She wished that he wasn’t asking her. She wished that his voice weren’t so enticing, so masculine and husky, thick with his desire for her. She wished that he didn’t sound so tender. She wished that he were angry. Because that would make this easy.
He seemed intent on making it anything but easy.
“I said it was what I wanted. You’re the one that’s surprised by the virgin news, not me.” She despised the sound of her voice. Tremulous and uncertain, rather than sharp and clear the way she would prefer. But she was in over her head. Drowning. She needed him to reach down and pull her out, to show her what to do, to dictate what happened next. She was dependent on him. It was nothing like she had thought it would be.
She had thought to find some kind of power in this. To reclaim something. But she didn’t feel it. Not now. She just felt hollow and vulnerable. She felt like any other woman, and yet at the same time so painfully aware that she wasn’t. Because she was twenty-eight, and she was a virgin. Because her skin was scarred and most people would never be able to call it beautiful.
She just wanted him the way a woman wanted a man. But it wasn’t that. It couldn’t be. It could never be. Because of her, because of him. Her teeth chattered, and suddenly he reached out, cupping her cheek, his warmth enveloping her, sending sweet, warm honey through her veins. It slowed her blood, slowed her heartbeat, slowed everything down until all she could do was focus on him.
On where his skin made contact with hers. On his breathing. On the way it matched with the steady beating of her heart.
“I want you,” he said.
The words were simple, but they were everything. They were the only thing that mattered. Because they stripped all that other stuff away, and they left behind the things she wished she could be. So maybe, for tonight, just for tonight, here in the dark, she could be brave. Beautiful. Sensual.
She didn’t say anything. She didn’t have anything to say, which was a miracle in and of itself. Instead, she swayed forward, pressing her lips to his. His thumb skimmed over her cheek and she melted into his touch, resting against the strength of his hand.
Her stomach turned over, something about that simple display of strength, that encompassing heat made her feel safe in a way that nothing else had.
How could she feel safe in his hands?
She blinked back a sudden, unexpected sheen of tears. She wished that she could see him, and she was glad that she couldn’t. Those two thoughts, those two desires, fought with each other as she gave herself over to their kiss. As she allowed him to pull her completely up against his body, so that she was pressed against him, from breast all the way down to her toes.
His arousal was hot and hard against her stomach, big and overwhelming, and something she couldn’t quite bring herself to think about. She was much happier wrapped in this kind of gauzy prelude that wasn’t overly realistic just yet. She was cocooned in darkness. In a deep, emotional hunger that made her feel so hollow she was desperate to be filled, and it all seemed limitless and endless. When she began to apply it to the physical, to reality, it seemed a little bit more impossible.
But he was sure, and he was certain, and she took a little bit of pleasure in the fact that she had been right about the kind of man she wanted to do this job. His hands were firm, knowing, as they slid over her curves, as he moved them both to the bed, laying her down gently, rising up over her, kissing the edge of her mouth, her jaw, down to her collarbone.
She might be hesitant, but he wasn’t. She might not have any idea what was happening, what was going to happen next, but he did. That certainty spoke loudly through each and every touch, through every branding kiss that landed on her skin.
He moved lower, his tongue sliding over the curve of her breast. She gasped as he moved to the side, his lips brushing against one of her scars. He skimmed over it as though it weren’t there. And she squeezed her eyes tight, trying to keep tears from falling, because that was exactly