Into the Goodnight

The position was extremely discomforting, making her feel more vulnerable than before. He hugged her thighs with one of his arms, effectively keeping them tight together and pressing the backs of them to his torso. Aurelia didn't know what he intended to do, but surely men and women did not couple in such a fashion. But she was wrong, clearly, as when he seemed satisfied that he had her securely restrained against him, he began moving in and out of her once more.

Aurelia waited for the pain or the pleasure, but neither really came. Not much of anything really came. Her thighs were effectively shielding off the little button of delight Maks had been previously playing with, leaving it bereft of sensation. She meant to tell him, to instruct him that he was no longer pleasuring her, but when her eyes found his, she knew instantly that Maks was all too aware what little this position did for her. He was using her body but denying her that something spectacular. She wiggled, or at least attempted to, but his grip around her thighs was as strong as a chain, and there was no use further wrestling the point—or him.

Aurelia glared at him as his pace gradually quickened, and though she should have been rabidly angry with him, there was something so incredibly alluring about his expression as he returned her heated gaze and pumped aggressively into her body. Maks almost appeared as if in pain and his panting evolved into rough growls. The sound of his body slapping against hers reverberated through the quiet room, but she had no mind to be embarrassed by it. His hips became erratic and fast and hard against her, and then he was jerking and growling powerfully as she felt her womb fill with something more than just his shaft.

He let her legs fall apart then and collapsed on top of her, panting heavily from the exercise. His breath rushed out against her neck and she could feel the hardness of his heavy chest expanding repeatedly against her. For her part, Aurelia lay stunned beneath her recovering husband. Her skin was still buzzing like a bee's agitated wings and she felt hot and sore and good and needy.

Panting wildly she asked between gasps, "What was that?" Then she bolted up right, only mildly wincing at the tenderness deep inside her sex. "You did that on purpose!" she exclaimed, anger replacing the previous sort of passion. "You kept it all for yourself!"

Maks too, was obviously heavily affected from his efforts, but was also blissfully sedated, and so lay breathing rapidly with his eyes closed. Her tantrum was disrupting the tranquility swimming through him. "Shh," he hushed Aurelia, quickly wrapping an arm around her and bringing her back down to lay against him.

But she simply struggled against his heaving chest. "Let go of me."

Maks seemed content to ignore her as he slowly recovered his breath. When Aurelia thought he was drifting to sleep, he suddenly let go of her and left the bed.

Aurelia felt the rush of cold air replace his heated body, but would die before she asked him to return to her. Whatever he was doing in the secrecy of the dimly lit room, he was silent about it, and as she felt the bed dip with his weight, she started to roll away from him, intent on giving him her back in clear displeasure. But a strong hand on her thigh kept her from turning over. She wondered if he meant to tend to her pleasure, but when she felt the wet warmth of a cloth press against her inner thighs moving up to her injured sex, she realized he must have retrieved something to clean the sticky blood and semen she could just sense on her skin.

"Leave me alone," she huffed, attempting to pull away, but his hand only tightened on her hip, keeping her in place.

"Stop that," he chastised softly, and by the one candle used the cloth thoroughly between her thighs and the folds of her tender sex. With a soft splat, he tossed it to the floor and resumed his position, wrapping an arm around her.

Aurelia lay in his arms, her ire stewing away. It robbed her of her peace and when she could no longer hold her frustration in, she let him have it. She pushed herself back up to glower down at him. "You used me," she accused crossly. "You lured me to bed with the promise of 'something spectacular,' but then kept it back for yourself."

An irritating smirk quirked up the corner of one side of his mouth, confirming her suspicions. "What did you expect?" he asked, still not opening his eyes. "You couldn't keep that little mouth shut. Wouldn't stop trying to goad me into doing something. And then you tried to insult me." He opened his eyes on her then and sat up, forcing Aurelia back. She frowned when his arm snaked around her waist, drawing her against him, pressing her chest against his. "Think I should reward such behavior?"

She opened her mouth, no doubt to argue for herself, but couldn't get a word out as Maks suddenly twisted them around so that she lay beneath him once more. His torso was draped over her as he unhurriedly studied her in the dim glow of the single candle. She was clearly irritated with him, but she was also containing her anger, her jaw clenching and unclenching as her eyes darted from his curious ones to the wall or just the empty spaces of black that filled their tiny house.

His small smile was teasing. "Come, come now, little bud, you're not going to stay angry with me, are you?"

"Think you can punish me?" she returned tersely.

