His strong hands slid down her shoulders and around her waist as he hoisted her up. She instinctively wrapped her legs around him as he carried her inside and kicked the door shut behind them.
She’d thought they’d sit and talk for a while, but this was better. No need to think, to worry about conversation, to worry about anything other than the feelings coursing through her.
Her nipples tightened at the friction as she slid down his body, putting her feet back on solid ground. His tongue teased hers, explored her mouth and flicked out, licking her lips. She panted, her body burning from his touch, at the only intimacy she’d experienced in four long, lonely years, as he broke away and trailed kisses and nips down her neck.
The sensations exhilarated her, overwhelmed her. The intensity was almost frightening, and yet she craved more.
“You okay?” he breathed against her ear.
Words failed her. In answer, she slid her hands beneath the hem of his shirt and smoothed them against the taut expanse of his stomach.
“I’ve fantasized about this moment for months,” he said.
“Me too,” she whispered.
Their lips crashed together again, their hands groping, tearing at the clothing keeping them apart. Her shirt and shorts were the first to go. His followed.
They stood before each other, bare, exposed. She sucked in a breath as he cupped her breasts and lightly stroked his thumbs back and forth across her nipples. His intense gaze made her body flame as he took in every inch of her nakedness.
“So sexy,” he said, his voice low, lustful.
The air sizzled between them. Her nerves were raw, her body needy, her brain a mess of incoherent thoughts.
He kissed his way down her chest, her stomach, and then kneeled in front of her. He placed his hands on the insides of her thighs, urging her to spread her legs. She stared down at him, her body trembling with anticipation. When his lips met her sensitive flesh, her knees almost buckled.
He licked her slow and easy at first, then ravaged her ultrasensitive clit with hard, quick jabs of his tongue. Grabbing her hips to hold her steady, he alternated between tonguing her wetness and sucking her clit.
Her pussy pulsed, a heavenly tightness accumulating deep inside. He sucked her clit and slid a finger inside, penetrating her until her muscles spasmed. Her aching cunt tightened around his finger as the pressure inside her built quickly. She fisted his soft, dark hair as her legs shook, her stomach knotted, and her inner muscles clenched from his skilled assault.
Moans escaped her as her head rolled back. The waves of pleasure swamped her as heavenly explosions erupted throughout her body and stars flashed before her eyes.
Her knees finally gave out as she sank to the floor with him.
He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her frantically. Tasting her juices on his lips was an erotic treat she’d never experienced before.
“I need to be inside you,” he said, his tone bordering on desperation.
“Please,” she said. It came out a wanton, breathy whisper.
He stood, helped her up, and quickly guided her to the couch.
“Turn around and bend over.”
She did without hesitation. The wanting, needing, and anticipation made her his to command. At that moment, she’d agree to any of his requests with no questions asked.
She gasped as he slicked the head of his dick between her drenched lips and then slammed inside her in one deep thrust.
“Fuck,” he said. “You feel better than I imagined.”
His words thrilled her, fueled her self-confidence, and her muscles clenched around his hardness to return the sentiment as he rocked slowly, torturously so, inside her wet heat.
“More,” she pleaded, not caring how needy she sounded. “Please. Need more.”
He obliged. His fingers dug almost painfully into her hips as he quickened the pace. The smacking sounds of their coupling reverberated off the walls in an erotic chorus. They were frenzied, on edge, and she was about to fall over the precipice of climax again. When he reached around to stroke her clit, her breath hitched and her heart pounded as he gave the final stroke to send her over the edge into ecstatic oblivion.
Just as her body came apart in a blistering orgasm, he thrust deep and roared. His dick twitched inside her and pulsed as he filled her with his release. He slumped over her back, his heart pounding against her, sweat accumulating between them, their combined juices coating the insides of her thighs.
Her mind reeled at the long-awaited pleasure, the needed release, the connection with another human being.
As their bodies calmed, he turned her around and picked her up.
