Page 44 of Bedroom Therapy

He laughed. “In college; I was a waiter. Part of the job was being able to advise customers on wine. I tried a bunch of them and found I liked them.”

“I think you know more about it than I do,” she conceded. “A lot of times I just go for a white Zinfandel.”

“We used to say people who ordered Zinfandel didn’t really like wine.”

“I like it. I just don’t know enough about it to feel comfortable ordering anything exotic.”

“It’s not that mysterious.”

She wondered if he was going to be around long enough to give her wine tasting lessons, then canceled the thought.

They ordered dinner, and she splurged on rack of lamb while he selected osso bucco.

“How did you get interested in human sexuality?” he asked, when the waiter had departed again.

She took a sip of wine. “Isn’t everybody?”

“Sure. But a lot of people just plunge right in. You made a study of the subject.”

She shifted in her seat. Most people didn’t ask her such direct questions. But most people weren’t detectives, of course. She could be evasive, but she knew she wanted to be as open and honest with Zachary Grant as she could. “I guess my interest goes back to my parents. They were pretty repressed and repressive.”

“Like how?”

Maybe it was the wine that made her answer, “Like I remember hearing the big kids laughing and giggling about something—and I didn’t know what it meant. I asked my big sister, ‘what does fuck mean?’ She told my parents, and I got a spanking for saying that word.”

“Nice.”

She shrugged, knowing that the wine was lowering her inhibitions. “You know all kids wonder how their parents managed to have any children. It was true in spades for mine. I think now that after they had my sister and me, they stopped having sexual relations.”

“That’s pretty radical. I’ve heard about women who never enjoyed making love and thought of all kinds of excuses to get out of it. Not many guys go that route.”

“I guess it wasn’t very important to them.”

“And you wanted a different life.”

“Yes.”

“What about your sister?”

“She’s still pretty uptight.”

“Is she married?”

“She was. It didn’t work out.”

“Oh.”

“I don’t think she liked sex. At least I didn’t pick up that attitude from my parents,” she heard herself saying defensively.

“But maybe your early experiences made you cautious about sexual experimentation.”

“Maybe,” she conceded in a low voice.

He leaned back comfortably and crossed his legs at the ankles. “I guess the column is broadening your horizons.”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re finding out what other people do.”

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