Quarantales: The Complete Contemporary Romance Box Set, page 10
“Cynda, you okay?”
I look up to see A and E, the twins I vowed to love and raise in my father’s absence, standing on the porch. They both look worried.
“I’m fine,” I assure them, putting more strength into my voice than I actually feel.
Rhys chimes in, “Unfortunately, we’ve been exposed to a patient presenting with signs of COVID. We’ll both need to quarantine for a few days. More if the patient’s test comes back positive.”
He’s right, I realize. But…where will I stay if I can’t be in the house with the twins?
A answers my unspoken question for me. “So she’s staying with you until you know whether you got the Rona or not?”
“Yes, she is,” Rhys answers. His voice is flat and terse. “But she’ll be available to you as always. By mobile or text. We both will. E, you should have my number as well…”
E shoots me a significant look before pulling out her phone. I can almost hear her silently screaming, “OMG, Cyn, did you really score a quaranboo, just like I said?”
I totally didn’t. But it probably looks that way when Rhys takes me by the elbow and leads me to his door.
I haven’t been in the back house since I spruced it up in hopes of securing a tenant.
It looks much the same. One huge room, featuring a steel bed, a small kitchen, and a slightly larger living area. The living room was a little overstuffed with a couch and my old piano. But other than that, it was neat and ready for presentation. The only difference I can see is a wicker laundry basket sitting near the dresser drawer set. Rhys must have ordered online.
I stand in the middle of it all, looking around. Not knowing what to do.
“Let’s get you into the shower,” Rhys says, leading me into the tiny bathroom off the back of the small unit.
He’s right. I should shower. We both should. But I can’t bring myself to move.
Mavis…how long had she been laying out there before we got to her farm? What would have happened if we hadn’t shown up? The answer comes back, quick and brutal. She would have died. She would have died all alone.
Hands unzip my hoodie and lift my tank top over my head. Not mine. Rhys’s. Rhys is undressing me like a patient who can’t tend to herself.
Next, come my yoga pants. And then my bra and panties.
Rhys is a doctor, but he could have been a nurse I find out in those moments. He’s quick and efficient and doesn’t linger too long on my nakedness.
But even after he turns on the shower, I can’t make myself let go of his hand.
“I was alone when I got the news my father died,” I tell him. “The twin’s mom had passed out and the twins were too young to sit in a hospital with me…”
I pause…then raise my eyes to meet his as I quietly admit, “I don’t want to be alone right now while we’re waiting to hear about Mavis.”
Rhys looks at me, and I look back at him, knowing he has every right to tell me no.
But in the end, he doesn’t say anything. He strips out of the Raines-Jewish t-shirt. First his free arm, then he transfers our hold to his left hand so that he can strip out of that side too. He pushes his pants down after that and he somehow manages to get those off too without letting go of me.
And no, this isn’t like that. We’re not like that. But I have to put a lot of effort into not looking down.
The shower is small though, and we have no choice but to bump into each other as we close ourselves up inside.
His cock is a situation we both pretend not to notice between us as we scrub our bodies and hair with the body wash and shampoo Rhys has in his shower.
He must have brought all of his shower stuff in Europe. Everything on the bottles is written in French, and I know they don’t sell anything like that at Guadalajara general.
“All done?” he asks after I rinse the French shampoo out of my hair.
Good thing I cut it. Impromptu wash days weren’t a thing I could do easily when my hair was chemically straightened.
I mean to answer yes, I’m all done. But instead, I ask, “Why did I make pancakes? I should have gone straight there. She wasn’t answering the phone. And I knew in my gut something was wrong.”
Rhys shakes his head at me, as the spray continues to run down both our bodies. “This virus is particularly cruel to the old. Even if we’d gotten to her earlier, there’s no guarantee she wouldn’t have ended up in the ICU.”
“But if I hadn’t…”
Rhys draws me into his arms. “Ssh, it’s not your fault. Don’t do this to yourself.”
I don’t realize how much I need to feel his arms around me until I break down crying. Gut-wrenching sobs that feel like they’ve been waiting to come out of me for a long time.
Rhys turns off the shower and holds me until the tears dry. Until I start to shiver with the realization that I’m cold.
Until I say, “I’m sorry. I’m really sorry for the way I ended things between us.”
His arms loosen then tighten back around me. “Don’t.” The one word is a harsh command delivered on a single breath. “Don’t start apologizing now. Three years after when it would have mattered.”
