by Gayle Eden
Sonja’s hands slid down his arms when he leaned back to view her. His silver mane was mussed by her fingers, and his nuzzling, his black rimmed eyes were slightly heavy and a darker lavender. The aristocratic bones of his face were enhanced by the sensual expression there.
Alexander shifted. She murmured some inane apology, seeing his torn shirt for the first time.
The sexual scoundrel in him was evident. He gave her a smile, showing himself a heavy-eyed, passionate, scoundrel. “Rip all you like, darling”
Teeth scraping her sensitive and tingling lower lip, she watched him turn and reach down, slipping her shoes from her feet. He cupped her ankle and skimmed up her silk stocking clad legs. “Gorgeous long legs. I suspected that.”
She wondered how much more she could take; already her body was afire and aching.
Sounding strange to her own ears, she managed, “Should I…should you take off your shirt.” Her tongue was too thick, her mind running too slow behind her coursing blood. She meant something that made more sense, surly.
Alexander glanced at her in a half smiling, half roguish way. He sat more up, undoing buttons and removing the shirt. Soon, her vision filled with a strong set of shoulders and chest, a torso that was honed and honey warm. Good lord, but he put men half his age to shame. His nipples were hard, dark peach and standing out on firm muscle. What a magnificent male he was. Sonja shivered.
Her hand reached out, not quite steady, and touched him, fingertips gliding over that velvet skin.
“Um. I like that.” He looked down, watching her fingers on him.
She liked his skin, the feel of it, and the scent of it.
Raising her eyes, Sonja observed his face as she lightly rubbed his nipples. Yes, she knew a few things, and it was a pleasure to watch him receive it so warmly. His eyes closed, savoring for seconds, before he was watching again.
“You’re a beautiful man.”
Those lavender eyes found hers a moment. “I’m pleased you think so.”
“Many women—think so.”
His gaze seared her, sexed and openly honest. “The only woman, who matters, is you.”
Alexander began touching her again, hand skimming once more. Her own strokes ceased a moment, palm resting flat on his muscled shoulder when Sonja realized his hand was further under her skirts, between her upper thighs and mere inches from her sex.
Those eyes met hers yet again. He searched openly, but not with urgency. It was more like an assuring of himself she was not pulling away emotionally.
Lost in his gaze, she relaxed her trembling limbs, enough so it was obvious he could move his hand.
Cupping the inside of her thigh, caressing higher, he whispered, “The warmth of a woman’s need, is truly a sensual thing.”
Alexander shifted more on his side and dipped his head, capturing a nipple, just before she felt his finger graze between her curls.
She made herself not tense. Sonja was relaxed. As much as she could be, discounting anticipation and a certain tinge of fear that she would lock down emotionally.
It became clear that she would not within seconds of the pad of his fingers gliding up and down between the folds. The hiss she drew in was because she was slick and moist, sensitive.
Sonja groaned, too pleasured to care how loud. Teeth bearing in her lip, her hands found his silken hair, holding him to that breast, hearing his grunt of pleasure at the move.
She sighed aloud, releasing some urgency unbeknown until his finger inched into her. The second by second by-play faded. The soft thrust of his touching her inside, did that. His finger eased deep inside of her sex, the thumb pressing and rubbing nerves between the lips. His mouth was still teasing her breasts and keeping her nipples incredibly hard and sensitive.
“Oh. God…” She moved subtly.
He lifted his mouth from her breasts and touched her lips, rubbing his mouth on them, slightly parted, like hers. Kissing the corner, Alexander murmured huskily, “So warm, so sleek and wet. Ah, Sonja…your body knows passion.” He held deep, while his thumb stroked between the lips. He reached for her hand, bringing it down, gliding under the pooled up skirts and letting her feel the heat. “Here, right here.” He guided the pad of her finger to stroke and circle those nerves.
Whilst she did so, completely caught up in the erotic atmosphere, he thrust slowly in and out of her sex. Breathing faster, shallower, she knew her climax was approaching. She trembled more. The tension mounted. The sense of place faded. Sonja released herself inwardly too, at a point of exquisite need.
“Alex...” She rasped.
His mouth found her nipple, his finger deep and snug inside of the contracting channel.
“Yes,” she breathed. The rise of that climax carried her beyond her body, higher and brighter. The ripples went through muscle and skin, radiating like melting sun. It was sexual, erotic, in an urgently explosive way. Sonja breathed heavily; feeling everything fall away, then slowly melt back together.
Lifting her lashes whilst her body still floated softly down, she received a kiss from Alexander, aware she was caressing his nape with her free hand, the other just easing from under her skirts.
He edged his finger out of her but slid back and widened her legs, dipping his head to lave between the curls his fingers parted for him...
She was incredibly wet now and ultra-sensitive to his tongue. It was intimate. It was sex. It was amazing—in more ways than she could vocalize. Utter a choking sound, the climax stole upon her. Sonja clutched at him whilst it rippled through. Even when he raised, laved his mouth and kissed her, she was still reeling.
Alexander moved back enough so that they could regard each other clearly. She discerned under his sensual smile and sleepy looking eyes, a tension similar to where she had been moments ago.
