The little silicone shaft was no bigger than my ring finger, but it still burned as my body clamped around it. I stopped, letting my muscles adjust, while my ears strained for any noise from the living room. Was that a creak of the couch? A deep murmur from beyond the doorway?
I breathed through the burn and let the silence pulse around me.
It would have been better to imagine anything else, but the only thing that came to mind was my wedding night. I imagined what it would’ve felt like not to stop. To invite Gideon into my body. To feel him shudder and gasp as he slid inside me. To watch him come apart, and to be able to chase my pleasure wherever it would lead.
The burn lessened as the minutes passed, and I began to move the dilator in and out in long, slow strokes. My breathswere ragged. My other hand moved to my bud, and a fine sheen of sweat covered my body as I touched and stroked. I sucked in a hard breath, and a whimper escaped my lips.
Pleasure tightened in the pit of my stomach. Shock warred with delight inside me; this didn’t usually feel good. My brain tried to tell me that it wasn’t anything worth celebrating. After all, wasn’t it the smallest dilator? Barely the size of my third finger? And it had taken me almost ten minutes to even feel okay with it inside me. Longer than any man would wait, that was for sure.
But even my most judgmental, self-acrimonious thoughts couldn’t win this battle. Not when I remembered the look in Gideon’s eyes, or the way his hands had felt on my breasts and my waist and my core. The bitter thoughts dissolved like the smoke of a blown-out candle, and pleasure crested inside me. I gasped, half-laughing, arching on the mussed sheets of my bed. I couldn’t quite help the low moan that escaped my throat.
For the first time in my life, I’d orgasmed with penetration as well as clitoral stimulation. I hadn’t had to stop from the pain. In fact, at the end, it hadn’t been painful at all. I’d felt full and stretched andwonderful.
I lay on the bed in shock, squirming at the sensation of the dilator still inside me, and tested the limits of my body by shifting the end of the shaft against my tender flesh. Stretching. Exploring. Learning the new limits of my body. Little sparks coursed through me, and I wondered how it would feel to move to the next size up. A scandalous thought. Thrilling. Unheard of.
And then, to my horror, I heard the soft snick of thebathroom door, followed by the patter of water hitting the shower tiles.
Gideon was awake, and he’d been just outside my door when I’d finished. There was no way he hadn’t heard me.
GIDEON
Hell. I was in hell.
I’d survived the warehouse fire and its scars, my rocky childhood, my ex’s cruelty, and my grandmother’s schemes.
I wasn’t sure I’d survive this.
ELEVEN
SADIE
Today was a big day in town. It was the third Saturday of July, also known as the Marswood Harbor Fair. I’d seen flyers go up over the course of the week, and the regulars at Knead More Bread had talked it up. It was the event of the summer. And at the very least, it was an excuse to get out of the house that wasn’t just wandering around town, wondering what I was doing with my life.
But when I ventured out to the kitchen, Gideon was there. “Morning,” he said, nodding to a takeaway cup from Knead More Bread.
Half-sweet almond milk matcha latte. Still warm.
My heart turned over. “Thank you,” I said, voice choked with emotion, then cursed myself. He was just being nice. It wasn’t some declaration of everlasting love; it was a hot drink. I sat down on the couch facing the water to enjoy it.
“What’s your plan today?” Gideon asked.
Surprised, I looked over to where he stood in the kitchen. “Why?”
Gideon huffed a laugh. “Don’t sound so suspicious, Sadie. I’m making conversation.”
“Oh. Do we do that?”
He gave me a flat look. “I’m currently regretting my decision to try.”
I rolled my lips to keep from laughing. “If you must know,” I finally replied primly, “I’m attending the Marswood Harbor Fair. A dozen people have told me it’s the best day of the summer.”
“Oh yeah?” Gideon snorted.
“What? It’s not a good event?”
“It’s fine,” he said, grabbing a pan from the cabinet. He put it on the stove, turned the burner on, then opened the fridge to get some eggs. “It’s just…remember that this is Marswood Harbor we’re talking about.”
“A fair is a fair.”
