They were settled on Griffin's couch after a dinner of tacos when Griffin mused, "You know a lot about me now, Beverly."

Beverly looked up from her laptop in bewilderment; she was settled on one side of the couch, stretched along the cushions so her sock-clad feet rested in Griffin's lap. He'd been rubbing her feet for the past thirty minutes while she worked on her coding, and the sudden break of the silence startled her.

"Okay . . .?"

Where's he going with this?

"I don't really know a lot about you." a familiar sheepish, almost scared look crawled up his face, and he rolled his shoulders twice. "I'd like to know more. If you want to tell me, I mean. Otherwise, it's fine."

She couldn't stop an amused smile from crawling across her face. How adorable he was, this man who could go from being intimidating and secretive to shy and nervous in less than a minute. "It's okay, Griffin, I don't mind. What do you want to know?"

His smile was grateful when he managed to meet her eyes again. "Tell me how you got into computers?"

Beverly's grin widened. "Ah, now this is something I can talk about." she moved her feet off his lap, internally cooing when he pouted at the loss of her; the expression vanished when she curled up against him, pulling his tattoo-covered arm over her shoulders and pressing into his side.

"When my grandparents were still alive, my family visited them every couple of months, since they didn't live too far from us. Now, both of my grandparents worked at a research station, but they were more math-orientated than anything.

"Grandma was fascinated with all the video games coming out, though. She always told me, 'Beverly, I cannot believe all of this; the first Gameboy didn't come out till I was in my thirties, you know?'" Griffin chuckled, pulling her hands into his and letting his fingertips dust across her own.

"So, when I got my first Gameboy at ten, Grandma was the first person I told. She was excited, but she didn't know how to use it; I showed her, and she told me that I would make a great programmer.

"I asked her why, and she said, 'Well, you'll be able to show everyone else how to use this stuff by the time your twelve, so you might as well start making programs of your own by the time your fifteen. Sound good?' I thought she was crazy, at the time, but when I turned fifteen, I had already made my own computer game. Grandparents are a lot wiser than we give them credit for."

Griffin pressed a gentle kiss against the back of her hand. "At least I know where you got your brains," he teased softly. "I like that story. What was your first computer game?"

Beverly pulled her hands from his and hid her face, feeling her cheeks heat up. "I don't want to talk about that part," she moaned in feigned agony. "That part isn't any good."

Laughing her favorite laugh of his (the deep belly-laugh that spoke of his utter joy and echoed off the walls of his apartment), Griffin shifted his arm and pulled her fingers from her eyes, his own sparkling with mischief. "Now I have to know," he prodded. "Come on, Beverly, what was it?"

She blew out a huff and looked away. "I'm not saying."

"Beverly," his husky whisper blew against the shell of her ear, and she practically flew off the couch. "Tell me."

Squealing, she scrambled backwards. "No!" she giggled when he snatched her around the waist and settled her in his lap. "I think I liked you better when you were awkward and couldn't talk to me," she joked, prodding at his cheek with her finger.

Griffin darted his gaze away. "We're not talking about my embarrassing moments, we're talking about yours." His expression grew more serious, and she could see now why he wanted to know; like her with him, he wanted to understand everything about her, even the seemingly insignificant things. "Tell me about the game."

Beverly released a low breath, her eyes flittering about his face, her fingers dancing through his long hair. "It's stupid," she warned.

"I don't care." He fired back, and they both knew he'd won.

"Okay, fine." Staring resolutely at a spot over his shoulder, she mumbled, "It was called, 'Just Peachy,' and the player was a peach that fell off a tree and rolled down a hill; the player had to keep the peach from running into things and get it to the bottom of the hill safely, where it could be plucked up by a farmer and made into a delicious peach cobbler."

A glance at him out of her peripheral vision showed him struggling to keep a smile off his face. "What happened if they ran into something?"

Accepting her fate, she settled her head on his shoulder, glancing at him and sighing, "Then the peach got bruised. They had three chances, and—if they used all of them—the screen would flash, 'Game Over' right above the picture of a bruised peach with 'x' eyes and a tongue sticking out . . ."

Griffin laughed again, and she had to pick her head off his shoulders because they were moving so much. "Shush!" she scolded, but her own lips drifted upwards. That laugh of his was nothing if not infectious.

When he had calmed, his eyes looked deep into hers, as though he were reading through every single one of her thoughts. "You are my favorite thing," he declared after a moment, and Beverly had to work to stop a gasp from escaping.

Holy frick-frack.

When her brain started working again, she smiled shyly and replied, "You're my favorite thing, too."

He grinned crookedly, turning her heart into a pile of mush. "Does that mean I can call you 'Peach,' if I want? It seems appropriate."

"Griffin!" she cried, mortified, untangling her arms from his neck and trying to scramble away from him.

Griffin's hands landed on her waist, his large fingers spanning along her hips and backside. The mood in the room shifted from playful to sensual in a second; Griffin caught her eyes for a beat, smiled slightly, then bent forward and claimed her lips with his hungrily.

Beverly relaxed into him instantly, her fingers moving from his chest back up into his hair, tugging at the strands. Griffin groaned, then shifted them on the couch so she was settled back against the cushions. He used one hand to hold himself up, while the other ran along her side, dusting against her stomach and making her squirm at the ticklish sensation.

He did it again, and Beverly broke away with a breathless laugh. "That tickles," she mumbled, pressing her lips against his cheek.

Griffin smirked, and—this time—Beverly knew exactly what the expression promised. "Don't!" she warned, but Griffin was already wiggling his fingers against her side, his lips twisting into a smile when she started squealing with laughter.

"Gri-ffin!"

"Beverly," he mocked, pulling his fingers from her shirt when she could no longer breathe through the laughs. Bobbing backwards, he pulled her up gently by her arms, switching their positions so he was lying down on the couch with her nestled against his side.

When he blew out a gratified breath, it brushed against her hair, and she asked, "Good?"

Now it was his turn to chuckle. "That's my line," he replied. "But yeah, I'm good. Do you need to go back to your dorm tonight?"

Beverly thought about Deb and the drugs she'd found on campus, then compared the possibilities attached to those factors to spending the night with Griffin in his apartment, safe and snuggled into his side. She'd have to leave early to get her stuff before class, but it would be worth it.

"Nah," she pressed a sleepy kiss to his clothed shoulder, "I'm fine right here."

She didn't have to see him to know he was smiling. "Me too."