Reluctantly, I do, but I can’t look at him. I’m completely fucking mortified.
“What’s wrong with you?” he asks.
“Huh?”
I look back at him.
“You’re doing it right now.” He motions his hands to emphasize ‘right now’; his eyebrows are knotted.
“Doing what?”
He licks his lips, sighs as if disappointed and finally says, “Camryn, you started to tell me something that maybe you’ve contemplated a time or two and just when you got the courage to speak your mind, you did a one-eighty and regretted it.” He looks deep into my eyes, his full of intensity and knowledge and something else I can’t yet place. “Ask me the question again and this time, wait for me to answer.”
I pause, searching that tense look on his face, unsure of it. Or, maybe it’s just me that I’m unsure of.
I swallow and say, “Have you ever had a one-night stand?”
His expression doesn’t shift or fall. “Yes, I’ve had a few here and there.”
He’s waiting for me now, even though I’m not sure yet how to make myself feel comfortable in this awkwardly-developing conversation. It’s like he knows I’m squirming inside, but to teach me a lesson he’s going to make me do the talking instead of being my shrink like he’s been since I came into his room.
His eyebrows arch a little as if to say: Well?
“Well, I was just wondering … because I’ve never done something like that.”
“Why not?” he says so casually.
I look down and then back up at him so he doesn’t scold me for it.
“Well, it’s just kind of slutty, I guess.”
Andrew laughs and it surprises me.
Finally, he relieves me somewhat of my torture.
“If a girl did that a lot,” he draws out that word with a squeamish smile, “then it would be slutty, sure. Once or twice, I don’t know …” he motions his hands at level with his shoulders as if shaking the numbers around in his mind indecisively, “there’s nothing wrong with that.”
Why isn’t he taking full advantage of this right now? I start freaking out a little inside, wondering why he’s still all shrink-mode rather than amping up the flirting and getting down to business.
“Alright, so …”
I can’t say it. It’s just not me, to be able to casually talk about my sexual anything. I can only vaguely do that with Natalie.
Andrew sighs and his shoulders slouch over. “Are you wanting to sleep with me, to have a one-night stand with me?” He knew I wasn’t going to come out and say it, so he gave in and did it for me.
The question, although obvious for both of us, stops my breath. It embarrasses and mortifies me with him saying it as much, maybe more, than if I would have.
“Maybe …”
He stands up and looks down at me and says, “I’m sorry, but I’m not into you in that way.”
The biggest fist in existence just slammed into my stomach. My hands go rigid, gripping the edge of the mattress, making my arms all the way up to the top of my shoulders completely unmovable. All I want to do right now is run out that door and lock myself inside my room and never look at Andrew again. Not because I don’t want to see him, but because I don’t want him to see me.
I’ve never been so embarrassed in my entire life.
And this is what speaking my mind got me!
I don’t know whether to accept it as a lesson learned, or to hate him for making me do it.
In a split-second, I leap off the bed and walk as fast as I can to the door.
“Camryn, stop.”
I just keep moving, even faster when I feel him coming up behind me, and I grab the lever and swing the door open and then I run out into the hall.
“Please, just wait a damn minute!” he says, following me and I can hear the aggravation elevating in his voice.
I ignore him and reach into the little pocket on the back of my shorts and yank out my card key, thrusting it in my door. I push my way inside the room and go to close the door, but Andrew is already through it behind me.
The door shuts after him.
“Will you just listen to me?” He tries once more, exasperated.
I don’t want to look at him, but I do anyway.
His eyes are wide and fierce and sincere when finally I turn around.
He steps up to me and grips my upper-arms carefully in his hands. And then he leans in and presses his lips softly against mine. I wilt, but I’m still too confused to react properly to it. Confused and stunned and my heart is racing.
He pulls away and looks in at me, his face every bit of sincere and he tilts his head to one side … smiling.
“Why is that funny?” I ask sharply and go to push away from him.
He holds me still by my arms and forces my humiliated gaze, which is beginning to reflect resentment.
“I say that I’m not into you like that, Camryn, because …” he pauses, searching my face, looking at my lips for a moment as if deciding whether or not he should kiss them again, “… because you’re not the girl I could only sleep with once.”
His words snap the thoughts out of me and my racing heart flickers behind my ribs. I can’t make myself understand what he just said and instead of trying to figure out exactly what he means, I pull my head together the best I can and try to gain back some of the composure I lost when I stormed out of his room.
“Look,” he says, moving to my side and slipping his hand around the back of my waist. Just feeling his fingers graze my skin causes shivers along that side of my body. What the hell is happening to me? I do want him … I mean, right now I feel like there’s no going back, that I would force myself to be a slut just for tonight just to keep him in the room. But what I don’t understand is why I feel like I want more from him than sex …
“Camryn?” His voice snaps me back into whatever it was he was trying to say moments ago. He guides me to sit down on the bed and then crouches down in front of me on the floor. He gazes up into my eyes. “I won’t have a one-night stand with you, but I will make you come, if you let me.”
A tiny jolt of electricity just shot through my belly and down in between my legs.
“… What?” I can’t say anything else, really.
He smiles gently, deepening those dimples just a little, and he rests his arms across the length of my naked thighs, clasping his hands to my sides.
“No strings attached,” he says. “I’ll get you off and tomorrow morning when you wake up, I’ll be in my room next door getting ready to head out with you to our next location. Nothing will change between us—I won’t even bring up what happened joking around or otherwise. It’ll be like it never happened at all.”
I can hardly breathe. He just made the sweet spot between my legs swell with just a few direct words.
“But … what about you?” I manage to get out.
“What about me?”
He presses his