In the Hollow of the Heart

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Dearest Lynne, Conni (and my newest reviewer, Barbossa Sprite) - I beg your forgiveness for taking so long to get this next chapter written and posted. No word of a lie, I have rewritten this no less than three times, wanting to give you something as sensuous as my previous scenes, but something new as well. Finally, here it is, and I hope that you find it up to your standards. Once again, I am eternally indebted to RF, beta extraordinaire, for knowing exactly what I needed to tweak to make it a better story.

Again, I am SO sorry this was so long in the making...I promise I will not tarry in the same way again!

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Chapter 8 - A Love Unbound

Hector caught Elizabeth with another kiss as he seized her in his arms and swung her around, the hot press of his mouth sending new waves of longing washing through her. His beard chafed coarsely against her soft skin but stopping was unthinkable – his crushing kiss was like the first sweet drink of water after a long, parched thirst and she drank greedily from him, each touch of their lips fuelling a craving for more.

The last time she’d readily given herself to passion seemed like a far distant memory now. Finally wed, she and Will had made love during those few fleeting hours on the beach nine years earlier. Elizabeth had adored her doomed young captain at that moment – she could not deny the fact. If she was to be honest to herself, though, the consummation of their marriage had been a disappointment of sorts. She was the first that Will had bedded, just as he’d believed that he was hers, and the awkward fumbling and quick congress that was the culmination of their honeymoon stood in stark contrast to what had taken place in the captain’s quarters aboard the Black Pearl the night before.

Just the memory of her first experience with Hector was enough to send a delicious shiver of anticipation through her. She’d never have believed that a man of such a fierce disposition and voracious hungers could be capable of such sweetness and devotion. With his deft yet tender touch, he had roused a carnal appetite she’d not known she possessed…had taken her repeatedly to the brink of jubilant tears with the aching intensity of her response. And when at last he could hold himself back no longer, the exquisite sensation of him moving within her had sent her flying apart in heart-stopping ecstasy.

Tonight, though, things felt very different between them. There was a sharp, dangerous edge to his need that Elizabeth sensed through the desperate grip of his hands on her waist, in the almost brutal way he clasped the back of her neck and held her prisoner as he repeatedly breached her mouth, in the raw gasps of desire that burst from his lungs as she writhed against him. As careful and considerate a lover as he’d been when he’d taken her virginity, she found the threat of his lustful and brusque side far more thrilling.

Before his restraint gave way altogether, though, she wanted something from him...something she had often dreamed of doing with him long before the fountain’s enchantment had stripped the years away and left her with a much younger version of her pirate captain.

Elizabeth reluctantly broke from his kiss and pulled back a few inches, earning a growl of agonized frustration from Hector in the process. When he bent towards her to claim her lips once more, she gently framed his face with her hands and shook her head, staring into his dark and sinful eyes.

“Please, let’s not rush this. I want to take my time looking at you…touching you,” she murmured, lovingly tracing his furrowed brow with her fingertips. “I’ve spent so many sleepless nights imagining it. Indulge me in this, my beloved.”

It was the endearment that ultimately convinced him, she knew, for his feral expression softened as the sentiment touched his heart. He wordlessly nodded his assent and Elizabeth felt a sudden twinge of sorrow, for in that instant Hector seemed far more vulnerable than ever before. It occurred to her that perhaps there had been no one up until that moment, including her, who’d ever cared enough to ask such a thing of him. Oh, she knew for certain he’d been with countless women over the decades – his seductive prowess alone spoke to his vast experience in the bed chamber. But by virtue of his reaction, he knew what she asked came from much more than a need for physical intimacy alone.

The thought that he was so moved by her request both pleased and pained her. It was sad that he’d not ever been close enough to a woman to have shared that kind of closeness, but she was inordinately glad that in this simple way at least, she would be his first. And she desperately wanted to ensure that he derived as much bliss from her actions as she did from his on their first night together.