But I have to.
“I’m sorry,” I say again. “I should’ve done it in a better way. But I didn’t know how.”
“In a better way?” He lets go of me. Steps back as far as he can in the small shower. “You shouldn’t have done it at all. You should have called me. Let me help you when your father died. But no, you had to be tough. Go it alone. Pretty but cruel Nurse America—”
He cuts off with a shake of his head. Looks away from me. Mutters, “I don’t forgive you. I don’t.”
“Okay,” I say quietly. Submissively.
Then I raise my eyes to meet his.
And he….
He grabs me by the shoulders and pulls me in for a kiss.
I kiss him back desperately. Scratching at his chest because I want him so bad.
He picks me up and presses me into the wall, just like he did that one time in the on-call room….
We’d had conflicting shifts all week long and had run into each other when he came into sleep just as I was leaving for the day.
One glance was all it took. He’d pressed me into the wall and taken me hard, with barely a pause to lock the door.
There’s no one to walk in on us now or clothes to remove, so he doesn’t even wait that long.
He wraps both my legs around his waist and pushes into me with an angry grunt.
“Why did you leave like that? Why did you…?”
“I’m sorry!” I cry out. Taking his dick, taking my punishment. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“Sorry is not enough,” he growls. “Go back to Ingrid you told me…do you know how mental you made me? How many women I fucked trying to get you out of my head? Ones that looked like you. Ones that looked nothing like you. And now here I am.”
He grabs a hold of one rock hard nipple. Tweaks it with a ruthless twist.
I cry out. The pleasure and the pain are both spiking and my brain doesn’t know what to do with the duality of such acute sensations.
He thrusts into my core, his hot and heavy body driving in an out of me with relentless force. “I will fuck you. I will fuck you until I can forget you. And only then will I accept your pitiful apology.”
Something’s uncurling inside of me. This is the punishment I deserve. The only thing I crave. Somewhere to finally put all my pain. I’m not going anywhere, pinned as I am between him and the glass. But I hold on tight to him, taking my punishment, whispering sorry in his ear.
Until I feel the crest inside of me.
“Rhys,” I moan right before I explode.
And then suddenly it’s gone. The pain. The sorrow. The worry. It’s all gone, and there’s only the bliss of coming.
“Not enough,” he’s still insisting. But then he cuts off with a guttural groan.
His dick spasms and he floods into me.
It feels so good. So good!
So damn good, it takes me a long, long time to come down… and realize, “We didn’t use protection.”
Chapter Thirteen
So yeah, the rest of the day is pretty awkward after that.
No more hand holding after that crazy shower sex. Rhys gives me a pair of boxer briefs and another Raines Jewish t-shirt to wear. Then we cobble together some sandwiches for lunch.
We just finished eating when the hospital calls with an update. The good news is that they’d gotten Mavis on a ventilator and her oxygen levels were up. She isn’t out of the woods yet but the prognosis is looking better than when she lost consciousness on the way to the hospital.
The bad news is that the sample that some brave nurse drove all the way out to the test site in Columbia came back positive. Mavis is officially Guadalajara’s first Covid-19 case.
“Poor Mavis,” I say, shaking my head when Rhys is done telling me the news.
Then I find myself in the weird place of having to ask him, “Is it really okay if I stay here? I can quarantine in my room at the big house, but then that means I won’t be able to use the kitchen and I’ll have to depend on the twins for everything.”
He folds his lips like he’s considering all the ways he could tell me hell no. But in the end, he says, “Yes, it would be best for all involved if we both stayed here.”
I blow out a quick breath of relief. “Thank you.”
“No, actually, thank you, Cynda,” he says. He grits out the words as if it’s paining him to say them. “If you hadn’t insisted on going out to see Mavis yourself, she might have died. You were right about that, and I was wrong. You blame yourself, but I would have been the one to blame if Mavis had died alone on her farm. I should have listened to you.”
I’m….
I’m not sure what to do with that. There’s probably no such thing as a woman who doesn’t love being told she was right. But in this case… “I wish I had been wrong. I wish there hadn’t been any reason to go out there.”
We share a moment like we used to, back when we were both working in the Emergency Department and understood just how hard it was to make all the decisions that could mean life or death for our patients.
But then the moment is done.
Rhys rises from the table. “I should start canceling all of my appointments for the next two weeks.”
I awkwardly clear the dishes while he sits at Grandma’s old rolldown secretary desk and gets to appointment canceling.
