I was not.
“Look, I…” He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, slanting his gaze away from me. “I haven’t been with a woman in a while, Liv.”
“You haven’t?”
“Since before my grandfather got sick. I had to deal with him and his illness, and between that and my book it didn’t leave room for anything else. Or the desire, really.”
“Oh.”
“I’m telling you because you’re the first woman in a long time whom I like,” he said. “And I didn’t mean to act like a horny teenager on his first date, but I did and I’m sorry. I do have more control than that and can move more slowly.”
I almost smiled. Well, that was something. A sexually experienced professor who had been abstinent for a while, and now wanted… me. It would have been funny if it weren’t another glaring reason why we couldn’t possibly work.
Or could we?
A whisper in my mind, faint as the last ring of an echo.
I stared at Dean, the fathomless depths of his brown eyes, the lock of hair brushing his forehead. I remembered when he had pulled me close to him, and we fit together like the pieces of a puzzle.
I looked at his mouth and recalled how it had settled seamlessly against my lips. How his body had locked to mine, my curves yielding to the hard planes of his chest.
Maybe we could fit in other ways too, convex and concave, angles and hollows. His confidence might bolster my own. Certainly he could show me what true pleasure felt like. And I…
I’d have loved to believe I was a fair lady to his knight, but from what I could remember of the King Arthur tales, none of the women met with a desirable end.
No, I was just Olivia Winter. Still trying to find my way through. A woman who knew very well that knights didn’t exist but held out hope that good men outnumbered the bad. A woman who still believed in leaps of faith, as long as you trusted your instincts.
I gestured toward the sofa. Dean and I sat down next to each other. Anxiety clenched my stomach as I struggled for a way to tell him the truth.
“I’m sorry I freaked out last night,” I finally said. “It really wasn’t you.”
“What was it, then?” Dean asked.
“I…” Just say it.
A crease formed between his eyebrows. “Liv, I shouldn’t have—”
“Dean, I’m a virgin.”
He blinked. “What?”
My heart felt like it was about to claw out of my chest.
“I… I’m a virgin,” I repeated. “I… I’ve never had intercourse before.”
“Oh.” Comprehension dawned in his expression. “So that’s why you…”
“I just… I don’t want you to think it was anything you did,” I said. “It wasn’t. Everything we did… I liked it. I wanted it.”
I wanted you.
“It’s weird, I know,” I continued. Sweat collected at the base of my throat. “I’m twenty-four.”
“It’s not weird,” Dean said.
Oh, with me, it definitely is.
“Well.” I let out a shaky breath. “I wanted you to know. When I… when I asked you about your girlfriends, I didn’t tell you that I haven’t had a serious boyfriend. Ever. I’ve dated some, but mostly I’ve just kept to myself.”
He frowned, as if he were trying to figure out what I wasn’t saying. I avoided looking into his eyes, tracing my gaze over his shoulders and arms. My pulse tripped at the way he sat—the wide masculine stance of his feet on the carpet, his hands linked loosely between his knees.
“I’m not frigid or anything,” I added quickly. “I mean, I have a collection of erotica and I… I touch myself… oh, God.”
My face flared with embarrassment. What the hell am I doing? I pressed my hands to my cheeks and closed my eyes.
Dean moved close enough that I could smell his delicious mixture of soap and autumn air, and then he closed his hands around my wrists and pulled them away from my face.
I forced my eyes open, my throat aching. Tension still lined his features, as if he knew there was more, but warmth and affection filled his expression. That alone eased some of my rampant fear.
“Olivia.” He skimmed his fingers across my hot cheek. “I want you. I won’t hide that. I can’t. But that’s not the only reason I asked you out.”
“Why did you, then?”
“Because you… you’re different.” He rubbed a lock of my hair between his thumb and forefinger. “I’ve spent most of my life trying too damn hard to prove myself to other people. To surpass their expectations. Or trying to fix things when I failed. But that only meant driving myself harder to succeed.”
Something inside me loosened at his confession. I knew all about presenting a very specific version of yourself to others. No matter how heart-wrenchingly difficult it was.
“I don’t feel like I have to try so hard with you,” Dean said.
“So you’re saying I’m easy?” I lifted an eyebrow skeptically.
A smile tugged at his mouth. “I mean you’re easy to be with. I need to prove myself to you, but in a good way. Because I want to, not because I have to.”