Hearts at Play (Love in Bloom: The Bradens, Book 6) Contemporary Romance (24 page)

Please enjoy a preview of the next
Love in Bloom
novel

Game of

Love

The Remingtons, Book One

L
ove in Bloom Series

M
elissa
F
oster

Ellie Parker is a master at building walls around her heart. In the twenty-five years she’s been alive, Dex Remington has been the only person who has always believed in her and been there for her. But four years earlier, she came to Dex seeking comfort and then disappeared like a thief in the night, leaving him a broken man.

Dex Remington is one of the top PC game developers in the United States. He’s handsome, smart, and numb. So damn numb that he’s not sure he’ll ever find a reason to feel again.

A chance encounter sparks intense desires in Ellie and Dex. Desires that make her want to run—and make him want to feel. A combination of lust and fear leads these young lovers down a dangerous path. Is it possible to cross a burned bridge, or are they destined to be apart forever?

DEX REMINGTON WALKED into NightCaps bar beside his older brother Sage, an artist who also lived in New York City, and Regina Smith, his employee and right arm. Women turned in their direction as they came through the door, their hungry eyes raking over Dex and Sage’s wide shoulders and muscular physiques. At six four, Sage had two inches on Dex, and with their striking features, dark hair and federal-blue eyes, heads spun everywhere they went. But after Dex worked thirty of the last forty-eight hours, women were the furthest thing from his mind. His four-star-general father had ingrained hard work and dedication into his head since he was old enough to walk, and no matter how much he rued his father’s harsh parenting, following his lead had paid off. At twenty-six, Dex was one of the country’s leading PC game designers and the founder of Thrive Entertainment, a multimillion-dollar gaming corporation. His father had taught him another valuable lesson—how to become numb—making it easy for him to disconnect from the women other men might find too alluring to ignore.

Dex was a stellar student. He’d been numb for a very long time.

“Thanks for squeezing in a quick beer with me,” he said to Sage. They had about twenty minutes to catch up before his scheduled meeting with Regina and Mitch Anziano, another of his Thrive employees. They were going to discuss the game they were rolling out in three weeks,
World of Thieves II
.

“You’re kidding, right? I should be saying that to you.” Sage threw his arm around Dex’s shoulder. They had an ongoing rivalry about who was the busiest, and with Sage’s travel and gallery schedule and Dex working all night and getting up midday, it was tough to pick a winner.

“Thrive!” Mitch hollered from the bar in his usual greeting. Mitch used
Thrive!
to greet Dex in bars the way others used
Hey.
He lifted his glass, and a smile spread across his unshaven cheeks. At just over five foot eight with three-days’ beard growth trailing down his neck like fur and a gut that he was all-too-proud of, he was what the world probably thought all game designers looked like. And worth his weight in gold. Mitch could outprogram anyone, and he was more loyal than a golden retriever.

Regina lifted her chin and elbowed Dex. “He’s early.” She slinked through the crowded bar, pulling Dex along behind her. Her Levi’s hung low, cinched across her protruding hip bones by a studded black leather belt. Her red hoodie slipped off one shoulder, exposing the colorful tattoos that ran across her shoulder and down her arms.

Mitch and Regina had been Dex’s first employees when he’d opened his company almost five years ago. Regina handled the administrative aspects of the company, kept the production schedule, monitored the program testing, and basically made sure nothing slipped through the cracks, while Mitch, like Dex, conceptually and technically designed games with the help of the rest of Thrive’s fifty employees—developers, testers, and a host of programmers and marketing specialists.

Regina climbed onto the barstool beside Mitch and lifted his beer to her lips.

“Order ours yet?” she asked with a glint in her heavily lined dark eyes. She ran her hand through her stick-straight, jet-black hair.

Dex climbed onto the stool beside her as the bartender slid beers in front of him and Regina. “Thanks, Jon. Got a brew for my brother?”

“Whatever’s on tap,” Sage said. “Hey, Mitch. Good to see you.”

Mitch lifted his beer with a nod of acknowledgment.

Dex took a swig of the cold ale, closed his eyes and sighed, savoring the taste.

“Easy, big boy. We need you sober if you wanna win a GOTY.” Mitch took a sip of Regina’s beer. “Fair’s fair.”

Regina rolled her eyes and reached a willowy arm behind him, then mussed his mop of curly dark hair. “We’re gonna win Game of the Year no matter what. Reviewers love us. Right, Dex?”