I’d forgotten how DIY he was. Other than the one time with Dr. Rahjeen’s chart, he’d never asked me for anything outside my expected duties. Which had made it hard for me when I’d received his first 360 evaluation right after Ingrid showed up at his apartment. But I’d done the right thing, grudgingly admitting that he was efficient and capable and a good communicator—basically all the things it took for an Emergency Room Physician to be good at his job.
I join Rhys in the living room after the dishes are done. While he messages his patients at Grandma’s desk, I sit on the couch and break the news to E.
Then I answer her many questions about who is supposed to do what.
“Do I have to cook and clean for A or does he have to start doing all that stuff himself? You know he’ll leave that game room a mess and be like it’s clean enough for the whole time you’re gone. He’s so gross.”
“I’ll have a separate conversation with him,” I assure her before texting her to bring over a few things.
“So how’s it going with ur Quaranboo?” she messages after receiving my list.
That was the one question I didn’t answer.
But I did make us dinner a few hours later. If I were in a better position, I’d of course offer to pay Rhys back for his hospitality by waiving a few weeks off his rent. But I’m not, so I guess I’m going to have to make myself as useful as possible for the next two weeks.
By the time dinner is done, we’re both kind of dragging. It’s been a while since either of us were in the ED, and we’re no longer used to the huge adrenaline spikes that come with life or death scenarios.
“I’m knocking off,” he says when I come back to the living room after washing the dishes.
“Me, too,” I agree with a huge yawn.
So we’re in agreement about bedtime too. This is off to a good start. Other than some ill-advised shower sex, we’re getting along and being reasonable and maybe that means the next two weeks won’t be so bad.
Friends…
Maybe we’ll actually come out of this situation as friends. Yeah, maybe if I play nice, my friend, Rhys, will agree to stop being bitter and give me my job back.
“I’ll sleep on the couch,” I immediately offer, warming up to the idea.
He casts me an unfathomable look. “That sofa is only a love seat. It’s much too small.”
“Okay, the floor then. If you get me some blankets…”
“Cynda?” he says, his voice irritated.
“Yes?”
His hand closes around mine. “It’s been a long day. Let’s go to bed.”
Just like that, the adrenaline is back. He’s holding my hand. Holding my hand and guiding me to bed.
I follow him, docile as a lamb.
And I guess I’m not as tired as I thought. After we’ve crawled into bed, I lie there for a long time in the semi-dark.
It’s been three years since I allowed myself to feel anything for anyone outside of a select few family and friends.
And I hadn’t chosen Rhys to be among those select few. I shut him out. And considering what had happened between us over the past few weeks, leaving him locked out of my fortress seemed like a good idea.
But my emotions—the ones I’ve been trying to shut down since my mother died…they’re a swirling. Again. Because of Rhys. And I don’t know what to do with them now, just like I didn’t know what to do with them back then.
I’m stuck with Rhys, whether I want to be or not. And this time, I can’t run away. At least not for another two weeks.
Chapter Fourteen
“Will you tell me if you’re pregnant or will you run away again?” a voice asks me as soon as I wake up the next morning.
Considering that I’d been asking myself that very same question since yesterday’s shower slip up, it would’ve been easy to think the voice was coming from my own head.
But no, it’s Rhys. He standing beside the bed wearing nothing but a pair of boxer briefs. And he’s holding the tray my grandma used to serve me sweet tea on when I was a little girl. But in this case, it’s filled with two breakfast plates.
I raise to a seated position and put on my fanciest voice to trill, “Ooh, The Fine Prince himself is serving me breakfast in bed this morning. What did I do to deserve this?”
He throws me a look, half-annoyed, half-exasperated. “I can’t say I’ve missed your cheeky tone.”
I laugh, mostly out of relief because he’s letting me get away with not answering his question. “Boy, you moved to small town Missouri. The only three settings we got are friendly, cheeky, and show me the receipts. I suggest you get used to it.”
He makes a non-committal sound and sets the tray down. It’s piled with what I used to call the Rhys special. Bacon, toast, and hard-boiled eggs.
“Sorry, love, that’s pretty much the extent of what I know how to make breakfast wise.”
He’d been apologetic back then, but this morning he throws the tray down like a prison guard would. You get what you get.
I eat my breakfast silently with all the thoughts swirling around my head. We had sex yesterday. The kind of balls deep wall-pounding sex we used to have when Rhys actually liked me and I was still on birth control.
