Chapter Ten
KIERAN WAS TRYING real fucking hard to be normal as he drove down the highway, but he was pretty sure he was failing.
“Is it nice to have an off week before the last big games?” Sammie was on her third attempt to start up a conversation. Kieran feared he wasn’t going to get any participation medals.
It had been the same the night before, when they’d hung out with their friends at Atticus’ house.
He and Sammie had talked, but no more than normal.
Not a word was spoken about their new business venture, their “collaborative efforts,” as Atticus had put it when he’d been trying his best to make both of them squirm.
Kieran had to try harder, because the woman in his passenger seat was starting to fidget, the awkward tension between them turning palpable as the sun slowly set on the horizon.
“A little,” he finally said, one hand leaving the wheel to scratch his beard. “Practices this week were solid. Lots of excitement building around the tournament. It’s nice to be able to squeeze in some extra prep time. But it also gives room for nerves to grow.”
“Attie?” Sammie asked, glancing over at him.
Kieran chuckled. “He’s no more nervous than usual. His moods are infectious, I don’t know what the team would do without him. Bowen and Eric, they’re great for keeping things positive. But your brother can be bright as the sun, and we need that when the season is on the line like this.”
Kieran could see Sammie’s smile growing from the corner of his eye. It took everything in him to stay focused on the road. She tucked her hair back, leaning closer, and the image of that same hair cascading past her shoulders in the mirror popped into his head.
The way her storm cloud eyes had bored into him as she’d rocked in his lap, stripping him bare in a way he’d never felt before.
The warmth of her gaze, a warmth he now found himself seeking out.
None of it made sense to him. Not the way thinking about their video made his heart beat faster, not the way it felt as though his blood had gone bubbly in his veins.
Sexual attraction came easy to Kieran, but this was different.
He’d never fixated on being with someone the way he already was with Sammie.
He couldn’t wait for the next chance they’d have to make something new for his channel—now their channel.
It had been heady, exciting, filling Kieran with an anticipation he’d never felt before.
The rush of emotions that he wasn’t used to, it was overwhelming, addicting… but it was also strangely comfortable. He’d known Sammie for so long, and even if they weren’t as close as they’d been as kids, she had never been a stranger to him.
His phone lit up where he had it propped on the dashboard. “Would you mind answering her?” He knew it was his mother, even if he didn’t let his eyes linger on the screen.
Sammie grabbed his phone, typing in the passcode as he rattled the numbers off. Another of her smiles lit up his periphery.
“She wants to know if you’re getting close,” Sammie said, chuckling lightly. “Does she know I’m with you?”
Ah. In the end, he hadn’t told his parents he was bringing Sammie down with him. Not out of shame or embarrassment, but simply because he’d had a busy week and didn’t want to deal with the inevitable deluge of not-so-subtle questions he knew his mother would hound him with.
“You can let her know if you want,” Kieran said. Sammie nodded, still smiling gently as she typed out a reply. Before she had a chance to place his phone back on the dash, several pings went off in quick succession. Kieran sighed.
“What did she say?”
“Uh.” A laugh escaped Sammie. “A lot, actually. The gist of it is that you’re in trouble for springing this on her at the last second, but it’s fine because she just washed the linens on the spare bed.
” She clicked the phone off and put it down, and Kieran could feel a slight change in the air between them, a new tension.
“What else did she say?” He turned to face Sammie, locking his gaze on her. She began to pick at one of her thumbnails, and a small ache swelled in Kieran’s chest.
Sammie chewed her lip for a moment before speaking. “Eyes on the road.” The words were teasing, but still tinted with hesitance. Kieran raised a brow before doing as she said, his grip tight on the wheel.
“She congratulated you.” A pause, and Kieran could see from the corner of his eye that she was still picking at that nail. “She seemed to assume this means we’re…” Sammie waved her hands in the air in a defeated motion. “Together. Or something.”
Or something. The truth of that would probably send his mother to an early grave. “I’ll talk to her when we get there,” he began. “Mom gets ahead of herself sometimes. She means well.”
“I know she does.” Sammie’s hands fell into her lap, and before she could start up her nail picking again he reached over.
She tensed under his grip as he laced their fingers together.
Kieran resolutely ignored the fact that the motion felt right, that reaching out and holding Sammie’s hand didn’t fill him with anything but that comfortable, anticipatory warmth that he’d been left with from the moment she’d walked out of his apartment two days earlier.
Several heartbeats passed, and Kieran began to wonder if he’d made a mistake, if he’d read the situation wrong.
Sure, Sammie had told him what they were doing was fine.
She’d agreed to his terms and had sent him a picture of her signed contract the night before.
She knew that what they were doing didn’t constitute anything more between them.
Even still… There was a small amount of worry, wriggling in the back of his mind, whispering that he was only going to hurt her in the end.
Kieran was ready to pull away, to let go of her warmth, when Sammie finally relaxed.
Her fingers wove between his as she leaned so that their forearms were pressed together, sending sparks along Kieran’s skin.
“So,” she said tentatively. “What are you going to say to her?” Kieran knew where she was going with that question, but he didn’t have an answer yet, and his silence seemed enough permission for her to continue.
“We haven’t really… talked about that. Atticus knows, and Kai, but does your family know? ”
“No.” She was right, Kieran knew she was right, they did need to talk about it, before they reached his childhood home and were inundated with questions. And he wasn’t one to steer clear of the hard conversations.
