Page 13 of Rent: Paid in Full
Despite the fact I’d dearly love to argue, both those things are, in fact, true, and it’s a long walk back to campus. A long-ass walk. And just because Miller didn’t turn out to be in the sex slave trade doesn’t mean walking alone at this time of night is perfectly safe.
“Buckle up,” he says as I struggle to click the buckle into the anchor.
He puts his foot down and takes off, causing a wide spray of water to fan out behind us. I sit on a plush leather seat which, if I’m not mistaken, is heating my ass. I’m half grateful and hating the feeling and half panicking about the fact I’ve just dragged at least a bucket of muddy water into a Range Rover that looks like a luxury hotel suite.
He cranks up the volume, and Taylor Swift’s “Getaway Car” fills the air. He looks over at me, gives me a crooked smile, and starts to sing along. I suspect the smile is meant to set me at ease, but it does the exact opposite. It sets off an alarm deep at the base of my skull. A tingling warning that raises the hairs on the back of my neck as a smooth, mellifluous purr fills the car.The space around me starts feeling too close. Too crowded and uncomfortably warm.
Motherfuck.
I sit still and don’t talk, waiting until we get to our room before I let him have it.
“Don’t do that again,” I say, pulling a crumpled handful of bills out of my jeans pocket and dropping them on his bed.
“Do what?”
“The big tip. Don’t over-tip me like that again. I don’t need your charity.”
“You don’t like charity, huh?” He looks me up and down, lips curved into an easygoing grin. Eyes focused. Sharp. Homed in on their target—me. A silver gaze pours over me like thick, molten steel. I get that feeling again. Tingling. Too close. Too hot. He’s thoughtful for a second, deliberating about whether he’s going to laugh at me or go in for the kill and humiliate me even more than he already has tonight. To my surprise, he pivots one hundred and eighty degrees and does neither, turning considered and thoughtful instead. Chin up. Eyes hooded.
It takes me a second to realize I’m wrong. It’s not thoughtful. It’s not thoughtful at all. It’s menace on the back of a picture-perfect smile.
“Guess we’ll have to find something you have that I want then, huh? Something I want to pay for… Something I’ll be happy to buy.” He looks down again. Slowly. Even more slowly than he did last time. His eyes track down my body, pausing briefly at my chest and coming to rest just below my belt. His top lip curls more. “Or rent.”
Despite making a conscious effort not to do it, I wave a hand over my junk as if trying to protect my balls from a direct hit. I squirm in discomfort, knowing he can see he’s affecting me. I turn my back on him to escape his blistering gaze. He lets out asoft hissing sound, and I immediately realize that’s worse. Way, way worse.
6
Miller
I probably shouldn’t havesaid that.
Yeah, I definitely shouldn’t have said it, but the pinched, prudish look on Ryan’s face is making it so worth it. He flails for a second, turning away and showing me the arch of his back and his sexy-as-hell denim-clad ass, and then turns back again quickly. He grabs his pajamas from under his pillow and scurries to the bathroom, and I really do mean scurries. He all but trots, taking quick, tiny steps to cover the space, arms stiff at his sides in an attempt not to look like he’s fleeing the scene.
Not going to lie, I love everything about it.
No idea why, but the thrill it gives me to shock him like that is unlike anything I’ve ever felt. I feel awake for the first time in a long time. Wide awake. Alive. My heart’s beating faster than usual. My senses are heightened. I’m pretty sure I can smell him even though he’s still locked in the bathroom. A deep, masculine musk, a hint of rainwater and annoyance. A rare and unfamiliar top note. Something sexy. Something I’m not used to. I sniff the air again to identify it.
Wait. Is that a challenge I smell?
And as for my dick? That bad boy is rock solid.
I’m not saying I have an infallible gaydar, much as I’d like to claim one, but I will say that I can’t think of a time I’ve been entirely wrong off the top of my head. I’ve asked around, and no one seems to know shit about Ryan. Aside from the fact that he’s a little weird or borderline scary, depending on who you ask, and he hangs out in the library a lot, no one seems to know anything about him. Nothing useful, at least. Nothing likehe’s a total butt slutorhe spends his free time chugging cum by the gallon.
That makes me sad, but I’m going to make it my business to find out more about him.
I strip down to my boxers and wait as he takes his sweet time in the bathroom. When he comes out, he side-steps me, giving me an unnecessarily wide berth as he makes his way to his bed.
My eyes don’t leave his. He looks straight ahead, unblinking as he passes, but right at the last second, right at the very last moment when I’ve started to think it won’t happen, he looks down. As soon as he realizes what he’s done, he spins his head to the side, overcorrecting hard enough to cause whiplash.
He’s not straight, says my dick.There’s no fucking way he’s straight.
“Sleep well,” I say.
So worn down is he by the day he’s had, he forgets himself and replies almost politely, “Night.”
I run the shower hot enough to scald me and only get in when the whole cubicle is filled with steam. I breathe it in deeply, but it isn’t enough to lessen the tension in my body.
I saw that look, the quick, furtive dip of his eyes, the hunger and aggravation when he dragged them back to my face. There’s no way he’s straight. Ryan Haraway likes dick. I’d put money on it.