Hold Me Close - Talia Hibbert Page 0,198

okay.” He held back his smile. “Sorry.”

With a haughty sniff, she continued. “I’m just going to be blunt. Blunt! It’s nothing to be ashamed of. It’s perfectly normal. I’m just going to come right out and…” She eyed him warily. “You’re not going to be weird about this, are you?”

He had absolutely no idea what she was talking about, but he said, “Nope.”

“Okay. Fine. Okay, so, I can’t… orgasm.”

He was so astonished by that statement, he didn’t even make a joke about the fact that she’d whispered orgasm. “Um… Hannah… not to be a dick, but I’m pretty sure you can.”

“Well, yes, I can,” she agreed. “Just not in front of anyone.”

“What?”

“I can do it myself.” Aaaaand now he was imagining Hannah doing it herself. Wonderful. “Although I don’t often bother. But usually—not always! Just, usually, when I’m with someone else, I get so anxious, and it just…” She shrugged. “Doesn’t work.”

“But you were going to. Just then, you were going to come.”

She stared at him. “I—well, maybe. Maybe. Maybe I would have.”

“So why did you want to stop?”

“Because I…” She broke off, her gaze flitting away from him, her lips pursing as if she were embarrassed. “I don’t know. I just get nervous. I don’t know. I mean, usually, when I’m with someone—well, mostly when I’m with a man—I fake it. Because people take it so bloody personally, and… oh, God, you’re not going to take it personally, are you?”

“What? No, of course not. Don’t worry.”

“Good. Some people are absolutely awful when they think their abilities in the bedroom are being questioned.” She rolled her eyes. “And they don’t seem to realise that sex can be perfectly enjoyable without all that fanfare at the end.”

It was both alarming and not entirely surprising to hear Hannah refer to an orgasm as fanfare. In such disdainful tones, too. Nate knew he should keep his mouth shut, but he really couldn’t stop himself from asking: “Are you sure you know what an orgasm is?”

She scowled. “Of course I do.”

“So you’ve had one. You have had an orgasm.”

“Yes.”

“When? How? Tell me.”

“Oh, for God’s sake. I promise you, Nate, I have had an orgasm. I have had multiple orgasms. They are absolutely lovely, under the correct circumstances. I just think sex is so much less pressure when you take orgasms out of the equation. I hate it when people want to make me come. They get all insistent and militant, like there’s a goal to reach—and you know, usually I like goals, but sex is supposed to be…”

“Easy?” he suggested. But no, that didn’t sound right. “Fun. It’s not supposed to feel like work.”

“Exactly! Exactly. So, that’s that. No orgasms. For me, I mean. I’m assuming you’d like one, though.”

“Ah…” This was really not going as Nate had planned. Actually, this whole day was like some kind of trip. He’d somehow gone from a hangover, to a haircut, to Hannah calmly ask him if he’d like an orgasm. “Well, no. I mean, if you’re done,” he began, but she gave him a pitying look and shook her head.

“We’re only doing this once,” she said. “I’m certainly not going to stop before I get you naked. You don’t mind stripping off for me, do you?”

And just like that, Nate was hard again. Fascinating.

15

Hannah hadn’t intended to make a fuss. She’d intended to take the edge off of this awful, intense arousal Nate sparked in her, fake an orgasm when she’d had enough, and be on her merry way.

But she’d gotten carried away. And things had felt so impossibly, breathtakingly blissful that she’d thought, for a moment she might actually do it. Or rather, that he might actually do it—make her come. Which is when the icy fist of her inhibitions gripped her. Sigh. But at least he’d been so very reasonable about it all. And at least he was now ripping off the rest of his clothes, just for her. That more than made up for her annoyance at herself.

When Nate shoved off his jeans to reveal thickly muscled thighs covered in sparse, black hair, Hannah was seized by the strangest urge to lick or suck or bite… something. She just needed something in her mouth. Preferably something that tasted like Nate. And then he dragged down his briefs, releasing the solid, ruddy length of his cock. It hit his stomach with a soft, rude sort of slap, and Hannah decided that the thing she needed in her mouth was right there, thank you very