Page 15 of Eternally Devoted

Sterling makes circles with his rough, broad palm over her knee. My eyes lock on the motion, and how it’s the exact touch she needs. And when I finally look back up at her, her shoulders are sloped with relief, and the lines of concern in her forehead have melted away. He makes her feel so safe, it’s clear.

“Okay, that’s good to know,” Sterling says softly, still slowly kneading and circling her knee. She reaches out, placing her palm on his, stopping the movement. She looks into his eyes, and for a second I’m jealous at the quiet intimacy they’re sharing at this moment. The dog whimpers, breaking the spell, reminding me that something is up.

I have half a mind to call the station, but something in my gut tells me not to. Something in this room tells me not to do anything but stay here and wait.

“Please,” she whimpers, her voice flooded with raw desperation and drunken need. I’ve imagined Juni begging, in the privacy of my mind, of course. And the crazy part is? She sounds just the way she did in my fantasy. Gentle, like even in her hungriest, most neediest state, she just doesn’t have it in her to be aggressive. Her eyes cut to mine, her green irises vivid and bright like a perfect spring day. Nothing in her expression says she’s backing down. She utters, “Please,” one more time, and my cock guiltily stiffens.

“What, sweetheart? Tell us what you need.”

Tell us what you need.My cock likes that too.

Juni’s hazy green eyes coast between the two of us, linking Sterling and I in a way I can’t explain. “Please, I just need you.” She pauses, the tip of her pink tongue making a seductive swipe over her bottom lip.“Bothof you.”

CHAPTER

SEVEN

IT ALL SEEMED SO SIMPLE.

Juniper

Stupidly, my plan was to never tell anyone about theotherside of me. I thought if I made enough jam, I’d be blissfully content not ever having a lover or children of my own. I want all that but by a certain age and when it doesn’t happen, well, I told myselfthat jam could replace a man, because my jam is incredible,andtakes a crapload of time to make.

It all seemed so simple.

But then white truck manhadto be a dog beater. And blinding rage found me, and it was the very same rage that made me pull over, made me grab the jam, andmade mebeat him to death with it until I couldn’t tell what was brain matter or preserves.

I don’t like that I have to make bad men learn lessons.

It is, however, the card the universe dealt me.

While I’ve learned over the years that there’s no cleanup required when Iavoidacting on my impulses, I’ve also come to realize avoiding them only adds pressure to the cooker in my soul. And rather than pretend my needs don’t exist, I usually make a little plan to channel my energy, to save hours’ worth of headaches. When seething anger and the overwhelming urge for retribution hits, I make myself take a day or two and plan.Normally.

Damn it, the dog beater guy messed everything up.

I’m worried if I don’t come clean, I’ll be discovered. Dash is so smart. And he’s a police officer. He knows when people are lying, and more than that, he knowsme.In the last couple years, the three of us have been inseparable.

We take mini getaways together to breweries, we have board game night and bowling night, we tried to start a book club (but Sterling fell asleep), we watchSurvivorand make each other playlists, we swim in the summer and snowboard in the winter.

We’refriends.

He’s aware that something more sinister has happened. But he’s not pressing it yet, giving me grace I don’t deserve.

And Sterling.

My gosh.

Ever since I met him, I knew there was something about him that screamed “forever.” It only took a few months of hanging out for me to realize that I wanted him the same way my little sister Dolly wanted her husband Hudson before they got together.

Passionately. Aggressively. Insanely.

But a woman with secrets like mine doesn’t easily take a lover. She doesn’t simply have a boyfriend or a husband, she doesn’t pose for Christmas cards and make baked goodies for the town during the holidays. She doesn’t have daughters who borrow her clothes and wear her lipstick, and she doesn’t host girls' nights and plan cross-continent vacations.

She doesn’t do those things becausewhenandifher choices catch up with her, it makes the fall that much more agonizing, more public, more painful for the ones who love her.

Years have passed and Sterling has never asked me out, anyway. When Dash came along, I fell for him, too. And whileneitherof them ever made a move, I’ve believed it's best that way, because the barrier of privacy, avoiding true intimacy—it kept my secret side safe.

Recently it’s been harder to stick to that ideology. The desire to have my dream life with them has been more challenging to suppress.

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