Elizabeth swept his dark coppery locks from his face and slowly followed the contours of his cheekbones with the backs of her fingers, smiling to herself as Hector closed his eyes and leaned into the caress with a ragged sigh. Even with his youthful renewal, he’d never inspire sonnets about male beauty, she silently acknowledged as she gazed fondly at him, but there was something so utterly masculine, so unerringly confident in his demeanour that she found no mystery to his appeal. From the hard line of his jaw to the dark fringe of his eyelashes, from the faint laugh lines around his stormy blue eyes to the alluring sensuality of his mouth, she treasured his every aspect – for her, at least, no other man could ever hope to compare.

She lightly brushed the lush curve of his bottom lip with the pad of her thumb and delighted in his soft exhalation of happiness at her gentle touch. “I love your mouth,” she confessed as she continued to stroke its generous shape. “Do you know how many hours I laid awake remembering the warmth of your lips on mine…the sharp scrape of your teeth on my breast…the broad sweep of your tongue over my belly and between my legs…?”

“Gods, ‘Lizabeth!” Hector gasped harshly, his eyes flying open as he fixed her with a smouldering look that caused her to flush from head to toe. Seemingly forgetting his promise, he ground his hips against hers, his grasp on her waist tightening as she felt him grow hotter and harder through his clothes. The fervour of his response lanced aching arousal down to her very core and for a moment Elizabeth considered abandoning her decadent exploration to give in to what they had denied themselves for too long already, but she stubbornly resisted the impulse. The time wasn’t right, not yet.

Elizabeth shushed him and entwined her hands in his hair, feeling the cool, wavy strands slip between her fingers and watching as the light caught streaks of reddish gold in amongst the darker tendrils. His eyelids seemed to grow heavier as she did so, almost as though he was a great cat being stroked, and a rumble of gratification rose from deep within him as she dragged her fingernails over his scalp. As her hands settled beneath the heavy drape of his mane, she played with the fine hairs on his nape and coaxed him forward until she was nuzzling the crook of his sweat-dampened neck.

“All that you did to me that first time, I wish to do to you, and more” she purred, letting her hot breath bathe his ear as she inhaled the tantalizing scent of his skin. “Undress for me, Hector. I want to see everything you have to offer me.”

“Choose yer words with care, missy,” he groaned, shuddering as she tongued his earlobe and then sucked it in between her teeth. “There be consequences to such bold talk.”

The cautionary note was entirely unnecessary – Elizabeth was well aware that she was playing with fire, one that would inevitably consume them both. But so long as he could curtail himself, she would take her time and create new memories to sustain them through any lonely times ahead. Tonight would not last forever and although she knew that he’d not stay away longer than necessary, who and what he was made parting inevitable.

Pushing aside all sobering thoughts of his imminent departure, she laughed softly and slipped her hands under his shirt, skimming the smooth, hot skin beneath. “I will willingly pay any penalty you choose to exact for my iniquitous behaviour. Until then, however...remove the shirt first, if you please.”

He stepped back and narrowed his eyes in warning, but the amused curl of his lip told her that he was far from reluctant to obey. With a smug and rather self-satisfied expression on his face, Hector bundled the hem of his shirt into his hands and gradually peeled it up over his torso. As he leisurely revealed himself, purposely tormenting her with a slow striptease, Elizabeth swallowed hard as she saw what lay beneath.

Any man who spent his life at sea could boast of a certain physical form; the day-to-day rigours of sailing, not to mention a limited diet, meant that most pirates were lean and hungry-looking. Hector, when she’d last looked upon him in the nude, had been no exception. But there was nothing even vaguely gaunt or undernourished about him anymore – from the broad, flat expanse of his upper chest to his tightly packed abdomen, his body now spoke of virility and strength. No wonder his fellow buccaneers had always hesitated to challenge his authority; there was little doubt that the physical dexterity and combat skills he’d possessed as a younger man would have meant a quick and decisive resolution to any disputes.

