Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 64452 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 322(@200wpm)___ 258(@250wpm)___ 215(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 64452 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 322(@200wpm)___ 258(@250wpm)___ 215(@300wpm)
CHAPTER 11
Heather
Lisa nodded. “Don’t drop any f-bombs, Heather,” she told me. “Or it’s not just your trainer’s hand you’re going to get on your bare butt. They use the cane for unladylike behavior like swearing.”
She smiled ruefully at the wide-eyed look I gave her, then continued, “Anyway, my husband David went through the same thing as Joann’s. He’d been so gentle, so careful with me for the first year of our marriage. I mean, it wasn’t exactly what I wanted, but I didn’t mind. I honestly thought I could live with it, and I didn’t think my… well, my attitude was related. Then suddenly David’s filling out forms giving strangers permission to…” She glanced at me, her cheeks coloring slightly. “Well, what they do here.”
I swallowed hard and looked down at my food. The urge to confess that I had seen Lisa’s trainer fucking her ass, to say it just to see how it would sound and what Lisa and the other wives would do, rose so high that I had to bite my lower lip.
Elizabeth spoke more quietly. “Thomas says I’m too anxious, too afraid of disappointing him—especially, you know, in bed. He… I guess he thinks if I learn to be more confident in my… wifely duties… it will help our marriage.” She looked down at her hands. “Maybe he’s right… but it’s, you know, so embarrassing.” She raised her eyes and looked around the table. “It helps that we’re not alone, though, right?”
They all turned to me then, their expressions expectant, but not unkind. I felt my throat tighten as I tried to figure out how to explain what had happened without revealing everything.
“Ryan… my husband… he found out I’d been lying to him,” I began, my voice barely above a whisper. “About small things at first. Then I crashed our car while I was texting, and I lied about that too. I told him I’d swerved to avoid a child, but the car’s data system showed I was looking at my phone.”
I paused, taking a shaky breath. “He tried to discipline me at home, but I… I ran away. I told him I wanted to leave him, leave the town. So he called for help.”
“What kind of lies did you tell?” Lisa asked gently.
My face burned. “Just… household things. Not cleaning properly, not doing laundry when I said I would. Avoiding…” I couldn’t finish the sentence.
“Avoiding sex with him,” Elizabeth supplied softly, her eyes full of understanding.
I nodded miserably. “He knew. Somehow he knew I was… that I was touching myself in the shower every morning because I couldn’t… because he was too gentle and I needed…” I couldn’t continue.
Joann leaned forward. “Needed what?”
But I shook my head frantically. I couldn’t tell them about Chad. Couldn’t admit that I’d been trained by another man to crave rough treatment, degradation, anal sex. That I’d spent a year being used like a whore and loving every second of it. That Ryan’s gentle lovemaking left me empty because I’d already been ruined by someone who’d seen me as nothing more than a collection of holes for his pleasure.
“I can’t,” I whispered. “I can’t talk about it.”
Elizabeth studied my face with those warm, perceptive eyes, and I had the uncomfortable feeling she could see right through me.
“There’s something else,” she said softly. “Something you’re not telling us. Something from before your marriage.”
My stomach dropped. How could she know? Was it that obvious? I pressed my lips together, shaking my head frantically.
“I don’t know what you mean,” I lied, but my voice cracked on the words.
Lisa reached across the table and touched my hand gently. “Heather, we’ve all been where you are. We’ve all had secrets we thought we could never tell anyone. But keeping them locked up inside… it only makes everything worse.”
“What kind of secrets?” I asked, desperate to deflect attention from myself.
Joann and Elizabeth exchanged a look. Then Joann sighed. “I used to… well, let’s just say I had some experiences in college that would make Jake’s head spin. Things I told myself didn’t matter because they were ‘just experimentation.’”
“And I…” Elizabeth’s cheeks flushed pink. “I had a relationship before Thomas. Someone who was… very different from my husband. Very demanding. I thought I hated it, but my body…” She trailed off, looking down at her hands.
Lisa nodded. “My David has no idea about Marcus. About the things Marcus made me do, the way he trained me to…” She glanced at me meaningfully. “Well, let’s just say David’s gentle approach wasn’t exactly what my body was used to.”
I felt tears prick at my eyes. They were all describing variations of my own situation—women who’d been with dominant men before their marriages, who’d learned to crave things their gentle husbands couldn’t provide. But I still couldn’t bring myself to speak.