Chapter 39
Emmerick
“This conversation is over,” I said with muffled embarrassment, through the arm I’d slung over my face.
I couldn’t look at her—this had taken a turn from vulnerable truth to utter humiliation. Instead, I was hiding like a coward after a beautiful woman had talked about whether I’d been pleasuring myself adequately. Kill me.
My body reacted despite my greatest efforts to think of anything other than her waiting presence beside me. Blood rushed to my groin, and my cock strained against the seam of my breeches. I pulled a blanket over myself.
“Oh, pet...”
I groaned.
“Do you not know how?” Her question made me want to crawl under the low table to my left, but I wouldn’t fit.
“Elsedora. Yes, of course I know how. It’s just…” I sighed as she tugged my arm away from my face, forcing me to look into those dazzling, multicolored irises.
She hovered over me, and her expression lacked all amusement now.
Despite my horror, the wine loosened my tongue. “It didn’t work. I wanted to—last night. I’ve always required someone to think about when I do that,” I explained, wholly expecting her not to understand.
The hole I’d dug for my grave got deeper. Her gaze softened, and her hands hovered over me like I might need resuscitation after the breath I’d lost.
“So last night, you wanted to? When?” she questioned.
“After leaving your bedchamber. Please don’t think too much into why.” My face burned, and my heart pounded.
Her lips tugged up at the sides. “It isn’t something to be ashamed of. It’s a natural reaction—I was half dressed.”
“I shouldn’t think of you in that way,” I said. “It would muck things up. It’s crass.”
And if I had her once, even in my head, I’d want more. That part, I kept to myself.
“Lust isn’t the enemy, and it certainly isn’t crass.
What if I’m perfectly willing to help you through this problem?
” She sat back on her heels and continued, “It was easier when we spoke through the mirror. We were bodiless. But we have bodies, Emmerick, and sometimes they need to react. That mucks nothing up. Not with me.”
I wiped a hand down my face. “You can’t be serious, Else.”
“You would not even need to touch me. It might help quell some of the tension. You can pretend that mirror is still between us.”
She spoke so pragmatically about it all. Did what she’d proposed make sense? Was quelling this tension what I really wanted?
Sources. Some temptations should be avoided. But the wine settled in my stomach, and it slackened my inhibitions just enough for curiosity to win out.
I’d imagined what an Elsedora “private show” through that mirror would be like countless times. Now, she was here—I could touch her. But I wouldn’t.
“How would you help me?” I breathed out. My hips shifted beneath the blanket.
There was a few hands’ distance between her knee and my side. She felt too far away.
“That’s simple. I’ll tell you what to do, and you tell me what you want to see. We can stop at any point.”
“You enjoy getting a rise out of me far too much,” I said. “We really shouldn’t…”
The evocative offer she laid out clawed at my interest though.
I burned to know what she wanted me to do.
“Nothing bad will come of giving in to a few urges,” she reassured me.
“I don’t want you to think of me differently,” I admitted. Lie. I wanted her to see me as more than a tryst, but my damned body coiled like a spring, imagining her coming undone before me.
She smirked. “Pet, this doesn’t need to mean what you think it does. You are stuck with me, whether you choose to torment yourself over it or not.”
This woman was bent on turning my cheeks into a molten inferno. But I grew more intrigued.
Was I ready to play this game with her? It still seemed mad, but here we were—two people who had known each other for over two decades.
Under her expectant stare, I felt laid bare despite being fully clothed. “I don’t want to disrespect you,” I admitted. She nodded her understanding as though she might retreat. “But I won’t lie and say I don’t want whatever you’re offering me.”
She smirked. “Would it help if I told you I’ve thought of you countless times while touching myself? Does that mean I’ve sullied our friendship or done something crass to you? I did so last night.”
This time I groaned for an entirely different reason—embarrassment gave way to unbridled desire. With the last of my inhibitions thrown out the damn window, I said, “Alright. What do you want me to do?”
Clearly, we needed to settle something before I could act normally around her.
Her eyes widened. I’d shocked her—had she just been humoring me?
“You first. What do you want to see?” Her voice was smooth as warmed honey as she turned the question on me.
