Bed Intimate Love Quotes

Think of all the women you know who will not allow themselves to be seen without makeup. I often wonder how they feel about themselves at night when they are climbing into bed with intimate partners. Are they overwhelmed with secret shame that someone sees them as they really are? Or do they sleep with rage that who they really are can be celebrated or cared for only in secret?

His hand lay across my stomach as he slept soundly. I entwined my fingers with his and breathed through the warmth that seeped through my chest. Such a simple, sweet thing to do, yet holding hands in bed was incredibly intimate.

believe that this way of living, this focus on the present, the daily, the tangible, this intense concentration not on the news headlines but on the flowers growing in your own garden, the children growing in your own home, this way of living has the potential to open up the heavens, to yield a glittering handful of diamonds where a second ago there was coal. This way of living and noticing and building and crafting can crack through the movie sets and soundtracks that keep us waiting for our own life stories to begin, and set us free to observe the lives we have been creating all along without ever realizing it. I don’t want to wait anymore. I choose to believe that there is nothing more sacred or profound than this day. I choose to believe that there may be a thousand big moments embedded in this day, waiting to be discovered like tiny shards of gold. The big moments are the daily, tiny moments of courage and forgiveness and hope that we grab on to and extend to one another. That’s the drama of life, swirling all around us, and generally I don’t even see it, because I’m too busy waiting to become whatever it is I think I am about to become. The big moments are in every hour, every conversation, every meal, every meeting. The Heisman Trophy winner knows this. He knows that his big moment was not when they gave him the trophy. It was the thousand times he went to practice instead of going back to bed. It was the miles run on rainy days, the healthy meals when a burger sounded like heaven. That big moment represented and rested on a foundation of moments that had come before it. I believe that if we cultivate a true attention, a deep ability to see what has been there all along, we will find worlds within us and between us, dreams and stories and memories spilling over. The nuances and shades and secrets and intimations of love and friendship and marriage an parenting are action-packed and multicolored, if you know where to look. Today is your big moment. Moments, really. The life you’ve been waiting for is happening all around you. The scene unfolding right outside your window is worth more than the most beautiful painting, and the crackers and peanut butter that you’re having for lunch on the coffee table are as profound, in their own way, as the Last Supper. This is it. This is life in all its glory, swirling and unfolding around us, disguised as pedantic, pedestrian non-events. But pull of the mask and you will find your life, waiting to be made, chosen, woven, crafted. Your life, right now, today, is exploding with energy and power and detail and dimension, better than the best movie you have ever seen. You and your family and your friends and your house and your dinner table and your garage have all the makings of a life of epic proportions, a story for the ages. Because they all are. Every life is. You have stories worth telling, memories worth remembering, dreams worth working toward, a body worth feeding, a soul worth tending, and beyond that, the God of the universe dwells within you, the true culmination of super and natural. You are more than dust and bones. You are spirit and power and image of God. And you have been given Today.

He did not think of love as an eternally vigilant, blazing flame, which with its powerful, flickering glow shown into all the peaceful folds of life and in some fantastic way made everything seem bigger and stronger than it was. For him, love was more like the calm, smoldering ember that gives off an even heat from its soft bed of ashes and in the muted twilight tenderly forgets what is distant and makes what is near seem twice as close and twice as intimate.

I sit on the bed and kick off my shoes, and he kneels before me and takes the riding boots, holding one open for my bare foot. I hesitate; it is such an intimate gesture between a young woman and a man. His smiling upward glance tells me that he understands my hesitation but is ignoring it. I point my toe and he holds the boot, I slide my foot in and he pulls the boot over my calf. He takes the soft leather ties and fastens the boot, at my ankle, then at my calf, and then just below my knee. He looks up at me, his hand gently on my toe. I can feel the warmth of his hand through the soft leather. I imagine my toes curling in pleasure at his touch. ‘Anne, will you marry me?’ he asks simply, as he kneels before me.

