Chapter Twelve
"I know that I said I would get dinner for us, but you seem to have taken me off the beaten path," Natalie said after a walk in the forest. Patrick told her that the ruins were best explored in full day light, but there was plenty to see in the forest.
"I mean, I suppose I could see if the deer we saw would be interested in selling us some kebabs or something."
Patrick shrugged.
"I'm not too worried about it," he said, laying in some wood for the fire. "There's food in the refrigerator. This morning I sent the call up for the caretakers to make sure that this place was well-stocked.
Blinking in surprise, Natalie made her way to the refrigerator.
"Oh my…" she began. The refrigerator was huge and fully stocked, as promised. "I've changed my mind, this is perfect," she said. "I'll make us some dinner, how's that?"
Patrick shot a wary glance at her over his shoulder.
"I remember last week at work when you told me that you sometimes poured chili into a bag of crisps and called it a meal. How worried should I be?"
"First, walking tacos are a delicacy in some parts of the world, and second, that's just what I do when I only have access to a gas station. This is different. Trust me. I'll get us both fed. You just build up the fire."
Patrick shot her another suspicious look, but she was already pulling out some ingredients from the refrigerator. She couldn't stop herself from being slightly gleeful about everything she had to work with. She had scrounged meals out of far less in the past, and with this, she was going to be able to feed them very well indeed.
She decided that ‘simple but rich’ would suit the circumstances of their trip, and at the end of the day, most things were delicious when dressed in olive oil and herbs and then roasted. She pulled out a half of a chicken from the refrigerator, and found an assortment of root vegetables, carrots, beets and potatoes. The vegetables were tossed in olive oil and a few tablespoons of Italian herbs from a small jar, and then the chicken, rubbed down with the same, was laid on top. When it went into the oven, she turned back to the fridge, looking with an eye towards dessert. She wasn't sure that she was up to baking, but there was plenty of beautiful fruit to be had, so she simply cut it up into a bowl, sprinkled it with sugar and the juice of a lime and stuck it back into the refrigerator.
"I told you that I would get us fed," she said triumphantly, and Patrick smiled at her a little.
"You're quite domestic," he said. "I didn't expect it after hearing about your love of travel."
Natalie sat down at the rough kitchen table, setting her phone's alarm to remind her when to take things out of the oven.
"I was told a long time ago that the best reason to travel was to find your home," she said. "I guess one of the things I've got going for me is that whenever I find it, I'll be able to cook and take care of things fairly well. My mother worked a lot while I was growing up, so if I wanted good food, I had to cook it myself. We were too poor for even the mixes and stuff like that, so I learned to make whatever we got from the food banks stretch out."
Patrick sat down next to her, and idly and naturally, he took her hand. She shivered a little as he traced invisible patterns over her palm, and she leaned against him a little. The fire was low at the moment, but it was warming up the guardhouse well. The warmth from Patrick couldn't be beat however, and she snuggled close.
"My mother did not cook," Patrick said thoughtfully. "She was from a well-to-do family that actually had a title, once upon a time. Her family didn't quite know what to make of my father, who had built a great deal of his own fortune. He was able to keep her well, though, and I believe that they were happy."
It seemed a little like a story from another time for Natalie. She could imagine a tall woman with Patrick's bright eyes, charmed by a man with Patrick's build and strength. She was glad that they had been happy for a time, at least.
"So did you learn to cook on your own?" she asked, and he laughed a little.
"Pet, I know how to grill meat, because a roommate taught me at university, and I know to boil an egg because it seemed a ridiculous thing for a man not to know. Beyond that, I am very reliant on the restaurants of whatever city I am in. Watching you cook is a little bit like magic. I've never been with a woman who has done so before."
She looked at him a trifle sternly.
"I really hope you don't mean that you expect women to cook for you?"
"No, you misunderstand. I do not expect anyone who is with me to cook. Cooking is done at restaurants. What you did is lovely."
