Chapter Twenty-Four #2
Belle shakes her head with an easy smile on her face. It falters only for a second. “We can’t…um…” She bites her bottom lip, making me look down at her. Her cheeks turn pink. “We can’t have sex. I got my period this afternoon.”
She’s embarrassed, but it doesn’t bother me at all. “Okay,” I answer easily. “Do you need me to stop at the store to get you anything?”
She slow blinks at me. “Like what?”
“I don’t know. Tampons. Medicine.”
The way she gapes at me makes my lips curl up slightly at the corners. It’s obvious she thinks I’d shrink away at the mention of a menstrual cycle, but that’s never bothered me. I’ve heard her complain about her cramps before, so it’s nothing new.
“Chocolate?” I offer, brows raising.
Belle lets out a long breath as her only response.
“I can stop and get us ice cream. Then we can go home and put something on TV.”
Her body melts into me like that’s exactly what she wants.
And that’s exactly what we do. One pint of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream and a romantic comedy later, I’m carrying a sleeping Belle up to my room to sleep.
She curls into her spot on my bed, nuzzles into her pillow, and all I can think is, this is exactly where she belongs.
Hell. I’d bet on me too.
*
I wake up to an ungodly number of texts from the guys asking where I am even though I told them I wouldn’t be joining them. It’s obvious that the messages are being sent when they’re at a level that’s way past hammered considering over fifty of them come after two in the morning.
I ignore them with a roll of my eyes, letting the haze of a good night’s sleep slowly clear as I continue to scroll. There are a few other messages, some spam, some from unsaved numbers, and one from Amber that catches my attention.
Amber A: Core Charge sent over some photos they want to use for their print campaign. You get final approval per your contract, but they’re pushing for number two or number four
Amber A: [four attachments]
Curiosity has me carefully removing my arm from under Belle’s sleeping form and moving my fingers to try getting feeling back in the limb. It took me no time at all to fall asleep after putting her in bed, and I wonder if I’ll be able to sleep as good as I do now when I’m at away games next season.
If there is a next season.
The sudden thought makes me tense. As quickly as it comes, it goes away. But not the knot coiled in my shoulders at the real possibility of me saying fuck it and moving on with my life.
I glance over at Belle, who looks oddly adorable with hair in her face and her lips slightly parted as she breathes peacefully in her sleep. I move a few strands away from her mouth, tucking them behind her ear. She barely moves.
When I turn back to my phone, I finally see the photos Core Charge sent for approval.
And they’re not what I expect.
The first one is basic enough—nothing unique or captivating about it.
Belle and I are both in athleticwear, her body leaning onto mine with her elbow propped on my arm.
We’re both holding an energy drink in our hands and smiling at the camera.
It’s a good photo. Bland, only in the way that seems too staged.
But when I scroll to see the others…
A breath escapes my lips, hushed but sharp at the image of Belle laying with her head in my lap staring up at me.
She’s laughing and her whole face lights up as we look at one another.
I’m sitting on the floor, one arm propping me up, the other around her bent knee, and my energy drink beside me.
This has nothing on the first image, and I can see why they love it. But…
This was one of the test photos they took, not part of the actual shoot. Belle isn’t even holding her drink. It’s not in frame. But her body, unlike the other photos, is looser. Comfortable. Like she knows as long as I’m there, nothing will happen to her.
We’ve always been that way.
Effortless.
The fourth image that they want to choose is similar, except Belle’s back is against my front with my arm draped over her shoulder and coming down between her breasts like a seatbelt.
I hold her to me like my life depends on it.
I’m not even looking at the camera, but at her.
She’s beaming as she smiles forward, her hand holding the citrus energy drink while mine is on the floor beside me forgotten.
This doesn’t feel like a commercial for Core Charge. It doesn’t feel like an ad at all. My attention doesn’t go to the drink, but to us. If someone were to ask me what they were trying to sell, I wouldn’t know what to say.
A groggy voice asks, “What are you looking at?”
I look over to see Belle blinking sleepily up at me with a tired smile on her face. “Morning.”
“Morning,” she greets, doing a stretch that exposes her midriff. I never thought midriffs were sexy, but hers…
I shake off the thought. “Amber sent over some photos that Isaac’s team want to use for a print campaign. And they’re…” Words are hard to come by, so I decide to show her instead. “See for yourself.”
When she stares at my phone, I’m not sure she sees what I do. She rubs her eyes, takes a minute, and sits up. Then she grabs my phone and studies the image like there’s going to be a test.
“Wow,” she whispers, her throat bobbing with a swallow. Her expression is as mystified as my response to the picture. “We look…”
I nod. “I know.”
“These aren’t the pictures from the shoot,” she notes as quickly as I did. She looks at me for confirmation. “I mean, they’re amazing, but they can’t really want to use these.”
I lift a shoulder. “We get final approval. We can say no and have them send more.”
It’s as simple as that, even if her slow blink seems disbelieving.
I’ve learned to have that condition added into all of my PR contracts because I refuse to have anything I don’t want aired out there.
There have been times, few and far between, where I’ve hated what I look like because of the heavy edits.
Despite how popular my scar is online some companies prefer a flawless look. One that I do not have.