When at last the garment had been tossed casually to the floor and Hector’s hair settled back over his shoulders, Elizabeth couldn’t help put reach out eagerly with both hands to touch him again. His shoulders were wide and solid, flowing beneath her fingers into arms that bulged with well-toned muscles. Each stretch and strand flexed slowly under her caress as she skimmed over the crisp hairs on his forearms.

“Oh...my...” she exhaled, squeezing his arm and thrilling at the unyielding feel of his flesh. His pectorals flexed as he curled his hands into fists, intentionally drawing her attention to the deep brown circles of his nipples that stood out on his flawless skin and practically begged to be sucked upon.

“An’ here ye had me thinkin’ that ye were disappointed in my choice to consume the water from the fountain,” he taunted as a slow, teasing smirk spread across his face.

“Perhaps there was some small benefit,” Elizabeth conceded with a furious blush as she ran her hands possessively over his lightly-tanned midriff. “I have to tell you, though...when I see you like this, I am forced to admit to being jealous of every woman who ever laid claim to you before me. I can’t stand the thought of anyone else having touched you.”

His smile slowly faded and he gathered her hands in his, laying them over his heart. “’Lizabeth...there might have been women before ye, but not a one as can be sayin’ that she claimed me. Ain’t ever given meself to anyone as I have to ye. I’d not have taken them waters at all had ye not declared yer love and so fed me starvin’ heart.”

Her chest ached with a suppressed sob as she came to the shattering realization that Hector would have turned his back on a long life if she hadn’t been willing to share it with him. “How do you expect me to seduce you when you all but reduce me to tears at every turn?” she cried in frustration, striking at his taut chest with her small fists. “You are positively infuriating!”

He roughly seized hold of her wrists to stop her ineffectual assault and his devious grin gradually reappeared as she tried to wrest herself free. “Show me, then, what ye’d have of me,” he muttered as he thrust himself against her, letting her feel for herself that his longing had in no way been assuaged by the sentimentality of their exchange. “I’ll take all that ye dare to give, me little hellcat!”

“Perhaps if it was your hands fettered rather than mine,” Elizabeth suggested impulsively, rubbing herself along the hot, hard line of his body and moaning as an echoing throb of need surged through her, “I would be able to do anything I pleased to you.”

Hector’s answering chuckle was low and sultry. “Bound and at yer mercy? Careful what ye ask fer, lass. Might just be tempted to take ye up on that offer. Ain’t nothin’ stirs a man more than a beautiful woman having her wicked way with him, and him helpless to stop ‘er.”

The image he described sent a thrilling flush of heat over Elizabeth’s skin and she trembled helplessly. Holding him hostage and subject to her every desire seemed almost unbearably erotic. And to have control of that kind over one such as Hector Barbossa...it was simply a fantasy too good not to indulge.

“Release me, then” she whispered, rising onto her toes so she could press her lips to his again. “Release me so that I may bind your hands and do with you as I will.”

His eyebrows arched in both disbelief and intrigue, and it was more from surprise than purpose that he loosened his grip on her wrists and allowed her to step away. Biting her bottom lip coyly, she regarded him from beneath hooded eyes and brought her hands up to offhandedly twirl the white satin ribbon tied at her bodice. As his gaze dropped to her bosom, she picked up each end of the ribbon and slowly tugged until the neat bow slipped undone and the lace panels parted to reveal the soft swells of her small breasts.

Smiling knowingly at the new tension that was making the muscles of Hector’s jaw tick and his hands clench into white-knuckled fists, Elizabeth wove her fingers into the loops of ribbon and started working them free from the eyelets on the gown. As she did so, she let her eyes rake over him shamelessly, taking in the fact that he’d left his boots at the threshold to her room and now wore only stockings and breeches...breeches that looked, as a matter of point, ill suited to containing the size of the arousal that stirred within. .

“Put your hands behind your back and turn around,” Elizabeth demanded huskily, dreamily slipping the smooth ribbon free of her garment and letting it hang from her fingers. It seemed very flimsy and unsuited to the purpose, but she hoped it would suffice. Then again, if it did not, the consequences were unlikely to be dire or objectionable. There truly was no way for her to lose.

