When he takes my hand, and leads me to his motorcycle, I know for certain this man is not like the guys inside that club. I told Colette and Gretchen earlier that if I was to go home with a man he had to be rugged and real. Callahan is exactly that.

He hands me a motorcycle helmet and I strap it on. He raises a brow at me. “You may be a couture model, but you look fucking adorable in that.” He slaps my ass then and tells me to jump on. I don’t hesitate.

Suddenly, I don’t feel like I’m in Los Angeles anymore. Suddenly, I feel like I’m back home, with one of the guys I grew up with. Guys who smoke cigarettes and drink Bud Light, watch NASCAR and name their rifles.

Okay, maybe Callahan is not quite that country, but he isn’t a city slicker either. He wears dark denim jeans, a simple T-shirt, black leather boots, and he knows how to ride this bike. He revs the engine, turns on the lights, and tells me to hold on.

Right now, I don’t want to let go.

Right now, I want this man to take me where I’ve never gone before.

We cruise through the city, and then we’re on the freeway, and I grip Callahan tighter, holding onto him as if I’m holding on for dear life. We swerve between cars, and before I know it we’ve exited an off ramp and he’s pulling up to a building as unassuming as the warehouse the club was situated in.

“This is home?” I ask.

He helps me off the bike, unbuckles my helmet and stows it underneath the seat. He looks at me like he has a secret, but that doesn’t scare me, everyone has some sort of secret. Something they’d rather keep under lock and key. Especially in a city like this.

My secret, I guess, isn’t such a secret anymore. I already told Gretchen and Colette.

I’m a virgin. I’ve been kissed, but not well.

And never by someone who meant anything to me. And I’m not saying Callahan means something to me, goodness I’ve only known him an hour. But I don’t know... can’t someone mean something to you in that short amount of time?

And I’m not talking love at first sight, rainbows, and roses—I mean can’t someone mean something to you even if you don’t quite know what that is yet?

Because tonight Callahan took me away from a club where I didn’t belong, and he held my face toward his in the alley, and he made me smile and laugh after I was affronted by those thugs.

He literally whisked me away from the place I didn’t want to be. So, yes, Callahan does mean something to me. And now, at the entrance to his place, he is offering me not only himself but a chance to experience something I’ve always wanted.

A man’s body against mine, touching me, opening me up, and making me a woman.

“What are you thinking?” he asks taking my hand in his, and I love that it is so much larger than mine, and even though I’m tall, he’s taller, and I like that about him. He’s all man and I don’t feel like that Amazonian woman who is too big for everything when I’m next to him. Next to him, right now, I feel safe. I feel like I fit.

I feel like all the bad things in the world are far, far away.

Right now, there’s just us.

“I’m thinking about what’s going happen when we get inside your place,” I tell him, not intending to hide anything from him—who I am and who I’m not. Because if he thinks I’m some experienced woman who knows her way around a lover, he’s got another think coming.

“And what are you hoping happens?” he asks, entering a security code and leading us through the entrance, into a service elevator. The doors close behind us.

“I’m hoping you can show me a good time?” I say with a lilt to my voice I wasn’t expecting. I wouldn’t say I’m confident, but I’m not shy either. But right now, in this small square elevator, I feel vulnerable. I know I’m on the precipice of something entirely new. Something I’ve never experienced before. I want it. I want it with Callahan.

But I also don’t know how to say it.

“I didn’t peg you as someone who couldn’t say what they wanted?” Callahan says as the elevator doors open, he tugs at my wrist and leads me from the elevator into a loft apartment that is sprawling.

His place is the entire floor. His job as a bartender at the A-List Fuck Club must pay him pretty well because, every surface, though modern and industrial, is still magazine worthy.

But fancy houses have never done much for me. And I’m not wooed by his in this moment either. Right now, I’m not in the mood for thinking about his granite counter tops or plank wood flooring—right now I only have eyes for him.

“I know what I want. I just—” I try, shaking my head feeling my face flush. How do I tell him I’m never been French-kissed? How do I tell him I’ve never been naked in front of a man? How do I tell him I’ve never had a man spread my legs apart and press himself into me?

Deep.

Until I moaned.

Until I came.

Until I was split apart.

“You just what?” He wraps his arms around my waist and pulls me to him. He is so suave. It’s obvious he’s done this before—brought women to this apartment, seduced them—and for that I am grateful.

I want Callahan to lead the way because as much as I want this I don’t exactly know where I’m going.

I shake my head ever so slightly. The space between my thighs is hot and warm. Wanting.

“I see,” Callahan says, nodding softly, with his hand on the small of my back, pulling me toward his chest until there is no space between us at all.

Until there is nothing but his hot breath on my ear as he tucks back a strand of hair. “You want me to take charge tonight?”

“Please,” I tell him. My voice is small, but it is clear. “Please take control of me.”

His cock is hard against my belly as he growls his desire, and when he presses his mouth against mine, I grow wet for him all over again.

My lips part; his tongue finds mine.

Oh, this is more than I ever thought it would be. This is a want becoming a need. A desire becoming a craving. My body has an itch that needs to be scratched.

Callahan steps back, I follow. Then two steps, three steps, four. His mouth lowers and finds my breasts. He rips down the fabric and kisses them greedily. He takes another step back, then another, and another. We stop, his bed is to the right of us and I wonder how we will get from here to there. I’ve never done this before... I want it to go right.

But I don’t need to worry. I’m not in charge.

Callahan is.

I gave him permission and he’s taking what is his. My body. Right now.

He unzips the back of my dress, and in seconds it is on the floor. I blink hard, grateful I wore matching panties and bra tonight. I smile as I remember the way Gretchen insisted I do so. I’m grateful I listened.