Driven by that extraordinary oppression which falls on every human being when, childhood over, he begins to divine that he is fated to go on in isolation and unaided towards his own death; driven by this extraordinary oppression, which may with justice be called a fear of God, man looks round him for a companion hand in hand with whom he may tread the road to the dark portal, and if he has learned by experience how pleasurable it undoubtedly is to lie with another fellow-creature in bed, then he is ready to believe that this extremely intimate association of two bodies may last until these bodies are coffined: and even if at the same time it has its disgusting aspects, because it takes place under coarse and badly aired sheets, or because he is convinced that all a girl cares for is to get a husband who will support her in later life, yet it must not be forgotten that every fellow-creature, even if she has a sallow complexion, sharp, thin features and an obviously missing tooth in her left upper jaw, yearns, in spite of her missing tooth, for that love which she thinks will for ever shield her from death, from that fear of death which sinks with the falling of every night upon the human being who sleeps alone, a fear that already licks her as with a tongue of flame when she begins to take off her clothes, as Fraulein Erna was doing now; she laid aside her faded red-velvet blouse and took off her dark-green shirt and her petticoat.

I looked at him, into his warm gray eyes, and suddenly understood what he was trying to tell me. The message hidden beneath the words. You’re not alone. Because he understood. He understood how it felt to be abandoned. He understood the insults. Understood me. I pushed myself onto my tiptoes and kissed him-really kissed him. It was more than just a precursor to sex. There was no war between our mouths. My hips rested lightly beneath his, not pressed tightly. Our lips moved in soft, perfect harmony with each other. This time it meant something. What that something was, I didn’t know at the time, but I knew that there was a real connection between us. His hands stroked gently through my hair, his thumb grazing my cheek-still damp from crying earlier. And it didn’t feel sick or twisted or unnatural. Actually, it felt like the most natural thing in the world. I slid off his shirt, and he pulled mine over my head. Then he laid me down on the bed. No rush. This time things were slow and earnest. This time I wasn’t looking for an escape. This time it was about him. About me. About honesty and compassion and everything I’d never expected to find in Wesley Rush. This time, when our bodies connected, it didn’t feel dirty or wrong. It felt horrifyingly right.

Though a modern woman’s computer is more intimate than her bed...

I couldn’t talk about it, about them—not yet. So I breathed “Later” and hooked my feet around his legs, drawing him closer. I placed my hands on his chest, feeling the heart beating beneath. This—I needed this right now. It wouldn’t wash away what I’d done, but … I needed him near, needed to smell and taste him, remind myself that he was real—this was real. “Later,” he echoed, and leaned down to kiss me. It was soft, tentative—nothing like the wild, hard kisses we’d shared in the hall of throne room. He brushed his lips against mine again. I didn’t want apologies, didn’t want sympathy or coddling. I gripped the front of his tunic, tugging him closer as I opened my mouth to him. He let out a low growl, and the sound of it sent a wildfire blazing through me, pooling and burning in my core. I let it burn through that hole in my chest, my soul. Let it raze through the wave of black that was starting to press around me, let it consume the phantom blood I could still feel on my hands. I gave myself to that fire, to him, as his hands roved across me, unbuttoning as he went. I pulled back, breaking the kiss to look into his face. His eyes were bright—hungry—but his hands had stopped their exploring and rested firmly on my hips. With a predator’s stillness, he waited and watched as I traced the contours of his face, as I kissed every place I touched. His ragged breathing was the only sound—and his hands soon began roaming across my back and sides, caressing and teasing and baring me to him. When my traveling fingers reached his mouth, he bit down on one, sucking it into his mouth. It didn’t hurt, but the bite was hard enough for me to meet his eyes again. To realize that he was done waiting—and so was I. He eased me onto the bed, murmuring my name against my neck, the shell of my ear, the tips of my fingers. I urged him—faster, harder. His mouth explored the curve of my breast, the inside of my thigh. A kiss for each day we’d spent apart, a kiss for every wound and terror, a kiss for the ink etched into my flesh, and for all the days we would be together after this. Days, perhaps, that I no longer deserved. But I gave myself again to that fire, threw myself into it, into him, and let myself burn.

And I didn’t think about anything except that I loved the way it felt to share something so deeply intimate with him, to share myself with him, to share this bed and this night and this experience. It was the most powerful and intense feeling I’d ever had. No wonder, I thought as we clung to each other in the warm, breathless aftermath. No wonder this is how a life begins.

...And you, behind the footlight's lure, Kissing an actress on the stage, Will leave her presence there, I'm sure, As I my people on the page. And yet - I love you, darling, yet I sat with someone at a table And gloried in our minds that met As sometimes strangers' minds are able To leap the bounds of times and spaces And find, in sharing wine and bread And light in one another's faces And in the words that each has said An intercourse so intimate It shook me deeply, to the core. I said good-night, for it was late; We parted at my hotel door And I went in, turned down the bed And took my bath and thought of you...

