Chapter 22
Sloane
To put it simply… I was panicking.
Outwardly, I seemed to be holding it together pretty well. Rhys was none the wiser about my inner turmoil, but holy motherfucking shit. I. Was. Panicking.
I’d lost track of the numerous questions that had been circling my mind whenever Rhys’s beautiful mouth wasn’t distracting me, but there were so many things I needed to know.
Rhys was acting… so normal, like it was just an everyday thing that we went down on each other before the sun was even over the building outside of my window.
Was it possible that he was just as nervous and panicky as I was? It was like the two of us were floating around in this beautiful, rose-colored bubble, and I never wanted it to end.
If we went about our day as usual, would everything be different when Rhys got back from practice? Could the separation make him realize that everything that had happened in the past twelve hours had been a mistake?
God, it really didn’t feel like one.
Obviously, we’d never been intimate before, but there wasn’t a second last night that didn’t feel right. Rhys was my best friend, but there was a deeper connection last night. One that tied our souls together.
I felt complete.
I felt happy and relaxed. And the second one of us finally popped the bubble to talk about everything, my whole world could come crashing down.
Rhys was in his bathroom while I finished getting ready for the day in mine. The only thing on my schedule was brunch with Cami, and I couldn’t tell if that was a good thing or a bad thing.
On one hand, brunch with Cami meant sitting and relaxing with a mimosa in my hand. As amazing as Rhys made me feel, I was also a tad sore, so not having to do anything but drink something small and enjoy a nice meal sounded perfect.
On the other hand: Cami. She would know. The second I sat down in front of her, she would know something had happened. She was my best friend. I didn’t even need the hickey on my neck to prove it.
I threw on an oversized Boston Bandits shirt, pairing it with some cut-off shorts, and slid into a pair of sandals. I moved to throw my hair up, as I normally do, but opted to leave it loose and around my shoulders instead.
As much as I would like to think I could just stay here in my room all day and lose myself in Rhys, we were adults with jobs and obligations.
Rhys had to go to practice in forty-five minutes, I was meeting Cami at ten, and soon, we’d have to talk about everything and see exactly what it meant for us.
Were we a ‘thing’ now? Was he my ‘real’ boyfriend? Or was everything still fake? But… with benefits?
I sighed, staring at myself in the mirror, feeling like a new woman. Rhys worshipped everything about my mind and body last night (and again in the shower this morning), and I felt every bit of it. I felt confident. I felt beautiful and worthy.
How was it even possible that after just one night, I felt so different?
I smiled, brushing my thumbs against bruised lips, the feeling of Rhys forever ingrained into my skin.
My phone vibrated on the marble countertop, bringing me back to reality —a big, bright picture of my mom filled the screen. “Hey, Ma.” I walked toward the bedroom door, pulling it open and coming face to face with Rhys as he stepped out of his bedroom.
He smiled softly, winking before walking towards the living room. One fucking wink and my arms and legs felt more like cooked pasta than limbs.
“Sloane, sweetie. Good morning! Are you and Rhys busy tonight?”
I bit back a smile, my mind immediately taking a deep dive straight into the gutter. God, I fucking hoped we were busy tonight.
“Sloaney? Did I lose you?”
I cleared my throat, the jingling of Rookie’s leash telling me that Rhys was taking him for his first walk of the day.
“I’m not sure. I can talk to him after practice, though. What’s up?” I smiled, Lisa yelling something incoherent in the background.
The fact that my mom and Lisa still hung out almost every day, after a lifetime of friendship, warmed my heart. They were so fucking cute.
“Hi, Lees,” I cooed, walking toward the kitchen to get a pot of coffee started.
The phone jostled on the other end, my mother letting out an exasperated sound as Lisa stole her phone. “We’re grilling out tonight! I'd better see my kids.”
I put the phone on speaker while I scooped out fresh coffee beans and threw them into the grinder. The two of them bickered over whether to add hydrangeas to the walkway at the community garden while I brewed coffee for Rhys and me.
He took his coffee black… with a sprinkle of sugar… like a fucking sociopath.
Whereas I went all out, caramel and vanilla syrup, frothed milk, and topped it with a little whipped cream.
Their back-and-forth paused as Lisa cleared her throat. “Did you hear me? I wanna see my kids!”
“It’s a bit weird to call us both your kids since we’re ‘intimate,’ right?”
I laughed as they both gasped in horror, Lisa and my mom both shouting my full name over the phone.
