cupped her face in his hands. “Listen to me, little one. Sex is a loaded gun. Once you have it with someone, it involves you in ways you might not realize. I can’t become involved with a virgin.”
“After the first time, I wouldn’t be a virgin,” she reminded him.
He sighed angrily. “After the first time, you might wish you still were,” he said bluntly. “You’ve been raised to think of sex as a sin outside marriage. How are you going to feel about yourself and me if I let that happen? Besides which,” he added, “there’s always the risk that you could get pregnant. And that’s a complication neither of us is ready for.”
She smiled wistfully, shaking her head.
“What does that mean?” he asked.
“I was just picturing you, your first time with a woman, going through all that with her,” she said on a grin.
He cocked his head a little and smiled slowly. “My first time,” he said in a loud whisper, “was so damned fast she hardly knew what was going on.”
Her face slowly went scarlet, and he laughed. “Did you expect that the first time is always good for a man?” He grinned. “Men aren’t born knowing how to make love. It takes experience to make bells ring and the earth move. After my first fumbling attempts, I had to work up the courage even to try again.”
“I can’t quite imagine that,” she mused, smiling.
He nuzzled his forehead against hers, sighing. “Funny, I can tell you things I’ve never told anyone else,” he murmured. “I must feel safe with you.”
“I feel safe with you,” she echoed. “That was why I latched onto you at the very beginning. You never tried to put the make on me.”
“Until now,” he corrected, lifting his head to search her eyes. “Are you sorry I didn’t let things go on as they were?”
“No,” she said almost at once. “Even though I can’t imagine lying with any other man like that, I know I’d have let you do anything you wanted to,” she admitted, “and I would have gloried in it. I don’t even have enough pride to refuse you. It’s too wonderful.”
His eyes narrowed in pain, and his hands tightened on her oval face. “You shouldn’t be quite that honest,” he teased gently. “I’m only human. I might lose my head one night.”
Her lips parted on a soft sigh. “I’ll bet you’re very good in bed,” she whispered shyly.
“So I’ve been told,” he said, laughing. His hands caressed her shoulders. “Look, we have to stop talking about sex,” he murmured, “or we’ll both be in trouble.” He sighed. “What a mess. What a hell of a mess.”
“It will all work out,” she said. She stood on tiptoe to touch her lips to his eyelids. They closed tremulously, and she drew her mouth over them, amazed at the sudden stiffening of his body, the catch of his breath. She drew away, but his hands caught her waist and held her there.
“Don’t stop,” he breathed roughly. “I like it.”
“Do you?” She repeated the soft little caresses, then instinctively smoothed kisses over his thick eyebrows, his lean cheeks and high cheekbones, down to his very sensuous mouth.
He was breathing rapidly, and she liked that. She remembered what he’d said to her that first time, driving her wild, and with her lips poised near his, she whispered, “Open your mouth.”
It was like setting a match to dry wood. He seemed to go up in flames. His arms lifted her, crushing her against him, and his mouth invaded hers with a sensuous insistence. He was trembling, and his loss of control inspired both fear and wonder in her.
“Yes,” she whispered when he backed her up against the door and fit his body to hers. “Yes!”
His rhythmic movements should have shocked her, but they were pure delight. She arched into them, her pride gone with her inhibitions, her arms curved around his neck, her mouth smiling under his as she gasped with pleasure.
She felt his hands moving on her body, gliding down to her hips, easing up the skirt of her dress. His urgent fingers felt cool on her hot skin, so welcome, so right. She moaned.
He lifted his head for an instant to breathe, his eyes frightening, his body shuddering. “Crazy child,” he ground out, glaring at her. Then he moved against her, deliberately. “Feel that! Don’t you know what you’re asking for?”
“Heaven,” she whispered, feeling deprived when he pulled away from her and turned his back.
“Heaven,” he