When her tone went from lusty to growly, I was touched that she cared enough for me to give a shit whether Finn had made it good for me or not.
Of course, we were like sisters, but Jenny was weird with men. That whole ‘bros before hoes’ thing? Well, in reverse, that wasn’t how she lived her life.
I mean, I loved her, too, but she would dump me as soon as a guy in a bar waved at her from across the room.
I was used to it, even if, once upon a time, it had pissed me off.
“It was like . . .” I couldn’t even describe what that first night with Finn had been like. The two subsequent nights after, I hadn’t heard from him, and had been certain his promise of ‘next time’ had just been BS. Then, the third night, the car had appeared out of nowhere at my side on Canal Street, and he’d pushed open the door with a ground out, “Get the fuck inside.”
I’d been surprised as hell, but something in me had leapt to obey.
I wasn’t the obeying sort. That was why I loved owning my own business. Liked being the boss, and where my kitchen was concerned, I ruled with an iron fist. But with Finn? It was like all that turned to dust.
I’d climbed in, and the minute the door had closed, he’d been on me like pastrami on rye. His mouth devouring me, his body pinning mine to the seat.
Even as I’d tried to get my breath, he’d bitten off against my mouth, “You’re fucking addictive.”
He hadn’t sounded happy about it, but I’d definitely been content at his statement.
Later that night, he’d told me he’d had no choice but to avoid me for two days. If he hadn’t, he’d have fucked me, and he knew I needed to heal.
It was like reverse chivalry, but I was learning I was far too easy where Finn was concerned.
I’d determined, though, that I needed to cut myself some slack.
Jenny went through more guys than I did panties, and she was used to the hustle. Used to the game. I wasn’t. This was new to me. I was allowed to be overwhelmed, allowed to act like a fool for this, my first foray into what went down between men and women in the bedroom, and I’d also allowed myself to hurt and to rage when he eventually decided things were over.
It all sounded very wishy-washy, but I was on the bullet train to Finn-sville, and it was a direct stop.
There was no avoiding him when he could and would appear in my life at his whim, and more than anything, there was no avoiding what he could make me feel.
Many women might judge me as pathetic, might say Finn was using me for sex, but I’d challenge them to spend a night with a man like Finn O’Grady and not be affected. Truth was, I loved the way he bossed me around. I loved the way I wanted to obey because everything he asked of me was so damn dirty, it felt wrong to comply without being pressured into it. If he used me for sex, I was using him right back, and to me, that was Feminism 101.
Except, in my class, I came out with a shit-ton of orgasms, some that were close to nuclear, and I also came out of it with a body confidence that was better than six months of dieting.
I was suddenly hyperaware of my form. Of my strong legs, of my round breasts. Finn seemed to have taken the shutters off, and I was loving it.
“You know the sex you see in movies?” I finally said, managing to get some of my thoughts into words.
“Porn or regular?”
I pondered that. “A bit of both?”
She moaned again. “You lucky bitch!” she whined, and hell, I couldn’t disagree.
Laughing as we headed into the nearest coffee shop that had, until five days ago, been my direct competition, we ordered coffee at the counter then headed for a small seating area.
As we plunked ourselves in the comfortable seats, I told her, “He’s filthy, Jenny.”
“Fuck,” she whispered back. “How filthy?”
“Super filthy.”
She snickered. “Only you could say that so piously.”
“I went to Catholic school,” I teased her.
“So did I!” she retorted, but we both laughed because Jenny had attended, but she’d spent most of the time not trying to learn or get her diploma, instead trying to get Father Bryan, the only priest on campus under thirty-five and who was surprisingly dishy, into her bed.