Ryder drew his arm farther under his head, propping up his neck. He stroked his other fingertips down her spine. “The accounts are just for attention.” Well, at least he was honest. “I started them between girlfriends when I was just feeling like shit and wanted an outlet. People responded online, and at first it was fulfilling, you know? All this positive attention from strangers. It got me out of my funk. But after a while, it just felt like…I dunno. Like the fans were pretend, and the things they said didn’t really touch me anymore. They weren’t real. None of it was. When I was a kid, Weston’s dad said that someday everyone would know my name as Air Ryder.” He frowned thoughtfully. “I’m pretty sure he didn’t think I would get famous for nudie pics and dirty jokes though.”
That sounded like a heavy burden—knowing from childhood that his fate was to be well-known. Lexi would’ve rebelled against a destiny like that and gone into hiding, but Ryder had embraced it and shouldered the pressure. He was even stronger than she’d realized.
“I like you,” she blurted out.
Ryder brushed her hair over to the side and began stroking down her spine again, his eyes averted. “What do you mean by that?”
“I mean I like the real you. The social media accounts? I read through your posts for two hours and didn’t feel like I knew you any better. I already thought you were funny and that your body was incredible, but I adore you when you’re like this even more. I like the serious parts, the humble parts, and the way you don’t really take yourself seriously like you try to convince the world you do. I like all the extra stuff beyond the one-liners and the muscles.”
In the middle of her heartfelt admission, Ryder’s eyes had drifted to her cleavage and glazed over.
Lexi swatted his shoulder. “Are you listening? I’m bearing my soul here!”
“Yes, I’m listening! But your tits are all mashed against me, and they’re soft as fuck. I have a boner, obviously, and if you could just say that all again while you’re rubbing your pelvis against mine, that would be great.”
“Ridiculous man,” she complained, trying to hide her grin. “I just told you something hard, so now it’s your turn.”
“I’m an open book. Nothing is hard.”
The smile dipped from her lips as she remembered the way he’d looked mid-panic-attack when she’d pulled up. “What was wrong with you earlier? What were you thinking about?”
Ryder’s eyes dimmed, and slowly he shook his head, denying her an answer.
She shouldn’t feel so slapped by his rejection, but he’d just shut her out of something big. Desperate to be let in behind the walls he’d so obviously built up, she whispered, “Please.”
Ryder let off a low, humming sound in his throat that sounded animalistic and pissed off all at once. His eyes sparked like gold flames in the second before he ripped his gaze away from her and gave his attention to the woods. The air felt heavier now, harder to breathe somehow, and chills blasted up her skin. Her instincts screamed to move away from him, but she felt like she was close to something. Close to peeking into his soul, perhaps, so she froze on top of him instead, careful not to move a single muscle.
Ryder dragged in a quick breath, as though his chest was constricting his lungs. “My real dad was an asshole, and sometimes I still let him in my head. I’m thirty years old, haven’t seen or heard from him since I was five, and I was raised by the best step-dad my mom could’ve found for me. So it’s super fucked up that I still think about my real dad because it’s disrespectful to Mason.”
“Why did he leave?”
Ryder sat up suddenly and positioned her over his lap, hugged her against him so hard it was even more difficult to breathe. He hid his face from her, buried it against her neck. “Lexi, I don’t want to talk about this. Please just drop this.”
“Okay,” she whispered, because this conversation wasn’t helping Ryder. It was hurting him. She could tell from the way his arms shook around her ribcage. Nothing in her wanted to ruin this perfect day. If he wasn’t ready to share this part with her, it was okay.
So she admitted something she hated thinking about as a reward for him giving her that much. “You know when I told you about my ex?”
“Yeah.” His voice sounded too low, too rough.
“And about how he cheated on me?”
“Yeah.”
“He told me the day before we were supposed to get married, right before our rehearsal dinner.”
Ryder’s limbs stopped shaking, and he hugged her hard. Lexi gasped at how strong he was, and he released her in a rush. Leaning back on locked arms, he cast his brightly-colored gaze off to the side and said carefully, “Tell me.”
“I had my wedding gown all steam cleaned and ready, hanging from the top of my closet door. The bridal luncheon was done, I had all the favors, flower arrangements, caterers, the venue, everything already paid for. My mom and I didn’t really get along, but she came around for the wedding planning and supported me one hundred percent. Everything was just as I had dreamed of as a little girl. It was perfect.” Her eyes burned with tears she refused to shed, so she blinked hard and continued. “Everything was perfect except the person I’d chosen to spend the rest of my life with. Blake had gotten his secret girlfriend pregnant, and he was starting a family with her instead of me. I. Was. Devastated. And instead of helping me deal with the mess he’d made, he took her on our honeymoon—the one I’d paid for—while I had to cancel everything, send the gifts back, and tell everyone the wedding was off. That’s the thing I hate talking about. Hate it. My family doesn’t even mention Blake or what happened anymore because I shut down for a year afterward. I hated everything and everyone, and I felt like I couldn’t trust people anymore. I’m coming out of it and finding myself again, but thinking about what happened makes me feel like I’m standing on the edge of a cliff and the wind has kicked up. It makes me feel like I could so easily fall back into the hole Blake created.” She cupped Ryder’s cheeks and dragged his glowing gold gaze back to hers. “So, you see, I’ve loved someone more than they loved me before, too, and I understand you don’t want to talk about ghosts. I still like you the same.”