Casey's POV

I had to look in the mirror twice to convince myself that it was really me staring back. Max had been right. The costumes were perfect. I adjusted the pink scarf around my neck again and played with the fringe along the bottom of my bodice, as I smiled back at myself for the hundredth time.

Then there was guilt again, because I couldn't make my mind stopping thinking about wanting Cappie to see me in it. I couldn't stop imagining the look on his face when we saw him at the party.

As I watched myself, a pair of hands suddenly came into view, wrapping around my bare mid-riff. They were closely followed by the rest of Max and I gave him a smile.

" You look gorgeous." He whispered as his placed a few soft kisses to the nape of my neck.

" You don't think it's too much ? Too slutty ?" I asked as I covered his hands with mine.

" Absolutely." He chuckled sending goosebumps along my skin as his breath flitted over my nearly bare shoulders. " All the men at the party will want you to give them three wishes."

I turned in his arms and eased the ridiculously large gold satin headdress from his head and left it fall to the floor behind us. " The Sultan and the Genie." I sighed as I worked my hands over the gold and royal purple satin that covered his shoulders. " Its perfect."

His hands moved up my sides, sliding over my ribcage. I thought for a minute he was going to cup my breasts, but he stopped before he got there and glided back down to my waist.

I sighed. I wanted him to touch me. What the hell was so wrong with me ? Twice now in two days I had men about to touch me then stop before they did. Did I smell bad ? Was my hair flat ?

I considered myself a reasonably attractive woman with healthy curves and all the right parts in all the right places. Was I really just butt-ugly and no one had mentioned this fact to me in all these years ? Was I repulsive ? Repugnant ?

I guess something must have shown on my face although I was trying to remain neutral, because Max put his hands on my shoulders and looked me in the eye. " I think maybe we should talk."

I swallowed. I hated when men said that. It usually meant something terrible was about to happen.

" Okay, what do you want to talk about ?" I asked, still trying to remain casual.

He dropped his hands and went to sit on his bed. Then he patted the spot next to him and I took it.

" We've been going about for a few weeks now." he began.

" A month and two weeks." I interrupted him, but who was counting.

" Okay," he smiled. " Six weeks then. And it has been a fantastic six weeks. I haven't been this happy in a long time."

There sounded like there should have been a but, so I said it for him. " But...."

He smiled again. " No but, how about an 'and' instead."

" Okay," I shrugged. " And.."

He rolled his eyes up to the ceiling and sighed. " I hate this. I'm not good at talking about serious things like this."

I touched his leg and gave him a smile. " Whatever it is, you can tell me. I'll understand."

" I think we should move this to the next level." He finally said, blurting it all out at once like it was something painful he was trying to expel.

I blinked at him in confusion. " Next level ?" I asked. " Are you proposing ?"

He ran his hands through his hair and let out a frustrated breath. " No. " He told me. " Not yet anyway. It's just that.." He trailed off as if he were searching for the right words and didn't find them. Then he dropped from the bed and came to kneel in front of me. " Casey, you are the most wonderful, beautiful woman I've ever known."

I blinked again. Okay, this wasn't so bad. I was liking where this was heading. I reached out and touched his cheek. " That's so sweet. I think you're pretty wonderful too, Max. But I still don't get what you're trying to say here."

He leaned up, bringing his face within inches of mine. His breath touched my lips as he spoke. " I want you so badly I can't breath when we're together."

I pulled back. " Is that what all this is about ?" I asked in shock.

He sat back on his heels and nodded. " Well, yeah. I wanted to talk about it before we did something one of us might regret."

I laughed. I didn't mean to, but the sound was out before I could stop it. He looked like I had kicked him. And I held my hand up to stop his line of thought before it got out of hand.

" Max, I want you, too. I'm sorry I didn't mean to laugh. It's just that you're the first guy I've ever met that felt he needed to ask my permission to have sex with me."

His face fell again. Okay, maybe I wasn't doing this right. Wasn't saying the right things. So I tried again.

I leaned forward so I could cup his jaw in my hand and pull him to me. " I love how sweet you are. Its a very refreshing change for me. But if you don't kiss me, I'm walking out of his room right now."

He looked startled for a moment and I smiled because it seemed like maybe I'd finally said the right thing.

In the next moment, his lips were on mine and his hands were digging into my waist. Yep, that was the right thing, alright.

His mouth moved over mine, his lips were soft, pliant and they felt wonderful sliding over mine. I grabbed his shoulders and pulled him closer as I wrapped my legs around his waist.

I needed this. Needed to feel wanted and desired. After my unresponsive night spent flirty with Cappie, I loved feeling beautiful and lust-inspiring.