Thrive had already produced three games, one of which,
World of Thieves
, had made Dex a major player in the gaming world—and earned him millions of dollars. His biggest competitor, KI Industries, had changed their release date. KI would announce the new date publicly at midnight, and since their game was supposed to be just as hot of a game as they expected
World of Thieves II
to be, if they released close to the release for
World of Thieves II
, there would be a clear winner and a clear loser upon release. Dex had worked too hard to be the loser
.

“That’s the hope,” Dex said. He took another swig of his beer and checked his watch. Eight forty-five and his body thought it was noon. He’d spent so many years working all night and sleeping late that his body clock was completely thrown off. He was ready for a big meal and the start of his workday. He stroked the stubble along his chin. “I worked on it till four this morning. I think I deserve a cold one.”

Sage leaned in to him. “You’re not nervous about the release, are you?”

Of his five siblings—including Dex’s fraternal twin sister, Siena, Sage knew him best. He was the quintessential artist with a heart that outweighed the millions of dollars his sculptures had earned him. He’d supported Dex through the years when Dex needed to bend an ear, and when he wasn’t physically nearby, Sage was never farther than a text or a phone call away.

“Nah. If it all fails, I’ll come live with you.” Dex had earned enough money off of the games he’d produced that he’d never have to worry about finances again, but he wasn’t in the gaming business for the money. He’d been a gamer at heart since he was able to string coherent thoughts together, or at least it felt that way. “What’s happening with the break you said you wanted to take? Are you going to Jack’s cabin?” Their eldest brother, Jack, and his fiancée, Savannah, owned a cabin in the Colorado Mountains. Jack was an ex–Special Forces officer and a survival-training guide, and he and Savannah spent most weekends at the cabin. Living and working in the concrete jungle didn’t offer the type of escape Sage’s brain had always needed.

“I’ve got another show or two on the horizon; then I’ll take time off. But I think I want to do something useful with my time off. Find a way to, I don’t know, help others instead of sitting around on my ass.” He sipped his beer and tugged at the neck of his Baja hippie jacket. “How ’bout you? Any plans for vaca after the release?”

“Shit. You’re kidding, right? My downtime is spent playing at my work. I love it. I’d go crazy sitting in some cabin with no connectivity to the real world.”

“The right woman might change your mind.” Sage took a swig of his beer.

“Dex? Date?” Regina tipped her glass to her lips. “Do you even know your brother? He might hook up once in a while, but this man protects his heart like it carries all of the industry secrets.”

“Can we not go there tonight?” Dex snapped. He had a way of remembering certain moments of his life with impeccable clarity, some of which left scars so deep he could practically taste them every damn day of his life. He nurtured the hurt and relished in the joy of the scars, as his artistic and peace-seeking mother had taught him. But Dex was powerless against his deepest scar, and numbing his heart was the only way he could survive the memory of the woman he loved walking away from him four years earlier without so much as a goodbye.

“Whoa, bro. Just a suggestion,” Sage said. “You can’t replace what you never had.”

Dex shot him a look.

Regina spun on her chair and then swung her arm over Dex’s shoulder. “Incoming,” she whispered.

Dex looked over his shoulder and met the stare of two hot blondes. His shoulders tensed and he sighed.

“It’s not gonna kill you to make a play for one of them, Dex. Work off some of that stress.” Sage glanced back at the women.

“No, thanks. They’re all the same.” Ever since the major magazines had carried the story about Dex’s success, he’d been hounded by ditzy women who thought all he wanted to talk about was PC games.

Regina leaned in closer and whispered, “Not them. Fan boys, two o’clock.”

Thank God
.

“Hey, aren’t you Dex Rem?” one of the boys asked.

Dex wondered if they were in college or had abandoned their family’s dreams for them in lieu of a life of gaming. It was the crux of his concern about his career. He was getting rich while feeding society’s desire to be couch potatoes.

“Remington, yeah, that’s me,” he said, wearing a smile like a costume, becoming the relaxed gamer his fans craved.

“Dude,
World of Thieves
is the most incredible game ever! Listen, you ever need any beta testers, we’re your guys.” The kid nodded as his stringy bangs bounced into his eyes. His friend’s jaw hung open, struck dumb by meeting Dex, another of Dex’s pet peeves. He was just a guy who worked hard at what he loved, and he believed anyone could accomplish the same level of success if they only put forth the effort. Damn, he hated how much that belief mirrored his father’s teachings.

“Yeah?” Dex lifted his chin. “What college did you graduate from?”

The two guys exchanged a look, then a laugh. The one with the long bangs said, “Dude, it don’t take a college degree to test games.”

