Page 51 of Romantic Hero
I give an awkward laugh that’s not really a laugh at all. ‘I didn’t mean to make it weird,’ I explain with a grimace. ‘I was just … well, Henry. The way he was holding Marisol. He never held me like that.’
‘He didn’t?’
I shake my head. ‘He always said I was cute, rather than sexy. And now I’m wondering if that’s what he wanted this whole time. A sexy person. And, you know, I guess I just wondered if I could be that. If I had a hope of ever being the kind of woman who could be described as that. Sorry.’
Why am I still talking? Why am I giving an oral history for the most hideously mortifying comment I’ve ever made to anyone? I want to slither down the plughole and disappearforever right now. I pull the duvet up over my head and shout from beneath it, ‘Go! You should leave right now, River. Good night. Sleep well! May your dreams be sweet! All the best!’
A few seconds later, the duvet is peeled back from my face.
‘Henry said that to you?’ River asks quietly. ‘He said you weren’t sexy?’
I shake my head. ‘No, no! He just … he said I wasn’t, you know, sexual. He said I was cute and funny and bright but, oh, you know …’
‘No, I don’t know.’
I sigh, my cheeks turning pink. ‘He said that … sex wasn’t my strong suit.’
River’s eyes widen in horror.
‘I mean, he didn’t say it horribly. We were bickering and I’d literally just told him that listening wasn’thisstrong suit. So he was responding in kind. And when I said that in the future I would try to be sexier, he hugged me and said that I was more the cute and funny type and that’s how he liked me. So, you know … I wonder. That’s all.’
River scratches his cheek, brows furrowing.
‘What Henry said is bullshit, Gertie, and I think you know it too. Sure, you’re not someone who demands to be the centre of attention. But you’re soft, and real and open and unnervingly easy to talk to.’ He huffs a laugh. ‘Which is, you know, very fucking sexy.’
‘If you really believe all that then why did you insist I wear that stupid silver dress? The massive high heels?’
‘I forget,’ he murmurs.
River’s eyes blaze as he scans my face and then, just like on the dance floor, something in the air shifts. The temperature, the energy, the weight of something intangible that suddenly feels very, very real. It could be the alcohol from earlier, the relentless summer heat, the weird invisible burgeoning dawn lighting the room dreamily. It could be that River and I are just looking at each other now. Not laughing. Not even smiling. Just eye to eye.
As a wisp of breeze floats through the open doors, River softly presses a thumb to the edge of my jaw. My body feels instantly alert, heart performing a little drum roll of anticipation.
River blinks then, as if pulling himself out of an unwanted trance. He takes a deep breath and swallows, wincing as if something is stuck in his throat.
‘Aha!’ I blurt. ‘Still not ready to be kissed like that, right?’ It’s an attempt at light-heartedness, but it doesn’t land.
‘Let’s get some sleep,’ he says after a beat, and my brain responds with a silent but forceful,No!
A reckless feeling begins to spark through me. A sort of electric hum of energy. I’m literally a woman who has nothing left to lose. A tired, heartbroken, befuddled woman sitting on a bed beside the most objectively sexy man on planet earth. A man who was just seconds ago touching her face in a way that didn’t feel at all like something designed to help make another man jealous.
I bite my lip and shift even closer to River. ‘Just out of interest …’ My eyes flick up to meet his. ‘That night on therooftop, when you said I wasn’t ready to be kissed like that … I was just wondering – casually – what exactly being kissed like that would, you know, entail?’
River’s breath hitches so subtly it’s barely noticeable. His eyes remain fastened on mine. ‘That’s not something you need to know, Gertie. Especially after everything that just happened with Henry.’
‘Wouldn’t that be for me to decide?’
River’s breath starts to come faster. I tentatively reach my hand across the bed, my little finger touching the edge of his little finger. His eyes darken in response, but his mouth twists slightly as if he’s toiling with something.
‘This wasn’t what we agreed,’ he murmurs, eyes travelling ever so briefly down to my lips. ‘It’s supposed to be fake. That was the plan.’
I swallow thickly. ‘I don’t know … Maybe this right now is just … us faking atnotfaking it?’
‘Faking at not faking it? Come on.’
Now the idea is in my head I know that it won’t leave me alone. I allow my eyes to linger on his lips. They look soft and juicy, a little dangerous.Different.
‘Just one kiss,’ I say, surprised at my own brazenness. ‘To distract us from this entire shitshow. To, I don’t know, cheer us up a bit. For curiosity’s sake.’
