Chapter 4 #2
“I’ll get the fire going to heat up some water for a bath,” he babbled, shoving kindling into the belly of the stove. Striking a long match against the flagstones, he asked, “Do you like it? The house, I mean. It’s fine if you don’t. I can change whatever you want, and the nest is—”
Mabel knelt down behind him. Wrapping her arms around his middle, she pressed her face between his shoulder blades. “It’s wonderful,” she whispered. “It’s so, so wonderful.”
Henrik sat back a little on his heels. Covering her hands with one of his, he sighed, “Good. It’s yours now.”
Summoning her courage, she whispered, “I know you’re exhausted, but…”
“But what, my blessing?”
“Will you share the bath with me?”
Henrik sucked in a deep breath. In a rough voice, he answered, “Aye, I will.”
They were both worn down after weeks of perilous travel and close calls, but none of that mattered.
Henrik fetched a massive copper tub and set it up in the middle of the living space before he went off to bring in water from an enclosed well off the kitchen.
Mabel found soft linens for drying and a large pot for boiling.
As the room was warmed by the roaring fire, so were they by the desire that simmered between them.
With every pot of steaming water they poured into the tub, the anticipation grew.
“You should get in first,” she offered, suddenly self-conscious.
Henrik nodded, but he didn’t begin to strip right away. Instead, he stepped around the steaming copper bath to settle his hands on her hips. “Let’s undress together,” he suggested. “That way we’re equal in this, as we are in all things.”
Mabel looked up at him. Her throat was tight with nerves when she whispered, “I’ve never done this before.”
“Aye, I guessed.” He stooped to press soft kisses to her cheeks and brow, tracing a path down to her lips. “There’s nothing to fear. What we do or don’t do, all that matters is that we’re together. If all we share is a bath, I will be happy.”
Mabel turned her head slightly, desperate to keep his lips and breath and skin near. “How do you have so much patience for me?”
“Because,” he whispered, fingers beginning to gently pull apart the layers of her scavenged clothing, “I’ve known the worst of the world. When the best stands in front of me, what complaints can I have?”
Her breath caught. Henrik’s hands, so callused and scarred, were careful as he slowly undressed her. Steam from the bath kissed the skin he exposed, and then so did he.
By the time he’d discarded his own clothing, her worries seemed small and unimportant. They certainly couldn’t stand up to the image of him, as tall and broad as a mountain, standing nude before the fire.
Slate gray skin criss-crossed with scars stretched over thick slabs of warrior muscle.
Those swirling tattoos drew her eyes to the mass of his shoulders and chest. A faint trail of dark gray hair trailed down from his strong stomach to draw the eye to a heavy, erect cock framed by muscular thighs sprinkled with hair.
A finer specimen of a man did not exist in the world, and he held his darkened hand out to her.
Henrik climbed into the hot water before he guided her to settle in front of him.
She was acutely aware of him against her back, and the length of that cock pressing urgently against her backside, but he wasn’t in a rush.
He stoked her desire with gentle touches and exploratory swipes of the washcloth.
He scrubbed her hair and ran his claws through the tangles, smoothing out the snarls until it ran in a smooth, wet curtain down her back.
When it was his turn, she took a deep breath and stood up. Water sluiced down her body, its path followed by hungry hazel eyes, before she sank back down into the warmth — straddling him.
Henrik grunted, his hands settling onto the soft flesh of her hips and backside, as the ridge of his cock found its way unerringly to the wet warmth of her cunt.
Chest rising and falling with rapid breaths, she began to wash him, too. But it wasn’t like the hundreds and hundreds of baths she’d given patients. There was no clinical separation.
There was only appreciation and the marvel of him, her Henrik, who allowed her the time to learn him at her own pace.
Mabel carefully shielded his eyes from the water she poured over his hair, rinsing out the soap she’d scrubbed into his scalp. When he was clean of suds, she dropped the cup onto the floor and stroked his jaw. Her thumbs brushed water from his cheeks and brows in reverent swipes.
“Thank you for saving me,” she murmured, rocking her hips a little. Friction, delicious and forbidden, sent a shock of pleasure up her spine.
Henrik’s hands snaked between them. They cupped her damp breasts, gently squeezing and rolling her pert nipples, then moved down. His fingers slid across her trembling stomach before they found the slick skin of her cunt.
