Name Your Price

Chapter 15

On Sunday morning, Olivia found herself riding the elevator up to Chuck’s apartment. It was the first time she’d returned to the scene of their breakup since it happened. This time, she wasn’t coming over to give him a piece of her mind. More like a piece of her heart. And three thousand of the best, most terrifying words she’d ever written.

When she’d pitched her idea to her boss Stephanie, she’d gotten near immediate and emphatic approval. She’d memorized Stephanie’s email and let the words bounce around her mind like a sugary little treat when she needed a boost of courage to remind herself that what she was doing was the right thing.

Yes. This is the hard-hitting piece I’ve been waiting for. I knew you had it in you, Olivia.

She ran the words through her mind once more as the elevator dinged and emptied her out into Chuck’s hallway. She hadn’t given him a heads-up that she was coming, but she knew he was home. Chelsea was still in town and had told her where to find him.

Olivia had worn a sundress and sandals and pulled her hair half back to contend with the warm day. She’d spritzed herself with perfume and painted her lips pink. Her heart nervously trilled as she stood at his door with her purse over her shoulder and an envelope in her hands. She knocked and held her breath.

A calm quiet hummed through the building. On a sunny weekend day, most residents were out at a farmer’s market or hiking or dining al fresco. According to Chelsea, Chuck was at home in his pajamas bingeing strawberry Pop-Tarts and Netflix.

When he eventually opened his front door, Olivia found him looking freshly showered and startled. His hair was damp and mashed and a few water droplets dotted his collarbone above his tee shirt’s neckline because he’d missed with the towel like he always did. Her knees wobbled and her heart walloped her ribs as if she needed a reminder how reflexive her desire for him was.

“Olivia. What are you doing here?”

“Hi. Can I come in?”

“Of course.” He didn’t hesitate for even one second.

She crossed into his living room and saw evidence of his despair. A small pile of dishes on the coffee table; empty bottles; a Pop-Tart box on its side, crumbs and wrappers leaking out; hoodies slung over the back of the couch. The tall windows on the opposite side of the room that normally let in a dazzling view of West Hollywood were at half-mast with their blinds pulled.

“Sorry,” Chuck said, and hurried to clean up. “I didn’t expect anyone to stop by.” He scooped up the dishes and bottles and wedged the Pop-Tart box under his elbow and hauled it all to the kitchen. He gathered up the hoodies and threw them down the hall toward his bedroom. “What’s up?” His embarrassment bled through his attempt to sound casual. He put his hands on his hips and gave her a cautious smile.

Olivia squeezed the flat envelope to her chest one last time, holding it close, before she extended it to him. “I have something for you—it’s not a challenge , don’t worry.” She gently smiled.

He took it with a curious tilt of his head. “What is it?” He undid the tab at the top and slid out the small stack of pages.

“It’s a profile on you. I finally wrote it.” She watched his eyes scan over the title and first few lines. Her heart quickened as his face flushed. He looked truly shocked.

“How did you…?” He sank down onto the couch like his legs might have been about to give out. He flipped the first page over.

“Your sister came to visit me,” Olivia said. “With Maddy.”

He sharply turned his head to look up at her. Worry bloomed over his face at the same time he went rigid with guilt.

“It’s okay, Chuck. I know the tabloid photos were not what they looked like. They told me everything about what happened—without violating the NDA, don’t worry. Mansi happened to be there for the whole thing, coincidentally. Turns out just because you can’t talk about any of this doesn’t mean that I can’t. So that’s what this is: the truth. Presented without any legal infractions.”

His lips twitched at her word choice, and hope spread over his face.

“It wasn’t fair to you, what Richard did. I got Maddy’s consent to tell the story, of course, and the legal team at Mix is ready to talk with Richard Sykes’s people about a statement, so all we really need is your buy-in.” She bit her lip and looked at him with a mix of hope and nerves. “Everyone thinks it’s a great piece, but I won’t publish it if you say no. It’s up to you.”

He swallowed hard and gazed back down at the pages. “Liv…”

She saw him start reading again and stepped aside to give him space. She’d nearly memorized the words, she’d read it so many times. It had to be perfect. For him.

The Chuck Walsh You Don’t Know

You probably know Chuck Walsh for the wrong reasons. The up-and-comer whose career derailed when he got fired midshoot from Richard Sykes’s blockbuster Safe Gamble . Or the guy from the viral breakup video seen arguing with his ex on the sidewalk who then ended up filming an episode of Name Your Price . What you don’t know is the truth behind Chuck’s reputation and the reasons why Hollywood wants to keep it that way…

She wandered over to the windows and lifted the blinds to let in more light. The street moved with life ten stories below: pedestrians, cars, dogs on leashes. The sense of being removed from it all, high up on a cloud with only Chuck where no one could reach them, made her suddenly dizzy.

