Totally Kiss Cammed (Nashville Outlaws #2)

Chapter 1

Chapter one

Sloane

“If you say the word organic one more time, I’m firing you.”

“Okay,” Trent says, like he’s humoring a toddler holding scissors. “Hear me out. We need the album to grow organically. Didn't say organ**.”

I pinch the bridge of my nose and stare at the Nashville skyline through the windshield of my parked car, as if the city itself might offer a refund on my patience.

I’m sitting in the back lot behind a coffee shop that prides itself on being “quiet” and “minimalist,” which is code for one outlet, weak Wi-Fi, and a barista who hates joy.

My latte is lukewarm. My phone is hot. And my artist’s debut album is currently performing like it was released exclusively to my mother and a handful of bots in Latvia.

“Trent,” I say, keeping my voice smooth because I am a professional and professionals do not scream into Bluetooth.

“If the album is going to grow organically, it needs sunlight, water, and perhaps a small miracle from a benevolent deity. Do you have one of those? Because I left mine in my other purse.”

On the other end of the line, I can practically hear him smiling. Trent is the label rep they assigned to us because he wears expensive sneakers and knows how to say “brand synergy” without choking.

“Look,” he says. “It’s not bad. It’s just… not hitting the way we hoped. The numbers are… soft.”

Soft.

That’s a cute way to describe something that makes me want to pull into oncoming traffic.

“Soft,” I repeat. “Yes. Like an undercooked pancake. Like a motivational speaker’s handshake. Like my will to live every time someone says ‘TikTok challenge.’”

“Can we not be dramatic?”

“Trent, I’m a music manager in Nashville,” I say. “Drama is my cardio.”

I tap the screen and pull up the streaming dashboard again, as if staring at it harder will make the numbers feel shameful.

They don’t.

The debut album, Good Girl Gone Loud, has been out for ten days.

Ten.

Days.

Which is long enough for the internet to decide whether you’re the next big thing or a quaint little blip they’ll forget by the weekend.

And right now, the internet is giving us the kind of silence usually reserved for awkward wedding speeches.

“We’re trending in exactly zero categories,” I say. “Our engagement is flat. Our pre-save campaign did fine, but now everyone’s acting like the album dropped and took their dog with it.”

“It’s early.”

“It’s early for a pregnancy test,” I snapped. “It’s not early for a debut album in the streaming era.”

He sighs. “We need a push. Something that feels authentic.”

I close my eyes.

“Don’t say it,” I warn.

“What?”

“The word.”

“What word?”

I take a breath. “If you say that O word again, I’m going to put your name on a flyer and staple it to every telephone pole on Broadway under the headline: ‘MAN WHO RUINED MY LIFE.’”

A silence.

Then he laughs. “Sloane, you’re scary.”

“Thank you,” I say. “I work hard at it.”

That part is only half a joke.

Because I didn’t get to this point in my career by being sweet.

I got here by being sharp.

By being the woman who walks into a room full of men in expensive boots and bigger opinions, and makes them all take a step back.

I’m Sloane Carter.

Music manager.

Fixer.

Strategist.

If chaos had a clipboard, it would have my initials on it.

And I don't panic.

Not out loud.

Panic is for people without backup plans.

I live on Plan D.

Sometimes Plan F.

On particularly cursed weeks, Plan “fake your death and move to a farm.”

Right now, I’m somewhere between D and “is goat farming hard?”

“What’s Raina saying?” Trent asks.

I glance at the passenger seat where my other phone… yes, I carry two because I hate peace… rests face down like it’s ashamed.

“Raina is saying she’s fine,” I say. “Raina is also currently refreshing Spotify every seven minutes like she’s waiting for a man to text her back.”

“I can call her.”

“No,” I say immediately.

Trent pauses. “Why not?”

Because Raina doesn’t need a label rep with a motivational tone reminding her she’s a product.

Because she’s twenty-two and brilliant and just walked out of a tiny apartment in Kentucky with a guitar and a dream and way too much trust in the people who told her she could do this.

