It was cold and windy as I waited on the steps outside Giana’s building after the auction. I’d dipped out long before the event actually ended, unable to stand the charade or Maliyah’s not-so-subtle gazes across the room for any longer than I already had.
Can’t wait for our date, she’d said seductively after I’d walked off the stage. I still felt the chill from her fingernail dragging down the length of my arm, could still see the promise in her eyes.
It had worked.
Just like I knew it would, seeing me with Giana had driven her mad, had made her realize that she still wanted me.
But now…
The soft sound of heels clicking on the dark sidewalk brought me out of my haze, and I jumped to my feet just as Giana met me at the bottom of the stairs. She looked frazzled, her hair falling from the bun she’d fixed it in thanks to the wind, and her makeup was a bit smeared, the night too long and involved for it to survive unscathed.
Without a word, she slipped past me, unlocking the door to her building and holding it open for me to pass through first. We walked silently up the stairs to her apartment, and once we were inside, she was on me.
I was just about to tuck my hands into my pockets when she dropped her keys and her purse, barely peeling off her coat before she launched herself at me, her mouth on mine in pure desperation and need.
I caught her with surprise, but also with a groan that echoed deep in my chest as she pressed every inch of her supple body against me in that dangerous, thin dress she wore.
“Tonight,” she whispered against my mouth before claiming it in another needy kiss. “I want you to do it tonight.”
My eyes shot open, but I couldn’t respond, not when she was kissing me with fervor, backing me up toward her bedroom while kicking out of her heels on the way. Every muscle in my body tensed, heart galloping and mind racing alongside it.
Tonight.
She wanted me to take her virginity tonight.
“Giana,” I tried, but she slammed her mouth onto mine before I could finish the sentence.
“Please, Clay,” she begged. “I need you.”
I closed my eyes at her words, at how they lit me up from the inside, how every molecule that made up who I was beamed at the truth I knew she said them with.
She slipped out of my arms, stepping back with only the light from the lamp on her bedside table illuminating her. With one gentle pull of a zipper lining her side, the dress gaped, and she slipped it off her shoulder, letting it fall to a sparkling pool at her feet.
She was completely bare beneath it.
“Jesus Christ, Kitten,” I groaned, swallowing as I stepped into her. I reached out to brush against her ribcage with the back of my knuckles, loving how she peaked and arched like she wanted more. “You’re so fucking perfect.”
Her breath caught as I dragged my knuckles up higher, over the swell of her breast and up to trace her collarbone before my palm flattened against her chest. I backed her up with small, calculated steps, the beast inside me taking over until I had her flush against the wall.
“Are you already wet for me?” I asked against the shell of her ear, palm sliding up to wrap around her throat.
Giana pressed into the touch, like she wanted me to grip her harder, to choke the life out of her as she answered on a breath. “Yes.”
“Show me,” I rasped.
Her hand dipped between her thighs, and then she held her shiny, wet fingers up in evidence.
Then, to both our surprise, she pressed those fingertips against my bottom lip.
I sucked her fingers into my mouth without question, tasting her arousal which fired up my own. Her moan when I sucked her digits had my cock aching for relief, and I squeezed her throat where I held her, giving her the pressure she wanted.
Then, she was pure, beautiful chaos.
Her hands blindly ripped at my tux, pulling at my bowtie before she tore at the lapels and wrangled the jacket off me. I released my grip on her long enough to let her strip me, watching with proud amusement as she unfastened every button of my white dress shirt before sliding it over my shoulders and down the length of each arm. She left them bunched at my wrists behind me like handcuffs as her hands moved to my belt.
She was less steady then, her breaths coming harder as she struggled with the metal and leather before finally freeing the restraint. And when she pressed up onto her toes to kiss me as her fingertips pushed the button of my pants through the slit and she peeled the zipper down, it shocked me like a Taser.
I froze.
I panicked.
And I tamed the animal inside me long enough to remember all the reasons this couldn’t happen.
“Giana, wait,” I managed on a breath, struggling to get my shirt back over my shoulders so I could stop her. My hands wrapped around her wrists, and I held her there, pinned against the wall with her labored breaths meeting mine in the dark space between us.
“I’m okay. I’m ready,” she assured me, even as she shook, even as her heart beat loud enough for us both to hear.
And maybe she was telling the truth.
Maybe she was ready.
But I wasn’t.
I dropped my forehead to hers, swallowing past the fiery breath that expelled from me next. “I… I can’t,” I croaked. “Not like this.”
Giana’s breaths came harder and harder until they caught on an inhale, one she held as her eyes slowly crawled up to mine.
I didn’t know how to tell her. I didn’t know how to form the right words to explain that I didn’t want to take her virginity for the purpose of her having sex with another man, that I couldn’t bear to show her how to find pleasure, only to know it would be Shawn she really craved it from. It killed me to admit it, and I wanted so badly to push all my fucking feelings aside to give her what she needed in that moment.
But I couldn’t.
“Oh,” she finally answered.
And then she shut down.
She pulled away from my grasp, slipping under my arm that pinned her against the wall and bending for her dress. She haphazardly brought it up to cover herself as she stared at the floor. “I… um… I understand.”
I swallowed, heart breaking at the sight of her, at how I knew she felt rejected when that was the furthest thing from my mind.
Tell her. Tell her something, anything.
I begged myself, but I was frozen, standing there in her bedroom half-naked, wondering if I’d lost my damn mind.
After a long pause, I bent to retrieve my jacket, shrugging it on over my open dress shirt before I fastened my pants and redid the belt. I stood there a moment longer once I was half-dressed again, watching Giana and breaking with every second that I did.
I approached her slowly, sliding my hand against her cheek until she closed her eyes and let out a long exhale.
“I’m not breaking my promise,” I told her, waiting until her eyes opened again and found mine.
And I believed it. I believed in the very center of who I was that I still would take her virginity and show her the map of every way to achieve pleasure in bed.
But I wouldn’t do it under the guise of it being fake.
I needed to clear my head, to sift through every fucked-up thought and emotion that had been haunting me all week so I could tell her what I was feeling.
And then, I had to pray it wasn’t one-sided.
Pressing a soft kiss against her temple, I released her, bolting for her front door before the beast inside me could overturn my control.
And on my walk home, I started making a plan.
