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I lean back on my hands. “I’m not asking for a list of your sexual history.”
“Wouldn’t take long,” he says, his voice flat. “After I changed, I tried.” His thumb drags once along the rim of the container. “Thought if I could do normal things, maybe everything else would start feeling normal too.”
“Did it?”
“No. I could want the idea of it. Company. Touch. Not being alone. But whenever I got close to a woman…” He shakes his head. “Nothing.”
“Nothing, as in emotionally?”
He laughs harshly. “Nothing, as in nothing.”
Understanding warms my face. “Oh.”
“Yeah.” He rubs a hand over the back of his neck. “Didn’t matter if I liked her. The second it went any further, the wolf wanted out. Away from her.”
“Wanted out?”
“He’d pace and claw at me from the inside. Sometimes, I’d shift before I made it through the door.” His voice holds no self-pity. If anything, he sounds irritated by the memory.
“And then you stopped trying.”
His gaze stays on the forest. “Wasn’t fair to them.”
Or to him, but I don’t say it.
I think about this morning. Hewit hard against me, and the growl that vibrated through his chest. His hands holding my face as if he couldn’t decide whether to devour me or make absolutely certain he never frightened me.
“That isn’t what happened with me.”
He looks at me, and the intensity in his amber eyes sends a slow pulse of heat through my stomach. “No.”
I force myself not to look away. “What happened this morning wasn't one-sided, but you act like you wanting me is dangerous.”
“It is.”
“Why?”
His stare sharpens. “You felt me.”
I shift on the step until my knee touches his. “Hewit, wanting me isn’t the same thing as hurting me.”
His gaze drops to where our legs touch. “You don’t know what happens if I stop controlling it.”
“Neither do you. You haven’t wanted anyone since you became a wolf.” I smile slightly. “I want you too, Hewit.”
His breathing changes.
And because apparently today is the day for truths neither of us intended to tell, I say, “I’ve never slept with anyone.”
He freezes. I don’t think he breathes for several seconds.
Then he slowly turns toward me. “What?”
“I’m a virgin.”
The container creaks beneath his fingers as he puts it down. “You’ve never—”
“No.”