Callahan’s eyes are all over me, he’s taking me in, drinking me up with his eyes and it feels good to be seen like this. Not like a thing, but a like a person who can give and take, a person made to receive.

In his apartment, there is only the shining light of the moon streaming through the big wide windows that cover an entire wall of this place. Looking out of the window I can see the entire city sprawled out as far as the eye can see. It’s breathtaking, but not as thrilling as what’s happening right in front of me.

What’s happening to me.

Callahan unbuttons his jeans and steps out of them. He pulls off his shirt, seemingly steady, not at all intimidated or trying to prove anything. He stands before me in his briefs, his cock stretching them. I can see the outline and it’s massive and tempting and more than I believe will fit inside me. But I want to try.

My nipples harden as I take in the ladder of abs that stretch up his body, his biceps are so big that both my hands wouldn’t fit around them. He’s all man, and right now he’s letting me know he’s all mine.

He cocks his head to the side, and my eyes follow his. “That’s my bed,” he tells me. “And I’m gonna take those panties off you. And then you’re going to lie in the center of it. Understand?”

I nod, liking his detailed approach of what happens next. My body is piqued at the notion of him stripping me to nothing.

“Do you want me to take off my heels?” I ask.

He shakes his head. “Women only wear heels like that when they want to get fucked.”

I raise an eyebrow, not knowing that was the purpose of these shoes, but not arguing either. I reach my hand back and unclasp my bra, tossing it to the floor.

Over the last few weeks as a model, I’ve undressed what feels like a thousand times in front of other people. Any modesty I held left the moment I stepped off the plane and arrived at LAX. So, the idea of getting naked for Callahan doesn’t shock me or embarrass me. Besides, I’ve been wanting this opportunity for years. Now it’s mine for the taking. Goodness knows I’m not going to find the kind of man I wanted in Resting, Indiana.

But I sure as heck didn’t expect to find the man I imagined taking me the second week I lived in LA.

“You’re so fucking beautiful.” Callahan’s hands run over my breasts and he rolls my nipples between his thumb and forefinger.

“Well, you’re pretty handsome yourself,” I tell him my hands running over his chest, over his shoulders, wanting to touch every surface of his chiseled body.

“I want to see your pussy,” he tells me. “And I want to kiss it the same way I kissed your lips.” I inhale sharply, his words sending waves of desire through me, rolling past my belly, making my panties wet, my pussy ache.

He pulls down my panties, and they fall to the floor. I step out of them and then I am before him, completely naked, in nothing but a pair of four-inch heels.

“Damn, woman, is there anything wrong with you?” he asks, his hand running over his jaw as he steps back and takes me in.

I shake my head embarrassed at his compliments, knowing there is plenty wrong with me. I’m insecure, and I have a hard time trusting people. I’m loyal to a fault and sometimes can’t see the truth because I’m so fixated on the idea of something that isn’t real.

I’m not perfect even though my body seems made for a runway.

“You’re modest,” he tells me. When I don’t answer, he adds, “but you also don’t see what I see, do you?”

I shake my head softly, never having seen myself the way people like Danny Bruneau, who signed me, see me.

I’m just a girl who grew up on a farm, who came to the city to save the place where her dad still lives. Wanting to save it before my Grandma dies, though she’s been sick in bed so long, I wonder if that’s even possible.

I’m just a girl who’s here for the money, a sellout, a fake. I’m not a supermodel. Deep down I don’t need to be anyone at all.

“It’s time for you to get in my bed, sweetie.”

I nod, then step away from him and crawl into his bed. On all fours, I know my ass is in the air, and I can imagine his eyes on it. It emboldens me—imagining him enjoying the view so much, and then I’m on my back, my head on a pile of pillows, my finger motioning him to come closer.

He pulls off his boxers, his cock standing at attention, huge and thick and ready.

“Don’t make me lie in this bed alone,” I tell him.

He strokes himself as he walks toward me, and I spread my legs as I watch him touch himself, needing to touch myself too.

“Oh, baby,” he tells me. “I won’t make you do anything alone if you don’t want too, but I sure like watching you touch yourself.”

“I know I said you were in charge tonight, but can I tell you one thing I want?” I ask.

Callahan’s on the bed, on his knees, spreading my legs with one hand pressed to my pussy. My body melts against him, his tender touch everything I never knew I needed.

“Tell me,” he says, flicking his finger against my wet clit.

“I want you to fuck me—really fuck me,” I moan. “I want you to fuck me like it’s the first time you’ve ever had a woman.”

Callahan’s fingers press deeper into my folds, my back arches as he moves up and down my slit.

“And why is that?” he asks.

“Because it’s the first time I’ve ever had a man.”

He looks deep into my eyes. “Are you telling me, as I’m two fingers deep in your pussy, that you’re a virgin?”

I nod, cheeks hot, hoping it doesn’t turn him off, push him away.

“Damn, Jules.” He smiles then, easing my worry. “You told me not to use cheesy one-liners, but I can’t help it. I feel like I just won the goddamn lottery.”

I grin because he’s grinning, and I feel pleasure rolling through me at the realization that I am giving him a gift. One he wants to receive.

“So, will you?” I ask.

“Oh, Jules, I’m gonna fuck you. But I’m not gonna fuck you like it was my first time. My first time was when I was 15 years old and didn’t know the first thing about a woman’s body.”

“But now?” I ask. “Now you know?”

“Oh baby, now I know everything.” Then he lowers his mouth to the space between my thighs, his tongue on my pussy, knowing exactly what to do.