Game Lover: A Steamy Standalone Instalove Romance Read online

  Gamer Love

  AN OLDER MAN YOUNGER WOMAN ROMANCE

  _______________________

  A MAN WHO KNOWS WHAT HE WANTS, 273

  FLORA FERRARI

  Contents

  NEWSLETTER

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Epilogue

  Extended Epilogue

  Extended Epilogue

  NEWSLETTER

  A MAN WHO KNOWS WHAT HE WANTS

  BRATVA BEAR SHIFTERS

  LAIRDS & LADIES

  RUSSIAN UNDERWORLD

  IRISH WOLF SHIFTERS

  Collaborations

  About the Author

  Gamer Love

  I’ve never been very good at real life romance. So when I befriend Smolder, a charming man in the video game Star Search, I feel like I’ve met my match.

  But Smolder doesn’t know what I look like. He has no idea I’m a curvy, shy nineteen year old wannabe programmer.

  He could be a six-foot hunk with a smoldering expression to match his name. Or he could be some troll in his mom’s basement.

  When he asks to meet I run scared. He deletes his account, and I’m sure I’ll never see him again. Until he appears at my doorstep.

  “I’m Smolder,” my dad’s best friend tells me.

  I must still be in the video game…

  Maxton Miller is forty-three years old, carved like a Greek god, with peppered hair, and a fierce way of looking at you. He’s been friends with my dad for as long as I can remember, and I used to have a major crush on him. He and dad built Star Search together, among many other games, making Maxton a multi-millionaire.

  I think he must be here to tell me we can’t do this.

  But he’s here to claim me, calling me his.

  I melt for him, but when we emerge from our steamy haze, we’re left with a question.

  When the virtual world meets the real one, is someone going to get hurt?

  Will it be me when Maxton realizes I’m a naive virgin and can’t fulfill his needs?

  Or will it be my dad, when he finds out exactly what we’ve been doing behind his back?

  I only know one thing for sure.

  Real life is way more complicated than a game.

  * Gamer Love is an insta-everything standalone instalove romance with a HEA, no cheating, and no cliffhanger.

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  Chapter One

  Madelyn

  “Are you ready?” Smolder asks.

  He’s a hunched-over alien with antennae sprouting from his green head and a scraggly blood-red beard, his one eye watches me from the observation deck of the spaceship.

  Of course, I know he’s not really a green-skinned alien and that his name isn’t really Smolder, but part of the charm of the video game Star Search or any game is that we have no idea who the other person is.

  It's part of the charm for me, anyway, because it means I get to hide behind my computer screen. After a long day of college classes, there’s nothing like relaxing on the multiplayer video game, searching the stars with my crew mate, Smolder, a person I’ve known for six months now.

  Maybe known isn’t the right word, because another feature of Star Search is it modifies your character’s voices, so when Smolder speaks it comes out high-pitched and eerie, to match his species.

  I press a button on my keyboard, directing my avatar to move forward and join Smolder at the observation window.

  Through the glass, the star sparkles and beckons us. We’re going to fly right to the center of it and harness its power, adding to our resources so we can make the return journey to the trading outpost… hopefully, with some star power to spare so we can turn a profit.

  “Genevieve?”

  My name fits my avatar, tall, beautiful, thin, and composed. Genevieve is nothing like me, with her high cheekbones and her obedient hair, never frizzing around her shoulders like mine. Her body is without curves, like a runway model, and she wears a startling dress that is completely out of place on our spaceship.

  But I don’t care. It’s fun to pretend to be beautiful, even if it’s only in a game.

  “Yes, I’m ready,” I tell him.

  My voice is sophisticated, with the tenor of a song.

  “Okay.” Smolder emotes, causing his avatar to grin. “Then let’s go.”

  The mission goes well and soon we’re gliding through the emptiness of space back toward the trading outpost. Star Search is a massive game, a huge world full of emptiness between the star systems. The point of the game is to find stars, harness their power, accumulate resources, and build bigger and better ships… all while defending ourselves from space pirates and raiders.

  Mom thought it was silly when I explain it to her, but it’s difficult for any non-gamer to understand just how freaking immersive it is.

  With nothing left to do but watch for pirates as we drift through space, Smolder and I hang out in the command room, the surveillance system showing us the vacant area around us just in case attackers take their chance.

  I shift in my chair, glancing at the clock. “I have to get going soon.”

  “Getting some extra work in?” Smolder asks.

  I nod, even if he can’t see me. I don’t bother to emote it. “Yeah, this project is kicking my ass, but it’s so rewarding.”

  “You’re awesome, Gen. Game design and programming. You’re a force to be reckoned with.”

