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She lifted her head and met his gaze. “When I started working at the club, I was a virgin.”
He winced. “You don’t have to explain anything to me, honey. Please, I don’t -”
“I want to,” she said. “I have to. Just listen, okay?”
“Okay.”
“When I started working at the club, I was a virgin. I was also lonely and worried about Mama J. The Alzheimer’s was starting to get bad, and I was so afraid I was going to lose her. And I was tired of feeling alone, you know? Jeremy was, well, he had a certain kind of charm, and I was stupidly naïve and believed him when he said he loved me.”
She dropped her gaze to her hands that were twisting in her lap. “Shamefully, it didn’t take him very long to get me into bed. I didn’t know it at the time because he was my first, but the sex wasn’t very good. Jeremy didn’t always take his time and didn’t seem to notice or care if I had an orgasm. I – he used to tell me that my breasts were too small and was always hinting that I needed a boob job.”
“Asshole,” Luke muttered.
She shrugged. “I thought he loved me. I really did. I knew he wasn’t always good to me, but I thought I was in love with him. I know now that I was just tired of being alone. But at the time…”
She gave him a small smile of regret. “I look back now and wonder how I could have been so stupid. I talked to him a lot about Mama J. Told him how much she meant to me and yeah, I told him that her care was expensive and tough financially, but I never asked him for money. What he said about buying me groceries is true. There were a couple of times when he bought me some food. Both times it was when he was staying overnight at my crappy apartment, and I think he only bought the food because he was hungry, but whatever – I needed the food. I should have said no, he made me feel a little bad for accepting his charity, but I was hungry.”
She could hear the shame in her voice, and she pulled away when Luke tried to touch her. “A few months after I started sleeping with him, I stopped by his place unexpectedly and found him in bed with one of the dancers from the club. He’d been sleeping with a bunch of women at the same time. We’d always used condoms, but I went and got tested for STIs immediately. I didn’t have any infections, thank God, but I couldn’t believe he had betrayed me like that. I tried to talk to him about it and get him to feel bad for what he had done, but he laughed at me. Told me I was a stupid little girl if I believed he would fall in love with someone as pathetic as me.”
She stared at her hands again before saying, “I was pathetic for thinking he loved me. But I – it was so nice to have someone, you know? To not feel like it was just me against the world. It’s stupid, I know, but I was blinded to the truth because I didn’t want to be alone anymore.”
She raised her gaze to him and stared unblinkingly at him. “I shouldn’t have slept with him. Not because he was a bad person but because he was my boss, and it was unprofessional even if I was just waitressing at a strip club. After we broke up, he took me off the weekend shifts and put me on weeknights. It was to punish me. Tips aren’t nearly as good during the week. It’s why I applied for the job as your PA. The cost of Mama J’s care had increased, and I didn’t have enough money even with both jobs.”
She smiled at him. “I was attracted to you but told myself not to act on it. I had already made one mistake by sleeping with my boss and couldn’t afford to do it again. Not when Mama J was depending on me. But I was still so tired of being alone and you were so different than I thought. You were kind and sweet, and it felt so good when you touched me. I’d only slept with Jeremy before you, and I had no idea that sex could be that wonderful, you know?”
He nodded, and she patted his hand. “I swear to you I didn’t get my heat and electricity cut off to try to sucker you into taking care of me. I believed you would fire me if I didn’t wear better clothes and needed my job. I was embarrassed by my lack of money, and the day I fainted in your office was one of the most shameful moments of my life.”
“I know you didn’t do it on purpose,” he said. “I’m sorry I said that you did.”
“I shouldn’t have slept with you, and I shouldn’t have taken advantage of your kindness, but you shouldn’t have believed Jeremy over me,” she said.
“I know,” he said hoarsely. She watched in surprise as he slid out of the bed and dropped to his knees beside it. He took her hand and said, “I’m sorry, Jane. I shouldn’t have said those horrible things to you. I love you. I’m so sorry. I don’t deserve it, but will you forgive me?”
“Yes,” she said.
He blinked at her, and she almost laughed at the look of surprise on his face. “Yes?”
“Yes,” she repeated.
“Just like that,” he said.
She scooted to the side of the bed and swung her legs over the side. She tugged him between her legs and cupped his face before pressing a kiss against his mouth. “A brilliant woman once told me that if you love someone, you forgive them when they say sorry. That love grows sweeter with forgiveness.”
“You love me?” he said.
She kissed him again. “Yes. I love you, Luke Dawson.”
“I love you too,” he said.
She gave him an adorably cheeky grin. “Yeah, I heard you the first time.”
He laughed and kissed her fiercely before hugging her so hard she couldn’t breathe. She pounded him on the back, and he released her before kissing her again.
“I want you to move in with me,” he said.
“What?” Shock reverberated through her.
“I’ve been miserable without you the last few days. Come home with me. Please.”
