I crawl to the side of her, then roll her over, spooning. I start to open my mouth to ask a question, then hide it with an open-mouth kiss on her neck. Do I really want to know about why no man has ever made her feel good?
As if she reads my thoughts, she continues. “My ex, Elliot.” She says his name like he still exasperates her. “He told me I was boring and predictable.”
Part of me wants to throat punch the idiot. “What a shithead. Babe, it’s his loss.”
Nodding, she snuggles into me further. “It wasn’t… I couldn’t…” She trails off.
“Bad sex?”
She gives a quick nod. “He wasn’t into it, and he made me feel like I was the problem.” I open my mouth to object, but she keeps going. “I didn’t have what the other girls had. Without a mom, I didn’t have lessons in how to be feminine. My dad taught me how to change a tire and reset the circuit breakers.” She rolls over to face me, but looks away. “When I was in high school, because of these”—she points to her chest—“every guy assumed I was easy. I wasn’t, but I got this reputation.”
“Babe.” I go to kiss her, but she pulls back.
“Boys told rumors about me. This one guy Clay bragged to everyone that I gave him a blow job in the janitor’s closet. Of course I didn’t, but it was my word against his. He was more popular, so people believed him. I had the fucking scarlet letter on me, only it was S for slut. So I dressed in baggy clothes to hide my body. I studied hard and got good grades and focused on going to law school and building my career. I didn’t care about my looks. Feeling sexy meant getting attention, attention I didn’t want.”
Maybe it’s caveman of me to want to beat this guy’s ass for making her feel bad, but it pains me that this dickhead shamed her.
I don’t say anything, but I reach down and thread my fingers through hers.
She watches me join our hands and then looks into my eyes, a solemn expression on her face. “So I’ve always hidden under baggy clothes, not wanting anyone to look at my body. Thing is, I have a body. And I do get turned on by things. Like your blog.”
“I love that.”
All of the warmth in my body races south at the thought of Evie getting off to pics of me, but I edge my hips back, not wanting us to just be about sex.
She sighs. “When I’m with you, it’s okay to be a woman. One who likes to have sex and isn’t shamed for it.”
“Hell, yes,” I say. “Of course it is.”
“I feel good when I’m with you.”
“Me too,” I say, and kiss her gently.
She whispers, “I keep trying to tell myself that this is wrong. That this is a bad move. That this could be career-ending for me and humiliating for you and your family if anyone found out.” I still, hoping she’s feeling as invested in this relationship as I am, at least enough to push past her fears. “But this feels too good for it to be wrong, you know?”
Relieved, I pull her closer. “I know.”
Her big, gray eyes turn up to me. “Even if I wanted, I’m not sure I could just be friends with you.”
“We’re not just friends. We’re so much more.”
She needs to see how great we’ll be together.
I plan to prove it to her.
20
Evie
A contented sigh leaves me as I stare at the countryside whizzing by. The sun is unusually bright in the sky, the wind is blowing through Josh’s Audi while classic rock blares from the speakers, and his hand sits possessively on my jean-clad thigh as he drives.
Josh looks so relaxed in dark jeans, a soft baby blue T-shirt and hoodie. He hasn’t shaved today, and the dark stubble on his chin makes me want to rub up against him like a cat.
When he pushes up his glasses and glances over, I smile. “You’re really not going to tell me where we’re going?” We’ve been driving south for almost an hour.
“Where’s the fun in that?” His lips tilt in a mischievous grin when he returns his attention to the road.
This morning, he told me to get my ass out of bed, that we were going out. That he was tired of living like a vampire, and we needed to do something together outdoors that consisted of more than taking Chauncey out to take a crap.
I smile, thinking about how serious he looked, bed head and all.
Over the last month, we’ve spent a lot of time together, even if it’s over pizza while we worked on his couch or at my kitchen table. We’ve both been slammed with our jobs, and when we haven’t been preoccupied with those responsibilities, he’s been helping me renovate my bathroom. I’ve spent so much time at his condo, he even bought Chauncey a little bed of his own and personalized dog dishes.
As though Chauncey senses I’m thinking about him, a wet snout pops up between the seats, and I face my little ragamuffin and scratch him behind his ears.
Yes, Josh said I should bring my dog with us.
“Hey, buddy,” Josh says as he reaches up to pet Chauncey, his eyes never leaving the road.
Ten minutes later, he pulls off the highway, and we bounce along on the country road for about a mile before we reach a farm.
When he parks the car, he turns to me and asks, “How does cherry picking and lunch sound? I packed a picnic and some wine.”
My heart does this little pitter-patter thing in my chest. “Really? That sounds so romantic.”
“Yeah?” His fingers tangle into mine, and he gives me a crooked grin.
I lean over and grab his scruffy jaw and kiss him before I bury my nose in his neck and breathe him in. “Yeah.”
An hour later, I have a basket of cherries tucked under one arm and an ear-to-ear smile plastered on my face. I don’t remember the last time I had this much fun.
A small group of people meander around the endless rows of trees that are leafy and vibrant and overflowing with fruit. I check my watch because I don’t want to leave Chauncey for too long. Even though my dog couldn’t go into the fields, Josh had already spoken to the owners, who agreed to let him play in their enclosed back yard while we checked out the farm.
The click of a phone camera draws my attention, and I peek through the foliage to see Josh taking a photo of me between the leaves. I feign indignation. “Another one?”
He ignores me and takes one more shot before he stalks closer to show me the photos he’s taken today. I place the basket of fruit under a tree before I press my chest to his back and wrap my arms around his neck. Snuggling close, I study the pics on his camera over his shoulder.
I’m usually one to shy away from taking photos, but Josh loves taking them so much that I’ve gotten over it. For the most part.
He scrolls through a few photos of me picking cherries until he gets to shots of me renovating the built-in shelves in my master bathroom, covered in dust and God knows what else.
Laughing, I release him from my koala hold.
“It looks fantastic,” he says as he reaches for me again and rubs my back.
Tilting my head up, I smile at him. “It does, doesn’t it? I’m pretty proud of how it turned out. Thank you for helping me find that mirror for the master bath. I’m excited to put it up.”
He found the perfect mirror online for half the price of the one I was considering.