Chapter 11: Guilt & Craving

The porch light flickered the same soft gold it always did when I pulled into the driveway that Friday night, but everything inside me felt different—sharper, heavier, like the weight of every secret I’d let pile up was pressing down on my ribs. My sundress felt too tight against my skin, the fabric whispering over thighs still faintly marked from the afternoon two days earlier, when David had pinned me to his kitchen island and talked about filling me until I carried him. The memory sent a fresh pulse of heat between my legs even as shame coiled tight in my stomach. This has to slow down, I told myself, gripping the steering wheel until my knuckles ached. One more night, then we talk. Really talk. Katie had texted about board games and popcorn like it was any ordinary sleepover, and I’d answered yes before I could stop myself.

She yanked the door open with her usual bright laugh, dragging me inside. The house smelled like buttered popcorn and the faint, lived-in warmth of laundry soap. We set up on the couch under the big fleece blanket, Monopoly spread across the coffee table, Katie chattering about her latest internship drama while David leaned in the doorway watching us with that quiet half-smile that always made my pulse stutter. His eyes caught mine for a beat too long—dark, knowing, full of the same hunger that had left me leaking his release down my thighs in broad daylight. I looked away fast, cheeks burning.

The game dragged. I rolled the dice, moved my little silver car, but every turn my mind slipped back to the way he’d growled about breeding me, the toy buzzing against my clit while he thrust deep. Katie kept poking my ribs, teasing me for being “spacey,” and I forced laughs that felt brittle. By nine she was yawning huge, stretching like she always did before crashing. “Midterms wrecked me,” she mumbled, hugging me quick. “Guest room’s yours. Night, Dad.” Her bedroom door clicked shut upstairs a minute later, and the house settled into that deep, sleeping hush.

I waited in the living room another ten minutes, heart hammering so loud I was sure it echoed off the walls, then slipped down to the guest room. The blue night-light painted everything in cool shadows. I sat on the edge of the bed in my thin camisole and sleep shorts, knees drawn up, trying to rehearse the words I needed to say. We can’t keep doing this. Katie’s right upstairs. The guilt is killing me. My thighs pressed together anyway, the ache from two days ago still lingering like a brand.