Total pages in book: 142
Estimated words: 134725 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 674(@200wpm)___ 539(@250wpm)___ 449(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 134725 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 674(@200wpm)___ 539(@250wpm)___ 449(@300wpm)
“I’m sorry, Zane.”
“As you should be.” He turned over; he turned his back to me.
Oh shit. I was screwing things up. Badly.
“I’ve never stood up for myself in a relationship, before,” I whispered.
He didn’t reply.
“I apologize for thinking what I thought, but I look at you and I think… Tanya: you’d never land a man like this if his planet didn’t have a shortage of women.”
He turned over and looked at me, incredulous, and barked, “Are you out of your fucking mind?”
He looked angrier.
I jolted. “I’ve only had one boyfriend. Giorgio.”
“Fuck me,” he grumbled. “Now you’re going to remind me I’m not the only man you’ve loved. Thanks a bunch, Tanya.”
“That’s not fair. You were married before.”
He glared at me and flexed his jaw.
“And I didn’t love him. Not like you think. And we never had sex because he didn’t truly want me.”
He licked his teeth behind his closed mouth and shook his head angrily.
“Please listen to me, Zane. It’s hard to open up, but I want to.”
He didn’t say anything.
“I was shy. So shy. The only experience I had with men up until a few years ago was when our across-the-hall neighbor tried to rape me when I was fifteen. Giorgio asked me out when I was twenty-one and I’d never had a boyfriend at that point because I was terrified of men. Our relationship was a long one that had almost zero physical contact. For nearly five years. He acted like sex didn’t matter. And at first, it was a breath of fresh air, because any guy who asked me on dates before him looked at me like they wanted sex. I tried to hide under camouflaging clothing because I was traumatized from our neighbor when I developed a C cup by the time I was fourteen. Mom wouldn’t move. She downplayed it, said we couldn’t afford to move, and she told me to ignore him. I was constantly afraid when I went out that he would corner me again. Try to put his hands on me again. Try to drag me into his apartment or out into the stairwell. I hid. A lot. I was afraid every time I came home. For four years, Zane. He died of alcoholism and sadly, it was a relief, but those halls in our building still haunted me until I moved out. Mom lived there until she died a few months ago and every time I was in those halls… anyway, I was always shy but I became so timid. And Giorgio made me not afraid because he had no expectations. Other than kissing me, which wasn’t even like real couple kissing. I started to try to make it into real kissing. And he acted kind of… repulsed, though he tried to hide it. And I was afraid to say anything about it because he was still sweet and held my hand and I didn’t want to lose my best friend.” I took a big breath. “One night we got drunk and I tried to take it further. I tried to come onto him, I laid it on pretty thick, and he put the brakes on. I internalized it. Felt unattractive. Unappealing. I stayed in that non-relationship until I found out by accident that he was a gay man living in the closet about it because he had super religious parents who would disown him if they knew he liked guys. I was a fake girlfriend. I was like a best friend to him. I know he cared about me, and I loved him like a brother more than anything else, but do you have any idea how hard it’s been on my ego to be twenty-six and still be virtually untouched? Until going to a place where I was told I’d die if I didn’t do it in three days? And let’s not forget another asshole being handsy and trying to threaten me into sex got me here. So, I have self-esteem issues. And you’re you. You’re the hottest, sexiest man I have ever seen. And smart. And sweet. And such a good dad. And you’re extremely sexual. But, I’m me. I’m just…”
“Beautiful. Funny. Sweet. Smart. Sexual,” he said, angrily. “You’re all those things. Giorgio used you and you didn’t deserve that. You certainly don’t deserve to think you’re less than anyone else.” He flipped over and put his hand to my face. “I’m a lucky man that I caught you. A lot of men from the competition wanted you as their first choice out of the thirty-eight girls.”
“Not likely.”
“You were the second most wanted woman in that group.”
I hard-blinked.
“I had to run for you because of all the things I already told you, about the pheromones and the concerns about the strange men lingering. But most of all, I knew I wasn’t the only man that wanted to make you his. I’m not cheating on you in my heart, Tanya.”