Page 23 of Painted

Somehow, all those good feelings transferred straight into their body. They felt graceful and beautiful in the studio light. They weren’t a confused kid with some degree of gender dysphoria that they hadn’t worked through yet. In fact, there was nothing wrong with their body at all. It was made up of artistic lines and graceful curves. It was something that could be admired and sketched and painted as freely as any of the works of the great masters. It didn’t even matter what genitals they had. Frankly, with the way Rhys gazed at them, they loved their modest cock and balls.

They could seriously get used to this. There was a definite high that came from confidence and from acceptance of one’s body, regardless of what it was supposed to look like or whatsociety said was attractive. With those sorts of feelings buzzing around their body, Early felt as if they could take on the world and make the most of it.

More than that, with the way Rhys devoured them with his eyes, as if caressing every part of them and transforming them into pure art, Early began to wonder just how far they could ride the wave of their newfound confidence. They and Rhys were sharing a flat at the moment, after all. With just a little inner nudge, they might find that last bit of courage that would be needed to seduce their way into Rhys’s bed. It was about damn time they lost their virginity, and Rhys was the only man they wanted to be the one to take it.

SEVEN

The meetingabout the fundraiser hadn’t gone the way Rhys wanted it to. He’d wanted his family to see that entertaining any idea that would make Mariel Flint into anything other than a negligent murderer was a terrible idea. Instead, they’d engaged with Martin Flint like he was a friend. Even after the bastard insulted Early with his obvious distaste.

Rhys stomped around his classroom after the last class of the day, slamming drawers a little too hard as he put away supplies from the primary school class he’d ended the day with and dragging easels a little too hard across the paint-splattered linoleum as he moved them back into place for the first class in the morning.

About halfway through the tidying and resetting process, he started to recognize how stubborn and bullish he was being. He stopped where he was, let out a heavy, helpless breath, and glanced around the studio to get his bearings. Sense told him it wasn’t Flint’s fault that his sister had gone to the pub with her girlfriends that night. It also whispered that not everyone was as comfortable with differences in sexual expression and Flint could have reacted even worse to Early.

None of it really helped, though. Rhys stomped on, dragging the rest of the easels into place, then retreating to his own studio nook once everything was ready for the next day.

He glanced sideways at his landscape canvas, but rather than sitting down straight away and working on it, he gathered up his brushes and took them over to the sink to give them all the thorough cleaning that they desperately needed.

He was exhausted from the war of emotion that had been raging in his soul for a year now, exhausted by being held hostage by feelings that had him behaving like a child when he knew he was better than that. As he dipped his brushes in turpentine one at a time, then rubbed them to work dried bits of paint loose, he wished there was something that could clean his soul in the same way.

That was the annoying thing about grief. It kept hanging on and reared its head at the most inconvenient times, especially when you thought you’d kicked it.

Everything within Rhys felt like it was straining to get over the last hump of losing Raina so that he could get on with things. He had a life to live, classes to teach, and a painting to finish. He should be getting out and socializing again, maybe even dating. He needed to find someone his own age, someone far more sexually appropriate than Early to go to bed with. It’d been so long since he’d had sex that he was afraid he’d forgotten how.

Well, not really, as his hand and shower could definitely attest to. But he’d probably completely lost whatever suave skills he’d possessed before. Maybe he should go back through some of the contacts in his phone to find an ex who he’d left things on good terms with so he could?—

“Hey.”

Rhys jumped at Robbie’s voice and at the knock on the doorframe of his studio, then turned to see what his brother wanted.

“We’re heading into London,” Robbie said, glancing at Toby by his side. Both of them were dressed up. “The Chameleon Club is having a games night. Do you want to come?”

“I—”

Rhys stopped his knee-jerk “no” answer. He glanced between Robbie and Toby. After a rocky start, the two of them were ridiculously happy together. They were like horny teenagers around each other, which was both sweet, sickening, and, unfortunately, rubbed off on Rhys, making him wish he had someone, too.

He’d just been telling himself that he needed to get out and socialize more. The Chameleon Club was the ideal place to pick up a friend for the night. The club even had rooms upstairs that members of The Brotherhood could rent like a hotel for a night or two, if they needed it.

“No, thanks,” he said instead, smiling weakly at Robbie and Toby. “I’m exhausted after today, and I want to work on the landscape for a while.”

Robbie and Toby turned their heads in almost comic unison to glance across the room at Raina’s landscape.

“It looks amazing just the way it is,” Toby said.

Rhys lowered his head with a skewed smile. “Thanks, but it’s actually rubbish. I need to figure out why it doesn’t look right and fix it.”

“Well, if you change your mind,” Robbie said, leaning back and tugging Toby with him. “The Chameleon Club is just a short ride away.”

“And a much longer ride, I hope, once we get back,” Toby teased him friskily.

Robbie laughed and grabbed Toby’s hand, and the two of them disappeared down the hall.

Rhys smiled at them. He was happy for his brother. Robbie and Toby were well-matched. It was about time Robbie was happy with someone after the way his nasty ex treated him.

His smile dropped as he finished cleaning his brushes and headed over to his nook. It was good that at least one of the Hawthorne boys had found love. The rest of them were rubbish in relationships. He was in a dry spell, last he’d heard, Rafe had turned into a man-slut over in the States, and Ryan was so picky about who he dated after an ex left him with an infection that had made a serious dent in his self-esteem that it was a wonder he bothered dating at all. Rhys didn’t know much about Nally’s dating life, but the idea of imagining his youngest brother in bed with anyone grossed him out. Nally was the same age as Early, and?—

Rhys blew out a breath through his nose as thoughts of Early rushed at him. He stood in front of his landscape canvas, but his gaze slipped to the side, to the half-finished sketch of a nude Early that he’d done in his class that morning, then set aside where the school kids wouldn’t be able to see it in the afternoon.

He heated as memories of the pale lines of Early’s body assailed him. They’d been holding the same pose as the last class that morning, but something had been different about Early. They’d had a sparkle in their eyes, and every time Rhys had met those eyes, his blood had pumped a little harder. Pumped harder to specific places.

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