Because if anyone is going to absorb the panic, it’s going to be me.

“I’ll handle her,” I say, lighter than I feel. “That’s my job. I manage the music and the feelings.”

“You manage feelings?”

“I manage feelings like a bouncer manages drunk men. With firm boundaries and the occasional threat.”

He chuckles. “Okay. So what’s the plan?”

There it is.

The question everyone asks me when something isn’t going right.

What’s the plan, Sloane?

As if I’m a magician and the plan is a rabbit I can pull from my blazer pocket.

I stare at the dashboard again and force my brain into its favorite coping mechanism: problem-solving.

We’ve already done:

— Radio pitches.

— Influencer boxes.

— A behind-the-scenes mini-doc.

— A late-night open mic pop-in (which, to be fair, went viral for exactly twelve minutes until someone posted a video of a cat playing piano and stole our thunder).

We’ve done the “authentic content.”

We’ve done the “raw and real.”

We’ve done the “let’s make fans feel like besties.”

And yet the numbers are sitting there like:

No .

“Plan,” I say slowly, because if I say it too fast, it sounds like I’m bluffing. “We need visibility that doesn’t feel like we’re begging.”

“I agree.”

“We need a moment.”

“A moment,” he repeats, like he’s taking notes.

“Yes,” I say. “A moment people want to clip, repost, argue about, send to their group chat with the caption ‘OMG.’”

“That’s very… Gen Z of you.”

“Don’t patronize me,” I say. “I can doom-scroll with the best of them.”

“What kind of moment?”

I open my mouth.

Then close it.

Because the truth is, I already know what kind.

I just don’t like it.

“There’s a Valentine’s charity thing,” Trent says, like he’s reading my mind.

My spine stiffens.

“Say less,” I mutter.

“It’s in two weeks,” he continues. “Nashville Outlaws. Big arena. They’re doing some kind of ‘dating game’ segment. Fans, bidders, whatever. It’s getting media coverage.”

I stare out the windshield again.

Of course it is.

Nashville is a city fueled by three things:

Music.

Hockey.

The relentless desire to turn everything into entertainment.

A charity dating game with professional athletes and Valentine’s branding is basically catnip.

And the worst part?

It’s a really good idea.

Which makes it a dangerous idea.

Because I don’t date hockey players.

I manage disasters.

I don’t sleep with them.

And I definitely don't build marketing plans around them.

“I’m not walking into an arena to flirt with a bunch of six-foot-tall men who think emotional intimacy is a pregame speech,” I say.

Trent laughs. “Not all hockey players are like that.”

That’s cute.

“Trent,” I say, voice sweet as arsenic, “I once dated a hockey player who told me he loved me and then forgot my birthday because he ‘was in a film session.’ And by film session, he meant he was in a hotel room with a puck bunny named Tiffany.”

Silence.

Then, very softly, he says, “Yikes.”

“Exactly,” I say. “So no. I don’t do athletes. I don’t do publicity plus hormones. I don’t do men who are professionally praised for body-checking strangers.”

“But this isn’t about dating,” he says quickly. “It’s about exposure. Your artist could perform…”

“She’s not performing at a hockey arena.”

“They bring local acts all the time. Intermission, fan fest, pregame. Sloane, it’s a huge crowd.”

I grip the steering wheel.

My brain hates him because he’s right.

My nervous system hates him because it's also right.

“Let me think,” I say.

“Please do,” he says. “Because we need something. And fast.”

I end the call before he can say organic again and toss my phone onto the passenger seat.

Then I take a long, slow breath.

In.

Out.

In.

Out.

I stare at the other phone like it might bite.

I flip it over.

A text from Raina pops up.

RAINA: Are the numbers… bad? ??

Of course.

She knows.

They always know.

I type back quickly.

ME: They’re not bad. They’re just… shy. Give it time.

A lie.

But a kind one.

Then another text comes in, this one from my assistant.

KIM: FYI the Outlaws are promoting that Valentine’s charity dating thing HARD. It’s everywhere.

I stare at the screen.

