A/N Thank you for the reviews. I couldn't possibly finish this off (only the epilogue to go after this) without a little more smut.
Very M rated, scenes of a sexual nature below.
They joined the crowds lining the path leading to the gleaming Rolls Royce Phantom. Anthony's arm looped around Edith's waist and he pressed a kiss to the top of her head. Cheers erupted as Mr and Mrs Carson emerged from the marquee. They walked between the two rows of clapping crowds, waving with smiles of embarrassment, Mr Carson laughing and Mrs Carson imploring in her Scottish burr, "ach, away with you, silly buggers!" Rose petals, white paper rice and, from one enthusiastic participant, glitter filled the air around the happy couple. They kissed at the car to the delight of their adoring fans and sped away to their future.
As the last of the confetti floated to the ground Edith spun in his arms, placing her palms firmly on his chest, "what now?"
He bent his neck and whispered, "Now, sweet one, I'm going to take you to my very large hotel bed and make you come so hard you can't see."
"Oh –" she giggled her embarrassment into his shoulder and her cheeks were that delightful shade of pink when she looked back at him, "that sounds acceptable."
They walked together across the hotel lobby, up the stairs and down the corridor to the door of his room. Either hand in hand, or, when he had the chance, with his arm wrapped possessively around her waist, pulling her close. A small irrational fear told him that if he didn't hold tight she'd be gone again. He refused to take such a risk. Opening the door one handed was a challenge, but absolutely necessary, it wasn't helped by the distraction of her lips beneath his ear and her teeth on his lobe.
He'd paid for the honeymoon suite. He worried he was tempting fate but Len's unassailable logic convinced him, "you'll either have the best room in the place to undertake the final and most important act of any reconciliation, or the most luxurious surroundings in which to pass out pissed and weeping in your wedding finery."
Edith stood in the centre of the room, turned a circle, as if appraising the place. Her mouth curved into a smile, "that is a very large bed."
"Super-king."
She nodded, closing the space between them, "I see."
Her bottom lip simply begged for his index finger, a gentle caress, stealing a touch of the moisture just inside. She kissed it and bit the tip. All the blood left his head and went south.
"Have I told you how completely and utterly sexy you are?"
"Sexy." She shook her head. "I am the furthest thing possible from sexy."
"You are so very, very wrong." He stepped behind her and pulled down the zip of her dress. The parting of the metal teeth the only sound in the silent room. He traced the line of her spine with his fingers, stopping at the twin dimples at the base of her spine. "Your skin is so soft, do you bathe in milk?"
She laughed, it hummed through her ribcage and into his hand, "double cream."
He turned her in his arms, claimed a kiss, "That explains it." He slipped a finger under the thin strap of her dress, pulled it over the line of her shoulders, first one, then the other. It made a valiant attempt to cling to the skin on the rise of her breasts but ultimately lost the battle with gravity. The light fabric floated away and pooled around their feet.
"I feel as though you're unwrapping me."
"That's precisely what I'm doing. You're a gift." He kissed behind her ear and moved to remove her bra but she stepped back.
"I think perhaps I need to start unwrapping you." She frowned, "we really went about this all wrong, your outfit is so much more complicated than mine."
Edith set to work on the buttons of his waistcoat whilst he shrugged out of the tails, tossed them over a chair and unwound the blue silk cravat. They worked together on the shirt, she slipped out three of the golden button studs and he pulled the fabric over his head. Slender fingers skirted through his chest hair, she abandoned him to do the trousers on his own. Placing open-mouthed kisses on his neck and Adam's apple. He had to push her away when she sucked at his nipple, "wicked woman, I'll do myself a mischief with this zip if you keep that up."
She raised her hands, "fine then. I'll just take this off." He paused to look up. She dropped her bra to the floor.
Amazing how fast a man, when properly motivated, could divest himself of his trousers and boxers. Even when navigating an impatient erection.
He hauled her into his arms and dropped her on the bed. She laughed and squealed and wiggled and, finally, she moaned as his lips found her breasts, the pulse at her neck, the freckles just behind her ear.
"I've missed your freckles."
"I've missed your jaw."
"My jaw?!"
She sat up on her elbows, "what? As if that's somehow a more peculiar thing to miss than freckles? I like your jaw - love, in fact. It's strong and proud and manly."
He held it for a moment between his thumb and index finger, offering her his profile, putting on the persona of some Greek Adonis. She rolled her eyes and kissed him.
"I missed your taste too."
