to dwindle to low single figures once he discovered more about her. She’d tried warning him but either he hadn’t been listening or he’d assumed that she was exaggerating the problem.
Or maybe he was one of those men who thought he was such a sex god he’d be able to get past the problem.
Which simply increased the pressure.
She was going to be the first woman he didn’t manage to turn on. Like an old, rusty engine that no amount of love and care could restore to working order.
She longed to have a normal, healthy attitude toward relationships. She should be flirting and laughing with anticipation. Instead, she wanted to run into the forest and hide as she’d done as a child.
Losing her nerve, she backed toward the door. “This place is for lovers.”
“Yeah, that’s right.” He slid his arm around her and hauled her back against him. “Is there something wrong with that?”
Everything was wrong with that.
Now she was here, all her insecurities came rushing back.
The fact that sex had never played a big part in her life had never bothered her much, and she realized now it was because it had never mattered enough. She’d never cared enough to be disappointed. To her, sex had been an activity fraught with complication and weighed down by uncomfortable memories of the past. But she’d never experienced the same electrifying urgency she felt with Matt.
She wanted him desperately. So desperately that the hum of physical awareness was something that seemed to be permanently switched on whenever she was near him. It had been that way since the kiss. And she wanted to kiss him again. She wanted to rip at his clothes and explore, a feeling she’d never had before. She wanted all of him, and the only thing stopping her was the fear that she was going to disappoint him. And herself. What if reality didn’t live up to the promise and expectation? Never before had she felt this delicious, intoxicating excitement. It was like being injected with a drug, and she didn’t want the feeling to vanish.
“Talk to me.” His voice was soft. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
“This is never going to work.” Given everything he knew about her, she saw no reason not to be honest. She hated keeping secrets. She already had more than enough of those locked inside her. “Every time I go to bed with a man it’s a disappointment. I’m bored. He’s bored. You’d probably have more excitement trawling the internet. I can’t—I mean I’ve never—” And that was something else she’d never told anyone. “Never mind.”
“You could never bore me, Frankie.” He slid his thumb across her burning cheek. “And you don’t need to be stressed.”
“I’ll decide what I want to be stressed about.” If a situation had ever been more stressful she couldn’t remember it. “I’m an adult. I own my stress levels.”
He smiled. “Sometimes the way to handle something you’re afraid of is just to do it.”
“Like going to the dentist, you mean?”
He raised an eyebrow. “I’m pretty confident the experience will be a few steps up from that. Do you trust me?”
“Of course, but that has nothing to do with this.” She made another desperate attempt to make him understand. “I don’t think I’m very sexual. I’m not built that way. Or maybe the whole thing with my mom has just made me so tense I can’t relax enough to do it. I don’t know, but I do know that you being insanely hot isn’t going to change anything. You think this is going to work because you’re a rampant sex god who is going to be the one to show me what I’m missing?”
“No, I know this is going to work because I care about you and you care about me. And also because I want to rip your clothes off the whole time. That’s another clue right there.” He lowered his head and brushed his lips across her neck. “Stop thinking about how it was before, and focus on how it is now.” He was so self-assured, every movement was smooth and confident whereas she was a shivering wreck.
She closed her eyes, trying to control the waves of sensation. Her heart was thumping so hard she thought he must be able to feel it. “Matt—”
“Have I ever hurt you before?”
“No, but we’ve never—”
“No is all you need to say. You don’t need the but. If I do anything you don’t like, or that makes you feel uncomfortable, all you have