a/n Thank you, kouw, as always, for the extensive and awesome beta-magic! You're amazeballs! Thanks, everyone who has been reading and reviewing! You are all lovely!
They cry together, and the drying of tears becomes a caress, and then, with his arm still around her and her face in the crook of his neck, she trails kisses up the soft skin there until she reaches his jawline, his cheek, then she is kissing his mouth. Slowly, so slowly. His stubble is just coming in. She can feel it against her palm, her fingertips as she reaches up to him. He breaks the kiss, runs his fingers over her cheekbones, her jaw, and his thumb lingers on her lower lip. She opens her mouth slightly and kisses his thumb, bites it gently. They smile at the reversal of roles from their day at the beach. How things have changed since those charged sunlit moments.
Twice they have burned together, hurried and desperate, but tonight they will take their time, loving slowly, weighing out the minutes and hours until morning.
Chapter 9. floating
She shifts until she is sitting on his lap, settles herself firmly against him. Straddling him. He has not wanted to be too forward tonight, not after the storm of emotion they've both weathered today. Not when she was so vulnerable. But now she is pressed against him, with her arms around his neck, and she draws back, letting her nose and lips graze his ear. He takes a deep, shaking breath.
He is almost dizzy with the sensations of her mouth at his ear, her thighs around him. She kisses his nose to make him smile and leaves little kisses on his cheeks, his jawline, his neck. She trails her fingers down to the first button of his pyjamas and undoes this button, the next, opening up his shirt little by little to lay bare his warm skin. Then she is peeling back his collar and kissing him, just at the hollow of his collarbone. No one has ever touched him there before, and certainly not with such heat, such unhurried intensity.
"I love you." He thrills to the sound of her whisper, to the feel of her hot breath on his sensitive skin.
They've said it before, but every time they say it it feels new, different. Richer, older, deeper. A fine wine aged to perfection, her burgundy to his oak barrel.
"I love you." His voice, gods, the things it does to her.
She pulls back to look at him, tangles her fingers in his unruly hair again. She can't stop; she delights in it, the curly mess she never gets to see, certainly never got to touch until just a few days ago when they'd finally kissed, burning together in the bright sunshine.
How beautiful he is to her when he is a bit undone; how delicious it is to feel the way she affects him. She would be weak in the knees if she were standing, but she is not standing; she is sitting on his lap, savoring the feeling of his hardness growing against her softness.
His hands are at her waist and she grasps them, brings them to her breasts. She moans as he touches her, runs his fingers over her nipples through the nightgown. He watches her, listens to her responding to his touch, and he realizes again with a thrill that she wants him. And he is joyful, oh yes, because she is smiling down at him again with those incredible eyes and undoing a few more buttons, slipping her warm hand down his front, taking her time, loving the soft silver hair of his chest with the smooth skin of her fingertips.
Finally the shirt is gone, landing softly on the carpet, and she leans down, curls her body so that she can kiss her way across his chest. Every movement is a caress, every touch a loving exploration, and she's discovered that he shivers when she runs her fingers across the crook of his elbow, and he groans with pleasure when she breathes hot against his ear.
His hands drop to her hips again and he pulls at her nightgown. She rises up on her knees to allow him to pull the light cotton garment up; she never wears knickers to sleep and his hands are warm on her bare skin, running up and down her thighs and cupping her bottom. She is covering him with kisses and he is breathless before her, this silken wanton woman who touches him with a passion he could never have imagined.
He whispers in her ear, asks her permission. She grants it, lets him run his hands under the hem of her nightgown, and oh, the feeling of his hands as they slide over that unaccustomed skin. She lifts her nightgown, slowly takes it off, lets it fall silently on top of his shirt. She rises again to kiss his mouth, hovers over him with her hands on the headboard, and suddenly he is everywhere. His mouth on her nipple, one hand caressing her bottom, the other seeking her folds, moving her with an agonizingly light touch. He gives a soft gasp as he feels how wet she is. For him. She begins to moan, to shake as his touch gradually changes to firm long strokes, and then she is shuddering toward her climax, thrusting against him, drunk on his touch. She arches, stretches taut, crying out her pleasure and her love for this man who brings her such sweet torment, such tremendous release. She is draped around him, over him, catching her breath, and they fall together, side by side, her hair tumbling around her shoulders and onto the pillow, and he is lavishing kisses on her face, her breasts, her hands.
