Because now, finally, she and Rio were alone.
She engaged the extra lock on the door then sat down next to him on the sofa. “Hi.”
He looked into her eyes. “You okay?”
Casey nodded. “A lot has happened.”
“Yeah.”
She took a deep breath. “I’m feeling a little self-conscious, because you are literally locked in here with me,” she admitted.
“It won’t be forever,” Rio reassured her. “And you know, I like to think of it as everyone else is finally locked out. Thank you, Jesus.”
Casey tried to laugh. “Good point.” Still...
“There, um...” He cleared his throat and it was obvious that he could tell she was feeling anxious. “There is some pressure that comes with it, though. I mean... I would love to use this time to talk. I have some things I, uh, really want to tell you, but... If you’re not ready, if you just need to sit and, I don’t know, breathe for a while... We could just do that. That’s okay with me.”
Casey kissed him. She couldn’t stop herself. He was just sitting there so genuinely, thoughtfully kind and considerate—thinking about what she was feeling, how she was feeling. That plus his adorableness and ridiculously fit body beneath his robe... It was just too much to resist.
Rio laughed a little as he kissed her back, and he even helped her move closer to him, helping her straddle his lap as she kissed him more deeply.
Except...
Casey pulled back and found herself looking directly into his beautiful eyes. “You want to talk,” she said.
“I... do,” he said. “But that was nice, too. A... different kind of breathing than I was expecting, but...”
She laughed as she pushed herself off of him, careful of his arm and his foot. But then, even sitting next to him on the sofa seemed too dangerously close, so she got up and sat in the easy chair on the other side of the coffee table.
Rio was laughing now, too. “We can talk later,” he said. “I mean, if you promise that we will talk. I definitely don’t want to do a repeat of last night. I mean, yes, I do, right up to the...” He searched for the right wording.
She knew exactly what he was looking for. “Batshit craziness?” she offered. “See, last night I thought if we had sex, I’d get you out of my system, which, hello, was equally batshit crazy. So this morning, when I woke up, I realized the truth and I got mad at myself, and that made me really mad that you lied to me—that you had to lie to me, because of—wait for it—my batshit craziness. You had to lie because I wanted Dave and Jon to live happily ever after even though their relationship was broken beyond repair, a fact I absolutely refused to see. And whenever I think about any of this, I keep circling back to why on earth you’d want to be locked in a room—possibly forever, we really don’t know when this is going to end—with someone, me, who’s demonstrably batshit crazy. And yes, that makes me a little panicky, because either you know it and you’re crazy, too, or you haven’t seen me clearly yet and when you finally do...” She whispered the final words because they were so hard to say. “You’ll leave.”
“I’m not crazy,” Rio said. “Okay, well, I’m a Navy SEAL, so maybe my definition of crazy deviates from the norm, but... I see you, Casey. I do. Very clearly. You let me see you, the real you. And maybe I am both crazy and wrong, but I don’t think you do that very often. At least not anymore. Not since the whole your-face-on-the-buses thing became status quo.”
Casey was silent because he wasn’t wrong.
He leaned forward. “Here’s the thing, and you may not like it, but I think the reason you let me see you is... because I lied to you. It’s because you thought I was Dave’s boyfriend Luc, you could just relax and be yourself. And I’m sorry about lying, but... I gotta be honest. I’d do it again, in a heartbeat. Because it went both ways. Because of WWLD.”
She didn’t understand. “Because of...?”
“What would Luc do,” Rio explained. “Me, pretending to be Luc was maybe the best thing that ever happened to me, because it, well...” He cleared his throat. “It taught me how to talk about how I feel. No, it did more than that—it gave me permission to feel. WWLF. What would Luc feel—fucker’d feel heartbroken. He’d let himself feel that pain, he wouldn’t pretend that he wasn’t hurt and scared and so fucking vulnerable. He’d let himself feel, and then he’d let himself show it and Jesus, he’d even discuss it. And maybe the idea of that would scare the shit out of him, but he wouldn’t run away.” He laughed. “I mean, that was what I thought, but I just found out that Luc did run. Talk about run far away—he ran all the way to London. Idiot fell for Dave and was afraid he’d be just a rebound and get his heart broken, so he adiosed his ass to the other side of the world. But Dave followed, because he’s Dave, god love him, and now they’ve got a second chance—to which Luc has said Hell yes, by the way.”
“He did?” Casey hadn’t heard that yet. “Oh, I’m so glad. You know, he texted me screenshots—Dave did. Of all those texts you sent him.” Please please please PLEASE call me!!!!! Rio had been desperate to tell Casey that he wasn’t really Luc.
“Yeah, well...” He laughed a little now. “I told myself that I couldn’t—shouldn’t—tell you the truth until Dave gave me the all-clear, but... There was more to it. See, I liked it. I liked the way I could be around you, pretending I was Luc, telling you, yeah, secrets that I’d never told anyone before. I liked hiding behind that lie. Getting to know you, being able to talk to you about, damn, about anything, without any pressure that I would accidentally... How did you put it? Show my entire ass.”
Casey shook her head. “You couldn’t...”
“Yeah,” Rio said. “I seriously could’ve, and the fact that I didn’t was a miracle. Except I did in the end, because you slept with me, and I completely missed that it wasn’t because you... loved me or forgave me or...”
“You happen to have a very nice ass,” Casey said.
Rio laughed. “I am relieved to hear that.”
She got serious. “What if I break your heart again?”
“What if you don’t?” Rio asked, then laughed again. “Funny, that’s what Luc texted me when he found out Dave was in London. He was like What if he breaks my heart? And before I could answer, he’d already figured it out. What if he doesn’t? That’s the question to ask. What if it works? You know what I wanted, when we first met? I wanted Dave to be safe and happy. I didn’t want it from you, I wanted it with you. I think that’s one of the reasons why we get along so well. And now that I know you as well as I do, I still want Dave to be happy, but I want to be happy, too. I want you to let me love you, and yeah, I want you to love me, too. I want to hold your hand when you’re scared. And I want to stand beside you—or maybe a little bit behind you when you’re angry. And I kinda never want to kiss your brother again, although I’ll do it if I have to.”
