Once Touched

by Laura Moore

  “I’d rather have a beer. Want one?”

  “So kind of you to ask. Since you refuse to leave me in peace, I might as well drink.”

  Without further ado, he went into the kitchen and grabbed two longnecks from the refrigerator. He rummaged around in her cutlery and utensil drawers until he found a bottle opener and popped the caps. Spying a bottle of whiskey sitting on the counter next to a neat row of shot glasses, he placed two over the bottle of Jack Daniel’s and returned to the living room.

  Sooner had abandoned his place to lie on the rug. Bowie, too, had moved, and now lay beside the smaller dog.

  Ethan dropped down on the empty cushion next to Quinn. The weight of his body caused hers to tilt toward him, their shoulders bumping. She righted herself and scowled afresh. “That’s Sooner’s place. And that’s my whiskey.”

  She certainly was tetchy tonight.

  “He abdicated. Here,” he said, and passed her a beer. “I figure whatever’s bugging you may require more than an IPA.” Placing the bottle of whiskey on the coffee table, he set up the shot glasses and filled one to the brim and the second half full. He slid that one toward her. “Cheers.”

  “Didn’t your mother teach you about equality?”

  “For all I know you’re going to get sloppy on even this minute amount of whiskey. I hate tears. As I recall, you used to bawl awfully loudly.”

  “I was, like, four years old.” Shooting him a lethal look, she reached forward, plucked the bottle from the table, opened it, and filled the shot glass to the brim. “My house. My whiskey. My shot glass. My inebriation.” Picking up the glass, she tossed its contents back, and set it back down with a sharp rap.

  “Impressive,” he said dryly. “Now, will you please tell me what the hell is wrong?”

  She flopped back against the sofa, and Pirate jumped off in a feline huff. She eyed Ethan balefully as if he were somehow to blame for that, too.

  “Fine. All righty, then. You want to know why I’m mad? I’m good and bloody sick of guys making me feel like a freak. I’m trying my best to get this whole sex thing over with and either get past the ‘God, this is awkward and excruciatingly unpleasant’ aspect and accept that’s how it’s going to be for me or decide to call it quits forever. I’m trying to settle the issue here, damn it, but it doesn’t help to have guys talk about how they can tell I’m not ‘into it.’ Well, duh.”

  His ears were ringing. He shook his head, hoping for clarity. “Did you just tell me you’re a virgin?”

  “Don’t worry. It’s not communicable.”

  He couldn’t even smile. “And you were going to embark on this fucking experiment of yours with Josh?”

  “He seemed like a perfectly viable candidate.”

  “Jesus H. Christ,” he muttered, and downed his own whiskey, wishing it were a double. “The guy has all the subtlety of a Texas longhorn.”

  She reached forward to grab her beer and said something that sounded like, “We can’t all be timberwolves.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing.” She sank back against the sofa. “And there was nothing wrong with Josh. He was a perfectly good kisser. I’m sure of it. The problem’s with me. It’s always been.”

  “Always? Just how many candidates have you auditioned for this job?” What a surreal conversation. She was a virgin at what, twenty-four? A part of him wanted to run screaming for the door. The other part, well, he didn’t care to examine too closely how weirdly possessive her being untouched made him feel.

  “You’re not nearly as funny as you think you are. I don’t know.” She shrugged uncomfortably. “Six, I guess—Josh was unlucky number seven. I’ve been trying to do the deed since freshman year in college. At least with Josh I realized pretty quickly that it wasn’t going to work out. We didn’t have to get naked or anything.”

  Thank God. He realized that his heart was pounding, hammering at the walls of his chest. The whiskey had done nothing to subdue it. He poured himself another shot and drank it, feeling the burn all the way down to his gut.

  The mega-amped drumming of his heart continued unabated. It wasn’t the only thing going haywire. The air in Quinn’s living room had become charged. Electric. It made his skin prickly, made his muscles twitch and tighten. Did she have any idea of what this conversation was doing to him?

  She’d shifted and was sitting kitty-corner now, her folded legs angled on the cushion between them. She had the beer bottle between her hands and her fingers were busy shredding the label into soggy confetti.