“I don’t want them to know, if you’re okay with keeping it a secret,” he said, squeezing her hand.
“I’m not sure how dad would react, but mom…
” He glanced over, meeting Sammie’s intense stare.
Her brow was furrowed with concern. It stokes the embers in Kieran’s gut.
“Mom wouldn’t take it well. She’s come around on a lot of things over the years, but her only kid doing sex work? ”
“I won’t say anything to them.” Sammie offered a small shrug. “I know what that’s like. The fear that their love will be conditional.”
Hearing it put that way, knowing that Sammie had ever felt it as well, it fucking sucked.
“It’s hard.” Kieran held onto Sammie’s hand, letting it tether him as he found words that he’d never before given voice to. “Knowing that something about yourself, something you love, has to stay hidden just to keep the peace.”
“It’s the unknown of it that has always scared me most. I was always so afraid to tell my granny who I really was.
I hid girlfriends from her. But the worst part is that I’ll never know if she would have come around.
If she would have figured out a way to love that part of me too.
I never worked up the courage to find out. ”
Kieran let her words sink in, a silence stretching between them that felt loaded, but not uncomfortable.
Would his mother be fine with what he was doing?
No, Kieran couldn’t see that ever being the case.
But what if Sammie was right? What if he told his parents about his sex work, and they accepted it?
He didn’t need them to sing his praises, he just needed them to be okay with the decisions he made for himself.
“I don’t think I’m ready to find that out for myself this weekend.” He flashed a small grin, and Sammie chuckled.
“Can’t say I blame you.” She squeezed his hand back, relaxing into the touch.
“So.” Kieran sucked in a breath, steeling himself. “Are you still feeling okay about the video?” About what we did together?
Sammie hesitated, so long that Kieran began to worry. What if she’d changed her mind? What if putting herself out there with Kieran, showing strangers something she’d never shared before, what if it had been too much?
Kieran hoped that wasn’t so, even if it was another thing he wasn’t ready to say it out loud.
“I love it,” she finally said. Her eyes were fixed forward, watching the road disappear beneath their wheels.
“I get a rush every time I watch it back.” Kieran raised his brows, glancing over and pulling a blush from Sammie as she narrowed her eyes.
“Not like that. It just feels so… liberating. Like I have power I didn’t realize was there.
Every time someone comments, asking for more, I can feel my ego triple in size. ”
Kieran laughed. “Well, at least you’re self aware.”
“Don’t you feel it too?” She was grinning now, wide and bright, turning toward him as she tucked one leg up into her seat. “Doesn’t it make you feel good, knowing how people react to seeing you like that?”
She was right, it did send a thrill arcing down Kieran’s spine every time a stranger on the internet asked him for more. But Kieran hadn’t had anyone to talk to about it all in so long, not since he’d left Seattle. Sammie was putting to words things he’d kept to himself for years.
“It always catches me by surprise,” he began. “The rush of feelings after I hit post. Society has been hardwired for so long to look down on sex work, so it took me a lot of time to feel the pride without the guilt.” He paused, glancing over at her. “You’re already leagues ahead of me there.”
Sammie shrugged. “I think it’s great. You’re—we’re—doing something that makes people happy. We’re doing it ethically. We’re good at it.”
“Ah.” Kieran chuckled. “There’s the ego. You’re as bad as Atticus.”
“We come by it honestly.”
“I’m glad you asked me to do this with you,” he said, sobering.
His heartbeat picked up as he spoke, racing in a way that made his limbs feel tingly and numb.
“I wasn’t sure if it was a good idea, at first.” He paused, turning the wheel with one hand as they approached his parents’ driveway.
He held onto her hand, his grip firm, even as he parked and the engine went silent.
It was a pretty night, cloudless, an orange glow fading along the horizon.
“But you’re right,” he continued, turning in his seat.
“We’re good at this. We can make something special here.
” Kieran paused, lifting her hand, rubbing a finger over her knuckles, holding her gaze steady.
He could tell it was hard for her, the prolonged eye contact, the thickness of the air between them.
He never knew how long was too long, when to break eye contact and look away.
Sammie had gone still, watching him with something unreadable in her expression.
Maybe, like her brother, she liked to put on a confident front.
Maybe their partnership made her more nervous than she wanted to let on.
Regardless, Kieran needed to be the steady one.
Steady was something he understood. Steady was something he was good at.
“Now.” He dropped her hand, reaching up to ruffle her hair. She let out a squawking noise, batting his hand away. “We’re going to go in there, and act super normal around my parents, not like we just posted a video of us dry humping on the internet.”
“Don’t just say it like that!” Sammie buried her head in her hands, but after a moment she nodded, lifting her face, one corner of her lips tilting up.
“Okay. Yeah. I’m good with that.” She laughed, a breathy, relieved sound.
“But we still haven’t decided what we are going to tell your family.
Your mom seems to think us showing up together means something is going on. ”
Kieran shrugged, finally letting her hand go as he moved to get out of the truck. “Maybe I’ll just tell her to mind her own business this time.”
“I’m sure that will go over really well.”
They were interrupted by barking as Chewie ran at them. Kieran could see the silhouettes of both his parents standing on the porch. He braced himself for the inevitable barrage he and Sammie were both about to face.
His parents loved Sammie. And they just wanted him to be happy. What was the worst that could happen?