A version of this story was longlisted for a writing prize last year. It’s been sitting in a folder on my desktop for a while now, so I thought it was time to release it into the wild. Because, well, we all know a Hugo (or two)…

There is also a recording of this story, which is available at the end of the page, if you dare…

Enjoy.

Joey, TSC xx

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Fractures.

Nighttime was when Hugo came out to play. The sun set, and so did the man he was during the day. Daylight was too honest. It highlighted the things he didn’t want to see. Dark circles under his eyes. Unwashed laundry heaped in the corner of his apartment. Unread texts from his mum.

But night had always been more forgiving. It blurred the edges. Smoothed over the questions. Let him put on the mask and become the character he’d created.

It began with the outfit. White shirt. Jeans. Sneakers. A hat covering his face just enough to seem mysterious. Unbothered. Hair loose. Cologne generous. Dior Sauvage. It was the scent that sealed the illusion. Women smelled him before they saw him. And when they did, they rarely looked past the surface. That was the point.

He was sharp, charming, always quick with a line. His British accent worked overtime, glossing over the cracks. He could say almost anything, and they’d laugh. It wasn’t about connection. It was about maintaining the illusion long enough to get what he wanted. Desire, he found, made people stupid.

Hugo didn’t feel much of anything. The last time he’d cried was in 2010, and he couldn’t remember why. Since then, he’d made it a habit to stay two steps ahead of any woman who got too close. They could want him, crave him, chase him. But they could never really know him. Never really have him.

How could they claim to know him when he didn’t even know himself? He moved through the world the way you move through a house in the dark. Careful not to look too closely, careful not to open certain doors that were better left closed.

Love? That was something people reached for when they couldn’t bear the silence inside their own chests. They dressed it up, gave it music, gave it meaning. But underneath it was always the same thing — the risk of being left holding more than you could carry.

Vulnerability wasn’t bravery. It wasn’t connection. It was exposure. It was standing without skin. And he had spent his whole life learning how to stay covered.

From a young age, he’d learned that feelings weren’t safe. His father, a stiff-upper-lip kind of man, once told him, ‘Toughen up. No one wants to hear a boy whinge.’ His mother, delicate and anxious, always seemed one emotional outburst away from breaking. Hugo learned to withhold. To keep things light, easy, charming. That’s what kept the house calm.

At school, vulnerability was ammunition. So, he stayed cool, became the funny one, the flirt. By the time he reached his twenties, it wasn’t an act anymore. It was his identity. He’d successfully become the man he’d always wanted to be. Cold. Avoidant. Detached.

He believed he was untouchable. You can’t break what you can’t reach.

Then came Josephine.

They met at a rooftop party. She was standing by herself, sipping a gin and tonic, staring at the skyline like she was bored of the view. And everyone else.

‘You look like you’re solving the world’s problems,’ he said, flashing the grin that always worked. He waited for her to smell him. To fawn over his blue eyes. To ask him where he was from.

She turned to him, brown eyes searing through him like a desert wind. ‘You look like you’re avoiding yours.’

He chuckled, then faltered. Most women played along. Josephine didn’t.

She had a kind of stillness that unnerved him. She didn’t try to charm or be charmed. She just was. Present, grounded, uninterested in performance.

‘You’re very pretty,’ she said after a pause, staring into his eyes. ‘But I can’t tell if there’s a person under all that or just… branding.’

He thought it was a game. The kind where he won in the end. Because he always won in the end.

They started seeing each other. Casually, at first. Drinks. Dinners. Then one night, they had sex that seemed too intimate. It started with the smallest thing. Her fingers brushing his wrist as she reached past him for her glass. A spark. Not the kind he usually chased. Something softer. Magnetic. Inevitable.

She was wearing a black slip dress with a low back and thin straps that invited disobedience. Her hair was loose. No makeup. Barefoot. Like she was daring him to see her without the costume. Without the mask.

They didn’t speak as he closed the distance. His mouth found hers in the hallway. Hungry. Desperate. She kissed him back just as fiercely, her nails curling into the back of his neck like she was anchoring him. His hands slid down her waist, over her hips, gripping her thighs as he pressed her against the wall. She gasped. Not theatrically, but like she meant it.

He kissed down her neck, tasting skin and warmth and the faint trace of something floral from her perfume. Her breath hitched as his tongue traced her collarbone. She tugged at his belt, fingers urgent.

He thought he had her then.

She pulled his shirt off over his head. He shoved her dress up around her waist. No finesse. Just need. Just desire. She wasn’t wearing anything underneath. That stopped him. Just for a second. He stared. Not just because of how she looked, but because of what it meant. The quiet confidence of it. The choice. She’d known what she wanted when she got dressed that night. She was in control, and it unnerved him.

His hands slid up her thighs, parting them. She tilted her chin like she was offering herself. He dropped to his knees in front of her, as if he were worshipping her. His mouth found the inside of her thigh, soft kisses trailing inward, tasting the sweat on her damp skin. She let out a low sound, threading her fingers into his hair, but didn’t pull. Didn’t guide. Just let him take his time.

He moved his tongue right up her centre. She writhed. Moaned. Opened her legs further. Held his head in place and pleaded with him not to stop. She was dripping wet. And he was impatient.

‘Can I?’ he asked. Looking up at her. Desperate to feel her around him. She nodded from above. Her face flushed.

He stood up. But it was her who guided him onto the mattress. Her legs wrapped around him, warm palms on his chest as she lowered herself onto him without breaking eye contact. They both gasped, like they’d been holding their breath since the moment they met. The rhythm started fast, desperate, but it slowed quickly.

She wouldn’t let him hide in it. Her lips on his neck. Her hands were on his face. His ribs. She touched him like she wanted to learn the texture of him, not just the shape. And that terrified him.

He gripped her hips, guiding her rhythm, but she didn’t need instruction. She rode him like she was writing her name across his skin, slow and deep, making him feel every inch of it. Branding him the way he had branded women over the years.

‘Fuck,’ he whispered, hands roaming her back, his jaw slack with disbelief.

‘Look at me,’ she said, grabbing his face with one hand. Her voice low, rough.

He did. And it wrecked him. Shattered him into a million pieces he never knew existed. There was no escape in her eyes. No distance. Just that unnerving stillness again. Watching him, taking him in, like she could see the man under the mask. The one he didn’t show anyone.

His pace faltered. She leaned forward, her chest brushing his, lips brushing his ear.

‘You feel too much for someone who pretends to feel nothing,’ she murmured. Licking from his ear down his neck.

The words hit like a blow. He flipped her then, her back to the mattress now, thrusting harder, trying to erase what she’d just said. He was in control. But it was there. Hanging between their bodies like a secret she already knew.

He kept thrusting into her. Put his hand on her breast and squeezed it. She was panting now. Scratching at his back. Digging her nails into him. He couldn’t look at her. Instead, he tried to focus on coming. On what he usually did when he fucked women. Stared at the wall or whatever was behind the bed. In Josephine’s case, it was a framed perfume ad. A Parisian woman skipping with a baguette and a bottle of wine, a dog on a leash. He focused on her blonde hair, on her figure. Removed himself so desperately from the moment happening in front of him that he imagined fucking the woman in the print.

He heard Josephine then. Her moaning. Groaning. Coming. It broke his dissociation with the Parisian woman. He looked at her writhing beneath him, and it shocked him how beautiful it was. Watching her like that. Her eyes half closed. Her fingernails digging into his forearms. Clinging to him. Her whole body moving like the tide as he plunged into her.

Then everything slowed. His body flooded with heat, his vision flared rainbow and Josephine…she looked like an angel. The brown of her eyes, piercing and golden. Her skin, glowing. The corners of her lips upturned so slightly that she could have been smirking or frowning. He wasn’t sure. It was what undid him. He thought about looking back at the Parisian woman. Almost pleaded with his brain to disconnect from whatever horror this was and just look. At. The. Damned. Parisian. Woman. But it was no use. His gaze was glued to Josephine. It was as if she had some sort of power over him. A magnetism. A spell. Witchcraft.

He felt it then. The approach. He had no control over his body. It felt as if his soul were leaving his body. Then he came. Loudly. It wasn’t the climax he usually curated. It was raw. Full-bodied. He buried his face in her neck, gasping her name, overwhelmed by the way her body held him, like she wasn’t afraid of the mess.

Afterward, they lay tangled in silence. Her breath steady. His uneven. He found himself saying things he didn’t mean just to keep her close.

‘You’re different…I feel safe with you.’ Lies that sounded like truth in the moment.
But Josephine didn’t melt like the others. She held her boundaries like they were sacred.

‘You say things that sound sincere, but your eyes are always somewhere else,’ she told him.

‘I’m here,’ he insisted.

‘No, you’re performing here. That’s different.’

He laughed. ‘You’re very intense, you know.’

‘And you’re very empty,’ she said flatly.

He didn’t text her the next day. Or the day after. He wanted her to miss him. To chase him. Like the others did. But she didn’t.

When he finally messaged her a week later, ‘Still thinking about the other night’, he got nothing in return.

At first, it didn’t hurt. He told himself she was just another girl who couldn’t handle him. That she was dramatic. Sensitive. Cold.

But then he saw her. Three weeks later, at a bar. Josephine in that black dress, her hair loose. Sitting close to a man with tattoos and soft eyes. They were laughing. Really laughing and she looked lit from within. Like someone who had nothing to prove.

Hugo stood frozen by the bar. The music drowned everything out except the pulsing ache in his chest. The memory of that night cascaded over him like cold rain. He shook his head, but the memories remained.

He left the bar without finishing his drink.

That night, he sat in the clothes he’d gone out in, scrolling through old photos. Her hand in his. Her head on his chest. Her voice in old voice notes, half-played. He thought about the boy he used to be. The one who cried easily. Who once told a girl in Year nine that he loved her and meant it. That boy had been shamed out of himself.

So, he built Hugo. This Hugo. A man made of smooth edges and curated detachment.
But Josephine hadn’t ghosted him because she couldn’t handle him. She’d ghosted him because she saw the cost of loving a man who didn’t know how to love himself and decided she didn’t want to pay it.

She didn’t abandon him. She protected herself. And for the first time, Hugo didn’t feel clever. Or wanted. Or untouchable. He just felt seen. And he wasn’t sure he liked who was looking back.

Audio version of Fractures available here:

Joey for The Spicy Chronicles, 2026.

Image: Pinterest

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I’ve been a bad girl, not posting any stories for you this year. Please forgive me. I’m working on a manuscript, and it’s taking me away from the work I love the most…. writing spicy stories for all of you little degenerates.

So, as an apology for leaving you waiting, please enjoy this saucy number from Grace R. Colt. Grace wrote a story for The Spicy Chronicles last year, and it’s safe to say, a lot of you were blown away (ahem) by the story. I know I was. I Aim To Please is a Romantasy/ Fantasy-Fiction short story, and if you’re into that genre (I’m looking at you ACOTAR readers), then I implore you to give it a read. You won’t be disappointed.

I’ll be back soon with a story well worth waiting for……

Joey, TSC xx

I Wasn’t Asking.

I stared at the two options in front of me, chewing on my lip. They had been so enticing in the store, and I’d felt pretty in the dressing room. Rissa had assured me my… assets… were very alluring in the lacy undergarments. I fingered the deep red panties that looked more like strings than actual clothes.

I hadn’t seen Jeremy in a week. Time crawled by, and I’d spent the last six days with a building ache in my core. It might have been avoidable, if he hadn’t destroyed my sanity with his mouth before he left that morning.

“Something to remember me by.” He’d teased.

When he kissed me, I could taste myself on him. I wanted more, but he reminded me he would miss his flight if he didn’t leave. The two pieces of lace blurred under my stare, the memory more fresh in my mind than the lingerie.

Any minute now, he would be done in the shower. I was supposed to be ready to go to dinner, and my dress taunted me from its hanger on the rack. Snatching the black one from the shelf, I shimmied into the panties and rearranged my breasts in the small scraps of lace.

I blew out a breath, my hand raking my hair back away from my face. Getting the dress on in the small walk-in closet would be more difficult. Fumbling the straps, it dropped from the hangar, pooling on the ground.

“Fuck me.” I muttered, bending to retrieve it.

“I’d be happy to.”

Jeremy’s deep voice startled me. I whirled, my eyes zeroing in on him in an instant. My mouth hung open, about to tell him I would be ready in just a minute, and I needed his help zipping the dress. The words died on my tongue as I drank him in.

His hair was still damp and mussed from being towel-dried. The towel slung low on his hips, held together loosely with one hand. His forearm braced him against the door frame, stretching his torso and accenting the definition of every muscle in his body.

“Is there anything else you need, Lauren?” A wicked smirk graced his lips, and my tongue felt heavy in my mouth as I struggled to form words.

“I’m—I’m almost ready for dinner.” I managed.

Pushing off the wall, he took a step into my closet, closing the short distance. He traced a finger over the swell of my breast, where the lace hugged the soft flesh there. Following the curve, he trailed his fingertip down the center of my body, past my stomach, and slipped it beneath the elastic band of the panties.

“I think I might start with dessert.” He murmured, tugging gently at the elastic.

“You haven’t eaten anything but plane peanuts.” My voice came out on a breath as he stepped toward me again, and again, forcing me to back up against the wall in my tiny closet.

“Mhm.” He nodded.

The scent of his sandalwood body wash swirled around me, his other hand on my waist, gripping me tightly. The heat of his touch seemed to spread through me, clouding my thoughts as they narrowed down to the feel of his skin on mine. If he kept touching me like that, I wasn’t sure we would make it to the restaurant at all. I would combust first.

“We should get you something to eat.” I reminded him. Maybe I was reminding myself.

“Or you could come to bed.”

Another tug at my panties, downward this time, as if to remove them. I glanced at the dress on the floor behind him as he stepped away, my lingerie pulled down around my upper thighs. The towel lay discarded next to it on the floor, and I caught the full view of him as he backed up.

“Don’t we have a reservation?” My protest sounded weak even to my own ears.

Jeremy knew it, his grin widening. His voice dropped as he held my gaze, sending a thrill through me.

“I wasn’t asking.”

Jeremy didn’t linger to see if I would follow, turning and walking toward our bedroom. Smiling to myself, I righted the lingerie. He could take it off again in the bed. I followed him, confused when I entered our room and he wasn’t there. Where had he gone?

Stepping around the bed, I looked on the floor like he would be hiding there. I shrieked in surprise when his arms grabbed me from behind pulling me to him. The hard length of his cock pressed into my lower back and desire shot through me. I wiggled in his arms, trying to turn as he pulled my hair to the side and rained kisses down my neck.

“Lauren, I’ve missed you.” He punctuated each kiss with his words, lips moving against my neck.

My head dropped back, giving him access as the hand he’d freed to move my hair slid down the front of my stomach, beneath my lingerie again. He had tormented me last week, his mouth nipping and teasing at my clit as he brought me to orgasm after orgasm, curling his fingers inside me while my hips bucked. The memory was enough. I waited all week for him to come home, and I didn’t want the foreplay. I wanted him. Now.

“Take them off,” I demanded.

Jeremy’s arms fell away, his mouth vanishing from my neck, leaving me suddenly cold. Heat grazed my back as he unfastened the bra I’d worn for less than five minutes, freeing my breasts from the lace as he slid the straps down my arms. Bending with him as he dragged the strings of my panties down my legs, I toed them off, turning to face him.

“Bossy today, aren’t we?” He smirked, reaching for me.

I was quicker. Wrapping my hand around his cock, I gave a light tug, pulling him forward. He raised his brows, following me as the backs of my knees hit the bed.

“You left me hot and wet last week.” I lowered my own voice, the sultry tone making him twitch in my grip.

“I wanted you buried inside me, filling me, and you got onto a plane and left me for a week.”

“I did.”

I let go of him, sliding back onto the bed. Jeremy followed, leaning over me as I moved, his gaze raking over my body. Hunger filled his expression as he bent to press kisses to my thighs, moving closer to my center as he climbed onto the bed.

“No, sir.” I twined my fingers into his hair, giving him a gentle tug away from my legs.

Surprise flickered in his eyes, but he followed my pull without fighting.

“How do you want me?” He asked, catching on.

“I want your cock buried so deep inside me the only thing I can feel is the sensation of you pounding into me hard and fast.”

Jeremy lined himself up at my entrance, moving the tip of his length through the wetness of my own arousal. His brows rose as he glided back and forth, teasing me.

“Already so wet.” His voice was low, the want coming through in his own stuttered breathing as he pushed deeper into me. Once. Twice.

Claiming my mouth, he thrust inside me, and stars exploded behind my eyes, pleasure ripping through me. I moaned into his mouth as he yanked my hips up, changing the angle.

“Is this deep enough?” The words came out against my lips, my hands clasped behind his head to keep his mouth to mine, unwilling to let him go.

“Never.” I breathed, the word punctuated with another hard thrust. My back arched as he buried deep within me, hitting against the spot that made my nerves sing with pleasure. He swallowed my cry as he kissed me, pounding against me again and again.

“Yes, Jer, yes!” I didn’t care that my voice was an octave too high, or that my words were scattered around my erratic breathing.

An ache built within me, winding tighter and tighter with each movement. Jeremy leaned back, pushing himself even deeper as I screamed for more. My release ripped through me, my body squeezing, forcing him against that sensitive spot just within me that pushed my orgasm further over the edge. My body shook as he rode me through it, his cock growing harder, pulling us into climax together.

“Fuck I missed you.” He collapsed on me, though he still held most of his weight from crushing me to the mattress.

“I missed you too.” I kissed him.

“Now we can take our time.”

“Are you asking me if I’m willing to go for round two?” He teased, skimming his nose up my jaw.

“Oh, no. I wasn’t asking.” I grinned.

Grace R. Colt for The Spicy Chronicles, 2026.

We’ve officially entered the in-between—that hazy stretch where time feels optional, and I couldn’t tell you what day it is if my life depended on it. I’ve noticed a few new subscribers joining us since my last post, and it felt only right to welcome you properly… with a saucy little send-off.

I truly thought I was finished posting for the year. But then I remembered a story I wrote a few months back—one that’s been waiting patiently for the right moment. And as it turns out, its theme and lesson belong squarely in the story below.

As we approach the end of 2025—the year of the snake—it feels fitting to talk about shedding. Letting go of what no longer serves us. Releasing the weight we were never meant to carry forward. So consider this story both a farewell and a reminder: we keep the lessons, lose the deadweight, and allow ourselves to begin again.

Here’s to closing out this year with intention, desire, and a softness that comes from knowing when to walk away.

Happy New Year, my loves. I’ll see you in 2026.

Joey xx

Water.

Zoe remembered the moment she first saw him. He was standing outside the pub with a cigarette hanging from his mouth, the smoke curling around his face like fog.

Small towns made strangers obvious. He didn’t look familiar, but she’d only lived there a few years—hardly long enough to know every man leaning against the pub wall staring at her.

Zoe and her friend ordered drinks, and she tried not to let him see her glance back. He was with two mates, loud and laughing, their accents Irish. Until he spoke. Aussie. Young. Blue-collar. Hands rough with ground-in dirt, nails rimmed with oil. Something about it all made her insides move in a way she cared to forget.

She asked him for a cigarette, even though she didn’t smoke. He smiled like he could see straight through the lie, which only made her want to do more absurd things in front of him. Up close, he wasn’t striking in a conventional way—blue eyes, fair skin, a moustache that should have made him look older but instead made him look impossibly boyish. What drew her in wasn’t his appearance, but a restless electricity pulsating through him. It was like he was bracing for something. Maybe that’s why the boundaries she crossed with him never felt like mistakes.

That night they drank too much and talked like they had years of catching up to do. And maybe they did. He told her pieces of his childhood: the hardness of it, the softness no one let him keep. Never the whole story, but enough to feel like she might know the shape of him. Despite the age gap—wide enough to name but never wide enough to feel—she never felt the distance.

She was still wondering why she’d tell a stranger anything when he kissed her. The air was cold, but his mouth was hot. The shock wasn’t that he kissed her—it was how much she liked it. And in that flicker of heat, she saw it: he was just as messy as she was.

He travelled for work, drifting from city to city, like someone who had never learned how to stay. And by the time she’d gathered the courage to want him—he was already somewhere else. Moved onto another city.

They spoke on and off for months. Their conversations rose and fell like tides—pulling her in, then receding without warning. Each retreat left her wondering: was he afraid of wanting her too, or was she simply another passing shore he would forget?

Still, she let the tide return every time.

There was so much he didn’t know about her, and so much she didn’t know about him. Their silences were full of it—the unnamed thing that hovered between them, warm and treacherous. It lingered like heat beneath the skin, a wanting neither of them dared to touch. Maybe they couldn’t name it. Maybe naming it would make it real.

She often wondered how well you could truly know someone through a screen. How much of a person survived the distance, the delays, the dim-lit pixels. Yet sometimes, being seen in pieces felt truer than being seen whole. As if the fragments revealed something the full picture never could.

And then, after months, they found themselves in the same city at the same time. As if the world had quietly tilted them toward each other. One more chance set in their hands.

She arrived at his hotel room after too many drinks. He offered her a cigarette. She still didn’t smoke, but she said yes anyway. It made her feel loose, unburdened, twenty-something again.

He sat too close for conversation, heat radiating off him like a storm about to break. She looked at the night sky, wondering where the stars were. Jake pulled her legs over his lap and told her he was happy to see her. Her smile reached her ears. Then when he told her he didn’t want to ruin the friendship, she laughed and said life was too short. They should absolutely ruin the friendship. Jake reached for her jaw then, shy at first, then sure. When he kissed her, it wasn’t careful. It was hungry, almost startled—like he’d only realised how much he wanted her the moment his mouth found hers. His breathing altered—quick, unguarded. He didn’t try to mute anything, and she was grateful for it. She could feel he was already hard. The honesty of it almost shocking. Zoe liked that she did that to him. Changed his body in ways that felt like control.

