At Althea's surprised look, the older woman shook her head. "It isn't the same thing, believe me. It isn't easy. People throw up all sorts of barriers because they fear rejection. That they are going to be found lacking as compared with some unknown standard of perfection. But just because you want to try to live up to this unknown standard doesn't mean you compromise who you are. No one has the right to force you, do you understand? Even if he is your husband."
"He's never forced me. He didn't force me the first time, he doesn't force me now. I meant, I want to be, well, more alluring."
She nodded. "Self-confidence is a big part of the allure. If you're happy in your body, chances are he will be as well."
She blushed, but asked, "Will you teach me?"
"So you're asking me to not just educate you on the biological side, but on the sensual side as well?"
Althea nodded, feeling more confident already. "Yes, I think so. If you can. I know it's a lot to ask, but you've been married twice and you seem very, well, fulfilled, content as a wife and person. I want to make him happy."
"And yourself at the same time?"
"Yes, both. Even the Bible sees nothing wrong with that sort of pleasure within wedlock."
Eswara grinned. "My dear, by the time I'm finished with you, he'll never even recall the name or face of any other woman he's ever met."
Althea smiled eagerly. "Yes, that's what I want."
"Then be patient, learn well, and you shall have your heart's desire in the end. If you really love him."
"I do really love him," Althea said with a tender smile.
"Good. Come, let's get some pictures to show you."
All too soon the clock struck six, and Althea started up, blushing. "l must go. But I wonder if I could-"
"Come again Thursday and we can go over this again, and teach you more. And we shall have my son Ash teach you some simple self-defense techniques. They might come in handy should you ever end up in another dire situation with a man who's violent or won't take no for an answer. I know you and Matthew both fear you being attacked again. No harm will come to you if you have the power."
"Thank you. You've helped me so much, you have no idea." She hugged her hard.
"I do. I was a very young bride once too, you know. It was only older, more experienced women who helped me understand it all. It was a good first marriage, but now that I'm older and more canny, my second one is so much better."
"And do you-" She blushed.
"What?"
"Well, do you and your husband subscribe to the notion that it should only be done once a week? My husband says-"
"Every couple is different. You need to adjust to each other's level of need. Sometimes none is required. Other times you might be forced to compromise. If you want to be with him more, or less, you need to admit it.
"If you want him more, and he is reluctant, you'll have to take matters into your own hands one way or the other. Usually it's the man who's more libidinous, but just because he lusts doesn't mean he knows what to do with it. In what I have taught you, the Tantra, it's a case of making time for the other person, each other. If you can only manage it once a week, fine. If you can manage it more often, even better. But it shouldn't be about frequency. It is supposed to be about treating the other person with reverence."
"That sounds lovely."
"And it doesn't have to be full intercourse to be thrilling. The important thing is caring for one another. Sexual fulfillment as part of being at one with the universe. With God."
She stared in surprise. "With God?"
"Certainly. Are not all the joys as well as sorrows of the world provided by him?"
She coloured to the roots of her hair. "Yes, yes, they are. I lost sight of that in my anger over what happened to me. My wondering how the Lord could have let me be used so cruelly."
"You've been tried in a crucible of fire. The elements within you have all blended, and rendered you a new person. Not least because your life and Matthew's have merged and fused. You are now one flesh. Mind and soul too if you can get past the fear. If you can have faith in one another. But first you need to have it in yourselves."
Althea's face brightened a little. "Yes, I would like to, very much."
Eswara stroked her shoulder soothingly. "Today I've set you on the path to seek yourselves. To know yourself, and to know him better. I can't speak for your husband, but it would be good if you could try to teach him as I am going to teach you."
"Me, teach him? But I have so much less experience in these matters--"
"Educate him about you."
"Oh, I see."
"It won't be easy. Men are reluctant to discuss their feelings, or to analyse them. They feel things very deeply but try to shove them way down into themselves, and they can be very hard to reach. Unless of course they explode uncontrollably, usually in a fit of anger.
"But I don't think you need to fear that from Matthew. Your husband sounds like a good man, for all he's been a rake. He's been fleeing from something. You need to get him to stop running and slow down. Grasp the significance of the momentous thing that's happened to him."
"Which is what, exactly?" Althea asked in confusion.
Eswara smiled. "The sacredness of uniting his life with yours. It can be the greatest blessing if only he will leave himself open to it. Not fear it."
Althea stared at Eswara in surprise. "Does he fear me all the time? Is that why?"
"He fears himself, and his own power. As well as yours, of course. And he will confide his other fears to you."
"Like being worried he will turn out to be like his own father?"
Eswara raised her brows. "Tell me."
