Dating a Metro Man
had felt about it, Jenna felt committed to the man inside her. She didn’t want that connection, didn’t want to feel the way she did. Her heart was breaking again, and she needed to be alone.
    She needed another kind of release now and needed it quickly.
    Tears hovered, waiting to fall, but Jenna battled them away. All she had done during the months she hadn’t been able to touch Seth like this was cry while she wanted to and he didn’t. She had no intention of stripping herself emotionally bare and bawling her eyes out in front of Seth over finally getting what she wanted from him.
    After a few long minutes of resting deeply inside her, Seth rolled them to their sides to relieve Jenna of his weight. He was disappointed when she pulled away and disconnected their bodies the first chance she got.
    Jenna rolled back to her back again and closed her eyes at last. Unfortunately, it didn’t block out the memories she was reliving. She took several deep breaths until she could trust herself to speak without dissolving. “Seth, I want you to leave. When I open my eyes again, I don’t want to see you beside me or above me. I’m just going to lie here while you gather your things and go,” she said firmly.
    “Jenna,” Seth began, feeling the hurt and anger rolling off her in waves. It was just like that day he kissed her in her bedroom. He stopped trying to talk when she held up a hand. A single tear rolled out of one eye and down her face to the carpet, making him want to die.
    “I’m sorry if I hurt you. I didn’t mean to,” he said, wretchedly close to tears himself.
    “You didn’t hurt me, Seth, at least not physically. This—this madness was probably inevitable, but I just wasn’t in the same mental place you were about having sex today. I’m—embarrassed about being with you, and maybe a little in shock that it actually happened after all this time. Just go, okay? I need to be alone right now. I’ll be fine. Just stay away from me for a while until I come to terms with this.”
    Seth stood and pulled his clothes back on, thinking how much he really didn’t want to leave Jenna this way. But what choice did he have? Jenna lay on the floor with her eyes squeezed tightly shut and wouldn’t even look at him.
    Somehow he made his feet take him across the room away from her.
    After Seth closed her front door softly behind him, he stood in the hallway wondering if he could wait her out and if she would let him back in to talk.
    Then he heard Jenna crying, the sound of her loud, tortured sobbing tearing him apart inside.
    Shame engulfed him. Had he forced her, he now wondered? Hadn’t Jenna wanted him as much he wanted her? Could he have been so wrong about what was between them?
    He remembered her two climaxes and knew that she had desired him. Still she had told him more than once that she didn’t want to want him anymore.
    The emotional pain of listening to her cry and not being able to do anything about it did not help the stress and tension he already felt. Knowing he was going to be physically sick if he stayed to listen much longer, Seth rushed out of her building to avoid leaving a final humiliation in front of her door.
    *** *** ***
    The crowd at Eddy’s was thick, and Casey was glad that he’d gotten there early enough to get a quiet booth away from the rest. He saw Seth come through the door and look around for him, so Casey waved a hand until Seth saw him. Seth had a two-day growth of beard and a deep frown that would scare anyone that looked at him.
    For the first time, Casey genuinely saw himself in the younger man he had raised. How well he knew that look was not good news for Seth’s emotional state. He’d seen that look in the mirror for months after Susan had died.
    “Hey,” Casey said, as Seth dropped his body into the seat across from him.
    “Hey,” Seth said back.
    “What’s up?” Casey said lightly, not wanting to seem too anxious to extract information, even though he was.
    “I

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