While he kept reading, she moved into his kitchen and set about cleaning it up. On any other day, the stack of dirty dishes would have made her scream, but she loaded them into the dishwasher and turned it on. And then she wiped down the counters and watered the succulent she’d bought at a farmer’s market for him. The plump little spears stuck up from the green pot in a star shape. She was organizing a stack of mail on his granite island when she heard him clear his throat from behind her.

She turned with her heart stuttering, worried he might rip her piece in half and tell her to mind her own business, but she found him filling the kitchen doorway with the pages in one hand and a half smile on his face.

He bit his lip before he spoke. “Everyone is right: it’s a great piece.” His voice came out thick and gravelly. She noted a sheen to his eyes and felt something tight unfurl inside her chest.

“Yeah?” she asked, hopeful.

He joined her in the kitchen and set the pages on the island. Standing so close, she could smell his shampoo and the fresh, clean water still clinging to his skin like someone had bottled dewdrops on a spring day. He nodded. “Yeah. Thank you.”

The warmth in her chest continued to unfurl. It shot out into her limbs and lifted her head into the clouds. She moved toward him, involuntarily, but her body around Chuck had a mind of its own. He was a magnet, and she couldn’t resist.

He inched closer as well, and she felt the barriers they’d built between themselves tremble and threaten to fall. She felt his eyes outlining her lips as her pulse leapt in her neck, her wrists, between her legs. They had resisted for so long, and an uncertain future waited outside the door, but for now, they were together, just the two of them, above the clouds and existing in a moment that was, Olivia knew, inevitable.

“Chuck,” she whispered on an exhale. It was a plea, a warning. An admission that she wanted him badly enough that the consequences didn’t matter.

“Olivia,” he said in the same breathy, desperate, aching tone, and that was all it took.

With a final step, the walls came tumbling down.

He reached out and gripped the nape of her neck and tangled his fingers in her hair. Their mouths were together in an instant. Olivia could already hardly breathe.

“I missed you so fucking much,” he slurred against her lips as he swept his hands down to the backs of her thighs and scooped her off the floor.

“I missed you too.” She threw her arms around his neck and linked her legs behind his back. He carried her—without looking because she refused to stop kissing him—to his bedroom. Her heart beat in a familiar rhythm, one that bruised her insides, and she gasped for air. She grabbed at him all over, taking handfuls of his back, his hair, his arms flexed and holding her greedy body against his. It was all so good, she equally wanted to speed to the end and make it last forever.

He stopped at the foot of his bed and pried his lips loose long enough to speak. “I still haven’t been with anyone since you.”

She smiled against his next kiss. “There will always only be you.”

He dropped her onto the bed with a bounce and tore off his shirt. Finally, she could look and touch. With him no longer off-limits, she took advantage of smoothing her palms over the tight panel of his stomach. The hard muscles rippled under her hands, and touching them made them both suck in a sharp breath. Like she was painting a fantasy into real life, she traced her fingertips along the angled grooves pointing from his hip bones down into his jeans. Then she clawed at the button and yanked down the zipper. Because of the force with which she pulled down his pants, he nearly fell over on top of her.

“Someone’s eager,” he teased with a dark laugh, and caught himself as he kicked off his pants.

She softly bit the tanned swell of his shoulder when it landed in front of her face. The smell of his shower lingered on his skin in a fresh, breezy scent and drove her absolutely wild. She trailed kisses across his chest until she found the water droplets still clinging to his collarbone and licked them off. He shivered at the feel of her tongue in a way that made her tingle. When she slid her palm down his flat abdomen and slipped her hand into his underwear, he full-on shuddered.

“Yes, eagerness seems to be contagious,” she purred, and wrapped her hand around the already hard length of him.

He swore under his breath and gripped the back of her neck to pull her into a hard kiss.

She continued to stroke him, feeling her low belly turn liquid hot at the soft moans escaping his throat while he consumed her mouth. He hadn’t kissed her so deeply, so desperately, so absolutely, since before their breakup. The totality of it—his tongue sliding, lips sucking, thumbs stroking her jaw—narrowed the world to the points where they touched. And suddenly, a kiss was not enough. She ached for him in every cell of her body.

She broke loose with a gasp and pulled him closer with her hand still gripping the now very hard length of him. “If you’re not inside me in the next ten seconds, I might die,” she desperately panted.

The consumed lust on his flushed face parted ways for a wickedly pleased grin to curl his lips. “Now who’s being dramatic?”

“I learned from the best.”