But this morning it’s like we’re two strangers. Reluctantly sharing the same space.
Which is probably a good thing. It’s better for us to be reluctant and awkward than sexy and confusing. Right?
My phone vibrates with a text before I can mentally answer that question.
I pick it up. “Ugh! They’re already squabbling. It’s A, demanding that I tell E to make him some pancakes.”
“He can’t make his own pancakes?” Rhys asks.
I grimace. “Technically yes. But the twins had a weird dynamic when I first arrived. A acted all helpless and E did everything for him like she was his mom. I’m proud of E for standing her ground though. A needs to learn some personal responsibility.”
“Then why are you answering him?” Rhys asks, taking the tray with my empty plate and standing up.
I stop texting A and look up at him. “What?”
“If E has stood up for herself and A needs to learn to take personal responsibility, why are you getting involved in their argument? It sounds as if E has everything well-handled.”
I tilt my head to the side, not sure how to take that question. “First of all, it’s not interfering. I’m their guardian.”
“A told me he was eighteen, is that not true?”
“I mean, yes, but…”
Rhys raises an eyebrow. “Then perhaps it’s time for you to let them solve their own arguments. You know, take care of themselves.”
“I mean, that sounds good in theory, but I’m not even sure they can do that without me.”
As if to punctuate my point, A texts. “Now she’s telling me I have to clean up my game room!!! Can you tell her she can’t tell me what to do?”
Before I can answer, Rhys plucks the phone out of my hand. “Let’s find out then. I’ll keep your phone for the next thirty minutes. If they’re still texting after that, you may interfere.”
“Again, it’s not interfering,” I start to correct as he deposits both my phone and the tray on the coffee table in front of the couch.
“And while we wait, you’ll answer my earlier question,” Rhys says, ignoring my protest. Then he comes back to the bed to ask, “Will you tell me if you’re pregnant or will you run away again?”
So I guess I hadn’t completely gotten away with not answering his question after all.
Which is tricky because I haven’t quite answered that question for myself. I mean, I already know I’ll keep the baby if it turns out I’m pregnant. Like that Halsey song, I’m bad at love, but taking care of other people? A+. I’ve loved my time with the twins and I could totally see myself as a mom.
I look up to see A and E, the twins I vowed to love and raise in my father’s absence, standing on the porch. They both look worried.
“I’m fine,” I assure them, putting more strength into my voice than I actually feel.
Rhys chimes in, “Unfortunately, we’ve been exposed to a patient presenting with signs of COVID. We’ll both need to quarantine for a few days. More if the patient’s test comes back positive.”
He’s right, I realize. But…where will I stay if I can’t be in the house with the twins?
A answers my unspoken question for me. “So she’s staying with you until you know whether you got the Rona or not?”
“Yes, she is,” Rhys answers. His voice is flat and terse. “But she’ll be available to you as always. By mobile or text. We both will. E, you should have my number as well…”
E shoots me a significant look before pulling out her phone. I can almost hear her silently screaming, “OMG, Cyn, did you really score a quaranboo, just like I said?”
I totally didn’t. But it probably looks that way when Rhys takes me by the elbow and leads me to his door.
I haven’t been in the back house since I spruced it up in hopes of securing a tenant.
It looks much the same. One huge room, featuring a steel bed, a small kitchen, and a slightly larger living area. The living room was a little overstuffed with a couch and my old piano. But other than that, it was neat and ready for presentation. The only difference I can see is a wicker laundry basket sitting near the dresser drawer set. Rhys must have ordered online.
I stand in the middle of it all, looking around. Not knowing what to do.
“Let’s get you into the shower,” Rhys says, leading me into the tiny bathroom off the back of the small unit.
He’s right. I should shower. We both should. But I can’t bring myself to move.
Mavis…how long had she been laying out there before we got to her farm? What would have happened if we hadn’t shown up? The answer comes back, quick and brutal. She would have died. She would have died all alone.
Hands unzip my hoodie and lift my tank top over my head. Not mine. Rhys’s. Rhys is undressing me like a patient who can’t tend to herself.
Next, come my yoga pants. And then my bra and panties.
Rhys is a doctor, but he could have been a nurse I find out in those moments. He’s quick and efficient and doesn’t linger too long on my nakedness.
But even after he turns on the shower, I can’t make myself let go of his hand.