Zoe expected Jake to be careless with her. Entitled. The way young men were. Maybe she even wanted to be used like that—maybe it would make things easier. But he didn’t. Jake was unexpectedly gentle, careful almost, and it disarmed her.

When he lifted her and pushed her onto the bed, she waited for her mind to scream no. That she had already gone too far and if she kept going, that was it. She couldn’t go back and undo what was already in motion. Her body responded for her instead. Greedily. She grabbed his fingers and took them into her mouth. Sucked them like they were candy with a surprise in the centre. His eyes rolled back into his head a little. His other hand slid up her shirt and undid her bra, and she ripped her shirt off over her head. She desperately wanted to feel his skin on hers. His fingers were rough, and her whole body arched into him without thought. He kissed her like he was falling through her. Messy and a little desperate. He made small sounds in his throat; the kind men make when they’re trying not to reveal too much.

Then he stopped. Looked at her.

‘Fuck,’ he whispered, like a confession. ‘I really—’

He kissed her instead, like finishing the sentence would break the spell.

Jake hovered over her for a second—his blue eyes boring into her. Checking if this was still real. Zoe pulled him down because she didn’t want hesitation. Not then. He moved lower, licking over her breasts, her stomach, the indentation of her hip. When he slid between her legs, it felt like he’d been lowered into a private room she hadn’t opened in years.

He looked up at her. ‘I can stop whenever you want. Just say so.’

A man, let alone a boy had never given her the option of consent like that. It completely beguiled her. She was desperate for him now. Any urge she might have to stop had been left on the balcony with the starless sky.

‘I don’t want you to stop,’ she said through a smirk.

He exhaled like he’d been waiting for that permission far longer than he should have. When his tongue touched her, her back arched before she even registered the feeling.

‘Jesus,’ he whispered against her, his breath hot on her skin.

‘Come here,’ she said, in a voice that didn’t sound like hers.

But he didn’t come up. He held her thighs apart and worked her with a kind of youthful recklessness—no overthinking, no performance, just wanting. Pure, unfiltered wanting.

She grabbed his hair, and he pulled her closer, tongue deepening, hands anchoring her thighs. The room spun.

‘You need to stop that soon…’ she gasped.

He didn’t. Instead, he pulled her hips toward his mouth with both hands—greedy, almost impatient. His mouth was warm, immediate, wild. Learning her. Mapping her. When she gasped too loudly, he grinned against her skin in a startled way that made her want him more. She came fast, too fast, almost embarrassed, but he didn’t let go. He kept going until she was shaking, until her hand fisted in his hair and she said his name without meaning to.

When he finally came up, his mouth wet, he kissed her hard, like he needed to taste what he’d just done. Then he flipped her over, and pulled her back against him, his hands clammering over her warm body. She felt consumed, but not in a frightening way. More like she was being returned to herself, piece by piece.

‘You know why I like older women?’ he said, thrusting into her so fast she gasped. ‘They know what they want.’

A boy who knew what he wanted. That did something to her. Made her body weightless somehow.

After he finished speaking, his words like honey in her throat, Zoe felt something inside her tilt—slowly at first, then all at once. Jake had always made her feel unnervingly calm, like standing waist-deep in the ocean on a windless day. She’d thought that was safety. But water is only calm until it isn’t.

He moved in her again, this time slower, like he was trying to memorise her from the inside.

‘Is this okay?’ He asked.

She smirked, seeing how much he wanted to please her.

His hands slid over her hips, her ribs, the back of her neck—anchoring her, guiding her, letting her drift. Every thrust felt like a tide pulling her farther from the shore she knew she should stay on.

Zoe stopped him, pushed him off her and then pulled him back on top. She wanted to look at him while he came. She wrapped her legs around him, and he let out a sound he couldn’t take back, a breaking in his voice that felt like a wave folding over her body. She drowned in it willingly. His breath on her collarbone, his weight pressing her into the mattress, the soft stutter of his rhythm—none of it felt like a mistake. It felt like the moment before a storm when the whole world goes quiet.

He kissed her like he was trying to surface and couldn’t. She kissed him back like she wasn’t sure she wanted him to, and when Zoe felt the tension building, she pushed him inside her harder, deeper – feeling the release was close. She slipped her hands between their bodies and rubbed at herself. Her back arched, his lips on her neck and then her breasts. It was too much; she couldn’t hold on any longer. When she came, she felt the room tilt on its axis. A pulsating energy coursing through her like its own solar system. When he came, he held her face in both hands, eyes seared into her, as if looking away would undo everything they had just done.

Afterwards, he didn’t pull away. He stayed inside her for a lingering heartbeat, breath unsteady, like he was afraid of the cold air outside her body.

It was almost enough to make her believe she’d be the exception. Almost.

Afterwards, he asked her to stay the night. She knew she couldn’t. Shouldn’t. It would complicate everything. Sleeping next to someone was more intimate than sex. Waking up with someone was a one-way journey to a place she wasn’t ready to return from.

That night she stopped pretending she was made entirely of restraint. And Jake looked at her like he’d always known. Zoe felt alive in a way that made her slightly afraid of herself. Not reckless. Returned. Like he’d shaken awake something she’d let go dormant. She wanted more of him. More of the moment where she stopped being the responsible version of herself.

In the days after, Zoe tried to fold herself back into her life. She lasted two days. Then three. Then a week. Her mind wandered constantly—to his face between her legs, to the reckless, breathless kissing, to the way he laughed into her neck like he’d stumbled onto something he didn’t know he’d been searching for. For months, she insisted she had no feelings for him. He insisted the same. But Zoe had lived long enough to recognise feelings even when someone tried to bury them—especially then. They leaked out in half-smiles, in the way he gazed into the screen, in the sunlight that filled her chest whenever his face flashed into view.

She told herself she was patient. That he would come back. He always did. And for a while, she believed it - just like she believed him when he’d texted, I hope our story continues. She later cursed herself for trusting a single word that leaked from him.

After a few days of silence, she started to grow tired. Tired of waiting for him to break his pattern. He’d give too much, let himself feel too close, and then disappear for weeks until she reached out again. Maybe he was busy. Or maybe he was pulling back from something he didn’t understand. Still, she couldn’t keep sitting in the space between his promise and his silence.

He’d once told her he used to chase girls, that he was done with all that now. It didn’t take her long to realise he wasn’t done with it.

He just wasn’t chasing her.

Because she had been caught. Held still in the kind of quiet water that people mistake for safety, right up until they feel themselves slipping under.

So, she did the only thing a drowning person can do.

She let go.

Joey for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

I know it’s been a while since my last story. Between multiple arts writing commissions (at once), a new job, and being longlisted in both a poetry prize, a short story prize, and news of a writing residency next year to work on my manuscript (all of these things take time in preparing writing and submission material), I haven’t had a lot of time to dedicate to writing my spicy stories. Alas, here we are, meeting for what might be the last time this year.

I want to thank all of my readers for being so supportive of doing something I absolutely love. I remember being petrified the first time sharing my first TSC story with the world (ok, like 200 of you) and now look at us. Hundreds more readers, dozens of characters spilled onto the page, and these amazing writers who have trusted me to share their work with this thirsty corner of the internet - , , , , , , , & Mistress Sarah. I also can’t forget my day ones who make this community what it is and are so supportive: , & .

You’ve made this strange, joyful experiment into one of my favourite creative projects ever. And even in the busiest months, your messages and enthusiasm have tugged me back to the page.

So, before the year ends, let’s go out with a bang. Quite literally.

Joey, TSC xx

Unwritten

The rain had begun before dusk, a soft Highland drizzle at first, then a proper downpour that slicked every cobblestone on the village roads until they shone like dark fish scales. Fog hugged the rooftops. Street lamps flickered along the narrow alleyways, their golden halos pulsating in the icy air. The tiny village: a handful of stone cottages, a crooked bridge over a bubbling river, the small square where sheep sometimes wandered through, felt tucked away from the rest of the world. Like a place time had forgotten. Or chosen to leave untouched.

The bookshop sat on the bend of the steepest lane, wedged between a bakery and an antique shop that always smelled faintly of cigarette smoke. Its sign, Parchment & Quill, creaked overhead in the wind. Inside, the shelves leaned into one another like old friends sharing secrets.

Georgia leaned on the counter, tracing the rim of her mug with a chipped red fingernail. Steam curled from her camomile tea, mingling with the scent of old paper, sandalwood, and the cinnamon buns the baker next door had passed through her door before shutting for the night. The rain tapped insistently at the large-paned windows, repeatedly reminding her of its presence.

8:36 p.m. Almost closing. She exhaled, half from the quiet, half from anticipation she refused to name. She moved to blow out the last of the candles near the front window.

Then the bell over the door chimed. She froze. He stepped in as though he was part of the night. Leather jacket soaked at the shoulders. Black jeans clinging to him like a second skin. A single curl of damp, dark hair pasted to his forehead. His presence always rearranged the air and her insides. Always.

To the untrained eye, he looked like a stranger seeking shelter. To her, he was a secret in boots. He didn’t greet her. Instead, he just nodded. The smallest tilt of his chin. The only acknowledgment they allowed each other in public. Not that there was anyone else around.

He wandered toward the front shelves, dragging one finger slowly over the spines, like he was stroking skin. He always did that. A silent message to her. To what he wanted and what she could never bring herself to refuse.

Heat coiled low in her belly. Finally, he paused. Picked up a slim volume.

‘Ever read this?’ he asked without turning.

She squinted at the title. Story of the Eye. Her breath caught.

‘I have,’ she said.

He turned then. Full gaze on her. Blue eyes like infernos in the dim light. ‘And?’ he asked softly.

She lifted one brow. ‘Not your typical bedtime story.’

‘No,’ he murmured. ‘But it gets under the skin, doesn’t it?’ A slow smile spread over his lips. Dangerous, knowing.

Thunder rolled outside, shaking the windowpanes. They both looked towards the sound.

‘It’s near enough to closing time,’ she said, voice too steady. ‘Let me lock up.’

She stepped away. Not because she needed distance, but because if she didn’t, she’d drag him into the back room immediately. He did things to her composure. To her pulse. To her sense of right and wrong. He always had.

She twisted the lock. For the storm. That’s what she told herself. But the heat between her legs told the truth. When she turned back, he’d drifted to the poetry section, hand resting on a shelf like he was in his living room and not her place of work.

‘Looking for anything in particular?’ she asked, trying to sound nonchalant.

He glanced over his shoulder. ‘Maybe.’

She approached, fingers brushing the spines as he had done moments earlier. Their hands nearly touched. Electricity crackled in the almost.

He held up a worn copy of Neruda’s Twenty Love Poems.

‘Read this one to me.’

She hesitated. ‘We’re closed.’

‘Scared?’ he asked, stepping closer, eyes burning into her.

‘No,’ she said, and hated how breathless it sounded. ‘Wondering if you’re always this forward with people.’

His eyes darkened. ‘Only the ones I already know,’ his moustache inching up as he smirked.

A pulse kicked between her legs. She opened the book; found the dog-eared page he had left there exactly weeks ago. Not that she was counting. A bookmark of their last encounter.

‘I want to do with you what spring does with the cherry trees,’ she read, trying her hardest not to look up at him. Not to make eye contact.

His gaze dropped to her mouth.

‘Again.’

She read it again, slower, her voice like silk over the words.

He took the book from her, set it gently aside. She remained still. Composed.

‘Say it without reading.’

She did. He stepped forward, chest brushing hers.

‘You want to be read,’ he murmured.

‘Do I?’ she whispered.

His smile was a quiet threat. ‘I can feel it.’

He backed her toward the small leather reading chair tucked between the shelves. The one crooked lamp cast a warm halo over the worn seat. She fell into it. He followed, his hands sliding along her waist, up her ribs, fingers grazing the underside of her breast through her blouse.

‘You’re shaking,’ he whispered.

‘It unnerves me being watched.’

‘You’re not being watched.’ His lips brushed her ear. ‘You’re being seen.’

Her breath shuddered. Why did he always have to make so much sense?

He kissed her. His mouth warm, his tongue insistent. His hand slid beneath her skirt, cupping her warm spot through her panties. Wet already. Too wet. How embarrassing. Her moan vibrated into his mouth. Fingers slipped inside her. How many, she wasn’t sure. Her hips bucked. She gripped his wrist as he plunged his fingers in and out of her.

But she never reached release. Because he knelt then pressed her knees apart.

‘I want to taste you,’ he murmured. ‘I’ve missed this.’

His mouth found her. His tongue slow at first, then fast. Rain hammered the windows as she tangled her fingers through his curly hair, trying to feel some sort of control over what was happening. But she knew the truth. She had none whatsoever. She could never control herself with him.

She came within seconds. A sound that shook the dust from the shelves. Hard. Pulsing. His mouth did not stop until she whispered him to.

He rose slowly. His lips glistened like the rain on the cobblestones outside the bookstore.

‘You taste like poetry.’

Then she pushed him back onto the floor and straddled him, her thighs still trembling. His expression changed. She unbuttoned her blouse, revealing the curve above the white lace but not the rest.

‘Don’t move,’ she said.

He didn’t. She slid down his body, unzipping his jeans, freeing him. It was perfect and partly the reason she couldn’t say no to him. It fit snugly inside her. Like it was made for her and only her. Although she knew that was just her penchant for dreaming getting the better of her. Like it always did.

‘Oh,’ she murmured, amused. ‘You’ve been waiting.’

He reached for her breasts but she slapped his hand gently away.

‘Still. I’ll tell you when.’

He mumbled something under his breath. A low sound of annoyance she felt ricochet through her spine. Georgia picked up a book off the floor next to her, opened the page to where the satin ribbon marked the page. Then she tied it around the base of his cock; the book still attached and resting on the floor like a deadweight. His breath hitched and he glared up at her. She knew he was annoyed but she didn’t care. That was their game. Tit for tat. But she always won. He always let her.

‘There,’ she whispered. ‘Now you don’t come until I say.’

She positioned herself over his mouth. Right where his dark moustache was just visible between her legs. Then she pulled her panties to the side, smiled down at him and rode his face until she shook. Once she’d orgasmed, she pulled herself off his mouth like a queen descending from a throne, then sat in the leather chair, legs parted, watching him kneel.

‘You want to fuck me?’ she asked. ‘Crawl.’

He crawled. Immediately.

She made him strip her panties using only his teeth, made him hold still as she lowered herself onto him inch by inch. Then she rode him like a wrangler breaking in a wild horse. The ribbon at the base of him only gave her more pleasure. He tried to hold onto her body, to stop the book from pulling at his cock. She leaned forward, pressing her hands into his chest to keep him still, riding him slower now, letting the teasing tension stretch between them. Every movement she made, he grunted and bit back moans. Every inch of friction, amplified by the stubborn weight of the book. Her body shivered against his as she guided him, deliberately prolonging their edge, until he was aching, restrained, and utterly under her command.

When her orgasm pulsed through her, she leaned down and untied the ribbon and whispered, ‘Now.’

He came beneath her, shaking, grasping for her like she was the only solid thing left in his world. And maybe she was. How was she to know?

Afterwards, they sat against a bookcase, bodies still warm, breath settling into sync. The storm outside had calmed. Somewhere in the village, a church bell tolled nine.

‘You never told me your name,’ she said, playing the game they always played, though her voice came out softer than she meant it to.

His smile curved without opening his eyes. ‘What do you want it to be?’

‘Ezekiel,’ she murmured. ‘Like the messenger – bringing me good news.’ She sounded desperate, and she knew it. He’d never deliver her the news she craved.

Georgia rested her head against his shoulder, feeling the steady rise and fall of him, feeling too much.

He tipped his cheek against her hair. ‘I’ll be whoever you want me to be.’ A pause. A small, dangerous one. ‘But next time,’ he added, brushing a kiss to her temple, ‘maybe don’t pretend you don’t recognise me when I walk in.’

She blinked. Lifted her head. ‘Why?’

He opened his eyes, blue and bright in the lamplight, a glint of mischief layered over something that looked almost like longing.

‘Because I grew up two cottages down from you, Georgia,’ he said softly. ‘You’ve known me your whole life.’

The floor seemed to tilt. She let out a surprised laugh, then covered her mouth with her hand, because the laugh felt too close to relief. Or to something far worse. And then, inevitable as thunder after lightning, her face slipped into Georgia’s mind. His partner. The one who tended their garden in spring. The one who brought scones to the shop last week. The one Georgia waved to every morning on her walk to work. Her throat tightened. This was why they pretended. Why they kept their distance in daylight. Why anonymity had become part of the seduction.

He reached for her hand. She let him take it. For now. Outside, the rain eased into a steady drip from the eaves. Inside, a book lay open on the floor nearby, pages torn, spine cracked.

Georgia stared at it and felt the echo in her chest.

Joey for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

Thank you for your patience while I juggled a mountain of arts writing commissions (the reality of my day job). I’m sure the wait was worth it as the next story is hotter than ever.

This instalment comes courtesy of the wonderful —a writer who has always enjoyed conjuring fantasies from her everyday (and not-so-everyday!) encounters. A few years ago, she realised that putting those thoughts into words for others sparked a whole new level of thrill. And because some desires deserve a wider audience than just her very lucky husband, she now shares her NSFW stories on her page—and we’re delighted she’s sharing one with us.

So settle in and get ready to feel that familiar spark…just don’t read this story on public transport or in the office—although I know some of you thrill-seeking daredevils do!

XOXO TSC.

The Terrace.

He had suggested it, and that small fact hung in the space between us.

I dressed exactly as he asked: soft, green leather clinging round my hips, a cream silk shirt with buttons that offered tantalising glimpses of red lace underwear beneath, red lipstick, black heels.

In the taxi, I steadied my breath. He leaned close and told me he’d be there. His calm sharpened my excitement. I was recalibrating, adjusting to the possibilities of what might happen. Possibilities I’d hardly dared let myself dream about, and now he was opening them up for me.

Hidden inside the poker-faced row of terraced houses, the apartment glowed and flickered like in an old cine-film. Velvet, low light, murmured laughter. Hands found thighs and lingered; palms rested and didn’t move on. I felt watched and protected in the same instant—his gaze sharpest of all. Two attractive men passed, a glance and a smile causing a flicker inside me.

My husband didn’t want to dance with me, but I was fizzing like champagne. I needed to move, to soothe this ache. I knew he wouldn’t mind watching me.

On the floor, a man in a dark suit moved closer, a polite but obvious enquiry. The briefest of nods from my husband, and I placed this stranger’s hand at the top of my ass: the leather warm under his palm. I wrapped my arms around his waist, felt the muscles shift as we danced—a small, electric contact.

My breath hitched. I hadn’t been this close to another man in a long time; his smell was unfamiliar and heady. Intoxicating. I wanted more.

His hand moved, stroked down the curve of my bum until his cock pressed my stomach through the fabric. That precise pressure excited me: the certainty of what I was doing to him. He bent and kissed me firmly; the way his mouth moved across mine made my insides tighten — my pelvic floor spasming, almost painfully. He slid a finger beneath the silk, brushing at lace, and my world narrowed to heat, friction, the low hum of other bodies.

My husband watched from the sofa, trying to look casual but not succeeding. The outline of his erection through his trousers gave me a surge of triumph. A small private victory lodged between us.

When the music shifted, my husband rose and thanked the man, leading me back to the sofa. I was desperate to straddle him, press him into the sofa, ease the ache, but he denied me any such relief. Frustration made me irritable; my pussy hot and impatient. He knew the effect this was all having on me and loved driving me mad. Punishment for my earlier cockiness.

‘I’m going to show you off first,’ he said.

He guided me to a padded leather table and instructed me to bend, face down. The firmness of the table against my palms was oddly grounding. His hands catalogued my body - fingers cupped my cheeks through the leather and stroked the groove where thigh met bum. I swallowed, mouth dry with desire. He slowly unzipped my skirt and let it drop to the floor before he traced the back of my legs from ankle to knee — unhurried and methodical.

He dragged a finger from my clit to my anus, deliberate and slow, fabric and flesh, and I was surprised by my own groan. He said, lightly, ‘I’m taking these off now.’ The twin feelings of exposure and excitement were overwhelming. My underwear slipped away, and air stroked my naked skin. Against my ear, he whispered: ‘You’re going to be fucked by three men. I’ve picked them specially for you. I’ll be right here.’

Vulnerability sat next to the ache. Being both guarded and exposed – a heady predicament. Seeing his eyes burn with interest steadied me; that look authorised everything.

He introduced Adam. Dark, dangerous, an Italian type. I felt hands shift as Adam’s fingers stroked down my ass, found my wetness, slipped one finger into me as he rubbed my clit with the other. I arched my back involuntarily and pushed a little on his hand. He laughed, pleased. He didn’t waste time: a condom, an agonisingly slow entry. He pressed himself in, not too large but perfectly filling, giving me the length of him with a slow, satisfying depth that caught all the right places. His control precise and rhythmic. My face flushed; the impact brushed my G-spot; the sensations swelled but didn’t quite crest.

He came sooner than I wanted. I tried to hide my disappointment and was reassured by my husband’s voice, ‘So greedy! But you’ve got plenty more cock to come.’ Those words alone were enough to nearly tip me over the edge.

Jake was bigger. His presence behind me solid and unyielding. I felt the square of his hand on the table, the tree-trunk thigh that steadied me. He pulled back my hair, pushed a finger into my mouth, then slapped my ass with a force that sent heat dancing through my body. His whole hand covered my breast, the palm swallowing it: I felt completely held.

