22. Ryan #3
My brain waits until the sun comes up to start second-guessing. Why I can’t just let myself enjoy this, I have no idea, but here I am, determined to find something wrong. The only time those thoughts go quiet is when we’re messing around. When I’ve got him fastened to some part of me.
Out of a sense of self-preservation, I get out of bed before he wakes.
I shower alone. I know I’m running the risk of pissing him off or hurting his feelings, but once again, I feel the need to scale this back.
This meaning whatever’s going on between us.
I need time to process and think, and whether he realizes it or not, he needs it at least as much as I do.
I’ve never been the impulsive one of the two of us, and I can’t shake the sense he’s headed for some kind of crisis over his sexuality. What he told me last night makes sense—the dots connect—but sometimes what we physically enjoy isn’t what we need to live a happy life.
Sometimes, it’s the exact opposite.
He does look annoyed when he wakes up to find me fully dressed and working at my desk, but he takes himself to the shower without complaint and emerges walking only a little funny. “Has Stephanie been out?”
“Yeah,” I tell him. “And I got you a smoothie.”
“You did? ”
“It’s in the fridge.”
He frowns but leaves the bedroom. When he returns, he’s slurping the hell out of the peanut butter banana smoothie I knew he’d like. “This is amazing.”
“You’re welcome.”
“What are you working on?”
“Ideas for the YouTube. Do you know how hard it is to make 401Ks entertaining?”
“That’s what you want to talk about?” he asks, taking a seat on the beanbag chair. I notice he’s leaning on his left hip, like his hole hurts. I scowl at that but return my gaze to the computer screen. Why does he want it if it hurts?
Why do I care if he has a sore ass? I certainly didn’t give a fuck last night. But I was careful, wasn’t I?
Maybe I have some things to learn about anal sex. It’s not like I’ve ever done it before. Already dreading that Reddit search.
I answer his question. “I mean, I know people are looking to get rich quick, but we’re trying to give good advice, right?”
“Could we do like a good cop bad cop thing?”
“Meaning what?” I ask.
“Like you hand out conservative money-making strategies, and I counter with ‘but if you wanna make a few bucks fast…’ That kind of thing.”
“You want people to watch us arguing?”
“You asked how to make it entertaining.”
“I guess,” I mumble, making a note on my ever-growing spreadsheet. “I should send this to Bailey.” I also need to mention the conversation I had with Miguel, but since I haven’t heard from him this weekend, maybe things have smoothed out between him and his team.
“How soon do you think she’ll want us to get started?” Mal asks.
“Soon,” is my guess. If we’re going to build off the TikTok momentum—especially now that Piper’s getting her hands into it—we need to diversify our audience before someone else comes along and starts doing what we’re doing better.
Not that I’m worried that person will be Piper, but the more attention we get, the more people will hop on the trend.
“We have to establish dominance,” I say.
“You shouldn’t have any problem with that,” he says, making it sound loaded.
“Yeah, well…we both know you can take me.”
Mal laughs, and I slide a glance his direction.
He looks incredible. The smile. The wet hair.
My t-shirt hugging his chest and a pair of sweats I don’t remember having.
He must have really been digging through the drawers.
His exposed ankles and bare feet catch my attention.
I think I might have a fetish or something. I drool for the sight of his skin.
While I consider whether I want to tackle him and pin him to the bed, both our phones ping with a message from our group text with Bailey.
I open mine first and see the TikTok link.
This time, Piper stitched one of my videos.
Mal and I watch as she pointedly uses a makeup blender and picks apart my explanation of the commodities market in laymen’s terms. She dismisses it as simplistic and once again tries to make herself sound smarter by using fifty-cent words and speaking way over the heads of a TikTok audience.
“What the fuck is this?” Malcolm asks. “Are they doing the same thing?”
I forgot he didn’t know about this. “I think it’s just Piper. I’m trying to talk Bailey into picking her off.”
“You told Bailey you wanted her to put makeup on?”
I laugh. “No.” I explain my idea about skin care and involving Calyx.
“When do I get to meet Calyx?” Mal asks .
“You want to?”
“You talk about him all the time,” he says with a pout in his voice.
“I don’t actually think I do.”
“Do you think he’s hot?” he asks.
I try to hide my smile. “I think he’s confusing.”
“Because he looks like a girl?”
“He doesn’t, though. That’s why it’s confusing. Do you think he’s hot?”
Mal makes a dismissive sound. “No. Not my type.”
“You have a type now?”
He cocks his head and stares at me.
“Is it the tattoos or the shoulders?” I ask, making the decision to enjoy this.
“Neither.”
“Then what?”
“I’m not telling you why you’re attractive,” he says. “Dream on.”
“You wanna know why you are? Would that help?”
He laughs. “No.”
“It’s your nipples,” I say.
He grabs the nearest pillow and tosses it at me. I catch it easily and stand, tossing it back before I tackle him to the bed. He struggles, sort of—as much as a person can when his natural instinct seems to be to wrap his legs around my waist.
I kiss him hard, driving his head into the mattress as I grind my cock against his. We’re both half-hard already, and as we kiss, it only takes a few seconds to form full erections.
“I should message Bailey,” I say when I break away to take a breath.
“You’re thinking about Bailey right now?”
“Just wanna stay on track. Money’s not gonna make itself. ”
He grabs my ass and makes me thrust against him, gnawing at my chin with his teeth. “I didn’t throw myself onto the bed.”
“But you were asking for it.”
“I wasn’t.”
I shove up his shirt, exposing his chest. “You were making me think about your nipples.”
He laughs and then yelps when I bite down on one. Soothing the sting with my tongue, I rub my cock against his relentlessly. Our phones ping with the group text again, but we ignore them in favor of moving further up the bed and shedding our clothes.