"What do you mean, no?" I asked angrily when I got over the initial shock.
"You heard me," he stated calmly like he was in full control of the situation.
It wasn't something I could comprehend. We'd just had the best sex and here he was telling me he didn't want to sleep with me again? He had to be lying, because there was no way it was true.
"You don't want me?" I said out loud, trying to wrap my mind around it.
"That wasn't what I said," he said, and I looked at him, more confused than before.
"I want you," he stated. The way his gaze swept over me assured me of that. "But I don't just want one part of you."
I frowned.
"I want all of you. I want the hot sex and I want you naked beneath me," he began to explain, and I felt my stomach flutter at the thought. I could feel his hands running across my body like he'd just been doing. Beneath his imaginary touch my skin tingled. "But I also want you with all the strings attached. I don't just want the physical side—I want everything."
I looked at him like he was crazy. How could he expect me to want that with him again? I'd let him in before, and look what happened. He'd hurt me deeply.
"Even if you only hate me, I need it all," he finished.
I remembered his betrayal and how every sweet moment we'd shared had been marred by the deceit. I pressed my lips together as I felt my anger return. How could he expect that?
He watched me carefully as I tried to figure out how to tell him it would never happen.
"You had me," I said. "And you lost me."
The finality in my voice summed us up. He'd had it all—and look what he'd done. He'd betrayed me. There was no way I could trust him enough not to hurt me again.
"I don't believe that," he said, looking at me confidently. All I felt for him at the moment was the physical need to be close to him; the emotions he was talking about were being smothered by the anger I still felt at his actions.
"It doesn't matter what you believe," I snapped back, hating the way he thought he knew me better than I knew myself.
If those were his terms, then there would be nothing between us. I wasn't going to chance getting hurt again and if he didn't want me without the strings then he couldn't have any of me. It would be hard to resist the physical attraction I felt for him, but I could do it.
But I wondered if he could. Then I smiled to myself. I could push him to see how he far he would go. In my mind there was no way he would be able to resist me if I tried to seduce him again like I just had.
"Anything I might have felt for you died the moment I found out you'd been lying to me," I reminded him.
He studied me for a moment.
"What I did was wrong, and I'm sorry," he said, sounding genuine. I hardened my heart. "But how I felt about you wasn't a lie."
His "sorry" didn't erase his actions.
"You have every right to feel angry and upset with me, but I know you will forgive me," he added.
I hated how he was so sure of the outcome, because I couldn't see the same picture.
"What if I don't?" I asked him.
"You will."
He was so sure of himself and it annoyed me. There was no other option to him and it was why he thought it was possible to have all of me.
"Why are you being difficult about this?" I asked him. What guy turned down good sex because he didn't want it without the emotions?
"I'm offering you sex. You know how good we are together and you can have it for as long as you are my bodyguard," I reminded him, feeling exasperated he wouldn't do what I'd expected and wanted him to do.
"It's not enough."