“Oh, good.” He reaches in and takes my head in his hands. We nestle against each other, nose to nose, breath to breath. “I love you, too.”
“Unfortunately,” I say, “for the next handful of years or so, we’re going to be long-distance.”
He doesn’t even flinch. “I like New York. Are you going to take temporary custody of my plant?”
“Not that long-distance,” I say. “This is going to sound strange, but—while you’re in Australia, I’m taking the GRE. And finishing an application to graduate school. I had a long talk with a professor at Stanford about cybersecurity. It’s a long story.”
“Good,” he says. “I like long stories. I have time.” Then he kisses me again—this time, harder.
“It’s scary,” I tell him. “It’s scary to expect things. It’s going to take me time to get used to it.”
He pulls me toward him. “We have time.”
“We do.” I find myself looking into his eyes. Leaning my forehead against his. “I don’t think I could ever have told you that you were enough until I believed I was, too. But maybe it’s that simple. We’re enough.”
He doesn’t respond. Not at first. Then he smiles, and his smile seems to envelop me in warmth. “Tell me all about it in an hour. For now, I have some other ideas as to how we should spend our time.”
“I like other ideas,” I say. “I like them a lot.”
Then he kisses me again, and again, and again, until we’re nothing but other ideas.
Thank you!
Thank you for reading Hold Me. I hope you enjoyed it.
Would you like to know when my next book is available? You can sign up for my new release e-mail list at www.courtneymilan.com, follow me on twitter at @courtneymilan, or like my Facebook page at http://facebook.com/courtneymilanauthor.
Reviews help other readers find books. I appreciate all reviews, whether positive or negative.
Hold Me is the second book in the Cyclone series. It’s preceded by Trade Me, and followed by Find Me, What Lies Between Me and You, Keep Me, and Show Me.
Is there anything else I can read about Jay and Maria?
A lot of times, when I delete scenes, there’s really nothing to do with them—I delete them because they’re stupid or they don’t belong in the story. I don’t want you to see them, now or ever.
When I wrote the first draft of Hold Me, I originally had flashbacks to Jay and Maria’s first discussions on Maria’s blog. I ended up deleting them because they interrupted the flow of the story, but you might still be interested. You can see the first time they exchanged comments, and why they call each other A. and Em. You can read them at: http://www.courtneymilan.com/jayandmaria.php
What is the Cyclone series?
The Cyclone series is a set of stories loosely (or not so loosely) connected to Cyclone Technologies, a fictional computer company located in the heart of Silicon Valley.
What other characters are getting stories?
Blake and Tina’s story started in Trade Me, and will be continued in Find Me. Kenji Miyahara, mentioned very briefly in this book, will be the star of Keep Me (alongside Ellie Wise—there’s an excerpt from Find Me that introduces her right after this section). Angela Choi is the star of Show Me. And Adam Reynolds will be the star of What Lies Between Me and You.
When will these books release?
I’m not the fastest writer and I don’t like making promises when I’m not sure I can keep them. I hope that Find Me and What Lies Between Me and You will be out sometime in 2017.
I don’t want to wait that long! What can I do in the meantime?
Luckily, I have written many other books. If you haven’t already done so, you can try my historical romances. I suggest starting with The Governess Affair— it’s free on most platforms right now. There’s humor, there’s angst…there are no smartwatches, but in the course of the Brothers Sinister series, you will get primers (they go from A-Z), pretty gowns (and some intentionally hideous ones), pink snapdragons (except there is no such thing as a pink snapdragon), and exclamation points (necessary for proper pronunciation). Give them a try. If you’ve already read all my books, I have a list of recommendations for other authors on my website.
And if you’re looking for more in the Cyclone universe, there are three shorts you can read. The first is from a few years before Trade Me starts, and it’s a snippet of life at Cyclone from Adam Reynolds’s point of view. You can find it here: http://bit.ly/afr-at-cyclone The second is a cross-over story between the Brothers Sinister series and the Cyclone universe, set initially in the year 2020...until Adam accidentally time-travels back to Victorian England. You can find that here: http://bit.ly/afr-meets-free.
Finally, The Year of the Crocodile is a short story that takes place between Trade Me and Find Me, right in the middle of Hold Me. You can find it for sale on any vendor where you purchased this book, or you can get a free copy by signing up for my newsletter through this link: https://www.instafreebie.com/free/xTLPC
Find Me: Excerpt
Blake Reynolds finally has everything under control. He and his father have ironed out the wrinkles in their relationship. He’s in love with his girlfriend. And with the turmoil of the last year firmly in the past, he’s ready to move on to the next phase of his life. Then the sister he didn’t know he had walks into his life. The mother he’s never met is in need of a liver transplant—and he’s the only possible match. Suddenly, everything he thought he knew turns inside out.
