Enchanted (The Accidental Billionaires #4)(34)

His eyes were wild as they met and held mine. “You think I’m sorry?”

I nodded slowly.

“I’m not. Fuck! How could I be?” he asked in an urgent tone. “I’m just a little stunned. I only wish I had known before we were at the point of no return. I would have been more careful. I wouldn’t have rushed things.”

“I didn’t want to go slow,” I told him. “I was beyond ready.”

“Why me?” he asked gruffly.

I shrugged. “Why not? It’s the first time I’ve ever really wanted to be with someone. I’m not going to get all freaked out over it. I told you, no strings attached. I just wanted to be . . . with you.” The last thing I wanted was for him to feel like he owed me anything because he was my first.

“Christ! And I was worried about my inexperience,” he grumbled. “Why in the hell didn’t you tell me?”

Noah sounded hurt, and I hated that. “I was afraid you’d be uptight about it,” I explained. “Or that you’d stop. Losing my virginity just isn’t a major life event to me.”

He shot me a sharp glance. “Taking your innocence was a major life event for me.”

I reached out and stroked his rough jawline. “Don’t make it that way. All I wanted was to be with you. Being a virgin wasn’t something I prized. It’s just the way things rolled. No hot guy in my life; no sex.”

“You consider me that hot guy?” He gave me a dubious look.

I smiled at him. “The hottest one I’ve ever met. I find you completely irresistible, Noah Sinclair.”

He leaned forward and gave me a gentle kiss before he said, “You’re crazy.”

“You’re gorgeous,” I shot back at him.

Really, my attraction to Noah wasn’t all physical, even though he was breathtakingly handsome.

I’d seen plenty of beautiful men, but they’d never made me feel the way Noah did.

There was something else that drew me to him, and I was helpless to explain it. It was honestly inexplicable. He was like a part of me that had been missing before we met.

I craved him like I needed to be connected to him to be whole.

I was telling him the absolute truth when I’d said that I’d never felt this way before, and that I’d never really wanted to be with anyone else.

“It’s hard to believe that you didn’t hook up with anybody in college,” he mused.

I tensed. “I told you that I dropped out to travel.”

“But you attended for two years before that.”

“Maybe I was just waiting for you,” I teased.

Even as I said those words, I had to wonder if there wasn’t a lot of truth to them. I’d gone out with a few guys during my first year of college, but the connection had just never been there for me.

They’d been attractive.

They’d been intelligent.

They’d been nice.

But there had been nothing there for me. Nada. Nothing. Zilch.

I’d had no desire to get down and dirty with a single one of them.

“You do realize that your opportunity to experiment is over. You’re stuck with me,” he grumbled.

I laughed. “No strings, remember?”

“I’m about ready to tie you to me with some very thick rope. Fuck the strings.” He shot me a warning glance. “This wasn’t just a fling for me, Andie. I don’t do flings. I’ve wanted to fuck you since day one.”

I shivered. Obviously, he’d felt the same chemistry I had when we’d first seen each other again. I wasn’t sure why that surprised me. Maybe because he’d hid it so well in the beginning. “I thought you considered me a flake since I dropped out of college to ‘flit’ around the world.”

He shook his head. “If I gave you that impression, I didn’t mean it. We’ve just lived such different lives. I spent most of my adult life taking care of my family, trying to make sure that they were going to be okay. You grew up wealthy.”

“And really lonely,” I confessed. “The money has never meant that much to me.”

“I get that now,” he said, his tone full of remorse. “I felt pretty alone, too. I just never admitted that to anyone. I couldn’t.”

“I think that’s where we’re a lot alike,” I pondered. “It doesn’t matter that I was set financially, and you were counting pennies. Neither one of us really had anybody to talk to about how we felt. The only one I had was Owen, and even though he’s been the most amazing friend I could ask for, he was surrounded by family who supported him. You get what it’s like to not really have anybody because you had to be the strongest one, the head of your family.”

“I needed them to think I was strong,” he agreed. “I felt like I needed to keep that facade in place. If I didn’t, who could they go to with their problems?”

“But where did you go for your strength?”

He grimaced. “I remembered my promise to my mom.”

I rolled closer to him, and he spooned me as I said, “That vow was what kept you going.”

“Always.”

I relished the feel of his powerful body at my back, both of us naked, our skin finally pressed together. I felt protected and cherished as he wrapped an arm around me and pulled me as tightly against him as possible.