I know she does. They all do.
“I’m not worried. If I can handle the politics of the Californian elite, I’m sure I can charm the rest of the world.”
This is what my mother raised me to do. I can work a room with my eyes closed. I haven’t spent years battling against Felicity Taylor just to be bested by some online trolls.
Aleks pulls me into his chest, and I snuggle into him.
“That’s my girl.”
“Always.”
THIRTY-THREE
* * *
ALEKS
“Are you lagging or something, English? Your shots are shit.”
“Well, maybe if someone wasn’t camping out by the weapon drop, I could get a better fucking gun.”
“I’m not camping.”
I’m totally camping.
I watch as Parker’s character comes ducking and rolling into the loading dock. I snipe him with a headshot. Again. He cusses me out, and I laugh back at him.
Then the screen switches perspective, and I watch as Jackson’s character assassinates me with a knife.
“Asshat.”
“The karma of camping,” he drawls.
“Oh, yeah, that’s great coming from the guy who keeps using his invisibility shield.”
“Don’t be bitter, it’s unattractive.”
While I wait to resurrect, I scan the chat. At least half of the messages are asking me to turn on the camera. BladeGurl69 is asking for “some of that eye candy,” while ProFly_1 is arguing that our video was AI-generated and “there’s no way all three of them could be attractive.”
It’s been two weeks since our reveal, our video having reached over twenty million views, but I’ve yet to actually stream or post any videos with my camera on. It’s just not my instinct.
I have taken off my gloves, though. Baby steps.
We’ve had hundreds of sponsors reach out offering us new filming equipment, gaming gear, and merch. Parker was on the money when he said we would hit new levels. All of our subs went up, and my average stream views are nuts. It doesn’t look like it will be slowing down any time soon. Sydney has had to hire an assistant just to help field all our social media and publicity requests. The three of us sit down for our first interview next week, and tomorrow night we’ll be heading to the Gods League Champion Series opening event.
Four weeks ago, Stevie and I thought we would have to sneak around the event. Now, she will be riding in the limo with the rest of us.
Stevie lounges on the bean bag I bought her, sketching away in her notebook. She’s been camped out at the apartment for the last four days ever since the media eventually got wind of our relationship and her place got mobbed. One of the outlets had finally gotten around to using the information Decker had scrounged up. We upped security for her, but she said it was just easier to stay here.
I stream with the boys for another hour before logging off and switching over to Death Valley to film some role-play content for my channel. I film around two hours’ worth of content, messing around with some new people I brought into my server, then send the footage to our editor. He’ll edit it into four separate videos to be posted over the next week.
It’s only ten, but Stevie’s knocked out on the beanbag. I go to move her sketchpad so I can carry her to bed but pause when I see what she was working on. It’s a graphite half-body image of me gaming, my expression pulled into a smirk. It shocks me. Not that she sketched me, but the image itself. I’m so used to seeing myself playing in the mask that the simplicity of it just being me and my headset throws me off.
“It’s rude to look at an artist’s sketchbook without permission,” her sleepy voice scolds.
“I think I get a pass considering I’m the subject.”
“Fair.” She sits up, stretching. “Do you like it?”
“I do. I’ve never seen myself this way before.”
She tilts her head. “It’s how I always see you.”
“I know, but it feels different now.”
She nods, looping her arms around me. I set the sketchbook down and pick her up, carrying her to the kitchen and sitting her on a stool. I pull our ice cream out of the freezer, double chocolate brownie for me, maple pecan for her. I leave them to thaw a bit as I grab some spoons from the drawer.
“You’ll get used to it eventually, Aleks.” She’s staring at her ice cream, watching it as if that will force it to melt faster. “You’ve shown me time and time again that the man behind the mask is no different. That Aleksander Knight is a game-crushing, motorcycle-riding hottie all on his own.”
I take the seat next to her. “You think I’m hot?”
She snorts, digging her spoon into the still frozen dessert, threatening to bend the metal. “Yeah, you’re hot. Think you can use some of that hotness to melt this damn ice cream.”
I dig a scoop out of mine, holding it out to her. She scrunches her nose.
“What?”
She’s looking at the ice cream like it offended her.
“I have something to tell you.”
“Ominous.” I pop the spoon in my mouth, savoring the chocolatey goodness as it melts against my tongue. “What is it?”
“I don’t really like chocolate.”
I blink at her, slowly sliding the spoon from between my lips before pointing it at her. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, I don’t hate it.” She rubs the back of her neck avoiding my eyes. “It’s not bad if it’s, you know, milk chocolate or something subtle, but…”
“But?”
She covers her face with her hands, resting her elbows on the table. “But, oh my god, you overdo it on the chocolate factor. It’s way too much. You keep buying those chocolate muffins, and I don’t like them. They’re so rich. I can’t do chocolate on chocolate on chocolate.” She peeks at me through her fingers.
When I don’t say anything, she gives me puppy dog eyes and pouts. “I’m sorry.”
I let her stew in her deception for a moment longer before letting loose the laughter that’s been building. She’s priceless, I swear.
“Why are you sorry? Just means more chocolate for me.” I ruffle her hair.
She sits up, eyes narrowing. “Are you sure?”
“Yes, Stevie. I’m not going to break up with you just because you don’t share my chocolate addiction.”
“What if I was a worm, would you break up with me then?”
“You’re a loser.” I spoon out some of her maple ice cream and hold it out to her. She smiles and bites it off, humming with pleasure.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“No, Stevie, I wouldn’t break up with you even if you were a worm.”
***
“Everyone, Francis will be here in ten minutes, and god help me if you are all not ready and standing by this elevator.” Sydney shouts from the living room. I can hear her heels clicking on the floor, pacing back and forth, no doubt.
“I’m almost done!” Stevie yells back from inside the bathroom.
Sitting on my bed, I watch her as she finishes applying her lip gloss and sprays some sort of mist on her face. She looks drop-dead gorgeous. Her dress is a red as dark as the blood running through my veins. I’m tempted to rip it off and make love to her on the bathroom counter, but I also want to kneel on the ground and kiss my way up her long, tan legs, worshiping her every inch.