THE CRAZY GOOD SERIES - Rachel Robinson Page 0,208

he means having sex with. Good thing my daddy is unaware of new age dating rituals. Or, I hope he is. Not that I was stalling before, but now there isn’t anything in the way. I’m nervous. Not that making love to Steven will be so different from making love to Stone, but that it might be too similar. That was the draw with Alex. There never would be any comparison. Pretending he is a normal guy and that I’m just any other woman wouldn’t be too far off from the truth. Steven’s brawny chest rises and falls a few times in the span of my thoughts, only causing me a sense of familiarity—a sense of non-normalcy.

“Well then, I’m sure he said yes and that opens the door to previously off-limit illicit acts?” The night when he walked in on me comes to mind. His control. The timbre of his voice as he ordered me to continue has me envisioning the reverse scenario—if I ordered him to pleasure himself in front of me. I have some idea what being with Steven will be like and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t dying in anticipation. It’s been a while, yes, but I also haven’t craved someone to this degree until him. I would have had a one nightstand here or there if the opportunity presented itself, and the man, obviously too divine to ignore. It didn’t happen. My tastes are brutally singular.

Steven scoots back in his chair, making a loud scraping noise. “Only what can happen in a twin bed? It’s only fair it begins there, because that’s where it should have started when we were fifteen,” he explains, referring to the tiny bed in his room upstairs. I think Mrs. Warner never bought him a larger bed because that would encourage his sexual activities. She had to have known.

“Fifteen?” I gasp. I had no idea he was having sex at that age.

Replacing his baseball cap, because he’s no longer sitting at the table, he heads for the kitchen. ”Oh, you should have seen what I was capable of back then. I’m practically an old man now. You’ll have to go easy on me.” He winks.

I’m racking my brain to try to think of the girlfriends he had when he was fifteen and end up appalled. “Fifteen?” I whisper again under my breath, unable to wrap my head around that number. “Wait!” I call after him, grabbing the back of his shirt when he’s close. He slowly closes the swinging door leading to the kitchen and faces me. “Why? Why didn’t you say anything before now? There were countless opportunities. You gave no indication that you had romantic feelings toward me…ever.” Sure, there were loaded stares and unspoken words, but I thought those were common things in male/female friendships.

“Or you just didn’t see them. Sure, I wasn’t as straightforward as I should have been…I was young. I just wanted you around me always. No sense fucking things up by mixing in sex,” he explains, resting one hand on my hip lightly. I guess that makes sense, but not in a practical teenage sort of way. I would have jumped at a chance to take things further with Steven back then. I was an innocent, young southern girl. Steven used that, knowing I’d never make the first move like all of the other beauty queens in his teenaged life.

“But is that what we’re doing now?” My heart rate accelerates. I feel my palms grow sweaty—things I can usually hide in court or with clients. I’m never close enough to anyone. “Are we messing things up by considering this now?”

“The time for considering is long past. You and me were meant to be. A wise man once told me that everything happens for a reason. Of course I called bullshit, because how does that make logical, practical sense? But look at us,” he says, motioning between our bodies. “The chemistry is basically melting the atmosphere! Timing: check. Attraction: double check.” Steven runs his hand over the curve of my waist, across the side of my chest. Tingles rise. “We have been a long time coming, Morg. A long ass time. If I don’t take this chance right now I’ll never be able to live with myself. You can appreciate that sentiment. I’m sure of it. So, if you’re amenable we’ll get started as soon as I eat another buttered croissant.”

“Because that’s not the hottest pick-up line I’ve ever heard,” I mutter.