“I don’t—Sloane, we don’t want to know that!” my mom stammered, like it wasn’t her who showed up at my doorstep, demanding to know more details about our relationship.
I rolled my eyes, grabbed the carton of milk, and poured it into my mug.
“Weren’t you just asking us about our plans to be intimate not that long ago?
” They both stumbled over their words, making me laugh some more.
“I’m not sure what Rhys has planned tonight, but I’ll be there. Do you want pink or blue hydrangeas?”
“What?”
“Pink or blue? Hydrangeas. It’s a little late in the season, isn’t it? I can stop at the nursery on my way, though.”
“See!” My mother exclaimed triumphantly over the phone. “I told you that, Lisa. It’s too damn late. They’ll never survive in this heat. Even grey thumb over here knows that.”
My brows furrowed as I sucked a little bit of whipped cream off my finger. “Grey thumb?”
Lisa chuckled. “Your mother is insinuating that you have a grey thumb. Like… the plants come to you for… hospice care. You, my dear, are the reaper of all things green and lively.”
I scoffed, my mouth dropping open. “Excuse me. I’ll have you know that I have a snake plant alive in the kitchen.” My eyes flashed over to the small plant perched on my counter. “It’s thriving!”
“The snake plant I got you two summers ago?”
“Yes! It’s doing just fine.”
“Oh, dear.” Lisa laughed again.
“Honey… it’s fake. I got you a fake plant. Have you been watering it this whole time?”
What the hell?
I walked over to the plant sitting next to my sink and sifted through the rocks covering the top. Sure enough… Fake. Very fake. For two damn years, I’d been watering a plant sitting in Styrofoam.
“Mom!” I walked back over to my phone. “I had Cami come water that when I went to Spain!”
They both lost it over the phone, their cackles echoing through the apartment. Rhys walked back in the door, bending to let Rookie run free with a curious expression on his face.
“Alright, you both suck. Mom, I’m not a virgin. Lisa, I’m gonna go have sex with your son.” I stabbed the red button on my screen with my finger to end the call, Rhys’s face flushing red as he choked on air.
I shrugged, reaching behind me to grab the coffee pot and pouring a healthy amount into both mugs before sliding one over to Rhys, and topping mine with whipped cream. “They deserved it.”
He cleared his throat. “I never said they didn’t.”
I took a sip of coffee in sync with Rhys, a slight awkward tension settling in the air around us.
Both of us knew we needed to talk. Neither of us wanted to be the first to bring it up.
We shared a couple of small smiles and loud, awkward sips of coffee before Rhys started fidgeting.
He set his coffee down.
He picked it back up.
He tugged at the hem of his shirt, then cleared his throat again.
If I weren’t so fucking nervous, I probably would’ve found it cute how someone who so confidently rocked my world earlier was so nervous and fidgety around me now.
“I think maybe we should talk, Pip.”
My stomach dropped. Even knowing this conversation was inevitable, no part of me wanted to have it. What if he thought everything was a mistake? What if he wanted to move out or end the relationship altogether?
I just got him back… after months of basically no contact and surviving Stu. I needed Rhys in my life. It made me sick to my stomach to think everything that had happened in the past twelve hours could drive him away again.
I took a sip of coffee to wash away the uneasiness that clogged my throat. “Yeah, I guess we should.”
The two of us locked eyes, a million questions and scenarios flooding my brain. Rhys looked just as uncomfortable as I felt, so I blurted out the first question that came to mind: “What happens now?”
His expression softened, emerald eyes staring at me over the brim of his mug as he took another sip of coffee. He placed the mug on the counter once more, twisting it in a circle before answering. “What do you want to happen?”
I swallowed, my stomach fluttering as I considered my answer. What did I want to happen? “Uh—Well…” I took a deep breath. This was Rhys. Everything would be fine. But— “I think I need to know how you feel first.”
Rhys understood. If anyone got my hesitation to be vulnerable, it was him.
He smiled softly, walking around the counter to stand in front of me. My heart rate picked up, my chest rising and falling rapidly as I waited for him to say something. Anything.
Rhys reached up, his large hand cupping the side of my neck while his thumb stroked gently against my jawline. “I feel like… I like us better with no cameras.” He leaned down, his lips ghosting over mine. My eyes lingered closed, even after he pulled away.
“Me, too,” I whispered, my eyes slowly fluttering open to find Rhys smiling.
His thumb ran across my bottom lip. “I feel like…” He swallowed, his smile faltering for a second, and his nerves slipping through the cracks. “I feel good, Pip. I feel… normal. Like we should’ve been doing this the whole time.”
