Sage's Story (The Town of Pearl 5)

“We’ll change your perspective,” Quaid added and then suckled against her neck, making her moan and close her eyes.

She felt Virgo’s mouth against the elastic of her panties. She gripped his hair and looked down into his blue eyes. He looked hungry, wanton, and that was how she felt.

“I’m scared, Virgo. If I give in, and you all hurt me, I’ll be left all alone. This is all I have to hold on to. It’s a part of me that no one else will ever have,” she said as a tear rolled down her cheek.

Dale gently caressed it away with his finger. “We won’t ever hurt you. We want you in every aspect of the word. Forget about anyone else who hurt you, or took from this body. Just think of us. Focus on our touches, our caresses, and kisses,” Dale whispered.

She glanced at Matt. He looked frustrated and she couldn’t help to think that he thought she was lying or playing a game.

“I need you to know something.” She felt the tears well up in her eyes. Her heart was racing, and it ached something terrible. She couldn’t say the words. Despite their strong hands on her, caressing her making her feel safe, she just couldn’t get herself to tell them.

“It’s okay. Just relax,” Matt whispered.

She held his gaze and pressed Virgo’s head against her belly in support as the words left her lips.

“Someone hurt me.” She took a deep breath, felt almost as if she could have an anxiety attack but she controlled it.

She felt Virgo’s lips against her belly and his warm breath as he held her thighs too. “Sexually?” Virgo asked.

She cried and shook her head side to side. He went to move away and she held him tighter, made him keep his warm breath against her belly and mound.

“I want this. I want to feel it fully. I want to know what it’s like to be loved, to be cherished and taken care of. I do, but the memories. The memories are so vivid. The things I saw, I felt, were so terrible. I just can’t give you all what you want. I can’t,” she said as she cried.

Virgo lifted her up into his arms and lowered her to the bed. He knelt on the floor, her thighs wrapped around his midsection as

he semi-crushed her to the bed, just holding her.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

* * * *

Mat ran his fingers through his hair in anger and sadness. He felt terrible for her. It was obvious that no one knew how much pain she went through. Perhaps not even Lena and her men either. It enraged him. She was so scared. What had that guy back in Detroit done to her?

“Baby, it’s going to be okay. I understand how scared you are. You’re so brave, Sage. Just telling us tonight and breaking the silence means so much. You’re going to be just fine, and we’re going to take it nice and slow, and show you what it means to be loved. Truly loved just for being the woman that you are,” Virgo told her. She wiped her eyes and looked at him.

“I want to be with you. But I’ve never had sex before, and everything I know about it or had seen was bad, and well, violent.”

Matt sat down on the bed so did Dale and Quinn.

“What? But you just said someone hurt you?” Matt asked.

She looked at him, took a deep breath, and then released it, but the tears still rolled from the corner of her eyes. “I said he hurt me. A man can hurt a girl, a woman, in so many different ways, but he didn’t rape me. A man so evil and desensitized to feelings, connections, and human emotion can do things to a woman’s body aside from rape. He made me do things to him. Made me watch what he and others did to women, young girls who developed earlier than me. Having a boy’s body until I was seventeen saved my life,” she said with disgust.

Virgo cupped her cheeks between his hands.

“He can’t ever hurt you again. We won’t do anything to you that would make you feel degraded, unloved, or uncherished. You’ve held on to your virginity. You have a right to decide to whom and when to give it away. Let us help you forget his hurtful actions. Can you trust us to do that?”

She stared at him and Matt watched, his heart racing, his possessiveness growing thicker, stronger to the point that he knew he would probably aggravate her with it. She was so very independent and strong-willed. Just like him. But he didn’t care. He wanted Sage to never feel such terror and pain again.

She looked at Matt, then at Dale and Quaid.

“I need slow.”

“You got it, sweetness,” Quaid stated, and she smiled.

“Did you like the way we’ve all kissed you?” Virgo asked. She nodded her head.

“Do you like the way our hands feel on you, against your skin?” Dale asked and she whispered a yes.