Her Perfect 10

by Brianna Cash

  Sadie: You’re young and innocent. Or so it seemed at first. You’re quickly catching up to me.

  OC736: My fantasy is that I get to be with you. Out in the open, where everyone can see and know. We don’t need to hide it or sneak around. You truly want to be with me, and we can be a couple.

  His words make my heart melt a little, but I’m not going to admit that. Not when I want to be in his arms, instead of alone in my apartment. Not when he’s getting so close to knocking down that last wall in my defense system.

  Besides, he needs to pay for telling me no when I admitted I wanted to stay with him tonight. That’s not a request I’ve ever made to a guy before, and his rejection was kind of brutal. Even if that’s not how he meant it.

  Sadie: That sounds great and all, but I can’t get off on it.

  OC736: I told you before, SD, I’m not a number. I want your heart in this.

  Sadie: What makes you think it’s not?

  OC736: You turn every conversation we have lately back to sex.

  Only since I started to suspect he and Owen were the same person. So…since last weekend. Does he really miss my conversational skills about things other than sex after only a few days?

  Sadie: Talk about hearts and magic and happily ever after scares the shit out of me. Orgasms are quantitative. I can prove those. I don’t need to question it.

  OC736: My heart’s in this and I’m not questioning anything.

  Fuck! How can he say something like that and expect me to be ok with it? We’re not there yet. We’re not even close to that yet.

  Sadie: You don’t have the history I do.

  Sure, maybe Owen and I have kept things light when we’re together face to face—or back to face, depending on our position—but our texts are anything but light half of the time. And after everything we’ve been through the past couple months, I know Owen well enough that I can predict how he’ll respond. A compromise. He’ll offer some promise that will indicate there’s still hope for me, even if I can’t talk about it. So, I beat him to it and give him that promise before he can come up with some tactful way to ask.

  Sadie: I’m not closing the book on anything, though.

  I can’t believe I once compared him to a robot.

  OC736: Thank you. That’s all I was asking for. Now, to help get you off…

  Smiling, I slide farther under the blankets and get comfortable.

  OC736: Tell me you’re going to touch yourself.

  Sadie: Already on it, 736. Give me the mental images to get there.

  OC736: One night, out of the blue, you show up at my apartment.

  Sadie: Why am I there?

  OC736: You’re wearing hardly anything under your jacket, and you tell me you couldn’t wait to see me, not even one more minute, and you hurried over without getting dressed because you knew clothes would only be in our way.

  I close my eyes and let myself fall into his fantasy world. I can picture it with a clarity that scares me. I can hear his voice, all gruff and surprised at my sudden appearance and limited attire. His eyes will flash with lust at my words and his hands will reach for me…

  Wait. His fantasy, not mine.

  OC736: I try to touch you, but you smack my hands away and tell me to take off my clothes and sit on the couch. Because you’re going to tease me until I beg you for it.

  Shit, I like the sound of that.

  I love begging Owen. I don’t think he ever realized he liked to be in control until I showed him how to do it, but he was made for it. He effortlessly slipped into the role of ordering me around and telling me, or just showing me, how he wanted me. And the more his confidence in that area grows, the better he gets at it.

  But I never realized he might want me to order him around, too.

  Sadie: How am I going to make you beg?

  OC736: So many ways. You tell me I can’t touch you, then get up in my personal space, rubbing your breasts in my face, grinding your lace panties over my dick, kissing me with that sweet, sassy mouth.

  OC736: When you can’t stand it anymore, you slide your hand inside those pretty panties, playing with yourself while I watch, drowning your fingers in your arousal for me.

  Moaning at the thought, I do exactly as he’s describing, keeping my eyes closed as I imagine every second. At least until my phone chimes again.

  OC736: You raise your wet, sweet smelling fingers to my mouth, slowly, letting me anticipate the thought of them finally sliding between my lips, where I’ll savor the taste of you for as long as you’ll let me. But you don’t let me. You pull away at the last second, sucking them into your own mouth instead.

