LEAD ME ON by Julie Ortolon (find a book to read TXT) 📕

out a package of ground beef. She dropped that onto the counter beside the bowl and started gathering the other ingredients for a meat loaf.

“Wanna tell me about it?” He came off the sofa and took a seat on a barstool across from her.

“What makes you think there’s something to tell?”

She grabbed a meat cleaver and chopped an onion in two with one brutal stroke.

“I don’t know, but I sure am glad I’m not that onion.”

She looked up with the knife still in her hand. “I just want to know one thing. Am I ugly? Do I have a huge wart on my nose that everyone but me can see? Do I have body odor? What?”

“That’s more than one question, but the answers are no, no, no, and what the hell are you talking about?”

“Men!” She attacked the onion, chopping with a vengeance.

“Uh, since I happen to fall in that category, do you think you could put the meat cleaver down before we continue this discussion?”

“There’s nothing to discuss.” She set the knife aside and scraped the onion into the bowl.

“Good. I’m too tired for a discussion that starts off with a woman saying ‘Men!’ ”

“Blind cretins. Or maybe I’m invisible.” She added bread crumbs and an egg, and started working them into the meat with her hand. “They never even look at me, much less ask me out, or so much as make a pass at me.”

“Are we talking about a general ‘they’ or a specific ‘they’?”

“We’re talking about a Scott Lawrence ‘they.’ ” She shook some spices into the meat mixture. “He wants to have sex.”

“Excuse me!”

“Scott Lawrence came to Galveston hoping to play a little beach blanket bingo.”

“He told you that?” Adrian came halfway off the barstool.

“Sure did.”

Adrian plopped back down, stunned. “Do you want me to beat him up?”

“Yes, actually I do.” She continued squeezing the ingredients through her fingers. “I want you to break both his kneecaps for insulting me.”

“I can’t believe he propositioned you.”

“He didn’t.”

“Okay, now you lost me.” Adrian held his hands up.

She glared at her brother. “Scott Lawrence told me he needed to do some ‘serious relaxing,’ which apparently includes recreational sex. The thought of having it with me, however, never crossed his mind.”

Adrian gave his head a quick shake, as if to clear it. “Let’s back up here. How do you know it didn’t cross his mind?”

“Because... he didn’t even try to make a pass at me.” She pulled out a Pyrex baking dish and transferred the meat mixture into it.

“That doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to,” Adrian said. “More likely, he just figured out you’re not the beach-blanket-bingo type. You’re more the ‘Let’s buy a house with a picket fence and have a couple of kids’ type.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “You’re saying a man can tell that after a few brief encounters?”

“Nooo, I’m saying a man can tell that after a few seconds. Like that hot number who checked in a few minutes ago—now there’s a candidate for beach blanket bingo.”

“Well, apparently Scott agrees with you, because they have a date tonight.”

“Man.” Adrian gave a low whistle of admiration. “Touchdown on the first play.”

“Cretins,” she growled and stalked to the sink to wash her hands. Yet all the questions whirling in her head wouldn’t go away. “Adrian ...”

“Yes?”

She shouldn’t ask. It was too embarrassing. But this was her brother, and if she couldn’t ask him, who could she ask? Drying her hands, she turned to face him. “Is there really such a thing as recreational sex? I mean, I know you men claim you can do it without any emotion involved, but... do you think it’s possible for a woman?”

“Sure.” He shrugged. “For some women, anyway.”

“What do you mean, ‘some women’?”

“People want different things out of life. Some women are focused on their careers, or they haven’t found Mr. Right, or they’ve just come out of a bad relationship and don’t want to get seriously involved for a while, or any number of things. But not wanting emotional involvement doesn’t mean they want to do without men altogether. As much as women like to bitch about us, admit it, there are times when y’all like a man’s company. Especially when it comes to what a man can do for you in the bedroom. Well”—he backpedaled—“not you personally.”

“No, of course not me.” She suppressed a twinge of hurt. Her experience with sex was so limited and so far in the past, she was likely a born-again virgin. “Adrian ... do you think there’s something wrong with me? Something that repels men?”

“No, there’s nothing wrong with you. I assumed you didn’t date because ...” Because you were so badly hurt the one time you did. The words hung between them, unspoken, but there. “Because you didn’t want to.”

“I’m not sure what I want.” She dropped her gaze to the towel and continued wiping her hands. “I know I’m not interested in getting married.”

“Why not?”

“I’m just not.” She looked up and saw the doubt in his eyes. “I’m serious. I have no interest whatsoever in marriage. But lately I’ve been wondering ... don’t you think it’s unhealthy to be completely asexual?”

“I don’t know.” He shrugged. “Nuns do it all the time. Or rather, nuns don’t do it.”

“I’m not a nun.”

“No, you’re not.” He sighed. “But if you’re thinking of having an affair with a man based solely on sex, don’t. You’re not cut out for it.”

“How do you know?”

“Alli, I’ve known you your whole life. You aren’t capable of sharing something that intimate with a man and not getting emotionally involved. Which is why men don’t hit on you. When the right one comes along, though, you’ll both fall like rocks, and live happily ever after, just like Rory and Chance.”

“I told you, that’s not what I want.”

“Of course it is. All women want that, eventually.”

“God. Men!” She tossed the dishcloth onto the counter. “You think you know everything.”

“That’s because we do.” He grinned at her. “Now, are you going to