My stomach does a slow, annoyed roll.

Because I can already picture it.

Bright lights.

A crowd chanting.

A line of hockey players on a stage.

And me, Sloane Carter, standing there in heels, trying not to commit a felony.

I let my head fall back against the seat.

“Absolutely not,” I tell the roof of my car.

Then, because the universe hates me, my brain adds:

…unless it works.

The idea settles into my brain like an unwanted houseguest. It kicks its shoes off. It opens my fridge. It refuses to leave.

I don’t need a date.

I need eyeballs.

That’s the thing people never understand about my job. Romance is optional. Visibility is not.

I sit there for a minute, engine still off, phone balanced in my palm, while my mind starts doing what it always does when panic tries to creep in.

It builds a spreadsheet.

If I enter the charity dating thing, purely hypothetically, I get:

– Cross-industry exposure. Hockey fans love music. Music fans love drama. Everyone loves a crossover.

– Media pickup that doesn’t scream please stream my artist or I will perish.

– A built-in narrative that isn’t manufactured by a social media intern with a ring light.

If I don’t enter it, I get:

– Another week of Trent saying “organic.”

– Raina pretending she’s fine while quietly Googling “what if my debut flops.”

– Me lying awake at three a.m. wondering if I missed the window.

I blow out a breath, start to drive, and see the Outlaws logo plastered across half the city. Billboards. Social posts. A giant digital sign downtown that lights up every time they win.

Hockey players are walking headlines.

And headlines are currency.

I hate that my brain is this good at ruining my own rules.

Because I do have rules.

Rule number one: I don’t mix business with feelings.

Rule number two: I definitely don’t mix publicity with professional athletes.

I learned that one the hard way.

The memory slips in uninvited, again.

I shake my head once, sharp.

No.

I am not doing that again.

This would be different.

Controlled.

Temporary.

Professional.

I wouldn’t be dating anyone. I’d be participating. Appearing. Standing on a stage and smiling politely while people clapped for charity.

One night.

One headline.

One spike.

Nothing real can come from something this public.

My phone buzzes again. I pull over at a gas station.

KIM: They’re calling it Hearts on Ice: A Valentine’s Charity Night.

I groan out loud. “Of course they are.”

Because Nashville doesn’t just do subtle. Nashville does glitter cannons and branding meetings.

I picture it again.

The arena. The lights. The crowd chanting something embarrassing.

Me, smiling like I planned this.

My stomach flips.

Not nerves.

Annoyance.

I don’t like being seen when I don’t control the story.

But maybe that’s the point.

Maybe the problem isn’t the attention.

Maybe it’s that I’ve been trying to manage everything instead of letting anything actually happen.

I don’t love that thought.

Which probably means it’s important.

I unlock my phone and open the Outlaws’ promotional post Kim sent. It’s already got thousands of likes. Comments are pouring in.

People are excited.

They want chaos.

They want romance.

They want something to talk about.

I hover my thumb over the link to the charity page.

This is not a date.

This is a strategy.

I tap.

The entry form loads.

Name. Email. Occupation.

I hesitate for exactly half a second.

Then I type:

Sloane Carter. sloane@. Music manager.

I place a hefty bid and hit submit before I can overthink it.

The confirmation page pops up immediately.

Thank you for your interest. We’ll be in touch.

I lock my phone and let it drop into my lap.

“Well,” I tell the empty car, my voice light and lying. “That was painless.”

And realistically? There’s a decent chance nothing even comes of it. I’m not a fan, not a puck bunny, not someone the crowd would cheer for. I could submit my name and never hear a thing back.

My chest tightens with anxiety anyway.

Because something tells me this isn’t going to be painless at all.

And for the first time since Raina's album dropped, I’m not thinking about numbers.

I’m thinking about the fact that I possibly just stepped onto a stage I promised myself I’d never stand on again.

I pull away and turn at the next light, already rehearsing the explanation I’ll give everyone.

This is temporary.

This is professional.

I am absolutely, definitely not here to fall for a hockey player.

Not this time.