Chapter 39
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
FINN
I can tell Curtis is nervous, so I don’t push as he climbs out of bed and comes back with his tablet. We settle back against the pillows as he opens his program and his book loads onto the screen.
“I don’t know if this will go anywhere,” he points out. “I wrote it for me, mostly. Because I thought it was fun, but …” He swipes across to the first page and—
“What the fuck,” I burst as I take the tablet and stare at it in wide-mouth awe.
Everyone has told me that Curtis is good, but this is next-level.
There’s so much detail and skill, and I’m sure many other things I can’t name because I’m shit at art.
He’s shown me something he worked on before, but it was nothing like this.
The talent here is mind-blowing, and if this isn’t made into a book, I’m going to knock on those publishers’ doors myself and demand to know why.
Or at least, I would, if I were a confrontational guy. In reality, I’ll just want to really badly.
Curtis is silent beside me as I flick from page to page, not even reading it because I’m so blown away by his art.
“Can you send this to me?” I ask in what I hope is a normal voice and not the voice of a man falling even deeper in love. I mean, look at this talent! And the man it belongs to wants me?
The day that I stop being impressed by him will be the day I’m dead.
“You don’t have to act—”
“No, I seriously want to read it.”
He bites the inside of his cheek, and his hazel eyes lift to mine. “You’d be the first one.”
“And now I doubly want to read.”
He’s grinning as he takes the tablet and sets it on his nightstand. Then he lies against my chest, and I wrap my arms around him. He’s here. Close and warm, every breath matching mine. I’m struggling to wrap my head around the fact that this is happening.
“So kids, huh?” Curtis asks.
My short laugh lets out a lot of the tension I’ve been bottling up. “One day. Normally, it would be too soon to think about things like that, but Money Shot adds an extra level to our relationship. I’d rather think ahead and be prepared than go in blind.”
“That makes sense. I can’t give you an end date though.”
“Which is okay too,” I say, maybe too enthusiastically.
I don’t want to leave Curtis with any doubts because I support him, and with so many people wanting him when I’m the only one who gets to have him is, I won’t lie, pretty hot.
But I also know the loneliness Gunner helped fill for me, and while I know the majority watching don’t feel that way, if one person does, I want him to give them that.
“If you do this forever, I’m on board. I hear the market for eighty-something-year-olds is wide-open. ”
“Give me fifty years and I’ll have it cornered.”
I’m confident that Curtis will be as sexy fifty years from now, and that proves how far I’ve fallen for him.
My fingers run up and down his spine as we hold each other in comfortable silence.
Surprisingly, I’m not the one to break it.
“So what next?” Curtis asks.
“What do you mean?”
“Tonight’s been a blur, and we’ve spoken a few times, but is this dating? Boyfriends?”
“Do we need to do the whole dating thing? I know how I feel about you. I know what I want.”
“What do you want?”
I shift so that Curtis props up and I can see his face. “Forever. That might be too soon to say, but what’s the point of getting into a relationship if you can’t see it lasting? I’m not someone who plays games, so you’re going to know how I feel. If that’s too much for you …”
He purses his lips, head shaking slowly while he thinks. “It’s not too much. It’s an adjustment. Bottling up feelings and running at the first sight of them is my default, so it’s uncomfortable, but a good uncomfortable. If that makes sense.”
“It does.”
“And I want to be boyfriends with you.”
That lights up something deep in my chest. “I want that too.”
“You know,” he says, smirk taking over his features.
“Alfie mentioned last night that if I wasn’t interested, he was going to make a pass at you, and I swear I wanted to jump over the table and tackle him to the floor.
I think that was the moment that it clicked with me that there was no going back.
Even with my exes, I didn’t do the jealousy thing because I didn’t let myself get that emotionally attached. You were like a sleeper agent.”
“That’s the coolest thing anyone has ever called me.”
He leans in, lips gently brushing mine, and I give him a second before I deepen the kiss.
There’s no getting enough of him. Curtis has so many parts that make him up as a person, and I’ve barely scratched the surface of learning them all.
So confident, but deeply vulnerable. Fun and happiness wrapped around the damaged center his parents left behind.
Full of love for Beth and David with none saved for himself.
This is my person.
So yes, I want to keep him forever. There’s no hiding it from him.
His tongue swipes mine one more time before he pulls back and cuddles into my chest.
“I’m beat,” he murmurs. “I’m not used to all this emoting.”
I hug him tighter and drop a kiss on top of his hair. “Sleep. We have plenty of time to talk about things.”
