Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
Eden
Three days.
It's been three days since Vaughn touched me.
Since he showed me what my body could do.
Since he gave me my first orgasm and left me trembling and confused and desperately wanting more.
Three days of trying to pretend it didn't happen.
Three days of failing spectacularly.
I wake up every morning with my heart racing and my skin too hot, my body remembering things my mind wants desperately to forget.
The dreams are the worst part.
Every night, they get more vivid, more detailed, more impossible to ignore or dismiss as meaningless.
The first night, I dreamed about the auction.
But this time, when Vaughn bid on me, when he said "two million dollars" in that cold, certain voice, I didn't feel terror.
I felt relief.
Felt something in my chest loosen.
Felt safe, which is insane because he's the one who bought me.
The second night, the dream shifted.
I was in my room, but Vaughn was there.
Not doing anything threatening.
Just sitting in the chair by the window, watching me with those ice-blue eyes.
And I wanted him to come closer.
Wanted him to touch me again.
Wanted to feel what I'd felt that night.
Last night was worse.
Last night, I dreamed Vaughn's hands were on my bare skin instead of over my clothes.
Dreamed his mouth was on mine, his body pressing me into the mattress, his weight holding me down but not threatening—protective, possessive.
Dreamed his voice in my ear telling me I was beautiful, telling me to let go, telling me I was his and that was exactly where I belonged.
I woke up gasping, my thighs clenched together, that familiar ache between my legs that I'm starting to recognize as arousal.
Wanting.
Needing.
Craving something I shouldn't crave from a man who bought me like property.
I hate it.
Hate that my body has learned to want something I was taught my entire life to fear.
Hate that I lie in bed at night staring at that rose gold vibrator on my nightstand, remembering how it felt, wondering if I'm brave enough to try again.
Hate that every time I see Vaughn at breakfast or dinner—those twice-daily encounters where we sit across from each other and pretend the air isn't crackling with tension—I think about how his hands felt guiding that vibrator over my clothes, how his voice sounded when he told me to let go, how he looked at me when I came apart.
Hate that I'm starting to forget why I should hate him.
The Sanctuary taught me that desire was sin.
That my body was shameful, a vessel that existed only for procreation and male pleasure, never my own.
That pleasure existed only for men, and women who sought it were corrupted, fallen, beyond any hope of redemption.
Good girls didn't want.
Didn't crave.
Didn't touch themselves or think impure thoughts or let their bodies respond to anything except their husband's demands.
Good girls submitted. Endured. Accepted.
But the books Vaughn gave me say something different.
Say desire is natural, healthy, normal.
Say women's bodies are designed for pleasure just as much as men's.
Say there's nothing wrong with wanting to feel good, with exploring your own responses, with understanding what brings you satisfaction.
And my body—traitorous, weak, desperate—believes the books instead of the Sanctuary.
Believes Vaughn instead of everything I was taught for twenty-three years.
Believes that maybe, possibly, I'm not broken or sinful for wanting what he showed me.
That's the most dangerous part.
Not the wanting itself, but the way it's changing how I see myself.
Making me question everything the Sanctuary taught me.
Making me wonder if I was lied to about more than just pleasure.
If everything I believed about myself, about women, about God and sin and righteousness, was just another form of control.
Vaughn is doing to my mind what he did to my body—showing me it can respond in ways I never knew were possible.
And I don't know if I'm being liberated or manipulated.
Hell, I don't know if the difference even matters anymore.
On the second night after Vaughn touched me, I tried to recreate it myself.
Waited until the house was quiet, until the last sliver of light had faded from my windows and darkness wrapped around the estate like a blanket.
Until I was sure Vaughn was in his office or his bedroom or wherever he goes when he's not watching me.
Though I'm starting to suspect he's always watching somehow.
The security cameras I've noticed in hallways and common areas.
The way he knows things he shouldn't know.
The feeling of being observed even when I'm alone.
But that night, I pushed those thoughts away.
I took the vibrator from the nightstand and turned it on.
The gentle hum filled the quiet room, and my heart immediately started racing.
Just the sound of it made me remember, made my body tense.
I pressed it against my palm the way he showed me, feeling the gentle vibration against my skin, remembering how it felt when he moved it lower, when he showed me what my body could do.