“Bedroom?” he asked.
Not yet able to speak, she pointed.
He carried her and laid her down on the bed, then joined her. He stroked featherlight caresses down her body that left tingles and goose bumps in their wake. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt so content. So not alone.
“That,” he said, “was worth the wait.”
Her face heated, but she nodded. “It was, but I’d rather not wait so long for next time,” she said shyly.
He grinned. “Keep meeting your goals.”
“Well, since you’re already here, and we’re already naked . . . ”
This time he laughed out loud. “Soon, but not yet.”
She put on her best pouty face, but he sweetly kissed her forehead and turned that pout into a smile.
“Don’t you want your birthday cake?”
She’d completely forgotten about the cake. Hell, she’d forgotten about everything outside of his touch. And, as much as she wanted more of it, she couldn’t deny the desire to enjoy some sugary goodness on her birthday.
She nodded eagerly. “Mmm. Yes, please.”
He shot her a breathtaking smile and a wink. “Be right back.”
He hopped out of the bed and wrapped a blanket around his waist. She wondered what the neighbors would think if they saw a half-naked man step outside her front door, and it made her smile. When he came back, he set the cake box on the bed.
“Go ahead,” he encouraged.
She sat up, pulled the box to her, and excitedly flipped up the top. The strawberry-frosted cake read, Baby steps, Baby. Happy Birthday.
Something about the cake, the months of encouragement, and the sexy reward filled her with the confidence and hopefulness she’d been sorely lacking. Somehow, she knew her progress would continue with or without Milo’s help. But she sure hoped it was with.
THE INVITATION
Regina Kammer
London, Spring 1880
Leonora opened her eyes.
Normality. Utter normality.
Nothing like the dream she’d just had.
She exhaled her disappointment.
Sunlight glowed behind the drapery sheers of her bedroom window, keeping the chill of London’s late spring at bay. The maid had already prepared the fire in the hearth and set the breakfast tray on the window seat where she knew Leonora preferred to enjoy her morning tea.
But this morning Leonora lingered in bed, snuggled under the feather coverlet, her palm on her belly, her fingers aching to touch herself.
She’d had that dream again, the one involving the young artist she’d seen in the National Gallery studying and sketching a Gainsborough. The dream where he exhausts her on the ballroom floor then ravishes her quite thoroughly in the garden.
Her prurient impulses won. She pulled up her hem and threaded her fingers through the wiry strands of her mons before sliding through her dewy slit, then pressing her middle finger on the gloriously sensitive nubbin.
She relaxed against the pillows and relived her fantasy.
His hand at her back was firm, commanding her in the waltz, buoying her as she swayed, light-headed from his intoxicating presence. She let go, knowing he would bolster her should she falter. But she did not falter, no. Instead she floated on air as they spun on the parquet, weaving elegantly thr
ough other couples, finding themselves near the French doors leading to the terrace. With a raised eyebrow and a suggestive smirk, the young man led her through the doors and into the night.
Arm-in-arm, they glided along paths dimly lit from lamps and moonlight, her feet still moving with the rise and fall of the dance, her mind swimming with anticipation, her body tingling with brazen desire.
A tug on her arm led her behind the thick trunk of a tree. He stripped off his gloves to brush her cheek with the backs of his fingers, standing so close his breath puffed hot against her face. His gaze fell to her lips the moment before he pressed his mouth to hers, his tongue quickly finding its way between her parted lips.
She gripped his shoulders for purchase as he lifted her voluminous skirts to find the opening of her drawers. She sighed when he stroked her yearning sex, whispering wanton approbations while he rubbed her pearl of pleasure.
More, more, more . . .
With a growl he drew back. He licked his fingers, the lascivious sight leaving her breathless, her nipples crinkling. He worked the buttons of his fly, freeing himself quickly. He gripped her bare thigh above her stocking while his manhood tantalized her cleft.
