by Merry Farmer
Malcolm had the good sense to laugh. The sound was as pure and free as anything Katya had ever heard, and it made her heart light. He kissed her again with more fondness than lust, then tugged at the sash of her robe. “If I’m getting in that bath, you’re getting in with me.”
“You know that neither of us are limber enough anymore for carnal gymnastics in a tub,” she said with a raised eyebrow.
“Who said anything about gymnastics?” he asked, unbuttoning his trousers. “I’m not limber enough to scrub my own back anymore. I need you to do it.”
Katya laughed, so happy that it brought her near tears. She shrugged out of her robe, tossed it aside, then helped Malcolm remove the rest of his clothes. He stepped into the tub, sitting with a long, gratifying sigh as she fetched the tea tray and carried it to a chair placed beside the tub.
“What’s that for?” Malcolm asked as she poured two cups, then left them on the tray to sink into the water with him. She’d filled the tub purposely so that it wouldn’t overflow with both of them in it.
“I figured that we could accomplish two things at once,” she said, handing him the soap with one hand and reaching for a scone with the other. “Since neither of us are quite up to that third thing in the confines of a tub.”
“This is luxury enough,” he said, dipping the soap into the water to bring it to a lather.
Katya sat back against her side of the tub, where she’d draped a towel to serve as a cushion, and indulged in the sight of Malcolm scrubbing off days’ worth of soil and cares while she sipped tea. She knew his body so well that she could practically feel what the suds were feeling as they slipped across his skin. He was clearly eager to get clean above all else and scrubbed his limbs and torso, even his back, in spite of his claims not to be able to reach it, and washed his hair while she observed, feeling hotter by the second.
“You know, you’re very well-preserved for a man past the half-century mark,” she said, nibbling seductively on the corner of a scone.
Malcolm let out a wry laugh, then reached for the pitcher beside the tub to rinse his hair. “The thirst for vengeance has kept me young all these years,” he said as he rubbed his eyes and slicked his hand back through his hair. “Now that Shayles is in jail, I’m going to let it all go and turn into a flabby, decrepit old man.”
Katya nudged his thigh with her toes and set her scone aside. “No, you’re not.” She surged forward risking bruises on her knees to kneel between his spread legs. She smoothed her hands up his now clean chest. “You’re going to get younger by the years because you finally have what you’ve always wanted.”
“And what have I always wanted?” he asked, his tone dropping to a seductive growl as he raked his fingers across her sides and up to toy with her breasts. “Shayles’s defeat?”
“Perhaps,” she said, kissing him lightly as steam curled around them.
“My daughter grown into a fine young woman?” he went on, teasing her nipples into hard points.
“That, of course.” He was teasing her in more ways than one, which fanned the inferno forming within her. She sought to provoke equal desire in him by sliding her hands down toward what she knew would be waiting for her under the water.
“Basil back among his friends where he belongs?” he asked on, his lips twitching into a grin.
“Now you’re just being silly,” she said, one eyebrow arched as she closed her hand around his stiffening cock and stroked him from balls to tip.
“What else could I possibly have that I’ve wanted all this time?” he asked, a hitch in his voice as she pleasured him.
She cupped her hands around his balls, holding them firmly enough to make him gasp. “Are you sure you want to keep toying with me this way?”
He surprised her by swaying forward and tipping her off balance. Her back thumped against the wet towel on her side of the tub as his hand slipped deftly between her legs. “I want to spend the rest of my life toying with you,” he growled as he did just that.
Katya caught her breath as he circled her clitoris. She was already aroused and ready, but she lifted her legs to rest her ankles on the sides of the tub so that he could stroke her more fully. She knew he’d enjoy the sight of her lost in pleasure that way and treated him to a vivid expression of erotic satisfaction as he drove her into orgasm.
She arched forward as waves of pleasure throbbed through her, bringing the tips of her breasts above the water. Malcolm groaned in satisfaction and thrust a finger inside of her to feel her body’s contractions. His thumb continued to tease her clit, drawing her climax on and on.
“My God, woman,” he growled at last, as her tremors subsided. “You come so hard and so easily that I nearly spent here in the water.”
“You make me feel this way,” she panted, languishing in her exposed and satisfied pose, even though her ankles would be hopelessly bruised by the lip of the tub. It clearly aroused him to look at her that way. “You’re the only one who can make me feel this decadent.”
“You’re a shameless hussy, you know,” he told her with a sly grin, shifting as though he was ready to stand.
“You like me this way,” she replied as wickedly as she could. “You like me a lot of other ways too.”
As she predicted, he stood. His cock leapt up in magnificent splendor, a sure sign that the evening had just begun. “We’d better explore as many of those ways as possible before we shrivel up into prunes on the tree.”
The moment of erotic teasing dissolved into the utterly graceless act of Katya moving her aching legs from the side of the tub and Malcolm helping her to stand. As soon as they were both on dry, relatively stable ground, she couldn’t resist plastering her body against his while they were both still wet. He accepted her at once, kissing her with reckless passion and tracing her curves with his hands.
“This is all the motivation I need to keep myself fit well into my twilight years,” he told her in a low voice, brushing his fingers deep into the cleft between her legs before lifting one of them over his hip. “I have to keep up with you.”