“Get on with it, ye evil wench, before I’ve a change of heart,” he said, his mouth quirking with a covert smile before he pivoted and faced away from her. The firm muscles in his back shifted temptingly as did he stretched his arms behind him, laying one wrist over the other and curling his long fingers into towards his palms. “Toy with me much longer and I’ll be grantin’ ye no quarter at all.”

Before he could make good on his provocative threat, Elizabeth quickly looped the satin cord several times around his wrists and then between them, forming a sort of makeshift shackle. Employing devious use of her nautical expertise, she finished it off with a buntline hitch, a knot that would tighten rather than loosen should he wrench at the tether. With a sly grin, she tugged the loose ends of the ribbon to ensure it would hold fast.

“I’d like to see you get out of that one, my fearsome prisoner.”

Hector glanced back over his shoulder, his blue eyes glinting with mischievous intent. “Best take whate’er liberties ye wish while me patience lasts, Yer Highness.”

Elizabeth trailed her fingertips lightly over his bare waist and sauntered slowly around him until she stood before him once more. “Mmmm,” she hummed vaguely, distracted as she painstakingly mapped the well-honed contours of his abdomen. His muscles twitched wherever she touched him, and his breathing grew more rapid with each new and enticing spot she discovered.

Her eyes flicked up to his face to catch him staring back at her with smouldering expectation, and she ceased in her ministrations, suddenly beset by doubt. What did she know about pleasing a man? During their one night together, she had received far more than she’d given to Hector, and there had been little time for her to learn anything at all from her few hours with Will. The possibility that she might be found wanting loomed large in her mind and she wondered in consternation if she shouldn’t let him take the lead again.

“’Lizabeth…” he said, frowning at her hesitance. “What’s come o’er ye?”

Elizabeth’s cheeks burned red. “I don’t know what to do,” she admitted faintly as she turned her head away, unable to meet his eyes. “I put you in this ridiculous position and now I haven’t the foggiest idea about how to make you…that is, when last I was with you...”

“Look at me. ‘Lizabeth, listen,” he said quietly. Grudgingly, she did as he asked and saw that he was smiling gently. “There’s great satisfaction to be found in discoverin’ fer yerself that which best pleases yer lover. Besides,” he added, leaning close so he could whisper lovingly against her mouth, “’tis yer caresses that I must have, yer kisses I crave. ‘Tis ye, me love, as be touchin’ me; the rest matters not.”

“Where did all this sweet talk come from, I wonder?” she asked lightly, speaking around the tightness in her throat brought forth by the word ‘love.’ Almost of their own accord, her hands rose to drift over his strapping chest once more, his skin a tactile addiction she couldn’t hope to resist.

“Ye might remember, missy, that I always did have a way with words,” Hector replied, his tongue gliding out to skilfully coax her lips further apart. Elizabeth snaked her hands up around his neck, holding him fast lest he dare rob her of the precious sustenance of his kiss. It was his tenderness, in the end, that finally cast away the last of her inhibitions and unlocked the lusts she’d harboured for so long.

“And what words might I expect, say, should I do...this?” She reluctantly pulled away to nuzzle the base of his throat, languidly licking at the hollow until his head fell back and his breath broke with a profound groan. His reaction caused her to smile against his warm skin and emboldened her further.

“Or I maybe I only wish to know,” she went on, the musky scent of his desire growing ever stronger as she pressed herself as close as she could to him and inhaled deeply, “how eloquent you are when I take of you in this way.”

Elizabeth kissed her way from his throat to his heaving chest and tugged one of his dark brown nipples between her teeth, nipping it sharply before she laved at it within the sweltering confines of her mouth. The air left Hector’s lungs in a harsh rush and he arched his back, pinned against her as he offered himself to her without benefit of coherent thought or dialogue.

