Slut by Saranna DeWylde

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About the author:

Saranna De Wylde has always been fascinated by things better left in the dark. She wrote her first story after watching The Exorcist at a slumber party. Since then, she’s published horror, romance and narrative nonfiction. Like all writers, Saranna has held a variety of jobs, from operations supervisor for an airline, to an assistant for a call girl, to a corrections officer. But like Hemingway said, “Once writing has become your major vice and greatest pleasure, only death can stop it.” So she traded in her cuffs for a full-time keyboard. She loves to hear from her readers.

What inspired you to write your book?

This is the second in my Labels series. It’s about the labels that we stick on each other and ourselves. That track in our heads that tells us that we’re not good enough, smart enough, thin enough… No matter what we do. It’s about defining ourselves with our own choices. This book is so close to my heart, just like Fat because I have these same tracks in my head. So, I guess you could say my inspiration was the journey to self love and self acceptance.

Here is a short sample from the book:

Thornton Henry Edgeleaf was all that a young society woman could want, but I didn’t hold that against him. He was classically handsome, educated, polite, rich and best of all, he fucked like a champ.
So why was I just looking up at the lovely paneled ceiling waiting for it to be over?
We’d had dinner at Chateau Avalon—at his insistence—but getting the suite had been my idea. He’d dutifully purchased the “Tuscany,” chocolate-dipped strawberries and champagne for dessert, and already scheduled room service and couple’s massages for the next day.
It wasn’t that the sensation of sex with him that was unpleasant, it wasn’t. He did everything right. He was like the Mary Poppins of bachelors, practically perfect in every way. Hard jaw, a body he worked hard to maintain, blue eyes so clear they reminded me of the sky. His skin had this warm golden glow that couldn’t be bought with any fake UV light. In short, he was beautiful. He touched me in all the ways I was supposed to like.
My legs were wrapped around his waist and his handsome face was buried in my neck while he moved toward his own culmination. I clung to him, fingers digging into his shoulders and hips arching to meet him—all very practiced moves designed for his pleasure, not mine.
And my reputation. I didn’t want it to get out that I was bad in bed. I knew the right moves to pantomime, but I never orgasmed during sex. For me, it was all about the chase. All about getting to this point.
Because I never believed I could.
I loved the dance of predator/prey. I loved that split second before the first kiss where supernovas burn and die in that space between your lips.
His lips moved up my neck and against my ear. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” I had to get my head straight. I tightened in a vicious Kegal to get his mind off me and back on his dick. I concentrated on the motion, flexing, pulling him deeper and squeeze, relax, squeeze with the cadence of my breath…
“That feels damn good, Bexy, but this is doing nothing for you. Tell me what you want.”
What I wanted? I didn’t even know where to start.
“You’re a woman who is comfortable in her own sexuality. That necessarily means you must be labeled, categorized, and filed away for everyone’s safety.”
I don’t know why my brain chose that moment to remember what my friend Claire said to me, but since she’d said it, it flopped around in my brain like a wounded bird at the most inopportune moments.
“I thought I wouldn’t have to ask a woman like you.”
I pushed at his shoulders and he rose up over me to meet my eyes.
“A woman like me?” A slut. That was half the reason any of these guys ever asked me out—because they knew I put out. And I didn’t care. I liked that they wanted me. I liked sex—no, that was a lie. I liked how I felt before sex. I liked being pursued. I liked being told how pretty I was and I liked all the stupid things guys would do to get into my panties. Then I felt like they deserved the prize after they jumped through all my hoops.
And they did call me names like whore, slut. But that was usually behind my back—not when I was on it. I stiffened, frozen, waiting for his answer.
“You’re not like a lot of the other women in our circles. You don’t lie back and dream about the wedding you think this will get you and my bank account. You’re a woman who lives for pleasure. So tell me how to give it you.” His voice was raspy and low, his erection still hard inside me.
He brushed his fingertips over my collarbone, my shoulder and down to my hand where he linked our fingers.
What kind of game was he playing? I was assaulted by memories of fat camp where that counselor told me how pretty I was, that he liked me for more than my fat and if I would just tell him what I wanted, I could have it.
After I paid him.
I looked up into those endless blue eyes searching for an answer to that question, but all I saw was an honest sincerity.
It was absolutely terrifying. I didn’t know how to process that because I didn’t believe it.
“If you changed your mind, we can stop.”
Suddenly, I had to get away from him. Away from this… connection. It twisted my stomach. I didn’t want a connection. I just wanted him to fuck me and go away. I just wanted him to prove to me that I made his dick hard, that he really wanted me. I didn’t—I couldn’t.
I didn’t care if he told people I was a bad lay, I didn’t care what he said about me as long as I got away from him. My skin was on fire, and I felt trapped under his body—a rabbit beneath a wolf.
“You’re terrified,” he murmured, his expression concerned. His cock wilted and he eased off of me.
I vaulted from the bed and shimmied into my clothes as fast as I could. “I have to go. I’m sorry.”
I didn’t give him a chance to reply and I fled before he could stop me.
I could’ve had the hotel call me a service, but I didn’t want to wait in the lobby just in case he came downstairs.
What the hell was wrong with me?
