Page 75 of Love You Truly

“Why?” The corner of his mouth rises in amusement.

I shrug. “No one particularly likes high school, do they?”

He rolls off the bed and strides to the bathroom to refill the water glass from my bedside table. I watch his tight, athletic ass retreat toward the open door of the bathroom, grateful that we didn’t pull the shades last night. Every detail of Dash’s back and legs glows under the warm morning light. He’s like a walking Michelangelo sculpture.

When he comes back with the water, I get an even better view. All sculpted abs, broad shoulders, and large dick.

I don’t realize I’m gawking in his direction until he looks very pointedly at me. I lower my eyes and feel the creep of heat across my face.

He drops back onto the bed next to me, and I hear his low chuckle. “You can look. God knows I can’t stop staring at you every chance I get.”

This makes me blush even more furiously, which is why I end up answering a question I didn’t plan on discussing.

“So… tell me about the high school version of you. What was she like?”

“You knew me then. I’m sure you remember.”

“I remember you as a hot senior that every sad little freshman like me looked at like the goddess you were. I didn’t know you. I wouldn’t have had the gall to say I knew you.”

I roll my eyes but feel my face blaze, no doubt turning the shade of a roasted beet. “I was just a regular senior.”

“But you were friends with my sister, right? Did you hang out at our house?”

“I didn’t have a lot of female friends,” I admit, telling myself it’s safe to admit this without worrying he’ll judge me for being antisocial. He had sisters. I’m sure he remembers girl drama.

“Not even Beatrix? Seems like she was friends with everyone.”

“Not me.” I press my lips together as though the truth is in danger of slipping out if I don’t hold it back physically. I shrug. “Like I said, I wasn’t friends with a lot of girls.”

He turns to face me while still holding me in his arms. Moonlight streams in through the open window so I can see his features clearly. The aquiline nose, the soft eyes with sinfully long lashes, the strong cut of his jaw. A few days’ worth of stubble rakes his chin, but it can’t stop his dimple from popping when he smiles.

“Talk to me, Mallory. I want to know you better.”

My heart twists in my chest because I want him to know me, and that’s new territory after spending most of my life trying to keep people away. And it still shocks me that he’s the one who’s bringing these feelings out, tempting me to share more details about my life. He’s making me feel like it feeds my soul to get closer to a person rather than protecting myself by pushing away.

The guy who doesn’t commit is making me want to commit. To him.

It’s a frightening thought, but like all other thoughts regarding Dash, I decide to let it ride. No point in analyzing it to death when my feelings are lust-fueled. That’s all this is. I’m lying in a gorgeous man’s arms, basking in the afterglow of incredible sex. Who wouldn’t feel an overwhelming sense of contentment? Who wouldn’t feel like everything’s right with the world?

Who is too much of a chickenshit to be honest with herself?

A problem for another day.

“What do you want to know? I was just a normal high schooler. You had two sisters and plenty of girls in your own grade. I was like them. I just didn’t happen to be friends with them.”

“Why not?”

I feel like it should be obvious to anyone who remembered me back then, especially since he described me exactly the way most guys viewed me. Dash looks at me and waits patiently, his steady eyes threatening to bore into my soul.

Might as well lay it out for him. He wants to know me better? Fine. It’ll explain a few things about my life now as well.

“Guys paid attention to me because I hit puberty early, had the big boobs and long legs when half the other girls were running around in braces and awkward bodies. I got a reputation for being fast even though I didn’t hook up with anyone until I started dating my boyfriend junior year. Girls in my grade believed the rumors, didn’t trust me, thought I was trying to steal their boyfriends.”

It all comes out in one long breath like I’m eager to get rid of the words.

Dash listens without his expression changing, except at the end. He winces when I describe how other girls saw me.

“I bet Beatrix didn’t think that.” He shrugs. “But what do I know about girls? Maybe she was worse than any of them.”

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