Free Fierce Player (Sierra Pride Book 4) by Liza Street Page A

after his brother Gabriel. Maverick usually asked questions first, and puzzled out a problem before resorting to violence.
    Something about this girl, though, made him feel irrational.
    And maybe that irrationality had him reading things into situations that weren’t even situations. Maybe the nontraditional student was seriously browsing a copy of Useless Inventions of the Twenty-first Century . Maybe the nontraditional student wasn’t sending occasional glances toward the girl. Maybe he wasn’t twitching every time her chair squeaked, as if he planned to follow her as soon as she left.
    Maverick pretended to be hunting for a place for Game Developing for N00bs , even though he’d already passed its spot five minutes ago. The girl continued to talk, worrying over things like danger, and attacks, and people waiting in alleys.
    Other than her scent of springtime, he couldn’t detect any fear, but the ceilings were high and the room was large—if she was mildly afraid, he wouldn’t be able to smell her fear until he got much closer to her.
    Damn, she was beautiful. Her face was nicer-looking when she didn’t have her nose wrinkled at him, and he liked her piercings—on the ear he could see beneath her mop of pink and white hair, she had a tiny gauge in the bottom and a series of studs going all the way to the top. He wanted to nibble on those earrings.
    He caught himself staring and looked once more to the bookcase. He didn’t want her to catch him ogling her. Bad enough that he was already a freak among humans; it made no sense whatsoever to call extra attention to himself.
    Plus, she was already paranoid about something—the last thing he wanted to do was add to her stress.

Chapter Two
    It wasn’t always easy finding a semi-public place to work on her games, and it was getting harder and harder when jerk-offs like the handsome asshole librarian came in to spoil Kate’s fun.
    He’d been looking at her off and on for the past five minutes, as if working up the nerve to tell her to end her call. She didn’t have the patience for him or his damn fine blue eyes and cute, spiky brown hair. It was Friday night, and next week there were no classes because of Thanksgiving. The library was nearly empty. There was no one else in the room until he came along—who could she possibly be bothering by being on the phone?
    He was facing her, but still across the room, so Kate whispered, “Great, the hot librarian is going to shut me down.”
    Trina laughed. Encouraged, Kate continued, “It’s fucking Gamergate, library edition.”
    Then she froze in horror when he turned slightly to look at her. He seemed to be fighting off a frown.
    He couldn’t possibly have heard her.
    She waited while he went back to shelving books, feeling bad about the Gamergate comment. Probably he only wanted her to be quiet. In the library. Because people were supposed to be quiet in the library—there were even signs posted about no cell phone usage. She didn’t need to be such a jerk about it.
    Trina chattered about the platform horror game she was working on, and Kate mostly listened, watching the librarian from the corner of her eye. He straightened, his gaze going back beyond the bookcase he stood at, and for once it seemed like his attention wasn’t on Kate.
    She took the moment to check him out more closely. He was hot—super hot. Lanky, yes, and his limbs looked almost too long for his body. It wasn’t usually her style in a guy, but he was well-muscled, and for a second she imagined running her fingers over those muscles while standing up on tiptoe for a kiss.
    Maybe she could write his character into her game. The hero—or maybe the king at the end that the heroine was trying to save. That might work.
    Ha. She was checking out the librarian. Maybe it was time for her to move past her last break-up. Stupid Cory, as Trina called him. Sure, Cory wasn’t super intelligent, and that had made his attempt to cover up his cheating