He kneeled on the mattress between her legs and slid his hands up her thighs. He kept going, dragging his callused palms up over the swell of her hips and the indent of her waist, gathering her dress along the way until he peeled it over her head and tossed it aside. Then he stared at her with a heat in his eyes that turned her into liquid gold. He looked the way she had felt moments before when she’d been unable to tolerate not touching his bare skin, except that where she had thrown herself at him, he held back.

“You know you can touch me now,” she said. “No more infractions.”

One side of his mouth slightly curved up while the rest of his face stayed taut in focus like he was making a very difficult decision. “I know. I just can’t decide where to start.”

She nearly burst into flames. The thought that access to her body overwhelmed him left her feeling like a goddess again. She gave him a devilish grin and shoved her fingers into her bra cups to yank them down. “How about you start with your favorite part, then?”

His eyes grew wide at the sight of her breasts pushed up and together, her nipples hard peaks. He leaned forward like he was under a spell. “Every part of you is my favorite,” he muttered into her neck before he kissed a trail to her chest. She arched into him with a gasp when he took one of her nipples into his mouth. Her hand fisted into his hair. His hands circled to her back to undo her bra’s clasp, and when her chest tumbled free, he gently pushed her down onto her back.

He looked down at her sprawled on the bed, drinking her in. “You are…” he said in a reverent tone that made her feel radiant under his gaze. The way he left his thought unfinished said not that he didn’t know the right word, but that there was no apt description.

“So are you,” Olivia said, and sat up to reach for him.

He crawled over her, their lips locked again, as they moved up the bed and threw back the sheets. Olivia’s head landed against the pillows, and he worked his mouth down her neck to her chest again. He buried his face between her breasts, kissing and sucking and moaning in appreciation.

Olivia quietly laughed and tangled her fingers in his hair. She tugged on it to pull his face up. “You sure they’re not your favorite?”

He gave her a lopsided, drunk grin that was still white hot and completely disarming. Then he moved his lips to her belly and kissed his way down to her thighs. The soft scratch of his jaw sent her spiraling. It brought her back to the pantry, the last time she’d felt his mouth on her, when it hadn’t lasted nearly long enough. Now the pressure between her legs, the ache, had her ready to burst.

“ Please ,” she heard herself whimper.

Chuck paused what he was doing to look up at her with hooded eyes. “You make that word sound so goddamn hot,” he said with a dark grin.

Olivia could barely stand the absence of his mouth, but the greedy spark in his eye had her begging for multiple reasons now. “ Please ,” she breathed again, and watched his grin grow bigger. “ Please, please, please. ”

He obliged and slipped her underwear off. Then he spread her legs and pressed his lips to where her pulse furiously throbbed between her thighs. She gasped and fisted the sheets at her sides. Her hips canted into him, and she was gone. Lost to the haze of his skilled fingers circling and gliding, his tongue sinking in and stroking. It was perfect and relentless and made her feel like her body wasn’t capable of absorbing anything more for a single second longer but then somehow kept going. She gasped out some unintelligible combination of his name and swear words over and over as she tugged at the sheets and his hair. In the seconds before she lost herself completely, she looked down and made eye contact with him, because she wanted him to know exactly what he was capable of. What he did to her. She saw a dark glint in his eye and a grin on his wet lips.

He knew, of course he did.

A hard cry ripped out of her mouth when she came. A pent-up need escaping in the hot rush of pounding waves. She exploded over and over, fizzling into oblivion all because of him.

She was a pile of bones afterward. Useless. And she knew just as well that it wasn’t over. Not by a long shot. She could hardly open her eyes for all the dopamine flooding through her brain. She felt his weight shift and the warmth of his body move over her.

“I swear, the sounds you make could kill me,” he whispered in her ear like he would enjoy the death.

A weak laugh burbled out of her mouth. She still hadn’t opened her eyes.

“That one too,” he purred, and she heard the smile in his voice.

He lay beside her and slowly smoothed his hand over all her curves, her peaks and valleys that had gone untouched by him for too long. She felt him hard and heavy pressing into her hip, but he knew the precise timing of every move. He knew how long to let her recover, to let her breathe, to let all the tight nerves in her body relax and prepare to swell up again and make the second act enjoyable for them both.

When she found the strength, she turned her head and softly smiled at him.

He smiled back, taking the cue. Then he rolled on top of her and sank his lips into her neck. He took her wrists and held her arms above her head as he tortured her with his mouth, kissing and nipping and grazing his teeth.

“You’re so perfect, Olivia,” he growled into her flushed skin. “Being in that house with you and unable to touch you was the worst kind of torture. I can’t be near you if I can’t touch you.” He palmed one of her breasts and twirled his tongue around her nipple again. “Every part of you is so beautiful. So perfect.”

