"God, Bel, you're full of surprises, aren't you?" he murmured, his arms tightening around me so I could feel his body was as bare as mine. The slide of warm satin against my belly told me that neither of us was naked yet, but I thrilled at the thought that we would be soon, with all that entailed.
His arms around me as if he was scared I might slip away, Aidan stumbled backwards, pulling me with him in stuttered steps. A kiss, a step, a stroke of his tongue, another step, a breath…Aidan stopped as he backed into the sofa, holding tight to me as he fell slowly onto the seat, breaking my already soft fall with his body.
His hands caressed me as his kisses grew more urgent. He circled my nipples with his thumbs, firm strokes that sent a shiver deep beneath my skin. A sound akin to a sob escaped from my throat, only to be silenced by yet another passionate kiss. I wanted…
More than kisses and somewhere more comfortable, too. Something hard and bony pressed into my thigh, so I shifted and slid a hand down Aidan's body to persuade him to shift with me. My fingers touched his smooth shorts and slid further – to the slit in the front where I met hot, hard skin crowned with hair. Oh.
"Hey, you know what we say back in Ireland, right?" Aidan asked dreamily, his hand closing around mine so all ten fingers were curled around him. "If you rub a man's red groin hair, you'll have amazing luck in the bedroom." He helped me stroke him slowly, once, twice, as if to demonstrate.
I fought it, but I found I couldn't resist. I burst out laughing and lifted my weight from him, placing both of my hands on my own thighs.
Aidan stuck up from his shorts like a grass tree, though a grass tree on fire. His expression held shock and hurt, yet I still couldn't stop laughing.
I climbed off him to stand beside the couch, trying to control my helpless laughter.
I sucked in a breath, a gasp and another deep breath before I could form words. "I don't know where you heard such a strange thing, but down here in Australia, it's stroking a lady that'll bring you luck in the bedroom, if you do it well enough. If not, you'll be stuck stroking yourself." I burst out laughing again.
Aidan's smile started to return. "If that's how it works downunder in Australia, I'll give it a go," he said.
My hands shook as I lifted them to take off my knickers. I hesitated, then strode to the table. Lifting my whiskey glass instead, I knocked back the contents, the burn barely registering compared to the blush I felt rising to my cheeks as Aidan's eyes fixed on me. He looked like he was drinking me, much the same way as I'd drained my whiskey. The alcohol flew straight to my head, so I sat down to deal with the dizziness. Still he stared.
Feeling self-conscious and slightly chilly, I reached for the fluffy blanket that had fallen to the floor earlier and pulled it over me.
Aidan's voice surprised me. "Don't, Bel. You're beautiful. I guess I'm still a little stunned." He knelt on the rug beside me and pushed the fluffy thing away.
I let go of it, a little less nervous now. "No one's ever called me beautiful before," I admitted.
"Then all the blokes you've been with before were either blind or stupid," he declared.
I gave a small smile. You have no idea.
He looked uncertain. "There have been other blokes, right? I'm not your first?"
I laughed outright. "No, you're not my first. I was pregnant once, remember?" My smile felt tight as I tried not to remember.
"Hey," Aidan's said softly, caressing my face with a kiss. "I didn't mean to bring up stuff that'd upset you. Let me help take your mind off it." He grinned. "I may be a bad doctor, but I'm bloody good at anatomy. Are you willing to let me get my hands on yours?" He reached eagerly for my chest, flexing his fingers.
I ripped off my undies, flicking them aside with my foot as his hands gently closed on my breasts.
"Do your best, for I'd like to try for some Irish luck tonight, too," I murmured, my hands doing a little stroking of their own. "Oh, Aidan…"
He chuckled as my thoughts settled on him and nothing else.
Ohhh…bloody good indeed…
28
I woke up on the rug in front of the fire, my head nesting in Aidan's lucky chest hair and the fluffy blanket attached to my leg by some sticky substance.
I lifted my head a little to look around. My clothes were strewn across the floor, along with Aidan's. The fire had died down to smouldering coals, but the room was warm enough for this to suffice. Through the condensation on the windows, I could see that the sun had risen.
