Chapter Eighteen
Eden
By the time the bomb squad finished up and all the barriers were moved off the street, it was only an hour past my normal opening time. I could tell Milo didn’t want to leave me in the store alone, but I forced myself to shoo him off to Dueling Dragons so I could rush through my morning routine.
He was right—from the minute I opened the door, I had a stream of customers that didn’t dwindle until late afternoon. I barely grabbed a moment to scarf down a snack around lunchtime and deflected as many questions as I possibly could.
Addie wasn’t scheduled to work that day, but she showed up anyway and made a beeline toward me.
“What the hell happened?” she whispered.
I glanced toward the customer perusing a rack of filmy silk nightgowns before muttering, “Nothing. Someone faked a bomb threat. Just a stupid prank.”
“I know about the bomb threat,” she replied tartly. “But what’s this about a threatening letter?”
“Who told you about that?” I asked, frowning.
“I have my sources, but you should have told me, Eden Rosalie Campbell. So I repeat, what the hell?”
“Addie, it was nothing. Remember the crap my parents used to hand out at Halloween? Those pamphlets about hell and damnation?”
Addie flinched. “Christ. Yes, I remember. That’s what was inside?”
“Not the same exact thing, but similar enough.”
“You think they sent it?” Her blonde brows drew together. “I thought they didn’t know about the store.”
“They don’t,” I replied. “At least, as far as I know—I don’t even think they know where I’m living, nevermind about the store.
I doubt an anonymous pamphlet would be the extent of their reaction if they found out, but from what I recall, all the shit they passed out had the name of the church on it. This had nothing.”
I’d known Addie my entire life, so I knew the expression creeping across her face never boded well for anyone. It was equal parts devious and determined.
“Adelaide, don’t do anything stupid,” I warned.
“What makes you think I would do something stupid?”
I huffed out a laugh. “Thirty-two years of experience, for a start.”
“I’m sure as shit not going to let them find out where you are or what you’re doing, Eden,” my cousin said softly. “I don’t want them within a hundred-mile radius of you. All I’m going to do is find out where they are and what they’ve been up to. And Isaiah.”
“How are you planning to do that?” My brother, Isaiah, had been just as embroiled in the church as my parents, the last I knew.
“I have my ways. You’re not the only super sleuth in the family, but it’s nothing for you to worry about. Besides, you’re probably right, just a stupid prank.”
Addie beamed at me as I cashed out the customer, who gave no sign of having overheard our conversation, then apologized when she told me she had to get back to her other job.
With a jaunty wave, she called out, “Looking forward to the party on Saturday!”
Once I was alone in the store again, I let out a long sigh and forced my attention to my to-do list for Monique’s event.
Addie and I were responsible for snacks, so I’d need to get my contributions sorted during my break on Saturday afternoon.
I tidied up the store, replenished a rack of the emerald green nighties from the front window which had become one of my bestsellers, and set up a rack of party exclusives in the back room so it was ready to go for the weekend.
I had picked out an array of purple options to match the Pleasure Players logo, including a pale lavender teddy, a deep eggplant corset set, and a lilac ruffled cami with matching boyshorts—which I’d already snagged for myself for a special occasion.
Milo, unsurprisingly, managed to take my mind off of hate mail and bomb threats that night. He cooked another stellar meal, took advantage of my wandering attention to beat me in a dirt bike racing game, then practically carried my exhausted self to bed.
When I told him about Addie’s plan to check up on my family, he nodded calmly and said, “I was thinking about doing the same thing. It’ll probably be easier for her, though.”
“I feel like I should have kept tabs on them myself,” I admitted.
He shook his head before I even finished talking. “Let someone else carry this weight for now. You don’t need any more stress on these lovely shoulders.”
“How did you get so amazing?”
He laughed. “I’m not. I just happened to find a woman who brings out the best in me.”
“Milo,” I muttered, propping myself up on my elbow to glare down at him.
“Eden.”
“You need to know something about me.”
His lips curved. “I know a great many things about you already, but go on, enlighten me.”
“I’m not good at flowery,” I admitted quietly. “Compliments and…lovey-dovey stuff. Not good at giving it and not really good at receiving it. I don’t want you to think that means I don’t feel the same. It’s just hard for me to express it like that.”
“Eden, beautiful, I already figured that out on my own,” he replied, a sweet smile curving beneath his beard as he stroked his fingertips over my cheek.
“Oh.”
He rolled us so he was looking down at me, gray eyes soft as summer rain. Beneath that gaze, I felt like I was blooming, blossoming into some new version of myself.
It was extraordinary.
“I don’t ever want to make you uncomfortable, so if my flowery words do that, I’ll try to scale it back. But I know who you are, Eden, and I don’t need the words back. You have the most expressive eyes and face of anyone I’ve ever known. Believe me, those give me all the reassurance I need.”
I blinked up at him, processing that. Milo’s gaze swept over my face, then he dropped his head and kissed me.
Maybe I wasn’t so bad at flowery after all.
Saturday found me in a tizzy of preparations for Monique’s toy party.
Addie had dragged me to one years ago, long before I moved to Spruce Hill, but I’d been there strictly for moral support and hadn’t purchased anything.
At that point, I was working my ass off to save up for the day when I could finally open my own store.
I couldn’t afford to drop necessary funds on vibrators or flavored lube.
Rent here was cheaper than in the city, and the store was doing better than expected, so I had a little bit of money set aside for things like this.
Monique was the sales rep, but I was ostensibly hosting the event.
That meant I’d get some hostess bonuses based on the party’s sales, along with some serious discounts.