My leg bounced as I let my gaze rove over her. She leaned back on her palms and stretched her legs out in front of her.
Her eagerness made this seem like a marvelous idea—like she’d just proposed we have tea or go to the market.
Blood rushed to my groin, and my hands fisted the thick blankets at my sides.
“I want you to take off your tunic,” I hesitantly instructed.
With the faintest of smirks, she reached down and peeled the wool over her head with tantalizing slowness.
My breath caught in the back of my throat as I realized she wore no garments underneath.
Her nipples pebbled, and her skin looked so smooth that I almost lost myself to the urge to reach out for her.
“Now will you do as I say, pet, and promise not to be terribly awkward after this?”
I’d jump off a cliff if she asked me to.
My erection pressed painfully against my breeches.
“Yes,” I agreed as she cupped her hands below her breasts—Sources, she was beautiful. My mouth fell open on an exhale.
“You will watch me. Eyes only, no touching,” she commanded.
It finally happened. I turned to putty in her hands.
“Whatever you say,” I huffed out, still clutching the quilts like they might anchor me from losing myself to the desire consuming me. She ran a hand down her torso, the other pinched a hardened peak of one of her breasts.
“Undress. Completely.” This time her voice wasn’t smooth—it was sharp, a directive.
Any mask of poise and sensibility dropped as I pushed away the blankets and quickly removed my tunic. I scrambled to unbuckle my belt before pulling it off in one swift motion.
A hum of satisfaction left El’s lips as she watched me kick off my breeches. The way she observed my body move made me grow harder. I felt more alive than I had in decades.
“You don’t have to do this for me,” I said. Sources, I didn’t even know what we were doing, but stopping now sounded like a terrible idea.
“This isn’t just for you,” she breathed out.
All restraint left me. “Take off your breeches,” I demanded. “I want to watch you touch yourself while you look at me.”
Who the fuck was I?
Her brows arched, and a wicked smile graced her perfect face. She unbuttoned her breeches and sat back to slide them off; I imagined trailing kisses up her thighs until I reached their apex.
She parted herself with two fingers, and my jaw clenched tight with anticipation. She was slick and ready—it almost undid me.
“I am going to enjoy being the first person to see you find release in two decades. Are you going to be good now and fist that cock for me?”
“Sources, Elsedora. You kiss your loved ones with that mouth?” I gritted out, but wrapped my hand around my shaft. The vulgar way she’d commanded me was intoxicating.
I wanted to kill anyone she’d ever played this game with before.
“Mm… you can imagine me kissing wherever you want,” she answered.
I responded with an indulgent gasp as I pumped myself, thinking about her mouth wrapped around me.
“Not yet,” she scolded. “You wait for me.”
Lying back, with her shoulders on the sofa behind her, she pushed two fingers into herself. The way her mouth dropped open, the look of bliss etched into her features as she trailed a smoldering gaze down me—it all became too much.
“Please,” I begged.
“Please, what?” she asked. It wrecked me.
“Please let me touch you.”
“No. We are friends, remember?”
I suddenly hated this song and dance.
I’d rather be between her legs, not laid bare before her, head turned to watch her touch herself when it should be my hands on her.
A low growl escaped me while my hand remained painfully still.
“Keep rhythm with me. Not a stroke more.” She let her digits slip back into herself with a low moan—her hair mussed and cheeks flushed from the heat of the fire. She didn’t look an ounce embarrassed to keep barreling down this path. “Don’t make me tell you again. Stroke yourself, pet.”
I obliged with a groan, and she reacted with the most delicious gasp of her own that nearly broke me. “You keep making that sound, and I’m done for,” I said, matching her pace with another stroke. Purposefully disobeying my plea for mercy, she moaned. Her damn sounds.
I watched her, wishing my tongue could replace her fingers or that I could catch her gasps in my mouth. With her knees open wide for me and her chin thrown up, she stared at me from behind lowered red lashes.
I tried my hardest to justify how aroused I was as her pace quickened—tried to convince myself that I didn’t so badly want to be inside of her, doing things that friends most certainly didn’t do.