  I blush, this time relieved he’s not watching me. “I wouldn’t go that far…”

  He chuckles. “Well, I would.”

  Smolder and I first met on the Looking for Groups page when the game first launched. I wasn’t sure what drew us to each other, but we quickly found we could sink easily into conversation, sharing banter and laughs as we set out to conquer the stars.

  I’m even tempted to say we have chemistry, a spark here, something. Yet every time I think that I have to caution myself.

  I don’t know who Smolder is, and I have no idea what he looks like. I know he’s a man and he’s forty-three years old… at least that’s what he’s told me. He could be lying, but a strange instinct tells me he isn’t, tells me he would never lie to me.

  It’s a stupid thought to have, and I try my best to reason notions like that away.

  At least I know I’ve told him the truth about me. I’m nineteen and a college student, but I’ve never sent him a picture and he’s never even heard my real voice.

  “What about you?” I ask him.

  His avatar is completely still. I wonder if his real features are tensed up. Smolder is always cagey when it comes to his personal details, beyond what he’s given me, making me wonder if he’s got something to hide.

  Maybe he’s in his mom’s basement, the stereotypical teenage gamer. He could be a woman. Or maybe he lives across the street. I simply don’t know.

  “I have some late-night work to take care of too.” His avatar wanders over to the customization station. As he speaks, his beard changes color, his one eye flitting and becoming two. “I’ve been thinking, Gen…”

  “Hmm?”

  “I’d like to meet.”

  My hand tightens on the mouse for a second. After a pause I sit back, feeling like all the breath has been sucked from my body.

  Smolder and I talk all the time, almost every day, but it’s always stuff related to the game… or to me.

  Never him.

  He knows about my classes and my dream to become a video game designer. He knows about my parents’ divorce and he’s even helped me through some dark times over the months we’ve known each other, letting me escape with him so I didn’t have to think about my failed forays into the dating world.

  “The boys my age are so immature,” I told him one day as we sat on the edge of a ruined planet system and watched a star cough up its final solar flare. “I wish I could find someone older, more experienced, someone, who could take the lead…”

  As hints go, it wasn’t exactly subtle. But it’s so much easier to be forthright in the game when I don’t have to worry about my sweaty palms and my blushing cheeks giving me away.

  Smolder soon changed the subject, and that was that.

  Does that mean he’s not really forty-three? Did he lie to me?

  “Gen,” he says now, pulling me back to the present.

  “Why?” I ask.

  “Because unless I’m crazy, I think we’ve got something here. Something real. I’ve tried to avoid asking you.”

  “Why?” I ask again, fiercer this time.

  I imagine his features becoming taut, his eyes hazy as he stares at the computer screen. What color are his eyes? Does he have a beard or is he clean shaven? Does he have a wife, a girlfriend?


  Too many questions. It makes my head throb.

  “ I know what you’re thinking. I could be an ax murderer. It’s difficult out there for a young woman. So many pricks trying to take advantage of you. But I can’t put it off any longer. I want to meet, Gen.”

  Sweat slides down my temples, my whole body feeling suddenly sticky. Insanely, a strong instinct takes hold of me, willing me to accept his offer. A voice screams at me to do it, that he could be the man of my dreams.

  “I don’t look like this in real life,” I murmur. “I don’t sound like this. I’m nothing like Genevieve.”

  He chuckles. It comes out funny-sounding from Smolder, and for about the millionth time I wonder what his real laughter sounds like. “You think I look like this in real life?”

  “Well, no,” I admit. “But it’s not the same. You’ve chosen a weird little monster as your avatar… no offense.”

  He laughs. “None taken.”

  “So whatever you look like, it’s going to be an improvement. But I can only go down from this. Trust me, you wouldn’t be as interested if you saw me.”

  “Let me be the judge of that.”

  My mouth is dry, my lips drier. Part of me wants to scream yes, but the rest of me wants to shut this down and end the game.

  I can’t think about meeting him. The nerves would choke me.

  I tried dating after Jess, my best friend, encouraged me, but it was always so awkward, the conversations stilted and forced, nothing like with Smolder.

  “I’m sorry. But no.”

  “Gen.” His voice trembles. “I can’t stop thinking about seeing you. It’s driving me mad.”

  I gasp. “Really?”

  “Yes, really. I’ve never lied to you.”

  “Neither have I.”

  “So clearly the age gap doesn’t bother you.” There’s a joking edge in his voice, and I wonder if the real him is smiling right now. “At least judging from those not-so-subtle hints you’ve been dropping…”

  I giggle. “Yeah, fine. Maybe I did drop a few here and there. But it’s not the age gap. It’s…”

  It’s me. It’s the look of disappointment that will surely reshape his features when he sees me.