  His gaze traveled up, taking in the gentle swell of her breasts. Christ, he could chug the entire bottle of Jack Daniel’s and it wouldn’t dull his wanting her. She had her hair up now, had done one of those things women did, twisting it and somehow looping it around so that the ends poked through a honey-blond donut. He imagined loosening the mass with his fingers and having its silken weight cascade over the backs of his hands as he cradled her head and brought his mouth to hers.

  Had he telegraphed his thoughts? Was that why she swallowed convulsively? Was that why her pulse was jumping at the base of her neck, its tempo as crazy as his own? He wanted to press his lips there and then let them travel over her body and discover other pulse points.

  The tension in him redoubled.

  But she was a virgin and, from the sound of it, a spooked one. He could only imagine what had happened to make her think there was anything wrong with her sexually. What he knew was that there were a lot of assholes in the world and that when their sexuality was threatened or when it became obvious that they’d failed to arouse their partner, they were quick to find fault elsewhere. Now he had seven assholes he wanted to punch.

  “I doubt very much that you were the problem, Quinn, or in any way to blame.”

  Instead of replying she tipped her beer to her lips. “I’m afraid I can’t agree. I’m kind of messed up. I know I look normal, but when the clothes come off and the touching starts, well, I just go kind of numb. Sometimes I get scared, but mostly I’m numb.”

  Had Galahad been sent on a quest involving Quinn Knowles, he would have failed. Ethan was sure of it. In a desperate attempt to block out the image of Quinn naked and where on her delectable body he’d like to touch her first, he pinched the bridge of his nose—hard—and almost missed her whispered confession.

  “But I felt something when I touched you.”

  Slowly he lowered his hand. “Did you now? Interesting. I felt something, too.”

  “You did? What—what—” she repeated, and then paused as if gathering her courage. “So what did you feel?”

  “Hard,” he said, deciding bluntness would be the most effective tool with her. “No small feat, since I haven’t had an erection in months.”

  “Oh.” A wealth of emotions stole across her face: embarrassment, excitement, pride…Humor won out. “I guess you’re not the only one who’s been numb. So, are you cured?”

  He shrugged. “Who knows? I may be as sexually dysfunctional as you.”

  “So we could be flops together?”

  “Misery loves company.”

  She snorted. “You seem awfully calm about your, um, condition. I thought men got all weird about that or began popping Viagra like they were Pez.”

  He might have replied that he didn’t give a shit about a lot of things anymore, his ability to achieve an erection included. Instead he said, “It simplified things.”

  He took advantage of her silence as she considered this by saying in a bored voice, “I suppose we could see if our sorry states could be improved. One friend helping another out.”

  “So we’d become fuck buddies?”

  The intentional vulgarity was an act of phony bravado, he knew. He grimaced nonetheless. “Is that what you kids call it nowadays?”

  “And what term would you use, Gramps?”

  He raised a single brow in challenge. “How about plain old ‘lovers,’ brat?”

  “Oh.” The silence stretched between them, and he wished
he knew what she was thinking. “But it would just be sex, right? Because, you know, I’m not looking for a relationship. I don’t have time for neediness—”

  As if he did.

  “—and you men seem endlessly needy.”

  “I’ll do my best to keep any whining and clinginess in check,” he said dryly. “As for the rest, I’m not looking for a relationship, either, so relax.”

  “Good to hear.” She took another slug of beer and lowered the bottle. Her gaze raked him. “And how up for this Masters of Sex experiment are you? Semi? Quarterly?”

  “Ha. Very funny. Let’s just say you might have your work cut out for you.” He had a hunch that having her focus on his rather significant problem might make her forget her own. “By the way, do you have any condoms?”

  “I’m a virgin, not a moron. Of course I do. I keep a supply in my medicine cabinet and change it monthly.”

  He tilted his head, intrigued. “Worried they’ll expire?”

  “Nope. Worried my mother will poke around in it—the statistics on medicine cabinet snooping are outrageous—and ask questions if, one, I don’t have any and, two, they sit unused. I also keep some in the bedside table since she’s a canny one.”

