Book 4 - Page 84 (1/2)

Beneath me, Ruby fell immediately still.

“b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l . . . Ruby. That was a terrible thing to say and at the most inopportune moment. I am an imbecile.”

She ran her hands up the back of my neck, lifting to kiss, possibly in an attempt to shut me up. “It’s okay.”

“It’s not,” I said into another kiss.

“It is,” she insisted, her voice uncharacteristically stiff. “I’m sure it’s weird to be with someone for the first time after only having been with her before.”

“It’s not that . . .” I began, and then trailed off, leaving the thought unfinished. I needed to fix this. It was bad enough that I’d gone mute when she’d said she loved me; I couldn’t let this be a disaster, too. “Ruby, my timing may be horrendous and I apologize for that, but I feel I need to explain how different this is for me.”

She nodded, relaxing a bit beneath me. As I searched for words, I struggled to hold on to the clarity of only minutes before, when I felt completely joined to her, knowing her. She’d given me something so rare—true insight into what it was to make love—and I’d f.u.c.ked it up immediately.

“At some early point in our relations.h.i.+p, Portia read some article explaining that men needed s.e.x at least once a week in order to not cheat. It was b.o.l.l.o.c.ks, but it became part of her mental relations.h.i.+p canon. s.e.x once a week. No more, no less. She was very organized, you see,” I said, hoping to add a bit of levity. “Staff meeting Mondays. s.e.x with husband Tuesdays. Rubbish pickup Thursdays.”

Her eyes went soft with sympathy. “Ouch.”

“It wasn’t so bad,” I said, and then tilted my head, considering this. “It simply wasn’t very good, either.” I met her eyes, swallowing thickly as the words took shape in my mind. “And see . . . that, right there. Please understand I feel uncomfortable even saying this much, particularly given our current circ.u.mstances.” I made a show of looking down the length of our bodies, as if to emphasize the point, to which she smiled. “As a general rule I don’t discuss my personal life. But now you are my personal life. I want you to know every facet of me, and how different I am with you. And unfortunately that often means knowing things about my relations.h.i.+p with Portia. Somehow her view on it made s.e.x both a special occasion and a ch.o.r.e.”

Ruby drew one fingertip across my bottom lip, tracing the shape of my mouth as she said, “Did you ever tell her any of these things? When it ended?”