A/N: This is it, sweeties. The Finale.
Chapter 8
"A-April . . . I-I mean . . . why?" he asked, voice squeaking in a very unmanly way, swimming head raised off the pillow before dropping it back down to stare at the ceiling.
Part of him wanted to shut the fuck up and go with it, another part had to know what this was. He needed to understand before he risked ruining everything. Yeah, she had said some nice things to him, things he desperately wanted to believe, but years of self-loathing culminating in the humiliation by those other women had him on the verge of something dark and bleak. His very life rested in April's hands. He couldn't take any more emotional damage, he just couldn't, and not by her. Not her. God help him, what if this was some kind of joke? Or worse, something done out of pity? He made a choked sound. And his fears must have shown clearly on his face as April froze on top of him and blinked.
Her expression softened from almost predatory to gentle, compassionate. She brought her palms up over his plastron, sliding them up over his heaving chest, leaning forward to lay flat against him. Heart to heart. Communicating in only the way lovers' hearts do, in secret exchange of the morse code of longing and need. She closed her eyes and listening to his ragged breath, the thumping of his heart above the sound of her own. Only now did she feel how he shook and only now did she really believe that nothing had happened between him and the prostitute that Casey had hired. She couldn't help but feel a jolt of gleeful joy knowing that she'd be his first. But she pushed away the thought, filing it in the back of her mind to enjoy at a later time, and refocused on him. His fear and need crashed over her and she couldn't tell which emotion was stronger.
"Shh, it's okay."
His hands went clammy as his fingers worked through the material of the blanket, clawing and releasing. This was happening so fast, he just couldn't keep up. He didn't want to be afraid. There was just so much at stake here. He felt helplessly lost in the tide of emotions rushing through him, dragging him under before he'd had a chance to take a breath. His body burned with need for her, his heart raced, his mouth went dry as he reached up with one trembling hand and stroked her silky hair, so soft beneath his calloused fingers. He turned his face and nuzzled into her hair, taking in a deep breath. Then another.
"I . . . I just . . . I mean, I don't want our friendship . . . to end, you know?"
She eased up enough to look him in the face, bracing her arms against his strong chest.
"And why would it end?"
He struggled for a moment. "I mess stuff up. I don't wanna mess this up before . . . before it even . . . Gah!" he groaned and rubbed his forehead in frustration. He flinched as he felt her fingertips stroking the side of his jaw. His eyes snapped back to her.
"I've known you for six years, Raphael. I've seen you at your best and your worst," she punctuated the word with a tap against his chin and he rolled his eyes. He didn't need to be reminded of some of the fits he'd thrown that she'd witnessed. "But it's your heart that brought me back and kept me wishing all this time." He slowly met her gaze and held it; listening. "Your amazing, loyal, loving heart. That heart that puts you directly in harm's way when you protect the people you care about like your brothers. That heart that loves so big and so hard you have to hide it or risk it getting chipped or broken."
He grasped her fingers in one hand, squeezed them gently but firmly. Her voice dropped lower, "I want to protect that beautiful heart of yours, Raphael. If you trust me enough to let me hold it . . . I promise I won't let anything happen to it."
"April," he rasped, overtaken with emotion, "You've always had it."
Her smile was triumphant without being arrogant or superior as he rolled her over onto her back. He loomed over her, eyes blazing down, burning so brightly with the passion that was searing his very soul. He brought his mouth against hers. Kissed her deeply. He felt her legs open as he shifted his weight. Dimly he registered the ache of his injuries from the crash, but they paled in comparison to the feelings that were surging through him. He pulled back, breaking the kiss and examined her face carefully for any sign of doubt.
She squirmed a little and he felt her damp heat against his length. He groaned softly at the sensation. The scent of her arousal was like an airborne drug, knocking his tentative hold on his senses reeling. But still he hesitated. Her hands were stroking up and down along the sides of his arms, then up and over his shoulders onto his broad chest, caressing the ridge of his upper plastron just below his collar bone. He shivered.
"I want you, Raphael."
He swallowed, soaking in the words. "MmmApril, oh god," he moaned into her neck as he lowered his mouth to kiss and lap at the fragile skin. He trembled and shifted his weight onto his elbows. The bed springs squeaked as he positioned his bulk better not to crush her. Then tentative and gentle, he sought out that warmth, that beckoning heat between her legs. He paused as the tip pressed against her and another tremor went through him.
"Yes, please, please Raph," she encouraged into the side of his head. His face still hidden into the crook of her neck.
"April," he murmured and it was a breath across his lips; a sigh, a resignation, a sweet surrender.
A roll of his hips had him gliding smoothly into her. He groaned as her heat surrounded him. The feeling of her silken wetness and tightness encircling him unlike anything he'd ever dreamt of before. The intensity of it had his mind blanking with only the pleasure of it. He froze for a moment, taking it in, luxuriating in the erotic lust sweeping through him. There was no coherent thought, only the sensual reality of their bodies now joined in carnal knowledge.
