Page 41 of Chosen

This was so domestic.

This was so real.

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d made hot chocolate for someone, that I’d tried to comfort them through a hard time at work. With my latest string of relationships, there’d never been an opportunity to get that close, a wall always blocking me from getting too serious, from getting too emotionally connected. But this, whatever this was with Sam, was so innately intimate that I hadn’t even noticed it, our connection wrapping us with an invisible string.

It was terrifying. It was perfect.

It was something I’d never find enough words to describe.

I shook my head, shaking myself out of the moment as I headed back into the living room with a hot chocolate for each of us. Sam beamed when he saw me approaching, his hands reaching out toward a mug. After handing the drink to him, I took a seat beside him, blowing on my hot chocolate to help it cool down.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you.” Sam let out a grateful sigh before taking a sip from his mug.

“You’re welcome.” I smiled over at him. “So, are you going to tell me what’s going on with that fire?”

“Okay, so remember that list of questions I emailed Wendi Z and a few others?”

“Yeah?”

“Turns out, someone decided to post the questions to their Instagram.” Sam rolled his eyes. “They said they did it because they were so thankful that someone was finally being considerate instead of the usual gossip rag interview, which is nice and all—”

“But?”

“But of course, Anthony who circles around celebrity social media like a goddamn vulture, picked up on it. My name wasn’t even tagged in the video, but he said he recognized the way I write. Plus, since I was already on a divorce feature, he was able to put two and two together pretty quickly.”

“Shit.” I sucked air in through my teeth. “What happens now? Is he threatening your job?”

“Worse.”

“What could be worse than that?”

“He’s making it into some kind of fucked up test.” Sam worried his bottom lip. “He wants this to be the highest trafficked article on the site and if it’s not, he’s going to hold it against me for the rest of time. I think he just wants to prove a point about how no one cares what celebrities actually feel about anything. According to Anthony, people just want to point and laugh.”

“Shit,” I repeated myself, as I moved closer to Sam on the couch. “So, what’s the game plan?”

“The game plan is to panic.” He solemnly nodded. “And hope that I get a shit ton of interesting answers to those emails or else Anthony’s going to be proven right. It needs to be insightful and relatable and—”

“Hey,” I pressed a hand against Sam’s shoulder, “you’ve got this, okay? I believe in you.”

“Yeah? What makes you so sure?”

“Because you’re passionate about your job and it shows,” I started. “You think I’m ever going to forget the story about that mesh shirt?”

“I am over-committed to getting the story…,” Sam sighed as he cut a look over at me. “Still. There’s never been this much pressure on me before. And it’s all my fault, too. If I’d just stuck to what Anthony wanted me to do—”

“If you’d just stuck to what Anthony wanted you to do, you’d be feeling sick about it right now.”

“You’re right, you’re right,” Sam murmured. “This was the right choice. I just need to stick to my guns on this one.”

“There he is. There’s my Sam.” I lightly chuckled before I pressed a kiss against the side of his head.

“Your Sam?” Sam murmured again.

“You know what I mean,” I said, before kissing him again, a smile growing on my face. “Or is there someone else you’re giving head to in the middle of the woods?”

“Oh? You thought that meant something? That was just a normal Tuesday for me,” Sam joked. “In fact, you were the third guy I blew today—”

“I swear, you know just how to get under my skin.”

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