Misunderstanding Mason (9 page)

“She
mentioned the project you’re doing for her, and that you’d had to outsource
some development needs.” Leather squeaked on the other end of the line. “I’ve
known Lisa a long time—I’d be happy to save you the trouble.” He paused, then
added with emphasis, “And Lisa the cost.”

Kirstin
frowned at the cycle selector. That didn’t make sense. If Lisa knew Steve, why
didn’t she just hire him? At this point, Kirstin would be happy to let the
project go, money or not. Working with Mason was just too difficult. And if
Lisa had phoned to hire her, someone else would eventually too.

“I’m sorry,
I’m not following.” She flipped the dial and turned the machine on. “Are you
saying you’d like to take the project off my hands?”

“No, no.” His
husky chuckle sent an unpleasant ripple down her spine.

“Then why are
you calling? Mason is doing my development. We’ll be finished with the project
in a week or so.” Pushing the laundry room door open, she stepped back into the
kitchen and went to the fridge for an orange.

“I, ah…”
Leather squeaked again. “I don’t mean to pry, but Lisa mentioned you and Mason
split. I thought, maybe, you’d like to get away from that awkward situation.”

Bent over at
the crisper drawer, Kirstin shot upright, smacking her head on the butter tray
in the door. She pressed a hand to the back of her head and winced. Oh, holy
hell. Mason was going to kill her. This was exactly what he didn’t want to
confront tonight—word spreading through Gamesquare that their relationship had
come to an end.
Goddamn her.

“Ah… Well…”
she fumbled.

“I’d do it
gratis. I’ve been in the position of having to establish myself—I’m even
willing to offer some additional work, if you’re interested.”

“I…Wow.” She
swallowed. Fire Mason and work with Steve? Talk about a situation even more
awkward than the current one. But the extra work was damn tempting.

Kirstin
closed the refrigerator. “I’m sure you can appreciate this is a surprise,
Steve. I need some time to think about it.”

“Sure, sure.
Take all the time you need.”

She glanced
out the window again and spied Mason exiting the patio door, barefoot,
newspaper in hand, along with a mug of coffee. Her heart lurched, her pulse
kicked up a notch. She sucked down a groan, and hurriedly looked away. “Will
you be at the Gamesquare launch tonight? We could discuss this there.”

“Oh. You’re
going?” Surprise laced through his voice.

“Yeah. I’m
attending with Mason.”

Another
chuckle uncomfortably prickled her skin. “That’s right. He mentioned you did
some work on the graphical interface. Sure, we can talk about it tonight. I’ve
already run some preliminary ideas and think it’s possible we could have this
turned around in half the time you’ve currently projected. I’ll give you some
insight on my thoughts before the dinner.”

Half the
time? Kirstin’s gaze pulled to the window once more. In four days, she could be
in an apartment across town, free from the heartache of loving Mason.

Chapter Eight

When eleven
o’clock rolled around and Kirstin hadn’t returned his phone call, Mason stopped
pretending to read the paper and went back inside to try again. 10:00 a.m. on
the nose was entirely too early for her to have had time to consume the
requisite two cups of coffee and down something quick to eat, to approach the
conversation anyway. Besides, he needed a little time to get his head around
the direction that would work best. By now, she’d be up, fully functional. If
she refused to come over and talk, he’d show up on Sam’s patio knock until she
caved.

As he reached
for the cordless on the kitchen wall, he glanced out the patio door and drew
back in surprise. Dressed like she intended on a run, she descended the
Roberts’ deck stairs at a jog. But instead of turning right and cutting through
the lawns to the lake, she started across the grass, on a direct trajectory
toward their patio. Nerves skittered around in his gut. Damn, he’d been so
convinced he could do this. Now, with the conversation imminent, his throat
went dry.

Time passed
in nightmarishly slow motion. He watched the door, eyed her shadow as it
elongated on the pavestones. Then she was at the glass, her gaze locking on
him, one petite hand lifted to knock.

He beckoned
her inside.