  Sadie: Are you jealous?

  OC736: So jealous. I love the taste of you. I growl in protest and you laugh at my impatience.

  Sadie: You? Impatient?

  OC736: When you’re teasing me like this, yes.

  I need to act out this scenario. Pronto. I’m dying to see Owen impatient.

  Sadie: What happens next?

  OC736: You mock me. Ask, ‘how do you want me, 736?’

  Owen, I correct him in my head, wanting his name to roll off my tongue when I do this. And I will do this. Maybe next week sometime, when we’re back from the wedding and have time to focus on us instead of rehearsal dinners and ceremonies and pictures and speeches and all the other shit that’s involved.

  OC736: I tell you I want you any way you’ll have me.

  Sadie: How do I want you?

  OC736: Besides every way imaginable?

  So damn true!

  OC736: Right then, you want me hard and fast. You tell me I still can’t use my hands and I can’t come, then you sink onto my dick, moaning at how deeply I fill you. You use me like a tool, riding me however you want, with no inhibitions or thoughts, chasing that release you need so badly and can only get from me.

  I can only get it from him. My definition of an orgasm is completely different after Owen. The ones he gives me are stronger, more intense, more satisfying than anything I’ve felt with anyone else.

  And Owen uses me like his favorite tool in the biggest tool store there ever was. He has so many options in that store, he’ll never run out of shiny, new tools to test. But I’m his favorite. I’m resilient; he knows he can be rough with me and I won’t break. He knows I’m reliable and I’ll never disappoint him by running out of battery life. And while there might be prettier, improved tools waiting for his attention, with upgrades I don’t have, he also knows I’m flexible. He can try new things with me, he can experiment with me, and I won’t judge him or be upset if the project didn’t turn out like we both wanted.

  He’s my favorite tool, too. I just haven’t taken the reins and used him nearly as often as he’s used me. He needed practice, and I love giving it to him. I can’t wait to start my own project now, though. Especially since I know he’ll get off on it.

  Sadie: I love when you’re balls-deep inside me. You fill me so good.

  OC736: It shows. You moan and cry out, your voice getting lower the closer you get.

  Sadie: Do I come on you like that?

  OC736: With a yell so loud, you scare the neighbor across the hall.

  I picture the look of horror on Mrs. Folston’s face at the noise we’d make. Although she’d probably be smirking if she knew no one was around to see it.

  Sadie: Did you get off with me fucking you like that?

  OC736: You told me I couldn’t.

  Sadie: I’m a heartless bitch. Do I let you get off now?

  OC736: While you’re coming, I can’t help myself. I pick you up and throw you on your back to the couch. You smile as I slam into you, as deep as I can get. Your hand cups my face and I know your feelings are more than just sex. You’re afraid of it, you won’t say it, but I still know it.

  If he already knows, why does he keep pushing me?

  I type out the ending for him, so he knows that I know, too. And that I’m ok with it, as long as he doesn’t ask me to voice it.

  Sadie: You
thank me by kissing me. You fuck me and use me with your dick but thank me and love me with your mouth.

  OC736: It’s the only way you’ll let me.

  I close my eyes and imagine every second of his fantasy again. I shudder at the image of me working him into a frenzy, rubbing myself with my left hand and pulling those fingers into my mouth so my right can keep working its magic. And I push two fingers inside as I imagine him filling me. But I make myself wait to come until he does, until I cup his face and let him see my feelings written in my eyes, because I’m so damn scared to voice them.

  Chapter 24

  Owen

  I stare at Sadie’s childhood home, more nervous than I thought I would be when I agreed to stay here yesterday. It’s a small, two-story, run-down house situated between two other small, two-story, run-down houses. That’s not what I care about, though. I know she didn’t come from money. The thing I care about is that I’m going to meet the woman who did her best to raise Sadie, which couldn’t have been easy. I’m meeting the person who helped Sadie become the smart-ass, confident girl she is, who doesn’t take shit from anyone.

  “What do I call your mom?”

