Chapter 29
“So…”
It was Monday, and now, everything was different between me and Nina. I really would probably reconsider having sex with coworkers if it wasn’t so damn fun, I promise.
“So?” I said, wheeling across the bench to move on to another prototype.
Nina let out a nervous chuckle. “So…how are we going to deal with…all of this?”
“All of what?” I said.
“Emma…”
“Nina, we’re coworkers, and we have a job to do. Right now, I can’t think about fucking you, or doing it again, but…get back to me later.” I said. I smiled mostly to myself, since I wanted to keep at least some sense of cool aloofness around Nina. “And we still have the product launch.”
“It’s pretty much finished…”
“Pretty much…” I said with determination. “Once we get from ‘pretty much’ to ‘definitely done’, then…we can relax.
Nina sighed. “Emma, it was…this weekend, it…was amazing.”
“I was there too.” I giggled. “But, this is…ostensibly a professional environment.”
“I’m finding that hard to believe, honestly.” Nina laughed to herself.
“Well, it is, and…damn launch bugs in the Molecule mean we need to figure it out before we can bask in the splendor of how amazing the sex was.”
“So you agree the sex was amazing?”
I shot Nina a look. “Of course it was, I was involved in it.”
Nina didn’t seem as impressed with my confidence, but, hey, at least I enjoyed it.
“So humble…and, also, what launch bugs?” Nina said.
“The timing issue. The sequencing is still fucked up, so, you’re not going to get the fun Emma back until it’s resolved. Those things are already headed to stores, and the firmware?—“
In something that, for most people, would have been an incredible breach of comfort zones, ethics, and all the other rules society puts in place to keep people a reasonable distance from each other, Nina reached out and put her hand on my chest, in the hollow of my neck.
“Emma, I think you might have misheard me, I said, what launch bugs?” Nina gave me a stare that told me that for as good of a sub she was, she was definitely a switch at heart, because it made even me feel things.
“Did you refresh the repository for fixes that somebody may have pushed last night because she was up late and couldn’t sleep because she was still riding the high of getting fucked better than she ever has been in her entire life? ” Fuck, her tone was irresistible.
“I’ve been working on it for weeks, it’s not…” I said. I turned to my workstation and typed in a command to refresh my code. I was so used to this being a solo operation that I never really had the need to check if others had left updates.
A crawl of lines populated the screen as the updates came in. A hell of a lot to do in one night, so, color me impressed.
“And I say this nicely, Em,” Nina smirked, “you’re…sort of stubborn sometimes, right?”
“No, never.” I flattened my expression, my signature dry wit probably funny to me and me alone.
“Right, so…you’re not a ‘read the fucking manual’ girly, right? And that probably also extends to release notes?”
“I know code libraries better than a lot of the devs.”
Nina closed her big, expressive eyes and chuckled to herself.
“That’s…probably true in a lot of cases, but…
in this one…maybe just this one case…you would have seen that the firmware for your microcontroller did have a known threading issue that was resolved…
” Nina looked up, calculating in her head, which was fucking adorable, “about three months ago?”
“People never update those.”
“They…sometimes update those.” Nina said. “Sometimes people are bored as hell in Florida and deal with their deteriorating relationship by bug fixing microcontroller libraries.” Nina shrugged.
“No, you aren’t telling me what I think…”
“If it’s ‘I actually solved your biggest problem with the Molecule before I even knew you’…I am, in fact, telling you that.”
It shouldn’t be a surprise I was a skeptic, but as the lights on the Molecule flickered while the firmware updated, I went to the long forgotten repository that I, ok, hadn’t updated on my system for eight months.
10.31.25 - NinaKitten - Fixed threading problem on JIT module - No clue how this had sat for this long, very easy fix
“You were fixing bugs on Halloween?”
“Emma, I’m almost thirty, I am not going to costume parties any time soon. Like I said, I was bored.”
“I think you’re…so very wrong about the costume party thing, because…I’ll just let you discover what Vi and me can introduce you to.” I grinned. “And…NinaKitten…am I seeing a catgirl in our future, or is it just a nickname?”
Nina pondered, “I’m still…way too new to kink to think about that.”
“I’ll check back in a few months…but, before that, it’s time to see if your little bit of genius actually solved the problem.” I pulled the transfer cable out of the Molecule and slid the silicone sheathing back in place.
“Alright, put it on the workbench, I’ll run the remote app from my station.” Nina wheeled back over to her computer.
“Oh, no. We’re not testing this on the workbench.” I smirked. I thumbed at the button of my jeans.
“I thought this was a professional and serious working environment.” Nina returned the smirk.