I supposed to the answer to that question was more in depth than what I wanted to deal with at the moment. Or what I could deal with.
Claire. I’d call Claire. I fumbled in my bag for my phone as I stumbled out the door and made my way toward the shopping center so I could get lost in the throng of people and hide until she came to get me.
“Can you come get me?” I asked as I climbed on the shuttle that would take me over to the Legends shopping center that was on the other side of the speedway.
“Are you okay? Where are you?” she demanded.
“I’m fine. I’ll be at the Legends. I’ll wait in the theater parking lot.” That was a great place to hide, but it didn’t make me vulnerable like the parking garage.
“Do I need to kill him?” Claire replied.
“No, he didn’t do anything. I just… please.”
“I’m on my way and I’m bringing Brant. Just in case.”
“Okay. Thank you.” I hated how my voice trembled. I hated how my hands shook. I hated how he asked me what was wrong. I hated that I had to call her to come get me. I hated everything about tonight.
“I’ve got your back, Bex.”
I hung up. I didn’t usually mind when she called me Bex, but I kept hearing his voice in my head.
Bexy.
Fuck you, Thornton. Fuck you and your pretty words and your easy intimacy. All I wanted was sex. I didn’t want him to see that part of me, all naked and vulnerable. It was just an exchange of fluids but he’d tried to make it something more and shat all over it.
It took her thirty minutes to cross town, but in that time I flinched at every car that drove past me, every time I heard a man’s voice until finally, I managed to get hold of myself.
“Wind yourself down, bitch,” I mumbled to myself.
If Thornton was going to find me, he would’ve by now. It comforted me in a strange way that he hadn’t chased after me. It meant he was like all the rest of them and this had been about his ego, his performance. Not any real concern for me or what I needed.
That was good because it meant he hadn’t tried to dig any deeper than I wanted to let him.
When Claire and Brant, her boyfriend, pulled up he scanned the crowd of people with the same intensity as I had.
“Is he here?” Brand demanded.
“No.” I shook my head. “Really, it’s okay. It just… it wasn’t a good night and I wanted to come home.” I slid into the back seat and Claire followed. “You don’t have to—” She hugged me.
That was intimacy too, but somehow from Claire, it was okay. I let her hug me and I hugged her back.
“Whatever happened, Bex, you can tell me,” she reassured.
“I don’t want to talk about it.” I really didn’t. I didn’t even want to think about it.
“You don’t have to. We’ll add him to the Asshole List and never speak of him again if you don’t want to.”
So far, there was only asshole on the Asshole List and that was her ex-roommate, ex-lover Kieran Holt. Hot as hell, but definitely an asshole. But that was a stripper for you.
Cold guilt washed down my back. Brant used to be a stripper and he was the furthest thing from an asshole. He was a nice guy—a regular prince charming. He was so good to Claire and that umbrella of goodness extended to her friends.
“Thanks for coming.”
Brant flashed me a look over his shoulder. “Uh, no. That would be thanks for not coming.”
I was horrified. They’d been in the middle of having sex and I’d ruined it, all because a boy asked me a question I didn’t like. Their relationship had been a roller coaster and when they got back together, they were taking it slow. They’d been waiting for a special night and I’d—
Maybe I belonged on the Asshole List. I sank down in the seat.
“Kidding, Rebecca. And even if I wasn’t, it’s not a big deal.” He winked at me in the rearview.
Claire shot him a dirty look, but his grin assured she didn’t hold the expression for long. “Don’t tease right now.”
“No, it’s okay.” I leaned my head on Claire’s shoulder. “Were you really having sex?” I whispered.
“Sort of. It’s probably best that you called anyway. Sign from the universe to wait a little longer,” she whispered back.
Yeah, confirmation I was the world’s biggest asshole.
I spent the ride back to the apartment in silent contemplation. Why had Thornton reminded me of that counselor at fat camp? I’d put it out of my head, or I thought I had. I hadn’t been Butterball Bex in a long time. Bariatric surgery had fixed what fat camp and my prodigious father couldn’t.
He’d asked me if I wanted a kiss and I’d paid him to kiss me. I never thought I’d have my first kiss otherwise.
I wish I’d known a woman like Claire then. She’d have laughed in his face and told him to get fucked.
She had curves for miles and she seemed to be made of confidence and sass. She was a self-proclaimed fat girl who’d managed to fall in love with herself. I admired her so much.
She told me once that she didn’t want to be pretty for a fat girl, she just wanted to be beautiful.
And she was. In every way.
I wished not only that I would’ve known someone like her, but I wished I could be more like her. I wished I could love me.
But I didn’t. If I did, what she said about being a woman comfortable in my own sexuality would be true and it wasn’t—even though I desperately wanted it to be.
I guessed that was the root of the problem—desperation. I was desperate to be beautiful, to be wanted. To be beautiful enough for all the things the world had to offer beautiful people.
Like love.
Since I couldn’t have that, I just needed to feel like I was worthy of it and the chase did that for me. These guys I slept with just took what they wanted and it was over, but I was okay with that because I got what I wanted.
It wasn’t an orgasm. It was validation.
How fucking pathetic was that? What was even worse was I’d had enough therapy that I could deconstruct myself—I knew all the areas that were fucked up and broken.
I still couldn’t fix them.
Maybe there was a part of me that didn’t want to.
I shouldn’t have called Claire. Instead, I should’ve gone to one of the bars and let a new guy take me home. Let him tell me I was beautiful, let him fuck me, and then sneak out in the morning intact and feeling great.
Instead, I wallowed in bad memories with the stain of pseudo-sincere kisses on my lips.
I blocked Thornton’s number.
If only it was so easy to block the memory of what had happened between us.