Chapter 891: Pride and Compensation

The world returned to Sarah in slow, indulgent waves.

First came the heat—thick, living heat wrapped around her like a second skin. Not the passive warmth of sheets or sunlight, but something primal and possessive:

Peter’s broad chest sealed

to her back, his

heartbeat

a steady drum against her spine, his arm slung heavy across her waist with fingers splayed wide over the soft curve of her bare stomach.

He held her like she might vanish if he loosened his grip, even in sleep. His breath ghosted warm across the nape of her neck—slow, even exhales that stirred the baby-fine hairs there and sent lazy, delicious ripples down her body.

Second:

the ache.

Deep, bone-settled soreness that bloomed between her thighs and pulsed upward into her lower belly like a secret brand

. Not pain—never pain—but a lush, undeniable reminder.

Every tiny shift of her hips reignited it: the stretch, the fullness, the way he’d split her open so carefully, so thoroughly, that her body still echoed with the memory of being claimed.

Last night hadn’t been a dream.

The

hallway,

the

bed,

the

slow unraveling

of her until she was sobbing his name between orgasms—none of it imagined.

Her pussy throbbed with the proof: swollen, tender, still slick in places, marked inside and out by him.

Third:

him.

Peter.

Her brother. Her everything.

Her mother’s lover, her twin sister’s man too, now hers too!

The boy who’d waited weeks—

patient, burning, restrained

—because she’d asked. And when she’d finally said yes, he’d worshipped her like devotion was a religion and she its only altar.

She moved carefully, turning in the cradle of his arms so she could face him without waking him.

The Egyptian cotton sighed against her naked skin—every inch of her still bare, still carrying the faint red map of his mouth, his teeth, his hands. The sheets were a tangled ruin around their hips, twisted from hours of slow grinding, desperate clutching, bodies finding each other again and again in the dark.

Now she could see him properly.

Eyes closed. Features slack—or

pretending

to be. The sharp, dangerous lines that defined him awake had softened in the pale morning light slanting through the windows: jaw relaxed, brow smooth, lips parted just enough to show the edge of his teeth.

The beautiful

godliness

caught a sliver of sun and made him more divine. He looked almost gentle. Almost innocent.

Almost.

Because even in feigned sleep, his arm tightened reflexively around her waist. Pulled her closer until her breasts pressed soft and full against his chest, until their hips aligned and she felt the

thick, warm weight of his cock

resting heavy against her lower belly—still half-hard, still ready, as if last night had only whetted his appetite.

Sarah studied him with that quiet, analytical hunger she reserved for the things she loved most. The curve of his mouth she knew by heart. The new shadow of stubble that rasped so perfectly against her inner thighs.

The way his lashes fanned long and dark against his cheeks. She

catalogued

it all—because Sarah always catalogued the people who mattered.

Her chest tightened. Not from soreness. From something fuller, fiercer.

She leaned in. Brushed her lips against his—

feather-light, barely contact

. Just the softest press of mouth to mouth, tasting sleep and salt and the faint echo of everything they’d done.

She pulled back.

His breathing stayed even. His eyes stayed closed. His arm stayed locked.

But there—

right at the corner of his mouth

—a tiny,

telltale twitch

. The smallest possible lift. The kind of micro-expression only someone who’d spent years memorizing his face would ever catch.

Sarah’s eyes narrowed.

"The fact that you’re

pretending

to be asleep," she said, voice still rough with morning and last night, "is enough to

wound my pride

, Peter."

Silence.

Another twitch—barely there.

"Seriously. I gave you my

virginity

and you can’t even do me the

courtesy of actually passing out

afterward?

I feel cheated

."

The laugh broke through—deep, warm, vibrating through his chest and straight into hers. His eyes opened, dark and bright with amusement, crow’s feet crinkling at the corners in a way that made him look older and younger simultaneously.

"

In my defense

," he said, voice thick with sleep he hadn’t actually been having, "I thought you’d love the idea.

Both of us limp. Tangled together. Passed out in each other’s arms after mind-blowing sex.

"

He grinned—that

insufferable,

devastating grin. "Very cinematic. Very romance novel. Very

us

."

Sarah snorted. The sound was deeply unladylike and completely perfect.

"As if you can ever actually sleep without,

Mom."

