Chapter 330: A Quiet Moment, Part 2

A soft moan.

A heavy gasp.

Eyes closed shut, I followed her sounds. I let her steer me, guide me, I didn't dare resist… I didn't even want to pull away even for a second. Her every move became mine… her every pace backward, my steps forward. 

A softer moan.

A heavier gasp.

I let a hand run freely through her hair… allowed the other to explore, gliding across her every curve… my fingers sank into her thighs, drifting slowly to the slender slopes of her hips - the touch of damp cotton, warm in my hand -  without even thinking it I tugged lightly on her towel, feeling it slightly come lax from between us.

Ash pulled me in again, harder, more forceful this time, I felt. She fell backward, I fell forward.

We landed muffled, we landed soft. 

On my knees, beneath my fingers, I felt the mattress sag ever so slightly underneath the weight… but I barely paid any attention to any of this. My mind simply refuses to wander astray, it just wanted to keep holding on to her, touching her, kissing her… it wanted to do so much more.

Ash offered no resistance to my advances, no walls of apprehension to scale across. The way she gave herself so freely to me, it was almost unsettling.  If this were a few days back, or perhaps just a single day prior, she'd have kept her hesitance, still deeply reluctant… a slave to her reserves, and her role as a lowly Knight, wanting no wants, desiring no desires.

No, she wouldn't have been touching me like she was touching me… her supple fingers, warm against my cheek, tight intertwined in my hand. She herself wanted, her body desired.

The moment her lips first crashed into mine, it was made abundantly clear to me that Ash had never once done something like this before. She was just pushing me, harder and harder, pressing her lips to the point that I could barely move mine, and the way she craved for more - by threatening to swallow my entire face with her mouth. What a slobbery way to go. 

it was awkward, it was clumsy, and somehow in an endearing sort of way, it was also very, very sexy. I'm supposed I'm obliged to show her exactly how it's supposed to be done, teach her right from wrong. I'm her Master, after all.

That quiet moment.

That lecherous moment.

When her soft moans trembled, when I pushed back, swallowed back… I took charge, led her along… oh, how she froze stiff when I slipped my tongue in, and how she practically seemed to melt trying to fight against the impulse. 

My hands continued to explore more of her body - her towel practically coming undone - I was learning more and more of her, the more I pressed on, literally and figuratively. 

She was particularly sensitive near her abdomen, her sharp shuddering breath after affirmed it so… less when I went higher, feeling her lean, slim stomach gliding smooth across the tips of my fingers.

Again, a whimper trembling, when my palm found her breast. I swallowed hard then. They felt so soft, softer than I ever expected them to feel. I could also still feel a bit of the towel above, but that did nothing to take away from the overwhelming sensation spreading across my palm. 

This was how she felt - how her breast felt, I… I mean. It was… a strange feeling. They felt… squishy. I already knew that they were squishy, I read that they felt squishy… and from porn, they do indeed look squishy. It was just… actually feeling that they were was a whole lot different from knowing that they were.

So malleable, sinking at just the lightest pressure. It was like my fingers were being sucked in. I wanted to reach for more, but my fingers could only stretch so far before it just couldn't. Now, I had my big hands. 

Ash was just bigger. 

And for some reason, I just couldn't control myself anymore from wanting more. Her soft moans, her body against mine - I pressed even more, I kept fondling her, touching her - somewhere in the heat of things, I felt myself shift around, the aching stiffness in my knee… I felt myself dragging it across the bedsheet, gradually upward, gently forward… slowly spreading her legs apart.

I was still kissing her, still caressing her, her body shivering, her voice quivering in response.

Still ever a carnal moment. 

But no longer that quiet moment.

Suddenly, her lips parted, a popping noise immediately right after, then her breath, blowing hot and heavy against mine.

"M-Master…" I heard her whisper, her words hopelessly in a stumble. "Y-You must… refrain…"

I finally fluttered my eyes open. 

White, glinting. Green, shimmering. Her eyes emitted their own light in the night, trembling beads of emerald staring up at me so tenderly in the darkness.

I had to swallow again, catching sight of the rest of her… saliva was dribbling a corner of her narrowed lips still wet and glistening. Her long, narrow ears were wincing, flinching in sporadic intervals… almost random, as if she's lost total control over them.

My eyes continued to scour down to the rest of her body. My hand was still cupping onto her left breast, while her right was only just barely hidden beneath the thick white wooly towel. I watch them rise heavy, and watch them fall heavy.