  “Do you want her to love you, or hate you?”

  “I’m having sex with her daughter in her house tonight, after meeting her for the first time. Let’s start off with hate and see if I can push it any farther downhill, shall we?”

  Sadie laughs, running her fingers through my hair when I look at her. “Start off with Ms. Dietrich and watch her blush. Then call her whatever she tells you to.”

  We get out and argue about who’s going to carry her bag. In the end, she lets me, but also says she thinks I’m being ridiculous. She pushes through the side door, tossing her keys on the counter in the kitchen. “Mom! I’m home!”

  “I’ll be right out!”

  She rolls her eyes. “We’ve got at least five minutes.”

  She leads me into a well-loved living room, where I find the front door and the stairs. She stomps up the latter without a backward glance, knowing I’m following without question. After pointing out the bathroom, she walks into a room with an open door, sitting on the double bed with a faded, thread-bare quilt.

  “This is my room. Don’t judge.”

  “What’s your mom doing that we have time for a tour?”

  “Reading.” She grimaces. “It’s her passion. Every spare minute she has is for reading.”

  “You don’t like to read?”

  Why is she taking that writing course?

  And why are we avoiding acknowledging that we know each other? That I’m her 736 and she’s my SD? We both know it. We both know the other knows it. But neither one of us will say it.

  The only thing bothering me is why she doesn’t have a car anymore.

  “As a kid, I hated it. It’s whatever now. I think I have some left-over resentment from when my mom would rather read than spend time with me.” She kicks her feet against the base of the bed, watching me look around her room. She doesn’t have any trophies or pictures of her in a sports uniform. There are no books on her bookshelf or posters on her walls. There’s hardly anything in here to tell me what she was like as a kid, or a teenager.

  Since she’s being honest, I go back to her lingering resentment toward her mom.

  “What does she read? What genre?”

  After studying me for a moment, Sadie stands and reaches for my hand. I give it to her freely, enjoying how she’s not shying away from me even though her mom would be able to see if she came up the stairs.

  “I’ll show you.”

  There are two doors on this floor besides her bedroom’s and the bathroom. One of those is slightly ajar, while the other is closed. Sadie opens the latter with a sigh, stepping into the bedroom-turned-library. “Mom reads anything she can get her hands on.”

  I step into the room behind her. Every inch of wall space is filled with shelving units, along with several in the middle of the room that create a faux wall. Every available inch of those units is covered with books.

  “Romance and science fiction are her favorites, but she’s non-discriminatory. They’re sorted by category, then her favorites.”

  Every genre is represented. Romance and sci-fi, of course, but also suspense, detective stories, women’s lit, fantasy, humor, general fiction, religious, drama, some classics I read in high school, non-fiction, and autobiographies. There’s even a self-help section. Slowly walking around, I take in the space, the thousands of books, and I suddenly understand Sadie’s need for organizing things into categories and rating them on a spreadsheet. She got it honestly. She got it from this.

  My eyes meet hers. She’s watching me carefully, some tension on her forehead that shouldn’t be there. I give her a small smile. “This is a lot of books.”

  She laughs, her face lighting up at my understated comment. “Yeah. It is.”

  “Why do you think romance and sci-fi are her favorites?”

  She sighs again, that smile gone as she walks to her room and flops on the bed, her eyes on the ceiling. “Dad used to beat my mom. She did what she had to do to get us out of that situation, but she never stopped loving him. Romance, because the two lovers always get to live happily ever after, and she didn’t. Sci-fi, because it takes her to another world, and she can forget all about this one for a while.”

  “What kind of books do you read?”

  She scoffs. “I don’t read. I watch movies.”

  I sit on her bed, trying again as she sits up and moves over, making it so we’re facing each other. “What kind of movies do you watch?”

  Her voice gets quiet, almost like she’s shy, or afraid to admit this to me. Or, maybe, admit it at all. “Usually, rom-coms. Because they make love look fun and easy. Because it’s always worth the struggles the characters go through. Because love conquers all…” Her shoulders bounce up and down. “At least in the movies.”