Which led me to speculate about what Milo might enjoy using with me.
Business picked up again in the last hour before closing, distracting me from my thoughts, then Addie showed up with the snack trays I’d ordered earlier in the day and a rolling cooler of beverages. It took us three trips just to haul it all inside.
“Just how many people are we expecting?”
Addie shrugged. “Better to have extra leftovers than run out in the middle of a party, right?”
Though she hadn’t mentioned my parents again, I knew better than to think that meant she’d abandoned her plans. Even if she’d rarely spent any time around them, she knew enough about my childhood to despise them on principle.
“Is Olivia coming?” I asked.
A pretty pink blush accented my cousin’s cheeks as she locked the front door and flipped the sign to announce the store was closed. When she finally met my eyes, hers were sparkling.
“Yep.”
“So things are going well?”
“Yep.”
I narrowed my eyes at her. “One word answers, really?”
“I don’t want to jinx it,” she whispered, dragging me into the back room to start laying out our spread of snacks and desserts. “I really, really like her.”
“Addie, that’s great. I’m happy for you. She and Milo are tight, from the sounds of it. Maybe when you’re ready, we can all have dinner or something.”
She flashed a blindingly bright smile. “I’d love that.”
A knock sounded at the back door, sending my cousin hurrying to let Monique in with her suitcases of goodies.
We chatted while she set up a separate table for her stuff, giggling like middle schoolers as Addie and I flipped through one of her catalogs, then I finally mustered the courage to admit something I hadn’t said out loud before.
“I think I have a praise kink.”
Monique smiled at me and said, “Nothing wrong with that, girl.”
“I’m not even remotely surprised by it, either,” Addie added gently.
“You’re not? What does that mean?”
“Babe, did your parents ever approve of a single thing you did? Validate your strengths, tell you that you were doing a good job?”
I frowned at her. “No.”
“Milo is into you in a way that extends well beyond a hookup, Eden. He values you—your heart and soul as much as your body, if not more. It makes perfect sense to me that him offering up a verbal confirmation of just how much he appreciates you would be insanely sexy.”
Monique nodded along with every word. “Absolutely. And if you light up when he offers praise, he’ll see that and make sure he keeps giving that to you. Do you feel like he’s noticed?”
“Yes,” I said slowly. “Even before we started really dating. I think he understood it before I did.”
“I liked him for you before, babe, but I like him even better now,” Addie said, grinning at me. Then she bounced her eyebrows. “And I think you should pick out a little something tonight to show him your appreciation. Something extra special.”
I blew out a long breath and nodded. “I think you’re absolutely right. Let’s do this.”
We joined Monique at the table to arrange party favors like flavored condoms, penis-shaped candles, and travel-sized bottles of Bombastic Lube.
I flinched when I read the label, and Addie wrapped her arm around my shoulders.
“It’s okay, babe,” she murmured. “We can swap those for something else if you want, right, Monique?”
“Absolutely. I should’ve thought of that, Eden, I’m so sorry.”
Steeling my spine, I shook my head and pasted on a smile. “No, it’s fine. These are adorable and I think people will love them. Besides, it’s not every day that name will be so on point, you know?”
Addie snorted and though Monique looked skeptical for a few beats while we all stared at each other, we ended up bursting into peals of laughter that washed away some of the bomb threat trauma.
The party ended up with a group of seven guests, plus me, Addie, and Monique. A few of them were women I’d met that night at The Mermaid, a few were unfamiliar, but everyone was chatty and enthusiastic enough to make it feel like a circle of friends before the night was over.
Nothing said bonding moment like comparing dildo models, from colorful silicone tentacles to a plaid behemoth called The Big McIntire, and debating the advantages of vibration versus suction.
Catching Addie and Olivia making eyes at each other throughout the night was a special treat, and the snack trays were almost completely depleted by the time we wrapped up. During a quiet moment as we filled out order forms, the woman next to me leaned over just as I set my pen down.
“Thank you for setting this up,” she said quietly.
I smiled at her and dropped my eyes to the sticky name tag on her shirt. “Thanks for coming, Simone.”
“You know,” she mused, “I’m a photographer. I mostly do weddings, family photo shoots, that kind of thing, but I’ve been thinking about venturing outside of my comfort zone and offering sessions for boudoir photos.”
“Oh?” My eyes shot wide as I imagined gifting Milo with a sexy photo of myself wearing some of my favorites from the shop.
Her lips quirked. “Yeah. You’ve done an amazing job with this place. Maybe we could come up with some kind of collaboration for your customers, like they buy one of those hot as fuck numbers out front and then we do a photo shoot of them wearing it.”
“Holy shit,” I breathed. “That’s an amazing idea.”
The woman on the other side of Simone leaned forward and raised her hand. “I volunteer as tribute.”
That got the attention of the rest of the circle, which meant Simone and I ended up with an entire lineup of interested women who had killer suggestions for how to promote these photo sessions.
Even though Addie and Aunt Jocelyn had done their best to give me the education and support my parents denied me, being so enthusiastically included by this new community who celebrated my passions instead of smothering them was like taking flight for the first time—terrifying and thrilling, poignant and astounding.
My heart soared, even if I still couldn’t shake the fear of an eventual crash landing.
It felt like the dawn of a new era. I hadn’t smiled so much in years.
I wasn’t sure how to handle going from zero friends to a room full of them, but if I’d learned anything from my relationship with Milo, it was that opening myself up to new experiences could lead to beautiful things.
And I did, in fact, pick out a few extra special items to surprise him with.