Love, Comment, Subscribe by Cathy Yardley

CHAPTER 29

The next morning, despite getting only a few hours of sleep, Tobin woke up feeling like he’d shotgunned five energy drinks. That might have something to do with the beautiful woman he’d woken up with. And the fact that he kinda had blue balls, but so be it.

She matters.

He didn’t know what it meant . . . yet. As in, would they be in a relationship? And if so, how would that work? Long distance? Regular commuting? Somebody moving? And how would they handle their channels? Their collaboration had been a huge success, professionally speaking, but he knew how protective Lily was about her brand. It might be daunting for her to suddenly go from EverLily to “The Lily & Tobin Show” in the eyes of some viewers. They’d need to talk logistics, boundaries, compromises.

That said, he knew in his gut that it would be worth it.

So he’d gotten up, taken a cold shower, and was now wearing clean clothes and eating a bowl of oatmeal with blueberries at Lily’s kitchen table. She walked out wearing a pink T-shirt with a hedgehog holding a buttercup on it, and a pair of cotton shorts. Her hair was loose around her shoulders. She bit her lip, sending him a lopsided, shy smile that made his body tighten almost painfully.

Without speaking, he reached out for her, and she went to his side, blushing slightly. “Good morning,” she said, before leaning down and kissing him.

He knew he shouldn’t get too worked up or press too much, but the kiss went a few minutes beyond “good morning” and almost into “let’s head back to bed.” He stopped himself before it went too far, leaving her with eyes hazy with pleasure.

“So. Video today,” he said, sounding like he’d swallowed a frog. He coughed. “I really appreciate your patience, by the way, with how long it’s been taking me to come up with ideas. Hopefully it won’t throw the viewers off too much when there’s two videos back to back on your channel, instead of alternating like we’d planned.”

“I was thinking about that,” she said slowly. “I mean . . . it’s not really original, per se, but I thought of a video that might fit better on your channel than it would on mine.”

“You did?” He hadn’t expected that. “What’d you have in mind? Not the TikTok dance challenges,” he added with a wink to take any sting out of his judgment. “Although at this point, I guess I ought to be more open minded.”

“This is pretty basic,” she said, tugging at the bottom of her shirt. She looked hesitant, and he just wanted to encourage her. “Remember how, when you were doing my makeup, I told you I don’t like to watch horror movies?”

He nodded, studying her. Her cheeks pinkened.

“Well . . . I was thinking we could do a reaction video.” Her voice all but stumbled. She was obviously afraid of being considered stupid, of the idea being bad, and he felt terrible. He wanted to hug her but knew that physical proximity at this point was probably not a great answer. “GoofyBui and EverLily react to a horror movie. That way, I’d still be a weenie on camera, and probably I’ll yell and hide my face, and you’ll do all those funny comments that you do. And it wouldn’t take six hours, like a video game, but it’d still have the same vibe.”

He blinked. “That’s actually really on brand. Or what we kind of have as a brand currently,” he said with a huge smile. “That’s brilliant. I don’t know why I didn’t think of that.”

She smiled, relief coming off her in waves. “Because you’re the one that comes up with the brilliant ideas?” she teased.

He rolled his eyes, his mind already whirring with possibilities. “We’ll probably want to film it down at my place. The setup’s better—my cameras, the chairs, the monitor,” he explained.

“Then we’ll need to drive to your place,” she said, nodding. “I guess we can wait until, what, Thursday or Friday? The usual?”

He suddenly didn’t want to be apart from her, which was crazy because they hadn’t spent that much time together until this past month. But after last night, he just . . . he wanted to see her. “Unless you’re going to be filming your own stuff,” he heard himself say, “I’d love to knock this out, you know? Just get it done.”

She frowned, and he realized he’d worded it poorly. “Just ‘knock it out,’ huh?” she echoed.

He sighed. “As in, I’d love to have you come down with me, to Ponto Beach, today. So we can shoot the video.”

There. He’d all but put out a welcome mat. He wanted to see what they could be. And hell, yes, he wanted to have sex with her. Preferably for a few weeks, until he got the hang of exactly what it took to make her shiver and yell and go absolutely insane.

Then he’d probably spend a few more months just perfecting it. But only when she was ready for it, and only if it meant they were leveling up to something more.

She smiled slowly. “I could go to Ponto today, sure.”

“Why don’t you pack some clothes?” he said. “And I’ll drive.”

She blinked at him. “You will?”

“No sense in us taking two vehicles when I’m just going to come back up here to film your last video,” he said, hoping he seemed reasonable.

“That’s true.” She smiled, sounding breathless. She sounded the way he felt.

He drove them down, and they talked companionably all during the two-and-a-half-hour drive, about everything. They decided which movie to watch. They talked about how happy Asad was. They talked about the upcoming reunion. Finally, they were at his house.

They’d decided on Midsommar, which was on a lot of horror top-ten lists and which he knew was also kind of artsy. He thought she’d respond better to that than to an outright slasher gore fest. They might work up to that.

Would you want to work with her again?

He frowned. Actually, doing videos with Lily had turned out to be more fun and more productive than he’d felt in a long time. He still loved doing what he did, but he’d been wrung out for so long that he wasn’t sure what he was going to do moving forward—hence being blocked. Still, if it was a choice between having Lily in a relationship and having Lily on camera, he’d choose the relationship. It sounded like she was on board too. He also wondered, absently, how slow she meant when she said “taking things slow.”

