Author: Tiffany Reisz

“He gives her a blanket.”

“Very romantic.”

Nora glanced down at her pages, still warm from the printer. “Okay, I’m her. I wake up and have to have you because while I know we don’t belong together, that doesn’t change the fact that I love you and want to try to make it work.”

Wesley nodded.

“You pretend to be asleep,” Nora instructed. “Then I’ll wake you up. Then you’ll let me make love to you.”

Nora expected a laugh or a protest but Wesley only tilted his head just slightly and sank deeper into her pillows.

“Okay, Nora,” he said, his voice low and serious. “Make love to me then.”

Tremors rippled through Nora’s fingers as if her hands had fallen asleep and were just now beginning to awaken. To cover her sudden nervousness, she purposefully scanned her scene, looking for a good place to start.

Nora took a deep breath and reached out. Wesley was feigning sleep. His head was turned to the side and his eyes were closed. His blond eyelashes lay on his tan cheeks. She touched his face as gently as she could and his eyes fluttered open.

“What do I do?” he asked.

“He grabs her wrist. Hard but not viciously.”

Wesley raised his hand and clasped Nora’s wrist. She wondered if he could feel her pulse racing.

“Then what?” Wesley stroked her wrist with his thumb.

“He says to her, ‘You know that’s against the rules.’”

“And she says?”

Nora paused. The light in the room changed as a cloud swallowed the sun and everything was thrown into pale shadows. The darkening room seemed suddenly and dangerously intimate, but she didn’t dare stop. She knew how fragile, how easily shattered such a moment was. Her body tensed. The room held its breath.

“She says, ‘This isn’t about the game. It’s just me now. I want, just once, to be with just you.’”

“And he says?”

“He doesn’t say anything. They look at each other in the dark until she says…‘please.’”

Nora’s and Wesley’s eyes met.

“Please,” Wesley repeated. “Then what happens?”

“The big moment—he’s been in control the whole time, totally in charge. This is when he lets go and gives himself into her hands. He surrenders.”

Wesley nodded his head solemnly. “And she?”

“She kisses him.” Nora laid her hand on Wesley’s chest. “And he lets her.”

Nora leaned in even farther, expecting Wesley to stop her at any moment. When he didn’t she nearly stopped herself, but after the briefest hesitation she pressed her lips to his. Opening her mouth, she brushed his bottom lip with the tip of her tongue and his mouth opened to hers.

A million times perhaps Nora had imagined what it would be like to finally kiss him. But as they grew to be best friends she’d tried to stop thinking of him like that. Their friendship was too fragile—it rested on the edge of a knife’s blade. Her resolve to love him without making love to him wavered at times, but her profound respect for him kept dragging her wayward heart and body back in line. But as his untutored lips trembled under her lips, and his tongue tentatively sought hers, that resolve threw itself onto that blade, sliced itself in two, slid to the ground and died there, quiet and happy and without any further protest.

“What happens next?” Wesley whispered when Nora paused for a breath.

“She pulls the covers off him and kisses him from neck to hip.”

“She doesn’t take his pajamas off first?”

“He sleeps naked. So does she, of course.”

Wesley smiled at her and she saw desire in his eyes.

“Of course.”

Nora pulled back a little and watched Wesley. In the space between them hovered a question that only Wesley could answer.

He rose up and with that enviable masculine grace pulled his T-shirt off and threw it on the floor. But he’d been shirtless around her a thousand times. She waited.

Nora studied his hands for any sign of nervousness, but his fingers didn’t quiver at all as he gathered the fabric of her silk camisole in his hands and pulled it off her. She watched him study her naked curves. His gaze of innocent wonder was more erotic than any lascivious stare she’d ever received.

“Don’t look at me like that, Wes. You gave me a bath a few nights ago.”

“The bubbles were in the way.” Wesley tore his gaze from her breasts and met her eyes. “You’re so beautiful.”

“So are you.”

Nora fell into his arms again and their mouths met. This time the kiss wasn’t remotely tentative. Wesley’s lips sought hers again and again, his tongue found hers, his arms encircled her and pushed her onto her back. He gasped as her lips met his skin. He tilted his chin back to give her better access, access that she took eager advantage of caressing his shoulders, his chest and his collarbone with her mouth. She felt unleashed at last, finally free to touch every inch of him as she’d wanted for so long.

“How am I supposed to do this again?” he whispered in her ear.

“You just kiss her anywhere and everywhere you want to kiss her…” she said, remembering the first night she’d slept next to him, the first time she touched him.

“Anywhere and everywhere…” Wesley kissed his way from her neck to her breasts. He paused for a moment and looked at her before lowering his head and taking one of her nipples in his mouth. She arched underneath him and sighed with pleasure. He was eager but gentle. It was the strangest sensation. Her instincts told her to throw him on his back, tie him down and have her way with him. Lying there so passively while he touched and kissed her felt so unusual, as if he was making love to her in a foreign language, a beautiful language to hear, but one she didn’t understand.

