“I know. I’m so fucking lucky,” he said as he reached down to keep the condom on the base of his softening shaft as he pulled free. “Let me toss this and I’ll be right back.”
“Okay, baby,” I pursed my lips for another kiss and he complied. I didn’t have to do much. I was still somewhat dressed, so the only thing I had to do was put my shirt back on. When he came back, he was all tucked back into his short and Rocket was on his heels now that the show was over.
Well, our show.
Shit, the interview! He always made me lose my mind and nearly forget the important things.
“Ready?” Chris asked me as he sat back down beside me. I place my head on his shoulder and turned the tv on. We made it with a minute to spare. Typical us. We always made sex the priority, but I had to.
He was too hot to ever pass up.
“As I'll ever be,” I petted Rocket's back and gasped when we came on. Had my hair really looked like that?
That wasn’t important.
“You look so hot,” Chris said. “You need to wear those heels in the bedroom.”
“Shhh, watch,” I said, popping a piece of popcorn in my mouth.
“Party pooper.”
“Hi, this is Samantha Grieves, and I am here with Melinda Bailey, the New York socialite, and Chris Bates, the successful snowboarder and Bates Resort business owner.”
“Melinda,” Samantha asked. “When did you and Chris meet.”
“High school. But once Chris moved out of town the summer before our senior year started, we didn’t speak again. Not until I applied for a job for his resort, not knowing it was his resort.”
“Ah, serendipity,” Sam commented.
“You could say that,” I nodded.
“You haven’t always been known to pick the best men to date. Last year you were involved in some pretty serious accusations, how did you handle it?”
“I ran out of town to hide away. That’s why I took the job at Chris’ resort. Though truly, I was sick and tired of my life in general. The life I was living in New York wasn’t truly a life I wanted to live. I was already hiding my true self. I'd done that since I was a kid.”
“Why?” Sam inquired.
“My father has a drinking problem. He's a great man in many ways, but he was rarely around when I was growing up. I didn’t want people to know that. I grew up as someone who always pretended. And I thought part of it was keeping up a facade where I went to the right parties and knew the right people, even if that was never my crowd.”
“I see. Chris has recently also opened up on Instagram about his father’s alcoholism and his brother’s problem with drugs. Would you say this brought you together?”
Chris shook his head and smiled. “Not at first. It was what had created a divide between us. We weren’t, let’s say, friendly with one another in high school. We were both too busy trying to outdo one another. And we carried that with us into our adult lives. We were both great pretenders, hiding away from the world.”
“That’s interesting, as you're both public figures.”
Chris shrugged his shoulders. “We let others make assumptions about who we were, scared that if they found the real people underneath, they’d leave.”
“Funny you say that because your revealing your family history led to a wave of support from your followers and a whole online movement about dealing with alcoholism and drug misuse.”
“Yes, it became the start of something good. It wasn’t something I’d planned, but when an organization came to me and asked if I could back it and start a campaign, I thought it was the right thing to do.”
“Yes, your authenticity has led to a lot of other people coming clean with their problems and, therefore, also taking action to deal with them. And your brother, how is he doing now? Him overdosing was one of the triggers for you opening up.”
“He is doing fine. He’s been clean for three months now. He had a near-death experience when overdosing, and that led to him wanting to make a change. From there, he found a new place to live and new things to live for, leaving the past behind.”
I looked over at Chris on the couch. “We really have done something good, haven’t we? And I’m so happy Charlie is finding himself!” He was now staying at a nearby ranch, working on learning ranching, as opposed to doing bartending in New York. He’d really done a 180.
“We’re good, Melinda. You and I. Us overcoming our own inner demons have led to a world of good.”