That night, Jackson and I didn’t make love. We didn’t do anything sexual at all, but we’ve never been more intimate. We laid in my bed and talked. We talked about everything from my childhood, to my family, to my hopes and dreams. I completely opened up to Jackson, and it was the most intimate I had ever been with a man.

Dropping to his knees before her, he loved her, worshiped her with his mouth, kissing her stomach, her hips, her thighs, and finally reaching her moist, intimate center. She cried out his name and he knew she was shocked at his behavior, but he didn't care. He devoured her, holding her tightly against his mouth as he drank her. Alternating between swirls of his tongue and long, languid licks, he let her moans and sighs be his guide to pleasuring her. Her body shook and he knew she was close. He quickened his movements. He slid his hands from her bottom around to her waist, and to her rib cage. Reaching her breasts, he plucked at her nipples while he suckled the tiny nubbin of flesh hidden in her folds. She screamed. And he continued his sweet torture until her knees buckled. He caught her to him. Holding her close he carried her to his bed, his cock so fiendishly hard he thought he'd go mad if he didn't take her at that moment. In a stunningly short amount of time, he rid himself of his clothes and joined her on the bed. Her legs spread for him and he sank himself between her thighs. Her limbs shaking, Charlotte wrapped her legs around his waist and eagerly met her husband's lips for a kiss. His body was simply magnificent, she thought, running her hands down his muscled back, over the hard muscles of his arms and chest.

I begin to learn there are certain things I shouldn't tell her. Like when we meet boys at Dorrian's and I give mine a blow job, or the time I messed around with a boy in the back near the bathrooms. Amy wants to be intimate with boys too, but to her this kind of conduct is slutty. I suppose it is. She, like most girls, including the Jennifers, has a different relationship to boys than I do. She engages in sexual acts with them if she wants, but from my vantage point it looks like she can take them or leave them if they are not just right. She considers whether she actually likes someone before she jumps into bed with him. She isn't wracked with anxiety when there aren't any boys around. And she doesn't need them to live, which is what it feels like for me.

Dealing with another human being on an intimate level is an exercise that is inherently fraught with difficulties. All human beings have good and bad traits/habits--no one is perfect. Even the most wonderful, "perfect for you" guy is going to do things that annoy you to no end, like leaving the toilet seat up, farting in bed, or conveniently forgetting how to put a new roll of toilet paper on the holder after using the last of it. That's life, people.

The brain is an organ of aggression, and there are many roads to this Rome of imagined conquests — so many that mental disorders, regardless of their particulars, often result in a derangement of our aggressive drive. Schizophrenics stand on the streetcorner screaming obscenely at passersby; depressives lie in their beds screaming mutely at themselves. Our gentle aggressions, the drive to be, prods us out of bed in the morning and draws us toward each other. And in each other we find what our aggressive brain desires: love. As we are wired for aggression, so we are wired to love. We are a lavishly loving species, aggressively sentimental. We are tirelessly in pursuit of fresh targets for our love. We love our children so long that they come to despise us for it. We love friends, books... We love answers. We love yesterday and next year. We love gods, for a god is there when all else fails, and God can keep all conduits of love alive — erotic, maternal, paternal, euphoric, infantile.

Psalm 63 A psalm of David. When he was in the Desert of Judah. 1 O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water. 2 I have seen you in the sanctuary and beheld your power and your glory. 3 Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you. 4 I will praise you as long as I live, and in your name I will lift up my hands. 5 My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods; with singing lips my mouth will praise you. 6 On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night. 7 Because you are my help, I sing in the shadow of your wings.

Inside, on a bed of black velvet, lay an exquisite perfume bottle designed from rose-colored glass caged in a silver overlay that twined about the glass like living vines. In the very center of the oval shaped bottle, the silver was formed into the image of a lily in full bloom. It was likely the most precious and expensive gift Lily had ever been given. She ran her fingertips over the delicate silver work before lifting the bottle from its velvet bed to allow the candlelight to shine through the rose-colored glass. She noticed then a folded slip of paper still in the box. Setting the perfume bottle in the valley of her lap, she lifted the paper and broke the tiny wax seal. In his precise, slanted script, Lord Harte had written: I was unforgivably remiss in not having a gift for you the other night. I chose the elements for this blend myself. It made me think of you. Lily brushed her thumb over the ink before setting the note back into the box. Then she shifted the bottle and removed the glass stopper. The scent wafting from the bottle was light, but heady. She noticed first the rich notes of clove and honey before her senses were claimed by the smooth, velvety scent of jasmine. Lily closed her eyes, allowing the aromatic infusion to settle into her awareness. There was another element hidden deep within the perfume. A layer of earthiness that warmed her blood. Sandalwood. Lily was enthralled. It was a complex and lovely scent. Floral and exotic, light and dark. Impossibly sensual. And it made him think of her. Something deep and fundamental spread through her core, and she understood why young ladies were warned so often not to accept gifts from gentlemen. It was a personal and intimate thing to acknowledge how he had wanted her to have something he chose himself.