* * *
Tina Chen wants to believe in a future with Blake. But when she tries to make his life easier by bringing his father into the confusing tangle, the conflict escalates from a difficult family matter into a worldwide scandal. Loving Blake is easy, but the temporary happiness they’ve found together just means she’s all the more aware when “ever after” begins to slip out of her grasp…
* * *
an unedited excerpt from Chapter One
* * *
TINA
* * *
My boyfriend’s sleek, fully electric vehicle stands out in the parking lot in my parents’ apartment complex, brand-new gleaming black paint juxtaposed against a collection of dried weeds and cracked asphalt. I stretch surreptitiously in the driver’s seat, feeling muscles that have been too still for too long protest.
In the seat next to mine, Blake glances in the side-view mirror. “Are you going to straighten…”
He trails off at my baleful glare. I should not have driven straight through from Coalinga. My butt hurts, my eyes feel too dry, and I have to pee. I’m annoyed with everything—probably because I’m thirsty and hungry and sore. This may not be the best time to argue with Blake. And yet here we are.
Wisely, he doesn’t finish his sentence. I’m not going to clean up my parking job, dammit. I’m in the lines. I’m maybe five degrees from parallel, and I’m done.
“You still haven’t decided what you’re doing this month,” he says.
I exhale and stare at the steering wheel. “Sky diving. And that’s my final offer.”
Blake Reynolds is my boyfriend. Some days—like right now—it still doesn’t feel real. We’ve been dating for a little over a year, and sometimes I feel like the weeds next to his perfectly-engineered Tesla. Over the last year, we’ve started a game of sorts. I used to play things far too safe, so now I’m trying to push myself. Every month, I’ve been doing something risky. It doesn’t have to be something big, but it has to be something that scares me. Something that stretches my boundaries. Over the last twelve months, I’ve taken a surprise road trip, gone bungee jumping, invested a thousand dollars in a startup, and bought a pair of heels that cost more than my monthly rent used to.
Blake glances briefly at me, then looks away. I know him well enough now to know that he’s holding something back. I can tell by the slight crinkle in his forehead, the dancing light in his steel-blue eyes. He rubs his eyes.
“Here’s another possibility.” He licks his lips. “We could go
to Vegas this week. It’s not that far.”
“Ugh.” My lip curls of its own accord. “No, sorry. No gambling. That’s not risky; it’s just stupid. A good risk has some possibility of danger, but a high potential return. Gambling is—”
“Not to gamble,” he says quietly.
I look over at him. He looks…slightly nervous, actually. I roll my shoulders, trying to ditch the lingering soreness. Maybe we can get this over with and I can go to the bathroom.
“Fine. Go to Vegas for what?” The air conditioning in the car feels a little stale. I can feel the heat of the sun coming through the windows. Any moment, my mom will notice that we’ve arrived, and…
“You’re still planning to go to medical school?” Now he doesn’t just glance in my direction. He looks at me. I can’t look away.
I’m not sure what that has to do with Vegas. I didn’t apply to school in Vegas, and it’s too late to do more. I have my first two acceptances thanks to rolling admissions, and the last few responses should be in soon. I’ve accomplished everything I’ve sacrificed for over the past years. And the truth is, every time I think about going to medical school…
I feel irritated think about the future right now.
He’s watching me carefully.
“What does that have to do with Vegas?” I can’t keep the suspicion in my tone. “Don’t tell me your dad owns some other medical start up there.”
He shakes his head.
It’s something of a sore point between us. I had an internship at a biotech company last summer, and it was amazing. They had me working long-distance with a guy who was crazy-smart, doing things with 3D biological printing that nobody had ever done before. The company was smart, innovative, and exciting. They offered me a job, and while the salary wouldn’t match what I could make as a doctor, it would start immediately, without student loans.
All my years of carefully laid plans should have gone out the window.
If Blake is the gleaming futuristic car in my overgrown parking lot, his father is the UFO hovering overhead, casually poised to destroy us all.
It’s not as simple as great job versus medical school. Blake is wealthy in his own right, but his father owns eight percent of that little biotech company—and that’s one of his tiny investments, so insignificant I didn’t find out about it until the end of my summer there. To make it worse, bioLogica pulled my résumé when my name was catapulted into the Silicon Valley elite because I was dating that Blake Reynolds.
Giving up a career where I would have the credentials to do anything with anyone anywhere in the country, in exchange for one where I would always know that I was dependent on his family’s good will…? That’s the kind of risk I’m not willing to take.
Blake isn’t an asshole. He hasn’t pushed me on this. But I know that he wonders.
“Want to do something risky?” He doesn’t smile. “Come with me to Vegas this week and get married.”
The bottom drops out of my stomach. I stare at him. I don’t ask him to repeat himself. I don’t ask for an explanation.
He gives one anyway. “I don’t really care what choice you make,” he says. “If you want to be a doctor, be a doctor. If you don’t want to be a doctor, don’t. But don’t go to medical school just because you’re planning for a future without me.”
The air conditioning doesn’t feel like it’s working any more. The car is too hot, too stuffy. And Blake is right. The only reason I’m considering medical school at this point is because I need to be the financially stable one in my family. I want Mable to never have to skip movie night with friends when she goes to college. I want my mom to never have to pick up extra shifts at the cupcake food truck during fairs because she’s two weeks late on the electricity bill.
