicist/fill-in assistant/best friend, she’d know how serious I am. “I’m not mocking. I’ve never had an eye for anything that includes colors, patterns, or furniture.”
She laughs and shakes her head. “You and most straight men in the world.”
“Are you calling me a cliché?”
She turns more toward me, crossing her long leg through the slit of her skirt. God, I bloody love a pencil skirt…
“Let’s see,” she says as she makes a show of eyeing me up. “Your Rolex isn’t fake. You don’t exactly have the frame of a guy who can buy a suit off the rack, so I’m going to guess this is custom made.”
She takes a second to gently feel the material of my suit, which she is right about—It most certainly is not off the rack.
I also can’t help but notice her fingers linger a little longer than they likely need to.
“Good quality material. Feels expensive, and I’d actually say it is. It goes well with the cologne, which is a cliché scent for a man of your caliber, but that doesn’t mean I don’t like it.”
Maeve gives me one more long look—of course while taking another sip.
I also make note to buy the cologne in bulk. You know, just in case I ever see her again.
“You’re cliché in the fact that you’re likely a high six-figure businessman. Finance, of course. No. Correction. A vice president of something or other at a company that makes the parts for the parts of clock radios.”
“Clock radios?”
She shrugs. “Sure. Why not? Doesn’t matter. You’re so high up you couldn’t even tell me what your company produces. You probably just collect checks, send out meetings invitations for things that could be emails, because you need to seem like you’re working, and pretend you know what you’re doing while your assistant actually runs everything. Oh, and I need not forget about your likely standing tee time and auto-renew membership at some swanky man’s club where you sip disgusting scotch and talk about the stocks.”
I laugh. Little does she know how wrong she is. “Anything else to add to my apparent mediocre resumé? Or would you like to fast-forward to the part where I tell you how off base you are?”
Her eyes double in size. Apparently she wasn’t prepared for me to push back. And frankly, neither was I.
Because yes, I’ve quite enjoyed being just a guy in a bar having drinks and conversation with a stunning woman. But I can’t let her think I’m someone I’m not. I’ve always been unapologetically me, so it’s time to come out from behind the curtain.
So as much as I’ve enjoyed just being Logan from Birmingham, it’s time she knows who I am.
“Have you heard of the video game SpaceCraft?”
It takes her a second to acknowledge what I’m saying, though I think the bottle of gin she’s consumed tonight has something to do with that. “My son plays that. And when I say play, I mean is obsessed.”
I smile and hold out my hand. “Logan Matthews, developer of SpaceCraft and CEO of GameTech, also known as the company that developed it. So actually, I’m worth ten figures, and it’s not for clock radios. Though we do have consoles with an alarm and clock in them, if you’re in need of one.”
She’s too stunned to laugh at my clearly hilarious joke. “And as for being in finance, I stay as far away from the books as possible. I only do enough math to code a game.”
It’s entertaining to watch her jaw drop as I lay out my confession. I’ve never told anyone about me like this, and it’s quite fun to watch the realization play over her face.
“Also, I never schedule a meeting that could be an email. Actually, I prefer to never have any meetings, if at all possible. Oh, and yes, while my assistant does handle many things for me, she’s compensated handsomely, as are my other employees.”
She thinks I’m done, but I curl my finger, asking her to come closer. When she does, I breathe her in, wanting to memorize the hints of vanilla and amber. “The only cliché thing about me is that from the second I saw you in the bar, I couldn’t stop wondering what it would be like to make you scream and come apart underneath me. Which makes me no different from every man you’ve ever met.”
She shakes her head, but doesn’t pull back. “Men don’t think of me like that.”
“Then they are all bloody fucking fools.”