The Remingtons_Blush of Love Read online

  Coming back to the present, Gunner entered the communications tent and sent a message to Rose_Colored_Gun. My dearest Rose, I’ve been waiting for you. Let’s renew our vows, and root out the trolls and bullies from our realm.

  Chapter Seventeen

  “Clarissa, answer the door.” Safire pounded on her sister’s apartment door. “I know what you did.”

  Silence lurked behind the door. After pounding some more, Safire gave up and went upstairs to her room. The security guard had left after sweeping her room for bugs and other electronic devices. He’d also taken her secure access point, which meant she could no longer get back on Thrive’s network—at least from the inside.

  Safire booted up her personal computer and browsed to the Planet Wargames website. Within seconds, she was in as Rose_Colored_Gun. Luckily, she’d finished resurrecting herself before being interrupted by Mitch.

  She ran into the communications tent in her warzone and checked her messages, not that she expected any, but if Fire_Hunter had her tracked, he’d get a notification if she logged on.

  Her face relaxed as she read the note from Guns4Roses, her ally in the hunt for bullies and trolls. He was a Level 80 hunter who had no trouble tracking and finding the trolls. Of course, his account was limited so he could not kill any of the other paying customers, but he was useful to have around, especially since they’d carried a long running flirtation where he’d proposed to her character and she’d accepted, knowing it was only virtual and that she’d never meet him in real life.

  She messaged him back. It’s good to be back. I’m sorry I left without saying goodbye. I miss you too, my—

  She felt funny typing “husband” to a stranger. A year ago, she’d been in love with the mighty hunter, but that was before she met Gunner—a flesh and blood man.

  One who’d betrayed her and was her avowed enemy.

  Husband. She continued the message. Are there any members of our quest left?

  No. They’ve all scattered after your disappearance. However, I picked up a newcomer. Guns4Roses typed. He’s Potentate level and can neutralize someone by looking at them. Of course, the Realm has to give him permission for that.

  What Guns4Roses didn’t know was that Safire had given herself control of the Realm when she brought herself back. All they had to do was isolate Fire_Hunter and keep him in their vicinity long enough for her to dump his data into her account. Once she had proof he was Gunner, she was going to pursue this with his team. It had to be a violation of professional ethics for a football player to hack and bully people, even if it was inside a video game.

  Awesome, she messaged. Let’s get to it then. I need to track every location Fire_Hunter’s been for the last week. Where can we meet to start?

  The Love Pavilion. We have some making up to do before heading off on our mission. Besides, the Potentate is having dinner and can’t be disturbed, so we have some time to get reacquainted.

  Definitely. Safire’s cheeks warmed as she recalled the hours she spent chatting with Guns4Roses. He’d told her about his childhood: growing up on the wrong side of the tracks, his wishes and dreams for respectability, and that was why he’d joined her group of vigilantes.

  He was her companion and would walk many miles with her on their quests, going from the snowy north to the jungles of the south. They’d talk and chat the entire way, and she’d shared things she’d never shared with anyone in real life—her insecurities being the middle child and never meeting her mother’s expectations. Her older sister’s control over her because she’d put her through college, and her younger sister’s disdain at her for being a nerd. How she drove men away by being clingy and caring too much. How hurt she was that showing concern to someone was smothering to them. How all she wanted was someone to care for and share a life with.

  He’d been so understanding, telling her that the right man would not run away because she cared or worried about him. That the right one would value her and want to spend time with her. And he’d shared how he had no real relationships because women only wanted him for a status symbol—someone to be seen with. How his marketability was dependent on image and appearance, but that secretly, all he desired was to be wanted for himself—faults and all, and not some idealized polished hero his publicist was making him out to be.

  Safire touched Guns4Roses’ avatar on screen, wishing she could know who he was. But of course, the anonymity of the virtual world meant that she could never know—even when she’d had the power to trace him, she’d refrained. It would have broken the spell to know who he was. It would also have violated the wall between developer and game player—something she was about to do now with Fire_Hunter.

  Show me your location. She messaged her virtual mate.