He eased into a rhythm: slow at first, then maddeningly sure, and I breathed around him, learning the measure of the size inside me. He used lube; the cold made me inhale and then melt. Each thrust winding me tighter; each withdrawal uncoiling something deeper. I felt the build of it — a low, grinding pressure — and then suddenly, yes, please, my imminent release. Jake’s movements turned urgent; my muscles spasmed around his cock. I started to come, a deep, whole-body wash. Warm wetness slid down shaking thighs. He pulled out, and I flopped, breathless, the echo of him still ringing inside me.

I had almost forgotten my husband’s promise. He hadn’t lied; he definitely chose these men with me in mind. The third was about to present himself.

Sam was different—lean, jaunty, smiling. He lay back on the table and invited me up. I eased onto him, feeling the pull of gravity and desire. My favourite position. He matched my rhythm, stroke by stroke. My husband climbed onto the table behind me and, with a rough tenderness, began to lick up from my pussy to my ass. The combination of sensations was indescribable; my insides curled tighter. He introduced a finger, then another; a small sting, a slick slide, cold then yielding. He worked with lube, slow, coaxing, and when he finally pushed himself into that newness, the first protest of my body dissolving into a fierce, insistent need to be filled.

He kept one hand on me, saying, ‘You can have these other men, but you’re mine.’ The possessive edge in his voice, the best kind of therapy. As he moved in and out of me, I rode Sam’s cock and felt Jake’s and Adam’s ghosts in my muscles. He pressed his thumb into my swollen clit, and that final ignition sent me roaring, my voice otherworldly.

We all came. The room, a chorus of sucking, thumping groans. When it ended, we lay like wreckage on the leather, breath pooling and mingling. My husband drew me close and brushed the hair from my face, looking like the man who had both given me away and kept me close.

‘Enjoy that?’ he asked, as casual as a man ordering another drink.

I half smiled, small and secret. His gentle kiss softening the night’s edges. ‘Let’s go home.’

In the taxi back, I rested against him, legs still trembling. At home, he undressed me slowly, reverently, like someone putting a coin back into a purse. In bed, he claimed me again, tender and fierce.

Afterwards, I smiled into his ribs; he tightened his hold. The house and the night and the strangers receded into a warmth that was only ours.

Sarah’s Secret for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

When I received Grace’s submissions, I was blown away. Like I had to grab my husband, blown away… Anyway, you get the idea. You’ve been warned!

I love nothing more than being transported into another world, and Grace did just that with all three of her submissions (don’t worry - I’ll definitely be sharing more of her work on here). Her Substack leans towards short stories and instalments within the Romantasy/ Fantasy-Fiction genre (which is where this story lands), and I implore you to subscribe to Grace’s page as her writing and world-building are seriously top-notch.

It’s such a pleasure to have writers like Grace trust me with their work. I hope you enjoy I Aim To Please.

XOXO TSC

I Aim to Please.

The room was packed with people, tons of obnoxious sycophants who had come to curry favor with Lord Orphean. Derek sighed, watching the townsfolk mill about, some dancing, some drinking and talking. His father couldn’t have picked a more odd location than this warehouse.

On the outskirts of the main city, it sat in one of the poorer regions of town. Scanning the room, he looked for any of the familiar faces that usually came to these informal balls. None seemed to be present, and he waded through the crowd to get a drink. Shifters bumped into him as he moved, drunkenly staggering their way through the song at the outer edge of the dance floor.

“Can I have red wine, please?” Derek tapped his hand impatiently on the scarred wood, ignoring the inebriated rat shifters giggling next to him.

The bartender’s shoulders stiffened, and he saw the male turn, a glare set onto his features. It died when he saw Derek, replaced with the stilted, fake smile reserved for members of the nobility. Sighing, Derek waved impatiently, gesturing for his drink.

“Of course, milord.” He nodded. His mouth was smiling, but his eyes were hateful as he pulled a bottle of red liquid out from beneath the bar. These things were stifling, and even the chilled wine did nothing to stave off the oppressive heat of the room. If it weren’t for his father’s orders to remain, he would have slipped out over an hour ago. In a room full of shifters, being a sorcerer was more than an advantage, except when it came to these events. The wine gave him a pleasant buzz that faded within moments.

A thudding headache began to form behind Derek’s eyes as the band—as inebriated as the rest of the guests—played increasingly worse. The discordant melody made him wish he could turn off his senses like the rest of the shifters in the room. At least while they were human, they could tolerate this… noise.

“Another, please.” He rapped his knuckles on the bar top, waiting for the deer shifter to fill the cup.

When the shifter froze, Derek’s eyes narrowed. The male was staring off behind him, longing and lust painting his features. Turning to follow the path of his gaze, Derek spotted the distraction. A snake shifter had stepped on stage, along with two new musicians. A drummer, a wooden flute player, and a fiddle player trailed the flowing fabric of the snake shifter’s skirts.

She was barely dressed. The V-shaped markings over her forehead and onto the bridge of her nose and the dark splotches on the sides of her face and down her arms told Derek who she was, as much as what. Viper. Which meant she was part of the opposing lord’s court, at the very least. Possibly a relative. With her mouth covered, he couldn’t identify her. Until she turned, giving him a full view of her back. Of markings he knew well. Ones he’d traced with his own fingertips.

Victoria.

The markings on her back were distinctive, elliptical blotches that ran down her spine, spanning its length. They were dark against her bronzed skin, glistening in the lights on the stage. He felt his blood shoot straight to his cock as he drank in the sight of her. Last time he’d seen her, she’d poisoned him. The sex had been well worth the risk, though sneaking the spell ingredients for the anti-venom had been a pain in the ass with a poison-addled brain.

She remained facing away from the crowd as the drums started. With them, so did her movement, and her body swayed with preternatural grace to the rhythm. The noise had died down, as if every shifter here were as enraptured by her as Derek was. His gaze swept over her hungrily as she danced, casting her spell over the room.

“Victoria.” He breathed, murmuring her name with the reverence it deserved.

Whirling, the viper shifter searched the room, as though she’d heard him. Their eyes locked, and her dance paused for a heartbeat. Two. Then she continued. Her gaze never strayed from his through the entire performance. The room may as well have been empty. When the instruments went silent, the crowd roared with approval. Breaking their stare, she slipped back out the side door of the warehouse, and Derek didn’t hesitate.

He was at her side so fast, it felt like he’d teleported. Victoria’s mouth crushed to his, the force of it stoking his desire further. She slipped a hand between them, gripping the rock-hard evidence of how badly he wanted her. Breaking the kiss, he groaned as she stroked him through his trousers.

“I didn’t know you would be here.” She murmured, grabbing his hand and leading him further from the warehouse. A large tent had been set up near the building, empty save for a dimmed lantern, instrument cases, and a portable clothing rack. The band had clearly been here, setting up for the night. She pulled him in, coiling her body back around his.

“I’m glad I didn’t leave earlier.” He admitted.

“It’s been too long since I’ve had you. I need you.”

“Derek.” She nipped at his lower lip, slipping her hand beneath the fabric of his pants.

“Fuck, Vic.” He hissed, arching into her touch. His cock strained into her hand, twitching with each teasing touch of her fingertips.

“Mmm. Are you going to talk all night? Or are you going to take me?” She claimed his lips again, this time opening for him as he leisurely explored her mouth with his tongue. He slid his hands up her waist and under the strips of see-through ribbon she’d used as her outfit.

“No biting this time.” He growled, cupping her breasts in his palms, massaging them while her hand trailed lower. A light squeeze to his balls had what little blood was left in his head shooting straight down. He wrapped an arm around her waist, pulling her flush to him, trapping her arm between them. “I won’t bite if you promise to fuck me with this—” she squeezed again, and he sucked in a breath. “—instead of just your fingers.”

A wicked grin slashed his features as he wiggled his fingers at her. With a flash, he had them up her skirt, stroking her clit with his thumb as he trailed a finger through the wetness of her arousal.

“You mean, like this?” He plunged a finger into her, and she buckled. He lowered her to the ground, slowly pumping in and out of her as he knelt over her.

“Just. Like. That.” Her breath punctuated each word. She shimmied out of the loose top, giving him a full view of her naked upper body. He untied the satin string at the side of the flimsy excuse for a skirt, and it fell away, leaving her fully exposed to him as he worked her. He slid a second finger in, his thumb circling her as he moved. His fingertip brushed against the rougher flesh within, and her body bucked. Once. Twice. On the third stroke, a flood of liquid spilled over his hand.

“Gods you are a stunning creature.” He admired her in the glow of the low light. Derek took his fingers and put them slowly into his mouth, sucking the taste of her off of him. He rid himself quickly of his clothes, discarding them in a pile while Victoria watched, eyes gleaming.

“I want to taste you, too.” Her voice was soft, alluring as she drew up to her knees, wrapping her mouth around the head of his length, swirling her tongue around the tip. He hissed, a jolt of pleasure shooting up the shaft and straight to his balls. She hummed as she took more of him in, the sound vibrating through him.

“That mouth of yours.” He groaned, straining against the urge to push himself further down her throat. Instead, gritting his teeth, he pulled back.

“What? Where are you—” Victoria’s words stopped abruptly when he pushed her back down to the ground. He lined himself up to her entrance, and she nodded. With one smooth thrust, he seated himself fully into her, relishing in her clenching around him.

Victoria cried out in pleasure as her body adjusted to him. She wiggled her hips, the sensation shooting through him as he started moving, slowly at first. His pace grew faster at her urging, her hips meeting his as he plunged himself into her.

In the heat of the moment, Derek didn’t notice the roughness of the ground beneath his knees.

Victoria was spread beneath him, breasts bouncing in time to each thrust as he drove them toward oblivion. Bracing his weight on one arm, he squeezed her breast, leaning in to graze the sensitive nipple with his tongue.

She gasped, the moan catching in her throat as he took more of her into his mouth, rolling his tongue around the peak before sucking on her, and she shattered, crying out. The sensation of her orgasm shot through him as she tightened around him.

“That’s my good girl.” He growled as he released her from his mouth, moving to her other breast to repeat the motion as he rode her through her release.

“Please. Don’t stop.” Victoria’s breathy plea came as her hips bucked beneath him. She reached up, threading her fingers through his hair as he moved in her. He grabbed her hips, his cock growing more rigid with each thrust, movements growing rougher. His pace was punishing as he chased his own release.

“I love it when you come undone for me, Victoria.” He praised. Pleasure washed over her features, and her eyes fluttered closed.

“More.” The demand was punctuated by his thrust, and he paused, slowing his pace. He didn’t have to ask what she meant. Shifting her by the hips, he slid a hand down her right leg, trailing his fingers down her thigh. When he reached her calf, he grabbed it, pulling it up to anchor over his shoulder, splitting her legs wider for him, pushing himself deeper into her.

“Fuck!” Victoria’s scream confirmed the change in position hit her in just the right spot. She wasn’t the only one affected—he groaned at the increase in pressure around the base of him, the shift threatening to send him over the edge sooner than he wanted. He slowed his rhythm, which only served to draw out the sensation of each movement, everything curling and tightening within him.

“Keep your eyes open, love. I want to see you while you make those little noises. I want to watch you come for me.” He rumbled, watching her unravel beneath him.

“Gods! I’m… Derek!”

Triumph shuddered through him as he felt her contract around him, unable to finish the sentence. He let go with her, riding the wave of euphoria that came with release. Panting, the discomfort in his knees flooded to the foreground of his mind. He eased off her, careful not to make a mess as he went.

“Three within a span of minutes. And you didn’t even bite.” He smirked, satisfaction radiating off him.

“I aim to please.” She grinned, breathing heavily as she rolled onto her side. Her eyes sparkled as she took him in, and he reached out, smoothing her hair.

“Good girl.”

Grace R.Colt, for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

We’ve all been there, done something we wish we could scrub from our minds with bleach and enough disinfectant to sterilise a hospital. But mistakes don’t vanish; they linger until we’re forced to face them. Sometimes that’s the point—what we regret the most ends up teaching us how we want to live and the version of ourselves we choose to leave behind.

XOXO TSC

Ghost.

She scrolled through the ghost app, thumb flicking faster than her mind could catch up. His name had vanished. Just like that—gone. The night before replayed in fragments, stuttering through her body: the candlelight, the soft rasp of her own breath, the blind faith in send.

Fuck. How could I be so stupid? Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

Snippets of her black lingerie and soft skin flashed through her mind, each one thudding like wet concrete setting too quickly.

She told herself this was a young woman’s mistake, something you do in your twenties, not your thirties. Back then, offering yourself up had felt like freedom. Like confidence. But now it landed as dread. Knifelike and humiliating. Nostalgia curdling into regret. The wind inside her shifted, heavy and sour.

Idiot.

She’d always thought she could float above these exchanges with younger men. That she was untouchable, the one in control, too clever to be undone by them. Yet here she was, gutted by the absence of a name on a screen.

Billy. So plain it sounded like half-cooked pasta.

And still, she had given him something real. A remnant of herself, sliced clean from her body and sent across the ether. Why did she do this for men like him? Or anyone? She had everything already: a mind that could cut glass, a face that turned heads, a body that could still surprise her in the mirror. She was smart, beautiful. Why sell her worth so cheaply?

The messages came back to her, still warm with the illusion of intimacy:

Him: Can I tell you something?
Her: Sure.
Him: Sometimes I wonder if people actually like me, or if it’s just because of what I can give them.

It was nothing, a scrap of faux vulnerability. But she clutched at it like it meant something. Like he was opening a door just for her. She thought: this is where it starts—the place we admit our fears, the place we get close.

I think people like you, she typed back, pulse skittering in her throat. I mean, I like you.

She waited, thumb hovering, already imagining what it might mean if he said it back—a line of connection, thin but strong enough to hold her.

Yeah, he replied. I guess. Still, it’s not hard to get what I want.

And there it was. The pivot. A turn she hadn’t noticed until later. He wasn’t offering closeness; he was testing her. Daring her to make herself smaller, to prove she would give him what he asked for.

There were always these flashes; moments where something deeper almost surfaced, truth glinting in the gaps between banter. But they vanished as quickly as they arrived, dissolved the second he tugged his shirt back on.

And maybe that was the truth she didn’t want to see: she always knew how these things would end, but she ran headlong into them anyway.

She had told herself his laziness was part of the allure—that offhand way he had of asking, as if intimacy cost him nothing and her everything. And then a few days later:

Him: I want to see more of you.

Him: Send me something I can’t forget.

Him: Bet you sound even better when you’re touching yourself.

She’d thought about his request for a week. And when she finally did it, when she hit record and leaned into the flicker of candlelight, she told herself it was for him only. A gesture toward closeness.

She angled the phone, the way he asked—the lens hovering like a voyeur. Her hands felt strange on her own body, clumsy at first, then practised, as though she’d been rehearsing all of her adult life for this moment. She tried to laugh once, to make it playful, but the sound died in her throat. Then she said his name out loud, thinking that might make him feel special.

A part of her longed for the gasp, the reverence, the words she wanted him to send back—God, you’re beautiful. I can’t stop watching you. She arched her back, let her breath catch, tried to look like the kind of woman who did this often, effortlessly. When the truth was, she’d never done it before. Not even once.

Him: Nice.

That was all he’d written back. One word. A door slamming. By morning, his name was scrubbed from her socials like she’d never even existed.

She hadn’t told anyone, not really. Only her friend, eventually, when the silence of being blocked threatened to collapse her chest. The shame, the ache, the dream that had warned her days earlier; him slipping away into a crowd, unreachable no matter how fast she ran. It was all there, all waiting, long before she pressed record.

‘He blocked me. I sent him a video of myself orgasming. He asked for it. It’s not like it was unsolicited. Why would he block me? I thought that would make him like me more.’

On the other end, a sigh, weighted with both fury and love. ‘Babe, the hot ones are always the laziest. They think sex will come to them. And it usually does. Until the realisation sets in that they give nothing back. He probably has some situationship on the side. Or a girlfriend. The hot ones always do.’

She closed her eyes, letting the words sting. The scene replayed again, the way her stomach folded when she shifted, the way her thighs looked too wide.

‘Maybe I didn’t look sexy, you know… like maybe he’s not into women like me,’ she whispered.

‘Everyone looks different on their backs. Skin falls down. It’s never as tight. You’re stunning. Don’t let some stupid man-child stop you from being you.’

But the reassurance slipped through her fingers. ‘I’m not. I’m fucking hideous.’

‘No,’ her friend’s voice was sharp, protective, like a spell being cast. ‘What you need to learn is this—you don’t need men to value you. And you definitely don’t need to send them anything to be worth something. You’ve gotta start living for yourself.’

Her chest heaved. Her fingers dug into her wrists, the ache in her stomach coiling like a live wire. The shame, the memory of the candlelight, the flick of her thumb hitting send—it all pressed down like gravity made of lead. And beneath it, a quiet, dangerous thought surfaced, almost swallowed whole by the thrum of her heartbeat:

If I’m not living for other people, then I don’t know how to live.

The words collided with her friend’s voice, warm and coaxing: ‘Start with you. Start for yourself. Nobody else.’

And in the quiet that followed the call, the texts, the blocking, something shifted. She didn’t feel triumphant. She felt raw. She felt human. She felt every ounce of embarrassment, every throb of shame and arousal, held together by the thread of her own attention.

His name was gone, but she was still here. And maybe, just maybe, that was enough for her to finally choose herself again.

Joey for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

Inspiration has a way of slipping in when you least expect it.

This story was born in the middle of an ordinary workday, when a colleague and I found ourselves utterly distracted by a devastatingly handsome stranger who drifted into the gallery.

Of course, nothing scandalous happened—at least not outside my imagination. But isn’t that what stories are for? To take a single charged glance, the way a stranger’s eyes can pin you to the spot, and spin it into something hot enough to leave your pulse racing.

So, to the mysterious man who appeared as if carried in on a gust of wind—thank you. You walked back out as if nothing had happened, but in my mind, you lingered. And here, on the page, I let the encounter unfold…

TSC xx

Mark Making.

The walk to work always began the same way: down along the riverbank where the wind seemed to run faster than the water itself. The long grasses bowed and rose like waves, their movement tugging my eye out toward the tide. Even on late winter mornings, the air carried salt, sharp enough to sting the back of my throat.

I liked the quiet stretch before the town woke. Just the crunch of gravel under my shoes, the slap of water against stone, and the thought of the day ahead. The art gallery sat at the end of the path like a white shell washed ashore — square, clean, at odds with the scrub and reeds around it. Sometimes I preferred the walk to the job itself. At least the river didn’t ask me to smile, to nod, to repeat the same pleasantries until my own voice sounded like an echo.

By the time I reached the doors, the café was beginning its hum. Cups clinked, chairs scraped, and a few regulars in fluorescent jackets were already lining up for their morning coffee. Inside, the air changed — warmer, drier, muffled. My station was the desk at the entrance, where I nodded at familiar faces, handed out guides, and welcomed visitors. Sometimes I wondered if anyone ever looked at me properly, or if I was just another piece of furniture in the lobby.

The automatic doors slid open just as I put my bag down under the desk, and it was as if a gust of wind blew him in off the street. He was all olive complexion, woollen jumper, chinos, and perfectly gelled hair. He smiled. A composed, enigmatic air about him. I looked him up and down, trying to get a read on where he might have come from.

Council workers often wandered into the gallery for coffee, but they either wore a lanyard or an identification card of some sort. He had neither. He looked out of place in this sleepy town, like a visitor from somewhere warmer, cleaner, calmer. He paused at the desk, smiled, and for a moment it felt as if the wind itself had followed him inside.

‘Hi,’ I said.

‘Hi,’ he returned, eyes glinting like sun on water.

‘You should start with the east wing,’ I said, gesturing toward the glass doors. ‘Figurative work, mostly. The newer pieces are in the back.’

‘Show me?’ he asked. Not pushy. Almost casual. But there was something in the way he lingered on the words.

I hesitated, the faintest edge of a smile tugging at my mouth. Technically, I wasn’t supposed to. But technically, most people didn’t look at me the way he did.

‘I shouldn’t.’

‘Then it’ll be quick,’ he said, already stepping toward the doors as though confident I’d follow. ‘I need some inspiration.’

The word made my pulse skip. Inspiration. Something I could do with more often.

The automatic glass sighed open. I let him go first. His shoulders moved with an ease I envied, the faint soapy scent of him trailing back.

The air was instantly cooler in this part of the gallery and the sound softened to nothing but the squeak of our shoes. He stopped before the first painting — a body sprawled against dark linen, brushstrokes loose and reckless. He didn’t look at it. He looked at me.

‘And this?’ he asked.

I swallowed, suddenly aware of how close he was standing. My voice came thinner than I wanted. ‘A study of the transient. How we hold onto something that won’t stay.’

His eyes flicked back to the painting, then to me again. ‘Like water in your hands.’

I exhaled, slow. ‘Exactly.’

For a moment, neither of us moved. The room felt like a tidepool. Soundless, brimming, holding everything in suspension.

He leaned in, as though examining the brushwork more closely, but his shoulder grazed mine. An accident, surely.

‘Strange thing,’ he murmured, ‘how stillness can feel so alive.’

I didn’t answer. My throat was dry. I could smell the wool of his jumper, faintly stained with the echo of spice and wood.

His hand lifted, hovering near the canvas as if to trace the white lines in the paint — then paused, dropped, and landed instead against the low rail of the barrier. Inches from my own. My fingers twitched. The urge to close the distance between us was sudden, startling, like the pull of a tide. I stepped back first. Only half a pace, but enough. The air seemed to ripple in the space I’d left.