That last thread of restraint wore so thin. When she broke around her own fingers, her head slammed back against the couch as she cried out, “Emmerick, now.”
A groan escaped me. I stroked myself faster and followed her into the swell of pleasure. Making a mess of my stomach and the quilts below me, I came on a guttural cry.
Elsedora rode her fingers through her last moments of bliss with her back arched. Sources, she was gorgeous. It was no wonder she could seduce the pants off anyone she pleased. Myself included.
Perspiration gathered on my furrowed brow. These moments of stillness with her staring at my bare body with lust and longing were the sweetest torture. I’d already let this go too far.
This had been reckless. Undoubtedly enjoyable, but reckless.
I reached over with my clean hand to grab a small throw blanket and offer it to her.
She took it and, to my surprise, collapsed beside me before covering herself.
It felt like there was a mile between us, which I dared not cross.
Despite the satiated look of awe she cast in my direction, guilt rocked me.
I cleaned myself with my discarded tunic and shimmied my breeches on, leaving the belt off.
I’d just taken a hammer and chisel to my deepest friendship.
I’d ruined it.
Already.
“What in Sources’ names have we done?” I threw my arm over my face again.
“Ah. That would be the lust leaving your body and the smarts returning.”
“I am so sorry, Else—”
“Emmerick, no fretting about this.”
I could feel her shifting onto her side. “But I really—”
“Shhh,” she soothed. “Bodies are nature—you have nothing to apologize for with me. And it seems we have solved a problem for you.”
When I let my arm drop away, she was staring down at the tent in my breeches where I was still erect, with her head tilted and lips curved up at the sides. Shameless temptress.
I sighed. “I will never live this down, will I?”
She smirked. “Live what down?” She seemed to enjoy seeing me reel from the moment, and her tone held amusement.
“That I wanked myself in front of you like a teenager outside of a brothel window.”
She choked on a laugh. “I don’t know what you mean. That is not what I experienced at all.”
“That’s really it? You’ll just pretend this never happened?”
Her brow furrowed in mock confusion as she rested her head on her palm. I tried not to notice where the throw bunched and her breasts pressed together. “What never happened?”
“Elsedora,” I pleaded.
“You get adorably flustered,” she teased. “Stop worrying. I’m no stranger to carnal attraction between friends.”
My stomach dropped. My mood sobered, and I searched her stare.
“That is why I cannot be your tryst, Elsedora. As confusing and exciting as whatever that just was, I don’t do such things with friends. You mean too much to me.”
She grimaced. “I’ve honestly never felt so cared for and rejected in the same breath.” I’d hurt her, and that sinking feeling made my guilt spike.
Reaching out, I took her hand and squeezed it. “I shouldn’t have let that happen.”
“It takes two. But, again, this doesn’t need to mean what you think it does.” Her cheeks reddened. “We can continue the night as though nothing happened. I will stay on better behavior from here on. I promise.”
I didn’t crave her on better behavior, but I couldn’t have only part of her either. So I agreed, “I think that’s for the best.”
Her mischievous smile returned. “Then, clean up your mess and find a clean tunic because I cannot look at all of that and behave myself. I’m going to mull more wine.”
I laughed as she shamelessly stood fully nude and pulled on her breeches first. I averted my gaze—finally making a correct decision. After tossing on her tunic, she marched out of the room with our mugs.
When she returned, I’d retrieved a new tunic and folded the quilts I’d sullied. For the rest of the evening, we stuck to safe topics of conversation and sat with a healthy distance between us. It felt natural again, and I breathed easier knowing that what I’d let unfold hadn’t lost me her esteem.
When she finally went up to bed, I settled in on the parlor sofa. My feet hung over the armrest, but at least the plush cushioned leather beneath me wasn’t a bed. I shivered to think about getting back in one.
The vision of El’s head thrown back and the memory of her satisfied sounds wouldn’t leave my mind. I stared at the ceiling, trying my hardest to will them away. I could hear her footsteps above me as she got into bed, which did nothing to settle the feeling.
I lay there, fighting sleep for as long as I could, terrified that if I slipped into slumber, I might not wake to greet her in the morning. However awkward that encounter might be, I looked forward to it.