Wesley brought his mouth to hers again and shifted so that his body was on top of hers, his full weight down on her, his hips pressing into hers. He pushed her arms over her head and she smiled—this she was used to. But instead of holding her down by her wrists, Wesley twined his fingers into hers. Something caught in her chest at the simple gesture of tenderness.

Pausing from the kiss, Wesley pulled back and looked down at her and searched her face as though he couldn’t believe she was real.

“Please tell me this means as much to you as it does to me,” he begged.

Nora swallowed a lump in her throat. “I’m terrified, Wes. I think it may even mean more to me.”

Shaking his head, he smiled. “Not possible.”

Wesley released her hands and pulled her into his arms. His body radiated warmth and she couldn’t seem to get enough of his skin. She wrapped a leg over his back and Wesley pressed his forehead to the center of her chest. Nora felt a flutter of fear when she remembered this was Wesley and he would never have sex with anyone he wasn’t in love with. The only person she’d ever had sex with who loved her was Søren. Søren…

“Wes, stop for a second.”

Wesley pulled away from her and she saw the fear in his eyes.

“I wasn’t hurting you, was I?”

She rolled up and pulled her legs to her chest.

“No, you weren’t hurting me at all. I just…” She panted a little. “I just need a second. I told you, I’ve never had vanilla sex before.”

Wesley laughed a little.

“Are you a virgin, too?”

She met his eyes and smiled.

“Guess so.”

Wesley reached out and ran his hand through her hair.

“Nora, I don’t think I can do what you do. I’ve never even had normal sex much less…you know.”

Nora took short breaths. “I know. I’ll try, too.”

She pulled Wesley to her again. She wasn’t sure how to do this, how to just let go and let him make love to her. They kissed and he pushed her onto her back. A strange panic set it. This wasn’t who she was. Nora Sutherlin didn’t have vanilla sex. She didn’t do missionary position. The last time she had sex on her back and face-to-face was with Søren, and she’d been in four-point restraints. She didn’t know the rules to this game. But she knew if this happened, if they made love right now, he would believe she loved him as much as he loved her. He wasn’t just giving her his body. He was giving her his heart.

“Talk to me, Wesley,” she begged. He grew more courageous with every kiss. His hands roamed over her arms, her breasts, and even slid between her legs and caressed her through the fabric of her silk pajamas. “Tell me what you want to do.”

Wesley placed a hand on the side of her face and caressed her cheekbone with his thumb.

“I want to be inside you.” He breathed the words.

She reached between them and unbuttoned his jeans.

“Nora—” She heard a note of panic in his voice.

“We can get under the covers. Would that help?” She hoped he would say yes. Maybe it would help her, too.

“I’m the guy. I’m the one who should be saying that,” Wesley said with a rueful smile.

“Don’t worry about it. I’m older and a slut. Let me handle it, okay?” Could she handle it? She wanted to stop, wanted to talk to him before they went any further. She hadn’t been nervous like this in years. The night she gave her virginity to Søren felt like destiny. This felt like fear.

Wesley laughed. “Okay. Yeah, I would feel much more comfortable under the covers.”

Nora scooted off one side of the bed as Wesley slid off the other. As they pulled the sheets back, the pages of her novel fell off the bed and to the floor. Wesley picked them up and glanced at them.

Nora crawled across the bed toward him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. But Wesley didn’t respond. He just kept reading.

“It’s just fiction.” Nora kissed his shoulder.

“William and Caroline?” Wesley finally tore his eyes from the page. “That’s your father’s name and my mother’s name. Is this about us?”

Nora shook her head. “No, not really.”

“Not really?” Wesley took a step away from her and grabbed his shirt off the floor. Feeling both defeated and relieved, Nora pulled her camisole back on and sat cross-legged on the bed.

“No, it isn’t our story. He’s not quite me. She’s not quite you. It’s just inspired by us, by things I’ve thought about because of our relationship. They’re lovers. We’re just friends. Or were. Jesus, Wes. Did you plan this?” Nora couldn’t quite finish the question; the enormity of what they’d almost done together finally hitting her as she surveyed her disheveled bed.

“You quit your other job. I thought now maybe it might mean as much to you—”

“God, Wesley, it does mean as much to me.”

“Or is this just about your book?” he asked, holding the pages in his hand. He glanced down and scanned them. “The Gift of the Magi. That’s my favorite short story.”

“I know. It’s what they’re talking about the evening before this scene happens, about what people have to give up when they’re together.”

“So what is his watch? My virginity? I was ready to give that to you.”

“Your innocence. So much more valuable and so much more traumatic to lose.”

“And her hair, what’s that? You’ve already given up your job with King.”

“But I haven’t stopped being who I am.”

“It isn’t who you are, Nora. It’s just what you do.”

“Even if I’m not doing it for money, it’s still who I am. And I can’t sell it, not even to buy you a watch chain. It’s what writes my books and makes me me. It’s the only thing I have of value. And even if you wanted to give me your innocence, wanted to come into my world with combs for my hair, I can’t let you do that. So where does that leave us? You tell me.”