“I’ve done nothing except return the favor,” he rumbled, stroking the bundle of nerves she was so used to touching alone in the dark of night. Her eyes fluttered closed as her hips rocked into his hand, seeking more.
Henrik’s fingers swirled, gliding through water and her own wetness. She could feel him watching her intently, but even if she couldn’t, she would’ve known. His cock, huge and hard and hot against the entrance of her body, throbbed with every pass of his fingers.
Curling the fingers of his free hand around the back of her neck, he dragged her down for a deep, probing kiss. Speaking into her mouth, he growled, “I’ll have one release before we leave this bath.”
Mabel dug her fingers into his shoulders.
Her magic hummed beneath her skin, a melody of contentment that grew louder and louder as the tension in her belly increased.
Henrik wasn’t rough with her, but he was relentless.
His fingers never grew tired or missed a beat.
He pulled an orgasm from her with terrifying skill.
Her shoulders curled and her cunt clenched hard as it rolled through her. The aftershocks hadn’t even begun before Henrik’s growled and swept her into his arms. He stood up from the bath, carelessly splashing water across the stone floor.
Nude and dripping, he carried her down a short hallway to another room she barely saw. Stars still glittered in her eyes when he parted heavy curtains to lay her in a strangely shaped bed.
Her body, lax and wet and full of buzzing desire, wasn’t prepared for the lips and tongue that found their way to the juncture between her thighs. Mabel’s back arched clean off the bed as his tongue found her clitoris at the same time that his finger slid inside her.
It was a storm of sensation, one of pleasure and slight discomfort as he soothed her with his mouth and stretched her with his fingers. Another orgasm hovered just out of reach, lurching closer and then backing off as he worked, until he tightened his lips around her with a hard, sucking pull.
A sound like a sob escaped her, interrupted only by the shock of him slowly pushing the broad head of his cock inside her.
Her limbs wrapped around him, holding tight. The discomfort of his size was astonishing. It blended with the ripples of her powerful orgasm, confusing her body until all she could do was cling to him.
“Easy,” he whispered into her hair. His big hands cupped the top of her head as he slowly flexed his hips, testing their fit. “I won’t move until the pain eases. Just breathe, my blessing.”
Mabel buried her face into his damp chest. The smell of him, clean and earthy and hers, filled her lungs.
For the first time in years, she felt more than alive.
She felt embodied. Like she was more than Mabel the healer.
She was Mabel the blessing, the woman, the lover who was flesh and blood and raw, bodily wants.
It was the most miraculous feeling she could imagine.
“Keep going,” she ordered, stroking her hands down his muscled back. “I want to feel you, my mate.”
Henrik’s groan reverberated through her. He seemed incapable of a response, but she didn’t need one.
He pressed forward, making a home for himself between her thighs, until she swore she could feel every ridge and vein of him molded into her flesh. The first stroke was a shock. The second made the muscles of her thighs twitch and shake. The third…
The third dropped her mouth open.
Mabel gasped, shocked by the feeling of fullness and electricity that accompanied every roll of his powerful hips. It was a bizarre feeling, being full of him and massaged from the inside, but it was a joyous one.
Sweat beaded on her freshly cleaned skin.
It wasn’t just hers. Henrik’s chest rose and fell like a bellows as he thrust. To keep her from sliding up the bed, he eventually sat up on his knees and lifted her hips to meet him, changing the angle so the flared head of his cock stroked the front wall of her channel with every roll of his hips.
The sounds of their bodies meeting was loud and wet in the confined space, heightening the pleasure of every tiny movement.
A silent cry left her as she clawed at the bedding, her cunt clenching sharply down on the monstrous cock shuttling inside her faster and faster until he slammed home with a deep groan.
A foreign warmth filled her as released inside her. Mabel’s legs tightened around his hips instinctively, trapping him there as he rode out the waves of his orgasm.
Henrik slumped over her, panting and sweaty. Finding her lips with his own, he breathed, “I intend to love you for all my life, Mabel.”
Draping her weakened arms over his shoulders, she sighed, “It’ll be a long life, won’t it?”
“Yes,” he whispered.
Mabel smiled against his lips. “I intend to love you all our life, Henrik. All our good, long life, come what may, and beyond it, too.”
END