Gio’s dark eyes narrow. His entire body tenses, pulling away from me, and I catch his face in my hands.

“Please—don’t go.”

“I wouldn’t fucking dream of it.” He says the words like he means them, but he’s the picture of frustration, his mouth turned down at the corners, eyes black. “Tell me,” he demands, the muscles of his arms tensing. He’s holding himself up over me, and all his want is coiled under his skin.

My lips buzz with nerves, and I lick them, a habit to remind myself that they’re still mostly fine. God. I should have let him go through with it, and damn the consequences. How could it have been wrong, to let Gio do what he so desperately wants to do? It’s nothing that other women haven’t done before. Other women all across the city are probably doing it right now, without a care in the world—

“Sia. Speak.”

“I’m a virgin.” I let out a hard exhale. “I’ve never—” My hands tremble and I slide them down to his shoulders. “I’ve never done this with anyone.”

Gio’s jaw works, and the breath he lets out is measured. An ancient patience comes to his eyes and a steely expression descends over his face. “A virgin.” It’s like he’s confirming that, yes, I have in fact made it to the age of nineteen without fucking anyone.

“Yes.” The air hangs heavy with my admission, and a storm rages beneath my skin. A cold front of guilt meets hot impatience and explodes into a rain of lust and hope. “Maybe it’s stupid, but—” The last of the sunlight is disappearing from behind the curtains, that last orange kiss of the sunset reflecting off the buildings outside. I’m here now, in the truth, and I might as well bare it all to him. “I always thought I’d wait until I was married.”

It’s a ridiculous thing, old-fashioned and uptight, and even as shame works its way across my cheeks I pull out all the available arguments. I never found the right man. I wanted it to mean something. I wanted—I wanted— I wait for the inevitable scoff, the dismissal. Most guys I knew in college didn’t want to fuck around with a virgin. Or, worse, they only wanted to fuck around with a virgin.

But Gio doesn’t laugh. He doesn’t scoff. He holds my gaze for several long heartbeats, the solid weight of him hovering above me, and then bends his head to my collarbone. He kisses me there as if he’s kissing the holiest object he’s ever seen.

When he raises his face again, his eyes are black with determination.

“Okay.” He says the word firmly, as if he’s made a decision.

I brace myself on my elbows while the final glimmer of the sunset fades, pitching the room the same glow as the streetlights outside. “Okay?” God, I hate how hesitant I sound, how unsure of myself. I never felt unsure of myself with Gio when we were in school. Now? Now I’m a mess. I’m a tangled mess of hope and desire and guilt and fear, and at the base of me I’m wet for him. I’m half furious with myself for stopping him and half relieved that I said the words in time to avoid any future regrets.

He stalks toward the window and yanks the curtain back, letting more of the city light inside. His hands work at his belt. He zips his pants. He threads the belt through the clasp. Every movement is strong, muscled, and god, he could have killed me. It shouldn’t be romantic, the thought that he didn’t—hasn’t yet—but something inside my chest warms and expands. That is the depth of his feeling for me. His family is all-important, but I turned him away from their demands.

Another wash of guilt. I don’t know why he feels this way about me, only that he must. It’s fucking ridiculous, but I can’t help knowing the weight of his family, the meaning of them. I never got to experience it that way, so I feel the absence like a phantom limb. Gio breathes, his shoulders rising and falling.

There’s a shift in the air.

He turns his head to face me, and the frission of his excitement moves up and down my spine at lightning speed. “Gio?”

“I know what to do.”

“What?”

Gio is at the side of the bed in an instant, reaching for me. I let him help me into a sitting position, my legs over the edge, toes brushing against the carpeted floor. My heart thumps madly. The fact that I’m completely naked and he’s fully clothed is a distant one. My trembling excitement keeps me warm.

He looks down at me and strokes one hand over my hair. Then, in a movement that’s so graceful it hurts to watch, Gio gets down on one knee. He takes my hands in his. He is dark-eyed, dark-haired, and those pools of black desire are lit with something else. Something fiercer.

“I found the way out,” he says, voice even. “The way out of all of this. And the way into—” A slow smile that makes me burn for him, hot from the inside out. “And a way into the future. Together.”

“What is it?” Even kneeling on the floor, I taste his strength in the air.

Gio takes a deep breath, as if he’s preparing to dive into deep water. “Marry me.”