I relaxed. I had no deadlines or pressing responsibilities today. I could sleep on the floor all day with this naked man and not feel I was shirking something, except perhaps a shower.
Aidan stirred beneath me. Bloody hell, the man's whole body was stirring. My thought drifted eagerly to what he could do with it. With me. I felt his lips in my hair and his fingers gently stroking my back.
"I knew it was too delightful to be a dream. You are amazing, my beautiful Bel." Aidan's lips touched mine, in a burning kiss that felt familiar. How many kisses had we shared overnight to make me accustomed to his touch? Did it matter? I want more…
I shifted on top of him, so only my knees, shins and toes touched the rug beneath him. Skin on skin, except where…
Aidan gave a gasp. "How do you feel about trying for one more time before breakfast?"
I feel like I'm on fire, with a fierce blaze that has nothing to do with whiskey or the embers in the fireplace. I didn't say the words. I simply smiled and shifted my hips, as Aidan sighed with pleasure.
"Ladies first," he murmured, his hands reaching for me. The next sigh of pleasure was all mine.
29
We were considerably stickier when we rose from the floor and I longed for a shower to wash the sticky sensation away. I wished also for some medication to dull the ache in my head.
"What would you like for breakfast?" Aidan asked with a smile, pulling on the red, shiny shorts.
I shrugged. "I don't mind. I'd like a shower first." I started to cross the room to reach the bathroom.
"Would you like some company?"
I stopped and turned, wondering. "I…" I began, unable to complete my sentence nor close my hanging mouth.
Aidan nodded as if he understood something I didn't and directed his eyes at the floor, his lips pressed together firmly as if he was trying to restrain laughter. After a moment, he said softly, "You enjoy your shower, Bel. Use all the hot water if you like. I'll make you some breakfast for when you're finished. I'll have a shower after we've eaten, when the tank's heated up again." He took a step forward.
He reached out and curled his hand beneath my jaw, as if checking my heartbeat with his fingers. Cautiously, Aidan touched his lips to mine, opening them to prolong the kiss as I leaned in closer, my tongue darting out.
Last night's passionate fire was nothing to the rapid acceleration of my heart-rate now. From Aidan's response I knew he could feel my pulse racing beneath his fingers. His free arm closed on me as my own arms reached around him to pull his body closer. A furious flurry of lips and tongues that left me breathless and panting, yet still wanting more. My chin resting at the base of Aidan's throat as I paused for breath, I gasped out words without thinking.
"Yes, I'd like you to join me in the shower. Please."
Aidan chuckled, stroking my hair as he said, "Sure. Give me five minutes and I'll come join you. The water should be nice and hot by then." He gave me one last lingering kiss and crossed the living room to his bedroom.
Dizzy with excitement and adrenaline, I stumbled for the bathroom, longing to feel the flow of warm water over my skin and his.
30
I twisted my hair up in a knot on the back of my head as the cold water hissed and pattered into the bathtub beneath the shower head. It was barely above freezing as I stepped into the spray, slowly heating until my skin warmed once more in the water. When steam rose to the ceiling from the shower rose, I turned to stick my face into the stream.
A slight movement in air
current told me Aidan had entered the room, for I didn't hear the door over the noisy cascade. His hands on my waist were warm as he pressed his body to my back, kissing my neck from behind. "Beautiful, Bel. You're so beautiful," he murmured.
Aidan reached for the soap and worked up a lather of foam between his hands, rubbing the bar in front of me for what appeared to be an inordinate length of time. Clinking the bar back into its dish, Aidan's breath tickled my ear. "For letting me share your shower, the least I can do is help you wash." His foam-filled hands cupped my breasts, gently massaging my skin until I relaxed against him. "That's better. You were so tense it was like you were worried you'd sprout tentacles as soon as you touched water!" Aidan laughed at his own joke but I merely smiled, closing my eyes as I enjoyed his caresses.