  Guns4Roses gave her the coordinates and she teleported into their private bed chamber inside his mansion. Soft music played amongst the gentle sound of trickling water. The walls were made of gemstones, and beautiful plants grew out of them. Colorful birds with iridescent feathers sang and flew in the canopy of leaves above them.

  But what got Safire’s heart beating faster was the way Guns4Roses had dressed for her. He was rugged and muscular, wearing the pelts and skins of mythical creatures. His eyes shone gem blue and he was surrounded by a warm glow brought on by the purchase of the most expensive elixir of love.

  You shouldn’t have spent so much coin for me, she whispered. I didn’t bring you anything.

  You gave me yourself. That’s more than I can ever expect. I thought I’d lost you for good. I checked every day to see if you’d be back, and today, my patience has been rewarded.

  You’ll never lose me. You’re good, honest, and loyal.

  Safire only wished real men were as honest and forthright as Guns4Roses.

  I’ve a confession to make, the hunter typed. I’m not good, honest, and loyal. In real life, I’m a sneak and a cheat.

  Why do you say that?

  Because I lost the woman I’ve grown to love. I didn’t fess up to what I’ve been doing. I thought that doing bad to do good was good enough, but I learned that honesty, trust, and integrity are much more important than the so-called good I was doing.

  Safire stared at the avatar, who had put on a penitent expression. Why was her virtual husband acting so strange? This wasn’t supposed to be real life. This was supposed to be fun, a fantasy, a world where dreams and nightmares collided.

  Are you speechless? Guns4Roses whispered.

  You mention a woman you lost. Is that in the real world? Are you telling me you’ve found someone else?

  I’ve found you, Safire Chu.

  “What?” Safire sucked in a breath. How did he know her real name?

  Who are you?

  I’m Gunner Gibson.

  No, you stole Guns4Roses’ account. You’re Fire_Hunter.

  I told you I’m not and I’ll prove it.

  How?

  Come into my arms and we will teleport to his location.

  Safire’s pulse expanded hot and cold in her head. Her heartbeat thudded and her mouth went dry. Could she trust Gunner? Or was he taking her to Fire_Hunter to terminate her character?

  I can’t step into your arms, Safire messaged. I need to leave.

  Please don’t. I told you I loved you. What I didn’t tell you was that I met you online in Planet Wargames. After the Fire_Hunter account was stolen, I came back with one aim. To find the bully who would steal an account from a boy who’d lost both his legs. That’s when I met you.

  How do you know my real name? Safire grasped desperately for a straw to cling onto. I never told you.

  You didn’t have to. Once I had a bead on Fire_Hunter, I followed him into the forums where he ranted and raved about you. I figured out he hated Rose_Colored_Gun and he named you. He must be someone at your work. Otherwise, how could he know so much? How could he trace you? How could he have purged your account?

  He purged it? Or you? Safire’s head swirled with hot and cold sensations. Her heart fluttered
and hammered. Half of her wanted to believe Gunner, but then how could she tell who she was talking to? Was Guns4Roses really Gunner or was it her unnamed enemy?

  She messaged him. How did Fire_Hunter know about Jake’s account? Only Gunner and Clarissa knew about the hack. Therefore, Fire_Hunter has to be either Gunner or my sister, who’s not answering her door.

  Come with me and we’ll find out. Guns4Roses extended his arms.

  Okay. Safire stepped into them, allowing him to wrap his bearskin cloak around her.

  The screen flashed and went dark. Safire waited, but nothing happened. She moved her mouse and hit the escape key. Her computer was stuck. Glitched. Or had she been booted from the system? Again?

  When would she ever learn not to trust Gunner Gibson?

  # # #

  “Got her,” Gunner said, putting down his video game controller. “Did you get Fire_Hunter?”

  “Yep. I trapped him at the same time you were talking to Safire,” Jake said. “Dumping the data now.”

  “I can’t wait to unmask the culprit,” Dex said, sitting behind the two of them. He’d been in on this ever since Gunner had convinced him someone was framing Safire.