She drew her bottom lip between her teeth and watched him with ever widening eyes as his mouth drew a path down her body. He ran his hand down one thigh and pushed the leg up and onto his shoulder and then mirrored the action with the other.
Anthony had partaken in oral sex before he met Edith but he couldn't say he'd enjoyed it all that much. It certainly wasn't an activity which increased his own arousal.
The sight of Edith like this, completely exposed. The sight of her when he tracked his tongue through her folds, not to mention the sounds she made; this wasn't just foreplay for her, it was foreplay for him too. He swept a finger inside, curled it high, into the spot he knew she craved. The one that set her on fire and caused her hips to arch. He followed it with a second and a wry, knowing smile, "Did you miss this?"
She gasped, "Yes, yes, yes."
"Did you touch yourself here and think of me?" He punctuated the question with his tongue, so she could be in no doubt about where, precisely, he meant. He flattened it to her clitoris and then flicked, once, twice, again. Her legs shook. He pulled away and looked up, "Edith?" She whimpered, fisting her hand into his hair, trying to pull him back, he resisted, "did you?"
"Yes, yes I did." She whispered, covering her eyes with her hand, "Yes. I cried when I came."
She brushed away a tear and he cursed, covering her body with his, "oh, sweet one, no, no, no, please don't cry, I didn't mean to make you sad."
"You haven't, you've made me happy."
"You're sure?"
She laughed through her tears, "happier still if you return to between my legs."
"To think that there was a time when you were mortified at the very prospect."
"I was never mortified."
"I remember the first time very clearly sweet one. I call upon the memory frequently."
She covered her eyes, "you do not."
"I do."
Her leg slid over his and she levered up onto his lap, "you live to tease me, Anthony Strallan."
He laughed, ran his hands up her wonderful thighs, "I do, sweet one, I really do."
She dipped a breast into his mouth, first one, then the other, giving him just enough time to tongue each nipple to a point. Then she pulled away and looked down at him heavy lidded and laughing, as if drunk on the power of straddling him or perhaps she was simply drunk on him. Now there was a thought.
"I love you Anthony."
"Well that's terribly convenient sweet one, because I love you too."
She kissed his neck, a nip and a suck followed the caress. He'd have a hickey tomorrow, probably above the coverage provided by his bands but he didn't care. He was hers, she could brand him anywhere she cared to.
She positioned him and he caught her just in time, "hang on! Bloody hell!"
"What is it?"
"Condom." He was a complete idiot, "I don't have any bloody condoms."
"I thought you planned to win me back at this wedding?!"
"I did." He brushed her nipple and she moaned, "as you can see, I succeeded."
She growled her frustration, "then why on earth didn't you bring condoms?!"
"I could say something gentlemanly, like, I didn't want to presume, but, truthfully, I forgot."
Peals of hysterical laughter wracked through her, her body shook with it, rubbing against his cock in a manner which was equal parts arousing and frustrating. She dropped her head to his chest and her hair tickled at his chin.
"Edith! This is not funny."
"No, not remotely, but if I don't laugh, I'll cry." She drew her fingers through his chest hair, strumming his ribs, her breath was hot on his skin, "I want you inside me, I'm desperate for it."
There could be no better sentence than that, it's perfection magnified by it emerging from Edith Crawley's lovely lips: I want you inside me, I'm desperate for it.
"Well, I would like children."
The laughter stopped, she stilled on his chest. She leant up, looming over him again, "excuse me?"
"It was a joke, sweet one." He'd certainly meant it as a joke, he was less sure now.
"Have you thought about that?"
"This is a very serious conversation to have when absolutely stark naked."
"Anthony?"
"Yes." Somewhat in vain he tried to clear the lump from the back of his throat, the words still emerged in a croak, "More than thought about it, actually. I dream about her - "
"Her?"
"Our daughter - blonde, with your face, and my eyes. We're dancing in the ballroom at Locksley, of all places, and she's spinning around us, holding her arms out as if she's being guided by an invisible gentleman. And she laughs, Edith. She giggles with happiness. Then I wake up."
The silence lasted for an age.
"Edith love, please say something. If it's not something that you want, I understand. I don't mind, honestly. I don't need children Edith, I just need you. I want you." If he'd scared her off with his fanciful ideas he'd never forgive himself.
"You really dreamt that?"
His slow nod was like a starting gun. All at once she launched forward catching his lips in a bruising kiss. She leant up, he missed the tease of her weight, then she grabbed his cock and he decided it wasn't so bad after all.
