“You’ll work for me, of course.”
I looked at the phone in frustration, then hung up without warning. I called back using video chat.
He answered. He was lying in bed shirtless, one hand propped behind his head. His purple nebula eyes looked sleepy, and his silver hair was all askew. “You hung up on me, darling.”
“I’m coming over. I need best friend advice.”
He shot up, and the sheet slipped down to his waist. “Seriously, don’t answer video chat if you aren’t wearing clothing! New rule!” I complain-hissed as I covered my eyes like his nakedness had seared me with a laser, or like the sun had burned holes in my retinas. “What is wrong with you? Are you entirely lacking in modesty?”
“Yes.”
I growled at him and attempted looking through the smallest space between my fingers. “I’m coming over.”
“You can’t. There’s a crazed killer trying to kill you! I’ll come over there.” He got up, presumably to put on clothes, and I shrieked and shoved a pillow over my face. I wasn’t a prude, but come on!
“Seriously,” I complained. “Clo-thing. It’s a thing, Rhys!”
He laughed at me, and I growled and hung up.
Zian growl-chuffed, and I laughed, feeling vindicated. “Right? He has no sense of decency.”
Zian did that funny thing where he attempted to answer me back using whines and chuffs and growls, and I laughed and kissed his nose. “You’re the best familiar ever.”
Thirty minutes later, Rhys arrived, let in by one of the guards, and I opened my bedroom door and yanked him in. I tackled him down to the floor in a hug, and he laughed as he squeezed me.
“What? What’s happening?”
Zian tried to lie over the top of our legs and I pushed him off, then dragged Rhys to the beanbag, where I proceeded to push him down onto it and then curled up next to him.
“Draven kissed me!” I said without preamble.
“I know, Starshine. I was there.”
Oh. Yeah.
Rhys’ eyebrow went up. “It looked…consensual?”
“Yes?”
“That’s not supposed to be a question. It either was or wasn’t.”
I sighed, and sank back into the beanbag, letting it support my head and neck. “Yes, it was, but…Geezer, he’s like almost a millennium old!”
“Yep, he’s a dirty old man for going after someone so young,” Rhys said with a smirk.
I smacked his arm. “Seriously, he’s so muchmorethan I am.”
“More what?”
I threw my arms wide. “More of everything! Wiser, smarter, stronger, and there’s certainly a difference in our economic situations.”
Rhys grabbed my hand and threaded his fingers through mine, probably trying to pin it down so I didn’t flail and smack him in the face again.
“I can promise he’s not noticing the differences you are. He seems happy.”
I turned my head to look at my best friend with skepticism. “Won’t this stuff come up later, though? The disparity between us?”
Rhys looked thoughtful. “Maybe in some form. But you’ll work through it. It’s not like he’s thinking about how much less intelligent you are, or how he can buy several small countries and you can maybe buy a pack of underwear.”