He shoved inside, his hard rod filling her, stretching her, stroking her depths to a rhythm not unlike the waltz. Her body bobbed as he thrust in and out, her chest rising and falling in syncopated cadence to the beat of his heart.
With quickening breaths he took her on the journey to culmination, feasting on her mouth, palming her left breast, his nails scratching and tickling above the décolleté of her bodice. Thrusting, thrusting, thrusting—
Leonora cried out her climax, her eyes opening to the smooth plaster of her bedroom ceiling, not the satiated visage of a lover.
A tear slid down her temple to dampen the pillow.
Would she ever feel the touch of a man again? Unlikely. Certainly not a man such as the artist. He was so young, probably not even thirty. What would a man in his twenties want with a widow of fifty-three who had neither money nor connections to advance his career?
There were few opportunities to meet gentlemen her age. She’d not been to a ballroom in years. Not since she was a girl of eighteen and on display for the perusal of her father’s business partners. A perfunctory dance with a man three decades her elder meant she was suddenly engaged, then, almost equally suddenly, married.
Her husband did not enjoy the frivolity nor the crowds of the ballroom, so they rarely attended such functions. When children did not come, despondency mounted.
Leonora inhaled deeply to calm the welling grief as she pondered her situation.
She’d been sent to a doctor who specialized in women’s ailments born from such dissatisfaction. He had treated her with intimate massage, releasing pent-up frustrations amidst a flurry of pleasure in such a way she’d never felt before, never knew existed. A way that left her discomfited a doctor should perform such an act and not one’s husband.
After another visit to the doctor, Leonora had informed her husband she was cured. What she never revealed was that she had paid very close attention to the doctor’s therapy, and then had taught herself.
Self-gratification in secret had become Leonora’s only means of erotic relief. Her husband had rarely invited her to bed, and when he had, it was for his fulfillment only. His death freed her to explore her body, to discover where and what libidinous delights could be elicited. Freed her to fantasize about young, handsome men such as the artist at the National Gallery.
Leonora rolled out of bed and slipped on her dressing gown. She perched on the window seat to watch the world through veiled windows as she nibbled on her toast.
Every Tuesday, Leonora met her friends Agnes and Cecily in a quiet tea shop off Oxford Street. Like women did all across England, they discussed life and politics and the latest fashions. Except Leonora, Agnes, and Cecily did it in a tea shop.
There was nothing wrong with having tea in a tea shop. There really wasn’t. It just wasn’t tea in a drawing room where one mixed with women of social importance. Where one’s mere presence elevated one in the eyes of the ton, even if one were only the wife of a baronet.
Within a few years of Leonora’s marriage, invitations to tea in drawing rooms had stopped. Leonora—childless, middle-class, ungregarious—was simply not useful to the aristocracy. She was even less so now.
“ . . . and so I said to him, I said, ‘Sir, the decoration on my hat is no concern of yours.’ ”
Cecily laughed softly at Agnes’s story. Leonora feigned amusement. She’d forgotten what they were talking about.
“My dear Leonora,” said Cecily. “You seem far away. A penny for your thoughts.”
“What? Oh.” Leonora put down her cup. “I’m sure they’re not worth a farthing.”
“Let us be the judge of that, love,” said Agnes.
“I was only thinking I should like to return to the National Gallery today.”
“Weren’t you just there?” Cecily asked before taking a bite of sandwich.
Agnes met Leonora’s gaze, her expression wary. “Does art interest you so? Is this a new diversion?”
Leonora turned her attention to her tea.
“You’re blushing, Leonora.”
Drat. Her face was hot. Her neck under her high collar as well.
Cecily beamed. “Ooh, what is it? Scandalous paintings? I’ve heard of frescoes from ancient Rome that depict”—she glanced around—“men and women copulating. Can you believe such a thing?” She tittered.
Leonora chortled. “I assure you I am not going to the National Gallery to look at lewd pictures.”
