STUCK WITH YOU

JENNA KENDRICK

M/M ROMANCE

 

AMAZON

ARe

iBooks

NOOK

KOBO

 

BLURB:

The Assignment: Discover if forced proximity leads to increased intimacy by being handcuffed to a partner for five days.

Jamie O’Connor’s closet is tightly closed and full of secrets. Attending college on a baseball scholarship, he’s hiding an injury along with his sexuality. A college degree is the key to escaping his family’s oppressive expectations. Until he graduates, he needs to play ball, both on the field and off. Being partnered with an openly gay classmate for a sociology project threatens to put more than just his free college ride at risk.

 

Seth Lerner’s closet is empty, but that’s because his baggage is always right by his side. Managing his severe ADHD while trying to overcome an earlier setback leaves him little time for any kind of social life, much less a relationship. He certainly can’t afford the distraction of falling for his closeted project partner.

 

Neither Jamie nor Seth plan on letting this assignment get in the way of their objectives. But secrets come out and goals change when you’re stuck together.

 

 

CHAPTER 1

 

The finest denim-clad ass Jamie had ever seen brushed past him, and Jamie almost dropped his textbook. He should be used to this reaction by now, but every glance at Seth Lerner caused him to lose all sense.

Seth went to his usual seat, one row ahead and three chairs over. Jamie was fascinated by the precise way Seth always lined up his blue pen and two highlighters, one yellow and one green, to the left of his composition-style notebook. While almost everyone else in the class typed their notes directly into a computer, Seth wrote his by hand. Once everything was aligned to his satisfaction, he pulled the earbuds out of his ears and bent over to shove his phone into the front of his backpack and zip it resolutely away. This was Jamie’s favorite part of Seth’s pre-class ritual, as Seth’s shirt rode up enough to give Jamie a glimpse of dimples and the faintest smattering of light brown hair at the top of his ass.

Jamie adjusted himself under the guise of settling into his seat. The stadium seating of the Kellogg 2A lecture hall sucked for a discussion-based class of only 30 students, but he was grateful for the long tables that ran the length of each row, hiding both illicit cell phone use and erections. He’d spend the majority of class half-hard, attuned to Seth’s every movement. The precision of Seth’s placement of his textbook to the right of his notebook belied his almost incessant leg-bouncing and finger tapping. More than once, Jamie had needed to borrow Christian’s class notes because he’d gotten too caught up in the rhythm of the song that obviously flowed through Seth’s body. Not that he ever admitted to Christian why he’d been unable to keep up with the professor’s lecture. After all, Jamie was straight.

Seth, of course, was oblivious to Jamie’s attention. Jamie had chosen his self-assigned seat with care, able to view the object of his attention throughout class without being obvious about it. If Seth ever felt as if he were being watched, he certainly never turned around or gave any other indication of paranoia. Good thing, too, because awareness would ruin the fantasy forever. Jamie could barely admit his interest to himself; he’d never be able to work up the courage to confess to anyone else. Especially not Seth himself. And he’d be more apt to walk across the quad naked than to act on his desire.

As the room filled with students, Jamie pulled his attention away from the way Seth’s wide shoulders narrowed to his lean torso and forced himself to focus on the front of the lecture hall. Dr. Pulaski was running late, as usual. She often left a discussion question on the board to get the class thinking and talking. But what did she mean by the single word she’d written today?

“Tethered? I didn’t see anything about bondage in the syllabus,” someone behind him said, accompanied by loud laughs from his friends. Donny Stewart had a joke for everything. If it could be at someone else’s expense, even better.

“It could mean the baggage we all carry with us,” a girl in the front row offered timidly. Mary, Marjorie—her name was something like that. Jamie had seen her waiting up for Seth outside the lecture hall and walking around campus with him, but for some reason they never sat together in class.

“You mean the baggage you’re carrying around your hips?” Donny’s sycophants laughed long and loud at his quick comeback. Hadn’t these idiots dished out enough of this shit in high school?

“More like the helium balloon that is your brain, Stew.” Jamie fired back. Few people stood up to Donny because they feared being the next victim in his crosshairs.