My skin tingled as Aidan's soapy hands slid down my belly to the length of my legs, all the way down before all the way up to my bottom, until he reached for the bar again. With a handful of foam, Aidan's firm fingers smoothed the tension from my shoulders and down my back. As he reached around me for the soap again, he murmured in my ear. "Stand with your feet just a little further apart…"
I slipped a little in the soap-slick bathtub, so Aidan's arm closed firmly across my chest to steady me, holding my body against his.
Now better balanced, I complied, my eyes on my toes as his foamy fingers reached between my legs and inside me. Without his strong support, I'd have crumpled to the floor, for my legs felt more like the consistency of gel and not bone, as his intimate caresses concentrated on the spots where I was most sensitive. And he knew, he knew…
The wordless cry I heard could only have come from my lips, but I couldn't remember uttering it. I could only focus on Aidan's hand as a louder cry tore its way out of my throat. I tensed in anticipation.
"Relax, Bel. I've got you." As if to illustrate his point, Aidan's arm tightened across my breasts as his fingers drove deeper. My voice sobbed his name, not once but over and over, my tipped-back head resting on his supportive shoulder.
I couldn't stifle the hoarse scream that ripped from my throat, for only a moment before it was muffled by Aidan's mouth as he bent his head to kiss me, his hand clenched between my trembling thighs.
I lifted my head as we both loosened our respective grips. I turned to face him, still lost for words as sensation lingered.
Aidan's face looked as stunned as I felt. "God, you're full of surprises, Bel. I almost came just watching you."
Not just watching, my sluggish thoughts stirred. Stroking and circling, sliding and slipping, strong hands that sensed every stutter in my breath, every shiver of my body…
I groped for the soap, not sure what I was going to do with it but determined to at least attempt to respond in kind. "Irish luck," I murmured, one hand reaching for him as the other closed on the softened soap. I was so intent on stroking Aidan to his increasing pleasure that I dropped the bloody bar into the bathtub.
"Bugger," I muttered, bending over to pick up the soap.
31
In my clumsiness, I almost slipped again, saved only by bumping into Aidan's body. His hands at my hips steadied me as I reached for the bar again.
"Bel…do you want me to…" he began, but didn't finish.
"It's all right, I think I have it," I interrupted brightly, straightening with soap in hand. I worked to lather it to foam as fast as I could, turning to take my chances with his Irish luck.
No longer a grass tree on fire, now he resembled a sentinel stone, surrounded by frothy sea-foam from waves breaking at its base. A rock warmed by sun and the water that washed him. I paused to admire my soapy handiwork, but he shrank before my eyes.
"Fuck!" he swore. "Sorry, Bel, that's the last of the hot water." He squeezed past me, wincing as he rinsed his body in the now near-freezing water, before turning the taps off.
Aidan stepped out of the shower and reached for the towels, tossing one to me. The fabric felt warm, as if heated. I looked at him in surprise.
He laughed. "Heated towel rail. Otherwise they wouldn't dry in this weather. Now, if you want to turn shrinkage into swelling again, a little stroking should fix me, what with your warm hands and all…" He moved in closer for another kiss. I felt him stiffen slightly in the close contact. He evidently felt it, too. "See? You work wonders, Bel."
I smiled, unsure what to say. My stomach betrayed me with a gurgle. I was hungry for several things at once.
Aidan laughed again, responding with a lighter kiss. "I should make you some breakfast first. I wouldn't want a wonderful woman like you going hungry." He hung his towel back over the heated rail and walked naked out of the bathroom. The muscles in his bottom shifted with each step, revealing a tantalising tuft of red hair between his cheeks.
I hastily did the same with my towel so I could follow. After the steamy atmosphere in the bathroom, the chill of the kitchen struck me more forcefully than the cold water. I felt my breasts tighten as if they, too, were shrinking away from the cold. I reached for the nearest item of clothing – Aidan's coat, draped over one of the dining chairs – and slipped it on, holding it closed with my crossed arms.
Aidan stared at me, as he donned some clothing, too – a flowery apron that covered his front but left his bottom bare. "How about I fry you up some eggs for breakfast?" he asked with a wicked smile. He bent over to remove a frypan from a low cupboard and I found myself staring at his bum and what dangled so temptingly beneath.
