He deliberately takes a long drink of the coffee and then slides it across the counter in a blatant “more” gesture. He’s not getting anything until he tells me what the fuck is going on and what the lawyer has to do with it.
“If I said you could go and sleep with other people, would you do it?”
The question comes completely out of left field and floors me. “What?” What’s with his fixation on sex lately? Is he trying to kill me? There are quicker, cleaner ways to do it.
“Would you?” he demands.
“That’s the most ridiculous question you’ve ever asked me.” I wasn’t interested in sleeping with anyone else even before he’d demanded it of me. There hasn’t been anyone else, even in the remotest sense, since him. He consumes everything, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
“Why won’t you answer it, then?”
“Me not answering a question you already know the answer to doesn’t mean that whatever theory you have going on in your brain is correct.” Turning off the oven and sliding the fry pan away from the heat, I gather him into my arms.
“Spence. There is no one else, and there will be no one else. Even if you leave me and tell me that you never want to see me again, there still won’t be anyone else. I don’t abstain from sleeping with other people because you told me not to; it’s because Ichoosenot to. They can’t ever give me even half of what you do. And if you need me to repeat that to you every day to remind you, to get it through that thick skull of yours, then I’ll do that.”
He softens a fraction in my arms. “What if I can’t ever—what if—”
“Why have you been thinking about sex so much lately?” I ask, brushing his hair away from his forehead. The blond strands are always so goddamn soft. “You said it wasn’t because you were thinking about it with other people, and I know you aren’t thinking about it with me. Talk to me, baby.”
“In the past—when—it’s always been hard for me.” He wrinkles his nose. “That came out wrong. You know what I mean.”
“I know what you mean.” There are a thousand jokes I can use to laugh this entire thing off, but I won’t. Whatever he’s trying to say, it’s important.
“I’ve never been interested in sex the way other people are. I did it because I thought I had to. That it’s a natural conclusion to a relationship. That in order tocallit a relationship, there has to be something physical.”
“Not necessarily. And ‘physical’ is a pretty wide terminology.” My knuckles brush across his cheek. “This is physical.” I kiss him softly, his lips warm under mine. “That’s physical.” Trailingmy hand down his arm, I tangle our fingers together and lift his hand to my mouth, kissing the back of it. “So’s that.”
“Are we in a relationship?” Spencer asks breathlessly.
“Yeah, baby, we are.” Lack of sex doesn’t make that any less true. We’ve been in one from the moment our eyes met for the first time, all those years ago.
“We don’t—I don’t—”
“Have sex? Do you think we have to? I’ve already told you that it has nothing to do withusor how important you are to me.”
“What if I want to try it?”
My heart thumps wildly. Every time he’s mentioned it the past week, I’ve dismissed it because I didn’t think he was serious. He’s never even hinted at it before. “Is this because I got hurt?” I’d asked him if that was the reason behind him being so clingy lately—more than normal, though it is a fluctuating needle—and he’d denied it, but now the strange fixation on sex? I don’t want him to have sex with me out of some weird obligation. It would make the entire exchange meaningless, and that’s one thing that we’ll never be.
“I don’t know how to answer that,” Spencer says. “I can’t say it’s not, not completely. When I think about it, how close to losing each other we were, I can’t breathe, I can’tthink.I need us to be as close to each other as two people can possibly be, and I don’t care what that means. I’ll do whatever it is, with no regrets.”
“We’re already as close to each other as two people can possibly be.” I place his hand over my heart so he can feel the way it’s trying to beat out of my chest. “You’re in here. There’s no closer place to be.”
His fingers curl over the fabric of my shirt, and then he’s tugging me down into an open-mouthed kiss. I moan and lean in, gathering him closer, one of my hands diving into his hair, holding him in place. He tastes like coffee, and it’s perfect.
“You never have to do what you don’t want to,” I murmur against his mouth, catching his hands where he’s trying to unbutton my shirt. “We don’t have to try anything, and you absolutely don’t have to make yourself uncomfortable because you think you need to. Sex isn’t the be-all and end-all.”
“You told me you wanted it with me.”
There’s a hint of hurt in his voice, like he thinks I’m lying. “I willalwayswant it with you. You are—” I take a deep breath. “You’ll never not turn me on or be the best-looking thing in the world to me. That doesn’t mean Ihaveto have it, or that not having it changes anything. I’ll be celibate the rest of my life and die with a smile on my face, knowing that I had everything I wanted, everything Ineeded.”
“Iwantto,” he insists. “I just—I’m scared, Ken. What if we do it, and I can’t? What if nothing happens?”
I know he’s capable of getting it up during sex. The very thought of it makes jealousy twist in my gut: that others have touched him, and he’slikedit. Unfortunately, I’m aware that it’s happened, and that his partners were all female. His worry isn’t unfounded. Not after everything we’ve done together that he hasn’t reacted to. It also doesn’t matter, because it’s not a make-or-break deal.
“Then nothing happens.” I brush my thumb over his bottom lip and then slip just the tip inside his mouth. He flicks his tongue over it and then suckles. It takes me a second to focus on what I was trying to say and not on the pleasure running through me like a live current. “If this is really what you want to try, then we can. If it doesn’t work the way you want it to, it’s not a failure, and I need you to agree with me right now that you won’t blame yourself, and you won’t feel bad about it.”
He nods too quickly.