“Sometimes…” I unzipped my pants and slid the smooth vibe down the front.
I wasn’t nearly turned on enough to put it inside me, but, this would suffice.
“But, right now, field testing is essential.” I shifted around so the Molecule nestled nicely against my clit, the soft silicone already exciting me just a little. “Alright, let’s see if you’re right…”
Nina kept her eyes on me as she hit the space bar, and the Molecule sprung to life between my legs.
I’d used this toy a lot, obviously, it had been my pet project for months, even before Pallas had started in earnest. And that damn sequencing bug irritated me way more than something that dumb should have. But, it had irritated me.
As the program played out, I felt the familiar patterns ripple through my body.
I was good at my job, what could I say? And, then, the moment of truth came.
The device only had enough memory for a forty-five second program, and as it hit the low rumble-tap pattern that I had put at the end, I braced for the inevitable stutter that had been plaguing me.
When I felt the pattern seamlessly loop, like it had been programmed to do, like I had fucking instructed it to do, I stared at Nina with an expression that I think scared her a bit.
“This probably wouldn’t be the first time I’ve come because a coding problem was solved, but it hasn’t happened much…” I laughed, leaning against my workbench, now giving in to the vibration.
“You’re that close?”
“I mean…”
I would have been considerably closer if the lab door didn’t open a moment later.
“You know you’re not supposed to test it like that in the lab, right?” Kim said, stepping in and leveling her gaze at me. Nina recoiled with panic, and I probably would have too were I not in a sleepy-eyed haze already.
I fluttered back into reality, sort of against my will, and looked at Kim, who was only sort of mad at the moment. “It’s fixed.”
“What’s fixed?”
“All the bugs…Nina…can you, um…” I looked at the computer and back at Nina, hinting that maybe turning the vibe off was a good idea.
“Oh, yeah, sorry.” Nina grimaced and slapped the spacebar, causing the Molecule to go inert against my body.
“It’s…” I took a breath. “It’s completely ready to go. Nina…fixed it.” I grinned, my body still buzzing even though my pussy wasn’t.
“Nina, Emma isn’t…making you do any of this, right?” Kim said.
“Oh…no, uh…” Nina shot me a worried look.
“You can tell her.” I looked at Kim. “I’m guessing at this point she is putting it together.”
“We, uh…hooked up a couple of times, so…this is…I’m OK with it…”
“Emma tends to have that effect on women, doesn’t she?” Kim walked over to me and stood tall, her imposing frame combined with the fact that I was already primed from the vibe making me shudder. “You know you can’t do this with every single woman I hire, right?”
“I’ll keep it to below half of them, I promise.” I gave Kim my best frightened doe-eyed stare. Whether I would actually keep my promise, well…
“So it’s done done?” Kim said.
“Ready to launch, I can push the app update today, and we’ll just need to wait for the thing to actually hit the shelves.”
“There’s been a lot of pre-orders, you know…” Kim cocked an eyebrow. “Want to know how many?”
“Honestly, I probably don’t because it will give me anxiety, but, I feel like you want to tell me, so, go.” I said.
“Sixteen thousand units. I haven’t been in the sex toy game for long, but based on competitor data, well…I think we might need to adjust who we consider our competition, because this puts us in the big leagues.”
“Is that a softball pun?”
Kim screwed up her face, “no, it’s…a phrase…Emma…you’re allowed to be excited about this.”
I took a breath. She was right. She and everyone who ever told me it was perfectly OK to celebrate unmitigated success, they were always right, no matter what my brain tried to say.
“That…is pretty fucking cool.” I allowed myself a genuine smile.
“It’s better than fucking cool, Em, it’s exactly what we wanted, and exactly what I knew you were capable of.” Kim leaned down and kissed me, a deep and sensual kiss that felt like a warm blanket. “We’re back, we can probably bring Vi over, and she can tell AthenaTech to fuck off finally.”
“Wait, so, you two are…also…?” Nina said, watching this moment that was, in retrospect, really, really intimate.
“Yes, a lot…all the time. You’ll…we have some friends you’ll love to meet, Nina, if you want to.”
“Judging by that kiss, I…I think I want to meet them.”
“You do.” I nodded.
“In the spirit of meeting those friends…” Kim turned away from me and towards Nina, still holding my hand, “we’re going to have a little dinner tomorrow night, all of us girls…and you’re more than welcome to join…”
“Oh, that sounds…great!” Nina chimed.
“What dinner? This isn’t on Vi’s calendar.” I said.
“It is, just…don’t worry about it. She’ll make sure you’re there.” Kim turned back to me and kissed me again, silencing any further skepticism from me.