Series: Cobalt Empire Series by Krista Ritchie
Total pages in book: 220
Estimated words: 215301 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1077(@200wpm)___ 861(@250wpm)___ 718(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 215301 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1077(@200wpm)___ 861(@250wpm)___ 718(@300wpm)
“I’m happy for you,” Phoenix says genuinely. “I honestly didn’t peg your billionaire blue-blooded parents for being accepting like that.”
“Not surprised. You have judged a lot about my family.”
“Hmm.” The deep noise in his throat and subsequent nod in agreement skips my pulse a beat. “I didn’t have much to go off of.”
“Because you still haven’t done your Cobalt Empire research. There are infinite-scroll fandom pages dedicated to my fam.”
“Infinite, huh?” He’s smiling a little.
“The lore never ends,” I say. “I’ll send you a link—”
“And I won’t click into it.” When I start to protest, he adds, “Never going to happen.”
“I’m going to go hoarse explaining this shit to you, dude.”
“Wow, having to have a real conversation with someone and not making them do homework to know you. I feel so bad for you, nepo baby.”
It’s not even that. I just want him to know me instantly. And yeah, okay, that is a cheap way to make it happen. But I’ve never felt like this with anyone else. This eagerness for them to really understand me, and maybe it is because he’s pumping the brakes at even trying to fish for the barest of details.
“Fine. A fact most people know,” I tell Phoenix. “My dad isn’t straight. He doesn’t do labels. He’s attracted to who he’s attracted to, and in the past, he hooked up with men before my mom came into the picture.”
Phoenix blows back in surprise. “You had your dad to talk to growing up? About dating men?”
“Uh, no,” I say into a deeper laugh. “I didn’t and don’t talk to my dad about that.”
He tilts his head. “You just bring up sex shops and spanking around him. Checks out.”
“Sarcasm noted,” I tell him. Holy shit, I’m burning up. I tug off my beanie, my hair sticking up, and I flatten it with a hand. “And when I say that stuff around my dad, it’s not serious. He knows it’s a joke. Going to him for genuine advice on dating guys and sex actually sounds like a horror story, and not because he wouldn’t be comfortable. He would. Like he is super casual about most everything in an analytical, logical way, and it’d embarrass the shit out of me because I can’t be that calm about it.”
“So you can get embarrassed.”
“Yeah, badly. Like full-on, I-never-want-to-leave-my-room kind of embarrassed. And there are only a few people in my life who can make that shit happen. You are not one of them.”
He glares at me. “Had to finish with that.”
“Had to,” I agree. I eye him, worry clenching the muscles in my abdomen. “What about you and your parents? They seem like they care about you if they’re attempting a meet-up with mine.”
“They do care. They care a lot. They want to make sure I avoid mistakes, even if that means not telling me about setting up a dinner-date with Rose Calloway and Connor Cobalt.” He takes off his baseball cap just to run an agitated hand through his hair. “Sorry about that by the way.”
“It’s cool. You don’t need to apologize. I mean, the inverse is they’re assholes—right?”
He nods, but I still see the heaviness in his body. “And I came out when I started dating my high school boyfriend, Garrett. My mom asked if I was bi, and I told her I was pretty sure I was gay. She hugged me. Dad hugged me. Then Birdie brought home a rainbow-sprinkle cake just so he could shove it in my face.”
“Literally?”
“No, it was a metaphorical cake. Yes, literally.”
I’m smiling. “Sounds nice.”
“Yours does too.”
We share a soft moment of acknowledgment that maybe we had different experiences, but the end result is the same. People in our lives care about us, and I’m just as happy for him as he is for me. His phone beeps in his hand, and he lets out a soft growl. “So while you were having that insane conversation with your parents, I got a text from my brother—I’m going to need to meet up with you in about an hour. If that’s okay?”
I frown. “Yeah, everything all right?”
He winces. “So we have these things called Future Favors. Basically they’re IOUs. Bird did me a solid a few weeks ago covering for me at the orchestra. He just cashed in his favor.”
And he thinks my family is weird.
“I’ll bite. What’s the favor?”
“I’m picking up my brother’s prescription for Klonopin. The pharmacy is a pain to get to, and I think he’s busy at rehearsals, so he wants me to do it for him.”
“If it’s just an errand, I can go with you…if you want.”
He considers for longer than ten seconds, which sets my skin on fire. The cold? What cold? My body thinks it’s July.
“Hmmm,” he breathes deeply through his nose before he tucks his helmet under his arm. “Okay.” He twists toward the street. “But let’s take your car.”