Lost in his words, she found his hand in the pillows up above them and laced her fingers between his. Somehow that act felt more intimate than everywhere else they were touching. He moved his other hand between her legs and slipped a finger inside her. She sucked in a sharp breath and felt her body deliciously clench around him.

“Please,” she breathed again.

“Please what?” he said, and pressed a hot kiss into the vein pulsing in her neck. He grazed his teeth over it and then traced it with his tongue.

“More,” she said. It was the only word she could muster in the heady fog that had consumed her. The ledge she’d fallen over earlier was quickly reapproaching and preparing to pull her into the abyss again. She squeezed his hand that she held and felt his other hand still moving between her legs. His fingers dipped and glided; his thumb traced out delirious circles.

“More what?” he whispered, and bit her earlobe. Tingles shot down her arm and turned the whole right side of her body to an icy fire.

“ Chuck! ” she whimpered, needy and fraught.

A soft chuckle puffed against her neck. He was getting off on teasing her, and if it weren’t so fucking hot, she would have scolded him for it.

She used her free hand to grip his face and hold it in front of hers. “You know exactly what,” she said sternly. “I’m going to die, remember?”

He looked down at her with a smug little grin. His pupils were blown out, his cheeks flushed, his hair a tumbling mess. God. He was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen. She couldn’t help smiling back at him despite the ferocious longing burning her alive. “Well, we wouldn’t want that, would we,” he said, and sat up to remove his underwear.

Olivia propped herself on her elbows to watch him fully undress. He was intentionally slow about it, knowing that her gaze was hungrily tracking his every move. How someone could make such a meal out of removing a single small piece of clothing was a true talent. Or perhaps she was simply starving for him. He hooked his thumbs into the elastic waistband of his boxer briefs and slid them down one painful centimeter at a time. The pronounced V of his lower abdomen slowly came into view like a rising sun, and when he fully exposed himself, Olivia reflexively wet her lips and had to make a conscious effort not to reach out and grab him.

“About time,” she said with an arched brow once he pulled his underwear off his ankles and tossed them aside.

He moved back between her bent legs and placed his hands on her knees. “When did you get so impatient?” he said with a sly grin, and sat back on his heels.

She could hardly hear what he was saying. The need to feel him inside her was growing primal. Unable to stop herself, she reached out and took him in her hand again. “When someone locked me in a house with you and said I couldn’t touch you. Please stop torturing me.”

He fell forward onto one hand, his hips between her thighs, and stilled. He used his other hand to wrap hers and hold himself an unbearable inch from where her aching body eagerly waited for his. He grinned down at her. “I just wanted to hear you say it again.”

She knew what he meant, and she knew that giving it to him would get her what she desperately needed. “Please,” she said. “ Please, please, please. ”

He gave her the wicked version of his dimple-popping grin and rocked his hips forward. She let go of him and felt him sink in one thick, perfect inch. Her eyes fluttered closed, and her head tilted back. Finally. A guttural moan poured out of her as her body tightened around him. He sucked in a jagged breath and then pulled back out.

“No! Please, please, please ,” she begged, and reached for him. The need was desperate. Frantic. Where she normally would have played along, savored his torturous game of slow, teasing inches, she couldn’t take it after being forced to keep their hands off each other.

When he sank back in again, deeper this time, she took advantage. She swung her hands around to grip his ridiculously toned ass and shoved him all the way inside in one hot, firm stroke.

“ F-fuck , Liv,” he stuttered as he fell forward and caught himself on his forearms, sounding like he might have been about to come undone already. The smell of him, the heat and weight of his body fully on top of and inside hers, engulfed her in a swirl of perfection.

“Sorry, but we’ve been tortured enough. I need you now.”

He looked down at her, messy hair tumbling forward and handsome face aglow, like he hadn’t considered her point but agreed with it now. Whatever game he’d been planning to play dissolved, and he pushed his hips against hers, notching himself as deep as he could go and making her gasp. “You have me,” he said with a soft bend of his lips.

It was the Olympics of makeup sex.

Chuck found angles Olivia didn’t even know existed. They clawed at each other, caressed each other. Sped up and slowed down. Tangled all their limbs and slicked each other with sweat. Olivia couldn’t get enough. It was equally new and exciting and like watching one of her favorite movies for the thousandth time. She responded to his every touch, rising and falling at his command, and he to hers. Their bodies belonged to each other. She was so consumed she couldn’t tell where she ended and he began.

She eventually sensed him rapidly scaling toward a summit. She heard it in his hitched breath, felt it in the urgent speed of his strokes going deeper and deeper. All over again, she was climbing to the same peak. A burn had started in her toes and rose higher and higher until her thighs shook with want, with near painful need for relief.

