Page 115 of The Kiss of Deception

I gasp in faux astonishment, but my grin doesn’t falter from my lips, colliding against his own gravity-defying smile as we refuse to part even an inch.

Snaking his arms around my waist, Miles lifts me up, twirls us around, drawing circles upon invisible circles in the grass.

Although my head falls back to the starry sky, my eyes close to savor the feel of the cooling late breeze against my flushed cheeks as my laughter floats with the fireflies, mingling with the wet sputtering.

Tiny splashes fall and fall until every inch of our skin is soaked, more powerful than any liquor. I feel drunk, so drunk on his love.

Under the stars, comets and constellations, Miles kisses me in the rain. Sort of.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Zoe

My pillow has been permanently replaced.

These days, I go to sleep with my nose buried inside my boyfriend’s arms, and I wake up drooling on a massive wall of muscle.

The alarm clock suffered an upgrade, too, and some days I stir with Miles’s mouth between my legs—which means I'm the one waking up the house with screams and multiple orgasms.

I'd never quite understood the appeal of early mornings until now.

Other than that, our lives changed without much changing.

Only the smallest shift of the last wall that crumbled between us. We tore it down to stand in the same room, and nothing separates us now—no lies, no pretenses, no hidden feelings.

The room is a bedroom, and we now share a bed. My sleepless nights don’t belong to my ghosts anymore, just like my dreams.

They all belong to my boyfriend. My boyfriend.

There was no strangeness or awkwardness, since transitions were unnecessary. Most nights, I fall asleep wondering what I was so afraid of in the first place.

Whatever lies I told myself before, the truth is we were already sharing a life together. The evidence is our routine, that has remained unchanged—with the exception of some nightly rituals. And morning. And the occasional afternoon.

Every day, we have breakfast together. Miles sits me on the counter so that I devour my cereal where he can cop a feel—or many—while preparing his fruit and fiber and protein, whatever that means.

As he leaves for the club facilities, I close myself in his library, which is officially my home office. My desk stayed, after all, albeit moved to a spot where I enjoy some vitamin D while I busy my hours with work.

My project officially launched on Miles’s birthday, in perfect harmony with the theme. The story of the man behind the athlete. The little boy before stardom.

If I’m honest with myself, I have to confess it started as an excuse to collect new pieces of the puzzle that is Miles Blackstein; who he is, and what made him who he is.

It quickly escalated into something else—something bigger. As my then-fake-boyfriend gave me a peek into his childhood through the eyes of his memories, something else glared at me.

In a world that treats athletes like public property, shiny things denied the basis of humanity—flaws and mistakes, or the simple concepts of privacy and dignity—there was a need to reclaim their humanity for them.

The series of intimate interviews that would translate into an article soon morphed into a short story in which a little boy was the main character. And through a character, we tell a real story.

A cartoon illustration of a young boy sets the tone. Then, the tale.

The official website reached proportions that I hadn’t anticipated, crashing countless times in the first twenty-four hours due to high traffic, the social media accounts hitting numbers overnight that had me questioning whether I posted the wrong picture of Miles.

In face of the numbers, I’m forced to consider that what started as a distraction had become as a project with serious potential.

In my head, plans are already taking shape: transfer the interviews into podcast format, and my priority: manipulate Rodri into being my next guest.

Although I miss the sidelines and the energy of a boiling stadium, I don’t miss the stress of my days in the newsroom or my dearest colleagues. I don’t even get to miss Liam, as he keeps badgering me with an average of eighteen texts per hour. I have no desire to participate in the hostility of the corporate ladder for a job that, as much as I love, no longer challenges me—and I’m fortunate enough to have the possibility to risk other ventures. To do something bigger than the sum of its parts, bigger than the work itself.

Still, I keep my remote duties, juggling both things. Resigning feels too final, though I know I eventually will.

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