Chapter 16
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Beatrice and Giovanni were lying in a field of spring flowers. Beatrice was dressed only in a soft nightdress with tiny sleeves and trailing ribbons on the bodice.
“Giovanni,” she whispered, setting her perfect mouth close to his ear so that he shivered. “I want you.”
Her hands traveled slowly up his thighs towards his prominent, straining arousal, and he groaned.
“I want you too.” He pulled her face to his for a long, luscious kiss. “God help me, I do.”
Giovanni rolled over in his sleep, groaning in frustration as the beautiful, summer-colored dream dissipated around him. He was almost painfully aroused. He pressed his face into the cushion, growling in frustration, and tried to get back to sleep.
God, how he wanted to finish this dream.
He could still feel the whispers of her fingers rubbing up and down his thighs.
Yet as Giovanni tried to even out his breathing, and tried to drift back to sleep, his senses were becoming more alert to something.
Someone was stroking his thigh. A soft, insistent hand was making long, luxurious strokes up and down his hip and knee, occasionally twirling a small circle at his hip crease to dance against that extra sensitive skin of his inside thigh.
He could feel the warm, regular breath of another person behind him.
He knew that scent, too. Perfume, flowers, lavender soap, and something deeper, more unique than he would recognize anywhere. Beatrice.
“I wonder what would happen if I touched you as you touched me last night,” Beatrice murmured into his hair.
Last night. Giovanni’s brain slotted into gear. He was not in bed; he was on the floor of an inn. Judging by the dark light beyond the curtains, it was barely yet dawn. He was here with Beatrice and last night he had...
“Oh God,” Giovanni whispered, pressing his face harder into the fabric of the cushion.
Memories of Beatrice’s soft, opening flesh, of her writhing and gasping under his touch as he brought her to a magnificent climax, flooded back into his mind and he gritted his teeth.
He was already so aroused. It had taken all of his strength the night before not to plunge himself inside her and release his pleasure.
Now Beatrice’s nimble fingers were reaching to the front of his breeches, unbuttoning and undoing him, and he felt like he could barely breathe.
“If you keep that up, you’re going to find out,” he gasped, quickly grabbing her wrist to still the movement of her insistent fingers.
“What if I want to find out?” Beatrice’s other hand brushed his hair away from the nape of his neck. Giovanni’s breath hitched as she pressed her warm lips against the skin there, and he couldn’t help the little jolt in his hips to press his manhood against her waiting hand.
“I was dreaming about you,” Giovanni mumbled, still feeling half asleep. Perhaps this was all a dream.
“Was it a good dream?” Beatrice pulled at the collar of his shirt, pressing another kiss there. Meanwhile, her small hand had reached under his shirt and followed the soft tendrils of dark hair from his belly button down to his crotch.
“Yes,” Giovanni licked his lips and let his head fall back against her cheek, reveling in the soft sensation of her body moving closer to his.
Her warm breasts pressed against his back, the curve of her legs pressed against his.
He moved his hand under the blanket to caress her thighs and realized in astonishment that she was no longer wearing her gown, only her shift.
“Beatrice!” He tossed over to face her, his heart nearly stopping when he saw her. Good God, she was nearly naked.
“What? You try sleeping all night in a gown, it is thoroughly uncomfortable.” Beatrice blushed, the redness so evident now that she was only dressed in her stays and the thin covering of her shift.
Giovanni was distracted for a brief moment by the way the blush travelled over the revealed skin of her breasts in such a delicious way.
“Well, we should not want that,” Giovanni said, unable to stop his hand from tracing the line of her body through the near-transparent material, from her shoulder down to her waist, feeling the warm swell of her hip. Beatrice’s breath juddered as she closed her eyes at his touch.
“I love it when you touch me,” she whispered.
Giovanni bit his bottom lip hard. She had no idea how alluring she was, how close he was to completely lose control of his passion.
“Good,” he managed to say.
“But I think I should like to touch you just as much.”
Giovanni looked up at her in surprise. Her eyes were open again, soft and dark in the dull light of the fire embers. Despite his experience, he had never expected to hear such words from Beatrice.
“Really?” Giovanni felt like his voice was stuck in his throat. “It is not common for a lady to want to give a man...”
Giovanni let his voice disappear. He enjoyed his experiences with other ladies, and yes, he had taken his pleasure with them, but it was not the same as this.
“I want to touch you, to see you, just as you touch and see me,” Beatrice whispered, her warm hand stroking his belly. “Don’t you think I feel the same about you as you do about me?”