When Chuck stilled against her with a hard shudder, groaning out an exquisite, jagged sound that made her heart swell, she tumbled over the edge with him as if he’d reached out to grab her as he fell. They crashed together, his arm hooked under her knee and his other wrapped underneath her, holding them chest-to-chest in an impossibly tight knot. They shattered to pieces because of and for each other, an infinite loop of giving and receiving that had her breathlessly gasping and him reciting a stuttered poem of her name and perfect and so good and holy fuck until they both collapsed in a blissed-out, exhausted heap.

···

The usual cocktail of confusion that swirled through Olivia’s blood after sleeping with Chuck was nowhere to be found as she lazed against his body. They were normally making up from a fight, their boiling blood temporarily setting a new course only to turn back to anger once they finished. But not this time. She felt nothing but peace. And it would have worried her if she’d allowed it to, given the uncertainty of their future. But she staved off thought of anything beyond the exact moment they were in. Only him; only her. His exhales becoming her inhales, the space between them nonexistent.

She lay halfway on top of him, facedown into the pillow with her head cradled between his shoulder and neck and his arm looped around her. The smell of him, the clean, heady scent of him , surrounded her: his pillowcase, his hair, his skin still damp from exertion pressed against her nose. She could feel his heart beating against hers where her chest pressed into his, a steady call-and-response as they drifted in a calm silence. Chuck used his thumbnail to trace a line up the back of her arm that broke her body out in tingling goose bumps. She shivered with a smile and snuggled herself closer to him.

Neither of them had spoken in ages, not wanting to burst the safe, perfect bubble. They’d taken to communicating by touch: her lips grazing his jaw, fingertips gliding over his chest; his hand stroking her back and tangling in her tousled hair. Olivia could have existed in the moment forever.

“Liv,” Chuck eventually said after what could have been the most perfect century of all time. His voice softly rumbled in his chest.

Olivia lifted her head to look at him and found a dreamy, warm haze in his eyes. His hair was a mess, his cheeks beautifully flushed. He looked plainly like a man possessed by feeling.

“Back in the house, when we were doing that interview about our first impressions of each other, you said you were intrigued by why I felt the need to hide my vulnerability in public.” He paused, and she nodded, recalling the moment. “The truth is, I don’t hide it. You just crack me open in a way that no one else can. In a way that honestly scares me, but I’ve known since the day we met that I wanted to be that open. With you. I love you.”

All his guards were down, the walls utterly demolished. He was wide open and welcoming her in with no barriers. She remembered what he’d said that day, how he’d called her The One while he’d scribbled his number in her notebook. She saw on his face now that it hadn’t been a cheeky joke, an attempt at ice-breaking, charming humor since they’d only just met. It had been the bone-deep certainty that would hold them together through all the ups and downs. Now he was finally giving voice to the steady current that had flowed beneath the surface of their relationship from the start. He’d leapt headfirst and was waiting for her to join him.

She scooted her body up along his and pressed her lips to his mouth for a slow, deep kiss. It burned all the way to her toes. Chuck let out a low, warm hum and rolled on his side to face her. She thought they were going to maybe go for a round two, but he pulled back and stroked her hair with a soft smile. His eyes melted into tender hazel pools and clearly said he was eagerly waiting for her to join him in the newly named territory.

But before she could join him, she had to say something else first.

“Chuck, I’m sorry about what happened at the house. Like really sorry.”

He smoothed his thumb over her swollen lips while he shook his head. “Olivia, don’t worry—”

“No, I need to say this.” She pushed herself up against the pillows and pulled the sheet to her chest. She’d put almost as much work into figuring out what she was going to say to him as she had into writing her profile. She took a deep breath. “I…run. You’re right. It took me running out on a million dollars to see how much of a problem it is—still very sorry, by the way. But I see it now. Not only do I run, but I also push you away. And it’s because I’m scared. I’m scared of getting hurt, but most of all, I’m scared of ending up alone. Abandoned.” Her voice hitched, and he reached out to tenderly stroke her cheek. “I probably need to spend a few years with a really good therapist to fully understand why, but I’m pretty sure it’s because of my parents. I spent my whole life thinking they didn’t care about me, that I was some unfortunate consequence of their affair and they’d rather have been out at parties than home with me—and I know that’s not true now, but it left a mark. They left me. The people who were supposed to care for and protect me the most. They didn’t do it on purpose, obviously, but it left this… hole in me, and a fear that it’s going to happen again. That someone else who is supposed to care for and protect me is going to leave. That’s why I run. Because if I leave first, no one can leave me.” A tear pinched out her eye and rolled down her cheek. He swiped it with his thumb.

“But you—” Her voice cut off with a bumpy stutter. She dashed her eyes and wetly smiled. “Sorry. I’m not very good at this.”

He sweetly smiled back and wiped her tears again. “You’re doing great.” His own voice was strained, thick with emotion.

