She'd never imagined coming home to Cambric Creek after that last solo resort visit with her FWB list accomplished, but he seemed to check every box, including some she hadn't even thought to include. She was so incredibly satisfied with the way things had turned out, that when the dating app on her phone pinged one night with a match, she found herself agreeing to and getting ready for the outing in high spirits, knowing that the outcome didn't really matter, only that she had a good time.
He was handsome, she thought as soon as she spotted him across the pub floor. Platinum silver hair with long sideburns and expressive eyebrows, his eyes dark with a liquid sheen, and a bright white smile. The dress she'd worn borderlined on inappropriate for the icy weather, but she liked the way the dark denim corset hugged her figure, the pencil skirt elongating her slender frame. Her date grinned as she approached, never rising from his seat to greet her or pull out her chair, but rather than feel frustrated, she only smiled. It didn't matter at all.
He asked her about her favorite clubs, favorite DJ, favorite after-party spots. She asked him if he'd ever been to the jewel-eyed hummingbird gardens and if he knew the history of their exportation to the unified states. It was clear they had nothing in common, but she enjoyed the amusing anecdote he'd told about his little niece, and he had the good grace to not pull out his cell phone at any point when she was talking.It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter.It was certainly not the worst date she'd been on, and she couldn't even say that she disliked the demonborn’s company, when his next words left her speechless.
"You know, you really shouldn't wear corsets, you’re too flat-chested. It doesn't do anything for you. I figured since it's our first date, I'd tell you nicely now."
She was so stunned by his casual words that she actually looked over her shoulder to make sure there wasn't some unseen presence behind her to whom the words were directed. When she realized she was, in fact, the intended recipient, she couldn't help her shocked, indifferent laughter.Un-fucking-believable.
"You don't say," she choked out, nearly wheezing. "I'm sorry, are youneggingme?! What century is this? Is that even a thing real people do?" She dissolved into giggles, draining the rest of her glass, and then reaching across the table for his. "Just so you don’t go home confused, I just want to say that we don’t have anything in common, so this wouldn’t have gone anywhere anyway." He'd ordered something that tasted vaguely sooty, smokiness floating over a base of gin, and she wrinkled her nose as she drained it. "But the problem with your strategy," she continued, "is that it only works on women with no self-esteem. So you should probably specify that’s what you’re looking for? It would be a good warning if nothing else. I hope you have a great night," she beamed at him, fishing the cherry out of her own glass to cleanse the taste of smoke from her mouth.
She didn't look back to see him sputtering as she left the table, fresh laughter shaking her shoulders, confident that it didn't matter at all. Relocating to the bar, she soon engaged in conversation with a sleek-scaled lizardman. He was there drinking away his heartbreak, he told her, having recently split up with a longtime girlfriend. It was a shame, she thought, because he was charming and witty, with a self-deprecating sense of humor.See? There are good guys out there too.
"That guy is crazy because you are stunning," he scoffed when she told him about the demonborn she had just abandoned. She wasn't drunk enough to be unaware that alcohol was definitely lubricating her good sense when she left the bar with him a short while later, and alcohol wascertainlyresponsible for the way she scraped her nails over the twinned bulges at the front of his pants. His cocks were identical — dark pink, with several vertical lines of nubs running from base to tip that she thought might feel exquisite inside of her, each shaft leaving the slit in his skin to balloon into a huge swell that tapered to a narrow tip.
She was not so far gone, however, to act recklessly. "Do you have any condoms?" she asked, knowing all she had in her wristlet were one or two orc-sized prophylactics that certainly would not work on him. He gaped at her, cocks bobbing.
"I . . . I don't. I haven't had to buy them in years. I . . . What am I supposed to do without her?" Alcohol had directed her feet out the door to follow him, but she was not so far gone to do something she’d regret. She had the uncomfortable certainty that the intoxicated lizardman was very close to drunken tears, but she also knew that his broken heart wouldn't be any less broken come morning, regardless of what he did or didn’t do with her.
Ris sighed, cursing her big heart. "You should call her this week. Give it a few days, don’t call her tomorrow, anddefinitelydon’t call her tonight. Sober up, get some perspective. You’re a nice guy. Just tell her exactly what you told me." She gave the despondent lizardman a double hand job on the side of his car, an act of goodwill, she thought, despairing that his nubbed texture would have indeed felt amazing.
When she’d arrived home, her fingers keyed open her phone, tapping on Ainsley’s devilish grin practically without her approval, but she didn’t disconnect.