  “You’re exaggerating wildly.”

  “Only a little.” She brought the beer to her lips and finished it off. “Mom’s going to be so disappointed about Josh. She was trying to set me up with him, you know.”

  Adele poking around in her daughter’s stuff? Wanting Quinn and Josh to date? Both ideas were ludicrous. He eyed her shot glass, her half-empty beer. “How drunk are you?”

  “Not even buzzed. I may be a flop at sex but I can drink with the best of them.”

  Damned if he was going to let the sex be lousy. Then a stark and uncomfortable realization struck Ethan. He’d never attempted to seduce a woman before. Never had to. A look, a stroke of a finger, a simple “Come home with me tonight” had always been sufficient to get what he wanted.

  Trust everything to be different with Quinn. Why was he doing this again? Oh, yeah, because he thought he might die if he didn’t touch her soon.

  He stretched his legs out long and then patted the tops of his thighs. “Why don’t you come here, Quinn?”

  She looked at him as if he’d just sprouted a second and even uglier head. Christ, how ham-handed had those guys been with her? Were they the doofus surprise-in-the-popcorn-box types?

  “You scared?” he asked quietly.

  “Absolutely freakin’ terrified.”

  He nodded. “You look it. You realize we’re not going to do anything you don’t like or want or that doesn’t feel good.”

  She gave a tiny and wholly unconvincing nod in turn.

  “You don’t need to be scared with me, Quinn. I lived with terror for six months. I saw brave men battle it every waking hour. It sucks and has no place between lovers. Can you trust me and let it go?”

  WHAT HAD SHE done? She had no clear idea how she and Ethan had gotten here, with him inviting her onto his lap as the first step to possible fornication. She’d needed to vent, big-time. That fact she willingly acknowledged as well as this next one: that for once she’d needed to spill her frustration and anger into human ears rather than fuzzy gray ones.

  But she hadn’t expected it to come to this. Surely this was the most unusual run-up to sex ever, she thought, eyeing his lap and the brown denim stretched over his lean thighs and the not negligible bulge just inches below his belt buckle.

  Was he telling the truth?

  He had to be. No man would willingly admit to sexual impotence. And she’d given him an erection? The notion filled her with a thrilling sense of power.

  “Quinn?”

  She dragged her eyes up. His mouth was crooked in a small smile. “I have a face, too, you know. Come here,” he said, his voice easy, almost a sleepy rumble.

  She knew what he was doing, recognized the technique. She used it herself on animals wracked with fear. He was slowing everything down, his movements, his speech—she bet even his heart rate was dropping to lessen the chances of startling her. Something like gratitude unfroze her muscles enough for her to smile a little.

  And she did trust him, had ever since the night they’d spent with Tucker. Even at his most irascible and prickly she knew Ethan would try to help her with her problem. And he wasn’t being prickly now. He was being kind of amazing.

  And she’d made him hard?

  With her eyes locked on his, she inched toward him and tentatively put her hand on his thigh. His muscles beneath the denim were as unyielding as cement.

  “Um, the sofa might be more comfortable,” she said breathlessly.

  “You wound me. Here.” He placed his hands on either side of her waist and, as if she weighed no more than she had at age four, lifted her and settled her across his lap. She tried not to squirm, but she was very aware of how many of their body parts were touching and brushing. And those thighs, they weren’t merely rock-hard. They were warm. And she was absorbing his heat. She shifted again and her shoulder pressed against the wall of his chest. A memory flashed bright and vivid of his naked torso. Her heart began galloping and there was nothing, absolutely nothing she could do to rein it in.

  Fighting panic, she looked up. This close, Ethan’s eyes glittered like chips of mica ringed with black. She’d never noticed how thick his dark lashes were, either. She pulled back, wanting him to look familiar.

  “Hi,” he said.

  “Hi.” The word came out a weak whisper. “You know, this is incredibly awkward.”

  “I know.”

  He did?

  “We might be completely incompatible.”

  She hadn’t expected that, had never heard a guy say anything but, Babe, I’m gonna make this so good for you…or some equally unnerving variation.

  “Yeah.” She bobbed her head manically.