Her exposed stomach, her slender legs far apart… and my knee between them. Instinct did all this, carnal desire so seamlessly, easily guiding my movements… without so much of a peek. 

And I didn't want it to stop.

"Y-You musn't…"

I didn't want to listen.

I leaned in again, darting fast, instant… she never expected it. Ash sounded another weak whimper as I forced her lips open, and for a moment we were at it again, our hands gliding, our tongues clashing, our desires, our wants, one.

Then once again, that moment was no longer.

Both hands pressing firm on my chest, Ash gently detached herself from me, breathing out again just as heavy, just as hard.

"Stop… you must stop…" Her glowing soft lights pleaded. "Please, Master…" 

I didn't notice it before, but I was trembling too, only I think… much worse than she was.

"Why?" There wasn't any power to my voice, it was like air the way it left me. "I thought you… I thought we… why… why stop now?"

The answers slipped past her lips, just as breathily, so depleted of strength, "Lady… Irene, Master. You mustn't… forget."

Irene's name was like a sledgehammer blow to the head. I was coming back to my senses, to rationality. I shook my head, I shook it harder. I don't want to come back just yet, I don't want to lose this… this moment... not yet, please not yet. 

"She comes first and foremost… to everything else…" Ash continued, her voice gradually returning steady. "Master, you made a deal with her… you promised. You'll love her first, you'll care for her first… that you'd want her first."

"But I want you, Ash," I spouted out, desperate clinging onto the moment. "I want you now... I love you now…" 

"I know, Master, I know," She said, smiling, reaching out, cupping my face with both her hands. "But I also know, just as much, you love her too, don't you?"

There was just no winning, no escaping… I didn't want her to be right, a despicable stubborn part of me wanted to shout out that I didn't, that I never did. 

But I did. I really, truly did… and there was just no denying those feelings… and I won't ever deny them. I can't deny them. Because I love her too.

Yet it hurts, I was a mess on the inside… shame I think, or maybe guilt, was tearing my heart into shreds. I wanted to go as Ash said, but I also didn't want to. I wanted to be with Ash now, but I wanted to be with Irene too.

Why can't things ever be so easy? Just for once…

"Love her, Master…" Ash spoke again, her emerald eyes glowing kind and tender. "Love her as you did me, more than you did me… and refrain yourself from ever thinking of me."

"What, after all this?" I asked, holding onto her wrist for comfort. "That's just impossible. When I kiss her - if I kiss her - how am I supposed to - ?" 

"Nevertheless, you have to," She interjected. "If you believe I've any qualms at all of your love for her, please Master, perish the thought immediately. I'll still be forever by your side, and you'll be forever in mine. It's as you said, Master… I belong to you, and you belong to me… and nothing will ever change that."

"That's not the point," I shook my head, hissing in a breath. "The fact that I have to flip-flop between my feelings for you, my feelings for Irene… Amanda. It feels so… artificial. How can I say I truly do love you, when it's so easy for me to redirect that love to someone else like a flick of a switch?"

Ash was quiet after that… and so was I. Our quiet moment shattered. Broken by the agonizing pounding in my chest, and the sound of her breathing leaving steady.

"Tell me this then, Master," Ash waited until I found her eyes again, and once I did, she gave another smile, an almost knowing, almost amused smile. "Is it easy?"

I couldn't answer that. Silence spoke in my stead, and silence seemed to be what she was expecting to hear.

"Then it seems that I am truly loved after all. That I am truly cared for, and that I indeed am truly yours," She raised her head, lightly gave me a kiss, then laid back down, her smile ever as prominent. "Nothing artificial about it."

Always so wise. Always knowing what to say, what to do. How is it that she can alleviate woes so easily?

It's almost like magic.

Sighing, I finally accepted, finally came back down to my senses. "Y'know I didn't expect this moment to turn out the way it did. To be honest, not that it's the right moment, but I was expecting something a little more."

Ash giggled at that, an endearing melody to the ears, then she reached her hands out again, carefully readjusting my tie again that had gone crooked, while leering so coyly."

"Perhaps next time, Master…" She said, pulling the tie tight. "I wouldn't mind just a little more…" 

Slowly, I crept backwards, pushing up away from her bed, away from her, pacing backwards towards the door, and twisting the door open.

"It's a promise then," I said, lingering beneath the doorway.

Ash sat up,  smiling, wrapping her towel in front of me, almost enticingly. "A promise indeed."

A promise it is, it seems... for a quiet moment next time.

Our moment next time.