"Nanaya, I was just thinking about how beautiful the moon is tonight, and here you are calling. I don’t think that’s a coincidence."
The sound of his voice, deep and smiling, sent a thrill of warmth through her skin. Talking to him through the week—trading pictures and texts, playing games and discussing their respective days—didn’t compare to hearing his rich laugh in her ear.
"I had theworstdate tonight," she admitted, gratified by his noises of disgust as she told her story, grumbling at the demonborn’s tactics, cheering her leaving with the lizardman, and nearly choking in laughter when she relayed the sad conclusion to the night.
"I hope he appreciates your commitment to making the world a better place, one pity handy at a time," he wheezed, interrupting himself with a coughing fit. "Fucking stars, you have me choking. You win the bad date Olympics tonight, Nanaya, I hope you’re happy."
"Why are you always trying to give me the worst trophies? You know what I like? Flowers. Not trophies. Whatever, jerk. What about you? Do anything fun?"
"Actually," he’d chuckled, "I’m walking home from my own questionable date. It wasn’t as bad as yours, although if that bar were any lower, I might trip on it. We didn’t click, nothing in common. I spent half the night rambling about seventeenth-century rakshasa invaders in Turkmenistan before I realized she was texting under the table."
Ris nearly dropped the phone as she hunched in laughter, pausing before hanging up her dress, thinking better of it, and tossing it into her bathroom hamper. "You’ve never once rambled at me, I refuse to believe this is true."
"That’s becausewehave conversations, Nanaya." Her cheeks flushed at his words, listening to the echo of his boots thudding up the staircase to his apartment. "I’m sure if we’d gone out tonight, you wouldn’t have left me solely in charge of doing the talking for the whole night."
"Well . . . you’re getting home awfully late. It couldn’t have beenthatbad."
"Like I said, not as bad as yours. Still not great though? I could tell she was bored the whole time, she might have been texting at one point then too. Didn’t want me finishing anywhere near her and she had theweakestgrip, so it took me forever. It was like jerking off with a fish. I don’t think I even had an orgasm, it was like, a little dribble and that was the end.Oh. . . oh wow. Did I get a pity handjob too?!"
It was a good thing she was sitting, for she dropped back on her bed, convulsing in laughter. "I have witnessed a gallon of cum in your condoms, so if all you managed was a little dribble, you might want to take back your trophy. Sounds like you need it more than me." She had never laughed this much with anyone else she’d ever known, she was absolutely certain. "Would you like to tellmeabout the seventeenth-century rakshasa invaders in Turkmenistan? Wait, is this that documentary about stolen artifacts?"
"Yes!" he bellowed in her ear as she laughed again. "I’m dying to talk about it, so tuck into bed, Nanaya, and let me tell you a story. I’m calling you back on video, give me two seconds to brush my teeth, and then I'll start my recitation. Please hold applause until the end of the lecture."
She curled into her sheets, leaning back on her pillow and propping the phone up against the folds of the comforter, wearing nothing but a thin cotton camisole. She was not particularly good at being vulnerable, she reflected as she watched him peeling off his shirt and shucking off his jeans. The thick skin she’d developed in childhood had developed into a brash brazenness with age, one that served her well and kept her heart protected. She wondered if he even owned pajamas as he slipped into his own bed a few minutes later, long and leanly muscled and completely nude.
"So this whole thing blew open because those scrolls were found out to be forgeries, right?"
She couldn't imagine being bored by anything he had to say, couldn't imagine not finding every minute in his presence to be interesting and amusing and rife with humor. She wasn't good at being vulnerable, and so she had a hard time explaining why being curled into her sheets with him on the phone seemed far more intimate than the hand job she'd given the lizardman earlier that night; intimate and personal in a way that made her stomach flip and her heart hum happily.
"Tell me if I’m boring you, my ego can’t take much more abuse tonight."
She giggled as he paused, motioning for him to continue. "The land treaties. I’m riveted, professor. Keep going."
She could not explain why her heart seemed to have shed a layer of its protective armor, nor why the time spent in his company, even when it was just through texting or phone conversations, had become the highlights of her week. She wasn't good at vulnerability and didn't want to be pinned down to one person forever, for she could barely manage her own happiness, and the thought of having to be responsible for another person's made her itch, but as he gesticulated wildly, barely coming up for a breath, Ris considered that she'd never actually been happier. She didn't have to be anyone but herself for him, and he didn't ask her for anything more than she was willing to give, and she wouldn't have it any other way.
