Page 204 of Everdoll

“Don’t make fun of this. I’m serious. We’ll be better.” My gaze lowered, a tiny smile on my lips. But he didn’t catch my emotional tone, or simply ignored it. He leaned over my shoulder, studying the bra straps at my back.

I held my breath, but I couldn’t hold my tongue.

“You never used to have to look. You’d have it off in one move.”

His smirk widened, his bright teeth flashing. His fingers closed around the strap. “I will master on it again.”

He began filling the tub with water, I sat there naked, my face burning crimson. I had thought the new Raymond would be easier to handle than the previous one, but hearing him say things like that with his adult face left me at a total loss. And damn it all, I had been living a celibate life for four years, too.

Once the tub was full, he bent down to test the temperature. When our eyes met, I pressed my lips together. But there was a mischievous glint in his expression.

I should have guessed he was about to toss me into the water.

“Raymond!”

I yelled in anger, but what caught my breath in my throat wasn’t the water.

After throwing me in, he climbed in right after. Completely naked. Within seconds, he had shed the torn, flimsy clothes he was wearing. The muscles across his broad shoulders had filled out, his thighs were larger.

And now, his navy-blue, bionic arm was fully exposed. There was no synthetic leather covering it. It looked just like the cyborgs I had seen on the news. The entire limb, all the way to his shoulder, was intricately laced with mechanical components and fine wiring. Before I had a chance to examine it further, I noticed an even more important detail: his cock, standing rigid.

So he was aroused after all! Then why weren’t we making love? Did he seriously think we were too dirty?

He spun me around inside the circular tub. Pressing my back against his chest, he settled behind me.

“Finally,” he whispered, resting his lips on my shoulder. He had his metal arm hanging out of the tub while the other was inside. It slid beneath the water, starting to stroke one of my breasts. I pressed my legs together. Damn you, Raymond. I was already sensitive. Now I had started to wonder what was going through his mind.

“You sure moved on from the existential crisis quickly.”

“It’s you. Getting used to you is easy.” he murmured, his voice hushed and reverent, like someone reciting a sacred text. “It’s like breathing to me.”

Either my mind hadn’t recovered yet, or Raymond was genuinely starting to outplay me at this. When I was supposed to be the one bewitching him, why did I always feel as if a spell had been cast on me? I couldn’t formulate a proper response to anything; I was just falling silent with my red face.

I must have missed him far more than I realized. In every possible sense.

I shifted, turning around to face him. His hand, which had been stroking my hair, hung suspended in air, as if waiting for me to return to my original position. But I needed us to be face to face in that moment.

“We’re clean now. Can we get out?”

“What do you want to do?”

“Sleep with you.”

Normally, I might have hated the miserable tone in my voice, but I genuinely needed this and couldn’t bear to hide it any longer. My body had been exhausted ever since I woke up. I just wanted to ease myself a little with make-out session.

“Only sleep?”

“Of course, not only sleep, Raymond. Are you dumb?”

He took me by the shoulders and spun me around again. And my back was pressed against him once more.

“Are you dumb? You haven’t even washed your hair yet.”

He worked shampoo into my hair, still damp from the abrupt plunge into the water. He was only using one hand, avoiding touching me with his bionic hand. But why? When his fingers began to massage my scalp, gentle and unhurried, I fell silent.

How had I ended up here again, so completely at his mercy?

And strangely, I found that I didn’t want to fight it. For once, I had no desire to control what happened next.