"Well, we'll wait to see what happens when it comes out of the oven," she said, and Patrick laughed.
She timed it well, and their food came out of the oven tender and delicious. Afterward, the fruit salad was the perfect amount of sweetness. Sated, they rested in front of the fire.
"It's so quiet," she murmured, unwilling to break quiet by speaking louder. "I never realized how noisy the city was until I left it, but it still surprises me every single time."
"That's one of the reasons I come out to this place, one of the reasons why I wanted to make it beautiful. I can be alone here with my thoughts."
Natalie thought about that for a moment.
"You're not alone right now, though," she pointed out. "I'm here with you."
"Ah, but I am alone with you, and that is a lovely thing as well."
She knew that he was going to lean in and kiss her, and she leaned into the kiss eagerly. This one was different from the ones that they had shared before. This was slow and slightly tired from a very full day. He kissed her thoroughly, but there was a gentleness to it, a feeling that the world ended at their door, and that there was no need at all to go any farther.
Before when they had made love, there was an urgency to it. Natalie could tell now that they had been starving for each other practically since the moment they laid eyes on each other. She had no doubt that they would reach that frenzied peak again, but right now, immediately sated, they could explore slowly, learning the particulars of each other's bodies, their rhythms and their harmonies.
After Patrick banked the long fire to make sure that it would last through the night, he led her up the staircase to the wide bed. The only light in the guardhouse came from the fire below, and in the dim red and golden glow, Natalie thought that they could have been anywhere, any-when. Lovers over the ages had looked at each other like this, and she felt a deep kind of thrum inside her that felt strangely connected to the world and her place in it.
"Natalie, I am going to undress you know," Patrick said, and there was already a kind of roughness to his voice that made her breath catch.
"Yes," she said, and when she tried to help him take her clothes off, he held her hands still.
"No, let me. I want to feel you. I want to know you."
For such a big man, he was remarkably deft. He slid her dress down her shoulders, and then he simply looked at her in her underwear. When she would have crossed her arms in front of her to hide, he held them down gently.
"I never want you to hide anything from me," he murmured. "Not now, not ever. You are far too fine to be hidden from my eyes, pet."
Shivering, she did as he said, and he slowly peeled her underwear from her body, letting her stand naked in front of him.
She thought she might die of anticipation before he started to touch her. He came to stand behind her, and then he only drew his hands up her sides, making her sigh a little.
"Ticklish?"
"Not usually."
"Good."
He spidered his hands down her sides and down her belly before sliding them up her thighs. Wherever he touched her, he left traces of fire, and it wasn't long before she started to bite back soft whimpers.
"Does it feel good?" he asked, and she shivered at the feel of his lips so close against her ear. His whisper sent a silvery shock through her, and she leaned back against him.
"You must know that it does," Natalie said, and Patrick chuckled.
"Just assume that I know nothing unless you tell me," he said.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that I want you to tell me what you want."
She gasped as his hands came to rest on her hips, tugging her back so that she could feel his erection against her rear.
"I don't think I've ever done that with anyone before," she murmured.
"Then you'll be doing it for the first time with me," he said firmly, and if she could have, Natalie might have buried her face in her hands.
"Tell me what you want, beautiful," he said, and there was an edge of command in his voice.
"I... I want you to touch me," she managed to get out.
He squeezed her hips gently and planted a kiss on the side of her neck.
"That's not good enough, pet," he said teasingly. "If you don't tell me better, I might stop. Is that what you want?"
"No!" she yelped in shock. "No, I don't want that! I... I want..."
"Where do you want me to touch you?"
"Everywhere!"
Natalie yelped as he landed a light slap on her rear, all sound and no pain at all.
"Do you want me to get my own ideas of where you should be touched?" he murmured, and she could feel a chill of darkness in his voice. "Would you like to leave it all in my hands, darling?"
"Yes and no," she confessed, and he laughed at that.
"That is a very honest answer, at least," he said, and Natalie could hear the smile in his voice. "I'll ask again. Where do you want me to touch you?"
