Page 11 of Unbind

Try as I might, I can’t help but imagine she’s that girl, Natalie. Just for a moment. Just for a fleeting, blessed moment where she doesn’t hate me. Or maybe... maybe shedoeshate me, but she wants me more.

Fuck, that fantasy has my cock swelling impossibly, needing to drive forward. Natalie on all fours for me, despising me, despisingherself, but needing so, so badly for me to fuck all that hatred and resentment and tension out of her that the power of her desire drives away every other emotion. Annihilates every other conflict.

Not that I’d allow her to stay like that for long.

I’d have to flip her over and get her on her back so I could enjoy the sweet look of surrender dawning on her beautiful, contemptuous face as she gave herself over to the inevitable.

‘I’m going again,’ I huff out. ‘You okay?’

‘God, yeah,’ she pants, giving me my green light.

And go I do. I push into that tight, hot space until I’m fully, gloriously in, and then I begin to move, my drives hard and rough and urgent. The astonishing pleasure of it drives any residual shame and self-loathing from my mind.

‘Rose’ is a palette cleanser. A fast fuck. A means to an end.

But the means is pretty fucking entertaining.

And the end, when it comes in an unstoppable tsunami of heat as the contractions of her orgasm milk my dick to its own glorious finale, is blessed oblivion.

Just as I intended.

7

NATALIE

Serenity is the rasp of tailor’s chalk dragging over wool, the clean, crisp incisions of sharpened scissors slicing through silk as if it’s water.

I stand at the edge of the high table in our light-filled attic studio, white-knuckling the edge and watching with a mixture of nerves and gratification as Evan, our pattern cutter, cuts expertly around the engineered panels printed on sumptuous duchesse satin.

The silk mill has done an incredible job with the print. It’s so flawless it’s as if an artist has taken an actual paintbrush to the fabric, capturing the prettiest daubs of wisteria in all its purple-hued glory, from palest lavender to richest periwinkle.

In actual fact, the flowers were painted digitally and then reworked into shaped panels that exactly fit the pattern of this evening dress, meaning that when the dress is assembled, the wisteria will fall just so, its blooms cascading in the optimum way to complement every pleat. Every dart.

‘Nat,’ Evan says through gritted teeth, his eyes glued to the fabric.

‘Yep.’

‘Kindly bugger off. You’re creeping me out.’

‘No can do. You know this is my therapy.’ I gaze at what will be the front panel for the skirt. It’s simply sublime. It’ll look incredible juxtaposed with the chunky gold hardware that’s one of the features of this collection. Incongruous, but incredible.

I run my fingertips reverently over an unprinted section of the fabric. Duchesse satin is one of my absolute favourites to work with, not only because of its lustre, which hits that exact sweet spot between matte and shine, but because of its weight. It drapes like nothing else. I love that we’re using it outside of bridal wear. My brand may bear the nameGossamer, but I value gravitas in my fabrics just as much, even if the majority of our collection runs towards the diaphanous.

Evan sighs. He’s a couple of years older than me, a great, hulking, fair-haired guy who cuts like an angel. The vision for Gossamer may be all mine, but Evan brings it to life. I have a combined business and fashion degree. I draw, and I can sew, but I certainly can’t cut at the level the brand requires.

For this particular gown, he draped and draped on the mannequin until we’d got every detail right before making up a toile of it in a cheaper polyester satin that mimicked the weight of the duchesse. Only then did Carrie, our print designer and a digital wizard, transfer the dimensions of Evan’s paper patterns into her CAD programme and play with the layout of the print on each pattern piece until her 3D mockup resembled the vision in my head.

No matter how laborious this career, I’ll never, ever tire of that astonishing jolt of creative satisfaction that comes from having a dream made real. Of obsessing over theephemeral perfection of an idea in my head and being fortunate enough to have a team of talented professionals who can draw it from my mind’s eye and conjure a flesh-and-blood garment before my eyes, even more beautiful than I could have imagined, as if they’re my fairy godmothers.

‘You look like shit,’ Evan says now. ‘You feeling all right?’

‘I’m fine.’

I’m far from fine, but I know from experience that his question pertains squarely to my blood glucose, which is stable despite the punishing vinyasa flow I put myself through first thing this morning. My sleep-deprived body complained the whole time, but I didn’t entertain its whining. It was worth it. The ritual grounded me, reminded me that I am in control. I get to choose how my day pans out.

Not my body.

And certainly not some dickhead whom karma forgot to call on.

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