He could have her, right here. Its own bout of rough and quick and shocking. But he’d left the club for something in particular. Quick and needy had its place, but not this first time.
Perhaps only time. Perhaps it was all they’d be given, all they’d need.
He doubted it, and still…
“No, not here,” he muttered, more to himself than her. He took her by the hand and led her deeper into the house. It would be in a bed. He would take his damn time.
In the bedroom, he kissed her again. Hungry gulps of that taste he’d never before found anywhere. She kissed him back, but as his hand roamed, explored, hers…didn’t return the favor. She didn’t seem to know what to do with them, even as she pressed her body to his, kissed him back with the same intensity, but something was just not…quite right.
He’d expected graceful, like she was in the boxing ring. Maybe combative, but certainly at ease. And yet there was some…odd tension in her.
He pulled his mouth away, stared down at her.
Her cheeks flushed, her pulse scrabbling as she breathed heavily. She appeared every inch the interested and willing participant, but something was…off. Unpracticed. An uncertainty she showed in almost nothing else. Except that which she’d never done before—balance on a boat, eat lobster and…this.
“Surely not,” he muttered, as the idea took root in his mind.
She looked away. “Why are you stopping?” she demanded. But she did not meet his gaze anymore.
His body raged, ached. A part of him wanted, with no concern for what he might be taking. But there was a larger part of him too aware of the power imbalances in the world. He would take care of everything for her, but did she trust that, believe that?
“I do not despoil virgins.” It came out harsher than he intended, but it seemed the only way to find his control. His sense.
She rolled her eyes, managed to glare at him, but the color in her cheeks spoke of more than passion now. “Despoil? Get a grip. I hardly consider myselfspoiledshould I let you put yourself inside me.”
It was a bit crude but not wrong he supposed. And confirmation of what he was concerned about. Concerned, though not…altogether against. “Then why have you not…?”
“Are you so sheltered you cannot say the words, Zervou?” she asked, mocking him. “Why have I nothad sexbefore?”
He was shocked into having absolutely no retort for that. Not the words, but the distasteful mocking in her tone.
“Because the world is a dangerous place,” she told him, with a flatness that definitely spoke of experience in danger. “And I have only had myself to protect me from this world. I suppose it might be smarter to protect myself from you, but I was rather looking forward to…not having to for once.”
Because she would let him protect her, this fierce creature. That was what she meant. She trusted him enough to allow him to protect her. That thing he’d always desired.
It made his decision for him. And it was a decision, a choice. He was in control. And he would protect.
“You said you I could use you. And you would use me.” She made a gesture to the space between them. “Is that not what this is?”
Use.It was not the right word at all, but he hardly knew what the right word would be. So he ignored it. “Be sure this is what you want,” he told her, commanded her.
She met his gaze. Direct and fierce. “I am always sure.”
It was only the tiniest bit of a lie. Ari was mostly sure. Almost totally. She wasn’t certain there wouldn’t be a regret or two on the other side of this, but she could live with regrets.
She herself was the embodiment of her mother’s regrets, was she not? Regret was simply an act of living. Like breathing. There were no choices, really.
Depressing thought. She wanted to go back to what she’d felt at the club. Somehow both powerful and entirely taken care of. That she was in charge, but he was handling everything, and she was free to simply enjoy.
The fact he’d seen the virgin on her was embarrassing. Not that avoiding engaging in sex was embarrassing—she knew her reasons. They had been good reasons and choices. The embarrassment was…something else.
Not shame. Perhaps just the discomfort in it being obvious she didn’t know how to do something when she had to know how to do everything.
And she didn’t like that at all. But if they could go back to the way he’d touched her in the crush of bodies, if she could feel that hard line of his body atop hers…the embarrassment would fade. The pleasure would return. And she could chase all these physical sensations to what people claimed wasquitethe end result.
So she moved into him again, wrapping her arms around his neck and throwing everything she had into the kiss.
It erupted, exploded, ebbed and flowed again and again, his hands streaking over her. She didn’t quite know what to do with her own, but she had a flash of him running on that beach in Mykonos. Of the way his muscles moved. She wanted to touch. To see.
