Husband & Wife #2
Their teeth knock together, neither of them willing to slow down enough to be graceful. They laugh against each other’s mouths before the kiss deepens, and Euphemia drinks.
The taste of him is a luscious wine, heady and all-consuming.
It makes her head spin.
Before she knows it, the air is moving through her hair as Dagfinn pulls Euphemia away from the wall and starts carrying her up the stairs.
“What are you doing? Put me down.” She laughs, but holds on tighter.
“I’ll put you down once I find the proper place.”
His voice is gruff and guttural.
It draws heat to the apex between her thighs.
“And where might that be?” she manages, just as breathless as he is after carrying her up the stairs.
They reach the top of the stairs.
“Where’s your bed?”
If just the sound of his voice can make her unravel, what is it going to do to her when his hands find their way over her most sensitive places?
“There.” Euphemia points.
The sound of her breathless already seems to do things to him, too. A growl answers her. And then they are kissing again. Lips colliding. Hands grasping. Flesh more like a barrier than a conduit.
Dagfinn presses her up against one of the walls. For a fleeting moment, the impropriety of it all slithers into her mind. Not here, in the corridor?
But then Euphemia feels the heat of him through his clothes. The hard length of him presses against the aching space between her thighs, and she arches instinctively into him.
She fought for this.
For Dagfinn.
Found him when he was barely more than a lost and fractured soul.
Nursed him back to his humanity.
Brought him home.
There is nothing that will stand in their way now.
He is hers as much as she is his.
Dagfinn nibbles on her lip and Euphemia all but melts in his grasp. She moans, head lulling back to expose her neck. Dagfinn does not squander the opportunity to devour her. The sensitive skin. The tender veins.
He buries her in ravenous kisses all the way down to her collarbone.
When he finally comes up for air, Dagfinn grips her rear again, this time more intentional about getting the fullness of it within his large grasp, and then he bolts down the hallway.
Euphemia is impressed they even make it to her bedchamber, given how many times they stopped to consume each other again.
Dagfinn practically kicks the door open.
They drag each other to the lush and feathery bed.
As they land atop it, Dagfinn notes the missing sheets and chuckles. “What happened to your bed?”
Dazedly, Euphemia feels beneath her. “Ah. That would be your fault, of course.”
“Of course,” he says earnestly. “Remind me how exactly, though?”
“The dreams,” Euphemia says with a groan. Then latching onto the back of his neck and pulling him closer, she adds, “Hush now and kiss me.”
“As you command—”
But Euphemia is done talking. She claims his mouth with her own, silencing his words.
Dagfinn doesn’t seem to complain, not about his unfinished thought nor the unmade bed as they tumble upon it.
It’s here, with Dagfinn pressed atop her, his hands working away at her stays that Euphemia loses the battle with patience.
She has spent so long imagining what it would feel like to have him here, beneath her hands, against her skin, that reality almost feels more overwhelming than any dream ever could.
She’s waited for him long enough.
Euphemia fumbles for the ties of his trousers, freeing the length of him in a matter of ragged breaths.
She claws at her skirts. There is too much fabric between them, too many layers separating skin from skin. She wants to feel him. Needs his flesh against hers.
And when she finally has the bulk of her skirts lifted away, everything about Dagfinn becomes measured. Slow.
He pauses for half a heartbeat, his gaze moving over her face as though he is committing it to memory.
There is something different in his expression now. The hunger is still there, but beneath it is something softer. Something almost disbelieving. As though he still cannot quite believe he has woken to find her here.
Here Euphemia is, ready to rush them into euphoria, and Dagfinn is savoring every moment. As if he has spent so long dreaming of this that he refuses to let it pass too quickly.
It is torture.
It is ecstasy.
It is a delicious kind of ruin.
Dagfinn leans back so that he can see her. Hunger fills his eyes at the sight of her bare legs, at the vulnerability of her body laid open to his gaze. For his pleasure. For hers.
With languid ease, he moves down between her legs, his face disappearing beyond the ruffles of her skirts.
For one long, painful moment, she cannot feel anything. Only pressure building inside her as she waits. The anticipation is almost unbearable.
Then he tugs her undergarment to one side. Cool air brushes her heated skin, and Euphemia shudders.
His warm breath follows.
It’s enough to make her thighs tremble. Her fingers curl into the bed already.
Then he presses something hot and wet onto the tender flesh between her legs.
Euphemia gasps, falling into the beginnings of a steadily rising pleasure. An unfurling of hunger she’s never known. But Dagfinn takes his time with her, every lapping of his tongue slow and deliberate.
And now Euphemia understands his slowness. The way he draws the pleasure out. This agonizingly slow building of pressure is all the sweeter as it rises. Carries her like a wave until she is crashing. Splintering. Imploding like a thousand bursts of stars.
Euphemia grips the back of his head as the pleasure crescendos, the white light fading to grey.
Dagfinn peeks up from his work.
A crooked smile quirks one side of his mouth as he beholds her bliss.