Wicked Torture (Stark World 3)

For months, it had been her smile that filled his mind whenever he closed his eyes. Her voice that urged him on, assuring him that all the time he was spending at the computer was going to pay off. That she believed in his talent, and that he was going to make a huge splash one day.

And he'd told her the same thing. He'd watch her pluck out a melody on her guitar, her voice adding words to the music that filled his apartment. He'd been amazed by the way she could sit and scribble out lyrics, profound and beautiful and sweetly sad, and then spend days and weeks massaging the words until what he'd foolishly believed was perfect grew into something transcendent.

He knew he had a gift for tech, but that was tangible, the numbers representing some physical property. The gift she had created emotions, and it both awed and fascinated him.

She'd filled him up back then. Her passion for her work underscoring his own. They'd worked hard and played hard. They'd fit together perfectly. And though he'd been so damn young back then, he'd believed that they would grow old together.

Then he'd gone and shot that fantasy all to hell, and suddenly Kiki wasn't in his life anymore. She was relegated to his memories, and he'd learned to live that way, like a man missing a limb.

But now she was back, filling his thoughts, and part of him wanted to run to her. To shake her. Kiss her. To make her understand that they'd had a second chance handed to them on a shiny silver platter. All they had to do was dig in.

But a bigger, saner part knew that she was right. They weren't the same people anymore. And while the attraction was there on both sides, the trust wasn't. She was skittish.

He got that.

He was the one who'd left, after all. He'd been an idiot, and he'd been paying the price for years.

Looked like he was going to keep on paying for a little bit longer.

Fuck.

It wasn't quite midnight, and since he couldn't sleep, he might as well work. By now, he should have received the latest reports on the prototype from the overseas production facility, and he could spend a few hours going through the evaluations and looking for functions that need to be tweaked before the final rollout.

That, at least, was a plan with two potential upsides. Either his concentration would be so laser-focused on the work that there was no room for Kiki in his brain, or else he'd fall asleep from the tedium.

Twenty minutes later, he was leaning toward the tedium side of the equation when his cell phone chirped, signaling a text message.

In Austin. My wife's abandoned me. You still up? More important, you up for drinks?

Noah grinned. Speak of the devil; he hadn't realized his friend Wyatt was in town, and seeing the text now, when he could really use some company, was almost like a gift from the gods.

He tapped out a quick reply.

About time Kelsey realized she was too good for you. Come to my place. I've already downed two fingers for you. You're welcome.

Since he had no idea what part of the city Wyatt was coming from, Noah settled back at the desk, prepared to get a bit more work done before his friend showed up. But his ass had barely hit the chair when he was startled by a loud rap on the door.

He pulled it open and found Wyatt standing right there. Which didn't say much for the building security, considering the elevators were operated by a six-digit password.

"What the hell? Were you waiting in the lobby?"

"Pretty much," Wyatt said, striding in. He was Noah's height, with golden brown hair and whiskey colored eyes that were crinkled with amusement.

"Where's Kelsey? Because if she's seriously left you, I should probably get word to her that I'm on the market."

"I'm meeting them at Griff's house later," Wyatt continued. "He's got a place in East Austin that he refurbished to turn a few of the rooms into a studio."

Now that Wyatt had mentioned it, Noah remembered hearing that Griffin was moving to Austin to work with a local production company that was producing his wildly popular podcast and adapting it to a web series.

"It's a pretty sweet set-up," Wyatt continued. "We drove his truck out from LA, along with the rest of his furniture."

"In other words, he owes you."

"Big time." Wyatt's smile reached his eyes. "I can trade on this for years."

"And if I hadn't been home?"

"That's the beauty of your new address. Such a convenient location. I would have just met up with them at whichever bar they landed at." He turned in a circle, taking in the open floor plan, the minimal furniture, and the collage of photographs on the back wall. "You've got good taste."