Althea took a sip of tea, and recounted what Matthew had told her that afternoon.
"Yes, that would be one of his fears. That and hurting you," Eswara said at the end of the sorry tale.
Althea's eyes widened. "But he would never-"
"Perhaps not. But your love for him gives him the power to do so. Intentionally or unintentionally. He actually fears the latter more. But if there is no love, there can be no hurt. You do love each other, or else you would not have come here to myself and Blake for help. If you trust to that, the rest, we can teach you as we go along."
"Thank you, Eswara. I'll come see you again on Thursday."
"I shall look forward to it."
Chapter Fourteen
Matthew had borrowed one of Blake's carriages to take his wife home, and enjoy a leisurely drive so they could have a chance to talk, grow more mentally intimate, even if not physically, though after all the doctor had told him, he ached for her with a passionate intensity bordering on agon.
On the way back from Millcote, Matthew asked how Althea was, fearing the worst even as she did so. "What did she say?"
To his infinte relief she looked up at him and smiled brightly. "She says I'm fine. No injuries physically, all the signs of addiction lifted. I'm still grieving for my poor father, which tends to make me sad, but other than that, all is well. There's no reason why we can't enjoy conjugal relations, and she gave me some, er-"
"Sponges?" he guessed with a small laugh.
She nodded. "And some other things to help make it easier."
He sighed. "I should know all this, try to be a better lover-"
"It's not your fault, not entirely. I also need to let you know what I want. For example, I adore it when you kiss me, but you do it so seldom."
"That's because it's like wildfire rushing though me when I do," Matthew admitted with a shaky laugh.
"Surely that's a good thing."
He shook his head. "Not if I want to avoid hurting you."
She squeezed his hand. "I'm healthy and strong. The doctor said so. Oh, and I adore it when you kiss my breasts." She lifted his hand to her bosom, but he started and tried to pull back.
"It's all right. You're allowed to touch me, don't you see? I'm a grown and desirous woman."
"Yes, I suppose you are at that,"
he said with a grin as she put his other hand around her waist.
"Now kiss me, Matthew."
He began to shower her face with little light kisses, but soon he pulled away and sighed. "You must be tired after the journey and visit to the doctor. I don't want to take any more advantage-"
"I'm asking you to touch me, kiss me, love me on the seat of this carriage if that's what you want," she said in a sultry murmur. "Be spontaneous, I believe the phrase is."
"I know, but the driver-"
Althea recalled what Eswara had said about making time for each other.
"All right, if not now, then how about this evening? We'll set apart a few hours before bedtime to kiss and cuddle and do whatever feels nice. Is that a bargain?"
"Hours? More like five seconds when I'm around you."
"Then let me help you."
"Help me?" Matthew echoed in confusion, staring at his wife in amazement. "But you're, well, you were, a virgin. Until I got hold of you and did the unthinkable--"
She gripped his hand hard. "You know a lot about me, about women." She blushed. "Teach me about yourself. Let me learn what pleases you."
"My dear, you aren't a professional or a bad woman, you're my wife," he said, mildly shocked at her request.
Althea lost patience then at his double standard. "What I am supposed to do, Matthew? Just stumble onto what you enjoy by sheer luck, am I? Play blind man's bluff with your genitals until I hit the right spot that makes you happy?"
"Althea!" he gasped in outrage.
"Well, I've just told you what I like. You haven't done either of them. I'm trying to be honest here. What else do you want me to do to make things right between us?" she wailed, near tears.
"You're right. I'm sorry. So sorry." He pulled her close to him, brushing her peachy soft skin with his hand as he began to kiss her again, her eyelids, nose, her cheeks, and finally her mouth. "The trouble is it's too right between us, for all it started out so wrong."
"There is no right and wrong, darling, there's just this..." she breathed, before melting against him completely.
Their senses soared as her lips parted and his tongue twined silkily along his. Matthew was sure he would be driven mad as she peeped the tip along his bottom lip, which she drew into her mouth. His hands cupped her breasts with tender urgency and he could feel her nipples jutting into his palms eagerly.
Her hands stroked down his hard cheeks, neck and chest. She clung to his shoulders as they jounced over a rut in the road. By now she was in his lap, and the contact was excruciating against his manhood. The need to feel her around him was so profound he threw all caution to the winds, and raised her skirts above her knees. He tugged at the tapes of her drawers and drew the lacy knickers down, then pressed her back onto the seat.
Althea marvelled at his urgency, but it was equal to her own. Her arousal had been triggered by their contact in the garden, and the thrilling things Eswara had told her about pleasing her husband and herself.