“I was alone when I got the news my father died,” I tell him. “The twin’s mom had passed out and the twins were too young to sit in a hospital with me…”
I pause…then raise my eyes to meet his as I quietly admit, “I don’t want to be alone right now while we’re waiting to hear about Mavis.”
Rhys looks at me, and I look back at him, knowing he has every right to tell me no.
But in the end, he doesn’t say anything. He strips out of the Raines-Jewish t-shirt. First his free arm, then he transfers our hold to his left hand so that he can strip out of that side too. He pushes his pants down after that and he somehow manages to get those off too without letting go of me.
And no, this isn’t like that. We’re not like that. But I have to put a lot of effort into not looking down.
The shower is small though, and we have no choice but to bump into each other as we close ourselves up inside.
His cock is a situation we both pretend not to notice between us as we scrub our bodies and hair with the body wash and shampoo Rhys has in his shower.
He must have brought all of his shower stuff in Europe. Everything on the bottles is written in French, and I know they don’t sell anything like that at Guadalajara general.
“All done?” he asks after I rinse the French shampoo out of my hair.
Good thing I cut it. Impromptu wash days weren’t a thing I could do easily when my hair was chemically straightened.
I mean to answer yes, I’m all done. But instead, I ask, “Why did I make pancakes? I should have gone straight there. She wasn’t answering the phone. And I knew in my gut something was wrong.”
Rhys shakes his head at me, as the spray continues to run down both our bodies. “This virus is particularly cruel to the old. Even if we’d gotten to her earlier, there’s no guarantee she wouldn’t have ended up in the ICU.”
“But if I hadn’t…”
Rhys draws me into his arms. “Ssh, it’s not your fault. Don’t do this to yourself.”
I don’t realize how much I need to feel his arms around me until I break down crying. Gut-wrenching sobs that feel like they’ve been waiting to come out of me for a long time.
Rhys turns off the shower and holds me until the tears dry. Until I start to shiver with the realization that I’m cold.
Until I say, “I’m sorry. I’m really sorry for the way I ended things between us.”
His arms loosen then tighten back around me. “Don’t.” The one word is a harsh command delivered on a single breath. “Don’t start apologizing now. Three years after when it would have mattered.”
But I have to.
“I’m sorry,” I say again. “I should’ve done it in a better way. But I didn’t know how.”
“In a better way?” He lets go of me. Steps back as far as he can in the small shower. “You shouldn’t have done it at all. You should have called me. Let me help you when your father died. But no, you had to be tough. Go it alone. Pretty but cruel Nurse America—”
He cuts off with a shake of his head. Looks away from me. Mutters, “I don’t forgive you. I don’t.”
“Okay,” I say quietly. Submissively.
Then I raise my eyes to meet his.
And he….
He grabs me by the shoulders and pulls me in for a kiss.
I kiss him back desperately. Scratching at his chest because I want him so bad.
He picks me up and presses me into the wall, just like he did that one time in the on-call room….
We’d had conflicting shifts all week long and had run into each other when he came into sleep just as I was leaving for the day.
One glance was all it took. He’d pressed me into the wall and taken me hard, with barely a pause to lock the door.
There’s no one to walk in on us now or clothes to remove, so he doesn’t even wait that long.
He wraps both my legs around his waist and pushes into me with an angry grunt.
“Why did you leave like that? Why did you…?”
“I’m sorry!” I cry out. Taking his dick, taking my punishment. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“Sorry is not enough,” he growls. “Go back to Ingrid you told me…do you know how mental you made me? How many women I fucked trying to get you out of my head? Ones that looked like you. Ones that looked nothing like you. And now here I am.”
He grabs a hold of one rock hard nipple. Tweaks it with a ruthless twist.
I cry out. The pleasure and the pain are both spiking and my brain doesn’t know what to do with the duality of such acute sensations.
He thrusts into my core, his hot and heavy body driving in an out of me with relentless force. “I will fuck you. I will fuck you until I can forget you. And only then will I accept your pitiful apology.”
Something’s uncurling inside of me. This is the punishment I deserve. The only thing I crave. Somewhere to finally put all my pain. I’m not going anywhere, pinned as I am between him and the glass. But I hold on tight to him, taking my punishment, whispering sorry in his ear.
Until I feel the crest inside of me.
“Rhys,” I moan right before I explode.
And then suddenly it’s gone. The pain. The sorrow. The worry. It’s all gone, and there’s only the bliss of coming.