“Forever …” he whispers like he’s testing out the word.
He can test it for as long as he needs to.
“I don’t know,” I say, jumping up to sit on Melanie’s kitchen counter as David and Curtis argue over the best way to cook potatoes. “It feels like it went really well.”
The interview with Ellie at the nursing home was easy.
We already had a rapport from the times we’ve spoken about Beth, and instead of sitting across a desk from her, we spent the interview walking around the place.
It’s exactly the type of facility I can see myself working at.
Big, open lawns, lots of activities, a slower, laid-back pace instead of people rushing around like every second matters.
Because in Emergency, it sometimes does.
“I’ll keep putting good thoughts out there for you.”
“Thanks. If I don’t get it though, there are other places I can apply.” Money Shot has really taken the pressure off, and I know that wherever I end up, it will be because I want to be there.
“It would be good for Mom to have a familiar face there,” David says, all but shoving Curtis out of the way as he takes over dinner. “No pressure, but it will make moving her there a lot easier.”
“From what I saw today, she’ll be really well looked after whether I’m there or not.”
“Holy shit!” explodes across the kitchen, and all three of us snap our attention to where Curtis is standing, staring at his phone, suddenly frozen.
“What’s wrong?” I ask around the spoon.
“Umm … I have an email. An email from the publisher.”
Oh. Holy shit is right.
He breaks out of his statue impression and crosses to me, shoving his phone in my hands. “I feel sick. You open it.”
“Me?”
“I can’t do it!”
“What makes you think I can?” It means so much to Curtis, so it means a lot to me as well. His happiness is my happiness, and reading that email with the potential that it isn’t good news … no. Nope. Can’t do it.
Then he gives me the eyes. The ones begging me to help him get through this moment, and I can’t ever say no to him when he needs me.
“Okay.” I clear my throat and try to hide how nervous for him I am as I lift the phone and click on the email.
There’s half a beat of expectation until my eyes land on the words that drop my hopes out through my ass.
… unsuccessful at this time.
I want to cry. I don’t, but I want to.
Somehow, I keep the heaping disappointment out of my voice as I say, “It’s a no.”
How could they?
“What?” Melanie snatches the phone from me, and David breaks into a rant about how stupid they are, but my attention is completely on Curtis.
A small line forms between his eyebrows as he stares across the kitchen, and I’m not sure whether to comfort him or give him a moment. I settle for giving his arm a squeeze.
Curtis snaps out of his thoughts. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
He manages a dry laugh. “It fucking sucks, and I’m fighting with myself not to let it get to me.”
“That’s fair.”
“But … it makes sense.”
“No it doesn’t,” David cuts in. “Your work is amazing.”
“Yeah, but so is a lot of other people’s.” Curtis’s voice grows with confidence. “And they’re usually rejected, too, because the numbers aren’t in our favor. There are so many submissions and only so many books published. This is normal. This is all part of it.”
While it’s all information he knows, it sounds more like he’s reminding himself than telling us.
“It’s a process,” I encourage him.
“Exactly.” He rubs at his chest almost without realizing it, and I hate that he’s hurting.
Hate that I can’t call the person on the other end of that email and urge them to reconsider.
This is the one area where I can’t protect him or fight for him though, and no matter how much I love him, it isn’t going to get him a book deal.
“Will you try again?”
There’s a pause while we wait for him to answer. “Yeah. I have to. I’ll send to more people this time, maybe some agents instead of direct to publishers, and I’ll keep working on something else. Maybe it won’t be this first one, but … it will be one. It has to be.”
Melanie hands his phone back, and David goes back to dinner while I pull Curtis my way.
“You are a very smart man,” I tell him.
“I’m not, but I’m trying to be.”
I drop my voice. “I’m sorry.”
“Me too.”
“David’s right that they wouldn’t know talent if it bit them in the ass. For what it’s worth.”
That pulls a small smile from him. “I love that you think that.”
“I’ll always be your number one fan.” I swipe my thumb over his jaw. “Have been since before we even met.”
“And if it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t have it in me to try again.”
“What do I have to do with it?”
“You’re proof that if I put myself out there, good things happen.”
This. This is why I love romance. How I make him feel good, and he does the same in return. Just a constant exchanging of love and support that fuels me like oxygen.
It’s hard not to believe in fate when I felt connected to him the first time I saw him through a screen. There’s no logical way I ever would have thought we’d end up here.
But we did.
We were both lost and trying to figure ourselves out when we met, and now we get to do those things together.
We’re building each other up, and I can’t wait to see what comes next.