Because it’s hard to explain. Because I’m embarrassed. Because I’m ashamed. Because I’m terrified there’s nothing I can do. Because I hate that it’s my responsibility and feel like an asshole for feeling that way.

All those responses and more rushed through my mind, but I just shook my head again, unable to say a single one of them.

Giana let out a long exhale, then nodded, as if she’d heard what I couldn’t dare to say. “Okay,” she said. “Then use me.”

I frowned, especially when she crawled over to sit between my legs. She sat on her knees in front of me, forcing me to open my stance, to unclasp my hands and let her in. She quite literally forced her way in until I had no choice but to look at her.

I was devastated when I did.

It wasn’t her curly hair, a bit frizzy from the game and a long day before that. It wasn’t the freckles on her cheeks, or the soft moonlight reflected in her aqua eyes. It wasn’t even her brick-red-and-gold plaid skirt, the modest black blouse she’d paired with it, or the knee-high black stockings that drove me mad anytime she wore them.

It was how she looked at me.

It was how she watched me with so much care and reverence that I was fucking speechless, unable to move, unable to do anything but watch her in return.

“Use me to take your mind off whatever it is that’s hurting you, to escape.” She swallowed. “Give me another lesson.”

I let out a shaky breath through my nose, ready to argue that now wasn’t the time, but her lips silenced me before I could. She leaned forward, kissing me slowly and confidently, her hands framing my face as mine came to her waist like it was the most natural thing in the world.

“I need you. Show me what’s next,” she breathed against my mouth, her lips hovering there as she added, “And this time, I want you to go first.”

I frowned when she kissed me again, squeezing her hips a little as I pulled back. “What do you mean?”

“I mean that last time you were left without a release,” she clarified, and then with all the confidence of a woman who knew everything instead of the shyness of a girl asking me to show her, she climbed into my lap, the heat of her against my abdomen as she settled into place. “Tonight, I want to make you feel good first. I want…” She swallowed, like she was ashamed, but then held her chin a bit higher and looked me right in the eyes. “I want you to show me how to taste you.”

Jesus fucking Christ.