While she’s been talking, the first shot has gone down. Sam pushes the other toward me. I’ve already got a pleasant buzz.
“Now I might be happily married, but that doesn’t stop me wondering. What’s Mouse like in the sack? He all dominant?”
My face glows. If it wasn’t for the alcohol, I’d probably be more cautious, but I find myself saying, “I don’t know.”
Her eyebrows rise. “The way he looks at you, Mariana, I’m surprised.”
“The way he looks at me?”
“Like a starving man, my dear.”
I cast my eyes toward the man in question. “He does?”
“Yeah.” She leans in conspiratorially, “If you can’t see it, that leads me to suspect you haven’t got much experience.”
“None,” the alcohol makes me admit.
“You could do a lot worse than him.”
“He could do better,” I retort.
After looking at me carefully, she starts to speak. “One night, before I got pregnant again, I was with Drummer and the guys. We all got a few drinks inside us. One of them, Beef I think it was, asked Mouse why he didn’t go with the whores.” When she pauses, I regard her eagerly, wanting to hear what his reply had been. “He might not have used the exact words, but he said, for him, sex had to mean something.”
I gaze down at my shot, unable to understand what she’s saying.
“If he wants you, and I put money on it that he does, it wouldn’t just be because you’re convenient. It would be because he really wants you.”
I flick my eyes toward the bar again. Tse’s still talking, but every so often he turns to check I’m okay.Always looking out for me.Like he’s done from the first day we met. Taking care of me when I needed someone.Is there more to it?“He could break my heart,” I admit.
“You could break his.”
I shake my head. I doubt it.
Her hand covers mine. “Isn’t it worth taking a chance? These men don’t claim ol’ ladies lightly. Oh, I know you got married. But to them, claiming you is a lot more than that.”
My head tilts to the side.Is it?I didn’t understand that. Tse told me he’d claimed me back in Colombia. Did he really mean something by it?
“I’m scared,” I admit. “Those days when I was kept in the basement of my father’s house. Men forced women right in front of me. I was so scared they’d hurt me next. They didn’t, but those screams, the women…”
Sam pushes the remainder of my second shot in front of me. “If you are a virgin, no wonder you’re traumatised by what you saw. Mouse isn’t like that. He’s not going to force you. He’s never done anything to hurt you, has he?”
My head shakes side to side slowly. “He’s not made a move on me.”
Drummer comes in and beckons Sam to him. With an apologetic smile, awkwardly with one hand on her huge belly, she gets up and leaves. I pick up the almost empty glass and drain it. Her words echo through my brain; I sift through them selectively.Tse wants sex to mean something.Then my last response.He’s never made a move on me.
That proves it, doesn’t it? When he promised he wouldn’t touch me, it wasn’t hard for him at all.He doesn’t want me.
He’d told me that consummating our marriage wouldn’t be a problem for him.
But once he’d known I was a virgin, he’d backed right off.
I sit. Undecided.Does he want me or not?
Chapter 37
Mouse
Seeing Sam’s left Mariana alone, I slap Blade on the back. “Gotta see to my ol’ lady.”
