Alicia’s looking at her carefully. “You say it won’t matter? It won’t affect me if I meet the right man?”
“Honey, if you’re worried about that, then he wouldn’t be the right man, anyway. Unless you’re looking for a religious nut. If you meet someone who prizes virginity, to be honest, if I were you, I’d run a mile. Live your life, enjoy it. In my view, God gave us sex, and it’s up to us to make the most of it.”
I kind of agree with her view of sex and sexuality.
“My first time was awful.”
Chapter Twenty
Grumbler
Entering the kitchen, I sum up the situation immediately. The fucking sweet butts are hovering around Alicia, clearly making her uncomfortable. And those words? The last thing the poor kid should endure is hearing about the sexual exploits of the club whores.
I take a determined step forward, my face showing my rage, when Mary’s hand lands on my arm, holding me back. When she puts her finger to her lips, she lets me know she wants me to remain silent.
What the fuck?
I didn’t even want Mary to meet the club girls. I had thought Patsy would have the sense to keep her and Alicia upstairs. But no, here she was, right in the thick of what is to us quite natural—girls we provide for so they in turn, can provide for us. A situation that men in an MC find quite acceptable, but one which fills most citizens with horror.
“Go on,” Eva encourages Pearl, while I want to scream she’s to keep her fucking mouth shut.
“I was eighteen and legal, believe it or not.” Pearl pushes away from her place against the counter and pulls out a chair. Once she’s plonked her ass on it, she continues, “I’d been friends with Frank since we were about ten and he moved in next door. As we got older, we’d called ourselves boyfriend and girlfriend. It was a Romeo and Juliet situation though, our parents never got on. Our dads clashed, and our moms snubbed each other in sympathy. So Frank and I had to sneak around. But he was ‘it’ for me, I knew it.”
Her eyes glaze slightly as she thinks back. “I think part of it was the danger. Keeping our relationship hidden made it exciting, though we spoke many times about how we wished we could date in the open. Date,” she repeats the word with a shake of her head, “that’s what we were doing—keeping things innocent—hand holding, a few kisses, never taking it further. Saving ourselves for the marriage that we knew we were heading for.”
“What happened?” Tits prompts, realising like me that there was not going to be a happy ending.
“I thought Frank was ready to wait. But one day I went looking for him at school and found him behind the bike sheds. He was fondling a cheerleader’s tits, and she, well, she had her hand down his trousers.”
“I hope you dumped his ass,” Cindy states.
Pearl shrugs. “Nope, I wasn’t as sensible as that. I went in all guns blazing and slapped her face. Then I asked Frank what he thought he was doing.” The hurt is so plain on her face that even a hardened biker like me can see it. I realise I’ve just accepted Pearl had come to the club, and we’d never bothered to learn her history. Of course Token had investigated her, but satisfied she wasn’t a plant by our enemies, that was all we needed to know. Oh, and that she knew how to fuck.
“What did he say?” It’s Alicia’s soft voice that encourages her this time.
“He fumbled his words. Said two things, one that he had sexual needs and I wasn’t prepared to do anything about them, and then came up with an excuse that he didn’t want to come to me as a virgin. That he needed to get in some practice first with a girl who didn’t mean anything. Of course, I couldn’t see the real him, all I saw was the moon and stars and that he was my everything. I’d do anything not to lose him. He promised me that this was the first time he’d given into his urges, that he could no longer live with his frustration.”
She stops, shakes her head, then resumes, “My parents were going out that evening, so I invited him over. One thing he’d told me was true, he hadn’t yet lost his virginity. He hadn’t a clue. His eagerness made him rough, and his hands were all over me. Talk about not knowing where a G-spot was, he didn’t know there was one to find, or even how to get a girl off. No, he just inserted item A into slot B, painfully as he hadn’t prepared me. But that didn’t matter, as he came almost before he was in completely. But I forgave him. I loved him, see? And knew in time it would get better.”
“Did it?”
Pearl turns toward Alicia. “Didn’t get a chance to find out. You’ve got a great mom, kid. See how supportive she is?” She jerks her head toward Mary. “Mom had gotten a headache, and my parents came home early. They caught us in my bed.”
“No.” Eva’s hand covers her mouth. “She stopped you from seeing him?”
“Oh yes,” Pearl confirms. “Dad hit him, hard. Frank’s mouth was bleeding. Me, he left to my mom, and she slapped me across the face.” She touches a small white scar on her cheek which I had noticed but never questioned. “Her ring caught me here,” she explains, now unnecessarily, her gesture had told us all we needed to know. “Then she grabbed hold of me and pulled me naked out of bed. She allowed me at least to pull on some clothes, then,