"I... I want you to touch my breasts?" It came out as a question, not because she was unsure but because she had never spoken her desire out loud like this. "But, um, not groping them, more... gently maybe?"
She was rewarded with a kiss at the sensitive juncture where her neck joined her shoulder. The kiss sent tremors straight through her.
"Thank you, pet, that is an excellent start."
Start? she wondered, but then his hands came up to cup her heavy breasts. He squeezed them with the utmost gentleness, and then he started to brush his fingers over the sensitive skin there, making Natalie gasp. He was making her moan with a light, barely-there touch. His touch brought shivers up and down her spine, and when he started plucking gently at her nipples, she felt oddly helpless as they hardened, aching for more. The whole time, he was whispering in her ear, soft words, words that verged on filthy, words that woke something inside her and made her long for him even more.
"That's beautiful, that's my beautiful girl," he was saying. "Do you have any idea what you do to me when you are like this? Do you know how much I want you, how much I just crave touching you?"
She could have let him touch just her breast for hours, but when he pressed against her from behind, she knew that she wanted more.
"Yes, pet? What else do you need?"
"My... My thighs?"
"Oh, good girl..."
Instead of leaving her to stand in the center of the room, he simply pushed her towards the bed, rolling her over on her belly. When she tried to turn her head to look at him, he ran his fingers through her hair, holding her still.
"No, keep your eyes forward," he said. "You've no call to be worrying about what I am doing right now. All you need to do is to enjoy what you are feeling, all right?"
She whimpered her assent because she was floating above it all right now. She would have let him do anything that he wanted just then, and perhaps that should have worried her more, but she trusted this man, and she wanted the pleasure that he had promised her.
He ran his his hands from her waist down to the place behind her knees. His touch was light at first, making her shiver, but then he started to squeeze, massaging her muscles with his large and strong hands.
"You're so strong, I can feel it here," he crooned. "So much pressure, so many miles you’ve walked."
He leaned down to kiss her thighs, and she gasped at the warm spots he left, kissing his way over the rise of her hips, her thighs, even the ticklish spot right behind her knee.
"I love tasting you," he purred as he pressed his knee between hers, opening her.
She arched against the bed, because she was sure that he was going to take her right then, but instead his hands traveled along her inner thighs stopping just short of her humid warmth.
"And now what shall I do?" he asked, and she gasped, calling him a sadist, a monster. All of her weak words only made him laugh, trailing his nails over the sensitive skin underneath his hands.
"Well, I may be all those things and more, but if you don't tell me what you want, you're the one to blame — aren't you?"
She might have said something, but he was already bending down to plant warm kisses along her back. She never thought that her back was terribly sensitive, but here and now when she couldn't reach Patrick to pull him closer or to push his hands to the aching places that she wanted, it certainly was. His kisses up and down her spine raised goosebumps all over her body, raising her need up higher and higher until she was practically sobbing.
"Come on, pet. What do you want? What do you want me to do to you, hm? Say it, or I'll just keep doing as I like."
"Please," she managed to get out. "Please, between my legs... Patrick, please don't stop."
He chuckled, and from the tremor that ran through his still-clothed frame, she realized that he was just as affected as she was. However, he seemed to possess an iron will. As he simply slid a hand down her back and over her rear, he only purred with pleasure at her shivers.
Patrick lifted her up to her knees, a hand on her shoulder keeping her breasts pressed against the bed. The position left her ridiculously exposed, but right now she was on fire with need and didn't care. All that mattered was that he would give her the satisfaction that she craved, that he would touch her.
"That's a beautiful girl," he murmured. "That's perfect, look at you."
He ran one hand up her thigh, spreading her knees even farther apart. He was making space to touch her, she realized, and then he slid one sure fingertip along her slit, finding her already damp.
"Oh, I know that you can get more ready than that," he said, and he started to push a finger deep inside, feeling how tight she was, the way she trembled with need.
