Chapter 30
POPPY
Cordelia didn’t follow me to my room tonight. Which isn’t abnormal, at least not anymore. It’s been a few nights in a row that she hasn’t slept with me. She’s started sleeping with Jett—against his protesting—although secretly, I think he likes it.
He complained about her fur covering his bedspread yesterday over breakfast, claiming that it was making his eyes itchy, but I’ve never seen him rub them once since she’s been here.
I did, however, catch him petting Cordelia and talking to her when he thought they were alone. Murmuring things about what a pretty girl she is and scratching her between the eyes the way she likes.
Cordelia can be standoffish when it comes to being pet, and that’s how I know that it wasn’t the first time he had done something like that.
I walk over to my bed, strip off my clothes, and enjoy the feeling of the cool sheets on my legs as I slip between the layers. My joints soften into the mattress as the pressure of gravity is taken off them, and I relish the comfort and softness.
I inhale a cleansing breath, and exhale slowly. Though my body is relaxed, a different sensation thrums beneath the surface, heightening all my senses and dragging my attention down towards a pressure building between my thighs.
Jett’s voice reverberates in my mind, the memory of the deep timbre warming me through to my core. What he said to me. That all my body has ever known is pain, never pleasure. Not in the truest sense of the word.
I know what it’s like to feel good. I love a hot bath, I love crawling into bed after a long day, I love a deep stretch first thing in the morning. And I certainly have lots of good days between flares.
But I’ve never known true pleasure.
Even the good days are overshadowed by trying to anticipate when the next flare might happen. Trying to play it safe so I don’t inadvertently overdo it, stress my body to the point of paying for it later.
I’m always waiting for the other shoe to drop. The day that all I can do is crawl under a blanket and hide from the world because I don’t have the strength to face it.
Now I’ve had a hint of what that pleasure might feel like. The second that Jett lifted me against the wall and brushed the pad of his thumb over my underwear.
It only lasted a second. But the electric ripple that rolled through my entire body, expanding from that one point of contact was enough to pique my interest. To want to know the full extent of what my body is capable of.
I slip my hand beneath the covers, hesitant and unsure of what I’m even doing. Touching myself is foreign and strange, though I know it shouldn’t. It’s my own body, there’s nothing embarrassing about it. I just don’t know what to do.
I’ve probably watched more than a thousand movies in my lifetime and I never once thought to watch a porno. It probably would have come in handy right about now.
Okay, think about something sexy.
I try, and try, and yet, I draw blanks.
I’ll imagine my dream man, I decide. The man I want to marry one day. The man who will touch me and know exactly how to make my body do what he wants it to do. The man who will care about my pleasure as much as his own.
I squeeze my eyes shut, running the tips of my fingers between my folds, and still, nothing happens. There’s no clear image, just an abstract image of a faceless man with solid abs—nice abs though, I have to say.
My mind starts to drift, and the only face I can think of has dark, almost black eyes, stubble on a chiseled jaw, a straight nose. Espresso coloured hair that always has a sexy, unkempt way about it. Soft, plush lips that grazed mine before pressing into them.
All I can think about now is Jett kissing me under the aurora.
Jett kissing me in front of our wedding guests.
Our stolen kiss behind the trees.
In the hall just outside this door.
A surge of warmth coats my fingers as pressure builds at the apex of my thighs.
This is the precipice where I have always turned back, where I’ve always shied away. Where I’ve denied myself of pleasure. Not tonight. Tonight, I resist wanting to squeeze my thighs together to make the feeling go away.
Instead, I lean into it, I embrace it, I open my legs wider and trail my fingers through my wetness, a tingle zipping through my core when I touch myself in one area.
I concentrate my efforts there, as if instinct takes over and drives my fingers to move faster. The pressure builds within me, like an elastic band being pulled taught and then…
Snap.
Everything inside me releases all at once. Stars explode across my field of vision as my body shakes and quivers. A whimper escapes my throat, louder than I intend, and I slap my other hand over my mouth as pleasure crashes over and through me at the same time.
Finally, the crashing waves settle into gentle ripples and then stop. My heart is pounding, chest heaving, and I let out a soft sigh.
A quiet sound drifts under the door from in the hall. Footsteps, maybe.
The lingering heat spreads from my body up to my cheeks as I listen for any more noises.
Was it Jett? Did he hear what I was doing?
I sink back down into the covers and pull the blankets up around my shoulders, turning over to my side and flicking off the bedside lamp. Despite any shreds of embarrassment, my lips curve into a soft smile as I close my eyes.
Because even if Jett did overhear, I think he’d be proud of me.