First Comes Marriage (Aster Bay #3)

Chapter Twenty-nine

“I’m telling you, my penis was crooked.” Kyla cocked her head to the side and lifted a finger, bending it to the left, as though that were an adequate representation of the clay phallus she’d created during the breakup party earlier.

Her friend Jo, a willowy honest-to-God model with a platinum blonde pixie cut, leaned across the small table at the back of the dive bar they’d gone to after the breakup party and bent Kyla’s finger even further. “It’s not crooked, but it kind of hooks to the left. Plenty of people like that kind of thing.”

“The point wasn’t to make the perfect penis,” Sabrina reminded them. “There is no such thing as perfection in art.”

“But there is such a thing as the perfect dick,” Jo said. She gestured to Kyla’s still bent finger. “And that was not it.”

Kyla dropped her hand and reached for her drink, her cheeks turning pink. “I have no need for perfection in clay when I have the perfect real thing at home.”

“Kyla Philomena Mitchell-soon-to-be-West!” Jo exclaimed with a delighted cackle.

“Not my middle name.” Kyla shook her head and took another sip of her drink.

“It’s too bad Ben’s dad isn’t hot,” Jo mused as she dunked another mozzarella stick in marinara sauce. “I could have taken a page out of your book and banged my ex’s dad. But Mr. Lewis is short and balding and I’m pretty sure he has a chronic case of pink eye.” She wrinkled her nose and took a bite of the mozzarella stick before aiming it accusingly at Tessa. “And my dad doesn’t have any hot friends, either. What good are you two? How’s a girl supposed to follow in your sickeningly-in-love footsteps?”

“Tessa’s dad is still single,” Kyla offered.

Tessa groaned. “Can we not?”

“Hypocrite,” Kyla teased, nudging her friend’s shoulder lightly.

“It’s not that! I’m not opposed to Dad finding love with someone I know, per se, but…” She shivered. “Never mind. Very much opposed.”

They all laughed as the bartender set another round of drinks in front of them. Sabrina listened happily as the other women bantered, their affection for each other clear with each teasing volley across the table, and marveled at being included. She liked these women.

She liked everything about her life in Aster Bay.

“Sabrina, did you ever figure out how to make one of the pottery penises…functional?” Tessa asked.

Sabrina cheeks heated. “Mmhmm. It wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be.”

“That’s what she said,” Jo mumbled.

“Does Jamie know you’re trying to replace him with a piece of pottery?” Molly, the dark-haired friend who’d arrived with Jo, asked.

“Not replace . Assist,” Tessa clarified. She turned to Jo. “Find yourself a man who welcomes the occasional assist. It keeps things interesting.”

“Noted,” Jo said with a saucy smile.

“Ooo, that should go on the checklist!” Kyla dug in her purse for a notepad, flipping pages until she found the right one. “Right after ‘good tipper.’”

“What is this checklist?” Sabrina asked.

“Things my next boyfriend has to have,” Jo said.

“Like a job?” Molly teased.

“Yes! Like a job!” Jo laughed, dunking another mozzarella stick. “Like the ability to dirty talk without referring to my petals .” She shuddered.

“He didn’t,” Sabrina laughed.

“Oh, he did. And that wasn’t even the worst one.”

“Flaps,” Molly said with a sympathetic nod.

“Sounds like he got his hands on some old school romance novels,” Tessa said. “At least the boy wanted to learn.”

“But I don’t want a boy ,” Jo whined. “I want a man. A whole, grown-ass man who’s not afraid of toys,” she gestured at Tessa, “preferably has some hot-ass kink he’s willing to teach me about,” she gestured at Kyla, “and can brood so well he can set your panties on fire from across the room.” She directed the last at Sabrina.

“Excuse me?” Sabrina laughed.

“Baz is the master of the brood,” Molly said.

“And he has a job,” Jo said. “And I bet he can dirty talk with the best of them.”

All eyes turned expectantly to Sabrina, waiting for her to confirm that her husband did, in fact, have the filthiest mouth she’d ever heard. She squirmed in her seat at the memory of some of the things he’d said to her the night before, the answering soreness between her legs a reminder of how much she’d liked each and every one of those growled commands.

“He’s not bad,” she said.

“Please,” Jo scoffed. “That man looks like he could make you come without ever touching you.”

