“It won’t be,” I responded confidently. “People have been talking about it for weeks. If nothing
else, doing it while the rest of the bar stayed open was a brilliant idea. Everyone’s dying to get in
there and see what you’ve built.”
“But what if they see it and they hate it?”
“What if they love it?” Fuck. I loved Sam, but sometimes trying to navigate his insecurities was
like banging my head against a brick wall. I’d be willing to bet he’d stayed up all night working on
lists of everything that needed to be done before losing himself in his sketches. “Come on, a nap will
help you feel better, and maybe then you won’t collapse partway through the night.”
I closed my eyes, remembering how William helped me when I couldn’t get my brain to turn off. I
hated how my body still reacted to the memories. I might never be what Sam needed but, in this
moment, I could give him a sliver of that peace.
“I don’t have time,” he protested. “There’s too much left to get done. I get why Jack wanted some
time off, but I wish he’d had better timing. He should be here tonight.”
“And if he didn’t have complete faith in us—in you—to make sure tonight is a huge success, you
know damn well he’d be here overseeing everything.” I jerked my head toward the door, and he stood
his ground, already pulling one of the notebooks back out of his bag. I snatched it out of his hand.
“Nope. You need to unwind a bit.”
“I already told you, I can’t,” he grumbled. I stepped up behind him, wrapping my arms around his
waist. It wasn’t an intimate embrace so much as me offering Sam comfort. As he always did, he
melted into my body. “Fine, but only for a few minutes. No napping.”
“Why don’t we go check out the playroom one last time,” I suggested. Before he could argue, I
slid my hand into his, leading him out of the office. I could practically hear him thinking, wondering
why I was taking him to the very room that had been his source of stress and anxiety over the past
month, but I didn’t explain my logic. Couldn’t, because I was still second-guessing myself.
I didn’t stop walking until I reached the huge bean bag near the center of the room. This, I knew,
was one piece of furniture Sam insisted on because of his own needs. We all had them, even if we
couldn’t talk about them. And Sam craved contact. I flopped back, tugging him down with me. We
both squirmed around until we were comfortable, him cradled in my arms.
I pressed my lips to the top of Sam’s head, wishing things were different. It would be so easy to
be with someone like him. He never asked anything of me, always had his own shit together, and he
