Page 74 of Untether

But I tell her.

I give my dear friend a blow-by-blow account.

Literally.

The cuffing, the pearl necklace, the choking me with his dick, the flipping me over and, yep,spittingon my pussy and taking me from behind, all while he was in character as some dangerous, hooded thug whose commands were terse and whose moves were rough.

Then, when it looks like she might have an actual heart attack, I tell her about the shower. How sweet he was. How careful. How tenderly he looked after me.

But I don’t tell her about him coming to see me on Friday, because that episode is a shiny, fragile bauble, a secret so delicious and so new I want to wrap it in cotton wool and warm it next to my beating heart.

The things he said.

The kisses he gave me.

The way he was with me.

Or the way I’ve been feeling all weekend: a pot-pourri of precarious and hopeful and incredulous and dreamy and perplexed.

Because the public doesn’t get to consume or enjoy or dismiss or mock or excoriate those intrepid new seedlings.

Only Cal and I get to do that.

47

AIDA

SIMONE: What did you get up to late last week, Aida?

ME: In a nutshell, I had sex with Callum.

SIMONE: To recap. He’s the first person you’ve had any sexual relations with since your divorce, correct?

ME: Exactly.

SIMONE: So last time we sat down, you’d had your massage, which had a very happy ending for you. And it sounded like that was a heavily planned, highly choreographed event?

ME: It was. Well, the ending wasn’t. [Laughs] But the overall concept was, yes.

SIMONE: And did you go with the same route for the next step in, for want of a better word, unfurling yourself?

ME: I didn’t. I’ve been fortunate to have a lot of creative licence with this production, and that’s something I pushed for, because there was no way I was cramming my sexual reawakening into someone else’s schedule.

SIMONE: Quite right. So how did you approach the next step?

ME: We had a tentative plan to meet up at Alchemy, Callum’s club, when it was empty. But I found out they were hosting a big masked ball there last week, and I guess the same side of me that’s dragged me into the middle of riots and terror attacks and even war zones smelt a story.

SIMONE: Yeah, you’ve never had much of a survival instinct.

ME: [Laughs] Right?

SIMONE: So you signed yourself up for this masked ball. And I’m guessingmasked ballis a polite term for a sex party?

ME: It was an orgy, yes. [Licks bottom lip nervously] So there were a lot of firsts for me that night.

SIMONE: You’re telling me. Wow. [Looks around comedically] Okay, no one from your production company has pulled the plug on your mic yet, so I suppose you’d better keep going with your fabulous adventure. Can I ask, was this just your nose for a good story driving you? Or was it something deeper?

ME: It was both. I instinctively knew a party would make for better TV. We got some early footage of the setup and the performers before the guests showed up. I wanted it to be immersive for the viewers.

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