Addison
Addison roused moments before her alarm started its vibrating blare from all the way across the room on the desk where she’d left it the night before. She remained in bed for a few moments to allow her brain to develop a sense of its surroundings and sever her from any lingering night terrors.
Slowly, it dawned on her that her mind wasn’t as addled with terrors as it usually was upon waking. While her dreams had been full of nightmares as always, the scope of them was nowhere near the usual atrocities she endured while unconscious. They all felt like cookie-cutter bad dreams that belonged tonormalpeople, people who’d gone through life without experiencing a single traumatic event. Falling down stairs, showing up to work naked, failing a test; that sort of thing. The dreams were a huge relief compared to her typically gory—and frankly downright abusive—dreams, a hodgepodge of current stressors, bone-deep insecurities, and past traumas, with a heaping helping of death, fear, and carnage strewn throughout. Her typical night was aboutsurvival, not mere embarrassment.
In fact, she woke with a slickness between her legs. She hadn’t been horny for months, even before Justin dumped her. Ever since he’d called her aneedy lover,her river had run dry. Apparently, that kind of thing gnaws away at a person’s libido.
Ever the eager opportunist, Addison was not about to let the moment slip away. She threw off the comforter, rose from the bed like a giddy teenager, tossed her soaked panties in the washer, and dug through the boxes and tubs strewn about the bedroom in search of her trusty vibrator. Once the pink apparatus of orgasms was in her hand, she arranged the pillows just so and sat on the bed propped against the wall.
She used the tips of her nails to trace the curve of her stomach, allowing her light touch to tease her deeper need and build her arousal. With her eyes closed, she pretended the soft caress was that of a willing lover, someone who found the extra curves on her body appealing and not repulsive as her last lover had.
Justin flickered in her mind and she shot her eyes open, determined not to let him ruin this. She rocked her hips to remind her body of the goal. With one hand caressing her breast and pinching her nipples, she ran the other down to her opening and slid a finger over her slick folds, which parted for her readily. She slid the toy against her liquid heat, rubbing against it to coat it before teasing herself with its entry.
A faint shadow near the doorknob stole her attention. Her heart skipped a beat, certain someone was about to walk in until she remembered she lived alone. Instead of allowing the hiccup to steal away her hunger, she let it feed her desire.
Would you like a show?She raised her knees and rocked against her toy, keeping steady pressure on her pert nipple as she delved it into her slick folds, guiding her slickness up to the nub of her clit. Her hips bucked and her heart quickened and she didn’t dampen her moans of pleasure as she chased her release. She rode her vibrator until her hips clenched and her arm locked in place, her climax stealing the breath from her lungs.
The rest of the morning was spent at her desk with Stevie, a plate of bacon, and Halsey’s comforting croon filling the room while she fiddled with Marissa’s cover. The design was coming along, albeit slowly, but her outlook was a little brighter. Maybe this new situation wasn’t as bad as she thought. Maybe it was a blessing that Justin dumped her before moving in together. Even her morning tarot card reading seemed to agree. She certainly wouldn’t have had an orgasm this morning if he were living in the same house.
“Hey, Addy! Thanks for working for me yesterday,” Leah said. She bumped her hip on Addison’s and smiled up at her from her four-and-a-half-foot stature. “You’re a great friend. Text me if you need any shifts covered this week. Just give me, like, a couple hours’ notice if you can.”
“Thanks, but I need the money. Let me know if I can pick up any more of yours, too. I’m happy to help.”
Over Leah’s shoulder, Nasty Nathan threw open the swinging kitchen doors. Her mood soured as his gaze rose from Leah’s ass to her own chest. In a lowered voice, she warned her friend, “Look out.”
Leah’s empathetic gaze flicked to hers before she scurried away. Addison made to follow, but a greasy hand landed on her shoulder. Her body curled inward as she ducked from his grip, and she noticed with a cringe that he was—once again—not wearing the plastic gloves everyone was supposed to have on at all times. This was a fish market, for goodness’ sake. No wonder her clothes always stunk, with her disgusting boss manhandling her whenever he pleased.
“You’re late. Again.”
What the hell are you talking about, you psycho?Addison was literallyneverlate. This dead-end job was all she had. Overqualified or not, she couldn’t risk losing the income.
“No, I’m not.” She yanked her shoulder free of his sausage fingers.
His stern expression lightened and he chuckled. “All right, all right. Get back to work.”
Ugh. So it had all been a ploy just to touch her.Gross.Between his lingering looks at every woman in the vicinity and the unabashed way he ogled her breasts, plus his putrid breath and handsy disposition, Nasty Nathan reminded Addison of the men who always happened to be at her childhood home. Even being near him made her skin crawl and her arms cross over her chest, just as she’d done when it became obvious that she was maturing faster than other girls back then.
The cloud of contentment that had lingered after her orgasmic morning dissipated. The good mood had made her thirty-minute drive one of loud music and off-key singing and left a blithe smile on her lips for the first few customers of the day.
Now she turned toward the couple at the counter with a sneer that she struggled to shake. Her thoughts turned to Florida, to her old apartment, and to her closest friend.I just have to make it through this year.
She was under no illusion that Florida was cheaper, but it was home, and she would happily share the rent with Marissa. With creative opportunities abound, she was more likely to find something that utilized her passion. Marissa was the only one who knew firsthand everything she’d dealt with growing up and loved her anyway, even after the cesspit of depression Addison had gone through after finally getting out on her own. Marissa was family, her only family in many senses of the word.
Hell, I’d even move back in with Mom for a few weeks if I had to.This thought didn’t ring quite as true, though, and her grimace deepened. Her mom was surely still on the coast somewhere, probably in need of some spare cash for a fresh bottle. Somehow the woman paid her rent and yet always needed to borrow money from Addison.
Work dragged on until the clock surpassed eight o’clock. Twenty minutes later, Olivia rushed in to relieve her. Addison forced a polite smile at her coworker, who she was pretty sure was allowed to be late whenever she pleased due to her shameless flirting with Nasty Nathan, but the extra minutes on Addison’s time card barred her from speaking up.
When she got home and after she took a shower, she blasted the speakers on shuffle and slunk into her computer chair. After some time of irritated fussing with the book cover, she decided to drop it and do some much-needed unpacking instead.
The noisy music barely pierced the incessant ramblings of her mind, the loop of thoughts that were ever-present when she was alone more powerful than any Bluetooth speaker. The sound seemed not to penetrate her eardrums as she worked her way through a box of clothes. Movement at the window cut through her humming and she furrowed her brow at the sight of a little butterfly flitting around the room.
The ends of the wispy black butterfly were undefined and seemed to flicker like the flame of a candle. Tendrils of shadow winked in and out of existence at the tips of the impossible insect, and its wings didn’t appear to flap nearly as often as ordinary monarchs. Entranced, Addison reached out and let the beautiful creature land on her finger. It fluttered over her skin and drifted up her arm, leaving a trail of bumps all the way to its perch on her chest.
A strange sense of familiarity tugged at her consciousness, like the foggy memories of a dream right after waking. The details were obscured and it was more a feeling than a formed thought, leaving her to wonder if she was already asleep.
Her body was suddenly too heavy to operate. She waded through molasses to reach the bed, slipped out of her sweatpants, and nestled into the covers.
Chapter 4