“Not enough,” he’s still insisting. But then he cuts off with a guttural groan.
His dick spasms and he floods into me.
It feels so good. So good!
So damn good, it takes me a long, long time to come down… and realize, “We didn’t use protection.”
Chapter Thirteen
So yeah, the rest of the day is pretty awkward after that.
No more hand holding after that crazy shower sex. Rhys gives me a pair of boxer briefs and another Raines Jewish t-shirt to wear. Then we cobble together some sandwiches for lunch.
We just finished eating when the hospital calls with an update. The good news is that they’d gotten Mavis on a ventilator and her oxygen levels were up. She isn’t out of the woods yet but the prognosis is looking better than when she lost consciousness on the way to the hospital.
The bad news is that the sample that some brave nurse drove all the way out to the test site in Columbia came back positive. Mavis is officially Guadalajara’s first Covid-19 case.
“Poor Mavis,” I say, shaking my head when Rhys is done telling me the news.
Then I find myself in the weird place of having to ask him, “Is it really okay if I stay here? I can quarantine in my room at the big house, but then that means I won’t be able to use the kitchen and I’ll have to depend on the twins for everything.”
He folds his lips like he’s considering all the ways he could tell me hell no. But in the end, he says, “Yes, it would be best for all involved if we both stayed here.”
I blow out a quick breath of relief. “Thank you.”
“No, actually, thank you, Cynda,” he says. He grits out the words as if it’s paining him to say them. “If you hadn’t insisted on going out to see Mavis yourself, she might have died. You were right about that, and I was wrong. You blame yourself, but I would have been the one to blame if Mavis had died alone on her farm. I should have listened to you.”
I’m….
I’m not sure what to do with that. There’s probably no such thing as a woman who doesn’t love being told she was right. But in this case… “I wish I had been wrong. I wish there hadn’t been any reason to go out there.”
We share a moment like we used to, back when we were both working in the Emergency Department and understood just how hard it was to make all the decisions that could mean life or death for our patients.
But then the moment is done.
Rhys rises from the table. “I should start canceling all of my appointments for the next two weeks.”
I awkwardly clear the dishes while he sits at Grandma’s old rolldown secretary desk and gets to appointment canceling.
I’d forgotten how DIY he was. Other than the one time with Dr. Rahjeen’s chart, he’d never asked me for anything outside my expected duties. Which had made it hard for me when I’d received his first 360 evaluation right after Ingrid showed up at his apartment. But I’d done the right thing, grudgingly admitting that he was efficient and capable and a good communicator—basically all the things it took for an Emergency Room Physician to be good at his job.
I join Rhys in the living room after the dishes are done. While he messages his patients at Grandma’s desk, I sit on the couch and break the news to E.
Then I answer her many questions about who is supposed to do what.
“Do I have to cook and clean for A or does he have to start doing all that stuff himself? You know he’ll leave that game room a mess and be like it’s clean enough for the whole time you’re gone. He’s so gross.”
“I’ll have a separate conversation with him,” I assure her before texting her to bring over a few things.
“So how’s it going with ur Quaranboo?” she messages after receiving my list.
That was the one question I didn’t answer.
But I did make us dinner a few hours later. If I were in a better position, I’d of course offer to pay Rhys back for his hospitality by waiving a few weeks off his rent. But I’m not, so I guess I’m going to have to make myself as useful as possible for the next two weeks.
By the time dinner is done, we’re both kind of dragging. It’s been a while since either of us were in the ED, and we’re no longer used to the huge adrenaline spikes that come with life or death scenarios.
“I’m knocking off,” he says when I come back to the living room after washing the dishes.
“Me, too,” I agree with a huge yawn.
So we’re in agreement about bedtime too. This is off to a good start. Other than some ill-advised shower sex, we’re getting along and being reasonable and maybe that means the next two weeks won’t be so bad.
Friends…
Maybe we’ll actually come out of this situation as friends. Yeah, maybe if I play nice, my friend, Rhys, will agree to stop being bitter and give me my job back.
“I’ll sleep on the couch,” I immediately offer, warming up to the idea.
He casts me an unfathomable look. “That sofa is only a love seat. It’s much too small.”
“Okay, the floor then. If you get me some blankets…”
“Cynda?” he says, his voice irritated.
“Yes?”
His hand closes around mine. “It’s been a long day. Let’s go to bed.”
Just like that, the adrenaline is back. He’s holding my hand. Holding my hand and guiding me to bed.
