Just Desserts
by Catherine O. Virtue

    Vincent came up behind her and slipped his arms around her waist.  Catherine smiled, then startled as his mouth grazed her cheek, then pressed a scorching kiss against the column of her throat.

    “Vincent!”

    His laugh was a deep rumble in his chest, and she could feel it as his arms pulled her back against him.  He kissed her neck again, his mouth moving deliberately over her skin while Catherine squirmed.

    “Vincent—not fair!”  She put the last soapy dish under the spray of the faucet and put it in the drainer, then turned abruptly into his arms.  His next kiss she met full-on, her mouth opening under his, her wet hands sliding to cup his neck.  She felt gloriously unsteady, and anchoring herself to Vincent seemed an imminently practical idea.

    Vincent apparently agreed with this assessment, for his hold on her grew from intimate to demanding, his warm hands sliding to cup and hold what was his.

    Catherine made a little moan against his mouth and her body, which had been straining against his, suddenly loosened.  “Yes,” she whispered.  “Please…yes.”

    There had been a time when this was new, when each new delight had been a miracle—perfect and complete within itself, but that time was gone.  This was not new.  This was achingly familiar, but it would never be old, and the miracle was still complete, still perfect.

    Catherine’s hands were tangled in his hair, holding his mouth fast against hers, leaving Vincent the lion’s share of work.  Catherine’s sweater was no impediment, but it meant they had to stop kissing, which proved problematic.  Vincent’s first attempts to pull away were met with furious resistance, and he relented, his hands gentle on the smooth, warm skin over her shoulderblades.  The warmth of his hands eventually communicated itself to Catherine’s pleasure-fogged senses, and it was the thought of those warm hands in other places that convinced her to let him drag his mouth away and lift the sweater over her head.

    If Vincent had been worried that Catherine would be chilly without her sweater, the heat rising off her skin would have reassured him, but he had not been worried.  He had, instead, been entranced with the sight of Catherine worrying the lacings of his vest, her slender hands working furiously to unknot the soft leather.

    Vincent stilled her hands with a touch, then stepped back and shucked the vest over his shoulders, letting it fall on the kitchen tile.  Initially reluctant to see him withdraw, no matter how temporarily, Catherine nevertheless made good use of the opportunity before her.  Shucking his vest over his head has caused his shirt to rise, revealing a golden expanse of torso that just begged to be touched.  Catherine’s hands on him, eager and insistent, caused Vincent to gasp, and when his arms were free again, he draped them possessively around her hips.  This meant that Catherine’s hands could roam unimpeded over his chest and abdomen, but their hips were still pressed familiarly close.  Catherine’s hands stroked and teased, grazing his taut muscles with satisfaction.  Mine, she thought happily.  All mine. 

    Strictly speaking, their bond communicated feelings, not words, but some of her possessiveness—and her delight in that possession—communicated itself effectively.  Ruefully, Vincent regarded her, reveling in her smugness.  Feeling his gaze, Catherine looked up, her eyes bright and feverish, her wide smile a challenge and an invitation.

    “Mine,” she said, and kissed him with that smiling mouth.

    Chuckling, Vincent bent to her, taking her kiss and demanding more.  “Yes,” he murmured, his mouth against her throat, and let his tongue flick across her fevered skin.  She gasped and arched against him, drawing his head down, and Vincent obliged, pressing a trail of kisses across her collarbone, and only stopping when he felt her hand inside the waistband of his dungarees, tugging the hook open.  It was not easy to do one-handed, but she managed without complaint, because her other hand had reached to cup his firm bum.  That got more than a rise out of Vincent.

    He groaned, his grasp on her hips tightening convulsively, and bent to cover one straining breast with his mouth. 