Years prior when he had cupped her breast gracefully in his hand and subjected her to the same exquisite torture, Elizabeth had been rendered powerless, no stronger than a kitten beneath his ardent attentions. To find that she was able to reduce him to the very same state by following his example was unspeakably exciting.

She abandoned the first nipple, giving him no time at all to recover his composure before she latched onto the second and suckled there as well, circling the flat tan oval and then jabbing the taut nub with her tongue. Hector’s entire body went rigid with tension, and she could tell from the contraction of muscles across his chest that he was fighting his silken restraints.

Letting his nipple slip from between her lips, Elizabeth gently blew across the turgid flesh until it puckered hard. “At a loss for words, are we?” she muttered shrewdly, watching him from beneath the lace of her dark eyelashes as she used a single finger to follow the faint line of dark red hair to where it disappeared into his breeches

“Perhaps I’ll be lettin’ me body do the speakin’ fer me,” he forewarned, by now making no secret of the fact that he was attempting to free himself so he could reciprocate her brazen efforts to rob him of self-control.

“You’ll do no such thing, bound as you are.” Confident in the strength of his bonds, Elizabeth cocked her head appraisingly as she slid her hand over the front panel of his breeches, revelling in the heat permeating the few layers of fabric that separated her inquisitive touch from his tightly-constrained manhood. When she scraped her fingernails over the swelling, his eyes squeezed shut in tortured ecstasy and he sucked in a hissing breath. She knew he wanted her to touch him beneath his clothes, skin to skin, almost as much as she wanted it herself...but the anticipation was too precious to sacrifice just yet.

Trailing her hand back to his waistband, she purposely took her time as she tugged and toyed with the buttons holding the panel in place, knowing that by now he was sensitive enough to feel every tiny wriggle and tantalizing scrape of fabric. When his moans grew most insistent, she finally accorded him mercy and worked the last of the fasteners loose. The flap of material didn’t fall open so much as burst outwards, leaving him sighing raggedly in relief as he was exposed to her in all of his considerable glory.

It was little wonder to her that Hector had always had a penchant for loose fitting breeches; the tight pants that were becoming increasingly popular with younger sailors would have been uncomfortably constrictive even when he wasn’t aroused. Whatever shortcomings he might have, what was jutting out proudly from between his legs wasn’t one of them.

Protruding impressively from a sparse nest of auburn curls, his cock was long and thick, swaying heavily between his navel and his thighs. His foreskin was a pale tawny brown, deepening in hue the closer it was to his loins. Bluish veins traced his entire length, meandering ridges that led up towards the broad, glistening, plum-shaped head of ruddy rose that had emerged fully from its sheath. The sight of him, so big and beautiful, triggered an equally ardent reaction in her own body and she felt an answering rush of slick warmth between her legs.

“Why, Captain Barbossa! You’re not wearing any small clothes!” she exclaimed in feigned shock, her voice shaking slightly as her fingers hovered a hair’s breadth from caressing his massive girth. “How very scandalous!”

He managed to bark out a strangled laugh. “Had ‘em when I first made shore. As luck would have it, though, they went astray while I took me bath, and I was left with no choice but to go without. If ye look to lay blame, ye must cast it upon the woman as chose me new clothes and left me in such immodest circumstances.”

“Tongues would definitely have wagged had the merchant found me pawing through the gentlemen’s skivvies,” she informed him, raising her eyebrow suggestively. “Besides, I quite like having you so…unencumbered.”

“Is that so? Well, ye’d not know it by the amount of touchin’ on yer part,” he snarled, clearly growing more vexed as she deliberately prolonged his agony.

“What would you call this, then?” she offered, walking her fingers slowly up the middle of his chest and delighting as he shivered visibly, gooseflesh breaking out over his sweat-dampened skin.

“Ye’ve gone on long enough with yer teasin’,” Hector warned darkly, the muscles in his shoulders and arms bunching into sinewy knots. “Ye know I’ll not be standin’ fer much more.”

