Every part of her was as swollen and aroused as it could possibly be and the ache of unsatisfied desire was so intense that it was all she could feel as it throbbed deep within her belly and behind her pubic bone. ‘My breasts!’ she complained, feeling the heavy ache behind her nipples as well.
‘Squeeze them yourself,’ said Edmund, unable to help her himself. ‘Start now, and squeeze harder than you’d normally squeeze.’
Gasping and moaning, Harriet encircled her breasts and squeezed. Immediately the ache changed into a thrill of wonderfully searing pleasure and, as she arched her hips slightly, with satisfaction Edmund finally allowed the very tip of his tongue to skim across her urethral opening and then flicked the point hard against the entrance itself.
Harriet’s scream as her body jackknifed on the bed would have been heard by anyone in the house, and it even carried through the open window to Oliver’s cottage where he sat reading in the tiny front room.
Noella kept hold of Harriet’s legs so that Edmund could continue to play his tongue over this exquisite area of tender flesh and Harriet screamed again as the sensations continued to flood over her, finally quenching the previously insatiable hunger that Edmund had aroused in her.
‘Stop!’ she shouted at last. ‘Let me go! That’s enough, it’s enough!’ Lewis saw her roll around the bed in a final delirium of ecstasy as Noella released her legs.
Chapter Eleven
* * *
HARRIET LAY IN an exhausted heap on the bed as Edmund rolled off her after finally allowing himself to climax inside her still spasming body. For him, as well as her, it had been the most intense experience of his life. He looked at Lewis. ‘Your turn tomorrow night,’ he said with a faint smile.
Ella licked her lips in anticipation and smiled at Edmund. ‘And mine with you,’ she reminded him.
Edmund nodded, his eyes suddenly cool again. ‘Indeed, tomorrow you and I spend the night together.’
Slowly Harriet sat up and looked about her. ‘No,’ she said clearly.
Edmund’s eyes narrowed. ‘What do you mean?’
‘This is the end. The game’s over.’
Lewis felt as though someone had hit him in the stomach as the pain of her rejection struck home. ‘Harriet, please …’ he began.
‘I know all I need to know now,’ she continued, still keeping her gaze fixed on Edmund. ‘This is the end.’
‘But Lewis has to see how well he can do.’
‘Tonight was for me, not for Lewis and most certainly not for you,’ said Harriet calmly. ‘I wanted to see how far it was possible for me to go and now I know.’
‘But I satisfied you more than Lewis has ever done,’ said Edmund. ‘I know I did. Does this mean you’re going to stay with me?’
She shook her head. ‘Of course not.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I could never love you. You’re a sexual technician, and a very good one, but there isn’t anything more. That’s probably enough for a lot of women, but not for me. I know now that for me sex alone isn’t enough, however incredible. There has to be involvement, feeling, love if you like, otherwise it’s pointless.’
‘I do love you!’ cried Edmund.
‘No,’ said Harriet, ‘you only think you do. I’m not your kind of woman at all, except sexually.’
‘Lewis doesn’t love you,’ said Edmund, his face twisting in rage. ‘When we toasted tonight he toasted his film. I was the one who toasted you.’
Harriet looked at her husband and he stared back at her, his dark eyes full of pain. ‘It’s true,’ he murmured. ‘I don’t know why. I wasn’t thinking straight at the time.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Harriet quietly. ‘I know how much the film means to you, and I’m sorry that I can’t go on, but for me this is the end of the story.’
Lewis nodded. ‘And for me. I knew even before you spoke that I couldn’t make love to you in front of the others tomorrow night.’
‘I think you’re both mad!’ exploded Edmund, grabbing hold of Ella’s wrists and drawing her into the bathroom. ‘I’m quite sure that there’s still some pleasure to be had from the night’s game even if you two won’t join in. Perhaps it’s Ella who’s the true Helena.’
Noella slipped quietly away to join Oliver, knowing that she wouldn’t return to America, and Lewis and Harriet found themselves alone.
‘Did you mean what you said?’ asked Harriet, as Lewis slipped her peignoir over her shoulders.
‘About what?’
‘About knowing you couldn’t have gone on with the game tomorrow?’
‘Yes. I was going to tell Edmund as soon as tonight was over.’
Harriet leant her head against his shoulder. ‘Has this spoilt the film?’
‘How could it? This is the end, and a very satisfying one as well.’
‘There won’t be any more films will there?’ she asked later, when they’d returned to their own bed.
‘Yes, but not involving us.’
‘I’m glad. I knew you’d realise one day that there are some things that are more important than art.’
‘And have you learnt anything as well?’ he asked gently.
‘Yes, that for me sex and love have to go together. Sheer sensation, however incredible, isn’t enough. I’m glad I did what I did, but it’s over now and I won’t ever need to test myself again.’
‘We need a proper holiday,’ declared Lewis as they both turned on their sides and began to kiss. ‘Where would you like to go?’
‘Italy I think. I love opera and art, and I’ve had enough of Cornwall for the moment!’
Gently Lewis eased himself into her welcoming warmth and they began to move together in a blissfully familiar pattern. ‘Italy it is, as long as you don’t have a weakness for Italian men,’ he laughed, watching her eyes widen as, to her incredulous delight, she felt her body coming alive again.
‘Only half-Portuguese ones!’ she promised him, closing her eyes as the warm glow began to fill her body.
To Lewis’s horror, he suddenly had an image of his wife’s fair-skinned body naked on a bed in the midday heat of Italy, her limbs entwined with the darker limbs of a young Italian male. It would make, he thought, as they both surged towards a climax, a very erotic shot.
In the next bedroom, almost out of her mind with excitement, Ella was finally allowed to climax beneath Edmund’s hands and tongue. Watching her panting with exhausted satisfaction, Edmund knew that at last he’d found his own, real life Helena.
And in the exercise room of the small cottage, Noella and Oliver toasted their future together.
Forbidden Desires Page 19
