Ficlet: 'The Last Day' (James/Elizabeth - R)

[dwgm]

I wrote this for my dear friend and beta reader, hereswith in celebration of her birthday yesterday. It also fulfills heartstrike's ficlet meme request for some James/Elizabeth. Many thanks to honorat for beta reading this!

Though it's probably clear enough on its own, this is sequelish to my post-CotBP A/U that includes Seconds, Delicious Repast, and Anything.






The Last Day


Two hearts made newly whole…


Elizabeth lay beside James, watching him sleep, her lips curving as she recalled how easily her new spouse had been persuaded to prolong their honeymoon by a day, though duty called, as ever, from Port Royal. He'd risen from bed immediately and dashed off a note to Captain Groves, remarking that he'd have been more hesitant if Gillette had been left in charge.

"You know Andrew: a stickler if ever there was one."

"Is he? I'd always thought that was you," she’d said with an innocent air.

"Indeed?" He sealed the note and turned to her with narrowed eyes, though she noted the evidence of a suppressed smile as he took in the sight of her, sitting cross-legged in the middle of the rumpled bed, unabashedly naked. His tone, however, commanded obedience: "Stay there.”

She tossed her head and he shook a long finger at her before leaving to find the innkeeper's wife.

He was gone far too long, nearly ten minutes. She rose after five, slipping on his frilled linen shirt and brushing out her hair quite thoroughly before he came back.

"Defiant chit, what did I tell you?" he said, and locked the door.

A shiver of excitement ran through her as he approached, shedding his dressing gown along the way. "I was quite tired of waiting," she told him, but she sounded more breathless than haughty, and no wonder. He was so very…. and the look in his eyes…

There followed an astonishing hour, and she had thought she was beyond being surprised by him now. That first night, yes, and perhaps even the second… and possibly the third day. But this was the fifth, and she found herself caught in a maelstrom of sensation, his passion racing like a tide, sweeping her along until she was beyond thought or caring, like some wild thing caught in the most torturously delicious of traps, only his mouth upon hers saving her from exposing her helpless ecstasy to the world. Tempting… teasing… tantalizing… and then, in the end, the solace of his surrender, as complete as her own.

They had slept in an exhausted tangle for a while before rousing briefly, just enough to pull the quilt up against the chill air.

Two hours ago. And now Elizabeth watched, and eventually bent to kiss his lips.

His eyes opened.
"My stickler," she said, very close.

He gave a kind of growl, rose up and was on her, pressing her into the bed. "Will you ever tire of that?"

"Never!" she declared. "If by that you mean my baiting you. Not when the results are so extremely rewarding."

He considered her, quite seriously. "I didn't hurt you?"

She bit her lip, put one arm up around his neck, took his hand in hers, placed it there… there, where she was still damp, swollen… and yes, a little sore. "James…" she whispered, and the one word was love itself... there was no need for any other.

Apparently he agreed, for his lips met hers, and then it was a great while before she could speak again at all.

~ .~

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