Eswara had been right about one thing. It was a great deal easier without him using any protectors, and she opened to him like a flower to the rays of the sun. She deepened their kiss, drawing his tongue right into her mouth and sucking lightly.
As his hands scooped her closer to him, pressing on the small of her back, she could feel herself soaring. She gasped into his mouth at the huge pressure building inside her body, radiating right out to her toes.
Suddenly the most magnificent display of fireworks sparked off in her head. She pulled him closer, his buttocks clenching fiercely under her cupped palms as he drove to his own climax.
Matthew was terrified by the forceful rushing sensations, but couldn't have stopped even if he had wanted to. His need for Althea was so acute it trammelled over all other considerations, even those of preventing conception.
But as his ardour cooled and his senses returned, so too did his feeling of disgust with himself and how he'd treated her. He tore himself from her soft twining limbs as though he had been scorched, and shoved himself into the far corner of the seat as though he couldn't bear to be near her.
She stared at his defensive posture, and her heart sank. Near tears, she twitched her garments back into place and said quietly, "I'm sorry if that was terrible for you. I do want to learn, try to make you happy."
"Don't you see! I can't be trusted!" he exploded, pounding his fist against his own chest like a self-flagellant. "Can't you see what I'm capable of?"
Her eyes widened. "But we're married! There's nothing wrong with taking comfort from each other."
He snorted in derision. "There is no comfort, don't you see? I deserve none! Not after what I've done!"
Althea stared at him, completely at a loss. "What have you done, darling?" she asked gently.
"T-t-took you when you were t-t-tied up. Had to m-m-marry you to save your reputation. And because I still throb with yearning for you, no matter how many times I, well, I--"
"Enjoy me?" she supplied with a small lift in spirits.
He nodded, though his expression was anything but joyful.
In fact, she had never seen her gloriously handsome cousin, now husband, in such a state before in his life, stammering, angry, utterly at a loss.
She pressed the palms of her hands together and counted to ten, another sage piece of advice Eswara had given her. She also recalled what the older woman had said about men not being able to handle their emotions very well, but that clearly whatever this display was, it meant he cared.
She gave her most encouraging smile, and said, "In that case, the only thing you've done, darling Matthew, is made me happy as well as yourself. Satisfied both of our desires."
She stayed one trembling hand as he tried to refasten his clothes, and in a fit of daring, touched him intimately. His sucked-in breath was one of both delight and dismay as he began to harden anew.
"Oh, no, please. You shouldn't-"
"I want to. You're so handsome. Like a classical statue. Why should I not wish to-"
"And I'm no use to you now anyway. I'm completely s-s-spent and-" he stammered, though his body certainly told a different tale.
"It doesn't have to be 'useful', as you put it. That makes it sound like a garden implement."
They both giggled, and Matthew looked away and covered his eyes.
"Does it feel nice?"
"Mm, lovely."
Despite his words, he was already nearly ready for action once more.
"Well, I like touching him because he's a part of you, and I love all of you.There are some things I would change, such as this incessant need of yours to protect me, darling. But on the whole, I have no complaints about our marriage. Except about you being high-handed and making decisions for us which by rights we ought to make together. I really am well, even if still very sad. You can't expect me to be the happy little child you used to push on the swing and take out boating, but there are other joys we can share. Even more remarkable ones now that we're man and woman."
She had inched right over to him on the seat, and put her head on his shoulder once more.
He nodded. "Yes, there are at that. And a great number of compensations in being married, have to admit. I can't tell you how strange and how thrilling it is to see you day after day, know you're in the house, in the bedroom next door to me. That I can see you any time I like, be with you."
She gave a teasing pout. "Does that mean you're taking me for granted?"
"Not at all."
"Then why avoid me if it makes you so happy?"
He stroked her blond curls and sighed. "I'm too happy. I can't trust myself, or you, don't you see? I'm afraid you're going to come to hate me."
She shook her head vehemently. "Only when you withhold yourself from me. The time we're apart. Otherwise..." She pulled his head down for one of their ravishing kisses, and there it was again, that incredible sense of delight as they melded into each other.
"No, really, we mustn't," Matthew gasped a short time later in a near pan
ic.
"Why not? Why do their have to be any rules?"
She slipped into his lap and after a few hesitant tries surrounded him and gasped as she slid down the full impressive length. Already the hot blush of love flooded her features in the twilight filtering in through the carriage window.
She felt completely in thrall to the exquisite sensations of the rocking of the coach as he pulsed inside of her with a steady throb. The movement over the potholes and ruts was compelling enough to leave them poised tightly, yet relaxed enough to see where the unique journey would take them.
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