  “Tell me your name, your real name,” I murmur.

  He pauses and then sighs. “I’m sorry, Gen. But I don’t think you’d believe me if I told you.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Another pause, and then he curses. “I’m sorry. I have to go. It’s work. Think about what I said.”

  He blinks out of existence.

  I grip the edge of my desk and sit back, letting out a series of frenetic breaths. I’ve dreamed of this moment countless times over the past half-year, but now I can’t even contemplate it.

  No matter what he says, he wouldn’t feel the same if he saw me.

  I can never compete with Genevieve.

  The very idea of meeting him makes my stomach swirl with anxiety.

  Chapter Two

  Maxton

  “Got carried away with your toy?” Steve jokes as we walk down the hallway toward the conference room to take the call with the Chinese counterpart of the company.

  I smirk at my best friend and my business partner.

  I’ve known Steve for a decade and a half and he’s always felt comfortable giving me crap in a friendly way, which is one of the reasons I like him so much. He’s around my age, but bald and short, with a perpetual grin on his face.

  “I call it market research,” I tell him. “No one knows who I am in there. It lets me experience the game from the consumers’ perspective.”

  Steve chuckles as we pass the large floor to ceiling windows of the programmer’s pit, empty this late at night. It’s ten PM here and eleven AM in Beijing.

  “That sounds like an excuse to spend more time with your online girlfriend.”

  I laugh, shaking my head. “I’m pleading the fifth on that one.”

  We walk into the conference room, the light automatically switching on. I take my place at the head of the table and Steve drops down next to me.

  As we wait for the Chinese to call, Steve runs a hand over his head, watching me closely.

  “What?” I ask.

  He grins. “What? I didn’t say anything.”

  “You didn’t have to.”

  He rests his elbows on the long conference table. I could’ve ordered my assistant or one of the interns to stay here and make us some coffees for the call, but it’s only going to take ten minutes and it seems unfair to steal an evening from them for that.

  But now I wish I had because Steve has that look on his face.

  It’s the look he used to give me a lot in the early days of the company when we were both programmers in our late twenties wondering if we’d ever make our mark on the world – the look he gave me when he needed to deliver bad news, or offer advice he thought I might not like.

  And it worked. We built an incredibly lucrative business together, with thousands of employees all over the world.

  “I think you might like this princess girl in your game,” Steve says.

  “Is this a therapy session?” I shoot back.

  He’s hit way too close to the home with that comment, because like is an understatement. Ever since we started talking, I felt something, a spark inside of me compelling me to meet with her, to see who she really is.

  I tried to fight it because I knew it would change how she saw me when we met. She thinks I’m Smolder, a weird little alien, not the CEO of the company who made the game.

  When she finds out, will she become like so many other women I’ve encountered, fake laughing at all my jokes, giving me come-to-bed eyes after a few minutes of talking?

  I like what we have, the anonymity of it, the way we’ve bonded without even knowing each other’s real names. But lately, the need has burned too brightly, blinding like the stars we plunder online.

  It’s like there’s a voice inside of me, primal and demanding, telling me I have to find her, claim her, be with her.

  Forever.

  And how crazy is that?

  Steve sighs after a long pause. “I only want the best for you, Max. I’ve heard how much fun you have with her. You never laugh like that, not with anyone. And when you talk about her – on those rare occasions – it’s like you’re talking about your girlfriend.”

  I shift in my chair, resisting the urge to snap at him. It’s not Steve’s fault I’ve fallen for a woman I’ve never seen.

  “But you need to be careful,” he goes on. “She could be anyone…”

  “I know that,” I grunt.

  “I just don’t want you to get hurt, man.”

  His voice falters and he turns to the dark windows. I wonder if he’s thinking about Anna, his ex-wife. Steve and Anna tried to make it work for two years of marriage counseling, but Steve could never forgive his wife for cheating on him after a drunken holiday with her friends.

  She confessed to it as soon as she returned home and they’d done their best. But I understood why my friend couldn’t let it go.

  A man has to own his woman, completely, possess her, claim her. If anyone ever tried to touch Gen, I know I’d snap, and all six foot five of me would burn with bloodlust.

  “I know,” I tell him, forcibly softening my voice.

  Steve nods, and then reaches for his phone. He glances at it. “They’re going to be a few minutes late. Coffee?”

  “Sure, thank you.”

  He wanders to the other end of the room, still walking with a slight limp from the time he shattered his ankle. I was there that day seven years ago when he was jumping around like an idiot after we cracked the billion-dollar mark. He fell down the stairs and snapped it, and he’s never walked the same since.