"Stay right there," he said in her ear. "You won't like what happens if you don't."
"What happens if I don't?" she gasped out, and he chuckled.
"Why, then I stop."
There were no other words that he could have spoken that would have kept her so still, and she needed them. Otherwise she might have flinched away when he lay down behind her, sliding up so that his head was resting on the bed between her legs. She squawked when he took her hips in his hands again, and then he was pressing her down to meet his mouth.
For a moment, Natalie was shocked by the intimacy of his touch, how powerful it was to straddle him like this and to give him the most intimate access to her body. It felt powerfully vulnerable, even unnervingly so. If he had told her what he planned to do, she might have demurred. But in the moment, her body refused to give her a choice.
Patrick started to lick along her slit, long slow strokes that built up her need. Just when she was settling into that, however, he reached up and started tonguing her clit. This time the sensations were so powerful that she started to squirm away, but his strong hands kept her exactly where he wanted her.
"Oh Patrick, oh please!"
He pulled back just far enough to give a breathless laugh.
"There's no one else for miles, pet, shout all you like. Believe me, I am going to stop when I am done and not a moment before."
The idea that this was all for Patrick's needs and Patrick's desires was a powerful one. She was carried away by the power of his desire. She didn't have a choice. It was immensely freeing, and she could hear her cries grow louder and louder as he stroked hard with his tongue and his lips.
Her hips were moving, her body was covered with a light sheen of sweat, and all she could do was ride the sensations as they thundered through her. At some point, Patrick managed to press his hand against her flesh, and his strong fingers eased in and out of her entrance. She could feel her flesh closing over him, but she knew with a desperation that felt almost too powerful to be real that that wouldn't be enough.
This was the man she wanted, and she couldn't bear the idea of climaxing just like this, when he was still unfulfilled.
"I want you, I want you," she whimpered, unable to vocalize anything else, but he seemed to understand. However, that understanding bought no relief for her. Instead, he only doubled his efforts, bringing a deep shiver through her body. She desperately tried to fight off the sensations that he was giving her. She held herself still and screwed her eyes tightly shut, but the sensations kept coming and soon Natalie was crying out as loudly as she was before, louder even.
She was sobbing with need, needing him, but then it was as if she had stepped over the edge of a cliff. Her orgasm rolled over her with an utter lack of mercy. It didn't matter if he was with her or not. All that mattered was the release that flowed over her, rocking her up in a show of fireworks before letting her drift back down.
Her entire body felt as if it had been running a long, hard race and now it could finally relax. Her muscles softened, and she would have slumped to one side if Patrick hadn't pulled back and held her up. With a kind of dull astonishment, she realized that he was still hard, and now he had unbuttoned his trousers so that his fully erect member was revealed.
"Did you think that we were done, pet?" he asked, his voice just a little menacing. "Not yet, oh not yet."
For a moment, she was certain that she would not be able to bear it. She felt sensitive, almost sore after the power of her orgasm. Surely anything more would be nothing but discomfort, if not outright pain. Then she felt the head of his manhood sliding along her slit, waking up the nerves again, and her desire came back to her almost as strong as before.
"God, look at how ready you are," murmured Patrick. "Look at how beautiful you are when you are this needy."
She buried her face in the pillow, blushing red at his words, but then his hand fisted in the hair at the back of her head.
"Don't you dare be embarrassed by something this beautiful, something this good," he purred. "I am proud of you, proud of your lovely body and your spirit, and you will not be ashamed."
She could do nothing but moan, but he did not release her hair from his grip. Instead, with his free hand, he guided his cock to her entrance. She shivered at how large he was, and how thick. She needed him inside her, but she also knew it would stretch her as it had before.
"There we are, darling. Hold still and I will make this so good for you."
He held her brutally still with his hand wrapped in her black hair, and then he started to enter her from behind. The feeling of being stretched was amazing. There was no pain after all the preparation they had done, and she gasped with pleasure when he was fully seated inside her.
