His room was the one place that looked like what I’d expected. It looked like a dirty teenage boy’s room was supposed to look like, just bigger. And possibly messier. He popped a window open. “Sorry. It smells like gym socks, right?”

He looked so handsome and boyish, and that was at odds with the way I typically thought of him. Saxon always struck me as something wild, like some feral creature that slept in a tree at night. When we had talked about him as a pet in Paris, the image of him as a huge, coiling snake or ravenous wolf made sense.

“It does. You could clean it,” I suggested.

He looked around without much interest. “No point. It would look like this again in no time. I have to try to be here when Carmella comes over, or she cleans it even though I say not to. She doesn’t make nearly enough to deal with this crap.”

“You have a maid?” I asked.

“You think Lylee does housework?” he returned.

“I guess she doesn’t seem that domestic.” His room was so unlike Jake’s it was crazy. We were sitting on small couches, set up on one side like a little sitting room with a chipped but expensive-looking coffee table between them. There were thick rugs over the hardwood, littered with Dorito crumbs and spilled who-knows-what. The bed was at least a queen, maybe bigger. It had gray sheets, and you could just tell from the way they bunched and piled so beautifully that they were something expensive. Maybe silk? The walls had framed art, mostly post-modern stuff, nothing I really knew. And there were band posters, the kind they use to advertise shows. I didn’t know many of them either. There was a desk with enough computer equipment to fill a NASA control room. Clothes were everywhere, and there were old plates, empty soda cans and, on the floor, what looked like a condom wrapper. What was it with the boys I cared about and suggestively placed condom wrappers? “Maybe you should just give Carmella a bonus and let her in here.”

“It’s freaking you out, isn’t it?” He looked around, and I imagined he was trying to see it through my eyes.

“It is.” I squirmed a little, equally fascinated and horrified. “Your dirtiest private dirt is crawling over everything in here. I can smell you. I can see evidence of you. It’s like looking at you under a microscope.”

“So this room is like my nasty little personal Petri dish?” He seemed unaccountably happy with the idea.

“Yes. You are one huge, gross science experiment.”

“You crack me up.” He laughed and his eyes got a glint I didn’t completely trust. “I don’t have many people in my life who make me laugh. I guess I don’t have that many friends in general. I’ve fucked it up with a lot of my guy friends, and no girl wants me for anything but what I can give her in bed.”

I rolled my eyes, but it was mostly to stay my panic. “If I have to hear about how good you are in bed one more time, I’m going to scream,” I joked. Though the delivery would have been smoother if my voice hadn’t wobbled. My attempts at levity were lost on Saxon. His black eyes were honed on me, and I knew for a fact I was trapped.

He moved across the space between us with all the feline grace of a jungle cat and then he was next to me. His body was warm and his skin emitted that amazing smell that was only Saxon’s and made me crazy. I tried breathing through my mouth, but I was no good at denying myself things. It just went against my nature.

“You think I’m exaggerating about how good I am?” His voice dripped with sex. “I’m not. I want to show you. I’ve thought about what I would do to you if I got you in my bed from the first minute I saw you.”

It felt like there was something crushing my lungs. I knew what he was saying wasn’t even just cheesy romance talk. I could see sometimes, when he looked over at me, that he was thinking things no normal human would entertain in public, even in his head.

“I kissed Jake when I saw him,” I confessed, desperate to derail this before it started, whatever it was. “Or I kissed him back. He kissed me first.”

“I don’t like it.” Saxon shrugged. “But you aren’t mine. Oh, wait. You’re nobody’s girl, right, Blix?” His eyes were bright with mockery. “You’re your own girl.”

“I am,” I insisted.

“Then stop pussyfooting around. Come to bed with me,” he lured.

“No.” I shook my head. Jake hadn’t wanted sex. Every time we were together, I knew he was going to talk me out of it. And that was a good thing. I wasn’t good at talking other people out of things. Especially things I could potentially like.

“Did he want you? Did he tell you to wait for him?” Saxon’s voice was so melodic it just couldn’t be sinister. Could it? My brain was fogging.

“No.”

“You want him back?” Saxon asked.

“Yes.” I did. Badly.

“But you like me?”

“Yes.” I struggled to break through his hypnosis. “And you and I tried in Paris. We didn‘t work. Remember?”

“Too much pressure,” Saxon argued.

God, he was handsome. I loved the angles of his face, his hard jaw and black eyes. Who had black eyes, anyway? When his lips moved towards mine, I tried to pull up an image of Jake, but all I could see clearly was him screaming at me to leave.

Fine.

He wanted me to leave? I was gone.

Saxon brushed his lips against mine, and I kissed him back. He put his hands on my back and dragged me closer to him. I opened my mouth and licked at his, hating the taste of cigarette smoke, but loving the real taste of him underneath it. My mind was working around Jake yelling and Saxon kissing, and I felt defeated and glad for Saxon’s understanding.

We kissed until he was pressing into me, and I felt that he was hard. I was trying to kiss him and keep a cool head. I knew I didn’t want to have sex, but I wanted…something. Something more than we’d done in France. Something better.

He got up and dragged me over to the bed with its rumpled, silky soft sheets. They also smelled like smoke and cologne and unwashed Saxon, which was, amazingly, not gross at all and actually pretty delicious. His hand moved to my hip and slid up my shirt, unhooking my bra and running over the soft skin of my breast, slightly flattened from lying on my back. I arched a little into his palm and he grunted appreciatively, pressing and squeezing and finally pulling my shirt completely over my head with one quick movement.

In all the times the same exact thing had happened with Jake, I had always been so ready for the next thing, I hadn’t given much thought to how I looked or what he might be thinking. It was different with Saxon. I wondered if he thought I looked good and what he would do next and how quickly I should stop him if things went too far.

As usual with Saxon, it was just too much thinking. He was looking at my chest, breathing hard.

“You’re beautiful.” His voice was hoarse.

“Thank you.” It felt formal.

He kissed my lips gently, then dipped his head down and licked one nipple. Without thinking, I grabbed him by his ears and yanked his head back.

“Ow!” he cried.

And I giggled.

He looked a little pissed, then his mouth curved up and he laughed a little too.

“This is great for my boner, Blix.” He sighed and lay down next to me. “I know you’re a virgin, but you’ve done all this before, right?”

“Yes, Saxon. Just not with you.” I looked at him closely, then reached a hand out and brushed his hair back.

“Is it bad. With me?” His black eyes flicked down. I realized this was probably going to demolish his self-esteem. I felt bad, even if I had always thought he needed to be taken down a peg or two when it came to his sexual abilities.

“No!” I said. “My head’s just in a weird place right now.”

“I can help with that.” He ran his hand down my shoulder and to my elbow. I felt a rush of goosebumps. “You think too much.”

“Only with you!” I insisted. “It’s like I’m on hyperdrive when you’re around. I can’t turn it off.”