She leans on the counter, and her eyes are wide when I look up again. “Did you have sex there? In front of people?”
My cheeks flush, because I haven’t spoken about this in a long, long time. “I did. I, uh, was tied up to a cross once, and had the domme jerk me off and edge me for an hour, in front of a lot of watching eyes.”
Amber’s mouth drops open. “Theo! And here I was thinking you were some sweet engineering professor who just happened to like the gym.” She giggles and shakes her head. “And now I find out you’re into BDSM and sex dungeons.”
I laugh as I chop the spinach and drop it into the bowl of eggs. “Look, it was a long time ago. But it did introduce me to things that I liked, and that I wanted to do with other partners. And I got a bit of a reputation at college for my… proclivities.”
“Now that’s a big word for sex fiend.” She holds up her hands and gives me a brilliant smile. “I’m joking, I’m joking! It’s seriously kind of hot. Like, really hot.”
“Yeah, but all of that kind of fell by the wayside when I got married, and then being a dad, working, all that kind of thing, you know, it just wasn’t that important anymore.”
I turn on the frying pan, seasoning the eggs with plenty of salt and pepper, and Amber comes to sit on the counter beside me, her long legs crossed at the ankles and swinging gently back and forth.
“So you still enjoyed vanilla sex after that?” She asks, running a hand through her hair and flipping it over her shoulder.
“Of course, I don’t need it to be kinky to enjoy it.”
“But if you had a partner who was into that kind of thing, would you do it more?”
I consider my answer as I fry the bacon in the pan, listening to it sizzle in the heat. “I mean, sure. If that’s what she wanted. But finding people who are on the same wavelength as you isn’t always easy.”
“That sounded heavy.” Amber raises her eyebrows as she looks at me. “Did you have a bad experience or something?”
I give her a smile, shaking my head. “Are you sure you’re not psychic, Miss Pope?”
Her cheeks flush when I call her that, the slight shift in her hips telling me she really likes that nickname. “You just looked really sad when you said it.”
I flip the bacon and sigh heavily, shifting on my feet as I take down a plate from the cupboard overhead. “After Mella and I divorced, I got involved with a woman I’d met at the gym. She was a little younger.” I look at Amber over my glasses. “No, not as young as you.”
She giggles, but doesn’t say anything.
“We got on well,” I go on, taking the bacon from the pan and putting it on the plate. “She was funny, smart, worked in investment banking. And after a few weeks of us sleepingtogether, she opened up to me about her likes and desires, and told me that she went to sex clubs in the city regularly.”
“Oh, like swingers clubs?”
I smile at the term. “Swingers club always makes me think of those 70s pornos. But yes. A swingers club, I suppose. Glory holes and voyeur rooms and you name it. She asked me to go with her, and I did.” I pour the eggs into the pan, and brace a hand on the counter. “It was a lot of fun, at first. After the divorce and all that, it felt good to let loose a little.”
“So what went wrong?”
I stare at the eggs, setting in the pan, and try not to focus on the icy coil forming in my stomach. “We’d been dating for over a year, she’d met Laurie, they got on great, I was going to ask her to move in. It all seemed good.” I trail off, folding the omelette on top of itself, and flipping it. “Then I woke up one morning, in agony. It felt like someone had my… balls in a vice.”
“Oh my god.” Amber’s eyebrows shoot up. “What happened?”
“I went to the doctor and it turned out I had gonorrhoea.”
“Holy shit!” Amber sits up straight, covering her mouth with her hands. “She gave it to you?”
I take the omelette from the pan, putting it on the plate beside the bacon, and get a knife and fork out of the drawer. Amber follows me back to the counter and sits on the stool, but she won’t touch the food, her eyes still fixed on my face.
“Come on, eat.” I gesture to her plate, and she shakes her head.
“What happened?”
I sigh heavily. “She’d been cheating on me. The entire time. When I confronted her, she acted completely surprised, saying it was part of the lifestyle. She said… she said that maybe I just didn’t understand BDSM like I thought I did, what it was all really about.”
“That’s called gaslighting, and it’s disgusting.” Amber’s voice is filled with outrage. “She never said anything to you about sleeping with other people?”
I shake my head, and am relieved when Amber finally huffs out a breath and takes up her knife and fork to start eating.