Next week is Beltane,” she reminded him. “Do you suppose we will make it through the wedding this time?” “Not if Gideon says you cannot get out of this bed,” he countered sternly. “Absolutely not!” she burst out, making him wince and cover the ear she’d been too close to. She immediately regretted her thoughtlessness, making a sad sound before reaching to kiss the ear she had offended with quiet gentleness. Jacob extricated himself from her hold enough to allow himself to turn and face her. “Okay, explain what you meant,” he said gently. “I refuse to wait another six months. We are getting married on Beltane, come hell or . . . necromancers . . . or . . . the creature from the Black Lagoon. There is no way Corrine is going to be allowed to get married without me getting married, too. I refuse to listen to her calling me the family hussy for the rest of the year.” “What does it matter what she says?” Jacob sighed as he reached to touch the soft contours of her face. “You and I are bonded in a way that transcends marriage already. Is that not what is important?” “No. What’s important is the fact that I am going to murder the sister I love if she doesn’t quit. And she will not quit until I shut her up either with a marriage or a murder weapon. Understand?” Clearly, by his expression, Jacob did not understand. “Thank Destiny all I have is a brother,” he said dryly. “I have been inundated with people tied into knots over one sister or another for the past weeks.” “You mean Legna. Listen, it’s not her fault if everyone has their shorts in a twist because of who her Imprinted mate is! Frankly, I think she and Gideon make a fabulous couple. Granted, a little too gorgeously ‘King and Queen of the Prom’ perfect for human eyes to bear looking at for long, but fabulous just the same.” Jacob blinked in confusion as he tried to decipher his fiancée’s statement. Even after all these months, she still came out with unique phraseologies that totally escaped his more classic comprehension of the English language. But he had gotten used to just shrugging his confusion off, blaming it on the fact that English wasn’t his first, second, or third language, so it was to be expected. “Anyway,” she went on, “Noah and Hannah need to chill. You saw Legna when she came to visit yesterday. If a woman could glow, she was as good as radioactive.” She smiled sweetly at him. “That means,” she explained, “that she looks as brilliantly happy as you make me feel.” “I see,” he chuckled. “Thank you for the translation.” He reached his arms around her, drawing her body up to his as close as he could considering the small matter of a fetal obstacle. He kissed her inviting mouth until she was breathless and glowing herself. “I thought I would be kind to you,” she explained with a laugh against his mouth. “You, my love, are all heart.” “And you are all pervert. Jacob!” She laughed as she swatted one of his hands away from intimate places, only to be shanghaied by another. “What would Gideon say?” “He better not say anything, because if he did that would mean he was in here while you are naked. And that, little flower, would probably cost him his vocal chords in any event.” “Oh. Well . . . when you put it that way . . .

