Page 68 of Our Elliana

I enjoyed toiling to accomplish something nice for Elle. It was a nice camaraderie. Yet it’s a different type from what I feel around any other group I know. More charged.

But is it sexual? Do I want to have sex with either of those men?

I imagine it. Imagine what it might be like to touch another man or to have him touch me. And while it’s not repulsive in the least, it’s not specifically what I’m craving, either.

Then, I visualize them rubbing up against me while I’m having sex with Elle. I picture watching their naked bodies undulating, the four of us moving in the same rhythm.

And boom, my erection throbs in my jeans.

What kind of sexual orientation is that?

By the time I pull up into Elle’s garage, I’m not sure if I’ve gained any clarity about myself or not. But in the end, it’s a moot point because everyone in the house is in an uproar. It’s a Friday evening, and Elliana worked in her store due to it being such a big sale day for holiday shoppers.

And sometime during this day she received another of those horrible cards. Only this time there wasn’t any vandalism, and it didn’t get delivered through the mail.

Instead, it was sitting on her jeweler’s bench inside her locked second-story workshop.

TWENTY-NINE: Playing with You

ELLIANA

I’m dragging my right thumb along the inside of my left palm so hard it’s making the flesh there turn red, but I can’t seem to stop. I’m a nervous fucking wreck. As awful as the break-in was and even though there’s so much less property damage this time, it somehow feels worse.

Way worse.

The sanctity of my private workspace has been violated, and we’re not even certain how. I always lock that door when I leave my workshop. Always. It’s an automatic step I take like buckling my seatbelt or making sure I have my purse. So, I know that room upstairs in Blingblang was secure. It had to be.

The only time I might leave it unlocked is when I’m in there.

It must’ve occurred when my staff and I had been knee-deep in customers on the salesfloor. Andre asked for the day off, and I’d willingly given it to him—no one works harder for me than he does—only to be too tied up when Jackson came by to go immediately.

He must’ve waited on me for a good twenty or so minutes holding a cute little brown paper bag with our deli sandwiches before I could finally break free. When I did, it was to discover that door unsecured.

I might’ve believed it to be something innocuous like me forgetting for once if we didn’t happen to see that card. That stupid motherfucking card just sitting there on my workbench like it belonged there. As if it didn’t mean anything.

But of course, it does mean something. At some point during this out-the-ass busy morning, someone entered my sacred space, placed the card so that it would stand up on its own, and exited undetected. Again, there was no theft, and again, it was that thick, fancy cardstock denoting a specific type of card. This time, the “thinking of you” variety.

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