“A positively terrifying thought, I’m sure.” Paying little heed to his threat, she let her hand drop back to his midriff and then coast progressively downward until she just grazed his short hairs. His breathing paused before his lips parted in a sudden, unsteady gasp, and she realized that the power she had over him now would always be there, bonds or not.

Elizabeth hooked her fingers over the waistband resting loosely on his hips and pushed his breeches over the curve of his flanks. The weight of the fabric took them the rest of the way down and as his trousers pooled around his ankles, she reached between their bodies and filled her hands with his pulsing cock.

Hector jerked hard within her palms and cried out, swaying on his feet as though his knees might buckle from the intensity of his pleasure. “Wait!” he panted, closing his eyes and shaking his head. “Wait. Just...just keep still. Fuck, ‘Lizabeth...ye’ll have me embarassin’ meself if ye so much as wiggle yer little finger.”

Her heart was pounding against her ribs, his powerful reaction both surprising and thrilling her. She did as he asked, trembling with the effort of remaining motionless as he fought to regain some composure. “Tell me what to do,” she breathed, wanting to give him more but not sure exactly how to proceed considering she’d already brought him to the brink of completion. “I want to please you.”

“Kiss me,” he replied, staring at her raptly. He lifted his feet in turn, kicking his breeches out of the way so he could set a wider stance. “Do naught but that fer now. I need yer taste on me lips.”

Ever mindful of her hands and his precarious predicament, Elizabeth slowly rose on her tiptoes to meet his descending lips and kissed him passionately. To her wonder, he grew even stiffer and hotter in her grip as their tongues first touched and then tangled. She moaned as she remembered the sensation of him buried deep inside of her, filling every lonely ache and hollow place.

Slowly he flexed his hips towards her, his cockhead bumping against her belly as he slid within her grasp. “Snugly, now,” he choked out, withdrawing and then thrusting forward again as she gently complied. “Aye...oh, lass...that’s it...so good...”

Elizabeth couldn’t help but look, riveted at the sight of his strong, rigid organ as it moved sinuously through the channel formed by her hands. It throbbed with the rapid rhythm of his heartbeat, twitching as the slick tip drove past the tight circle of her fingers.

On his next lunge, she loosened her grip enough that her hands slid all the way to his groin, and she brushed the heavy sac that hung beneath his shaft with her fingertips. He groaned loudly as his pace faltered, and she felt a faint jolt of panic. “Did that hurt? You must tell me if I’m doing something wrong!”

He shook his head vehemently, panting. “Don’t stop. I swear, there ain’t a thin’ ye can do as will wound me. I be yers, love...I told ye, whate’er ye’d have of me, take it.”

Reassured, Elizabeth ran her hands down to his loins once more and cupped his balls in her hand. The skin covering them constricted at her touch, drawing up towards his body as she swept her fingernails lightly over the rough surface. Turning her face back up towards his, she watched his blissful expression deepen as she tenderly cradled the fleshy heft of him in her palm. He was large here, too, in a way that spoke to his untamed virility.

“Every night you spent beneath my roof, I had to fight the urge to creep down the hall and slip into your room unannounced,” she revealed softly, squeezing his bollocks carefully and extracting another desperate gasp from Hector that only intensified the near-painful yearning centred in her womb. “I wanted to peel back your covers and rouse you by doing exactly this. Well, more than this, actually.”

He made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a moan. “What more?”

By way of answer, she knelt before him, releasing him so that she could feather her hands over his firm flanks and tickle the dusting of golden red hairs she found there. “I wanted the feel of your skin against mine...the scent of you all over my body...the taste of you in my mouth. I wanted to be marked as yours in every way possible.”

His eyes widened in astonishment at her brazen words, but she didn’t give him an opportunity to respond before she took him in hand once again and brought his engorged head to her lips. A drop of clear fluid welled from the tiny slit and she caught it on her tongue, savouring his succulent flavour as she leisurely lapped at the dark pink flesh.

