by Ariel Atwell
He climbed onto her bed, lay back against the pillows, and stared at her, his blue eyes now shaded to dark pools of black in the candlelight. The bed, which had always seemed spacious to Laurence, suddenly seemed much too small.
“Come to me, Laurence,” he invited, and when she hesitated, he gave her a questioning look. “Or are you having second thoughts?”
“No, it’s just…I had not imagined you…it would be so large, and I don’t think we’re going to suit after all,” she blurted out.
“I promise you that we’ll suit just fine,” he said. “Now come here and allow me to show you how before I lose my mind with wanting you.”
Laurence was dubious, but Matthew seemed quite sure of himself, so she joined him on the bed, her earlier self-consciousness coming back in full force.
“I am ashamed at being ignorant about such things at my age,” she said.
He took her in his arms. “Shall I confess something?”
“If your confession is anything like mine was, it’s going to be quite an evening,” she said drily, casting a skeptical look at his erection, and he grinned.
“Nothing nearly so dramatic as that, I promise,” he reassured her. He lifted each of her hands in turn and placed a kiss on the knuckles, and when she looked into his eyes she saw desire, but also uncertainty. “I want you very much, but I am quite mindful of the fact that this will be your first time, and I am quite terrified that I will disappoint you.”
She felt something move deep within her heart at his words.
“You are terrified?” she asked doubtfully. “I did not think that was possible, for you are among the most confident of men.”
“I would have said the same of you before this night,” he said lightly. “Now, where were we? Right here I think.” And when his hands went back in that sensitive spot between her legs where she pleasured herself, she was unable to conceal her reaction.
“That’s it, my love, show me exactly what you like,” he said, stroking and playing with her tender flesh until she was nearly wild with need. “Ah, Laurence, I wish you could see how beautiful you look right now, with your lovely slit glistening and flushed the color of a raspberry. I’m going to put my finger inside you very slowly, and you must tell me if I hurt you.”
“You need not treat me like a fragile piece of glass that might suddenly shatter,” she said, panting.
“But I want you to shatter. That is the whole point,” he said, carefully sliding a long forefinger deep inside her. He kissed her, his tongue mimicking the movements he made as he caressed her vagina. Her hips rose up, drawn like a magnet toward his touch, and as the tightness began to build, she realized she was no longer in control of her body, but hurtling somewhere both fantastic and mysterious.
“You feel so beautiful here, just like satin.” He flicked his thumb against her clitoris, and she cried out, her hips thrashing up against his hand.
“I think you are ready for more,” he said, neatly sliding a second finger into her channel and doubling the wicked sensations while using his palm to press against the tiny nub of sensitive flesh at the top of her wetness.
“You are driving me mad, Matthew,” she cried out. “Please do what you would do for I cannot stand it any longer.”
“Ah, Laurence, you have no idea how much I want to be inside you. But you are so tight, I fear I will explode in the first moment and that will be no good for you.” He bit her nipple softly and sensations rippled through her body like a burning fever.
“Imagine how good it will be when my cock is filling you and pleasuring you the way that my fingers are now,” he said.
“I am well past wanting to rely on my imagination, Matthew,” was her response. “I don’t want to wait any longer.”
“I will try my best not to hurt you, I swear,” he vowed. With one hand, he spread her legs, and she felt the soft knobby head of him against her entrance. There was a moment of intense pressure followed by a sharp pain. From somewhere she heard him groan, and then she cried out as he filled her with his unyielding hardness, his body stabbing hers back into the mattress. She had imagined what it might be like to have sexual relations with a man but never anticipated the feeling of utter fullness and the unmistakable sense that she had been changed by him in some indefinable way.
“You are so deliciously tight that I can hardly bear it,” and she heard the intensity of his tone. “Please tell me that you are all right.”
“I am not sure,” she said honestly, but as the words came out she felt the pain easing as her body adjusted. The burning soon subsided, replaced by a different kind of heat.
“Is it too much? Shall I pull out?” he asked, nuzzling her neck with his mouth.
She clenched her legs around him, feeling the sensations intensify in the most pleasurable way. “No, please don’t.”
He lifted his head to look at her, his blue eyes as sharp as lightning bolts.
“Then how about this?” He pulled himself partially out of her and then pushed back in, and she moaned. “Enjoy the feel of my cock, for it has no other reason to exist at this moment except to worship and pleasure you.” He grasped her buttocks in his hands and drove into her again, this time more firmly, his hard root striking against her sensitive nub. The sensation was unexpected and exquisite, and she cried out.
“Matthew, oh…”
“You wanted it, now take it all, every hard inch,” he ordered, stroking her again and again until she was beyond rational thought, her body writhing mindlessly against his erection.
She felt herself drawing closer to the edge, and he kissed her deeply, his hips continuing their rhythmic tattoo against hers. When he reached his hand around and ran his finger down the cleft of her bottom, the sensations overwhelmed her at last, and she screamed out her release. He was not far behind her, and she felt his body tense.