“Thank you,” she said with a sniffle. She took a steadying breath and felt her eyes grow wetter. “You make it all hurt less, Chuck. The truth is, I love you. Very much. So much that it scares me. Because I’m afraid—”

He scrambled to sit up when her words dissolved again. He held her face and kissed away her tears before he wrapped her in his arms. His heart thudded against her; his skin felt hot with emotion. When he pulled back to hold her face and look into her eyes, his swam with deep feeling. “I love you so much that it scares me too. Like terrifies me,” he said. “Every time we fight, and you run, I’m afraid you’re never going to come back, and I—”

“I don’t want to run anymore,” she said with a hard sob. “Not from you. Never from you.”

He kissed her again and squeezed her whole body against his. She felt it in his touch: as much as she didn’t want to run, he didn’t want to ever let her go.

There was suddenly, resolutely, no more uncertainty about their future.

They pulled at each other, tugging their bodies as close as they could get. Inhaling the other like they needed it to survive. Their embrace slowly turned into something hungrier, more desperate. He pulled her over on top of him to straddle his lap, and she sank down onto him, taking every inch until they were fused together again. Soon she was gripping the headboard above him with both hands and trying not to black out as he squeezed her thighs and hit a spot inside her so intense that she could hardly breathe when she saw stars this time.

She collapsed on top of him afterward and nearly fell asleep to the feel of his fingertips lazily stroking her spine.

“So we’re in love, but we’re still broke,” he said.

She chortled a laugh, still lifelessly draped over him like a jungle cat on a tree branch. “Yeah. That.”

He inhaled a deep breath that inflated his chest and lifted her with it. When he let it out, she rolled off him but stayed cradled in the crook of his arm.

“I guess it’s not too different than we were two weeks ago, we’re just more aware now. You were right: being in that house was what we needed,” she said with a lazy grin up at him.

He smoothed her wild hair and kissed her forehead. “Look at us. Growth.”

She curled against his body and pressed a kiss into his chest. “And I’m glad we can touch each other now without losing any money or having to hide.”

“Yes, definitely a perk of freedom,” he growled, and pulled her back on top of him once more. He buried his lips in her neck, and she squealed with laughter as tingles shot down her arm.

When he let her go, she propped herself on her elbows and gazed down at him. His eyes were honey warm, his cheeks flushed. His lips beautifully swollen from kissing her. His hair, an even more hopeless nest. She pushed it back from his face and saw the tiny scar he had from falling off his bike as a kid. “Can I ask you something?”

“Anything.”

She mulled her words, not wanting to burst the warm bubble they were floating inside. “When your sister told me about Maddy, she said it was fine because Maddy had told her the whole story while it was happening and before the NDA was in place. Why didn’t you tell me at that same time while you were still able to?”

His glow dimmed a few notches. An invisible tension pulled his face taut. His brow knit. “Honestly, I was worried what you would think. I felt responsible for the whole thing. I mean, my kid sister’s best friend, and I served her up on a platter to that jerk. And Maddy was so upset by it all—rightfully so. I didn’t want to disappoint you. And then Richard paid me off, which made me feel like even more of a degenerate.” He scrubbed his face with a hand. “And I’m so sorry about those photos. I don’t know who took them, but I wouldn’t be surprised if TJ himself got them to run the story so that they could spring it on us that morning with no warning. They knew I had an NDA and we’d agreed they wouldn’t bring up my job. It was supposed to be off-limits, but TJ went rogue.”

Olivia snorted. “Somehow not surprising.”

“I know, but I still hate that it happened. Even if the photos aren’t what they look like, I know that was a terrible situation for you given your history. But I couldn’t tell you the truth, especially not on camera, because of the NDA. God, what a mess. Everything is my fault.”

The remorse in his voice made Olivia’s heart ache. She removed his hand that he’d placed back over his face and pressed her thumb to his brow to smooth out the deep crease. “Chuck, first of all, TJ is an asshole. And you weren’t the one who ran out of the house. That was me, remember? And second, what happened with Maddy wasn’t your fault. She is lucky you were there to intervene at all. You were put in a terrible position even though you tried to do the right thing—and you put that money to good use. Chelsea told me you’re paying her tuition.”

He flushed with a twist of his lips.

“Third, and most importantly,” she went on, “I could never be disappointed in you. I think that’s your toxic trait. I run, and you run around trying to keep everyone happy for fear you’ll let them down.”

He huffed a quiet laugh and turned his head away.

“No, I’m serious,” she said, and hooked a finger under his chin to turn it back. “You lied to your parents because you didn’t want to disappoint them. You lied to me for the same reason. You’re always trying to fix everything. You hold yourself to this impossible standard like it’s your job to keep everyone happy, and that’s not fair.”

