Swallowing a mournful groan, she ended the kiss before things got out of hand. Much more of that and her favorite Rice University T-shirt would be on the floor, along with the rest of her clothes.

“Bathroom,” Samiah said against his lips. She gave his firm ass a squeeze and pat. “Get the cupcakes.”

She went down the hallway and opened the first door on the left.

And stopped short.

It looked like the cockpit of a spaceship. Four huge monitors and equally huge computer towers occupied two L-shaped desks that stood flush against each other. There were enough peripherals to stock a discount computer store.

“Not that one,” Daniel called as he rushed to her. The excitable edge to his voice was…new. He reached around her and pulled the door closed. “Sorry,” he said. “That’s my roommate’s. He works from home.”

“As what, Captain Kirk’s right-hand man? And where does he sleep? It’s only a two-bedroom apartment, right?” She hooked a thumb at the closed door. “I didn’t see a bed in there.”

“He sleeps on the sofa. The freelance work he does requires a lot of equipment, so much that it doesn’t leave room for a bed.”

“That’s…umm…weird. But okay.”

He shrugged. “He is weird, but he’s a nice guy.”

Her Spidey senses went on red alert. “You didn’t find him on Craigslist or something like that, did you? I know you’re still fairly new to Austin. Finding a roommate on short notice couldn’t have been easy.”

“I didn’t find him on Craigslist.” His laugh was more relaxed. “He’s the brother of a buddy of mine from the Marines.”

Well, that explained it. It was his nature to do for others, even if it meant living with his friend’s weird brother who’d rather sleep on a couch than reduce his computer usage by a monitor or two.

He directed her to the bathroom. Once done, Samiah returned to the living room to find a plate with several quartered cupcakes and two glasses of milk.

“You really do think of everything, don’t you?” she said, pointing to the dessert spread. “And they all look evenly divvied up.”

He raised his hands. “Hey, I’m not risking getting cut over cupcakes. We each have equal portions.”

She burst out laughing as she reclaimed her spot on the sofa. She unfolded two paper napkins and gently placed one in each of their laps.

“Okay, so how are we going to do this? Do we try the same flavors at the same time, or alternate and give our opinions?”

“Alternate,” he said. “You can be the guinea pig for the peppered bacon and chocolate one.”

“What? You don’t think that sounds good?”

“Not even a little bit.”