RHYS

Lydia is talking to Vince and she's upset. Agitated. While I'm trapped talking to the governor of Nevada, a board member from the UK and a high-roller from Hollywood whose name I can't remember even though we were introduced not five minutes ago. Because I'm distracted. The one thing I wanted to avoid during this opening was distractions and I've ended up with the biggest distraction of my life.

I'm irritated for allowing this to happen. Allowing Lydia to wiggle into my life and disrupt everything.

I'm aggravated that I can't hear what they're talking about. That I don't know why she's upset or what's causing her eyes to widen and her lips to pout.

Fucking Vince. I'm putting an end to this tonight. Why do I even associate with people like this? What am I doing? The arrangement with Lydia can't continue like this. Not for another day.

Except it will have to, because Vince disappears shortly after I spot him talking to Lydia. And I never get a chance to speak to Lydia about what's upset her because we're torn in different directions for the rest of the evening, or surrounded by swarms of people.

Everyone loves her. I get it, I do, but I don't want to share. I want her all to myself like the selfish prick I am. I want to drag her upstairs and find out what Vince wanted, then make love to her until she does the ‘oh, oh, oh’ and the ‘Rhys, Rhys, Rhys.’

But that does not happen. When we're finally headed upstairs for the night I get pulled away to speak with the president of a major liquor company, a woman who's flown in from France to attend the grand opening, so talk I must. Lydia heads upstairs without me and she’s sound asleep by the time I join her thirty minutes later.

Sunday morning I rise to find that Lydia is up before me, which never happens. "We need to talk," I tell her the moment I walk into the living room. I've just stepped out of the shower, a towel still wrapped around my waist. It smells like a bakery in here and Lydia is slicing bananas at the kitchen island. She's awake and dressed and somehow I'm already feeling three steps behind on this day. I checked my messages before I went into the shower so I know I haven't overslept. I also know I've got no fewer than a dozen voicemails that require an answer and Jennings wants to meet at ten to go over the forecasting reports for the next quarter.

And it's Sunday. And I'm tired as fuck. And all I want to do is eat breakfast on the couch with Lydia and watch whatever home show is on at nine in the morning.

"What's going on with you and Vince?"

"What?" Lydia looks up at me in confusion. "Oh, that. Crazy stuff. I made French toast casserole with Nutella and caramelized bananas. In the Crock-Pot, see how handy it is? I just have to sauté these bananas for the top and it's ready."

The Crock-Pot. That'd be why it smells like someone fucking cares in here.

"How much more do you need?"

"What?"

"I want you to stay. So how much more do you need? I'll talk to Vince and take care of it."

She slow-blinks at me for several seconds as my phone pings with another goddamned message.

“I’ve got a lot of calls to make, but I want to take care of this. Today. So what’s your price?”

Lydia turns away and places a frying pan I didn't know I owned on the stove. Scratch that, I'm sure I don't own a frying pan. She must have procured it from somewhere. I wonder if she ordered it from room service with the groceries? I wonder if I'll ever stop finding her so endlessly fascinating.

Lydia is fiddling at the stove, ignoring me, so I return to the bedroom to grab my phone, tapping out a text as I return to the kitchen.

"Say something to me, Rhys. Say something to me that is not what you just said."

"I'm not sure what you want me to say." I want to know what the fuck she was talking to Vince about last night. I want to know how she feels about me. I want to resolve all this uncertainty. My phone pings again and I glance at it before sending the call to voicemail.

"Do you know what, Rhys? I think you're so afraid of anything real that you hide behind work and strip clubs and general stupidity."

What? Okay. I blow out a breath. Okay, I might have this all wrong. "Wait, so—”

"No, I don't want to wait. I'm not much of a waiter, Rhys. In case you haven't noticed. I'm a doer and I've done everything. You're a decade older than me. You're the one with all the experience and confidence and life skills and yet I'm the one doing everything. Every. Freaking. Thing." She says that last bit slowly, like she's punctuating the words.

"Okay. Let's slow down here. If this is about breakfast we can always order from room service."

"Oh, my God." She snaps the stove off and puts down a wooden spoon. I didn't know I owned one of those either. "Yeah, Rhys. This is about who makes breakfast. Listen to yourself. You're thirty-four years old. Wake up. Pay attention to what's going on in your life for half a second. How about that?"

"I am,” I snap back. “I paid attention to your little pow-wow with Vince last night. Which is why I—”

“You think I’m having secret meetings with Vince, Rhys?” she interrupts again. “In the middle of the grand opening in front of everyone? Yes. Absolutely. I was lining up my next assignment before I came upstairs to Google Crock-Pot recipes for breakfast.”

“I don’t want you with anyone else, Lydia.”

“But you don’t quite want me yourself, do you? Not for real.” She shakes her head and presses her lips together before taking a deep breath. "Ask me how this feels, Rhys.”

It feels suspiciously like I've taken a wrong turn this morning.

"Never mind. I'll tell you. It feels like… like being empty." She shrugs when she says it but it's a sad shrug, maybe even on the side of belligerent. "It feels like getting to an amusement park and finding out they're filled to capacity and you can’t get in. It feels like someone just told me Santa isn’t real before I was ready. It feels like it's raining inside my heart."

I notice a moment too late that she's grabbed her handbag and looped the strap over her head as she walks to the door.

"Just for the record, I was ninety-three percent in love with you. I deducted five percent for being financially irresponsible because you could have had me for free if you weren't so afraid of your stupid feelings. And two percent for being an idiot. I'm probably double-counting the idiot percents with the money percents but you know what, I don't care."

"Lydia, wait." I attempt to catch the door with my hand, to keep her from opening it, which is just shitty and she rewards me with a look that says as much. And then she's gone.

Fuck. What the hell just happened?