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He stood up and offered me his hand like we were walking into battle together.
“You know how right now you’re just going on with things even though there’s this . . . thing in the background?” I said.
“I just wanted to—”
“No, no, I’m saying: You see how you can be kind of okay and have a good time and still shit is messed up, but the okay also isn’t fake?”
He nodded.
“That’s what I did. I didn’t . . . I wasn’t working hard to keep secrets from you. I—it was like there were the things from a long time ago. And there was you, and our life now. And I just picked apples.”
“Okay,” he said, jaw tight. “Okay, I see.”
We filled the basket, trying to choose the roundest, or reddest, or shiniest apples. I knew it had to be in my head, but the apples Rhys picked from high up really did taste sweeter, feel smoother in my mouth. Rhys grinned when I admitted it, and I rolled my eyes.
His phone rang as we finished filling the basket. Caleb.
“Hey, I can’t believe I have reception. I’m in the middle of an apple field. Ha ha, asshole. Yeah. Yup, he’s here.”
Then there was a silence that I assumed was Caleb giving Rhys a pep talk about me. I kicked at the grass, then caught Rhys’s eye and pointed to the apples. He looked puzzled, and I waved him away.
I texted Theo, Want some apples?
Yeah! Theo wrote back. What kind?
It had said on the marker near the entrance to the field, but I hadn’t paid attention.
Idk apples. I bet caleb can make hash out of them.
Theo sent back the green pukey face emoji, and Rhys hung up the phone.
“Sorry, what about the apples?” he asked, and I held up my phone so he could see the text exchange. “Oh, good idea. The picking apples part is fun, but I have no clue what we would do with all of them. I guess people make pies and applesauce and stuff. Hey, we could probably make applesauce.”
“I like applesauce.”
“Seems pretty hard to mess up,” Rhys said, optimistic as ever.
“That’s what your mom said about macaroni and cheese,” I grumbled.
Rhys laughed. He tugged me toward him and kissed me, bending me backward in the orchard like a Hollywood starlet, his mouth tasting of autumn.
Chapter 12
After we’d gotten married at the courthouse, we had been giddy, giggling like children and kissing every thirty seconds. We’d stopped at the liquor store and bought a bottle of cheap champagne, then gone back to Sleepy Hollow. I’d only been to the house a couple of times, then. We’d stumbled upstairs, pulling each other’s clothes off, but when we collapsed on the bed, Rhys went still and just looked at me for a long time.
“You okay?” I asked.
He smiled the sweetest smile and nodded.
“I can’t believe you’re my husband,” he murmured, his voice reverent. “I can’t believe it really happened.”
A rush of joy went through me that I’d never felt before, and I grinned, the word husband coursing through my veins with each beat of my heart.
“You happy?” I asked, leaning in.
“So happy, Matty. So fucking happy.”
“Me too,” I murmured. I hadn’t even known I could be that happy. I made a move away from him. I was just going to kick my pants the rest of the way off, but Rhys grabbed my arm.
“Don’t leave me,” he said. It was so fast and so quiet that I thought I imagined it for a moment. But the expression on Rhys’s face—raw, embarrassed, scared—attested to it.
“I’m not. I’m just taking off my pants.”
“No, I mean—” He shook his head. “Sorry, nothing.” But when I kept looking at him, he said, “I’m afraid this is a dream, and I’m going to wake up and things will be back to how they used to be.”
I knew the feeling. I shook my head and kissed him. “Not a dream.”
“You’re mine,” he said, half statement and half question.
“I’m yours,” I said. “Legally, even.”
“My husband.”
I nodded. “Your husband.”
Rhys moaned and adjusted himself, and I looked down to see his erection.
“And you’re mine,” I said experimentally. “My husband.” I watched his cock jump against his stomach. He whimpered and gave me a look like he was shocked by the intensity of his reaction. By how much he loved the certainty of us belonging to each other, how much it turned him on. How much it turned both of us on.
“Wow,” I said. He was hot and silky in my hand, and as I stroked him, I whispered Yours in his ear, and felt him come apart in my arms.
* * *
—
To my surprise, applesauce really did appear to be hard to ruin. Rhys had googled it, and it seemed like the only mistake we could make would be burning it, so I put Rhys in charge of stirring and myself in charge of tasting.
