I think this how vampires see the world.
Oops, anyway, taking a break from those filthy dirty vampires ... today I'm going to post an excerpt from my short story Repaint the Night, which is out right now in Irresistible: erotica for couples, edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel.* That's because Irresistible would make a fine Valentine's Day gift for someone, and if you live in the States you have time to order it, if you hurry!
The collection has a great author line-up, which you can find here. All the stories are about established couples proving that it's not just first-time sex that's blistering hot:
This Irresistible read features stories of couples turning their deepest fantasies into reality for uninhibited and imaginative sex. You’ll delight in discovering all the exciting erotic possibilities, and ways of getting and staying turned on. Editor Rachel Kramer Bussel notes that the lovers in this daringly romantic anthology are “able to open up in the ways they do is precisely because they have another person to rely on, coax them, challenge them, tease them and seduce them into traveling down a new sexual path. Whether that means outdoor sex, kink, a trip to a strip club or a very sensual massage, we get to see how the layers of trust that have been built up get used to stoke the fire that burns between them.”
Repaint the Night is about a woman who has a terrible fear of going outdoors after dark, due to an incident in her past. But on the last evening of a holiday, with the help of her husband, she decides to face her fear...
The first field beyond our garden fence is all grass, left tall and ungrazed, and slopes down to the hedge of tall hawthorn and oak trees at the bottom. Yellow wildflowers grow here and there among the feathery purple seed-heads of the grass. In the dark I can’t make out any colors, but I can feel the soft brush of the hip-high grasses through my thin skirt, and just make out the dark line of the path that cuts through that pale pelt. I’ve got to be careful with my footing here, not like on the mown lawn; I walk close in Callum’s footsteps.
There’s a picture of this meadow over our bed in the cottage. I recognized the shape of the clustering hills, but there the naturalism ends. The grass is painted in fiery, aching reds and purples, as if it’s burning.
I giggled and pressed up against him, then was impressed to find it was not entirely a joke on his part: there was a semi-hard erection stirring already in his jeans. The spring sunshine, I reasoned; the start of a week off together. The isolation. “I don’t think the farmer would appreciate us flattening his hay,” I pointed out, as Callum kissed my throat.
“Mmm...” He gripped my hips, pressing both thumbs just above my pubic mound, making me squirm deliciously. “You’d love it, Leah....”
I would love it, he was right. Well, part of me. I was excited by the thought of the freedom and the impropriety, but too much of me was self-conscious. “Don’t be silly,’ I giggled. ‘We’re overlooked here.”
“What?” He nibbled at my earlobe. “There’s no one in miles!”
“There’s a bridle-path up the hill there, under the trees. We could be seen.” I pushed him away. “Save it for the bedroom, Romeo.”
Callum sighed and bumped me against his crotch. “You’re wasting a magnificent opportunity here, you know,” he said, his lower lip thrust out boyishly.
I patted his stiffy in consolation, allowing myself a greedy fondle of his ball sac. “And it’ll still be magnificent when we get back to the cottage. I promise.”
“You expect me to walk that far with this?”
“For this,” I answered, pulling his hand down to cup my sex and speaking with my lips brushing against his: “Yeah; you’ll walk that far.”
“I’d walk to the moon,” he admitted.
That was in broad daylight. Now, in the dark and nearly a week later, we stand in the same field and there’s no levity, no teasing. Sweat is crawling down the small of my back and my heart is smacking like a clenched fist against my breastbone. The night circles me and I hear its eagerness in my own shallow breathing. It’s only Callum’s warm grip that’s stopping the great dark beast sinking its teeth into me.
For ten years I’ve been scared of the night. I close the curtains at twilight. I sleep with a bulb on in the hall and the bedroom door wide open. I won’t open the front door at all after dark.
Isn’t ten years too long?
Isn’t it enough, now?
Excerpts from all the stories here
*Wheee! I know something about RKB and Mischief Books! But we're not allowed to say any more about Mischief until the press release comes out. I'm biting my lip, people.