  “We’re going to have to take this step by step. I think you should kiss me and see whether you like it.” He paused. “And I’ll let you know my verdict. We can take it from there.”

  Oh. So he might call it off if she was a lousy kisser, huh? The other guys hadn’t seemed to think she kissed badly. She could do this, she was sure of it. Frowning, she leaned forward, only to pull up short when she saw that his eyelids were crinkled with mirth. “What?”

  “You look like you’re going to a funeral. It’s only a kiss, Quinn. They’re generally pretty enjoyable.”

  Goaded, she snapped, “Fine,” and lunged forward, plastering her lips against his, and pressing his head back against the sofa. He made an mhmmf sound against her mouth, but she could tell by the stretch of his lips that he was smiling. And suddenly she was, too, and noticing that his lips felt okay against hers and that his breath was warm and smoky from the whiskey. It was good whiskey. Her lips opened and her tongue dipped in for a taste.

  One kiss became two. Two turned into three. Then his tongue joined hers in an easy tangling mixed with slow sweeps and she lost count. She wasn’t even sure she knew her name anymore. Her world had narrowed to wet heat and pulsing sensation.

  He certainly knew what he was doing in the kissing department. He’d let her take the lead, answering her thrusts and glides, then slowly introduced his own moves, probing and drawing her tongue deeper, nibbling on her lower lip as he switched the angle of his mouth, kissing her just a little harder, as if every taste fueled his hunger. His mouth roamed, too, traveling over her face and kissing the arch of her brows, the shell of her ear, the nerve-sprinkled path down the column of her neck to where her pulse hammered, and then returning to her parted lips to catch her gasp of surprised pleasure.

  “Do you like me kissing you, Quinn?”

  Oh, yes. “It’s all right.”

  “Mmm.” He kissed her again, slowly, deeply and then raised his mouth to whisper. “Obviously I have to work on my technique.”

  Her lids grew heavy at the idea of him kissing any better.

  She felt the brush of his nose as
he dropped a beguilingly light kiss on the corner of her mouth. “Do you want me to touch you, Quinn?”

  “I, um…” She swallowed hard. “Yes, I guess so.”

  He nuzzled the side of her temple where her hairline began. Who knew that was such a sensitive spot? Had no one ever kissed her there or did Ethan have some special power over her? And why was he still only kissing her?

  She unglued her tongue to ask, “Do you want to—touch me?”

  “I might.”

  She was torn between laughing and elbowing him. But either reaction was preferable to the ones she usually had: either a blank numbness that resembled a winter whiteout or a growing unease that made her skin crawl like an army of ants on the march.

  “Lift your arms for me,” he said, interrupting her thoughts.

  “What? Why?” she asked panicky.

  “Because I enjoy seeing what I’m touching.”

  She could do this. She’d been naked with Mark and Randall and Tim and she’d liked them a lot less than Ethan. Her arms nevertheless were as heavy as thirty-pound weights as she raised them.

  He moved far more quickly. The blouse veiled her for a moment. Then it was off and she fought not to hunch her shoulders.

  His hoarse curse had her looking up.

  “Damn,” he repeated. “It’s possible I’ve been around goats too much lately, but your breasts are lovely.”

  She snorted with sudden, helpless mirth and felt a spurt of gratitude that he’d dispelled her anxiety—even temporarily. “Maybelle’s got a fine pair of teats, I’ll have you know.”

  “That may well be.” His smile was wry. “I guess I prefer ones that aren’t hairy.”

  Her laughter caught and became a soft gasp as he placed his hands over her. She felt the heat of his palms through the lace of her bra and her nipples grew pebble-hard and aching. Her gaze flew to his.

  His gray eyes glittered mesmerizingly. “You’re perfect, Quinn,” he breathed, sounding as stunned as she felt. Then his mouth captured hers and he kissed her as if it had been years since he’d last tasted her.

  Urgently his mouth devoured as his hands caressed, stroked, and kneaded. She should have been recoiling, but she was caught in the currents of pleasure swirling through her and pooling deep and low. An insistent, demanding pleasure, it made her arch into him.