“Yes, oh yes,” he cried, pulling himself from her body as a white liquid poured onto her stomach. When he had spilled his last drop, he curled her body into his and laid his head against hers, his breathing harsh.
She couldn’t move as the pleasure reverberated through her body.
After several moments, he stirred, rising from the bed. She heard him rustling around, and he returned with a dampened towel from her basin to wipe the evidence of his passion from her body.
“Are you all right, then, Laurence?” she heard him say. “Do you think we suit?”
She opened her eyes to meet his smiling gaze.
“I am much better than all right. So much better.”
It was the truth. After a lifetime of lies, how good it felt to tell it.
“I think we might suit.”
Chapter Nine
Afterward, they lay together, and with her head against his chest, she shared everything. About her mother, her uncle who was really her father, and the lie that had begun on the very first day of her life. He asked many questions, and she held nothing back. The story had been bottled within her for so long it felt good to finally speak aloud about what she had never said before, to confide secrets she had never trusted to anyone. After what felt like forever, they both fell silent, her head against his chest listening to the steady sound of his heartbeat.
“I cannot understand how your mother could do such a thing,” he said at last.
“She had no family and no money and felt herself fortunate to be the mistress of a wealthy man. Her role, as she saw it, was to give him whatever he wanted so he would take care of her. That is what she did.”
“To sacrifice you in that way—” he began, but she stopped him.
“What sacrifice was it to live in a fine house, attend the best schools, and receive training to work in a profession that I love? Would I have been better off as the daughter of a woman in a bawdy house? Or working as a maid? All for the dubious pleasure of wearing skirts?” She shook her head. “I don’t think so.”
“You misinterpret my words.”
“I don’t want your pity,” she shot back. �
��That is not why I told you my story.”
“Then why have you confided in me? What do I have to offer you?” he asked.
“Having you here…” Her voice trailed off. “I had not realized how empty my life was until you came.”
“I am someone to keep you company, then. A sort of companion.” He didn’t sound pleased.
She sat up on the bed and looked down at him. How odd that there was a man in her room, lying there unclothed among her things. Even in the candlelight, the darkness of his hair stood in sharp contrast to the white fabric of her bed sheets. If she had ever seen a more handsome man, she could not recall it. But now he was frowning.
“What is it that you wish for me to say, Matthew?” she asked. “You hold the advantage over me for I have little experience in what goes on between men and women, particularly in circumstances such as these.”
“This is not an everyday occurrence for me either,” he said, running his fingers through his hair in frustration. “I still feel like a damned idiot for not seeing your beauty. For not somehow sensing that you were a woman. Or perhaps I did without realizing it,” he mused. “Maybe that is why I found your company so delightful, yet felt it such a torment to be with you.”
His compliment took her by surprise, and she took refuge where she could find it. “You need not flatter me. I know I am nothing to look at, nor do I care about being so,” she said dismissively.
“You won’t even allow me to pay you a compliment?”
“That’s not what this is about.”
“What is it about, then? Is it an agreeable law partner you seek? Someone with whom to share lodgings or drink a glass of port before the fire when there is a chill in the air?”
Once again she felt helpless to answer his questions. “All I know is that this has been the most extraordinary night of my life, and I don’t wish for it to end,” she said honestly.
“It has been for me as well,” he said. Pulling her toward him, he kissed her until her head was spinning. When the kiss ended, he tucked her head against his chest.
“Perhaps our friendship is enough for you, but it won’t be for me, Laurence,” she heard him say, his voice rumbling through his chest where she lay her head. “It may well be madness, but I want more. I want you. I want all of you.”
She listened to the steady thump of his heartbeat and pondered his words as she drifted off to sleep. He wanted her. All of her. What on earth did that mean?
Chapter Ten
Before she opened her eyes, Laurence knew it was not going to be an ordinary morning. She could hear the familiar sound of birds chirping just outside her window. Less familiar was her body pressed against something very hard and deliciously warm. Not just something but someone.
Matthew. Her eyes flew wide open as she remembered.
“At last, the lady awakens.”
She looked up from her pillow, and her gaze settled upon him in all of his masculine beauty. His dark hair was disheveled from where she had run her hands through it the previous evening. But his eyes shone as crisply blue as always.
“Oh my,” she said, gazing at him. What must she look like right now? And why was she suddenly worrying about such a trivial thing?
“That isn’t exactly what a man hopes to hear from the lips of a lady in a situation such as this,” he said.
“It is to be expected when a lady has never before found herself in such compromising circumstances,” she retorted. “Or thought of herself as a lady, for that matter.”
He chuckled. “I can attest to the fact that the man in question is just as surprised as the lady to find himself here. So what shall we do about it?”
It was in that exact moment that Laurence realized the object that was pressing so firmly against her hip was in fact his fully erect cock. The very same cock that had brought her such enjoyment just a few short hours ago. When she shifted her leg, he groaned.
