Page 91 of Unconditionally Yours

My brain’s doing donuts in a Walmart parking lot at 3am, and every single thought is wearing a crop top and screaming self-sabotage is hot, babe, try it!

I thumb out a message:

Me: I need advice right now before I hurt someone. Please respond.

Rhys: Is this a true emergency? Do you have someone at gunpoint?

Me: Metaphorically.

I can feel his sigh vibrating through the text thread. He’s probably pinching the bridge of his nose with the same fingers that could make me forget my name and briefly believe in reincarnation if he ever stopped being so frustratingly boundaried.

Rhys: What’s happened?

Me: Jett fucked me.

Rhys: That is not an emergency. Unless you’re texting from the ER.

Me: There were feelings, Rhys. I saw them. It was extremely distressing. He said mine with his teeth in my neck and thenwent to go get me food. What does that mean?? Who says mine with their mouth full of neck and then goes to buy fries like we didn’t just trauma-bond through orgasm?? Is that normal? Is that courtship?

Rhys: What do you need from me?

Me: I broke into his locker at work. Also stole from his bike. That was before the sex. Do I tell him about Benji and you?

Rhys: There is nothing to tell about me.

Me: Yet. But what about Benji? Is now when we talk about those things? Or do I wait for him to run? He will run, right? That’s what men do. Except Benji. But Benji’s an angel in Carhartts. Jett’s… he’s… feral. He growls. He broods. He doesn’t know how to door. God, Rhys. Can I love two men and have them both love me back without triggering a cosmic glitch in the monogamy matrix?

Rhys: Do you want to build something with Jett?

Me: I don’t build. I scorch-earth demolish. But he’s getting me extra ketchup. Extra ketchup. That’s love. That’s foreplay. That’s a binding verbal contract in Jett-speak. So maybe yes. Maybe I want him.

Rhys: Honesty is always best if you want something real.

Typing bubbles.

Still typing.

Jesus, he’s writing the Ten Commandments of Boundaries. I can feel it drafting itself directly onto my ovaries.

Rhys: Are you in a safe location? Jett has temper issues.

Me: Jett won’t hurt me. Don’t be absurd. I’m trying not to hurt him.

And I mean it.

God help me.

That’s the scariest part.

I feel the rumble of Jett’s bike.

Seconds later he walks in with an armload of food like some kind of broody chaos deity and drops the bags beside me on the bed.

“Didn’t know what to get,” he says, jaw tight. “Got it all.”

Shit. Shit. Fuck.

I thought he’d bolt. That’s the pattern. Men disappear, I spiral, resume the regularly scheduled program of obsessive stalking and trauma-based foreplay. But instead… he brought me dinner. A peace offering. Or a declaration of war. Or maybe both, because he’s setting out a burger and fries with that grim focus.