Kirstin
slipped in with a hesitant smile. “Morning, Mason.”

“Morning,
babe.” The endearment popped out before he could stop it. He cringed
inwardly—not a good way to break the ice. The last thing he wanted to do was
set her on edge before he ever got to the important matters.

Mason nodded
at her tank top and entirely too-short cotton shorts. “Headed ’round the lake?”

“I thought I
might.” She dropped a hip onto the arm of his orange plaid chair. “I needed to
talk to you first.”

The fist
around his innards clamped down tight, but Mason exhaled slowly and
deliberately. No matter how impossible, how uncomfortable the confrontation
might be, he determined to overcome his nerves. He couldn’t afford to shut down
now.

He rounded
the countertop and took a seat on the edge of the oversized chair facing her.
Hands clasped loosely between his knees, he met her jittery gaze. “I want to
talk to you too. Last night—”

Kirstin
begged him off with a lift of her hand. “I can’t talk about last night right
now.”

“Then when?”
The demanding overtone to his question surprised him.

She gave him
a heavy sigh. “I don’t know, Mason. We’ve talked about it. We don’t get
anywhere. I feel like I’m going in circles.”

Talked about
what?
Confusion pulled his brow into a tight frown. “Like hell we have. If we had, I
might understand why you aren’t here, in this house, with me, where you’re
supposed to be.”

Pain flashed
behind Kirstin’s grass-green eyes. She lowered her face, her long black hair
hiding whatever other reaction she might have had. Mason’s gut rolled over. He
didn’t want to hurt her, didn’t want to turn this into an argument. But he
needed to know what she wanted from him, what she was so damnably convinced he
couldn’t give. And he needed her to realize just what sort of bitch Lisa Bennet
was.

“What
expectations?” he asked quietly. “What do you need from me?”

She lifted a
hand to shield her eyes, and her shoulders shook with silent tears. “You,” she
mumbled.

Him? Mason
blinked. That didn’t make sense. He reached between them and took her free
hand. “You’ve got me, baby.”

“No,” she
argued on a sob. “No, I don’t.” Lifting watery eyes to his, she gestured at the
hall. “Your work has you. The last time I went to bed before you, did you come
with me? No, you sat at your computer. You don’t involve me. You don’t tell me
what’s going through your head.” She jerked her hand from his and threw them
both in the air. “I had no idea you moved this damn chair out of consideration
for me! You told me it didn’t match the new, expensive, set.”

That was the
truth—it didn’t match. But when he’d moved the recliner, he hadn’t thought he
needed to state the obvious—she would be the one with clients coming in and
out. He didn’t care who saw the ancient ugly thing. Not so very long ago, she
would have realized that. And when she’d been taking night classes at the
junior college, he’d let her get her sleep then too. Not once had she doubted
his reasons for not going to bed with her. Hell, Kirstin slept in the nude. She
damn well knew he couldn’t keep his hands off her.

Mason’s frown
deepened, and he stared at his hands. The larger problem was what had happened
to make her so out of tune with him.

“My first big
project, you abandoned me on. You didn’t like Lisa, didn’t like the way I was
handling it, and you left me to figure out all the things I didn’t know on my
own.”

His head
snapped up, indignation nearly driving him to his feet. Lisa. The root of their
problem. He didn’t need any further evidence. “You’re right, I can’t stand that
bitch. She put you through hell, and I couldn’t sit back and watch. I couldn’t
take the project from you—you needed it. But I couldn’t deal with the way she
cut you apart and the complete lack of respect she had for you.”

Spots of
color rose to Kirstin’s cheeks, and her green eyes flashed. “Lack of respect
for me? Where would you come up with that? Christ, Mason, she referred me to
Steve Whitmore! He wants to hire me for regular contract work. Even my own
boyfriend didn’t offer me a job. I had to hire
him.
”

An invisible
fist thumped Mason in the chest and shoved the air from his lungs. Steve
Whitmore? That rat bastard was a snake in the grass. On at least two occasions,
he’d tried to take credit for Mason’s work. Thank God, Don paid attention to
artistic styles and recognized the truth at a glance.

