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“Me?You mean, you.”
“I’ll do it too. But I’m more concerned about you.”
“How dare you?” I gasped, sitting up. “I’m clean. I don’t sleep around with no protection. I don’t sleep around, period.” Patrick raised his eyebrows at me. “I was with Dexter for nine months before this.”
“Exactly.” He took some bills out of his wallet. “The guy’s a lizard. You don’t know where he’s been sticking his tail.”
“Are you for real?” I squeezed the pillow. “Dexter’s not like that. He keeps asking me if we can get back together. You met him, what, once at that party in November when you slipped me a random napkin? Or do you know him from somewhere else?”
“Don’t know him, don’t want to.” Patrick tapped the stack of bills against the edge of his desk. “I’m just going on what I saw.”
“Well, you don’t know what you’re talking about. And I told you not to poke around in my life.”
He shrugged a massive shoulder. “Twenties okay?”
“You know they’re fine,” I growled. “Just stick them in my purse, all right? You don’t have to rub them all over my body again.”
Patrick grinned at me. “That was pretty dirty, wasn’t it.”
Dammit. My lips moved before I could make a choice, in a fucking smile that wouldn’t go away.
“Where’ve you beensticking your tail?”I asked as he climbed onto the bed. Turning on my side, I felt him stretch out behind me. “Has there been anyone else this year?”
“No,” he said, after a minute.
His hand settled on my hip. I sighed and tucked the pillow under my head. The coliseum poster caught my eye, next to the mirror that showed us lying close together. His fraternity ring glinted in the light.
“Can I see your ring?”
The heavy circle dropped on the covers in front of me. I picked it up, warm from his skin, and studied the scratched metal and the nicks near the insignia.
“Who’d this belong to before you?”
“My dad.”
I pictured Patrick's father — broad shoulders, tired eyes — and wondered if the ring was an inheritance.
“You have the same size hands,” I tried.
“We do.”
Present tense. When I glanced up, he regarded me with an unreadable expression.
I slipped the gold circle on my left ring finger — way too big, of course. I almost made a joke about being blinded by giant diamonds, but Patrick gave me such a strange look that I took the ring off and thrust it at him.
He pulled back the covers. I burrowed underneath them while he turned off the lamp. When he murmured, “Come here,” I did. I curled up in his massive arms, my head on his chest, while the curtains fluttered and a sliver of winter chill chased the heat of the room.
8
Morning
Christina
After my first official visit to Patrick’s room, I thought I knew what to expect. I’d dress up, making damn sure my hair and makeup were on point. We’d start with a friendly chat. I’d confess embarrassing truths while he divulged almost nothing. He’d tease the hell out of me, insult me, and give me as many orgasms as I could handle.
Then we’d screw, and he’d pay me.
I was wrong.