  Gunner had also told Dex about Fire_Hunter stealing Jake’s account, and Dex had agreed to come with them to Jake’s apartment to trap the thief.

  “This proves it’s not Safire,” Gunner said, pointing at the screen. “She was talking to me so she couldn’t have been controlling Fire_Hunter.”

  Dex rubbed his chin. “I didn’t think it was her, but at the same time, you have to wonder about all the attention she was pulling with the negative reviews, the shaming, and all the drama. In the marketing and publicity world, negative attention is just as good as positive. Think of all the fans who rallied to Safire’s support because of Fire_Hunter’s rants. It also raised her visibility as a game developer sky high.”

  “It’s not Safire,” Gunner said. “She wouldn’t be so underhanded. Besides, she didn’t know about Clarissa hacking Jake’s account, so she couldn’t have sent that email to you, and I’m not Fire_Hunter because you saw me controlling Guns4Roses while Fire_Hunter was being controlled elsewhere.”

  “True, but no one hacked Jake’s account,” Dex said, looking at a message on his phone. “He won fair and square. Clarissa wasn’t able to break in.”

  “I did win on my own,” Jake agreed. “After I was supposed to go to bed, I snuck back on and gained the last remaining items and powered up through the nuclear football.”

  Dex raised his hand for a high-five. “Of course you did. As soon as I got that email from Fire_Hunter, I went through and retraced your steps. I also correlated your account access and found where you snuck back on. It was the same IP address as here in this apartment. There was no remote access from Safire’s apartment or her laptop at all during the hours leading up to New Year’s Eve.”

  Gunner’s mouth went dry and he let out a breath of relief. “You mean Clarissa lied? That she never hacked in?”

  “Appears so,” Dex said, shaking his head. “Anyway, I had to put on that act of being stern when I told Safire to leave the office, because I wanted word to get back to Fire_Hunter that Safire was taking the fall. It would make him or her less careful.”

  “Safire must feel horrible.” Gunner reached for his phone to text her. “Are you going to call her and let her know she’s cleared?”

  “Not yet,” Dex said. “We still have to unmask Fire_Hunter. The IP address is mapping to Nightcaps. I’m going to text the bartender and ask him to keep a watch on the patrons who are on their laptops or tablets.”

  “Clarissa hangs out at Nightcaps,” Gunner blurted, his heartbeat accelerating. “She also knew about the supposed hack for Jake’s account. But why would she throw Safire under the bus? She’s her sister. She put her through school. Paid for her college.”

  “Maybe she resents her, or she feels Safire isn’t thankful enough.” Dex shrugged. “Let’s nab her.”

  After Dex texted the bartender at Nightcaps, he picked up the game controller.

  Gunner and Jake watched the screen while Dex created his character, Boss_Mage. He materialized in front of Fire_Hunter, right in the middle of the trading post.

  Gratz, he whispered to Fire_Hunter. Rose_Colored_Gun has been terminated. She’ll be seeing jail time for pirating code. Add securities fraud for the free fall on Thrive stock this afternoon, and she’s spending the rest of her life in federal prison.

  I told you she was a cheat, Fire_Hunter whispered. But isn’t the securities fraud over the top?

  Not for theft of intellectual property. You should be happy with your role. She’s been arrested and taken to the Midtown South precinct. I don’t think she’ll raise bail. Like I said, she wouldn’t have been caught except for your vigilance. Please let me know your identity so I can give you a reward. I’ll meet you at the Imagine Mosaic in Central Park in an hour.

  “The bartender at Nightcaps is going to watch and see who bolts for the door,” Dex said, chuckling. “He’s even agreed to send a waiter to tail her.”

  What’s the reward? Fire_Hunter whispered back.

  It’ll be worth your while. Be there in an hour with a rose in your mouth.

  Dex logged out without waiting for a reply.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Safire paced inside her tiny apartment, back and forth, and back and forth. The walls closed in on her and she was doomed. Not only was she going to be fired, she’d also damaged Dex’s company and their reputation.

  The pirating of the game client had cratered their stock, and there was talk that the game would be canceled because the lead designer was guilty of the theft.