Her eyes were intent on his, she was breathless and he could feel her inviting heat, "there's still time to take it back."
He didn't want to take any of it back so he pushed up his hips and the head of his cock slipped inside her. She gasped and sank the rest of the way.
It was glorious. Wet, warm, tight. Entirely too much. Hyperbolic. Too good. Far too good. He was on the edge immediately. If he could just take his mind off her for a moment. Think of other things, boring, everyday things. Res gestae, R v Hanson and the hearsay provisions, the new sentencing guidelines for environmental offences.
Then, she shifted.
"Ah, Edith love, don't move." This would be over in seconds if she moved, "ah, ah, not like that either!" She clenched her internal muscles with a smirk. The only time he ever knew Edith Crawley to smirk was in bed with him, a fact he was damned proud of, "God, you feel unbelievable."
She pleaded an elongated version of his name, the Anth- dragging the ony in a seductive whisper across the tip of her tongue.
He stilled the movement of her hips with his hands, "You have to give me a minute sweet one, or I'll come."
"Isn't that the point?"
"Not before you love, never before you."
She flushed a delicious shade of pink all the way from where their bodies joined to the roots of her hair. She moved again, a miniscule flex of her hips and his fingers dug red crescents into her pale skin.
"You'll bruise me." He yanked his hands away, afraid to hurt her. She shook her head and drew his hands back to precisely the position they'd fled, "I don't mind."
He gazed at her, dumbstruck, awestruck, struck in every conceivable way by this woman. His woman.
"You want me." She shrugged, "I like it."
"I love you so very much."
"I love you too. That's enough stalling. Ready or not, I'm going to move now." Her hazel eyes, half-lidded with desire looked straight at him. The pink of her tongue darted out to moisten her plump bottom lip, "watch. I like it when you watch."
There was no need to ask, she knew him well enough to know he would always watch her, even if she wasn't putting on a show. This time she was obviously determined to do so. She started a languorous slide up, until just his tip remained inside her, and down, so she was fully seated again. He did as she asked: he watched. The length of him disappearing within her and emerging covered in her moisture.
He gripped her hips to help her along. Perhaps to speed her up, or to slow her down, maybe to still her movement entirely: he didn't know the reason, he didn't know much of anything at all except the sensations she created and the feel of her around him.
He took back the reins a little; thrust his hips to meet hers. She gasped and pleaded her poetry of half-completed words and disjointed syllables. She was beautiful all the time, and it wasn't fair to rank the occasions, but like this, in her pleasure, entirely at his mercy and yet mistress of him in every way, she was extraordinary. It was all intensified, like everything else, by being without protection. It was more than just the absence of the condom. He was giving himself completely for the first time. No pretense, no lies. Just as there was no physical shield, there was no mental one either.
He thrust again to compel another gasp.
"God, Edith, I love you." He palmed her breast, squeezed a nipple. She moaned and rocked forwards, he felt the telltale quivers. Too good, "Sweet one, I can't last much longer." The coupling was frantic now, "I want – I want to feel you, please, please." He panted, "touch yourself."
He smiled at her inability to speak but her ability to follow direction. It didn't take much, a matter of moments for her fingers to finish the work. She came, a perfect symphony of ripples and flutters, "oh, oh, oh, An-, oh, God!"
He couldn't last through that, it pulled everything together. His lust, his affection, his joy, his love; it was channeled to the place they joined. The first perfect note of an orchestra: everything in tune, all at once. Pure, majestic power. He emptied into her with a shout.
Her fading orgasm echoed around him and she collapsed on his chest, whispering into his ear, "I love you Anthony Strallan. I love you."
She rolled off and he pulled her into his side. She turned her head into the space where neck met shoulder, breathed deeply and nipped at his skin. He kissed her hair, forehead, the corner of her closed eye. She looked up at him, shimmering hazel orbs, filled with light and love.
The words tumbled out, "do you think we made a baby?"
She giggled, "I know women are supposed to be in tune with this kind of thing but I suspect it takes a little longer than forty-five seconds after the conclusion of sex to know if you're pregnant."
"Fair point." He pulled her tighter to him, "but do you think we did?"
Running a light finger around the shell of his ear, she smiled, "I don't know, but I can't help thinking it'd be no fun to catch first time around." She wiggled against him, caressed his torso, cupped his balls and grasped his burgeoning erection, "I'd like an excuse to do that at least another hundred times, wouldn't you?"