Page 92 of Hearts of Stone

He let out a sigh. “Enough to build many, many such facilities, if you wish.”

“Awesome.” When I raised my paddle, everyone turned to stare, so I held it higher, like the Statue of Liberty holding her torch. “2.2 million.”

The gasp that went through the room was so loud my ears popped a little from the change in pressure. I rubbed it with my finger, then nodded to the compere to make clear I was serious.

“Well…” She almost staggered back from the lectern. “If there are no other bids?”

There weren’t. Of course there weren’t. No one else was mad enough to bid so high, but that suited me just fine. Mellors had egged me on in this little power play, but in the end I’d focused on the one thing that was most important to me: enabling someone to keep their dignity. Women brave enough to try and escape their abusers deserved somewhere relatively soft to land, and Adam deserved to be treated like an actual human being, rather than like Not One of Us, and if it took 2.2 million to do that, then I was cool.

Right up until we were forced to take a photo together.

“Oh my god…” the woman from the shelter said, her hands going to her cheeks. “I had no idea… I mean, I hoped, but… Oh my god, I thought we had months and months of fundraising ahead of… Oh my god!” She stopped her outpouring of emotion to introduce herself. “I’m Sharon, by the way.”

Her feeling of joy mixed with disbelief was one I knew well. It was that sense of something finally going your way. I’d felt it the moment Mellors had walked into Trevor’s apartment with the news of my inheritance, and I’d felt it every day since. Letting someone else share that joy made me feel a little less guilty about my good fortune.

“I’m really honoured to help support your organisation, Sharon,” I said, offering her my hand, but she wrapped meup in a massive hug, squeezing me hard. Behind her, Adam approached much more cautiously, a wry smile on his lips.

“Let’s get a photo!” Sharon exclaimed, nestling in close as the photographer approached. “This will go on the front page of the newsletter.”

“Are you ladies OK if I jump in on this photo?” Adam asked.

“God, yes. Get in here!” Sharon’s enthusiasm was infectious. She flung an arm around my waist and his, dragging us closer. The photographer asked us to smile and we did so obediently before they pulled back and looked at their LCD display.

“Perfect,” they said. “Now, if we can get the next one with Jade in the middle? We really should have the winning bidder and her prize next to each other.”

“Of course.”

Nothing seemed to faze Adam. He just shoved his hands in his pockets and sauntered over to stand on my right. Was he standing much closer to me than he had been to Sharon? It was hard to tell, because she’d embraced him with such gusto. The photographer was giving him direction, but he just looked down at me.

“Is this OK, Jade?”

His arm went out, hovering around my waist area but not actually touching me, not until I gave consent. I smiled at him politely: a social reflex. Holding someone around the waist meant nothing. People did it for photos all the time. Mr Suit had gripped his nana’s waist and beamed for the camera, so why would I object? But when Adam’s eyes met mine, I saw something there, an intensity, a recognition, that told me he knew what I felt because he felt it, too.

That to touch me, to hold me, wasn’t an impersonal thing.

He was giving off major vibes and… I’d had one bloody boyfriend in my entire life. When Trevor had indicated that he wanted to get serious, I’d taken myself off the market with a sighof relief. No one else had been knocking down my door to ask me to date them. But as I looked at Adam, I had the feeling that he might.

Note to self, I thought,find out what the hell this situationship with the gargoyles actually entails.

“Yeah, of course,” I said with a little laugh, trying to make light of, well, everything. I turned back to the photographer, thinking that was a safer place to direct my gaze, but I was mistaken. We had an audience filled with keen eyes and even keener commentary, if the whispered asides were anything to go by. They all watched as Adam drew closer to me, observing intently as his arm went around me.

Sharon was pressed enthusiastically into my left side, but she was nothing compared to him. His hand landed very demurely in the small of my back, but somehow it was under my jacket. The satin of my blouse felt all too thin, the heat radiating off him threatening to scorch me, and that’s when that dream came back. My lips parted as I stared into the lens, but I didn’t see the photographer, just the Adam of my dream. My hands balled into fists, because otherwise I felt like I would be planting them against his chest for them to anchor me as my hips rose and fell.

“One more…” the photographer said with a distracted air, their finger poised over the button. “Now smile.”

But I couldn’t, not when my whole body burned. Sweat prickled across my brow. My cunt clamped down, then flexed, like I was actually doing what I’d dreamed about, the well-used muscles reminding me of just how incredible that had been last night. And then, to my shock, I felt something slippery slowly sliding past those muscles.

If you have a period, you know exactly what that feels like, when that thick, heavy fluid slides out of you. I stiffened, then pulled myself away, not sure what the fuck my body was doing. It wasn’t that time of the month and I…

“I’m sorry, I need to go,” I told the photographer, feeling something heavy and dark pulse inside me. I turned to the compere. “Mellors can sort out the payment details for me.”

I heard sounds, noises, people calling my name, but for the first time since I’d stepped into the place, I followed my instincts to get out of there. My heels clicked across the floor and I made a beeline for the sliding door, not even sure I knew how to open it.

“Jade!” A man’s voice called out to me, and I was willing to bet it wasn’t Mellors. “Jade!”

The sliding doors parted as I approached them. I let out a sigh of relief and continued, click, click, clicking as I walked through. Just as I burst out into the real world, a hand grabbed mine.

Oh my god…

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