“Yes, you do,” she hummed, reaching between them to close her hand around his cock. It didn’t matter that they had the rest of their lives to indulge in each other as much as they wanted, she needed to have him inside her as quickly as possible and to keep him there as long as she could.
He must have sensed her urgency. With a deep sound of pleasure, he broke their kiss and hurried her into the bedroom. As soon as she turned her back to him, he smacked her backside, causing her to gasp and shiver.
“Are you ever going to tire of spanking me like a disobedient child?” Katya asked as she reached the bed and lay her still-dripping body across the coverlet.
“No,” Malcolm answered, stretching atop her with a devilish gleam in his eyes. “Because I doubt you’re ever going to stop behaving like you need a good spanking.”
She laughed deep in her throat. “You wouldn’t want me to anyhow,” she said, opening herself to him and wrapping her arms and legs around him as he covered her.
“No, I wouldn’t,” he said with a sudden strain of seriousness. “I love you just as you are, brazen, impossible, clever, and oh-so-desirable.”
He kissed her between each word, saving his longest and slowest kiss for last. Their tongues met in a dance that was as familiar as the beating of her heart and as necessary as the blood that pumped wildly through her veins. She nibbled at his lips, arching into him and abandoning all inhibition to meld with him. Malcolm’s body was as much a part of hers as the organs that kept her alive. His spirit and his love were as essential to her as water and air. They could bicker and snap, they could even bare their teeth and claws now and then, but she couldn’t live without him.
“I need you, Malcolm,” she whispered as his kisses trailed from her lips to her neck and lower. “I need you now and forever.”
“Then you’ll have me,” he purred, repositioning himself so that he could drive into her.
His entry was so
fast that she gasped in surprise, then let out a long sigh of victory as he continued to plunder her. She’d had him in every way imaginable, but she still craved him. His thrusts told her that he felt the same way, that the new and novel from ages ago couldn’t hold a candle to the sheer pleasure of seasoned love, of knowing someone so well one could feel what the other felt as their bodies joined.
“I love you, Katya,” he said with passionate intensity as his thrusts grew harder. Heat poured off of him. She had no idea how he managed such delicious stamina at his age, but his determination had her spiraling closer and closer to another orgasm in no time. “I love you so much it drives me mad.”
She moaned in approval, clasping his backside and digging her nails in hard. It was just the thing to send him over the edge. With a loud curse that would have shocked the sunshine out of half of the sweet society ladies of London, his body tensed with a powerful orgasm. The joy of feeling him let loose was enough to launch her into bliss for a second time, and her body throbbed with his, milking him as he used the last of his energy on a few, final, weaker thrusts.
Once spent, he collapsed by her side. She rolled with him, a tangle of damp arms and legs, her heart soaring.
“Making love with you will never get old,” she panted, twining her body with his, even though they were both blazing hot, and threading her fingers through his hair.
“Let’s do it much more often,” he agreed, working to catch his breath. “At least until my heart seizes up in flagrante and I die in your arms.”
“I humbly request that you wait at least another twenty years to expire in the throes of passion,” she said, giggling and kissing his shoulder.
“If you command it, I’ll obey,” he said.
Whether it was the pleasure of the moment of the joy of achieving victory over Shayles at last, Katya couldn’t stop herself from laughing once the giggles started. Her whole body shook as she clung to Malcolm, which made him laugh with her. The two of them lay there, in a pile of rumbled, damp bedcovers, trying to kiss each other between giggles. As far as Katya was concerned, they deserved every ridiculous moment, every hysterical fit of silliness they could manage.
When their bodies cooled to the point of being uncomfortable, they got up to finish drying off, then quickly tumbled under the bedcovers, resting their heads on the pillows.
“You’re a brilliant woman to think of making love while sopping wet on top of the bed so that this part remained dry,” Malcolm said, a distinct note of exhaustion in his voice.
Katya hummed in agreement, too tired for the moment to think of a clever enough reply. They both needed a nap. They needed more than that. Five years at least to do nothing but curl in each other’s arms, alternating between athletic lovemaking and sleeping like the dead ought to do the trick. But before they gave in and slept—at least until they would be forced to get up, dress, and make an appearance at whatever party their friends were bound to throw to celebrate Shayles’s defeat—there were other matters to be settled.
“Malcolm?” she asked, brushing her fingers across his still-bearded cheek as he appeared to be drifting off.
“Hmm?” he hummed, confirming that he was all but lost to slumber.
“Will you marry me?”
His eyes popped wide open. He stared at her, blinking, then pushed himself up to one arm so that he could gaze down at her with incredulous surprise. “Now you want to get married?” he asked, his tone outraged even though pure elation shone in his eyes.
Katya shrugged. “Well, yes. It seems like as good a time as any.”
He gaped down at her, then launched into motion, attempting to roll her to her stomach. “Where is that luscious backside of yours. It definitely needs a spanking right now.”
Katya laughed and put up very little struggle as he rolled her onto his knees and began paddling her bottom. She would be ready for a whole new round of lovemaking long before she knew he’d be capable of it if he wasn’t careful.