He turned his head then, not smiling exactly, but with that same quiet composure.

‘Do you live here?’ he asked, casually, though nothing about him felt casual.

‘Nearby,’ I said.

‘And you?’ I asked, but he didn’t answer, just smiled. His silence wasn’t withholding so much as it was deliberate, like he wanted me to fill the gap with my own imagining.

We reached the far end of the wing where the skylight fractured the sun into slanted beams. Dust floated like tiny constellations. He stopped at the centre, turned, and leaned against the wall as if he owned the place. I stood opposite, trapped in the pale spill of light.

‘Do you ever get tired of it?’ he asked.

‘Of what?’

‘Looking at other people’s visions.’

His phrasing caught me. Not paintings. Not works. Visions.

‘Sometimes,’ I admitted. ‘It can feel like drowning.’

He tilted his head, as though weighing the confession. ‘And yet you stay.’

‘I like the tide,’ I said, before thinking.

The corner of his mouth curved. ‘You like being pulled under.’

A pause. Heat crept up my neck, despite the chill of the gallery.

I wanted to move, to walk back to the front desk, to break whatever this was. But my body stayed where it was, strung tight between retreat and surrender.

He stepped toward me. Not close enough to touch, but enough that I felt the air shift, the same way the shoreline changes when a wave draws back, promising a crash.

‘Show me something,’ he said.

‘What?’

‘Something they don’t see.’ His chin tipped slightly toward the door, the café beyond, the invisible line of visitors who shuffled through the gallery.

‘I can’t—’

‘You already are.’

I hesitated, letting my eyes flick toward the door. The café beyond, the shuffle of patrons — none of them would notice, none of them would care. But here, in this small bubble, I had a choice. My pulse hammered at my throat. I told myself to turn away, to go back to my desk, to resume the script of my small, safe life. I waited for the strength to do it.

It never came.

‘Follow me,’ I murmured, stepping aside and nodding toward a narrow side corridor that was usually reserved for trades and staff.

His eyes glimmered, sharp and alert, a wry smile crept up his lips. He didn’t question me, he just followed.

The corridor ended at a small storage room tucked behind the main exhibition space — stacked canvases, boxes of sculpture fragments, the faint scent of turpentine. I closed the door behind us and turned the lock. The hum of the gallery faded, replaced by the subtle creak of floorboards and the pounding of my heart through my ears.

He paused, leaning against a shelf, eyes sweeping over the clutter and then over me. His eyes darkened. He looked hungry.

‘And here?’ he asked, voice low, almost daring, ‘what happens in here?’

‘Here,’ I said, stepping closer, letting my body brush his as I reached for a canvas. My fingers lingered on his, the warmth of his hand sending a jolt up my arm. He held it lightly, teasing, letting the tension coil between us. ‘Here is where we box things... to keep them safe. ’

He nodded his head. Said nothing. Just stared at me with that wry smile and hungry glare.

He moved closer then, the space between us vanishing. I inhaled his scent — clean, faintly spiced. It unsteadied me. His hand slid from mine to my waist, tentative, asking permission without a word. I leaned in, pressing into his taut body, feeling the soft wool of his jumper through my shirt.

His lips brushed against mine, then along my jaw, teasing, electric. I tilted my head back, giving him access to me. Opening my body to him. His fingers traced down my shirt, hovering over each button until they hovered near the top of my pants. Then his hand slipped beneath the elastic of my underwear, that small barrier I had never thought much about until now. When his fingers found me, I felt both shy and infinite, like I was being sketched in a single, unbroken line. He touched as if testing the weight of an idea, as if I were clay that might collapse in his hands if he pressed too firmly.

I wanted to tell him not to stop, but the words wouldn’t form, so my body answered instead — hips lifting, a small gasp that sounded like someone else had made it. He drew circles with his finger, slow and repetitive, like tracing a coin on a piece of paper, leaving behind an impression only we could see.

When he slid a finger inside me, the air shifted. His eyes darkened as he watched me. The whole storage room seemed to take notice — the paint tins held their breath, the canvases leaning forward a little, dust trembling in the shafts of light.

He pressed his lips to my temple and whispered, almost conversationally, ‘I came here for inspiration… and found you.’

The sentence felt ridiculous and holy at once. My body trembled in waves, tightening around him, clinging, like I could anchor myself to that one line forever. He pushed his fingers deeper into me, slow at first, then with a pressure that made my knees give way. My hips rolled to meet him, desperate to keep him there, to pull his fingers further inside me. I moaned softly, the sound wet and ragged, and bucked harder into his curled palm — he smiled, eyes fixed on me like he was watching something fragile ignite. They widened, and he stopped, teasing, before slipping another finger in.

He could tell I was close because he began moving faster, in and out of me. Every nerve sharpened; the small room disappeared until there was only his hand, his breath at my temple, the wet sound of me yielding against him. The harder he pressed, the more I opened, spilling into his palm as if he’d scooped me out whole.

I could feel the rush approaching and I held my arms around his neck while we stared into each other’s eyes. The climax came not as a shatter but as a kind of soft collapse — like folding a sheet, like water spilling from a tipped glass. My legs quivered against him, my breath noisy and uneven. The waves crashed over my body - rippling like white light, and for a moment everything went black from the pleasure of it all. I held onto him tighter and he steadied me with his arms.

When it was over, he didn’t rush. He pulled his fingers free and held them up as though they were dipped in varnish, something glistening, a secret material. For a moment I thought he might press them against the wall, leave a mark, sign his name in me. But instead, he just looked — at them, at me, at the space between us that no longer felt like air but like paint still drying, fragile, alive.

Joey for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

This week’s story comes from . Matthew is a writer who’s been sharpening his voice across Medium, self-published short fiction, and now his Substack publication, Em Dash. Matthew writes like someone sliding you a stiff drink and a story you can’t turn away from. His worlds are sharp-edged and eerily familiar: tech giants, power plays, futures that feel too close for comfort. But he’s just as comfortable in the bedroom (or the forest, or the studio), where his stories blur the line between pulp thrill and erotic charge, between love story and moral reckoning. The kind you read in one sitting, then keep turning over in your head.

I hope you enjoy escaping into Matthew’s take on ‘en plein air’ painting ; )

Joey, TSC xx

Paint Me (The Art of Love).

“You need to hold still,” he said.

“I am holding still,” she said.

“Hardly.”

“Well it’s cold in here. And I’m rather exposed,” she said, trying not to smile.

“That’s never been a problem before,” he said, going back to his pad. His hand flew over the surface. The charcoal scratched against the rough paper.

“You want to change poses?”

“Yes,” she said and moved from her outstretched stance and curled into a small ball.

“You’re usually so still like a uh…”

“Like a what?”

“I was going to say stork. But now that doesn’t sound very flattering.”

She laughed, “You’re right it’s not.”

“I just meant they stay so still. Like when they’re fishing.”

“You’re such a dork.”

“I know.”

“Are you going to paint today?”

“I think so.”

She loved watching him paint. He was so intense. Gone was the happy go lucky man that made her laugh and the serious artist came out.

He was staring intently at some detail. She walked over.

“I think you should paint me,” she said.

“I am painting you.”

“No,” she said, taking the arm holding the brush and pressing the brush to her skin. A blue streak appeared across her body.

Her smile was wicked, “No. Paint. Me.”

He pulled her close and kissed her.

She remembered the first time she saw him. He was still an art student and she was modeling for the life drawing classes to earn extra money.

He asked her out for drinks afterward.

That was nearly three years ago. Against all odds his paintings took off while he was still in school. He liked to say he was just good at social media. But she knew the truth. He was the real deal. His art was magical.

She told him that once.

“You’re the art,” he said, “I just capture it.”

“That is the cheesiest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“I know. Worked though, didn’t it?”

“Ugh, it did,” she said blushing.

He would never admit it but he knew how to use his art at the perfect moment.

Once they went on a hike so they could spend the day outside instead of in the studio. He brought his pad with him and he sketched while they had a picnic along the trail overlooking the river.

She spread out on a blanket, while he sat on an old stump.

“What’s the matter?” She asked, looking at his furrowed brow.

“I’m not used to drawing you with clothes on,” he said.

“That can be remedied.”

“Oh?”

With a quick motion, she peeled off her tank top, leaving only her sports bra.

“Better.”

She went to remove the bra as well, but he stopped her.

“Shorts first.”

The command from the typically gentle artist sent a jolt through her. She slipped the shorts down, leaving her only in her panties and hiking boots.

She laid facing him. His pencil danced over the paper.

“I’m getting bored,” she said, and rolled onto her back.

“You’re not supposed to move when you’re posing.”

“Even if I do this?” She said and moved her hand between her legs.

“I suppose that’s allowed.”

She traced herself with her finger. Feeling herself through the fabric. She heard the pad drop to the ground. He laid down next to her. She could feel the heat of his body next to her. He tasted like salt when he kissed her.

She shifted her hips upward letting him pull them off. He kissed her stomach before taking a nipple in his mouth.

His fingers found their way inside her. He had the strong dexterous fingers of an artist and his gentle motions along with a well placed thumb was too much as she erupted in orgasm. The forest bearing witness to her pleasure.

He rolled her over, pulling her hips up. She gasped when he entered her. The first few thrusts, slow deliberate, picking up speed until he found their natural rhythm. This time she was not alone with her moans, and both of them filled the woods with the sounds of a couple in love.

Then it was time. She felt him get harder inside her. His breathing grew quicker and he moaned even louder.

She felt the warmth on her back as she became his latest painting.

A few minutes to clean up, and they were back at lunch. They talked about this and that. She told him about a shoot out west she might go on. He had a gallery show later that week. As well as the myriad of other things couples talk about.

Finally she asked what he was drawing. She figured he’d show her some amazing sketches of the landscape.

Instead he wordlessly tore the page from the book and handed her the drawing.

“Awww,” she said as she looked at the near photo-realistic sketch of a rose, “For me?”

“Of course.”

He then spent the rest of the lunch drawing her. It was one of her favorite pictures. It was framed back in the loft. She saw every time she went to bed.

He would draw out different pictures for her to find when she got home that when put together would reveal the location of her date.

For Valentine’s Day, he took advantage of her macabre sense of humor and she found a photorealistic painting of the human heart. She loved it.

And that’s how it was. Instead of notes, she’d find sketches here and there.

She was the only model he used. She jokingly said once, “You don’t date me just so you have access to a model twenty-four seven do you?”

“Oh gosh, I was worried you’d figure that out,” he said, trying not to laugh.

“Ugh I knew it.”

“Yep.”

“Does this mean we break up?”

“I think we have to now.”

“Shut up and paint me like one of your French girls.”

“Don’t bring that movie up.”

“Don’t worry I’d let you share the door.”

“See that’s what love is.”

“Now be quiet and paint. I’d like to do something other than lay here all day.”

But, that’s mostly what they did.

Even now, when they both laid there covered in paint.

Her hair messed up and her skin covered in multicolored pigment.

He sat against the couch with the canvas in his hands back to painting intently.

“You’re not painting me like this are you?”

“Why not?”

“I’m all messy.”

“You’re beautiful. Just stay still.”

“Fine.”

He worked for another minute.

“Ready?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said wondering how he’d make her look nice covered in paint.

He turned the canvas and she tried not to cry.

It was a painting of an engagement ring.

for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

Sometimes you get a submission that makes you smirk, go a little shaky, feel a little buzzed, and check whose reading over your shoulder while you’re standing in line for coffee.

This is one of those stories.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with , her publication, Pretty When You Kneel has been soaring on the Substack Leaderboards. Readers love her writing and I can see why. She’s got the ability to create a world I completely fell into and forgot where I was (while ordering aforementioned coffee).

This story is a little longer than the usual, so you if you have the Substack app, you can hit the play button at the top of the story and listen to it that way.

In other news, last week’s story Soft Landings is now available to read for all subscribers. I’m still workshopping if paid is a viable option for TSC right now. I want to offer something special for readers who want to support me, but I also want my stories available for everyone to read. So, as it stands (and it will probably change again) I will be keeping all stories from myself and collaborators free and paywalling my older ones that I have authored. I also plan on creating something special in the future for paid subscribers. If you have any ideas about what special treats you’d like as a paid subscriber, please hit me up with feedback by hitting the button below.

Special treats

Stay classy and sassy,

Joey, TSC xx

Queen of the Midway.

Tyler looked good. And unfortunately, he made sure everyone knew it.

Tank top snug around his chest, arms pumped from the gym, that effortless, tanned swagger he’d been perfecting since sophomore year. He didn’t need to try too hard.

The fair was full of girls, and he was convinced that most of them couldn’t keep their eyes off him. He clocked every stare, every distracted glance, every girl who leaned just a little too far over the lemonade counter and assumed it was out of lust.

And then he saw her.

She was dancing behind the “Test Your Strength” booth like she didn’t have a care in the world. Blonde ponytail swinging, glitter shimmer catching the sunlight as she popped her gum and shimmied to the beat of whatever song was blaring from the nearby speakers. Baby-pink halter. Cutoff shorts barely covering her thighs. She looked like trouble. The kind that smiled while lighting your ego on fire.

She caught his stare, slowed her hips, and smiled like she’d been waiting just for him.

“You look like you think you’re hot shit,” she said as he stepped up to the booth.

Tyler smirked. “Oh, I know I am.”

“Perfect,” she said, tossing him the mallet with one hand. “I love watching boys fail in front of a crowd.”

The high striker loomed over him, battered and faded but still menacing. Tyler rolled his shoulders. “I assume this thing’s rigged.”

“And I assume you’re all biceps and no bite.”

That pulled a few chuckles from the onlookers nearby. She leaned forward, elbows on the booth, her cleavage practically weaponized. “Let’s see what you’ve got, big man. Three swings to ring my bell. Let the crowd her the ding and get your prize.”

Tyler gripped the mallet and gave it a full swing. It landed with a dull, unsatisfying thud. The slider didn’t even make it halfway up the tower.

She gasped—mock horror, hand to her heart. “Oh no. That was... embarrassing.”

“I wasn’t ready,” Tyler grunted.

“Mmhm. Take your time, sweetheart.”

He swung again. The crowd oohed as the slider shot higher but still short. Still no bell.

“Third time’s the charm?” she asked sweetly, popping her gum again. “Or are you tapping out?”

“I don’t tap.”

She leaned in, eyes bright and cruel. “Then how about a bet?”

Tyler raised an eyebrow.

“If you win, I’ll give you a kiss. Hell, I might even give you a whole night.”

“And if I lose?”

“You’re mine. For the rest of the day. I’ll make you earn every second you spend looking like that.”

He hesitated for half a second. He is wasn’t used to having to fight for a woman. But something about the way she looked at him, like she already owned him, made something twitch in his shorts.

“You’re on.”

He raised the mallet, gave it everything he had.

The puck shot upward. And upward. And upward…

…and stopped just short of the bell. The crowd groaned.

She clapped once, bright and vicious. “Looks like we have a winner,” she purred. “And it’s not you.”

She stepped around the booth, wristband already in hand—hot pink with glitter letters that spelled out PROPERTY OF ERIN.

Before he could protest, it was snug around his wrist.

“Now be a good boy,” she said, looping her arm through his. “We’ve got a long day ahead.”

Becoming Erin’s Toy.

Tyler hadn’t expected to lose, and he definitely hadn’t expected to be paraded through the fair like someone’s arm candy. But there he was walking next to the bubbly blonde who'd just played him like a jukebox, her grip on his wrist firm, her steps full of bouncy authority.

“Slow down,” he muttered.

“Mm, no can do. I’ve got big plans for you, pretty boy.” She shot him a wink. “You lost the bet. That means you belong to me until the fair closes. And I want to show you off.”

They wove through the crowd, Erin waving to other carnival workers, who gave them knowing smiles or curious glances. Tyler hated how many people were watching them. He hated how smug she looked.

But more than anything, he hated how hard he was under his gym shorts.

She pulled him behind the Tilt-A-Whirl, into a shaded maintenance area with lockers and a few folding chairs. “This is where the fun begins,” she said, producing a drawstring bag from a locker. She held it out like a gift. “Put these on.”

Tyler peeked inside.

“You’re joking.”

“Nope,” she chirped. “Shirt and shorts. Now.”

It was a tight white t-shirt with pink edges and the word PRINCESS printed in shimmery cursive across the chest. Folded underneath was a pair of white athletic shorts with pink piping, way shorter than anything Tyler had ever worn.

He looked at her. “I’m not putting this shit on.”

Erin didn’t flinch. She just stepped closer, brushing a nail down his chest. “Oh, but I think you will. Because if you don’t…” Her fingers found the edge of his waistband. “I’ll make a little announcement. About a big, strong man who bet his body for a kiss and couldn’t even ring the bell.”

She tilted her head, lips just shy of his ear. “Or maybe you’d like me to pull you back out there and explain to everyone exactly what kind of ‘toy’ you are.”

Tyler clenched his jaw and started to change.

She watched every second of it, eyes gleaming as he stripped off his tank top and stepped out of his gym shorts. “Oh, you are gonna turn heads,” she said, biting her lip as he pulled the shirt over his chest. It clung like it had been painted on.

The shorts were even worse. Barely covering his ass, tight enough to press against the outline of his half-hard cock. He didn’t even know where to put his hands.

Erin made a show of circling him. “Mm. Not bad. But something’s missing…”

She produced a glittery pink hair tie from her back pocket and tugged it around his wrist like a bracelet. Then, with a playful hop, she kissed his cheek. “Perfect. My little trophy boy.”

Tyler had been stared at before but never like this.

Erin walked a step ahead, swaying her hips exaggeratedly, clearly knowing eyes were on her and on him. She didn’t hold his hand. She held his wrist, like he was a child being towed through a mall. Every time he tried to tug free, her fingers tightened and her voice dropped, sugar laced with steel: “Nope. You’re with me, remember?”

He burned under every glance. Some guys smirked. Some girls giggled. One older woman nudged her husband and whispered something that made them both snort.

His shirt clung to his chest like a second skin, and the shorts rode higher with every step. His thighs were out. His knees were out. His dignity was on life support.

“Smile,” Erin said, glancing back. “Or people are going to think we’re on a date.”

“We’re not.”

“We could be,” she teased. “But you’d have to be much, much better behaved.”

Tyler couldn’t tell if it was the heat or the shame making him sweat.

She stopped suddenly in front of a cotton candy stand. “Be a doll and get us some,” she said, handing him a crumpled bill. “Pink, obviously.”

He didn’t move.

“Tyler.” Her voice dipped, bright but dangerous. “You don’t want me to raise my voice, do you?”

He didn’t.

He walked to the stand, feeling every eye on his long legs and the humiliating message on his chest. The teenage girl at the counter giggled behind her hand when she read his shirt. “Cute,” she said, spinning the sugar.

When he returned, Erin was sitting on a bench, legs crossed, smiling like a queen. “Took you long enough,” she said, accepting the treat and patting the spot beside her.

Tyler looked away, cheeks flushed. This was ridiculous. He was Tyler fucking Chase. He had girls lining up to be seen with him. And now he was playing dress-up arm candy to some glitter princess who—

“Wait here,” she said suddenly, hopping down from the table. “I need to powder my nose.”

She turned and skipped off toward the public bathrooms. Tyler crossed his arms, scanning the crowd like he was trying to look busy. The tank top that once made him feel invincible now felt silly next to the Princess shirt she’d insisted he put on.

The tiny shirt clung to his torso. His shorts, rolled at the waist and cuffed tighter by Erin’s hand, showed off way too much thigh. He looked like he’d borrowed his outfit from someone’s flirty little sister.

“Bro?”

The voice hit him like a slap.

Tyler turned and froze.

It was Josh and Malik, two of his gym buddies. And they weren’t alone. Each had a girl on his arm, both of them decked out in short skirts and smirking hard.

Josh’s eyes widened. “Yo... what the hell are you wearing, man?”

Tyler opened his mouth. No words came.

Malik burst out laughing. “Damn, dawg, you join the cheer squad?”

The girls were worse.

One of them walked a slow, mocking circle around him. “Oh my god, that shirt is so cute on you,” she said, dragging out every syllable. “Do you, like, need a matching scrunchie?”

The other one giggled and fake-whispered to her boyfriend, “He looks like one of those TikTok boytoys that gets dressed up by his girlfriend. You know, the ones who carry the purse.”

“I don’t carry—” Tyler started.

Josh snapped a picture before he could finish. “Nah, man, I need this for the group chat.”

“Delete it.”

“Can’t delete perfection,” Malik said, howling.

Tyler wanted to disappear. His fists clenched, but he couldn’t throw a punch without looking even more pathetic. He was standing alone. With glitter on his wrist. In a shirt that barely touched his waistband.

And then Erin reappeared.

“Oh hey!” she chirped, sliding her arm through Tyler’s like they were prom dates. “Aren’t you gonna introduce me to your little fan club?”

The laughter died fast.

The girls narrowed their eyes. Josh looked confused.

Erin didn’t wait. She grabbed Tyler’s jaw, tilted his face to her, and gave his cheek a firm pat. “Isn’t he precious when he blushes?”

Tyler nearly choked.

“We’re doing a little day-date roleplay,” she said brightly. “He’s learning how to follow instructions, respect women, and stay quiet unless he’s spoken to. It’s going so well.”

She smiled sweetly at the group. “You boys should try it sometime. Who knows, maybe your girlfriends wouldn’t have to fake it anymore.”

The girls loved that. They started laughing all over again. Only now it was at their boyfriends. Josh went pale. Malik swore under his breath.

Erin tugged Tyler closer. “Come on, sweetheart. We’re late for your first obedience lesson.”

He didn’t say a word.

