Page 115 of Ricardo

She blushes, a delicate pink that is a lovely contrast to her freckles.

"I have never... I mean... I've never felt anything like that before," she says, her voice dropping to a more serious tone.

"I figured as much," I say, my fingers now tracing patterns on her stomach.

She shudders, then looks shy.

"No, I mean..." She looks down at her hands, which are now clasped together on her stomach. "I've never... finished like that. With... someone."

My smile fades.

That son of a bitch.

"Did he ever even try?"

She shakes her head, her cheeks flushing with a fresh wave of embarrassment.

"It's not something he was interested in," she says quietly.

I narrow my eyes.

"It's not like I never... did," she adds, seeing my expression.

Her face is blazing again, and I'm not happy to see it. I want to erase that bastard's face from existence.

"It was just never... intentional on his part."

"I see," I say, my voice dangerously low. "So if you had one, you had one. If you didn't, oh well. He couldn't be bothered to actually make an effort."

"It was... just not something he was into," she says, a note of defense in her tone that I hate.

"Making the woman he was going to marry feel good was not something he was into," I clarify, my anger rising.

"I think he saw it as an act of... submission," she says. "He was always very clear that there was a certain way a man and a woman should be together. That there was a natural order to things."

"A natural order," I repeat, the words tasting like ash in my mouth. "And what, pray tell, was your role in this natural order of his?"

She looks away, unable to meet my gaze.

"He was the man," she says quietly. "I was the woman. His pleasure came first."

My anger, which was already simmering, now boils over.

But I don't let her see it. I don't let her feel it.

That's what he would do. He would get angry and she would feel responsible. She would feel the shame, the guilt.

I am not that man.

I force the anger down, and I replace it with a tenderness that is so fierce it almost hurts.

I take her face in my hands and turn her to face me, my thumbs stroking her cheeks.

"Julia," I say, my voice low and gentle. "Look at me."

She hesitates for a moment, then her eyes lift to mine, and the vulnerability in them makes my chest ache.

"There is no natural order," I say, my voice firm yet gentle. "It's a load of shit that weak men spout to make themselves feel better about their own inadequacies."