Sonja brought him toward her for a kiss, and then reached, sliding his hand away and moving herself from under him.
He lay on his side, watching her with apparent relaxation. However, she finished divesting herself of the gown, something he clearly did not expect. Alexander was sitting up, legs splayed and watching more intent when she rolled her stockings down and laid them with her shoes.
Sonja was nude now, completely uncovered to lavender eyes that started at her feet and moved up her long legs, over her hips and stomach, her breasts, unhurriedly.
It felt like a touch.
She could not know her hair was wildly mussed, her eyes glittering from pleasure, lips, almost pouty with satisfaction. Sonja was aware, of a sliver of anxiousness but ignored it. She padded to him and stood a moment, inches from his knees.
There was a minuscule tremble in her, true, but beyond that, deeper, was a need to unleash fully, to bring down the walls all at once. She was old enough, spent wasted years…and she had to know it all. She was prepared for pleasure. She wanted him. It was admission that had more meaning than ever before.
The visual of him, combined with scent and knowledge now stirred her to the core. He was sexually raw and earthy and finally, finally, that untapped part of her felt it drawing her, felt an instinctual and primal kind of hunger for him.
Dampening her lips, her hair sliding round, mussed, framing her face and shoulders in long black waves, breasts rising and falling on rigid breaths, Sonja heard herself say hoarsely, “Alexander. I want to see you. All of you.”
He did not hesitate. Alexander stood with graceful ease, close enough to kiss her, then stepping aside. His boots went first, trousers, soon after.
Her heart sped.
He turned in the firelight and faced her. A well-shaped man, strong of body, magnificent really, with smooth muscled flanks and rounded and firm buttocks. His waist was tight, stomach ridged. A glinting line of jet-black hair led to his sex.
Sonja swallowed several times, aware of avoiding that area, not out of fear but rather liking all of him and feeling a keen attraction, a kind of wonder, at what was hid under clothing. His silver mane sparked in the glint of firelight, eyes a true
lavender, aristocratic face made sensual by the kiss swollen mouth—and the mark of sexual desire on him.
Alexander walked toward her. She raised her hands the moment he touched his palms to her sides. On her tiptoes, her own landed on his shoulders.
“Do I please you, duchess?” he asked that in a whisper.
“Yes. Very much so.”
“You please me, my love. Beyond measure. My knees are bloody weak.” His kiss was soft and gentle, almost too careful.
Gliding her mouth across his hard cheek, she whispered in his ear, “Take me the rest of the way, Alexander. I want you. I want this, for the first time in my life, I feel like I need… desperately. I need you.”
A shudder worked through him. Alexander’s arms went round her for a moment. She felt the deep thud, thud, of his heart, the dew on his skin, before he turned, his arm around her spine, and guided those few steps back to the sofa.
“I want you in a bed,” he said more like a breath, but laid her beneath him, and stretched out his masculine frame, covering her. One of her legs bent near the back of the sofa, the other foot she rested on the floor. Sonja did not care what the surface was. His body was firm, hot, and she had never felt so much the woman, so sexual, having him covering her like that.
He kissed her and then entered her on a swift and full glide. He filled up every space, deeply embedding his sex. A sound came hoarse and deep from her throat, a gasp next, as the muscles in her sex rippled and squeezed against him.
His head arched back a bit. Sonja felt as if fire raced through her, a raging one. Hunger licked at her nerves, pleasure undulating, like waves.
Alexander began to thrust.
She arched up into it—tightly, tensely; it was enough and not enough. It was almost beyond enduring, as if her flesh were inside out, the nerves under skin sparked against skin.
“Oh yes. Yes.” Every subtle movement was just as intense. The deep feel of him stroking her sexually was like nothing she’d felt in her marriage certainly, where degradation and power was the purpose, and not during those two encounters. This was lust and want, it was Alexander, and her body craved his, loved his.
There were whispered words; she heard them, from herself, from him. However, they were nothing compared to sensation and feelings.
Her nails scraped his muscled back and when he thrust deeper, they stung his buttocks. Alexander’s arms trembled as he held himself up more. With every lift of her hips to him, she heard his teeth grit, the sound of it burning him, as his stroking did her.
He stopped, panted, and though tense and strung, shifted down to kiss her quickly. Feeling his bunched thighs quivering against hers, she held him when he would have pulled out. Seeing his eyes widen slightly, she managed a coherent; “Stay in me. There’s no concern of pregnancy.”
He collapsed for moments after his seed bathed her wonderfully inside, a shudder racking his frame and white teeth clamped tightly.
Stirring when she shifted under his weight, not from discomfort of that, but from his seed running onto the leather sofa, Alexander got to his feet, heading for the water decanter. She arose too and joined him taking the cloth napkin from him, wetting it to clean herself before handing it back.
Sonja drew on his half-torn shirt and poured herself a brandy. She was tender, of course. She could feel that now. It had been years. He was thick and filled her fully. She could deal with that for however long, considering the pleasure had been… incredible.
Her fingers still trembled with the rush of it all. Beginning to end, it had been incredible. She wanted…so many things. She wanted. That feeling alone was almost euphoric, considering she did not believe it possible to feel passion like that for someone, or even in her own body.