Dex’s biceps flexed. There it was. The misconception that irked Dex more than the laziness of the kids just a few years younger than him. As a Cornell graduate, Dex believed in the value of education and the value of being a productive member of society. He needed to figure out the release date, not talk bullshit with kids who were probably too young to even be in a bar.

“Guys, give him a break, ’kay?” Regina said.

“Sure, yeah. Great to meet you,” the longer-haired kid said.

Dex watched them turn away and sucked back his beer. His eyes caught on a woman at a booth in the corner of the bar. He studied the petite, brown-haired woman who was fiddling with her napkin while her leg bounced a mile a minute beneath the table.
Jesus
. Memories from four years earlier came rushing back to him with freight-train impact, hitting his heart dead center.

“I know how you are about college, but, Dex, they’re kids. You gotta give them a little line to feed off of,” Regina said.

Dex tried to push past the memories. He glanced up at the woman again and his stomach twisted. He turned away, trying to focus on what Regina had said.
College. The kids. Give them a line to feed off of.
Regina was right. He should accept the hero worship with gratitude, but lately he’d been feeling like the very games that had made him successful were sucking kids into an antisocial, couch-potato lifestyle.

“Really, Dex. Imagine if you’d met your hero at that age.” Sage ran his hand through his hair and shook his head.

“I’m no hero.” Dex’s eyes were trained on the woman across the bar.
Ellie Parker
. His mouth went dry.

“Dex?” Sage followed his gaze. “Holy shit.”

There was a time when Ellie had been everything to him. She’d lived in a foster home around the corner from him when they were growing up, and she’d moved away just before graduating high school. Dex’s mind catapulted back thirteen years, to his bedroom at his parents’ house. “In the End” by Linkin Park was playing on the radio. Siena had a handful of girlfriends over, and she’d gotten the notion that playing Truth or Dare was a good idea. At thirteen, Dex had gone along with whatever his popular and beautiful sister had wanted him to. She was the orchestrator of their social lives. He hadn’t exactly been a cool teenager, with his nose constantly in a book or his hands on electronics. That had changed when testosterone filled his veins two years later, but at thirteen, even the idea of being close to a girl made him feel as though he might pass out. He’d retreated to his bedroom, and that had been the first night Ellie had appeared at his window.

“Hey, Dex.” Regina followed his gaze to Ellie’s table; her eyes moved over her fidgeting fingers and her bouncing leg. “Nervous Nelly?” she teased.

Dex rose to his feet. His stomach clenched.

“Dude, we’re supposed to have a meeting. There’s still more to talk about,” Mitch said.

Sage’s voice was serious. “Bro, you sure you wanna go there?”

With Sage’s warning, Dex’s pulse sped up. His mind jumped back again to the last time he’d seen her, four years earlier, when Ellie had called him out of the blue. She’d needed him. He’d thought the pieces of his life had finally fallen back into place. Ellie had come to New York, scared of he had no idea what, and she’d stayed with him for two days and nights. Dex had fallen right back into the all-consuming, adoring, frustrating vortex that was Ellie Parker. “Yeah, I know. I gotta…”
See if that’s really her
.

“Dex?” Regina grabbed his arm.

He placed his hand gently over her spindly fingers and unfurled them from his wrist. He read the confusion in her narrowed eyes. Regina didn’t know about Ellie Parker.
No one knows about Ellie Parker
.
Except Sage. Sage knows
. He glanced over his shoulder at Sage, unable to wrap his mind around the right words.

“Holy hell,” Sage said. “I’ve gotta take off in a sec anyway. Go, man. Text me when you can.”

Dex nodded.

“What am I missing here?” Regina asked, looking between Sage and Dex.

Regina was protective of Dex in the same way that Siena always had been. They both worried he’d be taken advantage of. In the three years Dex had known Regina, he could count on one hand the number of times he’d approached a woman in front of Regina rather than the other way around. It would take Dex two hands to count the number of times he’d been taken advantage of in the past few years, and Regina’s eyes mirrored that reality. Regina didn’t know it, but of all the women in the world, Ellie was probably the one he needed protection from the most.

He put his hand on her shoulder, feeling her sharp bones against his palm. There had been a time when Dex had wondered if Regina was a heavy drug user. Her lanky body reminded him of strung-out users, but Regina was skinny because she survived on beer, Twizzlers, and chocolate, with the occasional veggie burger thrown in for good measure.

“Yeah. I think I see an old friend. I’ll catch up with you guys later.” Dex lifted his gaze to Mitch. “Midnight?”