Moreover,
Steve ran in some freakish circles. Don confided Steve had invited him and
Maria to one of those private, hush-hush clubs where pleasure came from a lot
of pain in private cellar rooms. BDSM, fetishes.

Mason drew in
a sharp breath.

Swingers.

Fucking Lisa!

He ground his
teeth together and chained his temper. Holding Kirstin’s gaze, he chewed on the
inside of his cheek, debating how to proceed. Tell her everything he knew about
Steve Whitmore, or point out how willing Lisa was to stab Kirstin in the back?

Logic rushed
in, arguing neither. He’d unwittingly hurt Kirstin, and that deserved his
foremost attention.

“Kirstin, you
hired me
after
you walked out. That aside…” He reached between them
again, this time clasping both her hands. “I didn’t offer you a job because we
were already partners. Anything you wanted to work on with me—you think I’d
have told you no?” He gave her fingers a tight squeeze. “I’d have given you all
the work you wanted, but I didn’t know you had an interest. You didn’t tell me,
baby.”

When she
remained unresponsive, her fingers limp against his and her stare fixed on
something behind him that he couldn’t see, he lowered his voice and asked, “You
aren’t going to work for him, are you?”

Kirstin
answered with a weak shrug. Her voice rang just above a whisper. “I haven’t
decided. I don’t see why I shouldn’t.”

Why she
shouldn’t—he’d be more than happy to list the numerous reasons. Before he could
respond, however, she met his gaze with a short sigh. “Lisa recommended me.
She’s a pain in the butt, but she has connections. It could be my big break.”

Big break he
could understand. Yet there were a dozen other ways she could obtain it.
Namely, Don. One word to Don Margelies, and Kirstin would have clients coming
out her ears. Mason would have recommended her earlier, but he’d assumed, since
she’d never asked for help, that she wanted to forge her own way.

Regardless,
he couldn’t sit here and listen to her sing Lisa’s praises. He glanced down at
their joined hands, admiring her short, manicured nails. Her fingertips were
soft as silk, the warm press of her skin a comfort he treasured.
Affectionately, he ran his thumbs over the back of her hands. “There’s another
reason I left Lisa’s project to you.”

Her delicate
features scrunched together in curious puzzlement.

Damn, this
was going to hurt. No matter how he put it, he couldn’t soften the necessary
blow. Closing his eyes, he breathed deeply, exhaled hard. Then, he lifted his
lashes, and hoping she’d see how very much he didn’t want to tell her, he
brought his gaze to hers. “You remember the SIGGRAPH banquet?”

He’d have
sworn Kirstin flinched before she nodded.

“Remember
when, just before my award, Lisa pulled me aside?”

She nodded
again.

Mason gripped
her hands more tightly. “Baby, she didn’t ask me about the project. She asked
me to leave you with Tom and test out the king-sized bed in her room.”

****

Stunned to
the core of her being, Kirstin’s mouth dropped open. She snapped it shut and
stared, wide-eyed, at Mason. He couldn’t be serious. Lisa was in her fifties.
Tom doted on her. She always talked about how close they were, how much she
adored him. Lisa didn’t have any reason to proposition Mason—well, other than
the fact he could fill out a tux better than any man she’d ever met. That, and
his unruly dark waves gave him roguish sex appeal. Not to mention his blue eyes
held the power to make women melt.

Okay, so it
wasn’t the fact that Mason had been propositioned she found difficult to
believe. Just that
Lisa
had done so.

“You’re
making that up.” Even as the words flew from her lips, she knew they were
false. Mason might suck at verbal communication, but he’d never lied. Never had
any reason to.

He shook his
head. “I’m not. Tom and she are swingers. It shocked the hell out of me. Even
more when, before I could tell her to go to hell, she had my boys in her hand.”
In typical Mason misplaced humor, one corner of his mouth pulled up in a smirk.
“I don’t think my boys have ever been more frightened of a woman.”