“Stop, Malcolm, stop,” she laughed, gasping when he smacked her particularly hard. “I mean it. I want to marry you.”
“You were just waiting for me to stop asking so that you could ask yourself,” he said, smacking her one more time before sinking into the bed with her and rolling her into his arms atop him. “Weren’t you?” he asked again, far more tender and filled with love.
“Of course,” she teased him, stretching to cover him completely. “Well, and I was waiting for a few other obstacles between us to be cleared. Our meddling children, for example,” she said, glancing to the side with feigned innocence. “The specter of Shayles, the secrets of our past, the miserable failure to properly communicate.”
“So just a few minor things,” he said with equally faked casualness.
“Just a few.” She glanced at him with a smile, then leaned in for a long, slow kiss. “Now that those things are all out of the way, however….”
He laughed low in his throat, then rolled her to her back, kissing her with renewed passion. “So does this mean I get to be the next Mr. Lady Stanhope?” he asked, sliding a hand between them to cup her breast and tease her nipple.
“Absolutely,” she replied. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“Then let me see if I can’t coax these old bones to perform a small miracle of aged stamina,” he said, stealing a kiss, then going on with, “I’m going to have to work hard to keep my younger wife satisfied.”
“You are indeed,” Katya answered with a wicked flicker of her eyebrow. Though she was certain they were both up to the challenge.
Epilogue
The wedding was a small, summer affair with only friends and family present. Peter offered to host it at Starcross Castle, mostly because at the beginning of May, Mariah gave birth to a beautiful, healthy baby girl—whom they named Annalisa in what Katya thought was a touching tribute to Peter’s tragic first wife—and neither of them wanted to be far from home.
Starcross Castle was perfect, as far as Katya was concerned. She and Malcolm were able to have a quiet ceremony at the local chapel, and then a loud and raucous celebration at the castle itself.
“I knew the two of you would marry eventually,” Natalia declared, unable to stop giggling after Katya allowed her to have a single glass of punch. “I knew it.”
“To be honest, we all knew it,” Peter told her, then plucked the half-empty crystal punch glass from her hands. He handed the glass to Marigold, who stood nearby with Alex and young Master James beside her. James hugged her skirts, shy of the celebrating adults around him.
“Did you really?” Lavinia asked, blinking innocently as she leaned heavily on Armand’s arm, looking pleasantly round and in the family way. “All the two of you used to do was fight.”
“We enjoy fighting,” Katya said, turning a saucy grin on Malcolm, whose hand she hadn’t let go of since she joined him at the front of the chapel.
“Fighting means making up is that much more exciting,” Malcolm agreed with a wink.
“Oh,” Natalia exclaimed, then hiccupped loudly. Her cheeks went bright pink.
“Perhaps you would like to come see the baby?” Peter asked, resting a hand on the small of her back and steering her to the other end of the lawn, where Mariah and Annalisa were surrounded by a ring of admirers, including Basil and Elaine—who had made the long trip from Brynthwaite for the occasion—and Victoria, who held baby Peter, and Sir Christopher Dowland.
“Have there been any sparks between the two of them yet?” Armand asked, nodding to Victoria and Christopher.
“Christopher let slip to me last night that he’s impressed with Vicky,” Katya revealed as their group all turned to watch the interaction. “But Victoria is keeping her emotions veiled these days.”
“Poor thing,” Lavinia sighed. “Do you suppose she’s still traumatized by the things William deVere did to her?”
Katya sent a wry grin Lavinia’s way. The young woman must have had a bit too much to drink to speak so openly about some
thing so terrible and personal for Victoria.
“I think that’s it exactly,” Katya said. “But time heals all wounds.” She turned her smile to Malcolm, and when that wasn’t enough to express her joy and relief, she leaned in to kiss his lips.
“Mama,” Rupert scolded her, striding forward with Cece on his arm. “There’s no need to engage in shocking displays of affection in public.”
He was teasing her, but all the same, Katya replied, “Just wait until you find yourself in a similar position, young man.”
Katya glanced to Cece, intending to wink at the woman she was certain would end up as her daughter-in-law as well as her step-daughter, but Cece lowered her eyes with a hint of wistfulness.
“I don’t think that will be happening any time soon, Lady Stanhope.” Cece glanced up. “Or are you Lady Campbell now?”
“I’m Mama to you, thank you very much,” Katya said. Her expression filled with concern. “Is there something we need to talk about?” she asked, peeking at Rupert.
Rupert cleared his throat. “I’ve decided to enlist in the army, at least for a time.”
Katya opened her mouth to express her shock and worry and to tell him off, but Rupert rushed on.
“I inherited the earldom at such a young age, Mama, and the last year has shown me that a university education is not enough to make effective decisions, either at home or in the House of Lords. I need more experience of the world, and a commission in the army is the way to accomplish that.”
“Rupert, how could you—”
“A wise decision,” Malcolm said, cutting Katya off and slapping Rupert’s back. “A stint abroad, fighting for queen and country, is just the thing a young man needs.”
Katya gaped at Malcolm, ready to slap him. “He could be hurt or killed,” she argued. “That would break more hearts than just mine.”
