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Chapter Twenty-Seven
Hours later, Hollyn was sated and sleepy in her bed with Jasper sprawled next to her after they’d exhausted themselves with two rounds of lovemaking. The first time, they hadn’t even made it to the bedroom. It was as if the few days apart had been months. The minute they’d walked into the door after the picnic, Jasper had grabbed her and pushed her against the wall, kissing and touching her everywhere. They’d ended up on the couch, still half-dressed, and Jasper rucking up her dress and thanking the sex gods that he still had a condom in his wallet.
The second time, they’d slowed it down and actually made it to the bedroom. Jasper had driven her out of her mind with his hands and then his mouth before he’d dragged her on top of him and buried deep inside her. Her body had never felt so satisfied and sapped at the same time. But her body had nothing on her brain. She was riding some high that made it impossible to wipe the smile off her face. She’d put herself out there, had done the thing she was so afraid to do, expecting the worst to happen, and Jasper had said more than she could’ve ever hoped to hear.
Her best-case-scenario conjecturing with Mary Leigh had nothing on what the reality had turned out to be. Mary Leigh was going to feel so smug when she found out how right she’d been.
Hollyn laughed.
Jasper turned his head on the pillow. “What are you giggling about over there?”
She gave him a stern look. “First, I don’t giggle. That was clearly a very mature, sultry laugh.”
“Of course,” he said. “Lauren Bacall incarnate.”
“Thank you. And I was just thinking that my therapist is going to be buying feathers for her proverbial cap. She was the one who told me to get over myself and just tell you how I felt.”
“Your therapist is a genius.”
“Yep.”
He grabbed her hand, lacing her fingers with his as they lay on their backs next to each other, naked beneath the covers. “This is so not how I expected my day to turn out.”
She stared at their linked hands, loving the way his was so much bigger than hers, two of his knuckles dotted with burns from the coffee contraptions at WorkAround. “You and me both. Why did you ask me on the picnic anyway? Just to tell me to go be with Cal? That’s like a super unromantic picnic.”
He let out a breath. “Actually, that was not what I planned to talk to you about at all. I was bringing you out there to convince you to do me a huge favor.”
“Oh?” She turned her body to face him. “What kind of favor?”
He shook his head against the pillow. “It’s not important. I’ve changed my mind. I’m going to figure something else out.”
She frowned, not liking that closed off look on his face. “No, don’t do that. Tell me. We are rocking the honesty today. Let’s not end our streak. What’s going on?”
He looked at her, his brows knit. “I’ve got three big investors interested in my theater.”
Hollyn gasped. “Jasper, that’s great!”
He smiled a little. “It is. It’s unbelievable, honestly. But the catch is that they need to see a live show, and I need to make it seem like a spectacle. A packed house, a lot of buzz. I need to seal the deal with social proof.”
Hollyn propped her head on her hand. “Oh. Do you need me to write up my review? I had already started one after seeing your show with Cal. I could finish it up and get it to run in the next day or two.”
He gave the hand she still had linked with his a squeeze. “Thank you, but I need more than that. Fitz thinks that if we promote the event with Miz Poppy as our special guest star, we’ll get all the people we need. He wants the event to also be your identity reveal.”
She blinked and her nose scrunched. “Guest star? You mean like me,live onstage? To a packed house?” The horror of that rushed through her like a roller-coaster plunge. “Jasper…”
“Yeah, I know. It’s too much. Which is why I’m going to come up with something else. I’m not asking you to do that for me.” He brought her hand up to his mouth and kissed her knuckles. “I’m going to brainstorm some options tomorrow. There’s got to be something that will get a lot of people there.”
She watched him, her heart beating hard in her chest. She knew how much these investors meant to Jasper. This could be the difference between another year pouring coffee or his dream coming true, but he wasn’t going to push her to do it. God.This guy.
She had a potential key to the kingdom for him, but he was going to let her keep it in her pocket—without a guilt trip, without manipulation, without shaming her for her anxiety. If she promoted on her NOLA Vibe page that she was going to be a guest star at the show and reveal her identity, she had no doubt people would show up. Her numbers didn’t lie. But the thought of being up there onstage, no avatar, no opportunity to edit out mistakes, everything improvised, her tics showing up under all those bright lights…it made her feel faint.
“I would screw it up,” she said, talking to herself more than him.
He glanced over at her. “You wouldn’t. First, there is no screwing it up. It’s improv. But you don’t see yourself. You’re really quick on your feet. When you don’t overthink it, you’re really funny and smart on camera. I don’t think you realize it, but your Miz Poppy comes out. I can hear the voice from your articles coming through—the real you.” He rolled on his side to face her. “I’m not saying this to try to convince you, but I hope that other people besides me get to see that part of you one day. Whatever that timeline looks like for you.”
Hollyn swallowed past the knot in her throat. “I don’t think I can do it without panicking. My tics would be out of control.”
He kissed her twitching nose. “You don’t have to do it. I’m not asking you to.”
