Page 105 of Soul Mates: Hercules Valentine and I

Bentley leans into him, brows crimped as if he's extra curious. “Us?”

“All of us,” Max says, remaining the picture of calm. “Anyone who’s ever worked for him. My grandfather was your classic visionary.’”

I collapse back in my seat. “What the hell.”

My instincts were right—Lark Davenport is Paisley Grove.

I look down at my crotch. I grew wood, and that shouldn’t have happened.

I call up the photo of her walking down hallway on her way to my office. Outwardly, she’s come a long way since high school.Look at her.I zoom in on her.Damn, she’s beautiful.But inwardly, she’s still the same. In high school, her kind of confidence was alien. She interacted with teachers like they were her colleagues. She’d be the first to answer questions but knew when to pull back and allow others to shine. I noticed that about her back then, and I liked it. And now it’s how she leads her team. It's the reason they work like a whole new group. Jeff only cared about winning brownie points fro me. Paisley sees them.

“Damn it.” Regret fuels my sigh. “Why did she have to misrepresent herself?”

I don’t know what to do.If Orion found out… or Achilles…

I squeeze my cock.Damn it.It still wants Paisley Grove.

Chapter Thirty-Five

Say Yes, Say No, Say Oh…

Paisley Grove

At the end of a long day, I’m on my way home. After dodging a bullet over hot dogs with Hercules, I decided to be extra careful. I directed all my energy into gettingShop-a-Lotup and running as fast as possible. Success will provide a cushion for my fall from grace when Hercules learns who I really am.

Tinsley, in marketing, was able to get our sample version pushed to the one hundred thousand gamers who already used our products, and eighty-three percent of them preordered the game. Even though Mason looked pale and kept coughing, his bloodshot eyes danced with excitement. “That’s the highest percentage point we ever hit.”

He then asked if I could come up with a product that would propel us closer to the top. I knew what he meant. He wanted to catch up with my family. He wanted to be a real competitor with GIT.

I already showed him how our compression technology can enhance an RLHI, but I almost told him about Pro-Guide, the idea that I came up with a few nights ago. It’s at the top of my list. What I like most about Pro-Guide is that if I can get VTI and GIT working together on a winner, then it can probably end the silly feud between our families. I’m still confused about why the Groves and Valentines don’t like each other anyway. I’ve heard Grandfather say that all is fair in business and war. I’ve known him to forgive other companies who tried to get around our licensing agreement, hack our infrastructure, and circumvent our copyrights.If we could forgive them, why not extend the same grace to the Valentines?Deep down, the bad blood between us just never made any sense to me.

However, GIT engineers have always had a problem getting their RLHI, or real-light-human-image, to move within the average range of motion without a one-second pause. I identified the problem, but I could never fix it—that is, not until I applied the VSC chip. There’s no way I would play dirty and steal VTI’s technology. That’s why I never briefed Max about what I’ve been working on. He would insist I send him the code and then have one of his guys figure out a work-around. Treasure was right about Max. Sometimes his actions can be just plain old evil.

But I’ve been thinking that if I can convince Mason to approach Killian Masters, captain of products and technology at GIT, then the two of them could possibly work together to marry VSC and RLHI. Only Killian can convince Max to work with Mason.I hope.And I think that I can convince Hercules to work with Killian.

By the end of the day, my whole team was so wiped that everyone went home, canceling their regular Friday happy hour at In2It Bar and Grill, which is a few blocks away from the building.

So now I’ve reached my building. As soon as I walk into my apartment, I hear my cellphone ring. It’s not my personal device—it’s my work phone, which means the call is for Lark Davenport.

I dig the phone out of my coat pocket and put it against my ear. “Hello.”

“Hey,” a sexy voice croons.

“Hercules?”

“What are you doing?”

My chest tightens.Say you’re busy.“Nothing.”

“I want to see you.”

“Um…” I look around my living room, confused.

“My driver’s gone home for the day. How about I pick you up and bring you over to my place for dinner?”

Say no.“Okay. Sure.”

Not only was that the wrong answer, but I didn’t even pause before agreeing to do something I know I shouldn’t do. I'm playing with fire. But what the hell—I'm already burning.