A tall woman in a flowing pink negligee, nothing but glittering pink pasties visible beneath, stepped to our table, signaling that it was time.

I followed Sara as she stood, and sensed the way the room grew still. As we headed toward the hallway, I could hear the quiet shuffle of chairs pushed back from tables, of footsteps following at a respectable distance.

“You ready for this?” I asked her.

I could hear her smile: “Yeah.”

My heart seemed intent on hammering its way up my throat. We passed the scenes in the other rooms to our left.

An orgy of men.

An older woman masturbating a man who had such a young face, he may have turned legal only today.

I watched Sara walk confidently past clientele who looked up as she passed as if they knew her. I felt their eyes on my face.

To our left, a woman behind the glass was tied up and being prepared for anal penetration.

I could see the door to our room just around the slight bend and my body seemed to come to life.

I never knew what to expect as far as room décor went; some nights Johnny kept Room Six simple, with a bed and nothing more. Other nights it looked like my living room, a lavish hotel room, or, once, even a tropical bungalow.

Tonight Mr. French had gone with simple: a gleaming silver rolling cart with a decanter of scotch and some chocolates, a plush rug covering most of the smooth wood floor, and an enormous bed in the middle of the room. Soft plum-colored sheets covered the mattress but it was otherwise bare.

I walked to the rolling cart, looking over my shoulder at Sara. Already the thrill of being here overwhelmed me; I needed to distract myself with an activity other than throwing her onto the mattress and defiling her.

“Do you want a drink?” I asked. I poured myself a small bit of scotch and looked up at her.

“Sure. A little of that.” She nodded to the bottle in my hand. Sara rarely drank hard alcohol, but, again: breaking all the rules. She looked so in her element right now, so fucking thrilled. I could tell by the flush of her neck how much the walk down that hall had turned her on.

I poured her a small glass of whisky and she took it from me before dipping a finger in it and painting a wet line across her neck.

An invitation.

“We’re starting, then?”

Her laugh was a quiet, husky thing. “We started an hour ago.”

I downed my shot, took a step closer, and bent to suck her neck.

“The last time we were here, I was pregnant,” she whispered, and I wondered how firm the pressure of attention through the mirrored glass felt against her back.

“You were glorious,” I corrected her.

“Tell me what we did that night.”

“We were lying down,” I said, looking over to the far side of the room where the bed had been that time, right up against the mirrored window that let others see in where we couldn’t see out. “I was curled behind you, taking you like that.”

“Gently,” she interjected, laughing.

I smiled into her shoulder, nipping it. “Despite your efforts, yes, gently. But I watched you come with a scream, in the mirror just as clearly as they did.”

Her fingers moved up my chest and touched the bare skin beneath the collar of my shirt. “And then what happened?”

Inhaling deeply, I closed my eyes as the memory caused my heart to pound harder, squeeze faster. “Your water broke in the car on the way home.”

“And then what?”

And then what.

And then we turned around, drove to the hospital in a heady fog of terror and glee, and I burst into the ER, carrying Sara in my arms and yelling for help like she’d been shot instead of simply gone into labor.

“And then Annabel Dillon Stella was born thirty hours later.”

“We had a baby, Max.” Her chin was tilted up in her badass, proud smile.

I smiled down at her, feeling my chest expand until it consumed the entire world. “Yeah we fucking did.”

She ran her hand down my torso and cupped the swollen tip of my cock in her palm, pushing and slowly stroking it through my trousers. Just like that. There was no transition topic. No need to distance herself from remembering having our baby to touching me like that. No space between Sara the mum and Sara my lover.

“And here we are again,” she said, stretching to kiss my throat. “Just being in this room makes me feel wild. I love it so much.”

I closed my eyes and groaned. “I love you.”

“And I love you.” I felt her stretch, graze her teeth over my neck. “What do you think it’s like for them to watch us tonight?”

I blinked over her shoulder and gazed at the giant mirror. “I think it’s a milder version of how it feels for us to be here tonight.”

“Like they’re on this journey with us, kind of.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “Did you feel them following down the hall?”

“All of them.” She tilted her head back, running her hands into my hair as I bent and kissed lower, to her breastbone through her silk top. “I always knew people were watching. I just didn’t know it was nearly everyone.”

I unzipped her dress and slipped it down her shoulders inch by inch, feeling like I was seeing her new body through their eyes. Knowing they could see what I did—the fuller breasts, the return of her narrow waist. They would see her tonight without the benefit of transition—from lush and pregnant to her body now: slim, ripe, fucking wicked. She was a siren half naked in her delicate dress, her nails a soft pink, lips full and wet. Soft. Everything about her was so fucking soft.