“Marriage is a bigger decision than medical school,” I hear myself say. “And if you don’t think it is, there’s no guarantee we’ll be together long enough to make a difference.”
Blake bites his lip. He runs his hand through sandy-blond hair. “California is a community property state,” is the non sequitur that comes out of his mouth.
I have no idea what that means. I frown at him.
“If we get married,” he explains, “you are considered equal owner of my assets. It’s a little more complicated than that, and I’d have to make you sign a prenup that allows me to solely vote my Cyclone B-class shares, but if we got married, it would always make a difference. You’d get a lot of money if we divorced.”
My irritation multiplies into a thousand little points of sandpaper. “Blake, are you saying I should marry you for your money, then divorce you and take you for everything you’re worth?”
He shrugs. “You don’t technically have to divorce me.”
Of all the things for him to say. I know my rising tide of frustration has as much to do with the fact that I’ve been trapped in this car for too long. It’s not entirely about the fact that he asked me to marry him for his stupid, goddamned money. But it’s too late; I’ve passed from annoyed into downright aggravated. His shrug grates on my fraying nerves. His nonchalance is about to send me over the edge.
I take hold of the door handle, but there’s no easy escape from this situation. I take a long, deep breath. “The answer is no. I’m not going to elope with you to Vegas this week. And it’s not because I think it’s too risky. It’s because good risk has a reward, and nothing about that sounds rewarding to me.”
“Not one thing?”
“First,” I tell him, “if we ever get married, we’re not getting away with a Vegas ceremony. You’re news, Blake, and your getting married in Vegas will—”
“Allow us to avoid the paparazzi who try and sneak in,” he puts in.
I glower at him. “Fuck the paparazzi. Getting married is partially about developing a common community. If you think we’re going to avoid throwing two giant parties—one down here, for my family and friends, and another one up in the Bay Area for yours—”
“And the entire Cyclone team,” he puts in.
“—then you are badly mistaken. Second, if we ever get married, it will be because I believe that we will have what my parents have.”
He glances dubiously behind me. “A two-bedroom apartment in Alhambra?”
I’m aware of every blade of dead grass stuffed in the cracks in the asphalt. My temper flares.
“Fine.” I undo my seatbelt. “You want to be a dick about it? Let’s be dicks. You didn’t grow up with parents who loved each other, so you don’t know what it’s like. You don’t know what it’s like when two people assume that whatever happens to them, they’ll get through together. You grew up with your dad always getting his way, and you know what? That doesn’t teach you shit about marriage.”
His face has gone blank.
“Marriage isn’t always easy,” I say, “but it’s worth it. If we get married, it’ll be because we decide that we work. That we can solve problems together and trust each other and not get in each other’s way. If we get married, it’ll be because we both know that this is what we want from our lives—each other. Not because you’re…” I gesture at him futilely, unable to find words for my anger.
His lips compress together in a white line. “Are you done yet?”
I open my door. It’s blazing hot outside. After three and a half years in the Bay Area, I always forget how hot Southern California is. “Yeah,” I say. “I’m done. Do you really think you’re ready to make a lifelong commitment?”
Maybe I want him to say yes.
But he just shrugs again. “No. But I don’t want you to worry. I don’t want you to worry ever again, not even if you walk away from me. Even if you can’t stand me three years from now, I want to nod and say, it’s okay, Tina is doing okay. That’s where I am.”
This has to be on the list of the world’s worst proposals. I look over at him, and…
And this is our last spring break. It’s the last time we’ll have a few relatively carefree days together, possibly ever. After this,
I’m going to do…whatever it is I do. And he’s going to go back to Cyclone Technologies, his father’s company. I don’t want to fight. I exhale again, and try to push my frustration aside.
“I don’t need half your money to be okay. I would be okay financially without you. If we split up, it’s not going to be your money that I miss.”
He doesn’t meet my eyes. “Yeah. Fine.”
“Just don’t ask me to marry you because you want me to get your money if we divorce. That’s…” I don’t want to argue. I want to forget that we ever had this conversation. “That’s just going to make your dad start in on the kids thing even more.”
It’s the right thing to say. Blake laughs softly. “It wouldn’t make any difference. It’s not like he was married when he had me.”
Our eyes meet in temporary agreement on this one thing: Neither of us want kids, and our parents can—collectively—go soak their heads. It’s a good note on which to end the conversation.
I get out of the car and stretch my arms high.
“Come on,” I tell him. “There’s air conditioning to be had. We can talk about this later.”
With any luck, later will be never.
* * *
BLAKE
* * *
I’m thinking about password security as we ascend the steps to Tina’s parents’ apartment. It’s not as much of a non sequitur as it seems.
Thing is, Peter taught me how to pick a proper password back when he was still alive. I learned the trick from him when my fingers were still too small to stretch the span of the keyboard. Most people’s passwords are complete shit: a pet’s name, maybe with a number attached; a familiar date. These passwords can be cracked in minutes by any kid with a halfway decent script and a decent dictionary file. They can be cracked in a matter of seconds by anyone who takes the time to know you.