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And she would always be glad of it.

So she supposed she needed to suck it up and be honest.

“No. I never let anybody close enough for them to do that.”

“I know you go to prom or...”

“I’ve never dated anybody. I’ve never... I’ve never done this before. I just want to be normal.”

“Hold on,” he said. “You’ve never done this... You’ve never donethis?”

“No. Not any of it. Not kissing, the touching. I know all about it. I’m not innocent. You know me, I’ve made moonshine and smoked cigarettes. I think not giving men access to my body felt strong. Not falling into a pattern of letting some guy have me just because he was around and he wanted me. I just didn’t want to be more stuck than I already was. I had too many ties to all of that without introducing someone that I was sleeping with into the mix.”

“Shit,” he said. “I should... I should take you home, and send you to your own room.”

“Why?”

“Because you want normal, and I don’t think the Kings are normal. I don’t think I am.”

“But wanting somebody, wanting them so bad that it’s all you can think of, that’s normal, right?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “I’ve never had it quite this bad before.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, really.” His voice was rough. “I wanted you even though I felt like it was wrong. Or like it should feel wrong. It should, right?”

She looked into his eyes and saw a desperation there that made her chest hurt. He didn’t know? She would have said the man could write a self-help book on how to be a better human being when you were raised in a trash heap.

But he looked so earnest just then, and she wanted to be the one to tell him everything was okay. He’d been making everything okay for her for months now.

She wanted him. Damn everything else.

“No,” she said. “I have been sleeping down the hall from you for two months. If you wanted to take advantage of me, you would’ve done it. You never did. You gave me my first dance. My first kiss. I want it to be you. Because it doesn’t matter where I go, where I take my brick, it’s always going to matter. This place and you.”

He was going to be her brick when it came to relationships. He was going to be the one who gave her a standard to measure everybody else by. He was going to be the one she remembered fondly as her first. Andwhether they actually slept together or not, she realized that would always be true.

Every man would be measured against Daughtry King. They would probably be found wanting. That, she supposed, was a part of life too.

But she could handle it. As long as she got to have them now, she could handle it.

She didn’t want to ruin her chances by laying herself bare like this, but she also knew that she had no choice. Not really. He had given her honesty. The talk. Even when she didn’t want it. She owed him honesty too. He was so good. She couldn’t give him her virginity without him knowing that’s what was happening.

But instead of something concerned or overly caring lighting up his eyes, there was something wicked there.

Something that made her stomach turn over, anticipation and need tightening through her.

“I should tell you now, you realize that, right. Because I’m no virgin, and if you are, then you need somebody who can offer you more. More than a little bit of stardust, Bix. You deserve the whole damned sky. I can’t give you that. But I want you. And I am... I am thrilled as hell to find out that no other man has ever touched you.” He took a step toward her, dragging his thumb along her lower lip. Desire arrowed down between her legs.

She had wanted this. Last night, when they’d been up on the roof, she had climbed the tree to keep herself from kissing him. Because she would have. Because she had wanted him. Had needed him. And she hadbeen embarrassed to put herself out there. But this was the culmination of everything. Of her growth over the time she had been here. This wasn’t simply about confidence in the way she looked—though she did know that she looked better now that she was healthier. This was about whole acceptance of herself.

The woman she’d been up to this point, the woman that she wanted to be. The one she was now.

Pride in herself. An understanding of who she was and why.

And that woman deserved to have what she wanted. To have Daughtry. To kiss him, to be held by him.

She deserved to be in his bed. Even if she wasn’t chained to it.