A flush curled into his face. “I guess I just want to be… good .”

“Chuck, you are good. You’re an amazing son, an incredible big brother—to your sister and her friends. You’re a talented actor, an inspiring coworker—do you want me to read the profile again? It’s all in there…” She sat up as if she was looking for it.

He squeezed her ribs and tumbled over sideways with her. “All right. Point made.”

“And, I might be biased, but you’re a pretty decent boyfriend too.”

“ Decent? That’s the best you could do?”

“Stellar? Stupendous? Worth a million dollars?” She jabbed him in the ribs, knowing he was teasing.

He flinched with a laugh. “ Oh , too soon.”

“Sorry. Bad joke. You’re not going to hold that against me forever, are you?”

“What, that you lost me a million bucks? Nah. Why would I care about that? I’m actually already over it,” he said with a sarcastically casual eye roll and shrug.

She softly punched him in the ribs again. “Shut up.”

He grinned a lopsided smile and then his face grew serious. “Speaking of the profile. That was very brave of you to write. That might be the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for me.”

“Does that mean you’re okay with me publishing it?”

He stared up at the ceiling and took a long, slow breath. He exhaled it in a rush and turned to her with a light in his eyes. “I mean, might as well, right? I’ve already blown up the rest of my life. Seems only right to pull the pin in the last grenade.”

She smiled at him, and he mussed her hair.

“And hey, it could end up working in my favor. A lot of people in this town hate Richard Sykes, including Isabel Ramírez, whose new movie I happen to have an audition for.” He dropped the news casually, and Olivia’s reaction was clearly what he’d been hoping for given the grin on his face.

She gasped a sincerely ecstatic sound. “ You have an audition with Izzy Ramírez? ” A glee as genuine as what she’d felt when he’d gotten the part for Safe Gamble filled her full enough to burst.

Izzy Ramírez was a current It director in Hollywood. An indie darling who’d broken out big last year with a dark comedy box office smash. Studios took interest and started hurling money at her. She had her pick of projects and teams to work with. Olivia knew all this because she’d stepped in to finish a Mix piece on it when her coworker went on maternity leave.

“Mm-hmm,” Chuck confirmed with a proud hum. “Cameron set it up for me as soon as we got out of the house.”

Olivia gasped again and excitedly punched him in the chest. “Chuck! This is amazing!”

“Ow!” he said with a laugh, and clutched her fist. “Don’t get your hopes up. It’s a long shot, but if that profile manages to come out at the right time, things might go my way and I could be starring in next summer’s dark comedy hit.”

“I will hit publish tomorrow if that’s what you want,” Olivia said with a thrilled grin.

Another chuckle bounced his chest. “You have my permission. But really, the part would be a huge payday. Like ‘leave Name Your Price in the dust’ payday.”

Her jaw dropped and she genuinely could not stop smiling. “I am so happy for you. Seriously.”

“Thank you. And I want to take a moment to say that I am sorry for all the times I got a little too obsessed with my career. I know I’ve made some insensitive decisions in the past, and I promise to be more aware of that going forward.”

Olivia gave him an impressed nod. “Much appreciated.”

He sighed a dreamy sound and stroked his fingers through her hair again. It sent her body tingling. “So, what have you been up to since you’re no longer under twenty-four-hour surveillance? I mean, other than writing hit pieces on sleazy industry men.”

It was her turn for the big disclosure. “Well. Believe it or not. I have a meeting.” He looked at her with lifted brows when she paused. “With Astrid Larsson.”

At this, he jerked to sit up. A dozen questions zipped across his face like he couldn’t decide which to ask first. “How? Why? Where?”

“Because Mansi knows someone who knows someone who knows someone; because I want to talk to her; and at her house, which is obscenely intimidating, and I have no idea what to wear.”

He blankly gaped at her, from shock at what she was saying or from shock that she was saying it at all, she couldn’t tell. He rubbed his face with a hand. “Okay, I feel like I missed something here. You’re willingly going to talk to Astrid Larsson, the woman who very famously was married to your dad when—?”

“I know who she is, Chuck,” Olivia said with a soft smile. “And yes, you missed something. I didn’t want to tell you on camera at the house because I’m not ready for anyone to know yet. That’s why I had Mansi set it up. Discreetly. The truth is, that day your parents came over, I’d had a long conversation with my grandma, and she told me things I didn’t know—that no one knows. Other than her, Astrid, my parents, and now me and Mansi.”

His eyes had grown wide with expectant wonder. An eager but not intrusive hope that she was going to let him into the circle too.

She knew staring back at him that she could trust him not only with the truth, but also with her whole heart.

She told him everything.

