Page 26 of Love, Academically

Recogitate (intransitive verb) re·cogitate

Rhys

It wasn’t really okay, but what else was he supposed to say to that? Oh, thanks for telling everyone the one thing I have tried my hardest to keep a secret. Thanks, Fake Girlfriend, for betraying me.

Realistically, he was surprised that he’d managed to keep it hidden for as long as he had. It had been years and no one had worked it out. He’d not been close enough to anyone except Dan, for them to have worked it out.

Here was Lila, who had wormed her way into his life with her messy, comfortable house and wide, unguarded smiles, blabbing his family name to anyone who would listen. How was he going to get through the Dallimore dinner with someone who had betrayed him?

These were his intrusive thoughts as he pressed the handbrake button in front of Lila’s house. He would have parked behind Petunia, but a little black car was in his spot.

Rhys tugged at his collar as he waited for Lila to answer the front door. His bow tie was suffocating.

“Rhys, hi.”

It wasn’t Lila who answered the door, but Jasmeet, looking entirely too smug. He narrowed his eyes as she blatantly perused him up and down.

“Well,” she said with a grin, opening the door wider. “You scrub up quite well.”

“Is she ready?” Rhys asked, pulling at his collar again. He should probably redo it so he stopped fiddling with it, but he’d already done it four times and this was the best one yet. Besides, was it tight, or was he just nervous about seeing his family?

“Nearly,” Jasmeet said, scuttling upstairs.

Elin would have to be his safe space. His sister, for all her annoyances and issues, supported him and his decisions, even if she didn’t understand them. Lila was already doing so much, coming with him tonight. He couldn’t put any more of his nervousness on her.

Even if she had told Jasmeet his secret.

A noise and a shuffle came from upstairs. Rhys’s shoulders tightened even more. It was nerves about seeing Lila in that dress. The dress that made her feel like a princess.

Fuck, he was like a teenager on his first date. This was fucking ridiculous.

His head whipped up at the merest hint of a sound on the stairs, but it was just Jasmeet and a twinge of disappointment pulled at his insides. He needed to get a grip of himself.

“Two minutes, Rhys.”

Jasmeet narrowed her eyes at him.

“She’s really nervous. She’s worried about letting you down, about not being good enough for—” She snapped her mouth shut.

Ah. Right.

“For my rich family,” he finished for her.

Jasmeet flinched slightly and waved her hand dismissively.

“I think she’s more nervous about the whole Welsh thing than the rich thing.” She lowered her voice. “They’re your family, Rhys. She never met Jason’s family.”

“What, never? In seven years?”

Jason was a fool and delusional to boot.

Rhys could think of two explanations as to why Jason had never introduced her to his parents.

Firstly, he hadn’t told them that they were even together.

Or, that they did know about her and he was ashamed to take her to meet them.

Either thought left a sour taste in his mouth, because of what a disgusting fucking human being Jason was.

“Never. In seven years,” Jasmeet repeated.

Using Lila’s beautiful nature and willingness to help to his own ends was despicable and demonstrated by his free use of Lila’s wages for his motherfucking loan.

It boiled Rhys’s blood. But destroying her esteem by never introducing her to his family was something else.

Jason had more than likely removed every ounce of self-esteem that Lila had.

He started to understand why she fell back into old habits around Jason and why it took her a few days to get over seeing him.

Protectiveness surged through his chest and his hands clenched involuntarily. Rhys was a lot of things, but he vowed there and then to be the best person that he could for Lila. She deserved the world and he would do his best to help her get it.

“So, yeah, she’s worried that she’s not good enough. She’ll never say it, but that’s the problem,” Jasmeet said.

“That’s ridiculous.”

“That may be so,” Jasmeet took a step into his personal space, “but if you make her feel in any way less than your richy-rich family, I will break you. I won’t do it quickly, I won’t do it easily. It will be painful and you will rue the day you ever thought about hurting my friend.”

Jasmeet’s big brown eyes bore holes into his face with laser precision.

“Do you understand?”

“I have absolutely no intention of making Lila feel less than anything,” he said, bristling. “In fact, Jasmeet, I resent the fact that you are equating me with that absolute fucking dishcloth, Jason.”

Jasmeet grinned.

“Well said, Rhys.”

A smile pulled at his lips. They were on the same page. Good.

A little “oh shit” reached his ears and Rhys turned to see Lila gripping the banister with both hands, shuffling down the stairs slower than an ant with two legs.