The words landed between them—casual, teasing, loaded with the specific kind of truth that only family could wield. Not cruel. Just honest. The way Sarah was always honest.

Peter laughed again—quieter this time, an acknowledgment wrapped in amusement. "You’re not wrong."

"I know I’m not wrong. Everyone in this house knows you can’t sleep without Mom. Madison knows. Charlotte knows. ARIA probably has a published paper on it. All the harem women know."

She propped herself up on one elbow, sheet pooling at her waist, completely unselfconscious about the bare breasts on full display. Something about last night had burned the shyness right out of her.

"So don’t

insult me

by pretending I knocked you unconscious with my

Oh, magical virgin pussy

. My pride can only take so much."

"Okay, okay." He raised both hands in surrender, still grinning. "Guilty as charged, also for the record, virgin pussies are magical. Yours. And yes, I was awake the whole time. Watching you sleep, actually. Which is either romantic or creepy depending on your perspective."

"Creepy. Definitely creepy."

"Noted."

She held his gaze. Then—with the quiet precision that made Sarah

Sarah

—she said: "

I want compensation."

"Compensation?"

"For my wounded pride. You owe me."

His eyes darkened. That shift—the one that flipped from playful to predatory in the single heartbeat between one breath and the next. His hand, still resting warm on the small of her back, slid lower.

Fingers traced the smooth curve of her hip beneath the sheet, possessive, unhurried.

"Baby,"

he murmured, voice dropping to that low, gravel-rough register that always made her thighs clench, "your little pussy can’t take any more. You came so many times last night I lost count, and you’re—"

His hand slipped beneath the tangled cotton. Trailed down the soft plane of her stomach, past the fine hair at her mound, until his fingertips found the swollen, tender flesh between her thighs.

She was still slick—remnants of last night’s release mingled with fresh arousal that had begun leaking the moment she’d woken pressed against him. His fingers grazed her

outer lips

—

puffy, hot, flushed dark

from hours of relentless use.

The

lightest brush over her entrance made her flinch

—oversensitive, raw, the muscle still tender from being stretched wide around him for the first time.

His

thumb traced the slick seam

of her, feeling how delicate and parted her inner lips still were, how they clung wetly to his skin. Sarah’s breath hitched.

A soft, involuntary moan slipped free—low, liquid, dragged from somewhere deep in her chest.

Her hips rolled forward

into his hand despite the ache. Despite the soreness.

Despite everything.

"

Try me

," she breathed. Eyes locked on his. Steel beneath the softness. "I can take more than Linda can."

Peter’s hand froze. His brows shot up. "

Sarah Carter

. Are you seriously trying to

compete with Mom

right now?"

She shrugged—one bare shoulder lifting and falling with deliberate nonchalance, the motion making her breasts sway in a way that drew his gaze like gravity. "If I can’t make you sleep, I might as well be better at sex than mom ever will be."

The laugh that tore out of him was bright, startled, genuine—the kind that came from being completely blindsided by someone you thought you already knew every secret of.

"

You’re insane

," he managed, still grinning.

"I’m competitive. There’s a difference."

"That’s literally what insane people say."

But even as the words left his mouth, he was hardening against her thigh—

thick, insistent, the cock

she’d taken for the first time last night stirring back to life like it had heard the challenge and accepted it personally.

She felt it

swell,

felt the heavy length thicken and rise until it pressed hot and demanding against her skin.

Something fierce and hungry sparked behind her eyes.

Sarah moved fast.

Faster than he expected.

Faster than the careful, analytical girl who measured twice and leaped once had any right to move. She planted both hands on his chest, shoved him flat onto his back, and swung one leg over his hips in a single fluid motion that left her

straddling

him, the sheet falling away completely.

Morning light poured across her bare skin—golden, unforgiving—painting every curve, every faint red mark he’d left, every tremor of anticipation.

His cock stood

rigid

between them—thick, flushed dark, veins standing out in stark relief, the broad head already glossy with a fat bead of precum that slowly welled and dripped down the underside.

She reached down.

Wrapped one small hand around him—fingers still not meeting, still barely spanning his girth—and positioned him at her entrance. The swollen, tender lips

kissed the blunt crown

. Heat met heat.

Her thighs trembled violently.

It was going to hurt. She was sore, raw, last night’s claiming still written in every aching muscle, every tender fold.