Giovanni couldn’t think of a time when a woman had looked at him the way she did, as if she wanted him to please her and take pleasure from his pleasure. It was an offer too enticing, too romantic to lose.
“Well then,” he swallowed hard and lowered her hand into the firm tangle of dark curls. “You may do as you wish.”
Giovanni took a deep mouthful of air as Beatrice’s hand brushed lower, the warm tips of her fingers meeting the tight flesh of his manhood.
“You are so warm,” she whispered, her mouth opening slightly as she watched Giovanni’s chest rise and fall, anticipating her tentative, almost frightened touch. “So smooth to the touch.”
“Cristo, Beatrice,” Giovanni groaned, throwing his spare arm across his forehead, feeling sweat filming upon his skin. “When you talk like that...”
“Like what?” Beatrice’s fingers stroked him up and down, as light as a feather and just as tantalizing.
Giovanni didn’t know how to tell her that her every word drove him completely crazy.
Having her speak such innocent and fresh words to him with no pretense, just her first impressions of the male form was enough to tip him over the edge.
He was close to his peak now, a coil of tightness building in his abdomen, his manhood straining against her gentle, fluttering touch.
“Like you,” he reached up and pulled her mouth onto his, kissing her desperately. He felt her moan into his mouth and that only urged him on.
“How do you like to be touched?” Beatrice whispered. “You asked me last night.”
“Let me show you,” Giovanni fumbled his hand down to his breeches, placing a hand over hers so that her palm fully caressed his manhood. They both gasped, their heavy breathing beginning to sync together as Giovanni guided Beatrice into his rhythm.
“Is it building in you, too?” Beatrice asked wonderingly. Giovanni groaned and closed his eyes, knowing he couldn’t last much longer. “That feeling of pressure?”
“Yes.” Giovanni gritted his teeth.
“What must I do?” Beatrice pressed her lips against his cheek, her words driving him even closer to the edge. “To bring you that same release I felt?”
“Just this,” Giovanni panted. “Just this, Bea.”
She felt so ravishing and perfect, and he couldn’t think anything in the universe would compare to this. The only thing that could be better would be being joined with her entirely.
“This is perfect,” he rasped. “Just like my dream.”
“Can I tell you a secret?” Beatrice’s whisper sent a shiver down his spine and Giovanni grunted. He was so close.
“Please,” he gasped.
“I dreamed about you too,” she whispered, her words starting a tingling rush at the back of his head that started to spread down his whole body. “I dreamed about seeing you lost in passion. Like this.”
“Beatrice!”
Giovanni quickly pulled Beatrice’s hand away, rolling into the blanket as he reached his climax and emptied his seed into the fabric of his breeches.
Dazed, he felt Beatrice kissing his head and murmuring soft words of encouragement and gentleness above him.
He rolled back over, tugging her down for a ravenous kiss, the taste of her like an elixir of life to him.
“Did I hurt you?” Beatrice brushed sweaty tendrils of curls away from his eyes.
“No,” Giovanni laughed, kissing her softly. “I felt much the same as you, I should imagine. A tremendous release.”
“It is more incredible than anything I could have ever imagined.” Beatrice shook her head in amazement. “Does it always feel like this?”
“Not always,” Giovanni chuckled. “Only if the lady is a particularly amorous lover.”
“Oh.” Beatrice flushed but Giovanni could tell she was very pleased by his words. “You think I am a good lover?”
“I think you are the best,” Giovanni growled, brushing his nose against hers.
“I don’t believe you.” Beatrice pushed him lightly, the flush reddening her ears adorably.
“Why?” Giovanni demanded, pulling her back into his arms and kissing her cheek.
“Because you have had many lovers,” Beatrice’s voice was muffled into his chest. He could tell that this was something that she was embarrassed to admit. “And we have not even made love properly…”
“Beatrice,” he twisted her face up to look at him. Her eyes were tightly shut as if she didn’t want to see him. He kissed her nose softly. “Look at me.”
Reluctantly she opened her eyes.
“Making love is more than what a man and woman do to make a child.” He stroked her cheek tenderly. “What we have shared is already more powerful, more special than what I have shared with other women.”
“Why?” Beatrice whispered.
Because I love you.
“Because we know one another,” Giovanni swallowed hard, trying not to say the words he desperately wanted to. “Because we trust one another.”
“And you have never trusted another lover?” Beatrice asked curiously.