Not even when she slipped her fingers through his belt loops and led him away like a toy.

Erin offered him a bite of the cotton candy. “You were amazing just now.”

He didn’t respond.

She leaned in, her voice low and sing-song. “And guess what? You still haven’t earned your reward.”

Tyler looked at her, confused and flustered.

“Oh, I’ve got something much more intimate planned for you,” she said, licking a bit of spun sugar from her lip. “But not yet. You’ve got a little more parading to do, baby doll.”

The Winner Claims Her Prize.

Erin continued to pull Tyler through the fair until they got to the funhouse tent, away from the flickering lights and mechanical laughter, Erin turned sharply on her heel and faced him.

She stepped forward until her bare stomach nearly touched his chest. Her hand came up, not harshly, just confidently, and she flicked at the neck of his PRINCESS tee. “Off.”

He peeled it off slowly, heart pounding, the air suddenly cooler against his skin. She’s smiled again. That glittery, dangerous smile.

Then she pointed down. “Now take a knee.”

Tyler didn’t move.

“Unless you want me to call your gym bros back over,” she added sweetly. “Bet they’d love to see what a good girl you are. Either way, you’re going to be on your knees with your face in a crotch.”

His face burned. But his cock twitched.

She watched it. Then cocked a brow.

“Knew it,” she purred.

Her eyes dropped to his shorts again. “You’re already that hard? God, you’re easier than a ring toss booth.”

He lowered to his knees.

Erin turned and lifted her foot up onto a hay bale like she was posing for a fairground calendar. Then she wiggled her toes in her sandal. “Start with a kiss. Right there.”

Tyler stared.

“I’m not saying it again, princess.”

So he leaned forward. Kissed the top of her foot.

She giggles. “Oh, come on. You think you’re the first gym bro to fall to his knees for me? Give it some tongue, bitch.”

Her voice dripped with playfulness, but there’s heat behind it too.

“Do it right and maybe I’ll let you hump my thigh like the dog you are later.”

He flushed deeper. But he did it. Kissing her foot, the side of her ankle, her shin. Slowly. Upward.

“That’s it,” she whispered. “Make love to my legs like they’re the only thing you’ve ever worshipped. Not your own reflection. Me.”

As he kissed her knee, she slid her shorts down. They fell in a casual heap. No hesitation, no shame. Her panties followed, silky and soaked through.

“And don’t skip,” she murmured, as he reached her thigh. “Every girl you’ve ever been with, I bet you’ve raced straight to the part you want. Right? Get off fast, leave her aching, call it a night.”

He didn’t answer, lips brushing her inner thigh.

“I’m not like those girls,” she said, cupping his chin and making him look up at her bare pussy, glistening and waiting. “You don’t get to feel good today. I do.”

She dragged him the rest of the way, hand tangled in his hair, pressing his face into the wet heat of her.

“Make it count.”

Tyler started slow. Gentle licks. Testing. But she tightened her grip instantly.

“Nope. Not like that. This isn’t about you proving you’re good. This is about you proving you're mine.”

He tried again. This time deeper, tongue dragging firm and wet along the edge of her lips, circling her clit just like she told him.

Her breath caught.

“That’s it,” she groaned. “That’s fucking it. Just like that, you little trophy boy.”

Then softer, breathy, a cruel whisper just for him. “If your cock twitches again, I’m going to know you enjoy being owned.”

Her hips began to grind, unashamed. Her fingers curled harder in his hair. She moaned louder now. Raw, guttural sounds that shook him more than they should. It’s not just that she was getting off on him. It’s that she was using him. Like he was her toy. Her machine. Her revenge.

“I’m gonna—” she gasped, trembling. “Fuck. Don’t stop. Don’t you dare fucking stop.”

Tyler’s jaw ached. His cock was leaking into the inside of his tight shorts. He couldn’t breathe. His eyes watered.

And then she broke.

Her thighs clamped around his head, one heel digging into his back. Her whole body jerked and spasmed as she moaned. Loud, uncontrolled, stunningly messy. Her pussy pulsed against his tongue as she rode every second of her orgasm like a stolen carnival ride.

She tasted like sin. She screamed.

She sagged back, breathing hard. Sweat beading down her chest. Her fingers unwound from his hair.

Tyler’s face was soaked. His mouth ached. His cock felt like it could burst. And she just smiled down at him, glowing like a goddess high on power.

“You look,” she pants, “so fucking pretty when you kneel.”

She lifted his chin with a toe and laughs.

Her hand dropped lower, just lightly brushing the bulge straining in his shorts. He jerked instinctively, hips twitching forward—eager, desperate.

“Oh,” she cooed, all fake sympathy. “Is someone hoping for a reward?”

Tyler nodded, pathetically, his mouth still slick from her.

His cock was so stiff it hurt, throbbing against his shorts like it was begging. She let her fingers ghost over him again, and he practically whimpered.

Erin grinned like a cat with her paw on a caged mouse. “You poor thing. Bet you’re used to getting off and then walking away, huh? Leaving girls wet and annoyed while you brag about your ‘performance’ to your gym bros.”

She leaned in close, her breath hot on his cheek.

“But not today. Today, you get to feel exactly how that feels.”

She let her fingers graze him again—just enough to make him gasp—then stood up.

“Thanks for the orgasm, princess. Hope that ache keeps you company tonight.”

Last Thrill of the Night.

They sat on a hay bale behind the shuttered funnel cake stand. Erin was dressed again. Her tank top smooth, her shorts riding high up her hips, her lip gloss freshly reapplied.

Tyler was still shirtless. Still hard. Still aching.

She was sipping from a water bottle like nothing had happened.

“I should’ve let your friends see you beg,” she said casually, not even looking at him. “The way you whimpered into my pussy like it was your only purpose.”

He shifted, jaw tight. His hands were clenched in his lap. “You said—”

“I said I might let you come.” She gave him a mock-sympathetic look. “Sweetheart, I might let a dog lick my boots if it rolls over cute enough. Doesn’t mean I owe it a bone.”

He flushed. “So… that’s it?”

“Oh no.” She stood, brushing off her thighs. “You did so good today. Really. I’m proud of you.”

He blinked. Hope flared for a second.

Erin turned to him, eyes glinting. “That’s why I’ll let you finally get into my panties.”

He stared. Confused. Then—

She pulled a small, silky pair from her bag and held them out. Pink. Lacy. Worn.

“Put them on,” she said sweetly. “Right over those sore, needy balls. You’ve earned it.”

He hesitated, throat dry.

“Or,” she added, tilting her head, “I can go grab your gym bros and tell them exactly what you earned tonight.”

That was all it took.

Tyler slipped them on, cheeks burning, his erection tenting the delicate fabric as it clung humiliatingly to his skin.

Erin beamed. “Perfect. Now you’re really mine.”

She turned on her heel, already walking away, her voice floating back behind her like a kiss in the wind.

“Don’t take them off till you get home. Think of them like… a trophy. Something to remember me by.”

She patted his cheek.

And then she was gone, whistling as she disappeared back into the lights.

Tyler sat there, panting. Miserable. Hard.

He didn’t move for a long time.

Mistress Sarah for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

Some lovers stay. Others become language.

Joey, TSC xx

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Soft Landings.

Brandon had stopped hoping. That was the truth of it.

Lucy’s stories kept landing in his inbox. Paragraphs that were always just a little too close to the things they’d shared over messages. Months of late-night DMs, voice notes, half-finished drafts bouncing back and forth like teasing foreplay. She wrote about being watched. About being touched. About knowing exactly how to make him ache, how to make him want her. And only her. But it never became real. How could it? They were on opposite sides of the country.

Until Thursday night.

He was sitting on the worn leather couch in his rented apartment, the air thick and stagnant. The summer heat clung to his skin like a fur jacket. He’d already had a few beers to calm the nerves. Flicked through his socials until his thumb felt like it might go numb.

And then her text buzzed through.

Lucy: Just landed.
Lucy: I hope you’re ready.

Brandon’s chest tightened, and a heat rushed up his legs. He grabbed his car keys and fumbled his way out the door quicker than before the image of her mouth could fade from behind his eyes.

He met her outside the airport, his shirt clinging to his back, breath catching the moment he saw her in person for the first time in months. She looked like summer trouble: cat-eye sunglasses, a short denim skirt revealing long tanned legs, and those lips. The ones he’d dreamed of. The ones that had written him into her fantasies over and over again. His chest clenched. It wasn’t nerves. It was desire. It was need. The kind that made him doubt whether he really knew himself at all.

‘Hey, stranger,’ she said, smirking and stepping close enough that he smelled her perfume; amber, salt, something citrusy. His body flared with heat at the smell of her.

‘You actually came,’ he murmured, like she still might disappear. Like he might be dreaming.

She tilted her head. ‘You think I’d fly all this way and not follow through? After all this time?’

He didn’t answer. Just opened the car door for her, palms sweating, cock already stirring with a pulse that had nothing to do with the heat.

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This week’s story comes from Monica Van Fleet of You Want it Darker and Calliope Sparks Notes.

Monica has been a lifelong reader and writer, but spent 27 years (much of it at a major book retailer) in the corporate world before turning to writing full time last spring. She writes gothic horror over on her You Want it Darker publication, and her alter ego, Calliope Sparks is just dipping her toes into the world of smut. Welcome Calliope, I think you’ll be right at home here.

Joey, TSC xx

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Not Quite Mile High

“Excuse me, Faith Devereux?”

I glanced up, startled by the sound of my name on the lips of the flight attendant. I nodded at the pleasant young man standing in the aisle to confirm my identity and removed an ear bud.

“I’m sorry to bother you, Ms. Devereux, but we had a seat in first class open up, and you were next on the upgrade list.”

“Sure, twist my arm,” I chuckled in mock distress. As I stood and gathered my bags, I nodded a grim salute of respect to my former economy-class compatriots, then followed the flight attendant forward to the fabled land of more leg room.

The other first class passengers were already sipping on their complimentary preflight beverages as I stowed my bags and settled into my new and improved space. The same flight attendant asked if he could bring me something to drink. As a rule, I always order an Irish coffee when I find myself unexpectedly in first class. It’s no espresso martini, but the jolt of caffeine and bonus burn of booze always hits just right. After all, it’s 5 PM somewhere, and nobody should turn down free drinks

As “Irish coffee” escaped my lips, I heard something like a snort or chuckle from the window seat. The flight attendant nodded obediently and hurried away, leaving me to cast a scathing side eye in my new neighbor’s direction. The woman in 3A to my 3B looked familiar, but I couldn’t place her. When your profession makes you live out of a suitcase, you start to recognize faces that frequent the same routes.

Without being too obvious, I tried to sneak a more careful appraisal of her. What I saw made me raise an eyebrow. There is an unspoken etiquette to habitual air travel, and my seat mate was openly flouting those rules by making direct and uninterrupted eye contact, mischief shining in her dark eyes. Had she laughed at me? At my drink choice? Who does that? She was probably assessing the poor plebe she’d be stuck sitting next to for the duration of the flight.

She oozed glamor in a red silk top—casual enough for air travel, but sophisticated enough for the boardroom—the four top buttons left undone with carefree confidence. My eyes lingered too long at the exposed skin of her neck and the hint of a black lace bra that peeked out from behind that closed fifth button. Her lips were painted a dark ruby red, and her jet black curls were piled atop her head in the sort of haphazard bun that was somehow both effortless and polished. I wracked my brain trying to think where I knew her from—an actress maybe? It was also possible I’d just seen her in other airports.

My eyes flicked up to her face, and I felt a slight thrill as I realized she was still looking. Well that’s rude, I thought to myself. How dare she? I felt ire building in my chest—she was in first class, she should know the rules. Was she just some rich bitch who purchased the seat? Do people actually do that? I’m only used to people who, like me, fly first class when they get a free upgrade. She oozed a calm, collected confidence, and I was suddenly certain I’d seen her stunning red silk blouse in Tom Ford’s fall line.

I doubled down, refusing to let this overconfident stranger intimidate me. My death glare has silenced men twice my age, but this woman was still staring at me with brazen curiosity gleaming in her eyes. I steeled myself and met her gaze directly. I felt an uneasy thrill flutter through my chest: I knew that look—coy, almost predatory, just a little dangerous. Quickly overwhelmed and feeling slightly awkward, I glanced away with an uncharacteristic, shy smile. I struggled to maintain a semblance of calm as my growing anxiety blossomed in concert with the flush of blood in my cheeks.

Just as I thought I might panic, the trusty flight attendant broke the tension as he bustled up with my Irish coffee. He handed me the cup with a smile, and I took a fortifying sip before turning back to the woman. She was still smiling intently, so I decided a direct approach was best. I tuned my voice to the frequency used for unruly clients and, without turning to her, said, “Hi, I can’t help but notice you seem far more interested in my drink than your own. Can I help you out with that? I’m sure our flight attendant would be happy to bring you one.” I struggled to feign disinterest and annoyance, my smile placid and non-committal.

The corners of her eyes wrinkled in mirth, and her flirtatious half smile transformed into one that looked like she might be trying to sell me toothpaste. She was definitely an actress; normal people can’t smile like that. “Oh, honey!” she said, shifting her body to face me more directly, “I think it’s you who needs my help.”

My jaw dropped and my lips parted in surprise. I braced again and met her gaze. Her accent was distinctly Latin. She was petite, but there was something out-sized about her presence that seemed to fill the whole cabin. She was a total knockout. I decided to hate her for it.

It was time to try a different tack —authoritative and intimidating, a tone that dares you to disagree. “I appreciate your concern,” I said, sarcasm dripping from each syllable, “but I assure you, there is no help on offer that I need.” I was simmering just below boiling, and I poured that wrath into my gaze. It doesn’t matter how much space they seem to take up, I don’t allow anyone to condescend or make me feel small.

As if to settle the matter once and for all, I turned away and took another taste of my coffee. I tried to sip calmly, wondering whether she had decided to mind her own business. Then I reached into the seat back pocket and pulled my book from my purse, confident the matter was settled.

She surprised me.

“Don’t be like that,” she said, the teasing tone of her voice suddenly more gentle and inviting. I’d rested my elbow on the padded space between our seats, and she traced her fingertips gently along my wrist. I felt the thrill of a shiver as goose bumps stood to attention, and I struggled to muffle a surprised gasp. She lingered a moment too long. Her touch hadn’t been anything the casual passerby would have noticed, but as I turned again to face her, she arched one perfect eyebrow in amusement. Was she enjoying this?

My skin felt flushed where her fingertips had rested. I looked down, imagining there might still be dainty fingerprints left behind like rosy tattoos. I found myself picturing those graceful fingers still tracing the curve of my forearm, tickling with perfectly manicured intention. I felt a little lightheaded, a slow and pleasurable heat rising between my legs. My nipples were already hard, aching against the softness of my bra, almost painfully tight. I felt my cheeks burn in embarrassment, but I didn’t wilt. I looked back to her, returning her gaze with intensity, with an unexpected ferocity that dared her to try anything like that again. Wait—was I daring her? Would she see my response as a threat or an invitation?

For a moment we gazed at each other in electric silence . . . and then she broke into a fit of disarming giggles. I’d braced for almost anything, but I wasn’t sure how to handle laughter. She seemed so genuinely amused. I felt the corners of my own mouth twitch into a smile as she dabbed at tears in the corners of her eyes. Despite her obvious mirth, they still held a playful seduction that made my head buzz a little.

“Oh, I like you,” she said, extending the graceful hand that had undone my resolve. “I’m Louiza.”

I hesitated. Was my stomach flipping in fear or excitement? We were jetting away from my home town of Philly to Los Angeles, and that was about as long a flight as you can get without leaving the country. We were going to be here a while. What the hell, I decided to make peace. I shrugged and grasped her outstretched hand, “I’m Faith.”

Once we were airborne, the flight attendant returned to freshen our drinks. Somehow I wasn’t surprised that Louiza ordered champagne. When the flight attendant asked if I’d like another Irish Coffee, I made eye contact with Louiza and saw the hint of a teasing smile on her lips, humor sparkling in her eyes. I knew she already had a quip ready.

“What the hell,” I said with a teasing smile, “I’ll have what she’s having.” I waited for her clever response, but instead she locked eyes with me and simply moistened her luscious lips. The glimpse of her tongue sent another wave of aching anticipation through me.

As we waited for the next round, Louiza nodded toward the novel I’d shoved back into the seat pocket after we started talking. She asked, a mischievous grin crossing her lips, “And is that any good?”

With my Irish coffee settling and the promise of a heady buzz from champagne already putting me more at ease, I said, “It’s called Hungerstone.” I raised my eyes from the jacket copy and looked directly at her again, testing out my own seductive smirk, “It’s about lesbian vampires.”

For a moment we stared at each other. Her eyes were dark pools, her delicate features mesmerizing. I felt almost light-headed, keenly aware of the aching pleasure as my nipples hardened again. I was so entranced that I almost jumped when the flight attendant placed my champagne glass on the tray table.

We both nodded and smiled politely to the attendant, and I squirmed imagining he knew the lustful thoughts in my mind. As he walked away, Louiza flashed her winning smile again and lightly touched my arm.

“Faith, champagne, books, and lesbian vampires are my three favorite topics. I think we are going to have a lovely time together.” Hearing my name on her lips left me breathless. She giggled and held out her champagne flute for a toast.

I clinked her glass , a giggle of my own escaping. “Louiza, I think this will be a fun flight.”

The hours passed in what seemed like seconds, and far too soon the Captain announced our descent into Los Angeles. I braced for the enchantment to be broken and tried to keep disappointment from showing on my face. “I have to admit, Louiza, I’ve had so much fun talking to you. I’m a little sad it has to end.”

“Who says it does?” Louiza said, her eyes sparkling with mischief. “We are going to the same city, no? Let me take you out. The day is young.”

“I couldn’t,” I stammered, flustered all over again by her casual confidence. “I’m here for work, and—“

Louiza cut me off. “And you work all the time, don’t you? You push yourself too hard, love.” I felt a thrill at her already familiar tone. I wanted her to call me love again. “Take the evening off. It’s already past business hours.” She shrugged, as if it were the most obvious option ever proposed. I envied her confidence..

“I couldn’t,” I protested half-heartedly, but the conviction behind my tone was flimsy. We both knew what I really wanted. What we both wanted.

That hunger was back in Louiza’s eyes. She leaned in with a breathy whisper, as if we were sharing scandalous secrets at a slumber party, “Come with me tonight, my angel (my heart somersaulted at the pet name on her lips), and I promise you a time you will never forget.”

Her soft breath tickled my ear. I closed my eyes and held perfectly still as she tucked away a stray lock of my hair. Her touch lingered on my cheek a moment—I exhaled with an involuntary shiver—then her fingertips traced a gentle path to my neck and along the line of my collarbone, finally pulling reluctantly away. She seemed incredibly pleased with herself as she leaned back to take stock of the effects of her work.

“Say yes, please?” Her eyes were full of anticipation. I hesitated, pursing my lips doubtfully. My first meeting wasn’t until the following morning, but was I really going to do this? I’d never considered anything that felt so reckless—or so indulgent.

I imagined the cool breeze and faint scent of salt air at a beach-front bar. A quiet table and her dark hair catching the last rosy rays of a setting sun. I could almost feel her breath against my neck, her whispers nearly inaudible, her long fingers teasing. I realized my eyes were closed and my lips had parted. I opened them lazily, a slow, slightly knowing smile forming as I did so. She watched me, her eyes and ruby lips impossibly dark and intense.

Finally, I nodded and let out an involuntary, excited giggle. I felt elated, so overwhelmed by excitement that I couldn’t muster anything intelligible. Louiza beamed and grasped my hand. This time I offered no resistance as she brought it to her lips and kissed my palm, satisfaction at her victorious conquest written all over her face. I should have known I hadn’t stood a chance against those eyes.

As the cabin lights dimmed and the flight attendants took their seats, Louiza leaned in close for another whispered secret. Her lips pressed against my ear, her hand suddenly grazing my inner thigh and then resting there as she asked, “Tell me, beautiful Faith,” her breath was hot on my skin, her scent surrounding me, “will you beg before I let you cum?”

Monica Van Fleet, Calliope Sparks Notes, 2025

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Image: Pinterest.

This week’s story is a follow-up to If I Let You, which was published two weeks ago and written from Keeva’s perspective. If You Let Me is written from Jack’s perspective.

If you have time to read If I Let You, I’d encourage you to do so before getting into this story, so you understand the relationship dynamics a little better.

If You Let Me doesn’t just show power shifting between two people, it shows what it costs to lose it, and what it reveals when it’s gone.

This isn’t revenge. It’s just memory. Slicked in gloss, tied in red silk, and filed under “I win.”

Joey, TSC xx

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If You Let Me.

She answered.

Of course she did. Keeva always answered. Even if it took a minute. Even if she pretended she wasn’t waiting for the call too.

Jack smirked at the screen, already halfway hard. The camera caught him in bed, one arm behind his head, the other drifting lazily down his stomach. He liked this angle. She did too. Or she used to anyway. It made her say things like ‘fuck, those eyes,’ like he was some kind of storm she couldn't escape from. He liked having that power over her.

‘Show me,’ he said, voice low, casual. The tone women called cocky, but still made them wet.

She didn’t move. Just stared back at him like she was reading something on his face in a language he didn’t understand. That weird pause again. The one that had started showing up lately. Like maybe she was considering something, or maybe he wasn’t a sure thing anymore.

‘Hang on. Five minutes.’

Then the call ended.

The screen went black. Jack stared for a beat longer than he meant to. He hated waiting. But she made it feel like there was something worth waiting for. And most of the time, there was. Her.

