Page 243 of Devil’s Disciples

Glassey-eyed, he continued to stare.

I waited for what seemed like an eternity. I cleared my throat. Snapped my fingers. Hummed. Sang softly. Turned on some music. Drummed my fingers on the end table. Sang louder.

Nothing.

After twenty minutes, I’d reached the breaking point.

“Porter!” I shouted.

He looked up. It wasn’t like I’d startled him. He simply shifted his gaze upward until it met mine. Upon seeing me, his face distorted. Confused, he rubbed his eyes and glanced around the room as if he didn’t remember walking in.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

“Sorry,” he said. “I was just thinking.”

“About?”

“My mother,” he said. “Something she told me when I was a kid.”

In the amount of time it took to snap one’s fingers, I went from being angry with him to hoping I could do something to comfort him. I tried to imagine losing my entire family to cancer. I couldn’t comprehend it. I doubted anyone could. I wanted to hold him in my arms and tell him everything was going to be alright, but I didn’t know if it was going to be.

“Do you want to talk?” I asked.

He wrung his hands together nervously. “We probably need to.”

What I thought was confusion now appeared to be concern. He laced his fingers together, but it didn’t last. He began to rub his hands along his thighs, and must have found comfort in it, because it was then that he began to speak.

“My mother once explained that there’s two places you can categorize women when it comes to sex. A one-night-stand, or a relationship. I don’t want to have a one-night-stand with you, Abby.” He shifted his eyes to meet mine. “That only leaves one place for you to be.”

His words bounced around in my head until I understood them. Incapable of speaking – at least for that moment – I took every inch of him into view. He was muscular from head to toe. He had a keen sense of humor. He had manners. He was a real biker. He had a big dick. He knew how to kiss a woman. And, he didn’t want to use me for sex.

He was an anomaly.

A glitch in the male population.

“I don’t want to have a one-night-stand with you, either,” I said.

It wasn’t the complete truth. Immediately following that kiss, I would have tossed my belief system aside, have let him screw me bow-legged and be on his way. Now that I knew he had other intentions, I wanted more. I wanted what every woman wants.

I wanted a relationship.

My mind began to assemble the pieces of Porter’s puzzle. In doing so, I got confused. He said he’d never been in love. He’d never allowed himself to be. I couldn’t help but wonder…

“You’re not a uhhm,” I stammered. “You’ve had sex before, right?”

He spit out a laugh. “A couple of times, yeah.”

“Okay.” I wiped my brow. “Me, too.”

“I just. I’ve never,” he muttered. “I’ve never done this.”

I leaned forward. “This being what?”

“I’ve never been in a relationship,” he admitted.

I studied him as I formulated my response. His look morphed to one of innocence. At that instant it came to me. Porter’s hard exterior was his protection. The pursed lips. The muscles. His glare. Since we met, he’d been peeling away his outer layers and setting them aside. During his twenty minutes of silence, he’d removed his last layer of defense. I realized beyond the muscles and tattoos Porter was no different than anyone else. He was vulnerable.

Exposed and unprotected, he waited for me to respond. He may have been thirty years old on the inside, but the person seated across from me was seventeen and without a family.