  Her heart pounded like rocks tumbling down a mountain. Were they coming to arrest her? But then, Dex had said that if she was truly innocent, which she was, they’d find out soon enough.

  How soon was soon?

  She resumed pacing, feeling like a caged tigress. Where was Clarissa? Why wasn’t she answering her phone? Safire had tried both the apartment and her office. Her assistant had only said she was with a client, but could not divulge who.

  Could it be that Clarissa and Gunner had done this together? But why? Why would they want to destroy her?

  Safire raked her memory of all the people who she might have pissed off in the past. There was that girl in junior high school who missed valedictorian by getting an A minus in a class Safire got an A in. She’d always blamed Safire because when they studied together before the test, Safire had made a mistake in one of the molecular weights. During the actual test, Safire had realized her mistake and gotten the answer correctly, but her friend had not. Where was she now?

  Then there were the people in her graduate program who thought she got the plum assignments from her advisor. A fellow student even accused her of sleeping with her advisor to get the grant that led to her Ph.D. thesis.

  Once she arrived at Thrive, she must have displaced other designers. Mitch hadn’t seemed to mind that Dex had given her the new project since he was working on World of Thieves II, but Regina never warmed up to her.

  Safire wondered if there something about her bearing that made people feel she was aloof and standoffish. Was that why even the receptionist never smiled when she walked by? Meanwhile, she had reserved her biggest, most flirtatious smiles and batting eyelashes for Gunner Gibson.

  Which brought Safire all the way back to Gunner.

  Which was he? Fire_Hunter or Guns4Roses? Or both?

  Her head ached, and tears welled from under her eyelids. Once again, she’d been duped by a man she so freely gave her affection to. Once again, she’d been bitten by infatuation, not taking the time to sit back and bide her time—the way Clarissa did with her suitors, until she found fault with them and dumped them.

  A hurried knocking rattled her door, snapping Safire from her dark thoughts. If this was Clarissa, she’d have a lot to say to her.

  She strode to the door, her fists swinging, and yanked it open.r />
  Gunner Gibson stood there dressed in a leather hunter’s costume complete with faux skin cape and a bouquet of light pink roses in his hand. He was grinning as if he’d won the lottery.

  Safire moved to slam the door, but Gunner wedged his body in and shut the door behind him.

  “Dex caught Fire_Hunter. Everything’s okay.” He shoved the roses in her hands. “I’m Guns4Roses, and everything we said to each other’s avatars is true. I fell in love with you while hunting bullies, and I missed you so much when you disappeared. That’s when I got the idea of hiring Clarissa to be my publicist and thinking of a way to ask you out. I know I was wrong to try and cheat for Jake. It turns out he didn’t need it, and Clarissa wasn’t able to hack into your account. She didn’t do anything. Jake did it all by himself.”

  “Wait, wait, slow down.” Safire trembled, dropping a few stems of roses. “Where’s my sister? Was she behind all this?”

  Gunner bent and picked up the loose stems. His face was grim as he nodded. “I don’t know why she did this, but maybe it’s the breakup from Alan or all the stress she’s under.”

  “Where is she right now? I can’t get ahold of her.”

  “She’s going to be exposed soon. Dex went to Central Park to meet her, to give her a so-called reward.”

  “But, why? I can’t believe she’d do this to me.”

  “I’m sorry. I don’t know the answer.”

  Gunner guided Safire to the kitchen table. He emptied the wilted roses from the pitcher and put fresh water into it. Gently, he took the bouquet of roses and arranged them in the pitcher. “I didn’t get you red because I don’t deserve to be your lover. I got you blush pink to tell you how sorry I am, and I hope you’ll forgive me.”

  Safire’s knees felt weak and she couldn’t breathe. She palmed her hand over her eyes and sighed loudly. “I forgive you, but I feel like a chump. So easy to forgive. Easy to believe. Easy to get taken advantage of.”

  “You’re anything but easy, except easy to love.” Gunner wrapped his arms around her, and she melted. If he was really Guns4Roses, then she loved him already. She was already friends with him, even though she didn’t know his real identity.