She tensed as she felt the wide, thick cock enter and spread her. The size of him was unlike anything she'd ever had and there was some initial discomfort that burned as her body stretched around him. Breath held, her fingers dug into the tops of his shoulders before, with a hitching inhale, her arms wrapped around his head and held on for dear life as he started to thrust, slowly, gently at first; unsure and inexperienced; frightened and excited.
But before long the trepidation of wandering into this unknown territory abated and they gave themselves to each other without holding anything back. The pleasure came rippling through her, forceful and overwhelming. He was hers. All of him. At last. She murmured into his cheek, encouraging him with soft, loving pleas and intonations: I need you, yes, please, that feels good, oh, don't stop, please don't stop. He could only repeat her name between groans and incoherent wordless sounds of need and desire.
Their bodies locked in the rocking motion of his hips and soon her words fell away and she was left with moaning matching his own in cadence and rhythm. The headboard of the bed knocked into the wall with an ever growing speed and power as Raphael began to lose himself completely in April's body.
In a moment of surfacing, he reared back to check if she was still okay; if he was doing this right; if he was a disappointment. He stared down into her flushed face. Her expression was one of heated anguish and lust. His eyes, pupils mere pinpricks, were sharply focused on her now, drinking in her partially opened mouth, her puckered brows, her eyes squinting open and closed, gazing up at him, her flaming hair in a halo around her head with tendrils glued to her forehead and one cheek from the sweat. She never looked more gloriously beautiful than she did right there, beneath him.
She surfaced from her own pleasure and in that moment as their eyes locked, a delicate smile spread across her open mouth. Her loving, happy expression chased away any lingering doubt that he was anything but what she wanted. A thrill of joy went through him. Absolute and blinding. Exhilarating. The coiling tension in his lower stomach and loins suddenly tightened and in the back of his rational mind he realized that something other than the grunts and groans was building in the back of his throat, being forced up from his chest.
Any last amount of control was slipping and it eerily reminded him of losing himself to the bloodlust on the battlefield, of his mind being lost within his body, together but separate. It was as addictive as it was terrifying and thrilling; and so frighteningly similar but for one difference, April held him. Her hands and arms and legs tethered him to reality. He was safe in her arms; safe to lose himself inside of her; she would not let him drift away; she would bring him back after he dove off into oblivion. His lifeline. His compass. He gripped her and held onto her with all his strength.
"April!" he cried rough and strained into her neck. His entire body was shaking as he pistoned into her, unable to stop or slow himself. The force of it now slammed the headboard mightily into the wall and her cries became more urgent, more desperate and high pitched. She clawed at him, hands frantic. He felt her nails digging into his flesh and the sting only further pushed him towards the brink of no return.
"Oh, ungh! OH!" she cried, throwing her head back and arching her body under him. "Yes! Oh yes! Yes! Raphael! R-RAPHAEL!"
The sound of his name on her lips being shouted to the room, frenzied and hoarse, did something powerful to him. He shook his head and clamped his eyes shut as a spike of sharp lust speared him. He made a strangled, choked sound as his body contracted and his clenching jaw opened involuntarily. A rumbling, rolling growl-like noise erupted out of him as his climax surged through his body.
He slammed into her, as he wrapped his arms around her back; holding her, crushing her small frame against him, as he brought his open mouth to her shoulder; biting into the flesh, but not piercing it, enough to be pinning her as the reverberating growling churr continued with his bucking hips and spurting body. Lost in a primal need to keep her still as he finished, to fill her with his boiling seed. His body contracted again as he finished. Together they melted into one another, spent and exhausted.
He unhinged his fangs from her shoulder and immediately set to kissing the indentations gently and lapping at them, not even realizing what he was doing. He only knew he didn't want to hurt her.
He felt her kissing his cheek and he turned his face so that their lips met. They kissed and tasted each other's sweat and skin, smiling and whispering their pledges of love to one another.
"Was it . . . Did I . . . Was it . . . okay?" he whispered, a tiny curl of fear twisting inside him. She nodded and bit her lip then kissed him again. He breathed a sigh of relief between her mouth and chin. Then he rested his forehead against hers.
"I'll never hurt you, April," his voice was so soft and held such gentleness that April would have been surprised if she hadn't always known this side to Raphael existed. "I'll never stop loving you. Never, god, never. You're everything to me. Y-You always have been."
"I love you, Raphael. I love you so much."
He closed his eyes and smiled. She held him as he rolled to one side. He reached behind them with one swift motion, threw the blanket over their shivering, sweat soaked bodies. She reached out and caressed his face once before cuddling up closer under one strong arm that pulled her close so he could wrap his other arm over her. Sweat pearled and rolled down the sides of both their faces and necks.
Their racing hearts slowed and fell into a repeating pattern; one beat for the other. As they always had. As they always remained. Forever.
A/N: Whelp, hope you enjoyed this little romp into attempted smut. I adore this couple and feel that there was something between Raph and April in the very early Mirage comics but they wouldn't go into it. It's too bad, 'cuz it could've been great. :)
And anyone having doubts about older women with younger men, here's a little personal bit to chew on...my Mom is 5 years older than my dad - and they met and started to seriously date when he was 17. heh heh They've been married for 40 years now.