Seth turned in his seat to see who’d spoken. Jamie was startled as they made direct eye contact for the first time. The depth of Seth’s chocolate brown eyes captured him to the point that he almost missed Donny’s retort. Shit, if that asshole caught him making goo-goo eyes at a guy, not even Jamie’s status as pitcher and captain of the baseball team would save him from becoming a target of his bullying.

“Are lame comebacks what you’re pitching instead of baseballs these days, Windup? That’d explain why you’re not making it into the strike zone.” And sometimes even being a jock wasn’t a safety net. Especially a jock having a crap season and trouble performing up to expectations.

Jamie forced himself to look away from Seth and lean back casually in his seat, hoping the rest of the class thought he was just too cool to continue engaging with Donny. He was spared any further embarrassment—of the inappropriate attraction or sports performance varieties—by the belated entrance of Dr. Pulaski.

“Sorry I’m late, gang.” Dr. P greeted the class with the same refrain every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Jamie wondered how she’d react if they all recited it to her en masse one day. “The daycare center was a madhouse, and Lily was clingy.” She talked about her daughter at every opportunity and often raced across campus to the nearby daycare center between classes and office hours.

She dropped an oversized tote on the floor next to the podium with a heavy thud and removed her silly hat with the strings and pompoms. “So let’s get started. I didn’t leave you much to go on today, so I’m figuring either you all spent the last ten minutes on Snapchat—“ She looked up from where she’d been setting out her lecture notes and glared in Donny’s direction. “—Or making inappropriate comments.”

Everyone laughed, including Jamie. Although not part of his major, Sociology of Emotions was his favorite class this semester. He rolled his shoulders, ignoring the dull ache that was a constant companion, and settled in to enjoy the hour.

 

* * *

 

Jamie O’Conner stepping up for Mari, huh? That was usually Seth’s job, and he wasn’t entirely sure he liked his role being usurped. Especially by a jock who ranked only marginally higher on Seth’s homo sapiens scale than Donny Stewart, mostly because Jamie’s tall, lean build appealed much more than Donny’s broad, over-developed brawn and under-developed brain. Jamie’s blond hair and blue eyes didn’t hurt, either, or the way he seemed to be a bit shy under all that star athlete bluster if you looked hard enough. Not that Seth would admit to looking. Well, to anyone but himself.

He’d seen Jamie in the showers at the fitness center a couple times, discreetly gathering enough details to fill his inner spank bank for quite awhile. The guy’s big hands and feet, along with his rangy body, were dead-on as predictors of the size of the rest of him.

He hadn’t been to the fitness center lately. Or maybe all semester. Taking a fifth class each semester to make up for the colossal fuck-up of his first year might just kill him. Maybe he could change up his running schedule to every other morning and alternate with weights. Would that be active enough to expel some of his excess energy so he could focus—?

Mari wouldn’t appreciate being ditched every other day, though, and there was no way she was going back to the fitness center until, as she put it, her folds settled back into curves. Seth thought she looked hot—for a girl—and was way too hard on herself. But as something of a princess himself, he understood wanting to look your best to catch the best.

And dammit, he missed what Dr. Pulaski said about the word tethered. And—he glanced at the time on the large wall clock—at least ten minutes of her lecture. He’d need to ask Mari for her notes, and she’d shift from best friend to mother hen before his eyes. Feeling another tangent coming on, he forced himself to straighten up in his seat and control the tapping of his fingers on his notebook. That’s when he noticed he had the wrong notebook. How could he have put the green Philosophy of Mathematics notebook in his backpack instead of the blue he’d color-coded for sociology? Should he give himself a pass on notes for the entire hour and put up with Mari’s tsking, or write in the wrong book and have to copy it over later? And then not obsess for the rest of the semester that his philosophy notebook contained an hour’s worth of sociology notes. Shit, he’d have to purchase another notebook and re-copy his philosophy notes for the entire semester from scratch. And that meant stopping at the bookstore as well as making time to copy the previous several weeks’ worth of notes. That would be ridiculous. He’d have to take that time away from typing up today’s class notes into his computer, which would result—

“Seth!” Dr. Pulaski’s voice interrupted his shame spiral, instantly making him aware of the nervous laughter from his classmates. This obviously hadn’t been the first time she’d called his name. She knew his mind stayed present better when he engaged during class, but he hated when she put him on the spot.