  “You don’t believe in love,” I remind her, even though that statement is bordering on acknowledging who we really are to each other.

  “I never had a reason to, before.”

  Before? Does that mean…?

  “Sadie? Come down and visit with me! How much time do you have?” Her mom’s voice drifts up the stairs, pausing what felt like a very important conversation. Sadie grabs my face in her hands, pulling me to her mouth, where she kisses me like she’s not in any hurry at all. Sliding my hands to her hips, I yank her onto my lap, where she smiles against my lips.

  “To be continued,” she eventually whispers.

  She crawls off me, tugging on my hand. I follow her down the stairs and into the kitchen.

  “Hey, Mom.”

  Her mom’s eyes widen when she sees me trailing her daughter, and she pushes off the kitchen counter, running nervous hands over her clothes. “Sadie, who’s this?”

  “Mom, this is Owen, the guy I’m seeing. He’s also Rob’s brother, so he’s in the wedding, too. We’ll be walking down the aisle together.”

  Letting a genuine smile slip onto my face—she introduced me as the guy she’s seeing!—I offer her mom my hand. “It’s nice to meet you, Ms. Dietrich.”

  “Oh.” Her cheeks explode with heat, like Sadie’s occasionally do if I say just the right thing. “It’s nice to meet you too, Owen. Please, call me Heather…”

  Sadie

  “What is this?” Rob demands of Owen before the rehearsal dinner, gesturing to the two of us together. “I thought this was a fling at the beach.”

  Feeling out of place, I slip my hand out of Owen’s and meet his eyes before I walk away, so he knows I’m fine. I just don’t want to hear this confrontation. “It’s not a fling.” His voice fades as I get farther away.

  Unfortunately, I have my own questions to answer, and Roxy wastes no time asking them as soon as she corners me on the opposite end of the room from Owen and his brother.

  “Rob’s bitching about Owen not staying with him at the hotel, which is making Alena bitch about eve
rything. What’s with you and the uptight ass-wipe?”

  I roll my eyes. Maybe Owen and I should make an announcement, so we don’t have to do this with every person in the room. “Turns out he’s not an uptight ass-wipe.”

  Or a fuckwad. Or a dillhole. Or any other of the many derogatory things I called him.

  “What about Jamison?”

  “I let him go,” I tell her with more patience than I’m feeling, trying to make my way to the little room in the back of the church where Alena should be. That’s where her side of the bridal party is supposed to meet.

  “Whoa, girl. You gave up the ten? Is this thing with Owen serious?”

  My eyes roll again. “Jamison was only a ten in bed.” And ever since Owen made me scream on that beach in the Caribbean, I’m starting to question every other guy’s rating when it comes to that category. “He was an eight-point-five overall. It was time to cut him loose. Oh, wait...” I shrug with an exaggerated cringe. “I forgot I’m supposed to run all decisions about my sex life past you before I make them.”

  Roxy lets out a frustrated sigh and grabs my shoulder, spinning me around so she can look me dead in the eyes. “Does this mean Owen scores better than Jamison?”

  Shit. Guess I walked right into that one, didn’t I?

  “Ah…” I trip over the words that won’t come, at least not easily. I try to shake her off, managing only to get her to loosen her grip so I can keep walking.

  “No way, Sadie. You answer my question, or I’ll tell Alena.”

  “Jesus, Roxy! Alena’s going to find out I’m with him. Hell, she probably already knows!”

  “She doesn’t know about your little black book, though. I’ll tell her everything!”

  Ugh! Best friends suck! They’re basically master manipulators. They know all your weaknesses and blackmail you when there’s no way you’ll willingly do what they want. Especially when they think they’re doing what’s best for you.

  Alena will lecture me until the end of time if she finds out about my rating system. She’s a complete sucker for love, for romance, for being one of those people that won’t survive if their one and only leaves them. I’m not like that. My childhood is a testament to the fact that you can love someone and live without them.