Stay focused, dude.

“You all set up?” she asked, completely unaware of the turn his thoughts had taken.

“Huh? Oh, yeah.” He cued up the movie, scooching his chair closer to hers as the movie started. “Hey-oh, it’s GoofyBui with another video with my good friend EverLily. As it turns out, she’s not a fan of horror movies, which we probably could’ve guessed from the Mr. Perfect horror game video.”

“Ha ha,” she said, rolling her eyes, but smiling at him with fondness.

“So today, we’re going to attempt watching Midsommar. Hopefully she does not kick the shit out of me again,” he said.

“You gotta dream,” she murmured.

He got the movie started, and he was not disappointed. She was interested, and she made surprisingly funny comments of her own, not just playing straight to his goofiness. She also shrieked convincingly. The movie was more atmospheric and creepy than gory, and there weren’t a lot of jump scares, but there were some graphic moments. She yelped and buried her head on his shoulder, in his chest, and he laughed . . . and held her tighter.

“Tell me when I can look,” she mumbled against his super-soft sweatshirt, and he stroked her hair.

“You got it.”

They debated over what an absolute asshole the boyfriend was and commiserated over various deaths. She laughed at the surprising humor. And as the movie went on, Tobin couldn’t help feeling more and more enamored of her. He could envision them watching movies on his love seat, not for filming, but just spending time together, enjoying each other.

Finally, the video ended. “He got just what he deserved,” Lily said with a toss of her hair.

“Remind me not to piss you off,” he said with a laugh. “All right, we’ve got one more video in this series. Stay tuned on Lily’s channel to see what happens!” Then he ended the video. “Okay. That’ll just take some editing.”

“The thing is, now I don’t know what our last video is going to be,” Lily said. “I mean, we’ve done basically two makeover-style videos with you. I want to do something different. Something original. But I’m not sure what.”

“We’ll think of something,” he reassured her. He missed holding her. They’d basically ended the video snuggling each other on the love seat as they watched. He liked it.

“Okay.” She bit her lip, looking at him shyly. “When did you want to go back to my place?”

He took a deep breath. “Remember how I suggested you pack a bag?”

She nodded, still staring at him.

“I thought maybe you could stay a day or two,” he said. “You know. Hang out.”

“Hang out, huh?” She surprised him with a tackle. He laughed until she moved to cover him like a blanket.

“And, um, brainstorm,” he stuttered, as she straddled him.

“Hmmm.” She rested her chin on top of her clasped hands, peering up at him from his chest. He sat up so he could get a better look at her. “I have an idea.”

“Oh?” It came out as a squeak. A manly squeak, he thought.

Her smile was slow and hot. “I know I said slow,” she murmured. “But I didn’t mean stop entirely.”

He knew that his answering smile had to be just as hot. “How about you go as fast as you want,” Tobin said, “and I’ll just make sure we don’t jump the rails entirely.”

Please God.It had been difficult enough not crossing the line the night before. At this rate, he wasn’t sure he had enough willpower. But like he’d told her, she mattered. Until she was sure, he’d damned well stick to her original boundary.

She made a happy little humming sound and then plastered herself against him like wet cloth, her hot, hungry mouth kissing the daylights out of him. He could definitely get used to this, was his last coherent thought before his body took over. He kissed her back just as ravenously, his hands roaming over her body, pulling her tight against him. He barely registered her tugging at his shirt until they broke apart, panting, and she pulled the offending article of clothing over his head and tossed it on the floor. He could see her nipples sticking out against her thin T-shirt fabric. Without thinking, he leaned forward, dampening one with his tongue. She gasped, arching her back and pressing deeper into his mouth, so naturally, he sucked harder.

“Tobin,” she breathed.

She was moving restlessly against him, and he was hard as titanium at this point. He could feel the damp heat of her through her thin cotton and his silky nylon basketball shorts. He moved his hips to meet hers, stroking her along his hard length as she gasped and strained. He found himself notched right where she needed him, and she picked up speed, molding herself to him, her hips moving frantically.

“Baby,” he said as her fingers dug into his shoulders, moving with a quickly devolving rhythm against his arms. He was lifting himself off the couch, trying to get closer to her, and her thighs clenched against his sides as she rolled her body. She was breathing in gasping gulps. He kissed hard along her neck, cupping her ass as she bore down on him.

“Ahh!”She cried out and started shivering. He could feel the rush of wetness through her shorts, and her hips swiveled in a way that practically made his eyes cross.

Before he could stop himself, his body jerked, pleasure flooding out of him, into his basketball shorts.

They stayed like that for a long moment, just looking at each other and breathing heavily.

“So that happened,” he finally said unevenly.

Her eyes widened, and then she started laughing. He joined her, until they were both laughing hysterically, wiping at their eyes.

“Come on, get up,” he said. “I have to change shorts. I haven’t come in my pants since I was . . . God, I don’t even remember.”

“Worth it,” she said smugly. Then she surveyed him from under those long damned eyelashes of hers. “So . . . I’m guessing the guest bedroom’s still a mess, huh?”

He smirked. “Yeah.”

“Guess I’m sharing a bed with you again, then,” she said.

Suddenly, bedtime couldn’t come soon enough.