It Had to Be You (Chicago Stars #1)(104)

She finally understood what he meant. How could she admit to this worldly man that AIDS hadn’t been a serious issue the last time she’d slept with another man? Stalling, she propped herself up on the pillow with one elbow and gazed at him through a lock of hair that had fallen over her eye. “You sure know how to make a girl feel good about herself.”

“This isn’t a joke.”

“No, it isn’t.” She slipped her legs over the opposite side of the bed and went to the chair where he’d dropped his tuxedo shirt. She didn’t want to have this conversation naked, and she couldn’t bear the idea of struggling back into her dress while he watched. “You don’t have anything to worry about. I’m clean as a whistle.”

“How do you know?”

She slid her arms into the sleeves of his shirt. “I just do.”

“I’m afraid that’s not good enough.”

“There’s nothing to worry about. Take my word for it.” There weren’t any buttons on the shirt, so she wrapped his cummerbund twice around her waist and tied the ends.

“You’re not even looking at me. Are you hiding something?”

“No,” she lied.

“Then sit down so we can talk this through.”

“I don’t have anything else to say. Maybe you’d better take me home.”

He stood. “Not until we have it out. You’re scaring me.”

He didn’t sound scared. He sounded angry. She slipped into her heels. “I was fine at my last physical.”

“When was that?”

“Spring.”

“How many men have there been since then?”

His question was fair, but she still felt sick inside. “Dozens! Everybody knows I’ll sleep with anybody who asks!”

In two long strides, he was at her side. “Dammit, don’t do this! How many?”

“You want names and addresses?” She drew up her lip, trying to look hard and tough.

“Give me numbers first.”

Her eyes began to sting. “You’re going to have to trust me. I’ve told you that you don’t have anything to worry about. My sexual history isn’t any of your business.”

“Right now, it’s very much my business.” He caught her arm, not hurting her, but letting her know she couldn’t get away. “How many?”

“Don’t do this to me!”

“How many, dammit?”

“There haven’t been any! Just you.”

“Right,” he drawled.

His skepticism was the final drop in a night that had been an emotional roller coaster, and tears spilled over her lower lids. “Believe what you want to.” She pulled away from him to head for the door.

His voice softened and he caught her before she could get away, turning her in his arms until she was pressed against his chest. “Don’t cry on me. You don’t have to cry, honey. Just tell me the truth.”

“There hasn’t been anybody for a long time,” she said wearily. “A very long time.”

He pulled back just far enough so he could gaze into her eyes, and she saw that his anger had been replaced by bewilderment. “You’re telling the truth, aren’t you?”

She nodded.

He slid his fingers into her hair and gathered her against the shoulder of his robe. “I don’t understand you at all.”

“I know you don’t,” she whispered.

He drew her over to a cozy arm chair and pulled her into his lap. “What are we going to do about this? You’ve turned me inside out ever since the day we met.” He tucked her head under his chin. “When you said it’s been a long time, are we talking more than a year?”

She nodded.

“More than two?”

She nodded again.

“A lot more?”

Another nod.

“I’m starting to get a glimmer here.” He stroked her hair. “You really loved Flores, didn’t you?”

“More than I’ve ever loved anyone.” Until now, she thought.

“Are you trying to tell me there hasn’t been anyone in your life since then? Is that what this is about? Phoebe, he must have died six or seven years ago?”

She was going to have to do this. They had no hope for a future together unless she had the guts to tell him the truth and let him see her as she was, scars and all. But revealing so much scared her to death.

He didn’t try to restrain her as she rose from his lap and crossed to the bed. She sat on the edge so that she was facing him, with her knees pressed together and her hands clasped in the shirt folds that lay in her lap.

“Arturo was gay, Dan. He wasn’t my lover. In every way that counted, he was my father.”

She had never seen him look so bewildered. “Then I don’t understand anything.”

Placing so much trust in another human being was the most difficult thing she had ever done, but she loved him, and she could no longer live in the shadows. Gathering her courage, she told him about the rape, speaking in broken sentences and twisting her hands as she struggled to explain. She didn’t realize until she saw the outrage on his face that she had been subconsciously preparing herself for disbelief, and the words came more quickly. As she spoke of those awful months in Paris when she’d slept with so many men, he showed no condemnation, only a sympathy that relaxed the tough lines of his face and made her yearn to throw herself into his arms. But she stayed where she was, nearly faltering as she attempted to describe how frozen she had felt for years and how impossible it had been for her to be intimate with anyone.