Page 25 of Holding Out

“Let’s buy the dress,” Jenina said.“Then we’re going shoe shopping and lingerie shopping.”

Ten minutes later they were in the shoe store, and Jenina had three pairs of stiletto sandals hanging over her fingers.

“Can I help you with those?”the saleswoman asked.

“They’re for her,” Jenina said.“She needs to make a guy beg.”

The saleswoman’s mouth opened, then closed, then opened again.She was a dark-haired woman with white roots—Becca guessed she was pushing sixty.“Um, what size?”she asked.

“Eight,” Becca said.

The saleswoman brought out all three pairs and began opening boxes and pulling cardboard and tissue paper out of the sandals.The first pair Becca tried on were made up of a million spaghetti-thin silver straps, crisscrossed back and forth over each other.She admired her foot in the sandal, then stood and fell right back into her seat.

“I’m not going to be able to walk in these,” she said.

“You’re not going to be walking,” Jenina said.“You’re going to be hooking your ankles around his back.”

The saleswoman coughed and looked away.

“You’re evil,” Becca mouthed at Jenina.

“I’m pragmatic.”

Becca was pragmatic, too, or at least she’d alwaysthoughtshe was.But even though she needed to unfasten the sandals, take them off, and return them to the box so she could try on something more practical, she couldn’t make herself do it.She kept thinking of what Jenina had said, and the thought of Griff between her thighs and the sandals digging into Griff’s ass—

New Becca, among other things, was apparently a lot more good-to-go than Old Becca.She was allhoorayabout the stiletto sex.

The other thing she couldn’t stop thinking about was the look on Griff’s face when he saw the sandals.Sawherin the sandals.Saw the length of her legs, her ankles crisscrossed with those impossibly slim straps.

She wanted him to give her that look again, the one he’d given her just briefly when he’d found out she was a virgin.Like she was a meal he was about to ravage—with gusto.

“I’ll take these,” she told the saleswoman.

Lingerie was easier, mainly because she didn’t have to show it to Jenina, who was trying on practical panties—her phrase—in the next dressing room.

The panties Becca had on were not practical.Not at all.They were shimmery silver and barely there.If she weren’t wearing the obligatory underwear-under-the-underwear, she would be able to see herself through them.The thought made her extra glad she’d indulged in some ladyscaping earlier this morning—something she didnotfeel the need to share with Jenina, who would have put too much weight on it.She wasn’ttryingto impress Griff or anything.She just liked things trim and tidy.

There was a matching bra.Her nipples stood at attention beneath it.She stared at herself in the mirror.He’d seen alotof breasts.There was no reason hers should impress him.And Jenina’s assertions aside, this wasn’t about impressing him.

Jondalar would tell her that her breasts were the most beautiful breasts he’d ever seen, and he’dmeanit.

It was a damn good thing she was going to lose her virginity so she could stop having Jondalar fantasies and move on with her life.

Her hand rose, without her consciously deciding to do it, to brush over the sheer lace of her bra and the hard tip of her nipple.She shivered.And did it again.Then the other.

Wow.So, there was that.

It wasn’t like she’d never engaged in a little ...self-love ...but it was usually the quick and efficient Hitachi Magic Wand kind of thing.This slow burn sensuality thing that Griff had started—

Whole different ball of hot melting wax.

Old Becca gave New Becca the side-eye.New Becca gave Old Becca the finger and pinched a nipple.Sensation rolled down her belly, arrowed to her clit.

She’d be ready for him by the time Saturday rolled around, that was for sure.

11

I’m on my way,Griff texted.

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