Page 44 of Sex Positive

Because I wanted it to be true.

She shrugs. “He was being an ass and insisting I tell him who I’d slept with. Yours was the first name I thought of since I was seeing you the next day at our peer health event.”

He nods, glancing down the sidewalk. People trickle past them, someone occasionally pushing through the door into the building they just left.

When Wes turns to her again, his face is clear, devoid of worry. “Let me make it up to you.”

Charlie shakes her head. “It’s fine, Quinn. I promise.”

“When does your train leave?”

She glances at her phone. “Three hours.”

“Excellent.” He takes her hand without warning and leads her down the sidewalk. “Enough time to do a sightseeing crash course if we skip all the overcrowded touristy stuff.”

A thrill sweeps through her veins. She quickens her pace, trying to keep up with his long strides, almost convincing herself her cheeks are flushed because she’s practically running. “Are you kidnapping me?”

He laughs, loud and bright, the mid-afternoon sun glinting off his tousled blond hair, and leads her seamlessly down the street in a direction only he knows. His hand is warm and secure around hers. She tries not to imagine those hands touching other parts of her, the rough callouses on his palms gliding over her skin.

They pause at a crosswalk, waiting for the signal to change.

“That’s where your brain went? Always the pessimist.”

“Realist,” she quips.

The light changes, and he tugs her along. “Trust me, okay?”

That’s the problem, she thinks. She’s finding it more and more difficult to keep herself from trusting him again.

Thirteen

Frosted cupcakes, brightlycolored macarons, and elaborately decorated cakes fill the bakery window. Charlie waits outside, per Wes’s request—he disappeared into the shop five minutes ago, a sly smile on his face.

A woman and a young girl with black braids approach the shop, the girl bouncing with excitement. Her puffy winter jacket flaps open, and when the woman calls for her to slow down, she only bares a mischievous grin before disappearing inside, a bell chiming to signal her entrance.

Wes exits a moment later, carrying a white box wrapped with pink string.

“Hold this, please.” He passes it to her before guiding her to an empty table on the shop’s small patio. Once they’re seated across from each other, he gestures to the box. “Open it.”

“What is it?”

“Rogers,” he drawls in that voice that makes her feel like she’s standing next to an open flame. “You’ll see if youopenit.”

Her mouth waters at the sight of a dozen colorful half-dollar–sized cookies resting on a bed of pink tissue paper. “Macarons?”

“I didn’t know what flavor you liked, so I got a variety,” he says. “This place wins awards every year.”

“Are they all for me?”

“No, they’re for Theo, but I wanted you to look at them.” He laughs at the look she shoots him. “Yes. They’re forus, actually.”

A light breeze drifts through her curls, and she tucks one behind her ear. “Which one should I try first?”

“Let’s play a game,” he says. “We’ll try to guess the flavors.”

She hesitates a moment before she says, “All right.”

“Close your eyes.” He laughs when she frowns. “I should probably be offended by how quick you are to think the worst of me.”