He remembered the way her laugh used to slide under his skin. Low. Unbothered. Like she wasn’t afraid of anything. Least of all him. Sometimes he swore he could smell her. Vanilla and salt. Like beach skin. Like summer ruined.

He shifted under the covers, let his hand drift a little lower, but didn’t start. Not yet.

She’d be back. She always came back. He didn’t let his mind think otherwise.

He thought about the first time she sent him a picture. Just a little flash. Midriff. A hint of breast. Fuck, it had wrecked him. He hadn’t even asked. Not that time. He remembered showing his mate, laughing like he was king of something. But inside, it had felt like a prize. A secret she gave to him. Not to the world.

Now it was different. Or maybe he was different.

She texted: Face me. No touching yourself.

His cock twitched. He grinned, but it wasn’t as smug as it used to be. There was something sharp about her now. The soft girl who used to blush at his compliments was still there, sure, but she wore armour now. He could hear it in her tone, feel it in the way she looked at him, like she had put up walls and was already imagining walking away.

Still, he answered the call the moment it rang. His breath caught the second she leaned into the screen. Hair a little messy, lips a little shiny. Nothing fancy. A T-shirt. No bra. But fuck, if it didn’t short-circuit him.

He used to tease her about that look. Called it her Weekend Glam. Back when she’d laugh and flip him off, then kiss the phone screen like she meant it. Now, she didn’t smile. And he didn’t dare call it anything.

‘Don’t touch yourself. Just watch,’ she said.

Her voice did something to him. Made his ribs tighten. Made his skin itch. He obeyed.

She moved like she didn’t care if he came or not, and that’s what made him ache for it. That little stretch, the way the shirt lifted, just enough to suggest. The lazy circles she traced on her nipple. Her thighs parting just slightly. It was theatre, but also not. Keeva didn’t need to moan or gasp or tell him how much she wanted it. Her silence said everything. It was her silence that undid him.

She shifted. Picked up a piece of rope. Red. Silk. He froze then. Like a fucking statue.

‘Hands behind your head.’

His arms moved before his brain did. Automatic. Obedient. He wasn’t even in control of his body anymore.

He watched her with a hunger he’d never admit. Not out loud. Not even to himself. Because this wasn’t about sex. Not really. Not anymore. This was about her. And him. And the way she looked at him like she saw straight through all the bravado to the boy underneath. The one still trying to impress her. Impress his friends. Impress his dad. The one who learned from movies, porn, and locker rooms how to fake confidence. The one who never figured out how to ask to be held without sounding like a joke. All his life, he thought control meant being silent. Being the one who didn’t need. Didn’t ask. Now, he’d beg. If she told him how.

He watched her rock on the pillow. Fuck, it hurt. The ache of being told “no”. Of being made to wait. It reminded him of being a child. Of being powerless.

But he craved it. Keeva turned his mind into a maze. And she was the only exit.

‘Come for me now.’

His hand flew to his cock like it had been waiting on command. Because it had been. He didn’t even remember stroking himself. Just the wet slap of skin, her breath on the speaker, the way she stared straight through him, eyes dark, unreadable. He came with a groan he tried to force inwards. But it shattered out of him, sharp and violent, like pressurised glass.

Then she ended the call. No goodbye. No smirk. Just a click. Silence.

The buzz in his body died fast. Replaced by something hollow. A confusion that sat like static in his chest.

He messaged her immediately.

What the fuck?

Don’t leave me like that.

You’re such a tease.

I need you.

No reply.

Fuck.

He stared at the screen for too long. Wondered if she'd gone to someone else. Wondered if she'd laughed when she hung up. Wondered if this was the game now. If he was the one being played.

He’d never had to chase anyone before. And the sickest part was that it turned him on.

Because Keeva knew something he didn’t. Knew what it meant to hold power without ever needing to raise her voice. Knew how to make a man feel wanted and dismissed in the same breath. Knew how to unmake him. Not with cruelty, but with quiet.

He messaged her the next day. And the day after that. Said he missed her. That he couldn’t stop thinking about her. That he needed to see her again. No reply. It drove him nuts. He felt desperate. He felt more out of control than he’d ever let himself be.

Jack scrolled up through their old texts. Her selfies. Her voice notes. Tried to hear them the way he used to, when they made him feel wanted. Chosen. Now they felt like a trick. A spell he’d misunderstood. Like maybe he’d never had her at all.

He thought of all the women he’d made ache. All the messages he’d left unanswered. All the ways he thought he was the one in control. Keeva had flipped the script without ever raising her voice.

Later, he went out. Tried to forget her. Drank too much. Talked to some girl at the bar with eyes that weren’t hazel. With lips that didn’t curve the way Keeva’s did when she was about to say something devastating.

The girl asked him what he did for a living. He laughed. Said something stupid.

Then she said, ‘What’s your story?’

And Jack, for once, had nothing to say.

Keeva still lived in his throat like a secret he couldn’t swallow. Not the kind of ghost that weeps. The kind that lingers. The kind that watches you become someone you never meant to be.

She haunted the pause before every reply. The space between touch and meaning. He thought he was the one holding the match, but it was her who lit the fuse. And now he was just smoke. The echo of heat.

He thought he could forget her. Drink her out, fuck her out, scroll past the ache, but she wasn’t a girl you got over. She was a mirror you never asked to look in, but now couldn’t look away from.

And what he saw now wasn’t a man in control. Just a boy who thought wanting was enough.

Joey for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

This week’s guest post has been written by the saucy, Tina Guyotte (Tee) from Teez Time.

Tee isn’t here to play coy. She’s here to remind us that just because you’ve got kids, bills, and an ex who “tries his best,” doesn’t mean your body’s done speaking or being heard.

In Entry One: When the Package Came Early, an unexpected delivery man knocks on more than just the front door. And let’s just say… what he’s packing doesn’t quite fit in a cardboard box.

Read on, if you dare. Or desire.

Just don’t blame us if you suddenly crave a little cardio and cunnilingus.

TSC xx

The MILF Diaries: Entry One: When the Package Came Early.

Dear Diary,

You know what nobody warns you about in your 40s? The unsolicited delivery of sexual awakenings, disguised as younger men with confident smirks and zero shame.

It started on a Thursday. My ex had just picked up our daughter for his every-other-weekend dad shift, and I was already halfway into my second glass of overpriced wine. I was wearing my favorite “don’t talk to me” house dress... You know the one. Soft in all the right places, no bra, hair piled on top of my head like a cinnamon bun nobody’s allowed to touch.

And then the doorbell rang. Package delivery, or so I thought.

When I opened the door, it wasn’t the regular delivery guy. No, this was... something else entirely. Tall. Built. Tattoos peeking from under a fitted black polo. A gold chain kissed the dip of his collarbone like it knew a secret. And his eyes. Oh, those young eyes. Hungry ones.

“Hi,” he said, looking me up and down like I was a special order from his wishlist. “Delivery for Tee?”

“Yeah, that’s me,” I replied, resisting the urge to suck in my stomach or tame the nipple that had gone rogue in the AC. “You’re new.”

He smiled. “Just helping out. But I could get used to this route.”

I laughed... probably a beat too long. Blame the wine. Or maybe the way he looked like dessert had just answered the door.

He handed me the package but didn’t let go right away. Just held it there between us like a game. Like he wanted me to pull it from his grip so he could watch the way I moved.

And I knew that move. I used to do that move, back when sex appeal felt like a superpower and attention was currency.

I didn’t expect to feel it again. But suddenly, I did.

Sir.
Just… sir.

He walked away with a strut that screamed I do cardio and cunnilingus.

I stood there, newly baptized in flirtation, clutching an Amazon box of god-knows-what and wondering when the hell I became the older woman in someone’s wet dream.

And honestly, I didn’t hate it.

In fact, I loved the way it made me feel. Like I still had it, even if I’d buried it beneath PTA meetings, Target runs, and a divorce I never properly mourned.

So, I made a decision that night.

I poured a third glass. Took a picture of myself in that ugly-soft dress, nipple still misbehaving. And I started writing again.

Not for work. Not for content. For me.

That’s how these MILF Diaries began... not with a bang, but with a buzz at the door... and a look that reminded me that my body still speaks.

And some people?

Are listening.

****

Later that night, I heard a soft knock on the door. Not the bell. Just knuckles. Gentle. Intimate. Like the knock someone gives when they’re already a little inside you... in thought, in memory, in fantasy.

I peeked through the peephole.

It was him.

Still in that black polo. Still smelling like something sinful I’d whisper about in a confessional. Only this time, he was holding a different kind of package.

“This isn’t official,” he murmured when I opened the door. “Just something I thought you might want unwrapped slowly.”

He didn’t have to ask to come in.

I stepped back. He stepped forward.

His fingers brushed the hem of my dress, and his gaze dipped to the shadow of my thigh.

“I’ve been thinking about this,” he said. “Wondering if it felt as soft as it looked when you answered the door.”

I swallowed hard.

“You tell me,” I whispered.

He did.

With his lips, hot and unhurried. With his tongue, tracing a promise I wasn’t sure I was ready for. And then, with two fingers that slid beneath my dress and up my thigh…

I let out a soft gasp and reached for his belt buckle, heart pounding louder than the thoughts in my head.

His phone buzzed.

He froze.

Looked at the screen. Cursed under his breath. Then leaned in and kissed me. Once, hard, before pulling away.

“Next time,” he growled, backing toward the door, “I’m not stopping.”

And just like that… he was gone.

Entry Two: The Morning After and the Shower I Couldn’t Finish.

Dear Diary,

I couldn’t sleep.

Not because of a bad dream. Because of a very good memory, one that pulsed behind my eyes every time I blinked.

I kept feeling the press of his fingers under my dress, the weight of his body leaning in just enough to make me imagine the rest. The heat of his lips, the way he said, “next time I’m not stopping,” like a threat, a promise, and a prayer.

I don’t know what kind of spell that man put on me, but I woke up with my sheets twisted around my thighs and my panties soaked like I’d been waiting for a green light in a red zone.

And the worst part?

I wasn’t mad about it

I was needy.

Like... embarrassingly so.

The shower was my refuge, but also my battleground.

I stepped in and let the water hit me. Hot at first, steam rising and fogging the glass, then shifting to cool, trailing down the length of my back. The spray was relentless, a white noise to drown out my thoughts, but it couldn’t wash away the fire underneath my skin.

My hands moved on their own, slick with soap and slicker with need. I closed my eyes and let my fingers trace the curve of my neck, the swell of my breasts, the soft dip between my ribs. The scent of jasmine shampoo mixed with my own skin... heady and intoxicating.

I tilted my head back, feeling the water splash over my collarbones, down to the tautness of my stomach, where the gold chain he wore earlier suddenly seemed to trail over my imagination.

One hand slid down, soap melting into slick heat between my thighs. My fingers hesitated, then found the wetness that was my own... warm, slick, and aching.

I pressed slowly, circling, feeling the tension coil tighter and tighter inside me. My knees parted, and I leaned against the cool tile, my breath hitching with every slow, deliberate stroke.

I imagined his mouth there. Fuckin' hot and worshipful. His tongue traced the skin where my desire was thickest. His hand was firm on my hip, anchoring me in that delicious, dizzying moment.

I whispered his name before I could stop myself. Not that I even know his real name.
But in my fantasy? He had one. And it sounded filthy on my tongue.

The water drummed on the tiles, and my heart thudded in my chest. I was on the edge. The edge of release, and maybe the edge of something else. Just as the tension built to that sweet, unbearable point, my daughter’s voice cut through my fantasy like a knife.

“Mom, where are my clean socks?”

The universe’s way of saying... not today, lady. My body betrayed me then. The ache evaporated mid-thrust of my own fingers.

I sighed, turned off the water, and stood dripping in more ways than one.

It’s like my body is waking up after too many years of being polite, patient, and properly ignored. Like it’s remembering itself again... hungry, curious, raw.

This isn’t just about sex.
It’s about being seen.
Desired.
Touched like I’m not breakable... but built for sin.

I didn’t text him.

Okay, I would have if I had his number. I even scrolled through the Ring footage last night like a damn creep.

But no. I’m not chasing.
Not yet.
Let him wonder if I came.
Let him wonder if I’m still dripping.

Let him think he’s the only one fantasizing about a “next time.”
Because, next time?
I don't think I'll stop either.

Tina Guyotte for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

Image: Pinterest.

There’s a particular ache in wanting to be wanted, and a specific kind of power in no longer needing it. I think we all know what that feels like…

I used to think men held all the cards. That being chosen was the point. That love was earned in the mirror, in the pause before a reply, in the softening of boundaries.

Sometimes the most devastating way to leave someone is to let them think it was their idea, right up until the moment they realise you were holding the thread the whole time.

This story is about sex, sure. But it’s also about control. About silence as a weapon. About how it feels to be wet not from love, but from the quiet pleasure of knowing they’ll never forget you, even if you never see them again.

You think he’s using her. But she lets him.

And that’s the difference.

TSC xx

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If I Let You.

He called her on video. No warning. No text first. Keeva hit the green button. That grainy upward angle of Jack’s face in bed, dark, messy hair, those blue eyes that got her into this mess in the first place.

‘Show me,’ he said, a familiar tone in his voice.

Lazy. Expectant. Entitled.

She blinked at the screen.

Here we go… something twisted in her stomach. Regret, disgust – mainly in herself. She wasn’t sure.

Jack always called when he was alone and bored, like she was a slot machine of intimacy, always paying out. And she couldn’t help but play the game. He wasn’t asking how she was. He didn’t care if she’d eaten or if she was alone. He just wanted to come. With her as the means. A soft voice, a pout, a glimpse of her lacy underwear. The same way he always did it, with just enough charm to pass for affection, just enough silence to let her fill in the blanks.

Keeva stared for a second too long. Jack smirked, tugged his hand down his abdomen.

‘You there, baby?’

She swallowed the words ‘fuck off.’ Said instead: ‘Hang on. Five minutes.’

He smiled like he’d won something.

She ended the call. Then walked slowly to the mirror. The girl in the mirror looked familiar; soft, bare faced, a little dangerous. Beneath it all, the younger version of her, the insecure shadow laughed like she always did. You’re still not pretty enough, it said to her reflection.

Keeva brushed her dark, wavy hair, glossed her lips and swiped concealer under the dark crescents that hung below her hazel eyes. Just enough to look fresh without looking as though she’d tried too hard for him. Lines bloomed from above her cheeks, encasing her eyes like iridescent spiderwebs. They were new. She rubbed at the lines as if the gesture might remove them completely. It didn’t. She touched her collarbone like a piano key. Still sharp. Still hers.

There was a freedom that came from caring less about the male gaze. Keeva wanted to look good, yes, but not too good. She used to cover her face in makeup, lift up her breasts in their black lacy encasements, make sure she was hairless, clean, filtered – enough for him to think she was effortlessly sexy. As if she looked like this all the time. She’d done this dance for so long she didn’t even feel the rhythm anymore. Screen, mirror. Mirror, screen. The practised chaos of wanting to be seen, while also wanting to disappear.

She thought of the first man who made her feel invisible once he’d had what he wanted. This was before Jack. Long before. But the residue clung like a second skin.

She sat on the edge of her bed. Her phone buzzed.

Jack: Still waiting, babe. Don’t make me beg.

Her heart didn’t flutter. Not the way it used to. Not like the first time he asked for a video. When she felt dizzy with validation. When his wanting her felt like proof of something. Something she’d been begging for her whole life.

Keeva used to mistake desire for devotion. Need for love. Her mother once said, ‘you let them hollow you out, then call it connection.’ She wasn’t wrong.

She once liked being needed. But this, this wasn’t need. This was routine. This was entitlement. This was Jack jerking off to the idea of her. Not the real her. This ‘her’ was a made-up version. An actress. An idea. He just didn’t know that.

Then the disgust rose like a wave washing over her entirety. And something else, too. A slow wetness. Not for him. For herself. Because even now, especially now, she knew something Jack didn’t. He thought he was using her. But she let him. Of course she let him.

Every moan, every flash of her breasts, of what was beneath her underwear, every breathy little ‘yes,’ they were hers to give. And she gave them, not for him, but to watch him fall apart. It was as if she were holding a string between her fingers and watching him unravel from it. She loved the power of it. The control of what she did to him. How she made him come undone.

She texted: Face me. No touching yourself.

The first time Jack asked for a photo, Keeva didn’t even hesitate. Just slipped into the bathroom at her friend’s house, lifted her top, and clicked send.

He replied with: fuck. you’re so hot.

She stared at the message like it was a prize. Like she’d won. Then checked again five minutes later when he hadn’t followed up. She used to beg, not in words, but in silence. In the way she left her notifications on loud. In the way she waited for his replies like they were oxygen. But it wasn’t love. It was her auditioning for it.

That’s what had changed. Jack still thought he was getting the same version of her, the pliable, pretty thing who blushed when he said her name. But this version knew better. This version smiled when he begged. Because she was the one who decided when the game ended.

He replied immediately: Bossy tonight. I like it.

Keeva rolled her eyes. Smirked. Hit video. He answered in a heartbeat. Still shirtless. Still cocky. The angle was awful; chin up, shadows everywhere. He looked like every man who thought he was the prize. And they all thought they were the prize.

‘Look at you,’ Jack said. ‘All dressed up for me.’

Keeva swallowed her laugh. She was in a T-shirt and no bra. Minimal effort. Maximum control. Lip gloss catching a ray of sunlight. Skin flushed from the summer heat through the open window. She leaned into the screen.

‘Don’t touch yourself. Just watch.’

His breath caught. ‘Yes, ma’am.’

She let the silence stretch, made it part of the show. Shifted slightly on the bed so her thighs parted, knees bent, the hem of her shirt tugging upward just enough to suggest more. Not show it, just suggest.

Her fingers skimmed up her inner thigh, slow enough to be unbearable, then stopped before they reached the spot he wanted her to touch. She didn’t even look at the screen. Just stretched her arms overhead, arching her back, letting the shirt rise. No bra. No undies. Just skin and submission. Her nipples peaked under the fabric.

Jack groaned.

She lowered her arms, hair falling forward. Her fingers brushed her lips, then slid down her throat. Keeva was drawing this out, not for him but for herself. Letting the desire hum just below the surface.

His silence gave her the answer she needed.

‘You like this?’ she asked, barely above a whisper. Her voice like velvet dragged across hot skin.

‘Fuck. Yes.’

She smiled. Shifted again. Let one hand slide beneath her shirt, just for a second. Not enough to see anything, just enough to make him imagine everything. Then she licked her thumb and brought it to her nipple, visible now through the fabric, tracing soft, lazy circles. He was panting. His desire practically vibrating through the screen.

‘Please. I need –’

She held up a finger. ‘Shhh.’

Then she stood, letting Jack take in her bare thighs, the smirk on her face. Walked out of frame. Let him stew. Let him ache.

When she came back, she carried rope. Silk. Red.

‘Hands behind your head,’ she said.

He obeyed. He always obeyed.

Keeva took her time, positioning the camera so only her midsection was visible. She wrapped the silk slowly around her wrist, watching the muscles in his neck tighten. She didn’t tie it. Just dragged the rope across her skin, over her chest, beneath her shirt, then between her legs.

Jack begged again. She let him.

Then she straddled a pillow and sank onto it, eyes locked to the screen. Her breath hitched. She bit her lip and let out a moan. A soft, controlled sound.

His hand twitched toward his cock.

‘Did I say you could touch yourself?’

‘No, ma’am,’ he gasped.

Keeva smiled. Dared him with a look. Let her hips rock once. Twice. Slowly. Rhythmically. She rode the edge of the pillow with practiced control, lips parted, sweat at her temples. Gave him just enough sound to ruin him. Then froze.

She stared into the camera, face flushed, chest rising and falling. She leaned in closer, so her freckles were visible to him, and whispered, ‘come for me now.’

The sound of his hand rubbing at his skin filled the speaker. Quick. Desperate. A wet friction that made her smirk.

His breath hitched. A sharp gasp escaped him. Then stillness.

He came. Fast. Violently. Silently.

She watched him recover, watched the pink flush rise on his neck, the way his eyes glazed over, softened.

He looked wrecked.

‘You’re so good for me, Jack,’ she whispered.

Then she ended the call.

The texts started immediately.

What the fuck?
Don’t leave me like that.
You’re such a tease.
I need you.

She put her phone on silent. Went and made tea. Brushed her hair. Read a paragraph from a book she was enjoying. Stillness was a kink. Control disguised as quiet. The thought of his confusion turned her on in some weird way. She thought of all the girls like her, taught to give. Taught to beg. Power doesn’t always look like a whip or a command. Sometimes it looks like silence.

Later, when she was in bed and freshly moisturised, Keeva opened her phone. Screenshotted Jack’s messages. Saved them in a folder she’d started called “I Win.” She used to cry after sex sometimes. Quiet, curled in the shower. She used to try and fuck herself back into being loved. But not anymore.

Jack messaged again the next day. And the next. He wanted to see her. Said he missed her. Said he couldn’t stop thinking about her. She knew he would. They always did. Especially when she made them beg.

She said she was busy. Which was true. Keeva was busy becoming someone new.

Three weeks later, she was at a bar. New face. New name. New night.

He asked, ‘So, what’s your story?’

Keeva smiled. Sipped her drink. Ran her finger along the rim of the glass like a spell.

‘You’ll find out,’ she said.

But maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe no one would. Or maybe he’d end up in the “I Win” folder like the rest of them.

Because the power wasn’t in being chosen. It was in choosing who to let in. And who to leave aching.

She walked home alone that night. Head high. Mouth smiling. Heart beating loud and slow like a drum. Her legs still slick. Not from sex. From the quiet thrill of being the one who spun the thread.

And let it go.