Hector froze, every muscle in his legs tensing to the point where his limbs began to shake. “No,” he grated, his breath coming fast and shallow between tightly clenched teeth. “’Lizabeth! Don’t...please...”

His words of protest poorly masked his true desires, however, and his hips surged towards her welcoming lips as she opened her mouth wider and suckled at him, twirling her tongue around his smooth, wide tip and flicking the tiny flap of skin on the underside of his flared ridge. From the primal sounds he seemed helpless to contain, there was no denying that she was driving him mad and pushing him ever closer to the edge. What she lacked in experience, she was determined to make up with zeal and a rather sound hypothesis that what felt good to her would likely be equally arousing for him as well.

The truth was that Elizabeth didn’t care if she brought him fulfillment even without reaching her own. She loved that he was lost in the rising tide of pleasure she had unleashed, loved that he was unable to resist the warm haven of her mouth despite his pleas to the contrary.

“Ye must...stop...” he grunted, trying half-heartedly to twist away from her. “I’m warnin’ ye...”

She clasped his erection more tightly in her hands, sliding his foreskin slowly down and then back up his quivering length before she teased him with her tongue once more. “And if I choose not to...stop, that is?” she smiled deviously up at him, licking at her bottom lip. “I find myself disinclined to acquiesce to your request, Captain.”

What began as a giggle ended with a squeal of utter shock as she was lifted by her shoulders and flung back upon her bed. Before she could recover her bearings, Hector was upon her, pinning her to the mattress beneath the weight of his restless body. His hair swept over her face and his blue eyes glittered with nefarious victory.

“Wha...what? You were tied up!” she stammered, too stunned to do anything but lay submissively beneath him. “How on earth...?”

A tattered length of ribbon dangled from his long fingers. “Do you imagine that ye could hold me with so simple a hitch? I’ve been a sailor for nigh on two score and ten years, lass...and I had that there bindin’ of yers undone minutes after ye began yer wee game. Ain’t a knot ye can tie as can hold me...I only be insulted that ye thought otherwise.”

Elizabeth narrowed her eyes at him, torn between being furious that he’d only pretended to play along and being proud of his skills. “So why did you wait so long to show your hand, so to speak?”

“Humoured ye as long as I was able,” he growled, pushing her thighs apart with his knees. “Ye’d not listen, though, and would have had me spillin’ meself before I could claim the hard-earned right to fuck ye good and hard!”

He shifted his hips until he was well-seated between her legs and pressing against her quim through the gauzy fabric of her gown. Elizabeth gasped and then moaned at the stone-hard feel of him, glorying in the understanding that she’d brought him to the point where self-control was no longer possible and she was now about to reap the benefits. “What would it have mattered if I’d brought you off with my...explorations?” she asked desperately, trying to think coherently through the sensations. “With as much young blood as you have coursing through your veins, my beloved, I’d expect you’d be capable of rising to the occasion more than once.”

“In this, I’ll be brookin’ no argument. A decade ye’ve had me on tenterhooks, waitin’ fer ye to see fer yerself who was truly the better man. I’ll have ye as I see fit, and make ye all the more glad fer it!” Hector pushed himself upright enough to straddle her thighs and gathered the gaping material of her bodice in his fist. With a roar of pure animalistic lust, he tore the garment from her body and let the shreds of lace and linen fall to the wayside as he stripped her bare in a matter of seconds.

“Then take me!” she dared him, the sudden coolness of the night air a startling contrast against her burning skin. He was magnificent, looming above her with a wild look on his face and his body gleaming with sweat. Something deep in her body clenched and she felt herself opening for him, ready to take what he had to give. “Show me the depth of your desire and to hell with conversation!”

He fell on her at once, his mouth ravaging hers as though to steal the very breath from her lungs. Without any pretence of tenderness, he forced her to spread her legs even further apart and plunged himself into her slick passage with an abrupt burst of movement.

