Decimated, he fell onto her waterbed, feeling like he was floating as the surface sloshed him around a bit. Candace tentatively released him and crawled from the bed without speaking. Even from behind his closed eyes, he discerned a sudden burst of light from her bathroom. Heard water running. A moment later, a soft towel dropped on his stomach, brushing gently as she cleaned him up. He left la-la land and came back to himself, opening his eyes to find her staring at him, blond hair haloed by the bathroom light behind her.

Goddamn. He was close to professing undying love and she was probably about to kick his ass out of her house. Her silence unnerved him and he had to wonder if she was embarrassed, or thinking this whole thing had all been a huge mistake. If that was the case, she probably realized how much greater of a mistake it could have been. That was good. For her, anyway.

She went to click the light off and returned to the side of the bed, fingers fiddling with one another. “Are you leaving?” she asked softly after a moment.

“Do you want me to?”

Her answer was immediate. “No. I just figured you probably would.”

He patted the bed beside him, leaving his arm down so she could lay her head against his shoulder. She climbed on, pulling the covers over the both of them, and snuggled against him. It was probably the absolute worst, stupidest, most idiotic thing he could do, but he kicked his jeans the rest of the way off and curled her naked body around his so that there was scarcely a square inch of them that wasn’t touching. He would most likely dream about her all night and wake up with a massive hard-on, and there she would be, tantalizingly close and warm and maybe still willing.

Dude, you are either one stupid son of a bitch, or you might just be the smartest motherfucker who ever lived.

“Are you okay?” he whispered.

“Mm-hmm. Are you?”

He stroked her hair. “I’m great, sweetheart.”

“Can I ask you something?”

He had to chuckle. Whenever anyone else said that to him, he groaned. With her, he could only look forward to what she was going to inquire with eager curiosity. “Anything.”

“Did you quit smoking?”

For a moment, he was struck speechless. They hadn’t talked about this at all. He hadn’t talked about it with anyone. “I did, actually—well, I haven’t had one in two weeks, anyway.”

“I noticed. You never could go an hour without walking outside to light up.”

Maybe it wasn’t as big a deal as his mind—or his heart—wanted to make it out to be. Any observant person could’ve put it together. But his family hadn’t. His friends hadn’t. She had. She’d watched him that much.

He tightened his embrace on her and turned his face to brush his lips against her forehead. “Thank you.”

She tilted her face up to his. “For what?”

“For being there. For being you. For everything.”

“I’m glad you quit,” she whispered.

“Me too.”

She awoke to sunlight pouring in her window and a heavy leg lying on top of one of hers. The previous night came flooding back all at once, too vivid to have been a dream, and besides, the warm male flesh crowding hers in the bed was proof it had really happened.

She hadn’t slept much, awakening several times during the night just to stare at him and marvel that he was here, next to her. Her virginity may still be intact, but he’d taken it down from “complete and utter” to “technical only”. It was something, at least.

She lay on her side with Brian’s arm over her waist. His breath tickled her nape, slow and languid.

How would it feel to wake up like this every morning?

She wanted to stretch and arch her back and purr like a cat. The urge was almost undeniable, but it would probably disturb him, and she needed to savor these moments. There might not be any more of them.

The numbers on her digital clock said it was almost ten. She was dying for coffee. No class on Fridays, but for all she knew, he had someplace he needed to be. Sighing in resignation, she turned over in his arms and snuggled close, putting her lips on his throat and giving him a gentle bite. He chuckled drowsily and raised his shoulder, forcing her to pull back.

“You can’t be ticklish,” she said in disbelief.

“Mm-hmm. I am.” She loved how he sounded, his voice all slow and sleep-roughened.

“I’ll have to remember that.” Even as the words left her lips, her heart sank. What if this had all really meant nothing to him? What if he wouldn’t take her virginity because he suffered from that stupid male affliction of thinking she was going to want to marry him or something if she gave it up to him? Maybe she would, but that wasn’t the point. The point was, if that was the case, then he didn’t want her wanting him, because he didn’t want her.

Is that really what you want? I’ll hurt you.

It crushed her.

His hand came up to caress her cheek, pushing her tangled hair away from her face. When he looked at her as he was right now, she wondered what the problem was. He had to feel something. There was something there in his eyes she had never seen when he looked at her cousin. A…tenderness, lame as it might sound. As if the sight of her caused something in him to melt. She couldn’t be imagining it.

He was so beautiful. Handsome was such a plain word, too plain to describe him. Here in the light of day she could see what she was touching. She trailed her hand over his biceps, tracing the lines of his tattoos. It could turn into a favorite pastime of hers. She sat up a bit and leaned over to press her lips against a beautiful blue rose on his skin. The movement pressed her br**sts against him.

“Shit,” he whispered. His arm came up behind her so he could clutch at her hair. His other hand gravitated toward her left breast, palming it and gently massaging. She sucked in a breath and her nipple peaked against him. Her tongue sneaked out to flicker against his skin, and he pushed his hips into her.

His c**k was already as erect as it had been last night, a hard ridge in his boxer briefs. It ground into her abdomen and, before he could stop her, she plunged her hand down into the waistband of his underwear and deftly freed it.

“Candace,” he said, his voice tinged with warning.

“I just want to play,” she murmured. “Let me? One more time?”

His groan was a combination of frustrated pleasure and despair. She loved making him sound like that, as if he was torn in two over her, even though she knew she would be better off if she could take the “despair” out of the equation. “When you ask me like that, how the f**k can I resist?”

Giggling, she cupped both hands around his length and stroked, noticing he’d put his piercing back in at some point in the night. He was big and long and heavy, jutting straight out from a patch of jet-black hair. The thickness of his shaft and the silver glint of his barbell gave her a twinge of anxiety. If she ever got her chance, it would be enough trying to take him in without anything else going along. But at the same time, she wanted to experience everything he had to give her.

She continued rubbing him from base to tip, first with one hand and then the other. She circled the ball on the top of his glans with her thumb. His breath rasped, his grip on her tightened. He reached over and pushed her thigh up, burying his hand between her legs and groaning again when he felt how damp she’d grown.