She runs a hand over his side, his hip, reaches for his waistband.
His pyjama bottoms land on the pile of clothing, and he wraps his arm around her waist and pulls her in close. She hooks one leg over his hip and they hold on to each other, forehead to forehead, lying naked in bed together, at long last.
His hardness is pressing hot against her thigh and she reaches down to touch him. His breath hitches when she makes contact, her fingertips ghosting over him. She wraps her hand around him and he is moaning deeply, that gorgeous voice rumbling in his chest. He gasps as she releases him, but he has no time to worry because now she is shocking; she is gently pushing his hip, turning him onto his back, settling herself between his thighs and slowly taking him into her mouth.
She hums with it, remembering the magic he worked when he touched her as she touches him now, loving the smooth skin, the heft of him in her mouth. She slides tongue and lips around him and he gasps with pleasure. She watches, feels, listens - learning what makes him writhe beneath her, what makes his hands grasp at air. She kneels there and strokes his thighs, blesses his most sensitive skin with light fingertips, makes him moan and twist the sheets in his hands.
She can tell he is hesitant, so she talks to him. Tells him she wants to do this for him, tells him she is enjoying it. And she is, gods, she never imagined it could be like this, all heat and restraint and silky skin, and the stroke of him inside her mouth is more intimate than anything she's experienced before. She delights in his pleasure, in the way that her gentle and insistent touch can push him to the brink, make him lose control.
He is close, and he is worried. He thinks he should spare her this, doesn't know if she wants it, and yet some primal part of him wants to let go and come in her pretty mouth - but surely he can't, can't think these things, let alone do them. He is afraid of defiling her, disrespecting her, so he tries to stop her, asks her if she knows, if she minds. He is stunned when she answers him by crawling up to straddle his chest, whisper in his ear. Her hot breath, her voice - gods, that brogue of hers winds itself through her syllables as she says the most erotic thing he's ever heard.
"Yes, my man. I know. I want you to come. Please. Come for me."
And she is moving back down his body, trailing kisses down his chest, and she takes him into her mouth again. Now her hands are on him as well, stroking, cupping, and he is dying, he is falling, he is made of nothing but sensation, and she hums her delight, her pride at making this man (this most reserved, most proper of men) go mad with pleasure. He tenses and cries out and then it is over; he spills himself into her mouth and she knew it would happen and she takes it in, swallows his seed.
It's not as bad as all that, she thinks. She wasn't born yesterday; she's heard a few things about this part. She was expecting it to be awful, and admittedly, it's not something she'd necessarily want to taste every day. But in the end, she doesn't really care. It doesn't matter, and especially not tonight, because she has made this wonderful man, her man, fall to pieces, like this, and it was good, and she loves him and she too is proud, happy, to give pleasure to her lover, to drive him mad with her mouth just as he does to her.
She softly releases him, kisses him once more right there and draws the blankets up over them as she crawls up to join him on their pillows, dropping kisses on his abdomen, his chest. She lies with her head on his shoulder, wraps herself around him, sighs happily.
And he's adoring, astonished, grateful. His woman, the proper and authoritative Mrs Hughes, has just … he has no words for this holy, wanton act. Not even in his darkest fantasies has he imagined that she would do that, would want to do that. But here she is, smiling, eyes closed against his chest, holding him tightly.
"Mrs Hughes, I - my love - thank you. I never thought -"
And she is laughing, and it is a soft, lovely thing and he gets up on his elbows to kiss her. He can taste himself on her lips, just faintly and he smiles, can't quite believe his luck, can't fathom what this woman does to him.
They are warm, tangled together, and they sleep. Two lovers, joyful, at peace.
TBC