“Yes, ma’am.” He ran his fingers through his hair. Just a bit longer and he’d be able to hide his eyes behind it.

“If politeness counted in this class, you’d get one for manners but lose five for not paying attention.” The professor waited for the class to settle before repeating her question. “How long do you think it takes for intimacy to develop between two relative strangers?”

“If they hook up on Grindr, less than thirty minutes.” Shit, that’s not what he meant to say to his favorite professor. The one whose three-year-old he occasionally babysat.

Dr. Pulaski waited for the hoots to die down before saying, “While I applaud your success in the exciting world of online dating, we’ve already established sex is not the same as intimacy.” Yeah, that must’ve been established while Seth’s entire misguided thought process played out in his head. Too bad. He’d have liked to participate in that discussion. The whole discussion and not just the bit right now where his inattention was on display.

“Then I guess it depends on what they’re doing together and maybe their preconceived notions of each other…?” He hoped this was more on track with the conversation. If not, please let her take pity on him and move on to someone who actually had a clue.

“Okay, let’s work with that.” She smiled at him, although he saw the hint of censure in her eyes, then she turned to the other side of the room. “Someone else, what are some of the preconceived notions people might have of someone that can get in the way of developing a relationship, whether sexual—“She glanced back over at Seth. “— Or a friendship, working partnership, or simply living in a community with each other.”

Seth supposed it was a good thing he’d never hidden his sexual orientation because he’d just outed himself to the entire class with the Grindr reference. Brilliant! Part of him wanted to turn around and see what Jamie O’Conner thought of that disclosure, but he forced himself to continue facing forward. He needed to drum up at least a little self-control, and he had a feeling looking at Jamie’s perfect face would be yet another rabbit hole.

 

* * *

 

Jamie somehow made it through the next half hour while only giving into the temptation to peer over at Seth a few dozen times. Fortunately, the topic engaged everyone in the room, partly due to Seth breaking the ice with his slip about sex. His mention of Grindr and thirty minutes had Jamie’s head—both the big one and the one that did most of his thinking—exploding with visuals, but sheer force of will, coupled with the fear Dr. P would catch him unawares the way she had Seth, got him back on track.

“I know there’s a lot more to say on this topic, but I want to leave time to get back to the word on the board. As you know from the syllabus, every year I come up with a new group or partnered experiment. This time around, the assignment is going to relate to the intimacy discussion we’ve been having today. The title of the experiment is Tethered: Accelerated Intimacy through Forced Proximity.”

The professor waited for the hum of the class to die down. Jamie’s thoughts ran wild with possibilities. He could only imagine what the “tethered” part of this experiment would entail, and none of his ideas were good. Last year’s class had worn black and not smiled for a week. During his freshman year, primal screams had rung out throughout campus at random intervals, later attributed to this course.

“I have gone to the liberty of pairing each of you up based on the interview sheets you submitted at the start of the semester, previous knowledge of those of you who were blessed with me as your professor for Intro Soc or Theory, and what I’ve learned about you in the last several weeks.” She reached into her tote bag and pulled out a metal chain, which she unwound to show a handcuff at each end. “Your assignment is to be physically connected to your partner for a period of five days.”

Jamie suddenly wished he’d taken the class during his sophomore year. He’d have even gone the extra mile and dyed his hair black. Anything but this.

The room exploded with questions and grumbles.

“What about going to the bathroom?”

“What about team practice?”

“How am I supposed to hook up with my girlfriend?”

“Are we paired off girl-boy or with the same sex?”

“Why can’t we pick our own partners?”

Jamie stayed quiet, his head filled with too many questions to voice aloud. Under the pretense of looking at his laptop, he glanced over at Seth. The other guy was also silent, although he appeared tense, his shoulders stiff and his fingers and legs momentarily still.

“Calm down, everyone! Let me give you the details, and then I’ll answer all your questions. First of all, I have paired you up based on various criteria. Some of you are opposites in personality while others are quite similar. Some couples are mixed gender while others are the same. No,” the professor raised her voice when several students started to interrupt her, “there is no switching of partners.”

“What if we refuse to participate? I’m not going to spend a whole week attached at the hip to a mouth-breather.” Of course, Donny managed to turn even the most valid of questions into something crude.

