“Yes,” he said, his tone hard. “I know.”
“Anyway things were going well. We were kissing, I hadn’t injured him. He started to take my dress off.…” She blinked hard, trying to keep her tears from falling. She’d cried enough about it. “Then he grabbed my arm and pulled me out onto the football field, and the big lights came on, and a huge group of my friends in the senior class threw eggs at me. Laughed at me. They took pictures of me, half-naked like that and trying to cover myself up. They made fliers later to pass out in school.”
She bit her lip hard. “You know, I would have gotten in serious trouble, for being out there unauthorized, but I think the principal thought I’d suffered enough. My parents thought so, too. Because everyone saw it. Everyone knew. I don’t know why…I don’t know why I walked into that. As one of the girls put it, did you really think he came out here to be with you?” A tear slid down her cheek and she brushed it away. “I had. I had really believed it. But not after that. And they never let it go. They brought it up all the time, even after graduation, and they would just…laugh like it had been the funniest, cleverest prank of all time. And I learned to laugh, too. Because my only other option was showing how much it hurt and I wouldn’t…I didn’t want to do that.”
“But then you moved here. Away from those people surely…”
“And take a chance at being rejected again? Obviously not on a scale that grand, but still. My entire senior class made a joke out of my half-naked body.”
Dante swore harshly. “There’s nothing wrong with your body.”
“Maybe not. No…I mean I know there isn’t but…they said there was. And in high school that’s all that matters.”
“Paige, why did you sleep with me?” he asked.
She looked up at him. “You wanted me.”
She could see the horror that passed through his eyes clearly. “Is that all? Because you thought I was the only man who would want you? Those people you went to school with were stupid. As limited as your family when it comes to seeing beauty and value,” he bit out. “I cannot imagine any man not wanting you. So I sincerely hope that this wasn’t some desperate act of someone who believed they could never have anyone else.”
She shook her head. “No. No, that wasn’t it. It was…you wanted me, yes, and I could see it. But also…I wanted you. Enough to risk the rejection. I’ve never wanted anyone enough to put myself out there again. But I wanted you that much. And that seems like a good enough reason to have sex to me.”
“And now…now that you’ve seen that I’m not a supportive, caring lover. Do you regret it?”
Yes, his abandonment of her had stung, and yet, she knew it had to do with him, not with her. She wasn’t sure why she was so certain of that, but she was. “I can’t regret it. It was a lot more about me than it was you, by the way, so maybe take some comfort in that.”
A shadow passed through his eyes, intense, dark. But before she could analyze it, it was gone.
A high-pitched wail shattered the moment. “Ah,” Paige said. “There she is. It’s a little past time for that.”
She looked at him, and his total, casual nudity, and down at her blanket-covered breasts. “This is a little different now,” she mused.
“What is?”
“Uh, the idea of being naked in front of you. When I was turned on things were a bit more hazy. Also, the room was darker. And I wasn’t irritated with you.”
“You’re irritated with me now?”
She nodded. “Yes. I’ll get over it, but for now, yes.”
He nodded. “I’m going to shower now, so, you’re safe.” He turned and strode into the bathroom and she watched his butt the whole way, until he closed the door behind him.
Oh, he was so hot. And yes, that was maybe shallow. And yes, she was angry at him, which was just an even-greater testament to that hotness. But he was like four-alarm-fire hot, and she’d had sex with him. It was hard not to feel a little bit of smug triumph over that.
Sure, he hadn’t gathered her into his embrace and held her all night long, but Dante had never promised romance. And she wasn’t going to forget that.