His hands trailed down my waist and over my legs until they rested at my pink, sheer covered knees. I could tell he liked the feel of the material under his fingers because he just kept feeling them, flexing and relaxing his hands.

But I wanted him to feel me, not my custom, so I leaned back, dragging him up with me until we were both resting on the bed.

His hands moved back to my waist and his fingertips flitted over the skin there, but only slightly.

What the hell ? Why wouldn't he touch me ? I'd never had this much trouble convincing a guy to feel me up.

I decided that it was going to be up to me to take the initiative.

This was new for me. Evan always liked being the one in control. He liked to make all the moves. And Cappie, well, Cappie was different. With Evan sex was always pretty much the same. We made the same moves, the same sounds, hell we even used the same positions. It came to a point where it was routine. It was a nice routine, but a routine all the same. Then it became a chore. Something I was obligated to do. That's when I knew we were over.

With Cappie, it was never the same. We were unbridled, frenzied and passionate one time. The next it was intimate and needy and loving. Then the next it was all laughter and teasing and fun. Have you ever had a laughing orgasm ? Well, I had. It was one of the most memorable experiences of my life.

Max moved his lips to the column of my neck and found the spot right over my pulse point and started to suck. It was my weakness, my Achilles Heel, so to speak. I suddenly remembered when I'd found out exactly how sensitive that one spot was.

Cappie and I were in his dorm room making out like, well a couple of teenagers. I felt like he had reduced me to nothing more than a throbbing, out of control hormone already. But when he latched onto that spot and began to suck so hard, I was sure he was marking me, I was a goner. It was over for me.

No one else had ever been able to do that to me. Ever.

And Max was no exception. It was nice. His lips made me tingle and I gasped slightly. But it hadn't set me on fire the way it had when Cappie had done it all those years ago.

Damn it. I had to stop. I reminded myself that thinking about Cappie at the moment was wrong and I tried to push the memory of him from my mind.

No more Cappie. I was with Max and it was where I should be. Cappie didn't want me. Max did. Case closed.

I grabbed the pink scarf from around my neck and threw it to the floor. Then I reached behind me and with just a little bit of maneuvering I managed to unhook the pink and red bra and toss it away as well. I figured if I didn't do, Max would never get around to it.

He pulled back from and let his eyes wander over my bare breasts.

My mind instantly snapped back to the night before when I'd asked Cappie if he had ever seen prettier breasts than mine. I should have been embarrassed for even asking him the question, but remembering his answer made it all okay.

No, damn it ! I snapped at myself. No more Cappie.

He was instantly, if only momentarily erased from my mind as Max, finally, finally, leaned down and took my nipple into his mouth. I arched my back into him. He took this as encouragement and wrapped his arms around me, bringing me even further into his mouth.

I decided not to dwell on the fact, that actually I had been trying to get him to suck harder, to apply more pressure. It felt wonderful, but not exactly right. Not perfect.

But it was our first time together. I told myself. We would learn how to touch each other. Learn how to be perfect.

My mind betrayed me again as I immediately thought that Cappie and I had never needed practice to be perfect. That very first time, both of our very first times, in fact, had been perfect. Well maybe not absolutely perfect. But he HAD known exactly how to touch me just right. There was no fumbling about that.

I pinched myself. I actually physically pinched myself. This was becoming ridiculous.

Somehow, I was apparently so lost in my thoughts of another man ( God, I was a horrible, horrible person ) that I hadn't realized that Max had tossed off the robes of his costume until my hands found his bare shoulders.

I let out a startled gasp and he smiled down at me. He had no idea what I was thinking about and that made me feel so guilty I almost ended this whole thing before we really got started.

But I smiled back at him instead, determined to make it all up to him.

The next few moments were filled with the removal of the rest of our clothes. I know that sounds rather bland and truth be told, that was exactly how it felt, bland, ordinary, not really that special.

Now, being undress by Cappie had been one of my favorite experiences.

STOP IT ! I shouted to myself silently.

We managed to find the middle of his bed and we lay there on our sides facing each other for a long few minutes. We didn't talk, didn't move, just looked at each other.

I didn't know what we were doing. I didn't want to look at him, I wanted him to... Okay, no need to be vulgar, but it was what I was thinking.

Since he obviously wasn't going to move, I decided once again to do it for him.

I gave his shoulder a shove, causing him to flop over onto his back then I crawled over him, letting my ' beautiful' ( No, I reminded myself, yet again) breasts dangle in his face.

He leaned up and captured one of them as I settled myself onto his lap.

Okay, what the hell ?