Long after Simon had gone, Inara could smell him on her skin. It was a good scent – sex, sweat, and sleep – clean and pure as the man himself. As morning passed into afternoon, Inara filled a porcelain ewer with clear, cool water and the fragrant oil of violets, resigning herself to the fact that the night would have to be washed away. Regretfully, she unwound her robe and passed a sea sponge between her breasts. The water flowed along her skin like a second caress.
So, he had said, in a foggy newborn voice, did we just have sex?
Not according to most conventional dictionaries, she had said, laughing.
She had reached over his head to loose his restraints, and had taken both of his hands into her own, massaging them gently to help his blood flow. His fingers had curled around her wrists, gently, and he had brushed his lips across the point where her pulse beat through her skin, as if to send a kiss straight to her heart.
I'm not… I mean, I've almost never done that before, he had said. She had heard his shy, frightened stammer return, had seen hesitation and shame flicker through his eyes. Once. Twice, maybe...
I didn't think you had, she had said gently. But I sensed that you could. And I enjoyed the thought. I was taking a risk. Everyone in the 'verse has a different way of making love, Simon - trust me, I know. As long as we both want this, we have no reason to be ashamed.
Xie xie, he had said. The soft, sleepy Chinese phrase had brushed past her ear, soft as the wings of a butterfly, as he drew her down into his arms. I've missed you.
Even after her bath, the taste of him lingered in her mouth. It was salt and sweet, redolent of the moment in which she had given him his release. She had tormented him with it for nearly an hour, drawing him to the edge of the precipice countless times, pulling away when his pleasure seemed most assured. As she had drawn away, she had tipped hot wax onto his smooth, pale chest, watching him gasp and swear, even as he arched his back to meet it. His agony had blurred into ecstasy, as she had always hoped it could. The mere sight and sound of him, her sweet, vulnerable Simon, writhing on her bed, had made her clench and come. In the end, he had opened to her entirely. Lao de tien, a, ma sheng, ma sheng, he had cried. Sweet god, now, now, as his fists had clenched and fought the restraints. When she finally set him free, all of his words had been torn away. He had spilled onto her tongue, like a fruit grown so ripe that it split of its own accord.
For the rest of the day, the memory of Simon filled Inara with a blood-deep flush. It occured to her that he was one of the only men she had not been able to forget immediately. He lingered; he stuck; she could not come clean of him. The thought frightened her. She drew a long, trembling breath, trying in vain to regain her composure.
Merciful Buddha, she prayed, bring us through.
Nothing answered her. The air of Serenity hung thick and electric about her, scented with ozone, like the wind before a gathering storm.