Page 13 of The B Side

Darcy nodded. Made sense. But, “All right, fair enough. What I think we should have a talk about before I leave is what’s going on. Like, about how you’re feeling.”

She could see that Juliet was going to deny the maelstrom of emotions that had very clearly been coursing through her since Christmas and had gotten a lot worse since Darcy’s paparazzi incident. So, she headed that off.

“Don’t,” she insisted gently but firmly, cutting her a beseeching look. She reached out, dropping her hand to Juliet’s thigh. “It’s been almost a month. I think it’s time we just… face it. Whatever you’re feeling underneath it all.”

Juliet’s lips rolled into a tight line as she took a deep breath in through her nose. Holding onto her words and her emotions and everything else.

“Don’t shut me out, Juliet. Please don’t shut me out. Especially not now. Not while we’re locked in this together.” She could hear the begging tone in her own voice, but she couldn’t help it.

She felt that pleading through her entire body, like it had been building in her, coiling in wait. And, really, it had.

But she’d wanted to give Juliet time. She’d wanted to let her process. So, she’d done her best not to push, to show up how Juliet had seemed to need her to.

Juliet had been channeling a lot of her energy into… physical energy. And Darcy wasn’t really complaining about all of the sex, but they’d hit the point where she needed more.

They might have been together for over two years now – if counting their start as when they’d started having sex, which Darcy did – but right now, they were in uncharted waters.

For Juliet, for both of them as a couple.

They’d gotten very good at being a couple behind closed doors and being best friends in public. They’d gotten great at letting the backs of their hands touch instead of holding when they were seated next to one another at an event. Great at leaning in so their shoulders rubbed together instead of turning and leaning in for a kiss.

But they hadn’t dealt with anything of this magnitude. They hadn’t dealt with anything that had this kind of ripple effect in both their personal and professional lives. Even individually in their careers, neither of them had dealt with something like this.

She wasn’t entirely shocked by Juliet’s reticence. After all, it had taken months of them having the best, most intense sex of Darcy’s life before Juliet could even verbalize that she enjoyed Darcy’s company.

It made sense to her that when Juliet’s world was flipped upside down, she went quiet. And Darcy could handle that, could be here for that. But now that she wasn’t going to be here, she needed to push a little.

Because Juliet wasn’t the only one who felt uncertain about what this all meant.

“I don’t know what there is to say, when…” Juliet’s voice shook slightly as she turned her head away and swallowed hard, clearly keeping herself together. Either from breaking down or erupting in fury, Darcy couldn’t be sure. “None of this is a surprise. I knew all of this would happen. I knew Copper Canyon would be a nonstarter–”

And that was true. Neither of them would have wanted to be at Copper Canyon, even if they offered them the deal of a lifetime. But the only thing they’d heard from Copper Canyon were angry calls and their lawyers contacting Juliet’s to comb over the contract.

“I knew that so many people adore Robbie and wouldn’t hesitate to tear me down and jump to conclusions that I wronged him.”

Well, Darcy hadn’t seen that one coming at all. And people had been absolutely vicious; even worse than they’d been during that first week.

But given that Robbie wasn’t out and had no plans of coming out, there could be no implication that his and Juliet’s relationship wasn’t entirely authentic. Juliet was openly queer now, but as far as the public was concerned, she’d genuinely been with Robbie for nearly a decade. It didn’t seem to matter that Robbie himself had been vocal in supporting them and had sworn there’d been no infidelity.

The court of public opinion was its own beast, a beast that didn’t necessarily care about facts, and the hive-mind mentality was rampant.

“With our audience? They’d side with him just for being a man, let alone that I’m a lesbian,” Juliet continued, the words seeming to spill out now. Like they’d been unlocked.

And that was also true.

They’d definitely had a strong show of support all over social media. A ton of queer people had been very excited and very ardent about how they’d never been into country but were now streaming hers and Juliet’s music like crazy.

But the reaction from a lot of their existing fanbase had ranged from disappointed to downright hateful.

Laura had combed through both of their socials and sent them some positive, encouraging posts, while blocking the awful ones.

“I knew that my mom likely wasn’t going to be able to contact me much for a while, while she was dealing with the Harrison fallout.”

That one had cut Juliet deeper than she’d have cared to admit; Darcy knew that. In the last year and a half, since Juliet had come out to her mom privately, they’d talked a lot more. Her mom had come to visit them a handful of times, which she knew hadn’t been normal prior to that.

And now that Juliet’s relationship with her mother was in a decent place for the first time in her adult life, the Harrison inferno was roaring.

“I knew these were the consequences, Darcy.” Juliet was quiet, so somber, as she turned those dark eyes back to hers, the open vulnerability in them digging sharply into Darcy’s chest. “Nothing about this is surprising. No, I literally couldn’t come out before. But this is the reason people who aren’t held back by contracts stay in the closet. All of the noise, the doors that once would have been open without a doubt slamming closed.”