Rend (Riven 2)

“What’s wrong with you?” I asked.

“Hey, nothing wrong with a little glitter,” he said.

“No, not that. It looks great on you. You’re all . . . blond and ski lodge–y.”

He grinned, eyes going hot. But I felt strange. Overly warm and shaky at the same time. Picking out clothes with him felt intimate, and the idea that he’d put on something just to make me happy? I swallowed around the lump that had formed in my throat.

To distract myself, I pulled out my phone and snapped a picture of him, turning it to show him. In the picture, you couldn’t see the glitter, just his blond hair, blue eyes, and the sharp planes of his face set off against a pink so pale it made his skin glow. Rhys raised an eyebrow at me and stripped the sweater off. But that night, I set it as his photo in my contact info. I must have looked at it a hundred times.

* * *

—

A few days later: Want to come over and watch a horror movie with me? I want to see it but I’m scared to watch by myself! Then a blushy emoji, a grimacing emoji, a stabby knife emoji, and an angel emoji.

It would be the first time I’d been to Rhys’s apartment. It was a small economy owned by the studio he was currently recording the album for, he’d told me, and it was used by whoever needed a place to stay. Usually he stayed with a friend—I assumed it was the same friend whose music career he’d been focusing on instead of his own all these years.

It would also be our fourth date, and we still hadn’t done more than kiss, so I figured the scary movie thing was a pretext to get near a bed so we could finally fuck. Which was aces as far as I was concerned. I had begun to think maybe Rhys wasn’t attracted to me after all.

But I got to the apartment to find that Rhys had ordered Thai food and had the movie all queued up. When we settled on the couch, he pulled me close to his side and then proceeded to spend half the movie with his face buried in my shoulder, hiding during all the scary parts.

At one unexpected scare, Rhys startled hugely, muttered, Oh shit, and grabbed for my hand, and I . . . I felt something wash over me that I didn’t understand. Tenderness wasn’t something I had much experience with. It took me the whole walk home that night (after still not having done anything more than cuddle) to even identify the feeling.

It was then that I realized Rhys wasn’t playing some long game where he was trying to prove himself to me or elaborately romance me. He was just being himself, just doing exactly what he wanted to. And that seemed to indicate he assumed I was doing the same.

So, the next night I did just that. I texted him, Do you have sex?

He wrote back immediately: Yes.

I responded: Great. Wanna have it with me?

Rhys: More than anything.

And I was left speechless yet again, completely undone by his endearing brand of deep impact honesty.

OK I’m coming over, I wrote finally, suddenly convinced the whole thing would fall apart if I waited.

Yay! Rhys responded, and I found myself grinning despite myself.

* * *

—

“I was starting to think you weren’t into me,” I said, nerves swamping me when I got to Rhys’s. You’d think I’d never done this before or something. Although, I supposed I never had done this before—this having sex with someone I’d come to care about first. “Or weren’t into sex in general. Or both,” I rambled. “Or—”

Rhys slid a hand to my neck and looked deep into my eyes.

“I’m exceedingly into you,” he said, voice low and rough. “I promise.”

He tugged me close, but instead of kissing me, he wrapped his arms around me. For a moment, my whole body reacted to his size automatically, as a threat, and I tensed up. But when he started to ease off, I let my arms come up around his back and forced myself to relax. When I did, I felt the heat of his skin against mine, felt the strength of his body, and took a deep, slow breath.

“So why didn’t we fuck before?” I asked, my words half-garbled because my cheek was pressed against his shoulder and I didn’t want to move.

“It hasn’t really been that long,” Rhys said softly.

I shrugged. “I was ready to fuck you when we left the bar.”

“I know.”

“There’s nothing wrong with it,” I said, shoulders tensing defensively.

“Shh,” he said, running a soothing hand up and down my spine. “I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it.”

I pulled away so I could see his face. It suddenly seemed vital that I understand. “Then why?”