“There must be some other attraction, I should think,” Agnes prodded. “Perhaps a dashing habitué of art?” “Perhaps,” Leonora replied.
“What’s his name?” Cecily asked cheerfully.
Leonora braced herself. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?” Agnes’s tone was laden with reproach. “Are you so lonely you address strangers now?”
“He seems very pleasant.”
“Seems?”
“All right, he’s handsome and a skilled artist. Beyond that, I know nothing about him.”
Agnes placed her hand on Leonora’s forearm. “This is unlike you.” Her expression held genuine concern. “Be careful, dear.”
“Of course, Agnes.”
“Well, I for one think it sounds intriguing,” said Cecily. “I cannot wait for next Tuesday to hear all about your adventure.”
Leonora only hoped there would be something exciting to tell.
Trafalgar Square bustled with London life. Leonora climbed the stairs to the National Gallery entrance portico, her heart thudding with every step. At the top, she smoothed down her skirts, quelled her agitation, and went inside.
Where should she go? Back to the Gainsborough? His sketch seemed rather complete a week ago. He’d most likely moved on.
She glanced side to side. To the right was the gallery with the Gainsborough. A fuss in the gallery to the left impelled her to investigate.
Once through the doorway, her heart commenced its previous nervous racket.
He was there. Sitting right there, near the doorway, a sketch easel set before him, a small gathering of onlookers cooing over his efforts.
He copied a painting, a portrait of a dark-haired young woman looking over her shoulder, her chemise sagging as she clutched the garment to her bosom. A lovely and well-executed work with a hint of sensuality.
Leonora took her place amongst the spectators at the artist’s shoulder, watching as he worked in pencil and pastel. His copy was exquisite, with a touch of life the painting lacked, a liveliness to the expression.
“Isn’t the sketch exquisite?” remarked a woman in red next to her.
“Yes,” replied Leonora.
“An outstanding likeness of the original by Dubufe,” the woman in red continued. “Yet this young man has added a complexity to the subject.” She turned to Leonora. “Don’t you
agree?” Her genial countenance swiftly clouded with surprise. “Why, she looks just like you!”
Leonora’s cheeks burned as everyone around turned and stared, murmuring agreement.
“A portrait in a younger day—”
“Possibly her daughter—”
The artist stopped his work and rose from his stool. Tall, lean, clothes slightly rumpled, dark brown curls unruly, the man before her was far more attractive than she had remembered. He enlivened when he espied Leonora, his luscious mouth curving in a disarming smile.
Abashed, she tried to look away but was transfixed.
“My lady,” he said with a courteous nod. “Thank you for indulging me with your presence.”
What should she say? He was feigning familiarity between them. “I am always interested to see your latest work.”
He gestured to his sketch. “Please, let us discuss your commission.”
A clever subterfuge to dissipate the gathered crowd. A few lingered, but when the artist commenced a technical analysis of lines and shading, even they strolled away.
“I wanted to speak with you alone,” he murmured, his melodic baritone rippling through her.
He had always been silent in her dreams. Probably because he had not spoken when they had first exchanged glances near the Gainsborough. Not with words, anyway. His countenance had brightened as hers had flushed.
“I realized following you out onto the Square after our first meeting would have been boorish.”
Although not entirely unwelcome.
“So, I’ve been sketching every day in the Gallery hoping for another glimpse of you.”
“Every day?” she croaked.
There was that bewitching smile again. “I was utterly mesmerized when I saw this painting by Claude-Marie Dubufe.” He pointed to the artwork he had been sketching. “It’s called The Surprise.” He raked his gaze over Leonora, sending a shiver down her spine. “She looks just like you.”
“I fear my hair has not been that dark, nor my complexion that smooth, in many years.”
“But the beauty has never faded.”
Heat rose anew. Surely her cheeks were bright red. “Sir, you flatter me. I fear, perhaps, you also have the advantage of me. I do not even know your name.”
Best Women's Erotica of the Year, Volume 4 Page 13