Elizabeth might have screamed but for the fact that his barbarous incursion had temporarily robbed her of the ability to speak. Her back arched off of the mattress and wordless with awe, she sank her fingernails into the thick flesh of his arms, alternately trying to push him away and pull him closer. It wasn’t so much the pain of him sinking himself further and further into her that she found distressing, ‘though given his size and the length of time she’d been celibate, some brief soreness was a foregone conclusion. Rather, she was besieged by physical and emotional sensations so intense that she knew it would shatter her instantly if he didn’t stop and give her a moment to gather her wits about her.

Hector began to pull out but if Elizabeth expected any kind of brief reprieve, it didn’t come. Instead, her hunger grew more acute than ever before and she felt bereft of the flickering fire he’d just ignited. Elizabeth linked her legs around his buttocks and halted his retreat, pressing him back against the ready heat of her body. With a thrust of his hips, he sheathed himself within her once more, and the first joyful tear trickled from the corner of her eye to the sheets beneath her head.

“Ye belong to me, ‘Lizabeth,” he hissed, nipping at her neck as he set a fervid pace, his cock pounding into her and stretching her to her very limits. He dipped his head to catch her nipple between his teeth, flicking and jabbing at it with his tongue until she gave a ragged cry and writhed beneath him.

“Yes! Yes, only yours!” Her eager hands sought out the hard planes of his back, tracking the lithe, long curve until she could clutch the flexing muscles of his arse and spur him further on. Liquid flowed from within and coated her thighs with each stroke, signalling her eager welcome of his ardent affections.

“Should always have been so,” he persisted stubbornly, as though she hadn’t answered. He engulfed one of her breasts within his palm and she exhaled with a low, guttural moan of ecstasy as he squeezed hard. As dear as her memories of their first night together had been over the years, the passion he unleashed in her now made the past seem almost quaint by comparison

“All that I am, I give to you,” Elizabeth swore fervently, more tears brimming her eyes and making her vision swim. She gave a sharp grunt of surprise as he swivelled his hips, changing his angle so that he slid over untried and tender spots deep within her. Excitement surged in her blood, flames that tore through her and left a searing path of rapture in their wake. In that instant, she could feel every pulsating inch of him embedded inside...the slight trembling in his thighs...the harshness of his breathing. The awareness of their connection, body and spirit, transcended both joy and sexual gratification, and pleasure began to coil tighter and tighter within her.

He found her lips again, his rough kiss searing her soul and pushing her over the edge. Her body seized around him, racking spasms rippling through her and robbing her of her very senses. Her own voice rang in her ears as she shrieked his name, bucking beneath him as he continued his carnal assault on her body and mercilessly prolonged her climax with shallow, tormenting strokes.
“’Lizabeth! Look into me eyes!” he demanded, seizing her hair and bunching it into his fists. “See who it is as brings ye such sweet release!”

Her tears ran unchecked now but she blinked them away as best she could, finally staring helplessly into the face of her ravenous lover. “Hector...please!” she gasped. “It’s too much...I can’t...I can’t...”

Rivulets of sweat ran over his brow as he shook his head, his thrusts deeper and harder. “’Tis heaven...to be buried...so far within ye. Almost as though... ye were made...fer me alone. So...damned perfect...”

Elizabeth felt herself spiralling higher and higher, burning so hot that she felt sure she would explode into a million pieces. And then thought became impossible as she was swept away again on the crest of fulfillment so exquisite that it rendered her utterly mute. A hoarse cry broke from his lips as her overwhelming completion triggered his in turn, and he crushed her in his arms as his body convulsed within hers, his seed spurting in hot, relentless waves against her womb.

Drenched in sweat and quaking in the aftermath, Hector slowly moved off of her, winded from his efforts. Not wanting to be separated so soon, he scooped her up against his chest and rolled over with her so that she was sprawled across his body. They lay in serene silence, sated and content, watching as the first rays of dawn began to brighten the eastern sky and herald the arrival of Christmas Day.

*~*~*~*~*~*

I know that I've been naughty and don't deserve it, but PLEASE leave me a review/rating!!!