Chapter 11
THE MORNING AFTER INCLUDES A DELICIOUS BACKDOOR FINGERING
Andie
The first thing I feel is the cold: a thin, fresh chill against my naked shoulder.
The second is the absence. I open my eyes to a cathedral of glass and pale, midwestern sky, the endless sheet of city stretching out beyond the penthouse window, and Thomas’s body not next to mine.
Just my own arms curled around a dent in the pillow, and the silver silk sheet twisted in a noose around my legs.
For a minute, I don’t move. I just float there, the quiet hugeness of the space pressing in.
Light comes in from everywhere: watery, gold, insistent.
It’s too early for the sun to be so strong, but up here it doesn’t have to fight for its life, doesn’t have to crawl through the trees and telephone wires of the world below.
I shift to sit up, and immediately a sharp, electric ache wakes up between my legs.
It’s not bad, just there: a wrecked pussy, stretched and hollow and sore in a way that feels almost holy.
I flex my thighs, roll my hips in a little test, and wince—god, I’m going to remember this for a week.
I tilt my chin and look, almost on a dare.
There’s a thin, rusty smear on my right inner thigh, the same shade as the silk, dried to a tiny crescent.
I touch it, two fingers, then press them together, feeling the tacky bloom of it.
I want to be embarrassed, or ashamed, but all I feel is a weird pride: like proof that last night was real, that I didn’t dream it.
I lean back on my elbows and stare at the ceiling.
My heart does a weird little skip, and I catch myself smiling, teeth buried in the softness of my lip.
A sound breaks the moment: the faint, frantic sizzle of a pan, and above it, a man’s low, off-key humming. I freeze, then relax. It’s just Thomas. Not gone. Just outside.
He’s cooking breakfast, I realize. I picture him at the stove in his high-rise, shirtless, the scar on his shoulder a dull bar of copper in the morning light, flipping something in a pan while half his brain runs a hostile takeover somewhere.
The image is so domestic it makes me want to laugh, or maybe cry, or maybe just stay here under the covers forever.
Instead, I move. I wriggle my legs free of the sheet, and the cold hits me everywhere at once, pebbling my skin and making my nipples tight as thumbtacks.
I scan the floor for my clothes but see only his white dress shirt, crumpled where he must have tossed it.
I snag it and pull it on, sleeves covering my hands.
It smells like him: some expensive cologne, and underneath that, just Thomas, the scent of his neck and the salt of his sweat.
I button the shirt up and wrap my arms around myself, holding in the heat.
My purse is still on the nightstand, and suddenly, I remember.
My heart begins to race as my pulse jumps.
Oh shit. I sit back down on the bed with the purse in my hand and dig out my phone.
For a second, I just look at the black glass of the screen, seeing my own reflection—eyes puffy, hair insane, mouth swollen and a little raw from his kisses.
I look like a woman who’s just had the night of her life.
I thumb the phone awake. There are no missed texts, no SOS from Mary Kate or Kayleigh, no flurry of “where r u” from Simone. I scroll to the camera roll, tap the gallery, and there it is: last night’s video, the file marked only by a time and date, nothing else.
I hesitate, my thumb trembling. I could send it right now.
Just drop it in the group chat, three taps, and the prize is mine.
The money, the bragging rights, the satisfaction of beating my friends at their own game.
It’s what we promised, what we bet on. But the idea makes me weirdly queasy.
Like a betrayal somehow, even if this is what we agreed to.
I press play to check out the recording.
The video is graphic, in a way that makes me flinch and want to hide but also keeps me watching, unable to blink.
It’s me, legs in the air, Thomas’s huge body blanketing mine.
His face is shadow, but you can see the flex of his shoulders and the sharp, almost painful beauty of his muscular back.
His cock moves in and out of me, slow at first, then faster, and my own voice is in the background—broken, desperate little gasps, my hands fisting in the sheets, my breasts bouncing with every thrust.
I watch for maybe ten seconds, enough to see myself clench around Thomas’s cock, to hear the breathless way I say “please” and the way he groans my name, low and animal and hungry.
I’m gasping, while looking at him with adoration, and there’s something so intimate, so personal about the moment.
I press pause. My jaw is locked. My other hand is pressed flat against my sternum, trying to keep my heart from going through my ribs.
This is the evidence. The proof. This is what will win me everything.
