Don't Speak (A Modern Fairytale, #5)(35)

“Hmm.” She tapped her index finger on her lips in thought.

“I’ve got it!”

“Tell me,” she said.

“I get a kiss for every question I answer.”

Her eyes widened and she giggled happily, nodding her head. “Can I get thirty questions in before we get there?”

“I’ll drive slower,” he said, passing a sign saying that they were eight miles from the Washington Baum Bridge, which would take them across the Roanoke Sound to Manteo.

“Fire away, woman! Time’s a-wastin’.”

“Okay, okay! Let’s see. Um. Oh! One, what’s it like bein’ the governor’s son?”

“Mostly I hate it,” he blurted out. “I mean, there are times I enjoy the perks—end zone tickets for a Panthers game or ice time with the Hurricanes—”

“You ice-skate?”

“That’s question two, and yes, I do. I’m a Duke Blue Devil, darlin’!”

“Devil sounds right enough,” she shot back with a grin. “I didn’t know people ice-skate in North Carolina.”

“We have an NHL team, Laire.” She stared at him blankly. “The National Hockey League?”

“Oh!” she said, grinning at him. “I don’t know much about hockey. Mostly they just watch NASCAR on Corey. At the Fish Pot.”

“The Fish Pot?”

“The local bar.” She giggled softly. “They call it the Piss Pot when they’re drunk.”

Erik chuckled, then asked, “Ever been to the NASCAR Hall of Fame in Charlotte?”

She shook her head, feeling her cheeks flush. “I’ve never been that far inland.”

They stopped at a red light, and he turned to stare at her for a second. “You are a rare thing.”

“Is that bad?”

“That’s question number three, and the answer is no. It’s amazin’. It keeps me wonderin’ about you . . . every minute, all the time. I never know what you’re goin’ to say next to blow my mind.”

Warmed from his compliment, she grinned, thinking of another question. “Why do you hate being the governor’s son?”

He seemed to mull this over for a second before the light changed and he laid on the gas. “I don’t have much privacy. Everythin’ I do at Duke is reported on: which girl I’m dating, if I screw up a game play, if I—”

“Are you datin’ someone?”

“That’s five. And yes, ma’am, I sure am.”

Laire’s breath caught. “You are? Who is . . . I mean—”

“You,” he said, darting a glance to her. “I’m datin’ you, Laire.”

Feeling like a complete idiot, she took a deep, somewhat ragged, breath and nodded. “Oh, I . . .”

“There’s that jealous streak again.”

“Don’t play with me, Erik,” she said softly. “I don’t know enough about boys to know when you’re kidding.”

“I didn’t mean to mislead you, and I’m not kiddin’,” he said. “You’re the only girl I’m with right now.”

Which only made her wonder . . .

“How many have come before?”

He cringed, then huffed softly. “I don’t want to answer that question, Freckles. Next.”

“Is it a long list?”

“That’s question six. And no, in my world, it’s not. But in yours . . .”

“How many?” she asked softly. “How many who meant something?”

He was silent for a while, staring out the windshield as they crossed the bridge to Roanoke Island. Finally he sighed. “I’ve had about six girlfriends.”

“And how many have you slept with?”

“Laire, come on.”

“I need to know,” she said softly.

She didn’t know she was going to say those four words before they came tumbling out of her mouth, but she knew the truth of them right away. Since meeting Erik and learning about his less conservative views on intimacy and sex, Laire couldn’t stop wondering how many women he’d bedded, and her imagination was starting to get the best of her. What if the number was ten or fifty or—goddamn it!—one hundred? How many was a few? How many was a lot? She had no idea. And for whatever reason she couldn’t articulate, she needed an idea.

“Five,” he said, his voice low.

She gasped softly.

Five.

Five.

Five women had lain naked with him, feeling the heat of his skin flush against theirs.

Five women had spread their legs and felt the fullness of Erik Rexford inside them and looked into his eyes when he reached his climax.

Five women had known—had experienced—the most intimate, private, sacred part of Erik.

My Erik.

Five.

There was never such a hateful number on the face of creation.

No, it wasn’t one hundred or fifty or even ten, but Lord, how a spike of white-hot jealousy skewered her heart, making it race with fury and disappointment and ridiculous, unrealistic regret. Why wasn’t I one, two, three, four, and five? Why couldn’t I have been there instead of someone else?

“Laire?”