Medieval 03 - Enchanted

Simon asked in a low, intense
voice. “What is it? What drove you to me?”
    She simply shook her head and pressed even closer
to his body, fitting herself to him, giving herself to the dream
that had haunted her since she had lain in healing thrall and
learned that a man’s hands could bring comfort instead of
fear, pleasure instead of pain, ecstasy instead of nightmare.
    Closing his eyes, Simon fought against the fierce
rush of his desire. Of their own will, his arms contracted,
overlapping the edges of the mantle as he drew Ariane even nearer
to his body. Rather grimly he waited for her to realize what was
pressing against her belly.
    The feel of his wife’s hands settling most
carefully on the bulge growing beneath his breeches nearly brought
Simon to his knees.
    “I have dreamed of you, Simon. Have you
dreamed of me?”
    Surprise and desire hammered through him. He would
have spoken, but Ariane was measuring him full well with her hands,
taking away the possibility of thought, much less speech.
    Breath hissed between Simon’s clenched teeth
as he felt his laces coming undone. He knew he should protest,
should stop Ariane before she drove him over the edge of reason
with passion only half-slaked, but he couldnot
force himself to deny entry to her cool, searching hands.
    She found him, freed him, stroked him from blunt
satin tip to thick base and then beyond, cupping the aching flesh
that was drawn up so tightly with hunger that it was all Simon
could do to stand upright.
    Simon ordered his arms to push Ariane away, but
instead they contracted about her hips, bringing her even closer,
cradling her thighs hotly between his own. The part of his mind
that weighed and measured and reasoned expected Ariane to struggle
against the blunt sexuality of the embrace.
    Instead, Ariane pressed herself against Simon from
breast to thigh, moving slowly, caressing him with her whole body.
The erect flesh she held so lovingly leaped between her hands.
    “This is madness,” Simon hissed.
    “Yes.”
    “Give me your mouth.”
    “Yes,” she whispered.
    Simon bent to receive Ariane’s kiss, only to
feel her pulling away from the embrace.
    “No,” he said huskily.
“Don’t draw back.”
    “I must!”
    Clenching his teeth against words of
disappointment, Simon released Ariane completely, keeping only the
mantle around her.
    Immediately she slid down his body like a warm,
supple weight, vanishing entirely beneath the luxurious mantle.
    “Ariane? Are you feeling
fai—”
    Simon’s question ended in a gasp as her cheek
smoothed over his erect flesh. Her skin was cool from the wind and
her breath was warm from her body. It whispered over him in another
kind of caress as she turned her head from side to side, stroking
him. Then she caught him between her hands and brought him to her
mouth.
    “ Dear God ,”
Simon said thickly.
    His whole body tightened like a bow. Had it not
been for the stone wall against his back, he would have fallen.
Ariane’s mouth was hot, soft, wet, and her tongue was
endlessly curious.
    Simon took the wild loving as long as he could.
Then he sank the fingers of one hand into Ariane’s hair and
slowly, slowly, began to draw her head away from his body. She
resisted at first. He thought the sweet pressure of her mouth
tugging on him would be his undoing.
    In the end, Simon’s discipline and sheer male
strength won out over Ariane’s seductive caresses. But both
he and she were trembling by the time Simon drew her up his body
and buried his tongue hungrily in her mouth.
    The kiss was as abandoned as Ariane’s
caresses had been, a hot mating of tongues that left both of them
breathless, barely able to stand. Yet neither wanted to end the
kiss. Each clung harder, closer, deeper, while the wind whipped
Ariane’s hair into a seething black cloud.
    Beneath the mantle, Simon pulled off his gloves and
loosened silver laces until his fingers could slide beneath cloth
to touch Ariane’s breasts. The chill of his fingertips
against Ariane’s warmth served to heighten the intensity of
the caress, tightening her nipples in a dizzying rush. She moaned
deep in her throat and swayed toward Simon, knowing only him.
    It was a long time before Simon could force himself
to release Ariane’s mouth. He leaned heavily against the
stone wall, caressing what he could reach of her breasts with
hungry fingers, breathing as though he had been in battle.
    “Simon?”
    “The rest of your laces,” he said
huskily.