He’d played the night of the rockpool too because hitting things hadn’t resolved how he felt about Mena’s touch. He loved being touched. For the most part, didn’t matter who was doing the touching. He didn’t discriminate. Evie was constantly at him about not letting fans get handsy, but he always forgot to have his guard up until someone grabbed his junk in a meet and greet.
Mena’s touch had triggered all his sleepy warning, warning, inappropriate touch sensors even though nothing about how she’d touched him had been a genuine violation. Except a part of him had registered it that way, because Mena was supposed to be above all that. She was supposed to see his money as the thing she wanted to get her hands on, not his body.
Evie said it was up to him to practice safe touch procedures in meet and greets to reduce the number of arse slaps, nipple tweaks, tongue kisses and crotch grabs he got. It had to be his fault that Mena touched him, looked at him like she wanted to lick him, but fucking hell, what other way were you supposed to get wet but close to naked. He’d had no idea the water drummers were going to invite him to play with them.
He thought he’d resolved to keep his distance from any temptation, which is why he’d gotten frosty with her, but that didn’t grok with how he felt about Mena ghosting him.
Turns out she hadn’t gone ghoul; she’d gone arm’s-length. Which essentially solved the problem. Kind of.
The bumblebee piece was a minute fifteen of intense focus. He played it twice, and at the end he’d worked up a sweat and the necessary clarity to go read her emails. That took way longer and now he needed to respond.
He stared at his laptop keyboard; the blinking cursor was the wrong kind of metronome. A countdown to dysfunctional fingers as his brain got in the way again. Partly what Mena needed was stuff he flicked to his accountant to confirm, cc-ing Mena so she’d know what was going on, but there were other questions only he could answer.
Had he considered buying property for his parents? Did he have an interest in nanotech, biotech, fintech, medtech, scitech, regtech and a bunch of other techs he’d never heard of, where did he stand on ethical investments and venture capital?
He channeled a busy bumblebee and snapped out his next response.
I tried to buy my parents a new place, but they like where they live, they’ve made friends of their neighbors and they refuse to move. Best I could do for them is spend up on renovations and a new car. They get an overseas holiday whenever they want one, but they don’t like the neighbors to think they’re showing off. Pain in the Goddamn rear. They both still work and they don’t need to and they sacrificed a lot so I could have music. Now that I’m finally in a position to pay them back they don’t give a flying fuck what I want. So yeah, I considered doing more for my stubborn-arse parents and struck out.
He didn’t read it back, he hit send and opened the next mail but before he could think of a way to say he didn’t have a feel one way or another for tech of any kind, other than sound tech—was that an investment thing, Mena responded.
Mark, glad to hear from you. Thank you for getting back to me.
He replied to that mail with one word, his preferred name. Then he refreshed and refreshed again. Email was painful, no little dots to show someone was online and replying. And then, there it was. Mena’s reply.
Grip, you were incredible with those kids. I should’ve mentioned that. They loved their lesson with you. Thank you for inviting me to watch.
Now what was wrong with that? Proper use of his name and a warm and fuzzy compliment but that formal thank you was a Debby Downer.
You’re mad with me, aren’t you? Delete.
What the fuck? You’re mad with me, aren’t you? Send.
There was a go-pour-more-coffee gap before she responded. Of course, I’m not mad with you.
“Pigs in space, honey.”
A new email came in. I’m mad with me. I shouldn’t have touched you like that. It was a complete breach of trust and professional standards. You’d be within your rights to report me to management and have me removed from your account. I’m feeling more than a little ashamed.
He replied. Even if I liked it, because he had liked it, even knowing he wasn’t supposed to, and then held his breath while stabbing send/receive until he got, Grip, please don’t tease me about this. It’s very serious. It’s an ethical breach and I could lose my job over it.
Shit. He hadn’t thought it through to that sticky end. Was it really that big a deal? Wasn’t like he was going to report her to the principal and get her put on detention. I must not maul the client. I must not maul the client.
I’m not going to go getting you into trouble. I liked it. But I shouldn’t have. I get that. As fricking annoying as that was. But did she like it too? Beneath the heavy layer of ethics and professional conduct, did she still want to lick him?
Because he very much wanted to be licked by her.
There was a delay and then she replied. This is a problem, you know that, right? We need to have a business relationship.
I get that. I’m with you. Build that wall back. Brick by brick. It’s my fault. I keep making you blush. I see how it compromises you. I promise I’ll do this the normal way from now. Whatever you need. I