Chuck’s eyes had grown wider as he listened to her, taking in the shocking truth, until they were nearly filling his whole face. Then his brow suddenly bent into a jagged furrow, and he jumped out of the bed.

“ What? ” he shouted. His anger on her behalf ballooned into the room and made her tingle in a very specific and pleasant way. He began to pace at the bedside, swearing and fuming in indignation. His whole reaction was slightly undercut by the fact that he was naked. “Olivia, this is huge! Astrid Larsson has been lying for thirty years? I can’t even—” He swiped his hair and huffed. “No. This is too much. You have to—” He couldn’t seem to keep up with his own thoughts. “This is— Wow. Forget the profile on me. This is your bombshell!”

“What are you doing?” Olivia asked when he reached for his phone on the nightstand.

“Calling—I don’t know. Someone. This is—! I can’t—! I’m going to—!”

“Okay. Easy , cowboy,” she said, and sat up to remove his phone from his grip. “I don’t need you to run to my rescue on this.”

He paused, chest heaving, and stared at her. “But, Olivia, this is… wrong .” The word burst from his mouth like something he coughed up. A foul, bitter thing that he could not stand to have inside his body.

An endearing laugh warmly bubbled from Olivia’s chest. “Chuck, while I appreciate your enthusiasm on my behalf, this kind of reaction is what got you fired from a movie, remember?”

The realization visibly settled over him. The tension dissolved from his brow, and he blinked a few times. “You’re right. Sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize. It’s honestly really hot that you care so much. But I don’t want you to do anything to get yourself in trouble again. Come here.” She waved him over and pulled back the sheets he’d thrown aside.

He gave her a sly grin and spoke in a low growl. “You think this is hot?”

“Yes. And it doesn’t hurt that you’re standing there naked. Now, get back over here before I totally lose my train of thought.”

He climbed back in the bed and looped his arm around her looking all too pleased with himself.

“Don’t look so smug. You can’t even form a sentence when I wear leggings.”

He grabbed her arm and pressed a trail of kisses up the inside of her wrist. “I would have killed a man to see your ankles in the Victorian era.”

“Good thing it’s not the nineteenth century.”

“Indeed.” He continued his kiss trail up her shoulder and to her neck, where he sank his lips into the crook below her jaw that positively melted her.

“Are we going to continue this conversation?”

“What conversation?”

“Chuck.”

“No, I’ve seriously forgotten. What were we talking about?” He unsuctioned his face from her neck and looked at her with a drunken grin.

“Your lack of self-control.”

He kissed her lips. “Sorry. Making up for lost time.”

“I have no intention of leaving this bed for the rest of the day, so we have plenty of time.”

His drunken grin returned, and he leaned in. She stopped him with a raised finger against his already puckered lips. “But we were talking about my meeting with Astrid Larsson.”

He suddenly sobered and sat back against the pillows. “Right. Sorry.” He let out a big breath. “What do you hope to get from her?”

Olivia matched his sigh. “I don’t really know. Confirmation of the truth. An apology, maybe.”

He gently ran his fingers against the crown of her shoulder, making her tingle again. “Well, you deserve all of that, but remember she’s basically been committing slander by omission for thirty years, so don’t be surprised if it doesn’t go how you hope. Do you want me to come?”

She’d honestly considered it. Maybe not inviting him specifically, because she hadn’t been sure how this reunion was going to go, but she had thought of bringing someone for support. But the more she thought of it, the more she realized she needed to go alone. If she was going to set her parents’ legacy right, she needed to do it herself, as their actual living legacy.

“No,” she said. “But thank you for offering.”

He took her hand and threaded his fingers between hers. “I’m proud of you, Olivia. That’s a really brave thing of you to do.”

His faith infused her with warmth. She curled against his chest. “Thank you. I will let you burn me some banana pancakes after, though.”

“ Excuse me , my pancake skills have greatly improved.”

“Yes, I guess we learned a few things in that house, didn’t we.”

Chuck paused and then cleared his throat. “Speaking of the house. Are you, um…okay? With money, I mean?”

Olivia groaned and burrowed deeper into his chest. “Please, can we talk about literally anything else.”

He wrapped his other arm around her and kissed her head. “Yes, but I just want to make sure first.”

She freed her head, sending her hair messily flying. “Why, it’s not like you can do anything to help me out. You’re broke too.”

He gave her a knowing shrug of agreement.

They both sighed.

“At least I still have the advance from the show,” she said. “That will cover Willow Grove while I figure out what to do.”

He squeezed her. “At least I have you. Because that’s all that really matters.”

She looked up at him, and instead of saying how she wished that were true, she smiled. Because for right now, inside his warm bed up in the clouds, that was all that did matter. Only him; only her. And the fact that they’d found their way back to each other.