Instead, I tap out of the video, close the gallery, and set the phone down. I don’t delete it. But I also don’t send it. I need to think.
For a second, I just sit there, the shirt hanging off one shoulder, the chill of the room climbing up my spine. I stare at my knees, then out at the city, and wonder what I’m supposed to do now.
After a while, I stand. I smooth the shirt down over my hips, cinching the cuffs at my wrists, and walk barefoot out of the bedroom, my pulse fluttering with every step.
The kitchen is even bigger than I remembered.
Thomas stands at the stove, spatula in one hand, a pan of sausage links spitting grease like tiny volcanoes.
He’s wearing only grey sweatpants, low on his hips, the line of his abs sharp enough to cut glass.
His hair is rumpled, and there’s a five-o’clock shadow that makes him look both older and softer than last night.
He doesn’t see me at first, too absorbed in the act of not burning breakfast.
For a moment, I just watch him, soaking it in. The light. The hunger in my body, not just for food but for something I can’t even name.
And then, as if he senses me, Thomas turns. He sees me in his shirt and the look on his face is not lust or conquest, but something a little closer to awe. Like he’s surprised I’m real, that I didn’t vanish with the night.
“Good morning,” he says. His voice is hoarse, like he’s been yelling at someone in a boardroom all night.
“Hi,” I say. I don’t know what to do with my hands, so I fold them over my stomach, clutching the edges of the shirt. “You’re making breakfast?”
He shrugs. “I can cook eggs and sausage, or I can call down to the lobby and get you a pastry. Either way.” He gestures at the pan, as if that explains everything.
“It smells amazing,” I say, and I mean it. I drift closer, the cold of the tile floor stinging my feet.
Thomas sets the spatula down and pours black coffee into two thick mugs, hands big around the ceramic. He pushes one toward me across the kitchen island.
“I wasn’t sure how you take it.”
“Black is fine,” I say, lifting the mug with both hands. The warmth goes all the way to my bones.
We stand there, him on one side of the island, me on the other, both pretending this is a normal morning. The silence is comfortable, and strangely peaceful. I sip my coffee, watch the swirl of oil on the surface.
After a minute, he plates the sausage, then cracks eggs into the pan. He moves with a kind of grace I wouldn’t have expected—a man used to precise actions, never wasting motion. He glances at me, once, then again, like he’s checking for glitches in the matrix.
“Are you okay?” he says, suddenly serious.
I look up. “Yeah, I’m fine.”
“Really?” His blue eyes rake over my face, searching.
“I’m great,” I say, and a real smile breaks through. “I mean, I’m a little sore, but in a good way.”
He smirks, relief lighting up his whole body. “Yeah, about that. Sorry if I was…” He trails off, uncertain.
“You were perfect,” I say, and I mean it.
He grins, and it’s the most honest expression I’ve seen on him yet. “Good. I’d hate to have to take you to the ER on our first real date.”
I laugh, the sound bright and a little wild. “God, can you imagine what the doctors would say?”
“Probably ask to see my size,” he says. “Or if you needed an exorcism.”
I set my coffee down, steadying myself on the counter. “What if I did need an exorcism? What would you do?”
Thomas grins and leans in, bracing his arms on the island. The muscles in his forearms stand out, pale against the dark marble. “I’d lay hands on you. I’d cast out the demon myself.”
The words hang in the air, and for a second I think he might actually do it, right here, right now. But instead, he turns back to the eggs, the moment dissolving into the pop and sizzle of the skillet.
I watch him plate the eggs, toast some bread in a pan, slice fruit with a knife so sharp it whispers through the air. The domesticity of it makes my chest ache. I want to freeze time, or maybe rewind it and do last night again, but slower.
When he’s finished, he brings the plates over and sets one in front of me. He sits down beside me, close enough that our knees brush under the counter.
We eat in silence at first, me demolishing the eggs, him attacking the sausage. The food is perfect, salty and hot, and I realize I’m starving. I eat too fast and have to stop, catching myself before I look like a total animal.
He watches me, a half-smile on his face. “You don’t have to be polite,” he says. “You can inhale your food. I like it.”
I grin, mouth full, and keep eating. After a minute, I ask, “Do you always cook for your one-night stands?”
He shakes his head, slow. “Never. You’re the first.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Liar.”