The waiter, who was also the innkeeper, since there were only a few other guests, mentioned that the butter was hand-churned fresh every day in small batches. The rolls were baked from scratch every morning as well. It made sense, since there was no refrigeration beyond the old icehouses; nothing that would have been as convenient as having a fridge in one's house.
Cimmy indulged herself in a carb overload which she knew she was going to regret later, and secretly hoped that she didn't eat herself out of her clothes while she was here. It was going to be a temptation that was all too great, she could tell. Dessert was a simple apple pie, with very runny ice cream. But it, too, was pure Heaven.
After dinner, she took another long walk around the town, and noticed the same curious reaction she'd had before—where her usually dormant nipples rose and throbbed as she began to indulge herself in one of her favorite fantasies, trying to put herself into this time period as if she could simply will it. But she'd never before had a sexual reaction when she'd done that. Fantasizing about the past had always provided her a nice respite from the tension and stress with which she had lived as a med student, and even before then as she had had to work to maintain the grades necessary to get into medical school in the first place.
The way those achingly alert buds rubbed against her bra surprised her. She was no one's idea of a sex kitten; she'd had the same goal since she'd been a child, and no one—with a penis or without—was going to deter her. Her fellow students had teased her about her life as a nun, but those were the same people who'd fought over her help when it came time to study for exams and eventually boards.
She was a virgin, and in absolutely no hurry to change that state. She'd never met a man she'd felt attracted to—it would have been hard for him to compete with John Wayne, and anyway, Cimmy couldn't imagine a man today even trying to. Pickings were much too easy to have to do that much work just to get laid, and since she had no experience, it probably wasn't worth the effort for her male peers.
One of the few men who had tried to break through her single-minded determination had told her something to the effect of, "You can never tell what you're going to get with a virgin—she might be great, or, more likely, she might dissolve into tears in your arms." Cimmy had watched him shudder at the latter possibility and known she was making the right decision. She didn't need a man, and she most certainly didn't need the distraction. Medical school was hard enough without adding complications to the mix. And, having grown up with a single mother, and watching her bounce from one boyfriend to the next, Cimmy knew for a fact that men were definitely a complication.
But now, for the first time in her life, she wasn't sure what was going on with her body, especially when her nipples remained engorged, chafing with every movement, and awakening parts of her that she was becoming quite sure were better left asleep, especially as she felt more than a drop of wetness dampening her panties. It was a good thing she hadn't bought the open crotch bloomers she'd been looking at before the trip, or there'd be a river running down the inside of her thigh.
She was so bothered by the feelings that were stirring within her and her lack of control over them, that instead of stopping by a social the hotel was sponsoring in the Mark Twain Saloon, she instead made her way up to her room. With a cocktail added to the mix, Cimmy couldn't trust herself. One night stands were not going to become her style.
As she undressed in the glowing lamplight, she caught her reflection in the mirror and was taken by it, somehow. Her body had always been no more than that to her—a way of getting her brain to places where it could learn and absorb as much as it could—but somehow something seemed different, perhaps because of her surroundings. She'd never seen herself in such soft light, almost more shadow than anything else.
Her breasts felt swollen and tender, eager to be free of the confines of her bra. She watched herself reach behind and undo the clasps, then let it fall to the floor at her feet. She stared, mesmerized, as the naked mounds rose and fell with breathing that was becoming more and more ragged. She would have sworn they were growing in size under her gaze; the tips straining as if they were still bound by restrictive cotton, seeking something, anything, to soothe them.