Page 53 of Moving Forward

“Yes,” she murmurs.

“You and Ethan . . . did you . . .”

She turns red, which is all the confirmation I need. I instantly wish I hadn’t asked. I really don’t need to hear this. This conversation, yeah, it’s a little awkward. Her sex life before me is not something I want to think about, let alone hear about. The thought of anyone other than me being inside of her sends a hot wave of jealousy through my system. Not to mention panic. I want her to only belong to me.

If I feel this way about her and Ethan being together, I can’t imagine how she’d feel about my track record in the sexual conquests department. I wish I could go back in time and erase some of the girls from my past to make myself more worthy of her. She deserves more than someone who’s fucked so many women he can’t even remember their faces, let alone how many there were.

She pulls away, cowering under my gaze. “It was only ever once . . . right before he . . .”

Even though I don’t want to know—seriously don’t want to fucking know—I need to. Her second time is just as important as her first, not for physical reasons, but mental and emotional ones. She’s still inexperienced, unsure, and nervous. Maybe scared. She needs to work up to the point where all of that doesn’t get in the way. She needs to learn to lose herself when she’s with me, rather than worrying about what step comes next.

She takes my silence the wrong way and stutters a few undecipherable syllables before continuing the conversation, much to my dismay. “I didn’t mean to make him wait so long. Originally, I didn’t want to give just anyone that piece of myself. I wanted my first time to matter, and I wanted to be in love. I told Ethan that and I guess the idea of love freaked him out. That’s when he cheated on me. He always struggled with commitment issues. He didn’t even really cheat on me though . . . they almost had sex, but he bolted the second he realized it was wrong. It felt like such a huge deal back then. Now it just feels like a rough patch—time wasted when we could’ve been together. When we finally worked things out, it felt right, like nothing had happened. But it didn’t matter how much I loved him; I didn’t trust him. That’s why . . . that’s why it took me so long.”

I cup her cheeks, needing to touch her. I don’t know if it’s to comfort her or to comfort myself. Probably both. I hope it’s both because I want to put Max first. Throughout my whole life, I’ve been selfish—with Erin, with all those girls I fucked, with my family. That needs to end.

“I don’t want to wait that long with you, Cain. I want to be ready.”

“We just have to give it time.” I throw my arm over her hip, holding her tightly against me. “I’m not going to rush you, Peaches.”

“I wouldn’t blame you if you did,” she says. Her thumb absently draws circles on my shoulder, dragging my shirt with it.

“Did Ethan . . . rush you?” My entire mood goes green. Not the envious kind, either. I feel like I’m going to be sick at the thought.

She nods.

And now, everything is a violent shade of red.

Her thumb freezes. “Before I told him about wanting to wait. And then a few months after we got back together, he started pressuring me again.” She goes back to her circling motion, probably trying to calm me down. My muscles are so tense they might shatter. “After a while, I guess he finally figured out pressuring me wouldn’t work. He had to wait. So he did. He stopped trying to push me and even when I was ready, he kept asking to make sure.”

My vision starts to clear. I’m pretty sure it’s not humanly possible to resurrect the deceased, but if anything can, it’s my rage right now. I want nothing more than to dismember him.

I go a few steps back in our conversation. “I won’t rush you. You can wait as long as you need. Being with you like this is enough to hold me over. Besides, the more time we spend doing what we just did, the better it’ll be when the time comes for us to take things further. We’ll have more practice, more pent-up energy, more excitement. But Peaches, I do need to warn you that I plan on making our first time together as perfect as possible.”

“Just being with you will be perfect.” She tilts her chin up to give me a shy smile. “But I can’t say I would complain otherwise.”

She snuggles against me, fisting my shirt. I kiss the top of her head. Having her permission to hold her and kiss her is quickly leading to an obsession. All I want to do is relish in the idea of her being mine. If I’m like this now, I hate to see how I’ll be when she lets me inside her. Neither of us will ever sleep again.

“On a lighter note,” she says, “I do still have legs, right? Because I can’t feel them, which is a little bit worrisome.”

I laugh. My hands roam down her body, to the tops of her thighs. My fingertips drag over the strings of her bottoms, desperately wishing I could slip the thin fabric to the side and stick my fingers inside her wet heat. She lets out a small gasp, which I pretend to ignore even though my cock is throbbing. I continue my path up her stomach. My pinky dips into her belly button playfully. Finally, I end by grazing the sides of her breasts and dropping my hand to my side.

“Nope. Seems they’re still there.”

She mumbles something under her breath that isn’t quite a curse but isn’t all that flattering. Well, it kind of is given the situation. “If I didn’t feel so great right now, I would attack you for that.”

“No, you wouldn’t.” The hardest thing in the world is to ignore her beautiful nipples on those perfect breasts, hardened and straining, begging for my attention. I really want to draw them into my mouth again and make her writhe beneath me. The taste of her is just intoxicating.

A huff of air rushes out. “You’re right.” She nuzzles her nose against my chest. “You make me feel too good.”

“I’ve noticed.”

She smacks me. “You know what I mean.”

“I do,” I answer. “But what you mean can be taken in different ways. And I choose to take it another, more sexual way. Thinking about how good I’ve made you feel and how I plan to make you feel even better, whether I’m inside you or not.”

She shivers “Maybe that’s the way I meant in the first place.”

“Peaches, we both know that you didn’t mean it that way.”

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