I refrained from telling my followers on social media about Jessica. Considering the input from a few followers who knew about my relationship with her, I decided to take their recommendation to heart.

You can’t tell the book world you’re in a relationship, I was told. If you do, you’ll fail.

I entered the Indie Author world about the time it was getting started. I saw C. D. Reiss, Meredith Wild, and Vi Keeland as inspirations, but there was one clear difference.

I was a man.

According to those few followers who were in the know, part of my success, if not all of my success, was based solely on me being a man. At the time there were very few Indie Authors, and even fewer male romance authors.

My sole income was what I received from writing books. The thought of causing my own failure filled me with fear.

One evening during the previous winter, a friend in the industry had told Jessica and I her beliefs.

The women who read your books want to escape through the stories you write. Furthermore, that escape is enhanced by you being a male author. You can be in a relationship, but you can never announce it to your followers. Shoving that in their face would lead to complete failure.

I believed her. Jessica did not. Based solely on my fear of failure, I put my foot down, assuming the person who had spoken with us based the knowledge on nothing but statistical fact. So, for the eleven months that Jessica and I were in a physical relationship, I kept it a secret. I felt I needed to consider the advice of anyone who may be able to assist in my continued success. I chewed my lower lip while attending online functions and acted as though the woman I loved didn’t exist.

Over the course of that time, Jessica’s heart was breaking. I didn’t realize just how much I was hurting her. After a few tear-filled discussions one evening, I understood to what extent my selfish decision had affected her.

When I sat back and took a long look at myself, I saw a man who was willing to lie for the betterment of his career. I’d always considered myself to be brutally honest. My actions were in clear contrast to my beliefs. As I worked on completing the manuscript of Finding Parker, I stayed off social media entirely.

Upon completing the manuscript, Jessica offered to make the cover for the book. In addition to being a licensed cosmetologist, she’d gone to college to be a graphic designer. To date, my book covers were rudimentary at best. Jessica fashioned a cover that put my previous covers to shame.

We decided to tell the book world of our relationship when I released the cover. I was either going to sink or swim. I had no idea which one it might be.

I rolled the dice. I released the cover of the book on my Facebook page. In doing so, I told the world of my relationship with the woman I loved. The post was ‘liked’ by someone. And then, another. And another. Minutes later, a hundred people had liked it. Then, several hundred. The number escalated to over a thousand.

I realized something on that evening.

Jessica – and our relationship – were widely accepted by the book world.

Nervous, I released Finding Parker. It was my first release in almost six months. The book was a contemporary romance novel about a college graduate who was an orphan. He developed a friendship with a wealthy and very eccentric man who acted as a father figure to him.

Through that man, he found himself in a very unique relationship with a girl.

The book didn’t have my trademark elements of wild sex and violence, nor was it sprinkled with expletives. It was soft and tasteful. It could be read by high school students in the classroom. It did, however, appeal to a broad audience. An audience which I hoped included my followers.

Because of the depth of the father-son relationship in the book, I dedicated the book to my father.

The book was an instant success.

To me, Finding Parker was proof that I could succeed without tricks, lies, or lure. To Jessica, it was the point in time where she became part of two of the three worlds in which I lived. The only one she may have felt excluded from was the world of the motorcycle club. She had met the men, but she had yet to attend a function where she rode with them.

She wouldn’t have to wait long to feel accepted in all three worlds.