heartbeat, he caught her in his arms, and she buried herself in his kiss. She laughed and gasped for breath between catching hold of his lips with her mouth and stroking his forehead with her hands.
He pulled her against him, and they fell over backwards onto the bed. They lay side by side enfolded in endless kisses until the sun traversed the sky and disappeared behind the forest. The light from the ceiling faded, but didn’t go out altogether. Frieda lounged on the bed with her arms draped over Deek’s shoulders and chest, and they intertwined their legs together in fathomless kissing.
After an eternity of lying on top of the bedding fully clothed, Deek propped himself up on his elbow and regarded Frieda with an inscrutable eye. “It’s getting late.”
“Are you sure you aren’t hungry?” she asked.
“No one ever gets hungry here,” he replied. “It’s only people like you and Sasha that need food. You aren’t used to metabolizing the algae’s byproducts.”
“That’s exactly what Sasha said,” she told him.
“It’s true,” he exclaimed.
“Do you have to go home?” she asked. “Will your family wonder where you are?”
“They know where I am,” he told her.
“How could they know?” She closed her eyes. “Don’t answer that.”
He trailed his fingertips down the side of her face to the first button of her shirt. “How does this work?”
“Don’t tell me you haven’t seen buttons before,” she shot back.
“We don’t have them,” he replied. “This piece slips through the hole, I guess.”
She laughed at him. “It’s pretty straightforward when you look at it up close.”
He slipped the first button through its hole and moved down to the second. Then he spread the shirt lapels apart. “And what about the rest? Is that pretty straightforward, too?”
“It’s like any other woman you could meet,” she teased.
“I’ve never been with a woman before,” he told her.
Her eyes popped open. “What? Never?”
“I told you there aren’t enough women to go around,” he replied. “All Aqinas women are already mated. When would I get to see one?”
“But you’ve seen your relatives at close quarters all your life,” she pointed out.
“I didn’t examine them.” He popped another button loose. “And I certainly never studied their inner workings well enough to know what to do in a situation like this.”
He opened her shirt another inch, and she sucked in her breath. “I’m sure you’ll figure it out soon enough.”
He watched her nostrils flare and the blood rush to her cheeks. He buried his nose between her shirt lapels and nuzzled at her chest. She arched her back and cradled his head against her chest. He inhaled her scent, and his warm breath sent tingles through her spine.
He unbuttoned her shirt the rest of the way and laid both pieces aside. She lay on her back before him with her chest exposed. He ran his palm up and down her chest, down to her belly, to the waistband of her pants nestled in a tuft of hair. He discovered the clefts of her armpits and the dimpled pillows of her breasts.
Frieda struggled to control her breathing and lay still for his examination. He didn’t miss the slightest sign of his effect on her. He moved his hand an inch to the right or left and watched for her reaction before he made his next move.
Once he explored her chest to his own satisfaction, he moved closer to her so he loomed over her. He kissed her deeply, and then he plunged face first into her neck. He devoured her skin with his ravenous mouth and worked down to her chest.
Frieda exploded into a frenzy of passion. She clutched at him and gasped in excitement. He consumed her body in ardent appreciation. She pushed her breasts against his face and wrapped her legs around his waist to draw him into her.
He went as far as her belly before he withdrew, back to her face, leaving her breathless and desperate. He stretched out beside her and kissed her long and deep.
1802-1870 Alexandre Dumas