“Of course. I understand that. But … this is a little … personal.”

He let out a soft laugh. “Sex is all kinds of personal. You have done this before, right?”

When she didn’t say anything, he had his answer. He withdrew his fingers.

“Katrina. You’ve had sex before, haven’t you?”

She shifted and pushed her way up, leaning against the pillows. “Technically, no.”

Reality came tumbling down on top of him like a landslide. He avoided the knee-jerk reaction of wanting to ask her how the hell she could be twenty-seven and still a virgin. There was obviously a reason for it and he needed to get to the bottom of it. “Okay. You need to talk to me about this.”

She shrugged and looked down at her hands. “I’ve had … responsibilities. The kids. My job. There wasn’t time. Or the right guy. The right moment.”

And she thought he was the right guy and this was the right moment? Christ. That was loaded with responsibility. Responsibility he didn’t know if he was ready for. He’d never had a virgin in his bed. What was he supposed to do with her?

He looked over at Katrina and saw the disappointment on her face and felt an instant stab of guilt that he’d even, for a second, felt like this was a problem.

Okay, it wasn’t like they were sixteen—like she was sixteen. She was twenty-seven, and he sure as hell wasn’t a kid. He needed to be an adult about this. So she hadn’t had sex before. This wasn’t a problem. It was an opportunity. Looking at the embarrassment on her face made him realize this was no easier for her than it was for him.

And he’d be goddamned if he’d turn this into something less than monumental for her. She’d chosen him, and he felt damn good about that.

“You think I’m stupid,” she said, barely able to make eye contact. “Or naïve or something.”

He tipped her chin with his fingers, forcing her to make eye contact with him. “Hey, I don’t think you’re anything like that. I admire you for what you’ve done for your brother and sister. You’ve made a lot of sacrifices. But now it’s time to think about yourself and what you want.”

She didn’t say anything.

“But you have to be really sure, Kat. Is this what you really want? And now is when you want it?”

She gave him a quick nod. “I’m an adult, Grant. Not a child. I’m perfectly capable of making adult choices. This is definitely what I want. I’ve waited long enough and I want to be here with you.”

He felt relieved, and a lot of pressure to do this right.

He picked up her hand and twined his fingers with hers. “Okay, so tell me what kind of experience you have had. With guys. Or with yourself.”

“Well, I definitely know my own body. I mean technically I’m not really a virgin anymore. It’s more that I haven’t been with a guy.”

He smiled at that. “Which means you’ve used your own hands to get yourself off.”

She nodded. “Right. And vibrators.”

He sucked in a breath. “I’d like to watch you do that sometime.”

Now she gave him a sexy smile. He liked seeing her relax a little. It was time to get the topic back on sex, where it belonged. He wanted her confidence high again, where it had been before.

“You would?” she asked.

“Hell, yes. There’s nothing hotter than watching a woman make herself come. And you could watch me jack off.”

Her breasts rose and fell with her deep breath. “That would be interesting. And probably quite fun.”

He laid his hand on her leg, let his fingers do a light dance across her kneecap, then up her thigh. “Babe, you have no idea. Okay, tell me what experience you’ve had with guys.”

“Not much, really. I haven’t had a lot of exposure. Some kissing, a little under the shirt action. Nothing down here.”

She pointed to her sex.

Okay, so he had to educate her—and himself as well. Other than the early teen years when he and girls had fumbled around with each other, he’d only been with experienced women before—women who knew what they wanted and knew how to ask for it.

Katrina wasn’t going to be the only one experiencing something new today.

And he owed it to her to do it right, because a woman’s first time with a guy should be something special.

He didn’t intend to fuck this up.

SIXTEEN

KATRINA HAD BEEN MORTIFIED. SHE’D PLANNED TO get this sex thing over with before Grant had any inkling she’d never done this before. Leave it to someone as masculine and filled with confidence as him to read right through her. He’d known almost instantly that she had no idea what she was doing.

But he’d handled it so well. He hadn’t laughed at her, and he’d asked all the right questions. Now they could get down to business and make her lack of experience a thing of the past.

“Okay, so what do we do?” she asked. She had a gloriously hot and sexy naked man in bed with her, and she wanted to move forward with that.

His hand lay on her thigh, and as his fingers crept forward, that flush of heat surrounded her again, making her breasts feel swollen and heavy, and her clit tingle with anticipation.

But he didn’t move. Instead, he teased the inner curve of her thigh. “We do whatever feels good. I don’t know about you, but I’m not in any hurry. I want to explore your body. I want to kiss you and lick you and make you come. I want your bones to turn to jelly and make you quiver all over. And then when I fuck you, Kat, you’re going to scream my name over and over again.”