“It sounds as if you might be in need of some very specific assistance, sir,” she said gravely, deliberately rubbing herself against his hardness.
“What I need is to be back within your gorgeous body.” Before she knew it, she was flat on her back against the feather mattress, her legs spread, his fingers exploring the satiny folds of flesh at the apex of her thighs. “So beautifully ready for me.”
He entered her in one deep slide, and she gasped at the feel of him against her newly tried flesh.
“Tell me if I am hurting you, for you feel so wonderful I cannot stop myself from having you again,” he murmured, pressing tender kisses against her cheek and brow.
“There is no need to stop,” she reassured him. “I love the way it feels when you are inside of me.”
“Thank you for taking me again.” He kissed her, his hands and mouth caressing her in rhythm with the motion of his cock as he stroked in and out of her body. Holding her hips with both hands, he tilted her up until he was fully embedded within her. “Oh God, it’s so good. You are so good.”
She could tell by the increasing pace of his thrusts that he was growing more excited, and his enjoyment fueled her own passion. So when he suddenly pulled out of her a few moments later, she gave a little moan of protest.
“I won’t last long if we continue this, and that will not do at all.” She watched as he gathered up a blanket and thrust it beneath her hips, fully exposing her most private places to him.
“What are you…” she began to ask.
“Shhh,” he said. “You will like this, I promise.”
He lowered his head, and before she could react, his lips touched the core of her in a shockingly intimate kiss beyond her wildest imaginings.
“You shouldn’t, you must not,” she protested, seeking to push him away.
He looked up at her. “Laurence, you are undoubtedly the most brilliant, beautiful, and capable woman I have ever met. But right now, at this minute, you need to lie back and allow me to have my wicked way with you.”
“But…”
“Dammit it, woman, for once would you do what you are told?” he growled, and she retreated.
“Fine, but I won’t enjoy…oh…oh…oh yes,” she breathed as his flicked the tip of his tongue against that place where she pleasured herself at nights. And then he was licking her until she could no longer control her moans. Without lifting his mouth from her body, he grasped both her hands and put them on top of his head, showing her how she could enhance her own enjoyment by exerting pressure.
Again and again, she felt herself coming close to the edge but unable to reach that pinnacle despite all that he was doing, and she nearly sobbed with frustration as her fulfillment slipped from her grasp each time.
Sensing her need, Matthew slid a finger into her moist channel, continuing to ravish her with his mouth while stimulating the sensitive nerves inside her.
“Oh yes, yes,” she cried, as she reached her peak at last.
“My turn,” he said, rising up to again fill her throbbing body with his hard length.
With his kiss, she tasted herself on her lips and wanted to die with mortification, but he gave her no chance, thrusting harder and faster into her willing flesh. He stiffened and with a deep groan, lifted himself from her, spilling his seed outside her body.
He fell back against the pillows, panting heavily, and she lay back as well, enjoying the afterglow of the pleasure they had given each other.
After a few moments, he looked over at her. “Laurence, my love?”
“Yes, Matthew?” she said drowsily.
“Will you marry me?”
All at once, she was wide awake. “You cannot be serious.”
“Once again, not what a man hopes to hear from the lady in his bed.”
Sitting up, she pulled the covers nearly to her chin, as if they would offer some protection from the audacity of his words.
“Why on earth would you wish to marry me?” she asked, utterly confounded. “Have you gone mad?”
“If I have, it is because you are making me so,
” he said. “But more to the point, I am not in the habit of having marital relations with women I am not planning to marry—particularly virgins. Most particularly virgins who go about dressed as men. I would not have dishonored you this way had I not intended to offer you marriage.”
“I am nearly fifty years of age. Much too old for you,” she said.
“You are barely forty, and your age means naught to me,” he said dismissively.
“A man cannot marry another man,” she said.
“As we have proven last night and again this morning, you are not a man,” he pointed out. “You are a woman, an unmarried woman at that. And if you’ll forgive me for saying so, well past the age of consent. When we marry, you will no longer need to live this charade of being a man.”
“My life is not a charade,” she said sharply. “And I have no intention of becoming a wife.” She saw the hurt in his eyes and cursed herself for being so forthright.
“My apologies for offending you with my offer,” he said stiffly. He pulled back the covers and began to rise from the bed.
“Matthew, don’t leave like this.” She tried to grab his arm, but he shook off her hand.
“Like what?” he snapped, bending over to retrieve his clothing from the floor. Despite everything, she couldn’t help but admire his taut bottom and the way his muscles rippled across the backs of his powerful thighs.
“Like I have offended you and you hate me,” she said, unable to be anything but honest with him.
He turned around to look at her. “Dammit, Laurence, do you not understand anything? I cannot hate you, for I love you.”
His words flew toward her like the arrow from a bow, scoring a direct hit on her heart. She felt their impact like a physical blow to her body.
“You do?” she asked.
He nodded.
“No one…” She paused and swallowed. “No one has ever said those words to me before.”