Joey for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

Image: Pinterest.

I came early this week, but only because I knew you’d be waiting. You’ve been so patient, so good… and I thought you deserved a little reward. But don’t get too comfortable. I like to keep control and sometimes, that means surprising you when you least expect it…

Buckle up, this week’s guest post comes from the talented Katie Valentine, a writer who knows exactly how to push buttons and boundaries.

Katie’s Substack publication, The Year of the Cat, serves up smart, curious-girl smut with a side of erotic confession. Her stories hum with real-life heat, laced with just enough fiction to keep things deliciously anonymous.

She writes from experience but never plays it safe. Katie lives for the edge of the forbidden and invites you to lean in, wet your lips, and follow her there.

But don’t be fooled by the spice alone. This story tugs, lightly and unexpectedly, on the heartstrings. There’s a soft ache beneath the heat. A slow, sweet burn threaded through every gasp…

If you’re feeling bold (or want to be), you’re in very good hands.

TSC x

Thursday.

It’s the mid-summer. Hot and humid in a way that makes me want to crawl out of my skin. Everything feels lush and ripe and ready to eat. I’ve just got out of the shower and the breeze from my open hotel window against my damp skin is enough to make me reach between my thighs, I feel feral with it. We are abroad, somewhere the light hits the walls differently and dinner eases on until midnight. He is arranging a dinner reservation somewhere below us, cobbled streets and washing billowing on patio balconies.

He is also giving me some time to prepare.

We have been together now, exploring, learning, falling in love too, half a year maybe less. The sweet spin of us, the way that the centre of the earth shifts towards him, the gravity of it. The residual smell of his cologne in our holiday bed is enough to make me wild. We are in that phase. It’s heaven and chaos. The dynamic we are building is both the cure and the cause.

We had met in the winter, the canals froze over, our breath white in the cold air. We drank coffee and walked for an hour, that awkward trading of stories, well-worn jokes and how we found ourselves in London. We talked candidly about what we were looking for, how we both liked to toy with control and restraint. The app we met on has a reputation for transparency, an openness around preferences and desire. He made me laugh easily. Asked thoughtful questions. He kissed me in the warmth of a pub, pulling my bar stool closer to him. The heat of it. Biting my lip just enough to make me moan into his mouth. I knew then it was something.

A whirlwind follows, writing unspoken fantasies onto pieces of napkin at candlelit restaurants, pressed into his palms as I go to touch up my make-up and adjust my stockings. Text message notifications alone make me catch my breath in meetings. He wants to know how I think, what makes my skin flush and more importantly why. He sends me playlists, interspersed with his words. How he wants me. What I should be wearing. An image of scissors slicing through sheer nylon. A suggested outfit. A voice note reminding me where we are meeting. To not be late. I replay them when I am alone, a command enough to make me shiver and release again and again. He tipped me over into a part of myself I had only just discovered. A shadow, a dark ocean, I let myself be submerged quicker than I expected.

I need to know the why of it Kate, he says tracing the creases on the inside of my wrist, softly but with intention.

We have spent the evening consumed in each other’s company, the prospect of what is coming next thick in the air between us, he likes to draw it out. The anticipation of it. I put down the pen I have been absentmindedly chewing on, while writing out my yes/no/maybe lists. A list of kinks and desires that help map out what a scene could look like. What limits will be in play. Where the boundaries are firm and where there may be some give. It’s harder than I expected to answer, because they change, the reasons why I want what I want. And for so long had I repressed them. To speak these things into being feel like a sacrilege.

Nevermind the things you want to do, tell me how it is you want to feel. And then tell me why.

He takes the pen and adds another note to the page we’re focusing on. Adjusting his glasses on his nose, he writes WHY in big bold letters, a grin on his face as he sees how uncomfortable this line of questioning is making me. And how turned on.

Overwhelmed. Useful. Desired. Needed?

The last one makes me yelp. It feels too vulnerable to say out loud. The way we dance around our feelings in these early stages. I want to say that when he has me kneel at his feet I feel safe, and secure, and purposeful. That when I come, which is often and explosive, I feel undone. That his hands feel like prayer and sin all at once.

A good start. Is that all?

I can feel the heat between us grow. Shifting in my seat makes that clear, the coiling of need rising inside me - its written all over my face, and he whispers in my ear.

Tell me Kate or I won’t let you come at all tonight.

I roll my eyes in mock exasperation, mainly to hide my nerves. I feel the anxiety rise and fall as I open my mouth. He won’t let me hide.

Ashamed, but blameless, like I feel the shame of it but it’s not my fault. Like I can’t help it because I am just yours to do with as you like. Like I have no agency. No repercussions, no consequences.

He sits back and observes me, a thoughtful expression on his face.

Now we are getting somewhere

We spent the first few months tangled in bed sheets and each other, watching the spring explode around us. Cherry blossoms dusted the streets outside his apartment, the daffodils bright and hopeful in the parks we walked through, my arm looped through his while we tentatively planned what we might want to do next. Sometimes it involves the logistics or motivations of a scene we are planning - I have asked him to spank me until I cry, which he is considering how to build on. Sobbing over his knee, while he alternates between caressing me and inflicting pain, it's one of the safest ways I can find to access emotions I need to process. His voice is soothing and encouraging. The bruises offering me solace for days after.

Other times we wander through villages of north London we are plotting a weekend away, potentially meeting friends. I see new areas of the city. He takes me to his favourite spots. A walk along an abandoned rail line, an oyster bar, the best place for tapas. We are slowly moving from our bubble of just the two of us, hot and breathless every night, to the dance of watching each other interact with loved ones. The interplay of being a new couple, and a new dynamic.

Our planning resulted in finding ourselves here, in a village on the coast of the Mediterranean. In the heat, with no plans but each other. I have towelled down adding a touch of perfume to my throat. I’ve gathered my hair up in a ponytail, so it’s clear of my face. I lube up my favourite plug and carefully insert that too, before stepping into a bright pink thong. Hoping he won’t be long as I am already wet, waiting and getting ready and running through how his hands are going to feel on my skin. The thong will be soaked in minutes. I am heady with it. Over the top, I pull on a light slip of satin that could be either evening wear or nightwear depending on the shoes. Which are high. Lastly, my lipstick, mascara, and eyeliner that I know he loves to see run.

I hear his keys in the door and the thrill that runs through me is electric. He’s here. This man that I love. I know then with such a surety it takes almost every inch of my resolve not to blurt out loud. The breath punched out of me as he put the keys down on the table, along with his glasses. The way he turns to look at me. How pleased he is to see I’m ready.

Hello beautiful.

He scoops me into a kiss. Long and urgent, like we haven’t seen each other for days, when it’s just been an hour or so at most. He pushes me gently up against the wall, his hands gathering up the satin slip until it’s reaches my waist. His teeth on my earlobes. In one move he twists me around so I am facing the wall.

Bend over Kate, spread your cheeks, let me see.

I do as I am told. Always. He adjusts the thong to the side, so my swollen pussy and my ass, plugged and stretched, are on display for him. My face flushes every time he does this. Inspecting me. Checking I have followed the rules.

Did you touch yourself?

I hesitate for longer than I should. Did I? He responds by grabbing my right wrist and bringing my fingers to his mouth. I know the taste will betray me.

That was not allowed, was it Kate? Your pussy is mine.

I swoon into him, and then brace for what I know is coming. He tells me to get into position. My hands are flat on the wall in front of me. Back arched so my ass lifts high. His hands deliver my punishment. I gasp every time he makes contact with my skin. The sound reverberates around the small apartment. Skin on skin. He picks up the pace to get to ten, and to make me cry out and stumble in my heels.

Take those heels off. Disobedience won’t get you anywhere Kate. And for that your pussy gets nothing. Remove the plug.

He bends me over the sofa, I hear his zipper, the shuffle of linen as he releases his beautiful cock. Then the shock of wetness as he spits on my ass, and into his palms rubbing the tip of his cock with the mess of it. His hands are rough on my hips at first pulling me into position, he rips the thong all the way down to cut into my thighs. He pushes the head of his cock into me slowly at first. My ass is already primed from the plug, but I have to stretch further for him. I whimper a little, the initial pull of it. He grunts and pushes again, moans as it slides in. All the way before spitting again. He fucks me relentlessly. My clit is swollen and begging for it, and I am keening with want but I won’t get that release now. The heat and rush of being denied instead makes my need worse. Being punished for transgressions feels secure. And grounded. And real. I know what is expected of me and what will happen if I don’t comply. A relax into the crucible we have created, the safety of it, and let him punish me until he comes. Hard and hot, staining the satin, and dripping down my thighs.

Now clean yourself up and get ready to go out for dinner Kate. We’re due there in 15 minutes and I don’t want to be late.

Later, we walk through the door at 2am, happy and satiated with good food and wine and the conversation of the locals. I yawn and lift off my dress to step into a cool shower before bed. He smokes a cigarette on the balcony and watches the late evening revellers totter down the streets shouting in a language we don’t quite understand. I wash and cream my face and my collarbones and thighs, I look up to see him behind me, watching me perform this ordinary night time ritual. He polishes his glasses on his shirt before saying

Your influence is wide, you know. I see things everywhere and think of you.

He kisses my shoulders, and turns my face to meet his, and takes me to the bed with its cool sheets. Here he lies me on my back and runs his fingers over every inch of my skin, lingering here and there where there is the ghost of a bruise, a memory of pleasure before and the heat of my skin a reminder of what is still to come. I haven’t ever needed anyone as much, I want to say. And that is terrifying. I shiver a little and he holds me closer. The need rising in us both, I let my legs open for his hands to find me, wet.

Kate… his breath hitches when he says my name and when he pulls me beneath him and enters me in one move I cry, the weight of him on me, the feeling of being filled up. The words he whispers into my ears as he moves inside me, like a heartbeat.

I love you, I love you, I love you.

Our arena shifts and moves. But we come back to this.

How do you want to feel?

Loved, cherished, accepted, seen in all my ugliness and beauty.

Katie Valentine, for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

Instagram: @katies.valentine

I’ve revived an old favourite from the archives for you this week. This story was originally published on my other publication, Joey Writes, in 2024, and it was so well-received and viewed that it was the impetus for The Spicy Chronicles.

It holds a special place in my heart.

I hope you enjoy.

TSC xx

Orange.

The hallway is dim, and my shoes clack against the wooden floor as I step inside. The air is heavy with the smell of soap. He’s just showered.

‘Should I take my shoes off?’ I ask, seeing his straightened pairs of sneakers at the entrance.

He kneels without a word, unbuckling them with a precision that feels practised, almost ceremonial. It should feel strange. Someone I barely know crouched at my feet, his fingers deft and deliberate, but it doesn’t. There’s something about the intimacy of it that I like. I smile as I watch his hands move. I want to ask who came before me. How many women have stood in this hallway and felt his hands move across their ankles like this. But I don’t. I’m not sure I want the answer.

We met two weeks ago, at an art gallery. Georgia had dragged me along with the promise of free wine and ‘an excuse to wear something low-cut.’ I hadn’t protested. I’d needed the distraction.

‘You have to get out of your head, babe,’ she’d said, dragging lipstick across her mouth in a line so sharp I thought she might cut herself. Get out of your head. She says it often. She’s probably right.

At the opening, I’d circled the room twice, staring at art I didn’t understand. Paintings that felt coded, sculptures that looked like traps. But then I’d seen him: tall, sharp-jawed, standing too close to a spiked, metal sculpture like it might puncture him if he let his guard down. His jacket fit him perfectly, shoulders drawn back like he belonged everywhere.

‘You’re really staring at that thing like it owes you money,’ I’d said, emboldened by the wine.

He’d turned, looked me over like I was another spiky sculpture, and his mouth quirked up at the edges. ‘You don’t like it?’

‘It looks like something my cousin made in Year 12 Design and Tech.’

His laugh – short and clear – had felt like sunlight cracking through a closed curtain. ‘It’s Clement Tan,’ he said, glancing back at the thing. ‘Fifty thousand dollars of metal, apparently.’

‘Well, I hope it paid him back.’

He laughed again and I’d grinned at the sound of it. Warming me in places that had been all ice and snow for too long.

He hadn’t walked away. We’d talked. About art, about where we were from, about nothing, really. I hadn’t told him that I used to paint. That I used to feel something when I walked into a gallery. Now I just felt tired, like everything was slipping through my hands faster than I could catch it.

By the end of the night, he’d asked for my number. ‘To talk more about sculptures,’ he’d said, and we both knew it wasn’t true.

It’s nice to be wanted, I thought then. Georgia always says that’s a dangerous feeling.

Now, here I am in his apartment. He rises after unbuckling my shoes, as smooth as if he’s been rehearsing this moment for years.

‘Do you want something to drink?’ he asks, standing fluidly, his movements clean and contained.

‘Just water, thanks.’ The taste of tequila coats my tongue like a second skin. Any more alcohol and I’ll make a fool of myself.

At the sink, he turns the tap. The quiet hum of running water fills the silence. When he hands me the glass, his eyes linger on mine, and I feel a flicker of something. Curiosity? Calculation? Either way, his expression is steady, impenetrable.

He hands me a glass, and I take it, using the moment to look around. Sparse walls. A single photograph – a younger version of him with an older man. There’s something in their shared expressions that’s hard to place. I open my mouth to ask, but I stop myself. It feels too personal, and we’re not there yet. Although I’m not sure we’ll ever be there. Wherever there is.

‘Thanks,’ I say, testing his full name aloud. I trip over the last syllable, my voice catching awkwardly.

‘How do you pronounce it?’

He says it slowly, the edges of his accent soft but distinct. I roll it silently in my mind, tasting it like forbidden fruit. His name doesn’t belong in my mouth, but I want it there anyway.

I follow him to the couch, where he sits casually, legs apart, shoulders relaxed. But there’s tension too. A kind of restraint that draws me in. I slide onto his lap, straddling him. The alcohol in my bloodstream gives me confidence, but it also heightens my awareness of every tiny detail: the faint scent of soap on his skin, the way his breath brushes my neck, the heat radiating from him.

‘Are you always this forward?’ He teases, though his hands settle on me with ease.

‘Are you always this calm?’ I counter, eyebrow raised, happy with myself for being so witty.

I want to know what he sees when he looks at me. I unzip my top, the sound loud in the room. My movements feel clumsy, too eager. A flush rises in my chest. Is this who I am now - someone who sheds their clothes for the brief thrill of being wanted?

His grin doesn’t quite reach his eyes. I wonder what he’s hiding. Or if he’s hiding anything at all. Maybe he’s just...empty. Maybe that’s easier.

‘You’re beautiful,’ he murmurs.

The words sting more than they should. I’ve been told that before, but it never quite sticks. I want to believe him. I want to believe I’m more than a collection of shapes and lines.

‘Come on,’ he says softly into my ear, ‘I’ll show you my bedroom.’

His bedroom is neat, stark. His control extends here. I shouldn’t be surprised. His bedspread is the same burnt orange as the evening sky just before the sun dips below the horizon. It feels like it’s glowing, alive.

‘Your room feels...disciplined,’ I say.

‘That’s one way to put it.’ He laughs, and I’m transported back to the same way I felt the night I met him at the gallery.

Frank Ocean hums softly from his speaker, and the song pulls me back into the past. Music has a way of transporting me to places I don’t want to go. I push the song away. Force it from my mind, but the melancholic chords wrap around me. Around him.

He asks about my relationship. I tell him something that feels like the truth but isn’t. Something I wish was the truth but isn’t. But here I am, rewriting the boundaries in secret, pretending this is just a moment, something I can leave behind. But I am not like that. I hold onto everything.

This will hurt. I can already feel the sting. The burn of abandonment before it’s happened.

‘You’re distracted,’ he says, his voice low, almost amused.

‘I’m here,’ I reply, almost too quickly.

His eyes catch mine, and I feel pinned under his gaze. There’s warmth in it, but also a distance. A kind of untouchable quality that makes me want to crack him open, to see what he’s hiding.

‘You have nice eyes,’ I say. ‘Light brown.’ I think of an undulating river. Of honey. Of dried amber.

He laughs softly. ‘They’re boring.’

I shake my head, my fingers tracing the line of his jaw, the faint stubble rough against my skin. ‘No, they’re not.’

The kiss that follows is soft, careful. Too careful. He’s holding back. I pull away, brows furrowed. ‘Can you use more tongue?’ I say, impatient. Knowing what I like.

His mouth quirks into a smile. ‘Okay. Sure.’

The second kiss is better. But something in me is splintering, even as his hands tighten on my hips. The orange of his bedspread catches my eye again, and suddenly, I feel like I’m on fire, burning from the inside out. Orange flames consume me; a wildfire rages within.

He undoes the buckle on his belt, then he rips at the top button. He looks at me, then averts his eyes to where I know he wants me to be. I let him guide me downwards, let myself sink into him, into this. I take him in my mouth. But the weight of it presses against me. My thoughts spiral in the quiet, but I push them away. I’m here in his universe for a moment, and I want to remember it all. Feel it all. Get out of my head, just like Georgia told me to.

I look up at his beautiful body, at his abs that look like tiny sculptures protruding from under his skin.

‘I like being over you like this,’ he murmurs, his voice steady, unreadable. ‘Looking down at you.’

His words squeeze something in my chest. A bolt tightening. I look up at him. Catch his eye. A gesture that should be reserved for lovers. Of which we aren’t.

‘I like it too,’ I whisper, but it’s a lie. I feel small beneath him, insignificant. And yet, I can’t bring myself to stop what I’m doing.

I can see how much he’s enjoying it. His eyes close steadily, and his hands move to my head. Guiding me. There’s a power in it. It surges in me. Holding him in my mouth like this. I like that it brings him pleasure. That in this moment, I am all that he wants.

He starts bucking now. His fingers tighten around my head and dig into my hair. He’ll finish soon. If I let him. But I don’t want it to end. Not like this.

I pull back, remove him from my mouth and look up at him. He’s looking down at me. Squinting, cheeks flushed, eyebrows furrowed.

‘Why did you stop?’ He exhales. Frustrated now.

I stand up so I am level with his eyes. I smile, and I know he understands what I want. He wants it too. It’s why I’m here after all.

I unbutton my jeans and pull them down to my ankles, stepping out of them. Leaving them in a little heap on the floor. I move towards him and yank at his pants, keeping my eyes on his. They flicker like a flame in the wind.

‘You’re beautiful,’ he murmurs again as if hearing it for the second time, I should truly believe it.

He leans in, his stubble brushing against my cheek, kissing me with a fiery force. His hands graze my lower back, and I feel my underpants being pulled down. He’s at my ankles again, helping me step out of them. Touching me now.

He lifts me up, and the veins on his arms protrude through the muscles. My stomach hitches at the sight.

I gasp as his lips trail down my neck, over my collarbone, and he finds the sensitive peaks of my breasts. My thoughts scatter like shrapnel, the room spinning as I surrender to the moment. His touch, his scent, the faint metallic tang of sweat and cologne. It overwhelms me.

His hands slide lower, deliberate and commanding, coaxing me to open myself to him. I shiver, my breath catching as I feel him between my thighs, his fingers moving with a precision that makes me arch into him. Each stroke sends ripples of fire through me, building a need I can’t contain.

‘Please,’ I hear myself whisper, my nails biting into his skin. I cling to him, anchoring myself in this moment. Desperate for more.

The heat of his breath against my neck is like the sun burning my skin. The warmth of his skin against mine. Coating me like a blanket. I can’t think. I don’t want to. I’m untethered, riding a wave that threatens to drown me.

And then, he’s inside me. The pressure, the fullness, the way he moves. All consuming. I wrap my legs around him, pulling him deeper, urging him harder. His breath comes in ragged bursts, matching the rhythm of our bodies as they collide.

The tension spirals higher, winding tighter until I think I might burst. My world narrows – the orange bedspread flares in my vision, overwhelming me. Frank Ocean sings from somewhere in the room. I’m lost in this moment, to the flames blazing between us.

When the release comes, it’s explosive, a burst of pleasure that leaves me trembling and gasping, his name escaping my lips in a cry I can’t hold back.

He follows soon after, his body shuddering against mine, a low groan vibrating through him as he collapses into me. We lay there together, our skin damp, our breathing uneven but somehow in sync.

For the first time in months, I feel weightless, unmoored. But as I stared at the ceiling, the spell begins to fray. His warmth next to me, the lingering taste of him – it isn’t enough to smother the truth creeping back into the edges of my mind.

This isn’t freedom. It was a momentary escape, and I know the fallout is waiting just beyond the dawn.

I sit up on the edge of the bed, my hands twisting in the fabric of the orange bedspread. It’s soft but unforgiving, its vivid hue almost mocking. Frank Ocean fades in the background, melancholic as memory. Coaxing me into places I don’t want to go. He looks at me, tired, his faint smile more polite than real. The weight of his gaze settles over me, and I feel it again – that sharp, cold ache I can’t name.

‘That was nice,’ he says, grinning as if that makes it enough.

‘Yeah,’ I echo, my voice thin. That hollow surge of power flares through me. Although it won’t stay there for long. It never does.

But there’s no victory in it. My skin feels too tight. I gather my clothes, and he watches me.

‘Leaving so soon?’

‘I have somewhere to be,’ I lie.

I wonder if I’ll hear from him again. My hands tremble slightly as I wrap my top around me. He helps me zip it up and spins me around. Kisses me lightly on the cheek. Casual, forgettable.

The reality of what I’ve done presses harder with every second, like a bruise beneath my ribs. I glance back at the bedspread one last time before I leave. The orange seems alive, burning quietly, holding on to something I can’t take back.