If only she knew how right she was.

“He’s a good tipper too,” Jo continued. “And I bet he’s not afraid of the assist. ”

Sabrina thought of her own functional clay cock, newly completed with a shiny barbell all its own and tucked into the bedside table in Sebastian’s room. No, he definitely wasn’t afraid of the assist.

“Okay, okay, I think we’re embarrassing her,” Kyla said.

“It’s fine,” Sabrina said, but she knew her cheeks must be bright red.

Jo sighed. “You got one of the last good ones.”

“Bullshit. There are plenty of good ones left,” Molly said. “We just haven’t found them yet.”

“You will,” Sabrina said. “Sebastian and I knew each other for ten years before we got married. And for most of that time, he hated me.”

She knew it was the wrong thing to say the second it left her mouth. Four sets of interested eyes locked on her, and she could feel the barrage of follow up questions before they began.

“What do you mean hated ?” Kyla asked.

“Hated is probably the wrong word,” Sabrina hedged.

“How did you two end up together? Jamie was short on details,” Tessa said, doing her best to look as though Sabrina hadn’t let slip something she definitely shouldn’t have said in front of Sebastian’s friends.

“Oh, you know, just one of those things,” Sabrina said. You will not word vomit the details of your marriage to these women. You will not betray Sebastian’s trust that way. “Let’s talk about something else. Like penises! Kyla, does Gavin have a good one? Penis that is.”

THAT was the best topic change you could come up with?!

Kyla let out a startled laugh. “Yeah. He’s got a good penis.”

“Good. That’s good. Good penis is important,” Sabrina said. Oh, shut up.

“Alright, you guys, I think that’s my cue to get Jo home before we’re all too drunk to remember this conversation tomorrow,” Molly said .

“I want to know more about the good penis,” Jo complained. “C’mon. Let a girl live vicariously.”

With some more laughter and hugs all around, Molly finally succeeded in guiding Jo out of the bar, leaving Kyla, Tessa, and Sabrina alone.

“Hey, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” Tessa said.

“No, no, of course not. You didn’t,” Sabrina said.

“Kind of seems like I did.”

Sabrina sighed and met Tessa’s eyes. It would be nice to talk to someone about what was going on. Not the drunken Vegas wedding or the sort-of-fake-but-maybe-now-real marriage thing, but maybe the other parts. The way Sebastain had given her a string of soul-shattering orgasms the other night and then immediately pulled away. Not physically. He’d never left the bed they now shared, had even kept his arm banded around her all night, but…emotionally, maybe? She could feel the difference in the way he spoke to her, the way he looked at her. Like some of those walls from that first night in Vegas were back, keeping her out.

“Things are complicated,” Sabrina began.

Kyla smiled. “Then you’ve come to the right place. The two of us are complicated relationship experts. Engaged to my ex’s dad,” she said pointing at herself, then, pointing at Tessa, “married her dad’s best friend. Remember?”

Tell me what you want.

The sincerity in his voice still tugged at her heart. The disappointment in his sigh when she’d demanded an orgasm echoed in her mind the way the memory of his touch echoed through her body.

I’m not done with you yet, Sabrina. I’ll never be done with you.

She was tempted to believe him. She wanted to believe him. But she wasn’t sure how. And she didn’t know how to ask for what she really wanted from Sebastian .

“I’m fucking it up.” The truth of her words twisted in her gut. “I don’t know how not to.”

“You love him, don’t you?” Kyla asked.

“Yeah. Yeah, of course, I love him.” Sabrina blinked back the moisture gathering at the corner of her eyes. She loved him, and she was driving him away.

“There are a lot worse places to start than that,” Kyla said gently.

Sabrina swallowed a laugh, dashing away the tears from the corner of her eyes. “Gah, sorry, look at me, being that girl, crying in a bar.”

“Hey, that girl is our friend,” Tessa said. “And she’s allowed to have the full range of human emotions, even when it’s messy. And complicated.”

“I think I hurt him. I didn’t mean to. I’m just so afraid of losing myself again.” Sabrina closed her eyes, exhausted by her own hang-ups. For the first time, she really felt the weight of her fears, how they’d held her back.

“Marriage is hard, and trust is scary,” Tessa said. “The thing about really loving someone is you do lose yourself, but that’s okay, because you find yourself too.”