I was on my feet before I even knew what I was doing, striding toward the door as I tugged my robe back around my body and belted it. Just before I flipped open the security lock, I became aware of the Peppermint Stick still in my hand.
Oh God, oh God, oh God—
I hurriedly wiped the toy on the hem of my robe and then dropped it in my pocket. I flung open the door and tried to look cool and collected.
Kallum blinked, probably not expecting me to be in a bathrobe with mussed hair at six in the evening. Did I look like I’d just been masturbating? Could he guess?
“Hi,” I said in my most normal voice. I was an actress! I could do this! “What’s up?”
I must not have sounded as casually non-horny as I thought I did, because Kallum swallowed. In away. A way that made me aware of how wet between the legs I was.
“I wanted to make sure you were doing okay after today,” he said. He flicked his eyes down to my robe. “But I didn’t mean to intrude, I just wanted to...”
He trailed off, his gaze still trained on my robe. No, on thepocketof my robe; the not-deep-enough pocket where half a candy cane–striped vibrator was clearly visible. And then his eyes slid past me to the bed, where there was a Winnie-size dentin the duvet. Where my laptop rested, currently paused on a frame of Kallum three fingers deep in a bridesmaid.
I couldn’t breathe. My thoughts were nothing but thought-flurries—tiny, fluttering, elusive. Disappearing before I could catch them, look at them.
Kallum’s hands flexed by his sides, and then curled, his fingers rubbing restlessly against his palms before they flexed again.
And then he met my eyes, and his were such a bright and burning blue that I felt like I was standing inside the heart of a flame, and his jaw was so tense, and his chest was heaving, and I had an absurd idea, a horrible idea, an idea that I should never, ever speak aloud.
“Will you help me?” I blurted.
The door was still open behind him, and he checked the hallway before looking back to me. His Slice, Slice, Baby staff T-shirt clung even tighter to those massive shoulders as he did.
“What are you asking me, Winnie Baker?” he asked in a low voice. A low voice that I recognized from the sex tape. Under my robe, my breasts were heavy-feeling, full. I had goose bumps everywhere.
“I want you to help me have an orgasm,” I said, trying to sound confident and unconcerned, like this was all just everyday stuff for me, like this was just work. Same thing as needing help running my lines, right? Totally the same.
“Research not going well?” asked Kallum. There wasn’t any judgment in his tone, only a little bit of ruefulness, like he was ruefulforme. Like he wanted it to be going well for me.
“It’s not,” I said sadly. “And I tried a Jacuzzi jet and everything.”
“I... What?”
“And you’re supposed to be good at making people orgasm, and that’s all I want, just one orgasm, just so I can know what it feels like once in my life, you know? Yes, that’s your video over there, and I know it’s maybe weird that I’m watching it, but I didn’t even know where to start with regular porn, and Iknowyou, and it felt safe to me, and the way you make her feel so good—”
The door slammed shut and Kallum was striding forward, making me walk backward to the swivel chair in front of the knotty pine desk. His hands, warm even through my thick robe, curled around my shoulders and he pushed me down onto the seat.
He stayed standing, and more than ever, I understood the wordloom. He was looming over me, but it was incredible, thrilling, to have all that height and strength and intensity bent on me.
“Show me,” he said. His voice was still low, but it was rough now too, like the words were being dragged from his chest. “Show me.”
This was a terrible plan, a reckless thing, and yet I could not care when Kallum sounded like that, when his big hands and broad shoulders were right here, when his eyes were no longer fire-bright but glowing like stars.
Slowly, I reached for the vibrator in my pocket and pulled it free. It didn’t feel like a silly novelty toy now, not with the way Kallum was watching it, not with the way he worked his jaw to the side as I clicked it on.
Abzzzfilled the room and I spread my thighs in the chair, knowing he’d be able to see the center of me, wet and swollen and wanting.
His voice was rougher than ever when he spoke. “Open your robe.”
My free hand trembled a little as I plucked at the terry cloth knot—because I needed it, I needed to undress, and I couldn’t remember ever feeling that way, not even in my marriage. Like anything between my skin and a person’s stare was too much, and I would die if this person couldn’t see my body right this instant.
Seeing my struggle, Kallum knelt with a finessed ease that reminded me that he had been an incredible dancer once upon a time, and lifted his hands.
“Okay?” he asked. His hands were poised in the air, ready for permission.
“Okay,” I whispered, and he easily unknotted the belt for me. “You can touch me,” I added, in case my request for help earlier was being misunderstood. “I want you... I want you to touch me anywhere you think will help. Everywhere.”
