STORMY WEATHER. #romance #steamy #contemporary

A busy time of year, but a happy one, I hope. I wish everyone here a wonderful and blessed holiday season. I don’t – yet – have a Christmas story, but I’ll share an excerpt from one of my favourite, and earliest stories, from my book Need: An Erotic Anthology – “Stormy Weather.” I hope you enjoy it! 

Need: An Erotic Anthology

******

"It's going to rain." 

 "No, it's not." He looks up at the sky, trying to hide a touch of doubt. 

 "Yes, it is. Trust me." 

 I smile as I watch him roam around the small clearing where I've spread out the oversized blanket and our picnic lunch. He's restless: one huge canvas finished yesterday and off to the gallery; another project to start next week. He can't seem to contain the energy built up inside himself – letting go of one creation and preparing for the birth of another. He is an artist down to his very soul, creating or imagining something new into being every waking moment. 

 I watch him from where I'm sitting as he picks distractedly at a thin, green whip of a branch from the willow tree that sweeps gracefully down to touch the ground. There are several willows half-surrounding our little clearing, blocking the view between here and the huge, old manor house where we've rented a suite for the weekend. It's a little primitive, out in the middle of nowhere, and the house has seen better days. But it's got character, and it's very romantic to be out here in the country, just us. Alone. 

I arranged this weekend, picked this place so we could spend some quiet, reflective time, uninterrupted. Fill up that beautiful soul before he goes back to lay it out on a canvas again, create images and tell stories he alone can tell. Before I go back to the column-in-progress that is brooding in a file on my laptop, waiting for the right ending. 

 And for another reason: so we could get away from the gossip. The young up-and-coming artist, the somewhat older and successful journalist and critic. To their small minds, he's either using me for a leg up or I'm the only reason he's been a success, because of my influence. I'm a Svengali who has him in my sexual spell, or he's a gigolo looking for someone to take care of him. I know how much it hurts him, when the mean-spirited and jealous reduce the beauty of what we've found with each other to a sordid convenience. He wants to lash back, but I've convinced him – many times – to ignore what we can't change. And so . . . we deserve some time away, I think. The laptop has been left at home this weekend; I've just got a notebook and pen. I forbade him to bring anything more than a sketchpad and some pencils, though he calls this cruel and unusual punishment. But he knows what I'm about and agrees – sometimes a rest, a break from routine can make work new again. And the petty minds we have to deal with can be left behind, too. Sometimes the everyday needs to be cleansed by something as small and quiet as a weekend away. 

"Come over here and sit down." 

 I hold out my hand to him and he looks at me with a strange little smile, half pleased, half puzzled. Slowly, to tease me, he walks over to the blanket and stares down at me. I hold out both hands, and in a second, he is in my arms, all eagerness and passion, his weight and momentum pushing me down onto my back. I love the feeling of his body, all his weight, on top of me, and a small, quiet sigh of contentment escapes me. 

 His lips are on my neck, feather-soft as he moves down to the base of my throat. I feel his tongue flicker over the hollow there, and my breath catches. He keeps going, pushing aside the edges of the front of my dress as he kisses my collarbone, my chest, nips at the lacy edge of my bra— 

 And then, the rain starts. 

 "Fuck," he says quietly. 

 "Mm-hmm." Don't stop. . . . 

 He looks up, searching the sky, and I watch as the first few drops of rain trickle down his face. He lets out a deep sigh of frustration when he hears a faint boom of thunder from far away. "Well, come on—we'd better gather all this up and head for cover." Standing up quickly, he pulls on my hand as he looks around at all our gear. 

"Why?" I deliberately let go of his hand, and lie back down on the blanket, waiting for an answer to my question. He gazes at me for a few seconds, looking puzzled. 

"Umm . . . it's raining. We're going to get wet." 

I continue to lie there, looking up at him with a politely inquiring expression on my face. The silence stretches out between us. I can feel each plump droplet of rain spatter onto my face and front, and then the drops start to come faster and faster, soaking me and making my dress cling to my body. It's only thin, white cotton, that dress, and when I look down at myself, I can see the lacy edges of my underthings right through the wet fabric. I glance up; he's looking, too, and breathing a little harder than he was a moment ago. 

 "Do you have a problem with me being . . . wet, sir?" I ask, blinking outrageously as if I have no idea what I'm doing to him. He certainly doesn't seem to have any idea what he's doing to me; his T-shirt is plastered to his body by now, the rain is coming down that hard, and I can see his nipples, rock-hard, pushing against the cloth. I reach for the edges of the blanket and pull them up and around me in a makeshift tent. 

 "There's enough room in here for both of us. Come back. I love storms. They're exciting, don't you think?" 

 A little groan, followed by something more like a growl, and he's diving back into my arms, inside my little tent, rolling with me over and over until we're completely wrapped up in the blanket. His mouth is all over me, anywhere he can reach. One hand is trying to roam over my back, one twists gently into my hair as if he's afraid he's going to lose me if he lets go. I'm kissing him back as if he was air itself and I can't take in enough. It's become a battle, a skirmish of hands and lips, trying to conquer each other, hampered by the blanket in a most frustrating way. I manage to get one hand between his stomach and the second skin his T-shirt has become and drag my fingers over his belly. . . .