Page 101 of Off the Grid

“I need to have sex.”

He coughs over a laugh. “Need or want? Need’s a very strong word.”

The amusement in his eyes says he’s enjoying toying with me—almost as if he knows why I’m here and is going to make me go through a whole spiel to get it.

Dying a thousand deaths sounds more appealing right now than finishing this conversation.

“Nope. Don’t stop now.” He must see me waffling. “The Camilla Moretti I know goes after what she wants. Whether it’s a kiss in a bar. A driver she wants to go viral. And this. Whatever this is.”

“There are some things that . . . I want to have sex. Sex with you.” Fucking hell. “Is that better?”

He makes me wait for a response. He takes a painstakingly slow time to do so. “So we went from me helping you find your sexuality to you wanting to have sex. I mean . . . that escalated quickly.”

“They go hand in hand.”

“Um. Okay. Sure. I can see the correlation, but . . .” He hangs his head and chuckles. Normally I’d be offended but, for some reason, Riggs’s reaction doesn’t make me feel that way. “Care to expand?”

“It’s . . .” I sputter. Then groan. Then scrunch my nose up. “There was this thing, which caused this other thing that made me . . . never mind.”

“Sounds like there are a lot of things.”

“It’s complicated.”

He takes a step closer, his smirk curling up one side of his mouth. “What is? Sex? Sexuality? Owning it? Wanting it?” He shrugs. “Not really.”

“I’ll pay you.” Fucking hell. Did I just really say that? Desperation makes people say the stupidest things. Case in point, right here.

“Oh. So you want me as a driver and as a prostitute.” He’s fighting his smile.

I’m making a disaster of this.

“No. Not like that. I’d pay you for your time. I mean—”

“So an escort, a prostitute, and a driver. Got it.”

“Do you know the courage it took to come down here? How hard it is to ask someone this?”

“I can’t imagine.”

“Stop making this harder than it is.”

“Hard is what you’re asking for, right?”

“Oh my God.” He’s enjoying this, isn’t he? And he’s going to put me through the paces.

His Adam’s apple bobs and he coughs out a laugh. “Why?”

“Why, what?”

“Why me? Why now? Why—” He motions to his flat as if it’s the third person in this conversation. “This?”

“Why are you asking so many questions? What guy wouldn’t say yes to sex without strings? To not having to deal with emotions or feelings?” The dare card creeps into my head, but then I push it away. He may have said I wasn’t his type that first night, but every day since then he’s shown me otherwise. And yet, doubt creeps in. Insecurity. I buckle. “You know what? Never mind. Just let me go crawl in a hole and die.”

But as I try to walk past Riggs, he shifts to block my path and the door. His hands move to my biceps and his voice quiets until I finally look up and meet his eyes.

“Just let me go. Please.”

He nods slowly, but his eyes never leave mine. “I know most guys’ dreams are to deflower a virgin, but not me. That’s not what I want to be remembered for. That kind of thing should have strings. Lots of them.”