The Reluctant Read Online Free Page B

first week with him.
    He finished his own mouthful before
answering. “Yes?” For some reason, he sounded
apprehensive.
    “Are you drugging me?”
    He laughed nervously. “What makes you
think that?”
    “I’m comfortable with you,” I answered
carefully. “I shouldn’t be. I know I shouldn’t be, yet I’m here
with you, playing Xbox and eating spaghetti like we’ve been dating
for years. I haven’t even wanted to call my parents to let them
know that I’m alive.”
    He smiled shyly, an increasingly
endearing trait since he had no problem touching my body at any
time I felt like it. “I tried to tell you before that there are
things you should know about me.”
    Before when I asked him about his job,
he had coyly danced around not answering me. I dropped my
fork.
    “You’re a drug dealer?” I asked
shakily. I wanted to feel angry. I knew it at my core, but for some
reason, my brain didn’t respond.
    He waved away my words. “No, no, no.
Nothing like that, baby. There are certain things about my body
that you should know.”
    Like so many other things about Will,
I felt oddly relieved that I wasn’t correct in my assumptions.
“I’ve seen your body—all of it,” I said boldly.
    He nodded. “Yes, and your calmed state
is a reaction to it.”
    “That doesn’t make any sense. The sex
was good, but it’s been days.”
    “Do you know about
pheromones?”
    I reached hazily back into my basic
education. Remember, I was only nineteen at this point, not the
strongest student as indicated by my reluctance to enter college
right after high school, but neither was I stupid.
    “Aren’t they chemicals or something?
Like when girls’ periods sync up when spending a lot of time
together?”
    “Right,” he said instantly to make me
feel smart. He flattered me like that, and I definitely had no
problem letting him.
    “That’s what’s doing it.”
    I pushed my plate away, digesting what
he had just told me along with my few bites of spaghetti. “And I
thought only bees had sex pheromones. Wait, you’re doping
me?”
    “Yes. Pretty much, my presence makes
you drunk.”
    A giggle burst forth from my lips and
I fought to stifle it. “Well, no more Friday nights at the bar for
me. I’ve got my boy and my beer right here.”
    He laughed quietly. “I’m not a
boy.”
    I gave a wan smile. “I’m sorry. You’re
a man, but still, other men don’t make me feel this
way.”
    And yes, he was a man. His physical
attributes confirmed this, and he appeared beautifully
proportioned. Twenty-four with a Master’s degree in business, he
was more man than anyone else I knew.
    “ That’s not exactly what I
meant.”
    I leaned over playfully to nip his ear
and stared meaningfully at his crotch. “Well, I know you’re not
possessed of any female anatomy, so you’ll have to explain yourself
thoroughly.”
    Will sighed, a sound of great burden
that made me want to enfold him in my arms. “I’m scared to tell
you.”
    I reached for him, but he flinched and
drew back. “You can tell me,” I coaxed, my hand still hanging in
the air. His whole body went rigid.
    “No, I have to go,” he said as if
grinding his teeth.
    He vanished from the kitchen quickly
without a further word, even before I could ask him to stay. What
was he scared of? I heard the back door slam behind him. I wasn’t
quite sure how to react. Flabbergasted is a word that I don’t get
to use too often, so we’ll call it that.
    I stared hard at my abandoned
spaghetti. I realized that I could have been free if the
inclination took me. I had no desire to run back to the life of
living with a mother and father who were annoyingly attentive, and
no ambition to enroll in college or get a job. Dallying with this
stranger seemed like a good option at this juncture in my life. All
I wanted was to wait for Will to return with or without his
pheromones intact.
    And I may not have wanted to escape at
that moment, but I did want to see the outside. We had