    “Yes, yes,” Catherine panted, writhing as his mouth sucked and licked and teased her nipple erect through the insubstantial fabric of her bra.  It was not—quite—what was wanted, and Vincent pulled the fabric down with his teeth so that he could capture the rosy nipple between his teeth.  Catherine cried out as his tongue flicked impudently across the sensitive tip, teasing her, and she gave up her purchase on his backside to use both hands to wrench his zipper open.

    It was Vincent’s turn to gasp and cry out, but Catherine’s laugh was tonic.  “Mine, too,” she said, and grasped him firmly between her soft, strong hands. 

    Catherine’s drycleaner often wondered why her expensive slacks so often needed the zippers replaced.  Her slacks joined his on the floor and then his hands were inside the edges of her lacy panties, pushing them over the swell of her hips and to the floor.  Catherine was saved the necessity of stepping out of them when Vincent’s warm hands cupped her bottom, lifting her onto the edge of the sink.  This was—almost—perfect, given their relative heights.

    Almost perfect became perfect as their bodies joined, and Catherine relinquished the hold of her hands and replaced it with the clasp of her body, loving the feel of him with her, inside her, filling her to capacity. 

    “Catherine,” Vincent groaned, and fastened his mouth over hers.  Her arms were around his shoulders, and she wriggled impatiently, wanting their bodies as close as humanly possible.  Her lover obliged, clutching her to him as they began to move.  Gently at first, because his control was so tenuous, Vincent’s body worked with hers, his thrusts becoming more fervid, more insistent as they caught the ancient rhythm and entered the timeless dance.

    “Yes, oh, Vincent, like that, oh…yesss,” Catherine gasped, but Vincent wanted those lips under his and he smothered her cries of pleasure with his hard, hungry mouth.  Catherine groaned, her ankles tightening over his back.  Vincent might have conquered her lips, but her tongue warred with his for supremacy.  When he gasped, she tore her mouth away and bit him smartly on the neck.  He shivered and redoubled his efforts to drive her over the edge, his body ramming into hers with abandon.  He felt her body coil, felt her back arch in sublime anticipation and he bent and ravaged her other straining breast as her body began to buck.

    “Yes, oh god, yes, oh, Vincent, oh—more! Yes, yes!”

    More, thought Vincent dazedly.  Oh yes—everything!   And his hold grew more possessive, each thrust more deliberate, timed to her cries of pleasure and need.   Her hands clutched at him desperately, her body held captive and set free in the same act, and she laughed for the joy of it.  “Yes, Vincent,” Catherine cried exultantly.  “Oh, Vincent, Vincent, Vincent….”

    The sound of his name on her lips, the feel of her hands in his hair, her body, offered willingly and without reservation calmed the deep places in his soul and pushed him, finally, over the edge where worlds blend and souls unite and bodies become one.

    Catherine decided that taking off what remained seemed easier than trying to reclaim what was gone, and Vincent more than enjoyed the sight of Catherine running around the apartment with a short robe and nothing else.  The fact that she didn’t bother to belt it was an added bonus, and Vincent watched her move about the kitchen deftly.  There was something oddly erotic about watching Catherine make coffee—surely the most domestic of activities—in the altogether, and he stood in the doorway and smiled at her.  His shirt had been a casualty of their lovemaking, but he had retrieved his trousers.  Catherine turned and smiled at him over her shoulder.  She liked the sight of him in her kitchen, leaning in the doorway and watching her with hot, hungry eyes.

    “You didn’t even let me serve dessert,” she complained.

    Vincent made a sign that might have been protest, or negation, or simply amusement, and she grinned impudently at him, not at all abashed.

    “Fine,” she said airily.  “I can eat this whole chocolate marble cake by myself.”

    Vincent laughed at last, loving her bravado after the way her body had surrendered so completely, so wholly, to his.  “I’ll get the plates.”

    After the coffee was done, and two enormous wedges of cake rested on the dessert plates, they eschewed the table and went to sit in the living room.  Catherine perched on his lap in the big overstuffed armchair and they had cake, and coffee and…finally—once again—dessert.