Love Overboard - By Janet Evanovich Page 0,26
to my virginity for twenty-nine long years.”
This wasn’t going well. He sat up straighter and dragged a hand through his hair. “Stephanie, you don’t want to rush into something like a romance just because you think your bedpost needs some notches.” Way to go, Rasmussen, really delicate. He grimaced. He couldn’t believe he’d said that.
“Good grief.”
“Sorry, but I’m new at this. I’ve never tried to talk a woman out of going to bed with me before.”
“Lucky me. What an honor. In case you haven’t noticed, I haven’t completely decided to go to bed with you. Maybe I’ll decide against it. Maybe I’ll decide Ace is a better prospect. Maybe I’ll decide to run an ad in the paper. Lord, I never thought it would be so hard to get rid of my virginity. Maybe I should rent a pervert.”
“That isn’t funny.”
Stephanie plopped back onto the bed. “I might cry.”
Ivan stuffed a pillow behind his back and pulled Stephanie against him, wrapping her in his arms. “Steph, do you trust me?”
She thought about it for a moment. “Yes.”
“Don’t worry about the sex.”
“Easy for you to say.” Stephanie sighed. “I’ve been afraid for so long, you know? I wanted to be brave about this. I wanted to… go for the gusto.”
“What were you afraid of?”
“Everything. Just call me No Guts Stephanie. I lost my courage as a cop, then I realized that I didn’t have any courage as a person. All those chicken dinners and meaningless evenings with Steve. I was like a little kid carrying around a security blanket. I was afraid to go off on my own, afraid to break away from my parents, afraid to take risks in a more demanding male-female relationship.”
“Sometimes when you’re very close to things, it’s hard to see them. They get out of perspective. You were doing something that obviously was important to you, and you had to delay other parts of your life for a while. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
Stephanie allowed herself the luxury of leaning on him. “Thanks. I know it was a trade-off, but I think toward the end I was using my job as an excuse to avoid developing other areas of my life. I’d forgotten how to make friends. I’d made my life very narrow. I’d lost the courage to be accessible… to be vulnerable.”
“And now?”
“There are so many things I want to do. I feel as though I’ve been standing with my nose pressed against the bakery window, and now I’m finally allowed inside, and I don’t know what to buy first.”
“What goodies are at the top of your list?”
Stephanie hesitated. She shifted around in his arms and looked him straight in the eye. “I guess your goodies would be number one.”
“Oh.”
“Oh? That’s all you can say? Oh? I’ve just told you for the second time in ten minutes that I’m hot for your goodies, and all you can say is oh. I’ve just spilled my guts about being vulnerable, and all you can say is oh. What kind of a pirate are you anyway? Why aren’t you ravishing me? Why doesn’t anyone ever want to ravish me?” She was shouting, and her cheeks were bright red. “Look at me! I’m hysterical! You’ve made me hysterical. I’ve never been hysterical before.”
She took a deep, calming breath and pressed her lips together. “I’m going to leave now. Tomorrow I’m going to be mortally embarrassed about this, so I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t talk to me. In a year or so my embarrassment will probably fade, and maybe we can be friends. In the meantime, stay far away from me.”
Stephanie sat Indian style on the forward cabin roof. She huddled inside her hooded sweatshirt and squinted into the drizzle. Everything around her was black. There were no stars, no moon, no light from belowdecks. Everyone was asleep, exhausted from an old-fashioned Maine clambake. Tomorrow they’d sail into Camden Harbor and go about their business. Tomorrow she’d hunt up Stanley Shelton and get her toilet fixed. And Sunday she’d sleep until noon. She saw a shadow move at the other end of the ship and realized Ivan was also on deck and watching her. She had mixed feelings about that. He hadn’t done anything but watch her for three days. It wasn’t any secret he was lying low. Of course, that was exactly what she’d ordered him to do, but it didn’t sit well all the same.
He walked toward her, looking like an apparition gliding through the mist, very