Letting the brandy slide down her throat to her belly, she closed her eyes a second, simply taking it all in.
In his trousers now, Alexander joined her on the sofa, knees splayed, spine slumped, while he sipped brandy and finger combed his hair.
“Why can’t you have children? Not that I mind. I am too old to start over. But, I want to know?”
She looked down in the glass. “The physician Albert hired, and swiftly kicked out, said that I was too young for relations at the start. Damage was done. He thought it could be cured, rest, certain herbs and other advice. But Albert had no intention of pampering me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“That’s only half the truth.” She shuddered and took a long, deeper, drink, before confessing, “One of the maids mixed something for me that prevented it. At my behest, no matter how cruel he got when an heir did not come for those first months or years. However, it also affected my cycles. I had incredible pain for months.
When, years later, I was free of Albert, It took some time for my body to feel normal. I was always tense and on guard whilst Albert lived. In any event, I would sweat and chill, feel faint. I sought out a midwife who was well respected. She told me my body was ceasing its ability to bear children. I was not fertile. I am honest enough to admit it did not bother me at all. I was never sure… I would be a fit mother. My own was…cold.”
He reached out and captured her hand. “You would. I have seen you with Eddie. But perhaps grandchildren are better.” He laughed low. “Certainly we would be a riot having one at my age.”
She stroked his hand with her thumb though had not looked at him yet. “You’re a good father.”
“To already grown children.”
“True.” She smiled softly.
“I like that smile. I enjoyed beyond words, making love with you.”
Sonja looked at him then. “I think you know I enjoyed it.”
“I do. But you can talk to me about it.”
She sighed and released a breath slowly. “From the kissing I was already swept up, sucked deeper into it, intoxicated by you, beyond words. I cannot take it apart moment by moment.” She shook her head. “I may, later. Now, I am light with relief and pleasure too. I feel as if I never have in my life. I feel…” She blinked, shocked, appalled, that her eyes were getting damp.
He brought her hand to his mouth and kissed it.
“I…. just feel… too much.” She whispered hoarsely.
Alexander’s arm went round her, pulling her to his side. He held her there and brushed his mouth across her brow. “I may have appeared the opposite, love. But I was excited beyond measure, once we were joined.”
She laughed softly.
He grinned, and kissed her brow again. “You take me apart, you know. I am not even going to excuse how brief it was, because I did well to last that long.”
She said, almost too quiet to hear, “I felt used before. I was used, in my marriage. Albert had others, maids and anyone he could force himself on, or make to service him. He liked resistance. I had to shut down… to get through… those things…”
“I’m so sorry, love.”
“I ached for you, though,” the words sounded like awe. “Even when you were inside me, I wanted to bring you deeper and deeper, to meld you to me.”
“I’m glad you feel that. I hoped you would. I lost myself a bit too, Sonja. It’s so much more for me than I’ve felt before.”
She was glad of that too, but simply held his hand tighter.
In time, Alexander arose and put the screen in front of the fire. He walked her not to his rooms, but to the guestroom. He lay with her through most of the night, holding her with neither of them sleeping much. He knew she was thinking then, replaying, and accepting her passion, and his.
At dawn he kissed her, intending to arise, though was not surprised to discover she was only dozing. Under the covers, her hands found him fully aroused. In the shadows, she whispered her intent so throaty, it nearly undid him. Alexander turned, helping her unlatch his trousers, letting her touch him, as she seemed to need to. He stroked her hair and whispered soft praise as her silken fist glided and her lips were at his throat.
He let himself float through the climax she summoned in a heady cloud,
the release all the sweeter because she gave it from her own need to touch him.
The exquisite intimacy with a woman was something he had missed. that it was the woman he wanted, cared for above all others—gave him a deeper sense of release, of satisfaction, and contentment.
She slept again. After cleaning himself, he went to his own bed. Sleeping four hours, Alexander then arose, bathed, shaved and had breakfast.
By the time he returned for a walk, she was coming down the stairs.
Alexander grinned, unknowingly looking years younger this morning whilst he regarded her in trousers and linen shirt, a buckskin coat over her arms, her knee-high riding boots on. She had on a derby hat!
“Where—”
“Johanna’s room.” She laughed breathless, then looking behind at her backside. “They’re a bit snug.”
He came up the stairs and cupped that round backside, biting her ear. “I like them. They feel perfect to me. Have you had breakfast?”
“Yes. In my rooms.” Her hand touched his shoulder in a caress. Her eyes were regarding his face, as if she were renewing in her mind, the intimacy of the night before. Alexander liked that too, very much.
Leaning back a bit, he asked, “Where were you headed?”
“To join you, but I’ve missed your walk.”
“Not at all.” He took her hand and walked with her, jesting with the servants, who grinned at them in passing.
He drew his outer coat on, and outside, they headed toward the woodlands.
“It smells wonderful after the rains.” Sonja had her gloves with her, as he did, but neither put them on. They still held hands. “I’m surprised I didn’t sleep all day.”
“We could ride.”
She cleared her throat.
Alexander looked at her a full moment, and then smiled so widely she turned away blushing.