Romance of the sleepwalker" Green, as I love you, greenly. Green the wind, and green the branches. The dark ship on the sea and the horse on the mountain. With her waist that’s made of shadow dreaming on the high veranda, green the flesh, and green the tresses, with eyes of frozen silver. Green, as I love you, greenly. Beneath the moon of the gypsies silent things are looking at her things she cannot see. Green, as I love you, greenly. Great stars of white hoarfrost come with the fish of shadow opening the road of morning. The fig tree’s rubbing on the dawn wind with the rasping of its branches, and the mountain cunning cat, bristles with its sour agaves. Who is coming? And from where...? She waits on the high veranda, green the flesh and green the tresses, dreaming of the bitter ocean. - 'Brother, friend, I want to barter your house for my stallion, sell my saddle for your mirror, change my dagger for your blanket. Brother mine, I come here bleeding from the mountain pass of Cabra.’ - ‘If I could, my young friend, then maybe we’d strike a bargain, but I am no longer I, nor is this house, of mine, mine.’ - ‘Brother, friend, I want to die now, in the fitness of my own bed, made of iron, if it can be, with its sheets of finest cambric. Can you see the wound I carry from my throat to my heart?’ - ‘Three hundred red roses your white shirt now carries. Your blood stinks and oozes, all around your scarlet sashes. But I am no longer I, nor is this house of mine, mine.’ - ‘Let me then, at least, climb up there, up towards the high verandas. Let me climb, let me climb there, up towards the green verandas. High verandas of the moonlight, where I hear the sound of waters.’ Now they climb, the two companions, up there to the high veranda, letting fall a trail of blood drops, letting fall a trail of tears. On the morning rooftops, trembled, the small tin lanterns. A thousand tambourines of crystal wounded the light of daybreak. Green, as I love you, greenly. Green the wind, and green the branches. They climbed up, the two companions. In the mouth, the dark breezes left there a strange flavour, of gall, and mint, and sweet basil. - ‘Brother, friend! Where is she, tell me, where is she, your bitter beauty? How often, she waited for you! How often, she would have waited, cool the face, and dark the tresses, on this green veranda!’ Over the cistern’s surface the gypsy girl was rocking. Green the bed is, green the tresses, with eyes of frozen silver. An ice-ray made of moonlight holding her above the water. How intimate the night became, like a little, hidden plaza. Drunken Civil Guards were beating, beating, beating on the door frame. Green, as I love you, greenly. Green the wind, and green the branches. The dark ship on the sea, and the horse on the mountain.

She fell asleep rapidly, swimming through a haze of pleasant images... walking through the forest in Hampshire... dangling her feet in a cool pond on a hot day... pausing in the kissing gate, while the smell of sun-warmed meadowsweet rose thickly to her nostrils. She closed her eyes and tilted her chin upward, relishing the sultry rays, while a butterfly's wings brushed lightly against her cheek. Entranced by the delicate tickle, she held very still. The silken strokes moved over the tip of her nose, the sensitive periphery of her upper lip, the tender corners of her mouth. Searching blindly, she lifted her face to the brushes of warmth and was rewarded by a gentle pressure that opened her lips and drew a moan from the upper part of her lungs. Lord Sydney was standing with her in the kissing gate, his arms trapping her against the painted ribs of latticework. His mouth searched hers so gently, his body firm against hers, and she writhed in a mute plea for him to hold her more tightly. Seeming to know exactly what she wanted, he pushed his knee into her skirts, right against the place that felt swollen and yearning. Gasping, she curled her fingers in his glossy hair, and he whispered for her to relax, that he would take care of her, satisfy her- "Oh." Blinking hard, she stirred from the sensuous dream as she realized that she was not alone. The bed curtains had been drawn aside, and Nick Gentry's long body was entangled with hers. One large hand was cupped beneath her hips, while his leg wedged more intimately between hers. His breath surged against her ear, filling the shell with moist heat, and then his lips wandered back to hers in a searing path. He absorbed her protest as he kissed her, his tongue searching her mouth, his body levering over hers.

When Evie awakened alone in the large bed, the first thing she beheld was a scattering of pale pink splashes over the snowy white linens, as if someone had spilled blush-colored wine in bed. Blinking sleepily, she propped herself up on one elbow and touched one of the pink dabs with a single fingertip. It was a creamy pink rose petal, pulled free of a blossom and gently dropped to the sheet. Gazing around her, she discovered that rose petals had been sprinkled over her in a light rain. A smile curved her lips, and she lay back into the fragrant bed. The night of heady sensuality seemed to have been part of some prolonged erotic dream. She could hardly believe the things she had allowed Sebastian to do, the intimacies that she had never imagined were possible. And in the drowsy aftermath of their passion, he had cradled her against his chest and they had talked for what seemed to be hours. She had even told him the story of the night when she and Annabelle and the Bowman sisters had become friends, sitting in a row of chairs at a ball. "We made up a list of potential suitors and wrote it on our empty dance cards," Evie had told him. "Lord Westcliff was at the top of the list, of course. But you were at the bottom, because you were obviously not the marrying kind." Sebastian had laughed huskily, tangling his bare legs intimately with hers. "I was waiting for you to ask me." "You never spared me a glance," Evie had replied wryly. "You weren't the sort of man to dance with wallflowers." Sebastian had smoothed her hair, and was silent for a moment. "No, I wasn't," he had admitted. "I was a fool not to have noticed you. If I had bothered to spend just five minutes in your company, you'd never have escaped me." He had proceeded to seduce her as if she were still a virginal wallflower, coaxing her to let him make love to her by slow degrees, until he was finally sheathed in her trembling body.