Maks leaned down, his face rubbing against hers, sending shivers down her spine, her nipples rehardening. His lips grazed the sensitive curve of her ear. "Yes," he whispered.

Enraged, Aurelia puffed up and started to fight him off, but Maks proved too quick and far too strong to allow her to slip from his grasp. "Now, now, little bud, behave yourself." His body was pressed fully on her, his hands holding both hers next to her head." Despite herself, Aurelia felt a surge of desire, and couldn't stop the soft moan as a wave of pleasure tidalled through her.

Maks smiled, not quite pleasantly, but not entirely evilly either. He leveled his gaze with her. "If you promise to draw back your claws, I'll reward you with what your body needs. But your attitude must go; it has no place between us."

For several long moments they stared challenging at each other. Aurelia warred in herself, so accustomed to bowing to no man, but so desperate for the fulfilment of his promise.

"Fine," she huffed at long last, anger lacing need.

But Maks raised that challenging brow again, not allowing even the smallest amount of dissension. It was that very implacability that she had never encountered in anyone her whole life that made her finally yield. And when she gave herself up, she felt all the resentment evaporate and found herself nodding in concession. A vulnerability lingered along the spaces the fleeting anger and bitterness left behind, but all unease vanished when Maks smiled warmly at her.

"Good, bud," he murmured in praise a moment before his lips found hers, touching her with the softest of caresses. There was a moment's pause before Aurelia let out a sigh and opened her mouth to his gentle prodding. The kiss was slow, languorous, as his tongue stroked against hers. A gentle balm to soothe all her prickles away. Maks growled appreciatively when Aurelia's hands slid over his shoulders and pressed herself against him. The kiss grew in fervor as he rebuilt the embers of her passion.

Maks' hand moved from its position at her breast down the contours of her stomach, over a hip bone and into the curls shielding her sex. Aurelia was quick to lift her hips to him, a thigh falling to the side to open her sensitive body to him.

"So eager for me, my little bud," Maks teased her between his dizzying kisses.

"Yes, please," Aurelia admitted before she could guard her desires. She was rewarded with a pinch to that excruciatingly sensitive nub, the sharp pleasure causing her to moan loudly into his mouth. Maks continued slipping his fingers along her exceedingly wet slit, but when his finger entered her still very tender tunnel, she hissed in pain and he mercifully withdrew. He rubbed and stroked, pinched and rolled the other places of her sex, teaching her the many sensations that small part of her body was capable of under the right hand.

Gradually, Maks focused more and more attention on the aching kernel that seemed like a reservoir of all pleasure. It wasn't long before Aurelia's breath came out in a steady stream of whimpers and moans in response. She called to him then, called his name in a needy and frightened voice, to which he shushed her lovingly. Maks lifted himself up on an elbow to gaze down at her flushed cheeks and face filling with the burden of pleasure.

"That's it, my little bud, come for me," he enticed with soothing tones, though the arousing effect of being the instrument of her orgasm was evident in his voice.

"Maks," she called to him again, beautiful pain marring her brow. Her hands pulled him back down to her, her lips kissing him wetly as she felt a great weight of pleasure build, starting at the magical little button he worked furiously and blossoming out like violent ripples from a stone dropped in water. Aurelia couldn't contain the moan that grew into a scream as the crushing weight overtook her senses, dragging her mind down into darkness while setting her flesh on fire.

She was vaguely aware of Maks murmuring things to her, but couldn't make sense of his words as he wrung the last possible drop of pleasure from her. She clung to him, allowing him to console her with soft kisses to her mouth and nose and eyes. He cradled her against him, holding her while she buzzed in darkness. She felt him drape a sheet over them, her skin suddenly too sensitive for the coarse fabric. But she was too numb, too far from the world to do anything about, and so stayed cuddled against his side.

Consciousness returned in stages. First the fact she looked at flame. That it was a candle. That she could feel Maks' body entwined with hers. That his lips were moving languidly on her neck. That he had misspoken, calling that spectacular. There were no words that could describe it. Name it. Contain it. She had died and been reborn. Like the myth of the red bird, she mused, burning up and then emerging from its own ashes. She moved experimentally, stretching into the remnants of the bliss still lacing through her muscles.

Maks reached over with some effort and extinguished the single flame. They settled together, a new intimacy now forged fostering a relative ease as he wrapped his arm around her, drawing her spent and naked form against him. The idea did surface in her mind that she should protest, but it was so...nice, the warmth continuing as skin met skin, his breath against her neck. And before any one particular reason could form as to why he should unhand her, she was asleep, deep and full.