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“About me being the perfect woman?” I purred. He’d said that earlier today when I helped Jolene do the dishes after dinner while Gravity hung from my neck like a little monkey.
“That too.” Rhy palmed the coin pendent on the chain around his neck, ripping it from his skin in one go and flattening the padof his thumb over it. “You have to believe in something, and I believe in nothing, so I might as well take a leap of faith. Here.” He grabbed my hands and squeezed, brushing his thumbs back and forth over my skins soothingly. “It’s the only coin I have.”
“I’m pretty sure this thing is a part of your DNA.” I tried to inject some laughter into my voice, but the truth was I was choked up with emotion. He had one wish to spare, and he was giving it to me? “I’ve never seen you take this thing off.”
“Silver Washington quarter. Rare coin.” He smirked, ignoring my rush of incoherent words. “My grandfather gave it to me before he passed away. I used to spend summers with him. We were close.”
I shook my head vehemently, gulping. “I’m not throwing that away, you psycho.”
“If you won’t, I will. And I’ll wish for something really spiteful.” He assessed me for a moment. “That your perky boobs will go saggy or something.”
“You wouldn’t.” My eyes tapered.
“You know I would. It’s classic me.”
True. Rhyland was that level of stubborn, just like me. We weren’t yin and yang; we were two fucking yins that still managed to complete each other.
He dangled the coin in front of my face slowly, mock hypnotizing me. “You’re getting very sleepy, and you want to use this to make a wish, because I decided that’s what needs to happen, and I always get my way.”
“Ugh.” I snatched the pendant from his hand.
Clutching it, I peered down at the dark nothingness of the well and took a deep breath. The summer air hit the bottom of my lungs. I knew what I wanted, but I was afraid to ask for it. I’d spent the past four years training myself so well not to want, not to wish, not to dream, that it was hard to admit I wasn’t happy. That my sweet, bright child wasn’t enough.
I squeezed the pendant harder. No matter which direction my thoughts skidded to, I was met with a wall of anxiety.
Med school? Financial insecurity, long hours away from my daughter, the possibility of failure.
Rhyland? Heartbreak, insecurity, past trauma, crushing betrayal that was to come, because it always came. Other than Row, there had never been one man in my life who hadn’t disappointed me.
“Go nuts, Cosmos,” Rhyland urged in the background. “Ask for your wildest dream.”
I stretched my arm, letting the coin fall into the well. A soft clink sounded as it hit the still water.
“What did you ask for?”
You.
DYLAN
Bruce and Jolene smiled at us when we scurried into the house.
“Had a good time, lovebirds?”
“Yup.” Rhyland slung his arm over my shoulders.
As they both stood up to excuse themselves to their bedroom, Bruce’s gaze halted on Rhy’s neck, where the pendant used to be, and he nodded to himself in approval. He knew. And just like that, I wondered if Rhyland sacrificing his pendant for my dream had been about me or about him.
Asking outright would be foolish. I wasn’t supposed to care. Why couldn’t it be both?
I thanked the couple for taking care of Gravity and padded into my room to check on her through our shared door. She was fast asleep. I closed the door softly. When I turned around, Rhyland was standing in front of me, partially naked and completely hard.
“Oh.” I raised one eyebrow. “That’s fast.”
“Literally never heard that from a woman.”
I smiled, but the truth was I wasn’t in the mood. No matter how filthy and decadent our sexual encounters were, to me, they still meant something.
“What’s up?” He sauntered over to me in just his briefs, hugging my midsection.