I poured her a glass, and we went out onto my back porch to sip wine and talk it out.

“What an asshole,” she repeated, for maybe the third time.

I nodded, taking another drink.

“Is he an asshole in bed, too?”

I wasn’t sure how to answer that.  He was bossy, sure, but he ate pussy like a champ.

“No,” I finally settled on.  “He’s very aggressive, very forceful, but he’s definitely adamant about getting me off first.”

“Well, that’s something.  I’m convinced that men who are assholes in bed are basically hopeless.

I laughed because it was true.

“Asshole in bed—impossible to rehabilitate.  Asshole in general, hell, who knows—there’s probably some hope.”

I laughed harder.  This is why I’d called her.  Girl always told it like it was.

Danika was fluent in sarcasm.  It was one of my favorite languages.  I found I always trusted a person more once I discovered they had the sarcasm gene.

She was the perfect balance of practical levity that I’d known was needed to improve my mood.

CHAPTER NINE

He showed up at my door about a week later.  It was a Tuesday and eleven o’clock at night.

When the doorbell rang, I didn’t know who it could be, but I still didn’t even suspect that it was him.

I had the brief urge, after looking through the peephole, not to even answer the door, but other, stronger urges won out.

At least I kept the chain on, talking through the small opening that left.

And the first thing I said when I did open it was, “I don’t think I should let you in.”

His brows shot up like he had no notion where this was coming from.  “What?” he clipped out.

As I gathered my reply, my eyes ran over him.  He wore jeans and a tight gray T-shirt.  He looked edible, and I still wasn’t accustomed to my reaction to him.

“You didn’t even bother to say goodbye the last time,” I told him, making my voice as cold as it would go, which was still about ten times warmer than his normal tone.  “Hell, I don’t think you even said hello.”

He just looked at me like he had no clue what I was going on about.

Infuriating man.

“No woman has ever made you work for it, huh?” I asked wryly.

I didn’t even want to think about that.  But, of course, I did.

God, the girls his age.  I knew what was up.  I had two sons that weren’t much younger than he was.  I’d talked to their girlfriends over the years, talked to them, to the parents of other people in their generation.  Girls his age were down for just about any damn thing, and guys did not have to work hard to get it.

Who the hell could compete with that?  Who the hell wanted to?

Me, apparently.

“I’m not sure what you’re asking,” he said carefully.

Me neither, though mostly because I already had my answer.  This man was not housebroken.  Had never even considered the idea.  Why would he?  If he wanted sex, he clearly did not have a hard time getting it.

“Look, I don’t think this is working for me.”

He still looked fantastically confused, like he just had no notion what my problem was.  “What isn’t working about it?”

I stared at him, not sure if he was mocking me.

“What I mean is, what do I need to change to make this work for you?” he added.

It was downright polite, for him.

And just that easy, I was ready to play again.

Dammit.

I unchained the door and let him in.

“Some manners,” I said grudgingly, though not grudgingly enough.  “You need to learn some manners.  The basics.  Hellos, goodbyes, a little bit of small talk.  Something that tells me this isn’t just casual sex.  This may surprise you, but I don’t do casual very well.”

“Who said this was casual?”

Again, I couldn’t tell if he was mocking me.  But then, I was getting the distinct impression that he wasn’t much of a jokester.

I didn’t know what to say to that, didn’t know how he meant it, so I moved on.  “More manners,” I stressed again.  “That’s what I need.  Can you do that for me?”

My hair was pinned up, the heavy masses secured with several clips I’d thrown in carelessly throughout the day.  Heath started taking it down, clip by clip, his clever fingers finding each one unerringly, until the black strands were loose and wavy around my shoulders.

He gripped both hands into it, his arms bunching distractingly as he pulled my face close to his, bending down to meet me halfway.

“Manners.  Hellos.  Goodbyes.  Small talk.” He repeated it all back like he really didn’t know what I was talking about, but not in an asshole way.  More like he was trying to follow along, whether he understood it or not.

I thought that, just maybe, I could work with that.

A big maybe, but not so big that I didn’t let him take me to bed almost immediately.

He stripped me down, sat me on the edge of the bed, and knelt between my thighs.

He was leaning down, just a breath away from my sex, and said softly, “Hello.”

I smiled, then gasped as he promptly and enthusiastically started eating me out.

He did this for so long (three orgasms and counting) that I finally had to scramble away to get him to stop.