“While I would love to make this experiment mandatory, and some of you clearly need to open your minds a bit, the university insists that I offer all of you an opt-out. Believing I’ll catch more flies with honey, I will excuse anyone who completes the experiment from the final exam.” Again, the professor waited for the buzz to die down. “But both partners need to agree to participate or not. If you cannot convince your partner to get in on the act, you both must take the final. And if either of you drop out during the experiment, the final exam is back in play for both of you. Remember, this is an experiment in cooperation.”

“Can we find out who our partner is before deciding?”

“I still want to know how we’re supposed to pee—oh my god, and shit—while we’re attached to someone!”

“If you’ll let me finish… Yes, I will announce the pairings and give each couple a chance to talk before you collect your tethers. The length of the chain between the cuffs is twenty inches, which leaves enough room for your partner to turn away while you take care of bodily functions and even stand outside the shower stall while each of you bathes, if you coordinate it properly. Or you can wear swimsuits if you’re modest. But you will be attached while these things take place. The object of this experiment is to see how intimacy develops or devolves by forced proximity over a period of time. By definition, that must include being together at some of your most personal moments. The only time you may remove the cuffs during the experiment, other than to dress and undress, is to attend different classes that occur at the same time or to participate in sports, theater, and similar activities. Attending campus events without actively participating in them is not a valid excuse. If you and your partner have different social interests, you’re going to have to compromise, which is part of developing a relationship.”

Dr. P continued listing the rules and requirements of the experiment. Jamie only half paid attention, knowing all of this would be reiterated in the packets she said she’d hand out. He surreptitiously scrolled through his calendar app, making note of all the practices, games, and classes he could use as an excuse to separate from his partner. Opting out completely was off the table. One fewer final meant more time to devote to training, finishing the college season, and getting ready for summer ball on Cape Cod. But getting a free pass on the final didn’t mean he wanted to spend a second longer than necessary attached to someone else, no matter who was at the other end of the leash.

“Previous research shows extended contact like this escalates the speed at which an emotional connection is formed. Tensions are going to be high. You’re going to learn a lot about yourselves and each other. You may find yourself sharing secrets you didn’t expect to open up about, especially in such a short period of time.”

That’s exactly what Jamie was afraid of. He had a lot of secrets. An entire closet full of them. What used to only encompass his sexuality had expanded to hold all manner of desires and doubts. And that door needed to stay firmly shut or life as he knew it would come to an abrupt end.

Maybe he’d get Christian as a partner. They already shared a room, played baseball together, went to the same parties, and took two of the same classes. Hell, they were practically tethered already! He doubted Dr. P would pair them up, though, for that very reason. He almost hoped he’d get Donny Stewart as a partner. There’d be absolutely no temptation to reveal anything more than his brand of toothpaste to Stew. Plus the guy spent every spare minute in the weight room to bulk up for football season, so they’d have an excuse to go their separate ways a lot.

After what seemed like endless questions and repetitions of those questions and variations of those questions, Dr. P finally called a halt and began to announce the pairings. The expected squeals and groans followed. As everyone was coupled up, they moved to the front of the room to line up for their tethers and information packets. Christian got paired with a cute blonde girl named Dana, who immediately informed him that there’d be no funny business. Donny’s assigned partner, Seth’s friend Mari, didn’t even lift her head as she announced, “I’m out. I’ll take the final.” But Jamie really only cared about his own name. He started to look around the room to see whose names had yet to be called. No, please no.

“Jamie O’Conner and Seth Lerner.”

The walls of Jamie’s closet suddenly started closing in.

 

Jenna Kendrick writes contemporary, new adult, and paranormal romance about smart guys with a propensity for snark. Jenna went to a small college in the woods of Western Massachusetts, where she alternated between bare feet and hiking boots and used dining hall trays as a mode of transportation in the winter. She fell in love with creative writing after writing a satirical essay to get out of yet another literary analysis assignment. Unable to choose a coast or climate zone, she bounced around the country before settling in Upstate New York. She lives with her husband and several furry creatives, some of whom think of her desk as their own. This may be why Jenna’s developed a sudden urge to write about shifters.

 

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