Rhys found it difficult to get a full breath into his chest because regardless that Lila was bent almost double, the skirt of her dress thrown over one arm and her brows pulled tightly together in concentration, she made him forget how to breathe.

“Oh, for God’s sake, Lila, we practiced this,” Jasmeet said, rushing halfway up the stairs to take her hand.

“It’s all right for you, Miss-I-Wear-Stupid-Shoes-All-The-Time,” she grumbled.

Rhys’s muscles tightened with the effort of not pushing past Jasmeet to scoop Lila up from the stairs and depositing her safely on the floor.

If she fell and hurt herself, then it would be his worst nightmare, spending all night in the hospital (again) in a goddamned uncomfortable bow tie.

Because of course he wouldn’t leave her by herself.

Lila huffed out a breath as she reached the bottom of the stairs and unhooked her dress from her arm.

“There aren’t any stairs at this place, are there?” she asked, looking up at him with those big, trusting eyes.

How would he know? If there were, he would carry her. He shook his head slightly.

“You look…” he started, but his voice didn’t work very well.

“Hang on,” she said, dropping her gaze to his bow tie. She reached up to tug lightly on it, even though it was perfectly straight because he’d seen to it in the mirror.

Pressing her lips together, she glanced up at him.

“There,” she said. “Much better.”

His body reacted to her being so close and there was a distinct tightening in his crotch area. Fucking hell, she’d tugged on his bow tie. What would happen if she tugged anywhere else?

Rhys swallowed and took a step back. A semi wouldn’t be a good look.

“So?” Jasmeet said, jerking her head towards Lila.

“Yes. You look…” He cleared his throat. “You look…”

Why were words so fucking difficult? With Jasmeet glaring at him, and Lila looking like that in front of him, a blush staining her cheeks, her eyes bright, he could not think of one single word to say.

“It’s okay, Rhys,” she said, with a smile. “Come on, let’s go.”

Lila headed towards the door.

“Lock up, would you, Jas?”

“Yeah, of course,” she said. “Text me if you need me.”

He frowned. Why would Lila need her? Perhaps it was because he couldn’t string a sentence together, because his mouth was too dry and his brain was mush, all from seeing Lila Cartwright done up. For him.

But it wasn’t ‘for him’. It was her end of the bargain. If he wanted to see her done up for him, then he had to tell her that was what he wanted.

After tonight. After their bargain. When they could start afresh. It was unfair to put that pressure on her now, tonight.

Rhys opened the car door for Lila and ushered her in, closing the door softly behind her.

She wasn’t wearing a coat, and it wasn’t warm.

Perhaps he should have bought her a coat as well?

Jasmeet watched with a warning glare on her face as he settled behind the driving wheel, and pressed the ‘Start’ button.

“Hey,” Lila said, her fingertips grazing his hand as it rested on the gearstick. “It’ll be all right tonight, Rhys. I promise.”

Rhys wasn’t so sure. Whether or not he had Lila beside him, looking earth-shatteringly beautiful and being a well of bounteous support, it was going to be a difficult night.

A night that, apart from Lila, he had tried not to let invade his thoughts.

Because that dark hole of doom was never fun to head down.

Lila

It was only a dinner and they were just people.

That’s what Lila was telling herself as Rhys pressed his hand to the bottom of her back, guiding her through throngs of people who parted like Rhys was the second coming. He was tense, his shoulders bunched and jaw locked tightly.

“Rhys, you need to stop scowling at everyone,” she whispered with a smile.

She couldn’t be nervous. That was pretty much the whole point of her being here tonight; to support, to be calm, to prove to Rhys’s family that he was a successful human being. Although, how a person like Rhys could be unsuccessful, she didn’t know.

“I don’t know if I can,” he said under his breath.

Lila stopped and turned to face him.

“Look, I know this isn’t easy for you. I know you’re out of your comfort zone,” she said, doing her best ‘kind counsellor’ voice. “But if you keep being so tense and robot-y, people are going to smell a rat.”

Smell a rat. What an interesting phrase. Lila shook her head slightly. Think about that one later.

“Robot-y? From the woman who loves words?” he asked with a wry smile.

Lila’s own smile grew.

“Yes, Rhys. Robot-y,” she said. “Come on, let’s get a drink, shall we?”

Rhys nodded. Instead of woodenly guiding her through the crowds, he grabbed her hand and gave her a light tug.

“Better?” he said over his shoulder.

“Better,” she said, trying hard to keep her blush down. Because not only was she holding hands with a very attractive Rhys Aubrey, who looked a little like James Bond in his tux, but he had probably caught her having a good look at his arse.