Sheltered by Charlotte Stein

Author:Charlotte Stein [Stein, Charlotte]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781419938146
Publisher: Ellora's Cave Publishing Inc
Published: 2012-03-09T08:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seven

He was going to be up in a second. He’d said it. He wanted more, and although the idea of more scared her it also made her almost electrically giddy. She had to think of dull things just to keep it contained, and the longer he took the worse it got.

By the time he finally, finally walked into her bedroom, she’d made great twisted shapes in her ridiculous frilly pink coverlet. The rest of her cotton-candy ten-year-old’s bedroom didn’t even embarrass her, because every one of her thoughts was directed at what might possibly happen now.

Unfortunately, however, the décor seemed to embarrass him. He looked stunned once he’d shut the door behind him, and it was obvious why. There were pictures of babies in flowerpots on the walls. Things had frills. The frills had frills.

And all of it made her want to explain, somehow.

“I didn’t—” she started, but he cut her off like a cleaver coming down.

“Are you naked?”

The words didn’t so much die in her mouth as turn into something else altogether. Couldn’t be helped, though. Her words had expected one thing, and prepared a defense. And then he’d given her another thing instead.

Something she couldn’t exactly deny.

“Maybe.”

Even hedging sounded stupid.

“You’re totally naked under those covers. You’ve taken all your clothes off.”

She fidgeted. His open mouth just looked absolutely huge—like a mime’s version of shock. Somehow, she’d inspired a comedy caricature of a real emotion.

“There may have been some removal of the things I was wearing, yes.”

He held up his hands.

“Whoa, no. No. That’s not…that’s too much. Too fast.”

There were times, many, many times, when she just didn’t get him. She’d heard on numerous occasions that men were bad, wicked creatures, who’d do terrible things at a moment’s notice. You wore the wrong skirt or bent over at an inopportune time and BAM. They slipped their penises into you.

But not Van. He actively backed away from it—heck, he backed away from it even after he’d said he wanted more. And though she suspected that sex wasn’t exactly what he’d meant, even so, even so.

It was what she’d meant. She wanted it to be in there, meaning something.

“I thought you said it wasn’t enough—” she started, but he laid his hand over his eyes before she could finish.

“God, no. Evie—I wasn’t asking you to put out.” He swallowed too thickly. Pushed that hand through his hair hard, hard. “Fuck. I’ve somehow become one of those guys who manipulates his girlfriend into having sex before she’s ready.”

The weirdest thing went through her, when he said those last words. It felt like the urge she’d had to go to him, when she’d seen the bruise that was still apparent on his face.

She couldn’t go with it, however. Something else needed clarifying first.

“I’m your girlfriend?”

His expression softened immediately, immeasurably. She suspected hurt was at least twenty percent responsible for the change, however. No wonder she’d wanted to go to him—he was actually wounded by what she’d said. And now that she’d spelled out exactly what she thought of their situation, it got worse.

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