"Can you bear it?" he asked, his voice thick. In that moment, she knew that if she told him to pull away, he would. He was listening. He was ready to stop himself from hurting her, and yes, that made her want him more.
"I want it, and I want you," she whimpered, and then it was almost as if something audibly cracked inside Patrick.
With one hand in her hair and another on her round hip, he started to thrust into her. There was none of the deliberation or control of before. This time he was simply riding her, filling her up all the way before drawing back to do it again. His motions stopped just short of violence, but there was something in Natalie that craved it. She wanted him to be so out of control that he couldn't stop. She needed him to fill her up, and it took her a moment before she realized that she was telling him so. The words that spilled between her lips were shocking — surely that couldn't be her telling him that she needed more, that she wanted him inside her, that she needed him?
She was gasping at the pleasure and the intensity of it all. She could feel the heat deep inside her broil. She wasn't going to reach her own climax again, but that was far less important than what was happening here, the fire and the heat and the pleasure of being with this man. She felt as if she were caught up in the storm. Natalie grabbed two enormous handfuls of the sheet underneath her, bracing herself so that Patrick could enter her even more fully. It felt as if her body was shot through with electricity, and she only wanted more.
Patrick had given up on words. Now all she could hear was a tortured groan that shook his frame, that aroused her in a way that she couldn’t describe. It was purely primal, purely male. She was being claimed. She knew that he was going to leave marks on her hip, but she didn't care.
Finally, he thrust deep inside her one last time, shuddering like a stallion at the end of a race. She could feel him spill inside her, a primeval feeling that flooded her with a sense of deep satisfaction.
For a long moment, he stayed frozen, the pleasure flowing through him, and then he pulled away from her. She had been so long on her knees and her elbows that she was a little stiff, but then he rolled her over to her side.
"Oh my gosh," she managed to say, and Patrick laughed.
"That good?" he asked, and she managed to get the energy to turn towards him with a withering look.
"Are you fishing for compliments? You know that you are amazing. You don't need me to tell you."
The grin he gave her was surprisingly boyish, making her want to smile in return.
"Well, you saying that I am amazing is certainly a good start. But one always does like to know if things are going well or if improvement is called for."
"Oh my God, if you improved anymore I think that it might just kill me," she said with a sigh. "Yes. Yes. You were amazing. It was..."
"It was amazing for me with you," he said softly, coming to rest next to her. "You are..." Patrick searched for the words, and it struck her as strange that a man who had been so talkative during the act was now at a loss. "You are perhaps the most wonderful woman that I have ever been with. It has never been like this with anyone else."
She felt strangely touched at his confession. She reached down to hold his hand, and he took it gratefully.
"I have never known anyone like you before, Natalie, and though I know that our paths are very different... thank you for sharing yours with me for at least a short while."
Something in Natalie ached at the idea of only being with Patrick for a short while. She had known in her heart that this was a limited engagement. She would be seized by wanderlust, and he would find that she was not challenging enough for him or something, and then it would be over. They were from two different worlds, and she accepted that.
"You're welcome," she said, and she tried to show him in the kisses she gave him how very much she meant it. In the wake of her bliss, she realized that Patrick was still clothed from the waist up. "Take this off," she sighed, tugging at his clothes, and with a chuckle, Patrick rose to do as she said.
"Bossy little thing," he said fondly, climbing back into bed with her.
Natalie didn't care about the amusement in his voice as she curled next to him, her head pillowed on his chest. Somehow, when he was naked he seemed even larger, and she felt absurdly and beautifully protected and safe.
"Why do I feel so good with you?" she wondered drowsily, and he made a sound that felt like a purr under her ear.
"Because we fit together, pet," he said. "Because when it comes to this at least, we were made for each other.”
Natalie knew that something about that statement should have set off alarm bells in her head, but right then, it all just felt good. In the exhaustion after their lovemaking, there was nothing she wanted, nothing that could frighten her or upset her. For moment, all was well.