When I step into the hallway, the sound of my shoes against the wooden floor feels deafening. The air is heavy, thick, as though the walls themselves are watching me.

Outside, the night waits like an open mouth, and I pause before walking into it. I close my eyes and breathe, but the colour orange clings to me. It burns under my skin like a secret I can’t name, a reminder that I can’t outrun myself.

I think of Georgia. I think of how I stood in that gallery and wanted to feel something. I think of his laugh, that clean break in the air, and how I thought it meant something, knowing it won’t.

Joey for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

This week’s guest post has been written by Lotus Reborn. Lotus (nom de plume) writes LGBTQIA+ stories from his homeland in Alexandria, Egypt.

His pieces are confessional, erotic and full of heat and heart.

I hope you enjoy The Window.

TSC xx

CW: This story contains M/M.

The Window.

He saw me. That man from the neighbourhood.

He saw my softness, my walk, my shyness, my inability to hide what I am beneath my skin. And instead of turning away or mocking me, he approached.

His voice was low, curious. Flirtation in the air like smoke. He told me he liked the way I moved, that he saw something in me others refused to name. Then, almost like a dare, he invited me to his home. Secretly, of course. A window at the back. Late. Quiet. No one must know.

I stood there for a long time. My heart ached like a hymn. I hadn’t answered him out loud. But something in me had already agreed. I went home and showered. Not to be clean, no.

To be worthy.

Tonight, I would step into his space, silent and trembling, and lay myself down at the altar of his chest, his thighs, his need. I would be nothing and everything. I would be his.

I walked the short distance to his building as if it stretched across a thousand lifetimes. Each step was a war: between fear and hunger, between shame and the ache to surrender. The streets were dim, the air thick with Alexandria’s evening heat, and I was trembling, not from the cold. When I reached his back window, I hesitated. It was open, just like he said. But I stood there, frozen, my hands refusing to move, my breath shallow. I could hear the sound of a fan inside, the low hum of a TV, distant voices from another room. His family?

And then, he appeared. A shadow first, then a body. He reached out his hand, silent and sure. I took it. He helped me inside like he was guiding me into another realm.

Where men like me aren’t mocked but devoured.

I landed in his room with a thud of reality, my feet touching the ground, but my soul already floating.

“Cold beer?” he whispered, already pulling a bottle from under the bed.

I nodded. My voice still hadn’t returned. He handed it to me, eyes fixed on my lips as I drank.

“I’ve wanted you,” he murmured, stepping closer. “You’re like an angel… a fallen one. Still glowing, just in need of someone to remind you you have wings.”

He touched my waist, gently. Then firmer. His lips met mine. Warm, thick, smoky. And when his tongue slipped inside my mouth, I moaned. I couldn’t help it. He undressed me with deliberate ease. Every button he opened felt like a prayer unspoken. Every touch said, you are mine tonight. Then he pulled me onto his lap, holding me tight as his mouth kissed its way down my neck. I moaned louder this time, my back arching, and I felt it, his cock, hard and alive beneath me. I stood up, dizzy with wanting. He stripped in seconds. That body. God. I reached out and wrapped my hand around his dick.

He groaned, eyes closing, and said, “Suck it.”

I dropped to my knees like it was my place. Like I had waited my whole life for that command. And I sucked. Deep. Slow. Obedient. I let his moans guide me. I worshipped him with my mouth until he growled and pulled me up, lifting me like I was weightless, tossing me on the couch. He kissed my ass. Licked my hole. Devoured me with hunger so primal I almost cried. I was shaking, moaning, burning. But I wanted more. I needed to be filled.

“Please,” I whispered. “Please…”

He didn’t wait. He entered me in one rough, glorious thrust. I screamed, and his hand clamped over my mouth.

“Shh—my family’s home,” he whispered. But he didn’t stop. He fucked me hard, in doggy, slamming deep until my body softened, opened, stretched to fit him like destiny. Then he flipped me over, held my thighs up, and fucked me face to face. I stared at him, eyes wide, tears brimming, because it was too much, too perfect, too filthy and divine. I came first. Violently. He followed, groaning, cumming on my face, my chest, marking me like his own shrine. I dipped my fingers in his release and tasted it.

He laughed, breathless. “You’re more than a whore.”

I smiled, still kneeling, and sucked him clean. But just as the room filled with silence, a voice echoed from the hallway. Someone else was home.

“Dress. Now,” he hissed. I obeyed, heart pounding, fumbling for my clothes.

I climbed out the same window I entered, barely breathing. Only when I reached the alley did I feel it. His cum on my face, still warm. His seed soaking through my shirt, leaving a wet stain on my chest like a secret still glowing.

Lotus Reborn for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

Image: Roger Mattos // linearcollages via Instagram.

This one’s for the Mums.

The stretch marks that ribbon your flesh are not warnings, they’re constellations, etched in skin.

A map of what you’ve endured.

That soft tummy. Proof that life grew in your body. And now lives outside it.

And still, you are radiant, sexy, and attractive.

Not despite it. Because of it.

TSC xx

CW: Hot tradie + MILF = gird your loins.

Pressure Points.

The baby monitor was silent, its soft static hum oddly peaceful. Claire should have been resting. She’d been up four times during the night, settling her seven-month-old. Instead, she stood in the kitchen, bath towel knotted loosely above her breasts, her damp hair trailing water down her back. Steam still clung to her skin, the kind of warmth that evaporated too fast.

Her husband had been gone for months now. Maybe longer in all the ways that mattered. He’d said he needed space. That things had changed, but wasn’t that inevitable with a child? The absence stretched through the house like an echo.

A single droplet of water slipped between her breasts, tracing the line of her sternum before disappearing beneath the edge of the towel. She should’ve dressed. Should’ve napped. But the silence of the house was too rare, too golden to waste.

Drip, drip, drip. The tap had been leaking for days, maybe weeks. Wednesday the 30th. Yes, she was sure it was Wednesday. She picked up her phone from the counter. The text displayed: Monday, 28th. Her mind did that weird recalibrating thing where it raced back over the last few days. The week stretched out in front of her like a desert. Long, hot and lonely.

She stared at the bubbles clinging to the sink. Her body ached. Not from exertion, but from being constantly claimed. A child’s needs. A man’s absence. Her own disappearing act. Time had stretched and warped since he’d left. Anything related to maintenance of the house had been his domain. But now, like everything else, she was responsible for it all.

He didn’t even take all his things. Just enough to sting. A few shirts, his toothbrush. The pictures were gone from the frames. She'd taken them down. Couldn’t bear to look at them anymore. But the rectangles of pale paint on the walls gave him away. Ghosts in matte finish.

Claire couldn’t remember the last time someone touched her without expectation. Not for milk. Not for comfort. Not for convenience. Just… because they wanted to. Because they couldn’t not.

She caught sight of herself in the microwave’s reflection. The dark crescents under her eyes – the latest accessory of motherhood. The softness where muscle used to be. The way her towel clung too tightly to a stomach she no longer recognised. She used to be magnetic. Beautiful, spontaneous, confident. The proverbial life of the party…

She blinked, and for a moment she was twenty-six again, bare-legged on a rooftop bar in Positano. Hair wild from the sea breeze, skin still hot and salty from the sun and ocean – dancing with strangers and laughing into the night. Tequila stung her throat, and music throbbed in her chest. She remembered how it felt to be wanted. Not needed.

That version of herself felt muted now. Faded to sepia tones.

Stillness didn’t offer her peace anymore. It gave her too much time to think. Of before. Of who she was. Of who she might never be again.

Then the doorbell rang.

Her heart kicked up, absurdly. She wiped her hands on the towel wrapped around her body and walked to the front door.

A man stood there, tall and tan, piercing blue eyes, shaggy blonde hair, sun-kissed skin like he belonged to the beach, to salt and sand and endless waves. Not standing on her front porch with a toolbox in hand and a smirk in the other.

‘Claire? Here about the tap. Leaking, yeah?’

She’d forgotten she’d called anyone. Her mind had been elsewhere. Lost in sleep schedules, grocery lists, dirty nappies, and laundry.

‘Yes. In the kitchen. It won’t stop dripping.’

He followed her up the hallway and past the blank spots where wedding photos used to be. The house was full of tiny silences like that now. Gaps where love had once lived.

She walked ahead, the towel clinging to her still-damp skin, hips swaying with intent. Heat bloomed between her thighs. Not from the shower, not from the summer air, but from the raw, rising ache of having a young male within a few feet of her.

In the kitchen, he crouched down and opened the cupboards under the sink. His shirt pulled taut over his back. His shoulders flexed. His hands were big. Capable. She imagined them on her. She shouldn’t have. But she did.

She leaned against the doorframe, crossing her arms over her chest, trying to feel less exposed. She should probably have walked to her room at this point and put clothes on. But she didn’t.

‘The washer’s gone,’ he said, glancing up. ‘Been dripping for a while. You notice any damp underneath?’

She blinked. She could barely remember what she’d had for breakfast.

‘Yeah… maybe,’ she murmured.

His eyes met hers. Steady, unreadable.

‘I’ll need to shut off the water for a minute.’

‘That’s fine,’ she said, her voice thinner than she meant.

Minutes passed. She stayed close. Closer than she needed to. Observing him. There was something raw, primal, and masculine about watching a man who knew what he was doing. A tightness pulled at her ribs. Unsettling, but alive.

‘You got a towel?’ he called from under the sink. ‘I left mine in the van.’

Before she had time to think about what she was doing, she stepped in closer, undoing the towel from around her body and handing it to him in one swift movement. Then, for a split second, she imagined him looking up at her and seeing what she saw. A woman with a record of motherhood etched across her skin.

Her hands moved to cover her body at the thought.

‘This towel…’ Then he looked up at her and smirked.

He was on his knees, level with her thighs. He didn’t flinch.

‘You always fix your own plumbing?’

‘Lately, I’ve had to…’ she replied, ‘fix my own everything.’

He twisted his mouth, then smiled like he understood.

‘Is that so…’

He stood. So close she could feel the heat radiating off his body. Her breath snagged. Her nipples peaked. The kitchen felt warmer now. The scent of him. Sweat, sun, something woody and unfamiliar.

‘Can I ask you something?’ he murmured.

She nodded, wordless, smirking. Mildly entertained at her own audaciousness.

‘How long’s it been since someone fixed this?’ He licked his lips and surveyed her body like it was his next meal.

The question cracked her. She didn’t answer. Just stared at him.

He smirked. Confident. Then leaned forward a little. Testing.

Her body answered. She filled the gap.

His mouth met hers with devastating hunger. She moaned softly into his kiss. He pulled her closer, fingers fisting in her damp hair now, his other hand grazing the underside of her breast.

He pulled back slightly and whispered in her ear, ‘If I took control, would you let me?’

She blinked. Her heart slammed. This is insane. This is reckless. This is exactly what I need.

‘Yes,’ she said, clearly, without hesitation. ‘I want you to.’

Somewhere inside, her shame tried to rise. The part of her that still thought of the stretch marks that coiled up her thighs as warnings instead of maps. But here, this man looked at her like she was more. More than just a mother. More than just a woman whose husband had left her in the trenches on her own.

He turned, unhooking his tool belt. Thick nylon. His hands, broad, stained with effort, moved with deliberate care.

‘Trust me?’

‘Sure.’

He stepped behind her, slipping his hands down her sides, fingers brushing along the soft curve of her hips. His touch was firm but gentle, grounding her, reminding her she didn’t have to hold everything up. Not right now.

‘Your husband’s not going to walk in on us, is he?’

‘No.’ Her voice caught. ‘He left. Me.’

He looked her over again. ‘Are you serious? You’re fucking gorgeous.’

Claire smirked. She couldn’t remember the last time someone told her that.

He smiled and knelt. His hands found her thighs, warm and steady. She shivered. Partly from the cool air, partly from the electricity coursing between them. His fingers traced lazy circles along the tender skin, igniting a slow fire inside her.

Claire’s breath hitched as his lips brushed a path just above her knee, feather-light, teasing. His beard scratched softly, sending ripples of sensation deep inside her. She closed her eyes and tilted her hips toward him, silently begging for more.

His mouth was a question mark, tracing, tasting, coaxing. His tongue flicked, circled, pressing into the soft swell of her inner thigh, slow and reverent, like learning the coordinates of a lost city.

She felt the muscles in her legs loosen, her heart thrumming in her chest like a wild drum. Every nerve ending sharpened, every breath a tremble.

His hands shifted to cup her ass, thumbs pressing into the muscle with deliberate care. She could feel the pulse of his hands, his face, taut and eager, against her flesh.

The kitchen faded away. There was only the heat between them, the wetness gathering where his mouth met her skin.

Claire’s fingers tangled in his hair, pulling him closer, deeper. A low moan escaped her lips, raw and unguarded. He lifted his head briefly, eyes dark and hungry, meeting hers. No words were needed. They both understood.

Slowly, his mouth dipped lower, kissing and licking the sensitive flesh of her folds. His tongue traced delicate patterns, teasing her entrance, coaxing her to open wider.

She gasped, hips arching involuntarily, surrendering to the wave building inside her. The ache grew, sweet and gnawing, wrapping around her like a tide. His hands roamed up her sides, fingertips skimming over the soft skin and stretch marks, worshipping every inch without hesitation or shame.

Her breathing grew ragged, fingers digging into the rough wood of the countertop for purchase. The world tilted.

Then he rose, lips glistening, eyes shadowed with desire.

‘Can I?’ he whispered, voice low and gravel thick.

Her answer was a breathless nod.

He unbuttoned his shirt then and threw it behind him on the floor. A tattoo wound down his forearm like a code.

He positioned himself, hands steady on her hips as she lifted herself onto the countertop, her legs wrapping around his waist.

Slow and sure, he entered her, filling her with a deep, relentless pressure that had been absent too long. Claire’s nails raked down his back, leaving faint trails of fire. His teeth grazed her shoulder, marking her.

She clung to him, heart pounding, breath shuddering, until she felt like she might shatter from within. Her body was glass. Fine and fragile, stretched thin by months of holding everything together. But in his arms, she wasn’t cracking from strain. She was breaking open. And it felt good. Felt necessary. Like being split was the only way light could get back in.

Her moan rose from somewhere deeper than pleasure. Something raw, guttural, almost grief-like. A sound she'd forgotten she could make. The kind that comes from finally being seen, from being touched like a woman instead of a function. Instead of a ghost.

His mouth was at her ear now, murmuring something she couldn’t quite catch, and it didn’t matter. The only thing that mattered was the way he held her like she was holy. Like the stretch marks were brushstrokes. Like her hips were scripture.

She felt herself unravel then. Tight muscles letting go, breath hitching, body clenching around him with a tremor that pulsed through her like thunder. A sweet, seismic undoing.

She gasped. Froze. And then let go. Of everything.

Her voice broke through the silence. Raw. ‘Don’t stop.’

His answer was a growl, deep and hungry, matching her pace, matching her need.

The climax came slow, deliberate, like the final brushstroke on a masterpiece. Her body trembled, muscles tightening and releasing in waves. She cried out softly, a sound full of release and rediscovery.

He followed moments later, his own breath ragged, body shuddering against hers.

They stayed pressed together, basking in the aftermath, in the quiet that meant something new.

Claire slid off the counter slowly, legs jelly.

She picked up the towel from the floor, grease marks staining the cotton, and tucked stray hairs behind her ears.

‘You should probably fix that leak now,’ she rasped.

He smirked. ‘Already did. But I might need to check in next week. Just in case.’

She smiled. Wider now. Real.

‘You do that.’

She turned to the window, heartbeat still drumming. The sun was higher now, washing light across the kitchen bench.

The house was quiet again.

But Claire wasn’t. Not anymore.

Something had shifted. Not everything. But enough to remind her who the fuck she was.

And she wasn’t about to forget it again.

Upstairs, her daughter stirred, a soft rustle through the baby monitor. Claire took a long breath, savouring the final moments of stillness before turning toward the stairs.

Her body humming, her skin still tingling, as she went to tend to the tiny life that still needed her.

Joey for The Spicy Chronicles, 2025.

Image: Pinterest

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Clear your schedules (and your browser history), because this week’s guest post is brought to you by the one and only Emily Extra, the wickedly wild voice behind MILF Chronicles.

She proudly wears the MILF crown, and from what I’ve read, especially the story with the unicorn goals, or that hot sexcapade with two underwear models, it’s well deserved.

She calls herself a MILF. I call her dangerously addictive.

So do yourself a favour: check out Emily’s page. But don’t blame me when you’re sweaty, breathless, and suddenly fantasising about that hot mum from the local café.

Joey xx

Sexual Savant

I stare at the magical pink, orange, and red streaks across the sky, unique to a West Coast sunset, from the rooftop of my hotel. In what can only be described as hopeful attire - a tight black dress, CFMP’s (‘Come Fuck Me Pumps’ in Gen X vernacular) and expensive lingerie - I am waiting for my date to arrive.

Lately I’ve been struggling with single parenting, working too much, thinking too much, and decision-fatigue. Before this trip, I gave myself permission to do something selfish and outrageous. I posted an explicit message on my profile seeking an adventurous night with a hot, smart, funny, experienced sexual deviant.

I am a strong, independent woman, but sometimes I need someone to tell me to shut the fuck up and to put me in my place.

I receive several hundred expressions of interest in the days leading up to my trip. I say this not to flex or to stroke my own ego, but to remind you gorgeous women that if you want casual sex and you can clearly articulate your needs, it’s there for the taking.

I engage only with a few men who are well-endorsed and well-endowed, and I select a British guy named Will.

He seems confident, intelligent and witty. The chat is easy in the days leading up to my trip. He takes the time to understand my boundaries, he asks what I like, and he discovers what I haven’t tried but what he suspects I will most definitely like.

Back to the scene at the rooftop bar of my hotel. I lick the margarita salt from my lips and look up to see Will standing next to me.

Not what I expected physically, but he projects a curious mix of alpha male and intensity with a hint of vulnerability and approachability. He sits across from me and we have good banter and a quick drink.

Sure a few things are lost amongst our drastically different accents and we don’t agree on politics, but the eye contact is intense and I am enjoying our intellectual sparring.

Me: Do you want to come back to my room?

Him: Fuck yes.

We exit immediately and walk quickly to the lift. The doors close behind us. He pins me up against the wall, kisses me hard, lifts up my dress, pulls aside my g-string and shoves his finger inside me. All in the 30 seconds between the rooftop and my floor.

It. Is. On.

Once inside my room, I excuse myself to the bathroom where I strip down to my lingerie, take a swig of mouthwash and tussle my hair. I make a provocative grand entrance in my bra, g-string and CFMP’s.

He is sitting on the bed. Once he sees me, he jumps up to kiss me and he grabs my ass with both hands. He deliberately walks over to the window and tears the blinds open so we are exposed. It is 7pm on a Tuesday and there are neighbouring buildings who have a direct line of sight into my room.

Him: It’s hotter this way.

He pushes me on to the bed. He is aggressive and urgent. He climbs on top of me, pins my arms above my head, and kisses me fervently. He studies me slowly from head to toe as if I am his prey.

He tells me that I am stunning. Once and only once.

Him: Don’t move and don’t talk.

He yanks my bra to the side and pinches my nipples. He alternates between thrusting his tongue inside me and a finger or two.

I am his play toy and he is an expert in what he is doing. My back is arched and I am whimpering and panting and writhing and desperate to cum. Suddenly his blue eyes are staring into mine.

Him: Shhhh…not yet…calm down…be quiet.

My demented brain thinks of Mel Gibson in Braveheart saying “Hold! Hold!” and I laugh out loud.

Him: No laughing.

Me: Yes sir.

He kisses me again and makes his way back down to my completely engorged pussy. He takes off my g-string and starts finger-banging me in a way that I’ve only ever seen in porn. Fast, hard and with that squelching noise.

Him: I’m going to make you squirt.

Me: Not sure I can…

Him: (Shifts positions so he can whisper this right in my ear) Let yourself go.

I proceed to cum loudly and squirt everywhere. I honestly did not know I had that in me.

Him: Good girl.

This whole night is an out of body experience. I stop counting orgasms after the first two and I have every boundary pushed in the best possible way. This man is a sexual savant, a pussy-whisperer.

The night is a jumble of pleasure and the details are blurry but there are a series of freeze frames etched in my brain.

He directs me to a chair by the window and bends me over it so I can face the city. He wraps his leather belt around my waist so he can pull me into him while he fucks me from behind. My hands are pressed against the glass and he is in complete control.

At one point I am biting the corner of a pillow while he plays with my ass and pussy. He pushes the limits of how much I can take. I am so lost in the moment that I could care less if it’s 3 fingers or a full fist.

There are surprisingly tender, soft moments in between with slow kissing, gentle touching and a quick massage.

I am typically a classic switch but with this man, I succumb. I don’t need a voice, he anticipates my needs and the needs I didn’t even know I had.

We take some breaks to drink water and he asks me pointed questions to continuously refine his understanding of my body. I tell him that sometimes I like it slow, and I am self-conscious that I cum best with my legs straight and tense.

Without judgment, he quickly converts this new intel into a pleasure scenario for me. He puts me in a position that I love and talks absolute filth in my ear. I contract around his cock for what feels like an eternity.

After hours of being lost in my own immense pleasure, I finally think to ask him how he would like to cum. He bends me like a pretzel, fucks the shit out of me, pulls off the condom and cums on demand all over my stomach.

Do you realise the self-control it takes for a man to be able to cum on demand like this? He deserves a medal.

I clean myself in the shower, put on pyjamas and escort him out. I order room service and fall asleep content and satiated.

My phone rings an hour after he’s left.

Excuse me ma’am, there has been a noise complaint…

Emily Extra, MILF Chronicles, 2025.