Page 3 of Taken By the Crab King of Atlantis

“Yen is a good girl,” my mother said, nodding with approval.

I shake the memory away and grab a curry puff and a glass of soy milk from the fridge, taking both back to my room.

I navigate by dim screen light to my desk and read the Zodiac Association email again, checking my calendar to see if I can fit this crazy plan in. I have to finish another assignment early if I’m going to do this Zodiac thing, and I’ll have to beg the other waitresses to take my shifts at work on the nights I’ll be away, but it’s doable.

I’ll tell my parents I’m staying at Sofie’s house and we’re doing some last-minute cramming. If it’s a study excuse, they’ll buy it.

Five million dollars has to be enough to buy Aya’s freedom, and a new life for my family where Chris can never find us.

Once I’ve signed and sent the paperwork, I pull the elastic out of my hair and collapse back into bed with my eyes closed, enjoying the dull ache of relief in my scalp. Another day over.

In the dark, my body is my own; the duties of the day behind me. I’m going to lose my virginity. My skin prickles at the thought, and a sliver of excitement thrills down to my core.

I laugh at myself in the dark. I don’t even know what Karkinos looks like, and it’s unlikely this contract is going to be pleasurable. My friends have told me enough about sex to know I might not even have an orgasm. This contract gets Aya out of trouble.

But the excitement doesn’t leave my body. I probably won’t even be attracted to the man I lose my virginity to, but I’ll still be touched in a way I never have been before.

It’s not that I never think about sex. But between work and study, I’m too busy to worry about my lack of a love life. Aya says I’m afraid of men, and willfully ignorant of it, but her taste in men isn’t inspiring either.

I turn over with a huff of irritation, and my thoughts stray to the contents of my bedside table. My eyes fling open. Once the idea is in my mind, it’s hard to push away.

I try anyway, closing my eyes and willing my brain off.

I run through the last piece of music I memorized, tapping the bedspread. A Beethoven piece. The stress of the exam I studied it for has embedded it forever in my memory. I run through the piece for fifteen minutes straight, and I still can’t sleep.

Sleep. Sleep. Sleep.

Yeah, that never works.

My mind is too full, and my skin is sensitive with tense expectation. I give up. My eyes open and I reach over and pull a vibrator out of my bottom dresser drawer, diving it under the covers as if someone might see it in the dark room.

It took me months to try the vibrator Aya bought for me. The first time, I told myself it was a natural sedative. Something to help me sleep.

But now, as with every time I play with it, the room slips away and my nipples tighten with want.

I’m standing in my highschool English class after everyone has gone home. An anonymous man in a suit is with me. He’s clearly a teacher, but not one I’ve had in real life. It’s just him and me, all alone.

He’s standing in front of his desk, looking stern, arms crossed. His shirt is open at the neck, and his sleeves are rolled up. His forearms are strong and tanned, his biceps full under the thin fabric.

I’m beside him, facing the desk in a skirt shorter than I ever wore in school, biting on a lustful pout I’ve never dared in real life.

“You’ve been a bad girl.” He presses a hand between my shoulder blades and I bend over, hands planted on the desk.

The imaginary teacher trails fingers up the backs of my thighs. My pulse quickens in response. He reaches between my legs…

The vibrator finds my clitoris through layers of fabric, and sensation concentrates on my sensitive nub.

Every muscle tenses as pleasure mounts.

In seconds, bliss floods my senses, whiting out all thought.

The world disappears.

I float.

And then the shame creeps in.

I bury the vibrator in my bottom drawer again, flushing red in the darkness.