My heart expanded, a few more days with him, and there wouldn’t be enough space inside my ribcage. “Can I ask you a personal question?”
“Sure, as long as I’m allowed to ask one, too,” he said and shifted his glorious body closer to me.
I cleared my throat. “Do you often… I mean… How many…” Why was it so hard to get the words out? “Forget it. I shouldn’t ask you, anyway.” I drank my coffee, averting my eyes.
“No, go ahead and ask,” he said in a low, heartfelt tone.
I closed my eyes as if that meant I became invisible, and it could help me ask my stupid question. “How many women have found themselves waking up like this, in your room?”
He smiled softly, a glint in his eyes. “Not many. Brie and now you.”
Get out of here. I scrunched my face and squinted at him with one eye. “Really? You’re thirty-four and you’ve only had sex with two women?”
“No. I meant…” He chuckled. “I don’t bring women to my house, mostly because it’s Charlotte and Lulu’s home too. And I haven’t met a woman I wanted something more besides just to…” His eyebrows quickly jumped up and dropped down.
“Make love?”
“I wouldn’t call it that.” He reached for his coffee and took a long sip. “You must be in love with someone to make love to them. I’d call it casual sex.”
A sharp icicle of disappointment dropped into my gut. Whatever we had last night, it was more than sex to me. I needed to slap some sense into myself. What was I thinking? Of course he saw it as nothing more than remarkably great casual sex.
“Did you make them breakfast?” I glanced at the flower near the bread roll, then took another sip of my coffee. I didn’t have my toothbrush, and on the off-chance Andrew decided to kiss me, I needed to mask my morning breath. But he wouldn’t kiss me. Nobody kissed aftercasualsex. The words had started to rub me the wrong way.
“No. We were in her hotel room or her place.”
“We’re in a hotel room.” I waved my hand as if to prove my point. What was my point? Where was I going with this? “And yet there is food next to the bed.”
His eyes twinkled, and a devastating smile spread across his face. “It’s a different circumstance.”
And dammit if my heart didn’t skip a beat at that. “How?”
“I think that’s more than one question. It’s my turn now.”
I finished my coffee and set it on the nightstand, then vigorously ran my fingers over my scalp and hair to make it look like sexy morning hair and not a mop. “Ask away.”
“Earlier you said you don’t date. Why?”
“Pff.” I rolled my eyes and settled against the wall, pulling the sheets higher. He leaned back on his hands and stretched his long legs out. “I can ask you the same question. You’re kind and smart. I think you have a good job—however, I haven’t reached a verdict on that one. You’re good-looking, and I must say,” I fanned myself, “You are agodin bed. So, what is wrong with you?”
“Enough with compliments.” He stared at me, the corners of his eyes crinkling. “Answer my question.”
I shrugged and pinned my gaze to the window. “It’s easier to be single. I was busy with work. I traveled nonstop. I didn’t even get a cat because it would be alone in my apartment for days, sometimes the entire week. And nowifI’m going to start my business, it’ll suck up all my free time.” Yes, I didn’t give him a real answer, but what I said was also true. I sighed. “And I guess I just haven’t met Mr. Right.” Someone who would think I was good enough. And there was my real reason. The fear I’d never be good enough held me back. I couldn’t change where I came from no matter how far I went in life. No matter what higher circle of class I reached, I was always going to be a girl from a trailer park. Greg’s words struck me again, and a string behind my eyes burned. I could have tried to find a guy from the same background as me, but it was not like there was a box “must come from a trash family” to tick in the dating app. Good lord, I could only imagine what suggestion I would have gotten.
I cleared my throat and rubbed my nose with the back of my hand. “I should find William. He’s probably wondering if you murdered me.” I pulled the sheet around my body like a toga and planted my feet on the cold floor. Where did we throw all my clothes last night?
“He knows you’re alive. I saw him when I went to get breakfast. He slid these under the door about an hour ago.” Andrew tilted his head to the stool where several foiled condoms laid near his coffee mug.
Heat crept up my neck and up to my cheeks. “So thoughtful of him. But I should go. You need to work.” And I needed to pee badly. “Do you know where my clothes are?” I twisted left, then right, searching the room. Andrew rose to his feet, stepped around the bed, and from the chair, he picked up my neatly folded t-shirt, PJ shorts, and lacy underwear.
“Thanks. Um… do you mind turning around?” I clutched the sheet to my body with one hand and reached out with the other one for my clothes.
His eyebrows shut up. “I already saw you naked. And I wouldn’t mind seeing your gorgeous body again.”
“I know but…” I took a deep breath. “That was in dim light, and now it’s bright, and you might see my imperfections, not that I care if you think I’m not perfect. Because this was a one-time casual sex thing”—with multiple orgasms—“but I want you to have a flawless image of?—”
Andrew stepped to me, laced his hands behind my neck, and his sultry mouth took over mine. It was a tender, lingering, knee-buckling kiss. Then he drew his face a few inches away and his beautiful eyes searched mine. “Adriana, you’re perfect. And this isn’t a one-time casual sex thing.”
Then he kissed me again.
