her eyes relaxed, and she rose on tiptoe to press a kiss to his cheek. “Thank you,” she said softly before she moved inside.
Stef, trailing her friend, did the same, adding after her thanks, “She likes you.”
Ben winked, ushered her inside.
And then they went to dinner.
“What do you do?” Kate asked, as they sat around the table, beers and prickly pear margaritas in hand.
Stef’s gut seized, remembering the way he’d reacted that first night.
But tonight, Ben was relaxed, his mouth soft and curved when he shrugged. “I’m the CEO at Hunt Inc.”
There were raised brows all around, but Kate just smiled. “I loved the new movie. Did you have any part in that?”
He shook his head. “No. I just helped negotiate some of the distribution deal. Though I can’t even take credit for that. I’m just lucky to have great people working for me.”
“That’s why you looked familiar,” Kels said. “I read an article about you a couple of years ago. Didn’t you build the initial streaming platform yourself?”
Ben nodded. “As clunky as it was, I did. Luckily, I was able to bring on some engineers much better than I to perfect it, and they did such a great job that we were able to transition into creating our own content.” He chuckled. “I’m much better with contracts and ideas than the nitty-gritty of actual programming.”
Kels turned to Tanner. “He’s being modest. He actually revolutionized the delivery system. That’s why Hunt Inc. got so many users. Instead of the menus being so clunky, he streamlined it and made it very user-friendly—”
“We know it’s user-friendly,” Cora drawled. “That’s why we all use it.”
Stef bit back a smile as she studied Ben’s face, and she had the feeling that he was blushing. She squeezed his hand, opened her mouth to change the subject, but Kels kept talking.
“But how did you come up with that algorithm to suggest recommended content? It’s a freaking stroke of genius.”
“Um,” Ben said.
Kels kept going. “No, really. You’ve got to tell me how you came up with the idea for the source code. It’s so much better than—”
Tanner covered her mouth with his hand. “Nice to have you here, Ben.”
Kels’s eyes narrowed.
“Why don’t we let the poor man off the hot seat?”
“Yes, please,” Ben muttered.
“Seriously,” Cora said. “My brain is bleeding.”
Kate, nice as always, tried to turn the conversation to something else. “Tell me about work, Kels. Did you finish your project?”
Kels, the smartest one of them, was thankfully as excited enough about her latest project—something about improving the delivery system for one of RoboTech’s newest drone systems—to get off the topic of Ben’s algorithm she was lusting over.
Unfortunately, her project and subsequent explanation was just as dry.
Which meant that Heidi and Cora listened for about three seconds before pouncing on Stef.
“You owe me details,” Heidi said. “You’ve been avoiding telling me how you met Ben all week.”
She felt Ben look down at her, but she didn’t glance up.
She had been avoiding telling the story.
Not because she was embarrassed, but because having a How We Met story felt like they had a relationship, and then having a relationship—or the possibility of one—had her heart clenching and worry creeping in and—
Ben squeezed her hand.
“I met her outside of Bobby’s. We saw a movie and hit it off, and I’ve been trying to tempt her into spending as much time with me as possible.”
Cora grinned.
Heidi studied him closely. “Why do I feel like there’s more to the story?”
Because there was.
But she wasn’t going to share her breakdown three months before, nor the fact that she’d drunk messaged him on Tinder, nor that they’d only been seeing each other for a week.
It felt longer, and she supposed it was in a way.
In the past, when she had gone on a date with someone, she’d seen them once a week, maybe a couple times a month. Then they parted ways or moved up to twice a week.
She and Ben were on date . . . seven? Maybe eight or nine if she counted the full day on Saturday and Sunday as separate from the evenings.
Yes, she was grasping at straws.
Yes, it made her feel better to think that their time together was equivalent to two months of dating.
“Whatcha thinking?” Ben murmured.
She blinked, realized that Heidi had gotten pulled into conversation with Kate, Cora with Tammy, and Ben was staring down at her quizzically.
And his eyes were so pretty that she found herself blurting, “I was adding up our dates.”
He lifted a brow.
“We’ve