We ended upside-down on the bed, my bare feet sliding under our pillows, but he made no move to right us. He was too busy staring between my legs as his fingers rubbed and pulled and pinched at my flesh. His eyes were so dark they looked almost black, and his eyebrows were furrowed in concentration as he suddenly stopped, causing me to whine out my annoyance.

“What’s my name?” he asked me gruffly, moving his hips back as I tried to reach him.

“Huh?” I was in a fog of arousal and didn’t understand why he was talking instead of touching me.

“Who am I, Callie?” he asked again, rubbing his fingers softly across my skin. “What do you call me?”

“Asa!” I cried out as his fingers finally hit the spot where I needed him.

“That’s right, Sugar. Say it again,” he demanded as his fingers started up a rhythm that had me squirming.

“Asa. Asa. Asa,” I murmured over and over. I didn’t care at that point; he could’ve asked me to call him Sergei the Snake and I probably would have screamed it.

By the time I came back down from my orgasm, he’d shifted us on the bed so we were cuddled under the blankets. It took me a few minutes before I realized that he hadn’t come. Normally, when we were messing around, I’d use either my hands or my body to get him off, but I’d been so blissed out I hadn’t even tried. I reached down to the waistband of his boxers, running my nails across his skin the way I knew he liked, but before I could dip my hand inside, he grabbed my wrist and pulled it back up between our chests.

“It’s fine, Callie,” he told me sleepily, “that one was all yours.”

I lay there for a few minutes thinking over his words when I finally decided to ask him a question that had been bothering me for days.

“Why won’t you have sex with me?”

He choked a little from surprise, and then situated himself more comfortably next to me with his arm curled up under his pillow.

“We’ve had this conversation,” he told me bluntly, closing his eyes as if to end it.

“Yeah, but that was before. We’re practically having sex already, what’s the big deal?” I asked. His logic was completely asinine in my opinion, and I was wondering how he would try to explain it.

“Callie,” he huffed out in annoyance, but when he opened his eyes and saw how serious I was, his expression changed. “It’s gonna happen. Probably sooner than later. But, fuck, I’m leaving in two days. You’re gonna have a hard enough time with me gone, living your own life and going to school and shit. I’m not gonna take it all and then leave you, baby.”

“Pfft! You act like I’m asking you to marry me or something. Don’t act like you don’t sleep with chicks and then bail all the freaking time,” I scowled back, completely irritated with his explanation.

“You and me are different.”

“What the heck does that mean?” I raised myself up on one arm and had to push his face up to look at me when he seemed to be mesmerized by the breast that was peeking out of the blankets.

“It means that you’re living in my house and sleeping in my bed. Those other bitches aren’t relationships, and I don’t give a flying fuck what they think about. I don’t care before I hit it, and I sure as hell don’t care after.”

My jaw dropped.

“That’s a dick thing to say!” I exclaimed, my eyebrows practically touching my hairline in surprise. “What the hell?”

“Callie, don’t look at me like that, Sugar,” he scowled, “those chicks know the score. Not one of them is looking for a happily ever after, and when I’m with them I treat ‘em with respect.”

“Oh, yeah. You sure sound respectful.”

“Like I said, they know from the beginning they’re only getting one thing.” He sighed in exasperation, “How the hell did we get on this conversation?”

“I was asking why you wouldn’t fuck me, even though apparently, there are loads of women that you will.”

“Baby, I ain’t looking at nobody but you. Alright?” he said as he leaned forward to give me a soft peck on the lips. “But we’re waiting until I get back.”

I lay there silently as he fell asleep and thought over what he’d said. I knew logically that he was trying to look out for me, to keep things as easy as possible as I made my transition to living alone.

I was just afraid with the unspecified status of our relationship; he wouldn’t have a problem with having sex with someone he didn’t care about.

I was suddenly glad that I left reminders of me all over his body.

Chapter 28

Callie

Asa left me for the first time on a Monday morning.

We’d spent the weekend lying around the house, watching Westerns and debating music. Yes, Westerns. I’d been expecting the old-fashioned John Wayne movies, and there were a few of those, but he’d also introduced me to Lonesome Dove and Tombstone. Those two had me at the edge of my seat, giggling and biting my nails. The longer we watched, with Asa’s running commentary, the more I realized that he didn’t watch them for the men in the white hats—he identified with the men in black.

A few of his friends stopped by the house on Sunday, introducing themselves as Echo, Chucky, and Michael. Asa seemed more relaxed around them; it was a side of him that I’d never seen before. He laughed more often. It was a quiet rumble, but it was there, and it was a beautiful sound.