Page 4 of Shark’s Pride

“At first, I told her to go take care of the problem. I was also clear that if she still wanted to see if something could happen between us, great. But I was in no way equipped to deal with a virgin.”

Yet another gasp from her. No, this was a full huff. “Sebastian. Albert.”

“Cassiopeia. Artemis.” I mimicked her serious tone—for all of two seconds. It was impossible not to laugh when I let her full name fly. “Boy, our parents fucked you good with that name.”

“Yeah, yeah,” she groused as I let the laugh burst out in full. But honestly, the opportunity would never get old. Poor Pia had to wear our parents’ badge of irresponsibility from their hippy phase in the shape of her damn name—yet she’d always just used it to gain strength and courage. My sister was the poster child for making lemonade out of lemons. Young women of the world could take a few lessons from the incredible lady on the other end of this phone line.

“Are you done?” she snipped. I could picture her inspecting her manicure or doodling idly in the margin of the papers on her office desk.

“Yes, mother dearest,” I voiced like a bratty child, then added in my normal voice, “Lighten up, Dub.”

“Now that’s funny,” she snickered. “Seriously. That, coming from you, the man who usually has a stick rammed so far up his—”

“I get the imagery, Pia.” I cut her off easily, relaxing with our tried-and-true volleys instead of tackling the real problem at hand. Not that she’d let me get away with it for much longer.

“Enough stalling, big brother.” Yep, right on time for calling me on my shit again. “What’s the actual problem here? Out with it, Bas.”

Just rip the fucking bandage off, man.

“All right.” Deep inhale. “I had to leave.” I stuttered for a second. “I mean, right after.” Paused for two more beats. “Right after we…uhh…finished.”

“Finished?”

“Fucking. Right after I took her virginity.”

“Ohhh.”

That definitely wasn’t a good oh.

“Nooo.”

And I didn’t dare consider where she was going with that response either.

“It wasn’t good, Pia.”

“You think?”

I ignored her comment. “I mean, it wasn’t bad. The sex was outstanding, in fact. Leaving was bad. I didn’t want to leave. And I wasn’t a dick about it, I swear! I had no choice! I explained why I had to leave. She understood. She said she understood…” My voice trailed off as I heard my own absurdity.

“Okay, let me see if I understand this,” Pia stated, sounding like a damn schoolmarm now. “You took a thirty-year-old woman’s virginity and then left immediately after? And now you haven’t seen her for two weeks? Is that what you’re saying right now?”

“For Christ’s sake. It wasn’t like that. Not at all!” The words rushed from my lips, fast and frantic. Defending myself wasn’t familiar territory. I always did what I did with little to no apology—at least to this point in my life.

Was that what I was doing here? Apologizing?

Was this what some people called regret?

No wonder I’d avoided this feeling like the plague.

“Well, by all means, Sebastian, explain to me what it was like, then.”

“For starters, she’s not thirty.”

“You know what I mean. Thirty-ish. Whatever.”

This was going to be a real mic drop.

“She’s twenty-two.”