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He’d wanted to fix it and we’d ended up arguing when I told him he couldn’t. He’d disappeared into Rebel’s home gym for hours and I’d fallen asleep alone. Still a virgin. Still scared that I’ll end up heartbroken.
It was still awkward when I left this morning.
“The first time you have penetrative sex is special to some people,” Dr. Keller suggests. “The physical connection between two people can feel like a bond.”
I shrug as I glance out the window at the parking lot while we discuss my virginity like that’s my biggest issue. Alec demanded my attendance this morning. He acts like a king. I roll my eyes.A goblin king.
Lucky for me he’s still in New York so our face to face was done via technology while I’d sipped my favorite morning pick-me-up and walked across campus to the admissions office. I tell myself I’m getting better and growing stronger, but I like the twenty-seven hundred miles between us a little too much for that to be true.
It certainly made it easier to pick over what I wanted to tell him. The article is still going ahead, yes. Ro won’t be scared into backing down no matter how many dead mice he leaves in her bed, not that he took the bait when I worked it into the conversation that it must have taken some forethought to come up with something so…smart. Instead, he suggested it was a shame that something so horrible could happen to someone as lovely as Rochelle Kitt and then talked about the weather in New York.
We’d moved onto Rebel and how furious he’d been. And whether he was on the war path.
I left out the part where the guys had found a bodyguard they could trust to have Ro’s six. He’ll be here beforeHollywood Juicecomes out in a week.
I also left out that Rogue is so protective of me that Alec could use me to hurt him. Possibly in much worse ways than just blackmailing me into spying on his family. Actually I’m not sure he isn’t already clued in, but he will never, ever hear it from me.
His eyes had gleamed when he asked me if I liked my surprise.
He’d sent me a recording device to help me do what I do best. Capture conversations. Of course he was careful not to mention that during the call. And when I did he asked me about my medication. Covering his ass with my mental health issues so that if anyone were to listen to our conversation they’d think I’m crazy. Paranoid. Imagining things.
He has to be aware that the package wasn’t enough to throw me. Even with an alibi I know he was behind what happened at Ro’s. He has to be.
“Ivy?” Dr. Keller asks. Her pencil tap, tap, taps against her notepad.
A sleek black motorcycle comes to a stop in one of the few empty bays. The sun glints on the paint of the racing bike. I turn my back on the sunny day outside to face Dr. Keller. “That’s not the issue.”
“It isn’t?”
“No.” I’m already in love with him. How much more of a bond could we create?
She waits for me to continue.
The lull in the conversation swells from a pregnant pause into uncomfortable silence marked by the swinging pendulum of time and, apparently, my channeling Edgar Allen Poe.
“I don’t know why losing my virginity is this big a deal to me. Other than the fact that I never thought I would get the chance.” I was so shy I couldn’t talk to anyone, let alone someone of the opposite sex. To get to the point where I could be physically intimate with someone seemed like a pipe dream until Rogue Maddox jumped in front of my car.
Last night I was ready… until Riot and Kelsey had an argument under the tree house and I kneed Rogue in the nuts. Today I’m questioning whether I freaked out about that girl yelling or the fact Rogue told me he loved me during such an intimate moment. “I think I might have sabotaged myself. Why can’t I rock his world? What is wrong with me?”
“There’s nothing wrong with you, Ivy,” Dr. Keller says with the patience of a saint. “You want to…you’re not nervous about the actual act, are you?”
“Yes. Of course I want to.” I bite my thumbnail. We combust every time we touch. We’ve done everything else. “It’s not about the physical aspect at all.”
“So it’s emotional. Perhaps you’re protecting yourself because you’re worried about his reputation prior to you.”
“No, that’s not it.” We all have pasts. Some of us are still living with them in the present.
“Okay.” She taps her pen against her notepad again. “He is a huge personality. It could be that you’re worried he’ll undo all the hard work you’ve done to get to this place where you’re okay as an individual.”
“So it’s about control?” I hug myself as I go back to staring out the window. Of course it is.
“Perhaps,” Dr. Keller says. She never gives me the answers, just leads me in the direction that makes sense.
“He bought me a car.” I stare at the little white Mercedes across the lot. I’m still not completely over the fact that he had Jaffa towed away. Though I will admit my new car handles like a dream.
“And how did that make you feel?”
“I didn’t ask him to spend that kind of money on me.” I take a seat opposite her on the plush couch. My hands flex on the cushioned edge. “I don’t want him to.”