Then I lay back on the bed. Closed my eyes. Tried to recreate what he did.
Started with my collarbone, just like he had.
The vibration through my silk pajamas felt pleasant.
Soothing, almost.
Moved it lower.
Over my chest, my stomach, feeling the gentle buzz against my skin through the thin fabric.
Nothing.
Just vibration.
Just sensation without meaning.
No building heat.
No mounting pressure.
No pleasure that made me forget my own name and the Sanctuary and everything except the feeling.
I tried to remember exactly what he did.
The angle he held it.
The pressure he used.
The circles he drew.
Moved it lower, over my pajama pants, to the place where he'd shown me.
Where he'd made me feel things I didn't know were possible.
And—
Nothing.
Not nothing, exactly.
There was sensation.
A gentle buzzing that felt pleasant in an abstract, distant way.
But not the overwhelming, consuming, mind-erasing pleasure from three nights ago.
Not the building tension that made my back arch and my breath catch.
Not the incredible release that left me trembling and gasping.
Just... buzzing.
I adjusted the angle.
Tried different pressures, different movements, different positions.
Lay on my back, on my side, propped up against the pillows.
Spent an hour trying to make my body respond the way it had with Vaughn.
An hour of frustration building with every failed attempt.
Because it should work, shouldn't it?
It's the same vibrator, the same setting, the same body.
The mechanics should be identical.
But they're not.
Because the variable isn't the vibrator or the setting or even my body.
It's him.
Finally, I gave up.
Put the vibrator away with shaking hands.
Lay in the darkness, staring at the ceiling, trying not to cry from pure frustration.
Because apparently even this—even my own pleasure, even this one thing that was supposed to be mine, that the books said belonged to me and me alone—I can't do without him.
My body won't respond the same way.
Won't build to that impossible peak.
Won't give me what I'm craving.
Not without Vaughn's hands guiding the vibrator.
Not without his voice telling me it's okay to let go, that I'm safe, that what I'm feeling is natural and good.
Not without his presence making me feel secure enough to surrender control.
I need him.
The realization hits me hard.
I need him to feel pleasure.
Need him to make my body work the way it's supposed to.
Need him in order to want.
And that makes me want to scream.
To throw things.
To rage against the unfairness of it all.
Because needing him means he was right about everything.
Means I'm exactly what he's been trying to make me—dependent on him for pleasure, for sensation, for feeling anything good at all.
Means the cage isn't just the house with its biometric locks and motion sensors.
The cage is my own body, trained to respond to him and only him.
And I walked right into it.
I let him build it around me one careful touch at a time.
Believed his lies about choice and agency and liberation while he was actually just making me his.
I spent the rest of that night lying awake, hating myself.
Hating him.
Hating that I still want him anyway.
The third day dawns gray and miserable, matching my mood perfectly.
I drag myself out of bed, shower in water that's too hot, trying to wash away the dreams and the wanting and the desperate need that's eating me alive from the inside out.
It doesn't work.
Nothing works.
I can't read.
Can't focus on anything for more than a few minutes.
Can't stop thinking about Vaughn and that night and what he could show me if I just asked.
If I just surrendered.
If I just admitted that I need him.
By breakfast, I've made a decision.
I'm going to ask.
Going to tell him I want more.
I want him to show me what else my body can do.
I want to understand this thing that's consuming my every waking thought and turning me into someone I don't recognize.
I hate that I want it.
Hate that I'm giving him exactly what he wants, proving every single thing he's said about me.
Hate that I'm admitting defeat, admitting that he was right and I was wrong, admitting that my body needs what only he can give.
But I can't stand this anymore.
Can't stand lying awake at night wanting something I can't give myself.
Can't stand the curiosity that's eating me alive, making every minute feel like an hour.
Can't stand being this close to understanding myself and pulling back because of pride or fear or stubborn resistance to admitting the truth.
I need to know.
I need to understand what my body is capable of.
I need him to show me.
Even if it means giving him power over me.
Even if it means becoming exactly what he's been engineering me to become.
Even if it means losing more of myself in the process.
At least I'll know.
At least I'll understand.
At least I'll stop wanting so desperately that it hurts.