Relief crashed through my body, my knees wobbling from the sudden weight that had been lifted off me. He was confirming everything I’d been feeling. The tension I’d been carrying since he left my room this morning dissolved from my shoulders, and I fell into Rhys’s chest. “Oh, thank god.”
He shook with laughter, his arms wrapping around my shoulders and holding me close. “Did you honestly think I would say anything different?”
I lifted my shoulders in something that resembled a shrug, Rhys’s arms weighing me down. “I don’t know, you’ve been surprising me a lot lately. I wasn’t sure what to think.”
“What’s been so surprising?”
“One: wiener size—”
“Don’t say wiener.”
“Two: you hang out with strippers now—”
“Not ‘now,’ it was like a two-time thing. Maybe three.”
I pulled away from Rhys, shooting him an unamused look. “Three?!”
He winced, pushing my face back into his chest and holding it in place despite my struggling. “I said maybe three. Let’s not talk about that.”
I rolled my eyes, relaxing into his body once again. “Sorry, I don’t have a problem with strippers. I just don’t want my boyfriend and client to make coke on some girl's ass a regular thing.” My mouth snapped shut, totally aware that I just called Rhys my boyfriend.
Technically, he was my boyfriend. Fake boyfriend… But the word had been used before. I crossed my fingers and hoped he wouldn’t think anything of it.
But, of course, that didn’t happen.
Rhys stepped away, his eyebrows snapping toward his hairline.
He blinked once.
Then twice.
The confused expression on his face shifted to one full of excitement and hope. “Am I your boyfriend?”
“I uh—well, technically, we are dating. If we—I mean—”
Rhys cut me off with a laugh. “God, you’re so fucking cute when you’re flustered, Pip. There’s no pressure. I can be your real boyfriend, or we can take it slow. Day by day. There’s no pressure to add labels if you’re feeling overwhelmed or confused.”
The tenderness in his voice turned my insides to mush.
If Rhys wasn’t confused or overwhelmed, I wasn’t either. A lot of my anxiety stemmed from not knowing exactly what was going on in his mind. He seemed confident in whatever thoughts he had.
Maybe this was a huge mistake, or maybe he would be the love of my life. Either way, I needed to find out.
“I’m not confused.”
“No?” he asked, a hint of a smile pulling at his lips.
“No.”
“Well, me neither.”
The two of us stood there in my kitchen, grinning at each other like idiots, like one night hadn’t just completely changed the course of our lifelong friendship.
Rhys gripped the back of my neck and pulled me close, dipping down to capture my lips against his. And once again, I melted.
He pulled away before I’d even had a chance to recover. “I do have to go, though.”
“I know.” I smiled, letting go of Rhys’s shirt and quickly grabbing my coffee so I didn’t pull him back against my body. “Oh, hey. Dinner tonight at your parents’. I’m assuming everyone will be there.”
He deflated a little, looking up at the ceiling. “I’m guessing we don’t have a choice?”
“Nope,” I answered, sipping my coffee.
Rhys looked down at me again. “That’s unfortunate. How the hell am I supposed to keep my hands off of you?”
“Who says you have to? Who says I want you to?” I answered with a coy shrug. “Didn’t this start because we needed to convince people we were in a relationship?”
He smirked, gently pulling me back into his body by my hips; the only thing separating us was the coffee in my hands. “Sloane, I think you’re going to regret saying that.”
“I’m looking forward to regretting it.” My voice came out all breathy and low, Rhys’s green eyes flaming in return. His brows pulled together, his face twisting with indecision. “Rhys…” I warned, “You need to go.”
His tongue slid slowly across his bottom lip, my eyes tracking the movement closely, and remembering the way it felt on various parts of my naked body. “I can be late.”
My heart rate kicked up once again while my brain tried to figure out why the hell I’d never had this kind of visceral reaction toward Rhys before.
How the hell had I never looked at him like this? How had his eyes never burned into me like this before?
And what the hell have I been missing out on?
“I’m supposed to be a good influence on you,” I whispered. Rhys leaned in toward me again and pressed his lips ever so gently against mine.
“You’re right,” he murmured against my mouth before standing up straight while my eyes stayed shut, lips awaiting the kiss they desired. He chuckled as I pouted. “I’ll see you after, okay?”
I nodded, lifting the mug to my lips as Rhys walked out of the kitchen. The front door opened and shut quietly before I melted into the counter, squealing softly into my arm before standing back up.
How was this happening?!