It All Started With A Payback

Seventeen: Explain Yourself

"You've got a lot of explaining to do," Louie said later in between bites of his burger. Tori wiped the burger sauce in the corner of his mouth and sucked it from her finger. Just like that, he was getting hard again.

"Stop that," he said his eyes still trained on her lips. "You're distracting me."

Tori's lips quirked in amusement, unabashedly gloating over how little control he had over himself when it comes to her.

There was mischief in her smiling eyes, he soon found out why.

"Would you rather..." she began slowly as she leaned towards him, he stiffened when her tongue lightly passed over the spot where the sauce was. He turned his head and captured her mouth and taught the little minx a lesson.

He plundered her mouth and teased her tongue ruthlessly with his own. His arms wrapped around her and he lifted her onto his lap.

She pulled away from him, "I do that." She said in a low breathless voice that made his blood simmer with desire. Her heavy lidded gaze brought it to a rolling boil in a second.

He ran the pad of his thumb on her lower lip.

"Considering how you drive me insane with lust and everything else I couldn't even identify, I wonder how you managed to remain a virgin for that long," he whispered part in awe and wonder.

"A guy told me once, to give my virginity to someone who deserves it." She whispered back.

He kissed her softly, "Smart guy."

"Of course, the fear of being unwanted and being rejected after seeing me naked had as much bearing as the smart guy's seemingly sound advice." She mumbled, her voice tinged with scorn when she said 'smart guy'."

He cupped the back of her head with his hand and brought their foreheads together. He didn't know if he should be selfishly happy that Tori gave herself to no one else but him or if he should be filled with self-loathing because what he did to her in the past had scarred her badly enough to make her fear intimacy.

Now he understood completely why she fought so hard not to let him get too close to her physically and emotionally so soon.

He had marred making love for her as well as the beauty of being in a meaningful relationship.

It was completely unfair, for Tori had done the opposite for him. It was her who taught her that there was more to a relationship than physical gratification.

She had fillled the void that sleeping around had not filled. Not when he was in highschool and not even when he had grown into a man.

A man. Perhaps physically, there was more to it than that.

Despite what he did to her, how he made her feel; she still chose to forgive him, love him, surrender herself to him completely and allowed herself to be vulnerable again.

That realization hit him hard, as if somebody had punched him in the gut. He swore to himself from that day forward, he would do everything in his power to make him worthy of the amazing woman in his arms.

"You're awfully quiet," observed Tori.

He cradled her face in his palm. "I was just thinking," he brushed his knuckles over her cheek softly, "How unworthy I am of you and how sorry I am that I hurt you so badly. Most of all, how lucky I am that you're willing to take a risk on me again."

Her eyes grew so wide it was comical. She blew out a whistle, "Wow! For someone whose erection was so hard just a few minutes ago it could have impaled me into incapacity, that's deep."