I follow him, docile as a lamb.
And I guess I’m not as tired as I thought. After we’ve crawled into bed, I lie there for a long time in the semi-dark.
It’s been three years since I allowed myself to feel anything for anyone outside of a select few family and friends.
And I hadn’t chosen Rhys to be among those select few. I shut him out. And considering what had happened between us over the past few weeks, leaving him locked out of my fortress seemed like a good idea.
But my emotions—the ones I’ve been trying to shut down since my mother died…they’re a swirling. Again. Because of Rhys. And I don’t know what to do with them now, just like I didn’t know what to do with them back then.
I’m stuck with Rhys, whether I want to be or not. And this time, I can’t run away. At least not for another two weeks.
Chapter Fourteen
“Will you tell me if you’re pregnant or will you run away again?” a voice asks me as soon as I wake up the next morning.
Considering that I’d been asking myself that very same question since yesterday’s shower slip up, it would’ve been easy to think the voice was coming from my own head.
But no, it’s Rhys. He standing beside the bed wearing nothing but a pair of boxer briefs. And he’s holding the tray my grandma used to serve me sweet tea on when I was a little girl. But in this case, it’s filled with two breakfast plates.
I raise to a seated position and put on my fanciest voice to trill, “Ooh, The Fine Prince himself is serving me breakfast in bed this morning. What did I do to deserve this?”
He throws me a look, half-annoyed, half-exasperated. “I can’t say I’ve missed your cheeky tone.”
I laugh, mostly out of relief because he’s letting me get away with not answering his question. “Boy, you moved to small town Missouri. The only three settings we got are friendly, cheeky, and show me the receipts. I suggest you get used to it.”
He makes a non-committal sound and sets the tray down. It’s piled with what I used to call the Rhys special. Bacon, toast, and hard-boiled eggs.
“Sorry, love, that’s pretty much the extent of what I know how to make breakfast wise.”
He’d been apologetic back then, but this morning he throws the tray down like a prison guard would. You get what you get.
I eat my breakfast silently with all the thoughts swirling around my head. We had sex yesterday. The kind of balls deep wall-pounding sex we used to have when Rhys actually liked me and I was still on birth control.
But this morning it’s like we’re two strangers. Reluctantly sharing the same space.
Which is probably a good thing. It’s better for us to be reluctant and awkward than sexy and confusing. Right?
My phone vibrates with a text before I can mentally answer that question.
I pick it up. “Ugh! They’re already squabbling. It’s A, demanding that I tell E to make him some pancakes.”
“He can’t make his own pancakes?” Rhys asks.
I grimace. “Technically yes. But the twins had a weird dynamic when I first arrived. A acted all helpless and E did everything for him like she was his mom. I’m proud of E for standing her ground though. A needs to learn some personal responsibility.”
“Then why are you answering him?” Rhys asks, taking the tray with my empty plate and standing up.
I stop texting A and look up at him. “What?”
“If E has stood up for herself and A needs to learn to take personal responsibility, why are you getting involved in their argument? It sounds as if E has everything well-handled.”
I tilt my head to the side, not sure how to take that question. “First of all, it’s not interfering. I’m their guardian.”
“A told me he was eighteen, is that not true?”
“I mean, yes, but…”
Rhys raises an eyebrow. “Then perhaps it’s time for you to let them solve their own arguments. You know, take care of themselves.”
“I mean, that sounds good in theory, but I’m not even sure they can do that without me.”
As if to punctuate my point, A texts. “Now she’s telling me I have to clean up my game room!!! Can you tell her she can’t tell me what to do?”
Before I can answer, Rhys plucks the phone out of my hand. “Let’s find out then. I’ll keep your phone for the next thirty minutes. If they’re still texting after that, you may interfere.”
“Again, it’s not interfering,” I start to correct as he deposits both my phone and the tray on the coffee table in front of the couch.
“And while we wait, you’ll answer my earlier question,” Rhys says, ignoring my protest. Then he comes back to the bed to ask, “Will you tell me if you’re pregnant or will you run away again?”
So I guess I hadn’t completely gotten away with not answering his question after all.
Which is tricky because I haven’t quite answered that question for myself. I mean, I already know I’ll keep the baby if it turns out I’m pregnant. Like that Halsey song, I’m bad at love, but taking care of other people? A+. I’ve loved my time with the twins and I could totally see myself as a mom.