"Should I help?" I asked doubtfully, as he strode around the kitchen, pulling out implements and ingredients.
"I can make you breakfast, Bel. You relax." Aidan smiled.
I sank into a dining chair, pulling my knees up to my chest to keep more of me warm inside Aidan's coat. I was so intent on Aidan's nether regions that I didn't realise his eyes were fixed on me, too. I smiled, embarrassed but rueful.
Aidan shook his head. "I still can't believe you're sitting in my kitchen, wearing nothing but my coat, letting me make breakfast for you. I feel like I'll blink and you'll disappear."
"Me either," I admitted.
He flipped eggs onto plates, salting them liberally before passing me some cutlery and an egged plate.
I swallowed the eggs as quickly as I could, barely tasting them, until my stomach was sated. I craved a different sort of satisfaction and my eyes strayed to the likely source of it, so the finger he slipped inside me beneath the table took me by stunned surprise. I straightened and tightened as Aidan slid his finger out again, with more difficulty than it had entered. "Still so wet, I see," he said.
Cutlery clattered as I dove for him, intent on finishing what we'd started in the shower. Beneath my fierce kisses, he murmured words that I didn't hear until his hands pushed my breasts away. "Bed. Bel, I'd like to take you to bed."
I shed the coat and stood, as he struggled out of the apron. Kissing and stumbling, caressing and gasping, we crossed the living area to his bedroom. The bed pressed against the backs of my legs and it took only a slight push to tip us both onto the slippery sheets. Red satin, like last night's shorts, I thought incoherently, my hands sliding over the fabric as Aidan's fingers were far more productive.
I could feel the ripples building for another powerful orgasm as Aidan asked, "What do you want, Bel? How do you want me?"
I crossed my legs around his hips, my feet pressing insistently against the bum I'd admired over breakfast. My voice came out in a sob. "In me. In me. Now. Oh, Aidan…Aidan…"
32
Some time later, when the sweat-saturated satin stuck to my skin and our Irish luck had well and truly wilted – at least for a few hours, Aidan assured me – I lay beside him. My heart still racing as I tried to catch my breath, I couldn't resist Aidan's kisses as he lightly stroked my skin.
"Thank you, my amazing, beautiful Bel," he murmured, stretching as his head hit the pillow beside me.
"Shouldn't I be thanking you?" I responded lazily, my skin feeling pleasantly raw in places from the frenzied friction of ou
r lovemaking.
His laughter shook the bed. "I'm pretty sure you've expressed your loud appreciation already."
I blushed, feeling my already warm cheeks grow hot. "Am I too noisy?" I whispered, mortified.
Aidan turned, his face hovering above mine. "If you screamed for joy at the top of your lungs every time you came, you'd never be too loud for me, Bel. You'd only make me want to hear you scream again." He kissed my neck, lifting his leg to stroke mine beneath his.
His caresses had very little effect on him – nor did my hands help. He sat up. "A couple of hours, Bel, and I promise I'll be ready for you again. Is there anything you'd like to do while we're waiting?" He seemed on the cusp of saying more, but he didn't.
I shook my head, contenting myself with stroking the length of his red chest hair, from top to glorious bottom.
"On the Sundays I'm not working, I usually go up to the Distillery for lunch. Taste a whiskey or two and have something to eat…" He trailed off, his mouth still open. A moment passed before he continued. "I'd love to take you out to lunch, if you'll let me. I think you'd enjoy tasting the whiskeys, too, if you liked the one we shared last night." He looked worried. "But if you don't want to…"
I reflected. "I think you're right. I would like to." I summoned a smile that came easily to my lips. "But I think I'll need another shower and some clothes."
"Let me help you," Aidan offered eagerly.
I shot him a questioning glance.
His smile was broad, though I didn't trust it entirely. "Oh, this one will be very clean. Plenty of soap and this time we'll be in and out before the hot water runs out," Aidan promised.
Water and Fire Page 6