These associations—Cavafy, my mother polishing the silver, a missionary aunt who fled the familiar turf of Tennessee for the otherness of Korea (presumably with the intent of teaching them something, hopefully with the result of being taught), my Mamaw’s fragrant old bureau with its smell of wax and polish—all of them would be brought to bear upon my painting of peppermints, but none of them would be visible; there’s no reason the viewer would know any of this. I could render only what can be seen—color and form, though the painter’s splendid artifice reveals to us texture, too, and rich associations of scent and flavor, all arriving through the gates of the eyes. And yet there is something more here, and that something is what nags at me to write this book, what tugs at my sleeve and my sleep. Why, if all that is personal has fallen away, should these pictures matter so? Why should they be alight with a feeling of intimacy? Interiority makes itself visible. In my imaginary still life, the “context and commentary” of my experience would be gone, but something would remain, something distilled and vibrant in the quality of attention itself. Is that what soul or spirit is, then, the outward-flying attention, the gaze that binds us to the world? Coorte’s asparagus, his gooseberries and shells, distill this quality down to its quietest, most startling essence: the eye suffuses what it sees with I. Not “I” in the sense of my story, the particulars of my life, the way my father tended his old asparagus beds each spring, the way my beloved loved the forms and colors of shells. But “I” as the quickest, subtlest thing we are: a moment of attention, an intimate engagement. Is that the lesson, then, that ultimately I becomes an eye? What is left of Adriaen Coorte but this? Isn’t that enough? […] That, I think, is the deepest secret of these paintings, finally, although it seems just barely in the realm of the sayable, this feeling that beneath the attachments and appurtenances, the furnishings of selfhood, what we are is attention, a quick physical presence in the world, a bright point of consciousness in a wide field from which we are not really separate. That, in a field of light, we are intensifications of that light.

There’s my girl.” He tossed the rag to the hearth. “Now, cuddle up. Do you know, I think you put bruises on my arse, woman?” He stretched out on his side, right smack beside her. “You have slain me, Emmie Farnum.” He sighed happily and felt cautiously for her in the dark. His hand found her hair, which he smoothed back in a tender caress. “I badly needed slaying, too, I can tell you.” He bumped her cheek with his nose and pulled back abruptly. “I would have said you were in need of slaying, as well,” he said slowly, “but why the tears, Emmie, love?” There were women who cried in intimate circumstances, a trait he’d always found endearing, but they weren’t Emmie, and her cheek wasn’t damp. It was wet. “Did I hurt you?” he asked, pulling her over his body. He positioned her to straddle him and wrapped an arm around her even while his hand continued to explore her face. He thought he’d been careful, but at the end, he’d been ardent—or too rough? “Sweetheart.” He found her cheek with his lips. “I am so heartily sorry.” “For what?” she expostulated, sitting up on him. “I am the one who needs to apologize. Oh, God, help me, I was hoping you wouldn’t learn this of me, and I tried to tell you, but I couldn’t… I just…” She was working herself up to a state. Even in the dark, her voice alone testified to rising hysteria. “Emmie.” He leaned up and gathered her in his arms. “Emmie, hush.” But she couldn’t hush; she was sobbing and hiccupping and gulping in his arms, leaving him helpless to do more than hold her, murmur meaningless reassurances, and then finally, lay her gently on her side, climb out of bed, and fish his handkerchief out of his pockets. All the while though, he sorted through their encounter and seized upon a credible source of Emmie’s upset. “You were not a virgin,” he said evenly as he tucked the handkerchief into her hand and gathered her back over him. “I was n-n-not,” she said, seizing up again in misery. “And I h-h-hate to cry. But of course you know.” I do now, he thought with a small smile, though had he thought otherwise, he wouldn’t have been so willing to bed her—he hoped. “Cease your tears, Emmie love.” He tucked her closer. “I am sorry for your sake you are so upset, and I hope your previous liaisons were not painful, but as for me, I am far more interested in your future than your past.” A moment of silence went by, his hands tracing lazy patterns on her lovely back, and then she looked up at him. “You cannot mean that.” “I can,” he corrected her gently. “I know you were without anyone to protect you, and you were in service. One of my own sisters was damned near seduced by a footman, Emmie. It happens, and that’s the end of it. Has your heart been broken?” She nodded on a shuddery breath. “Shall I trounce him for you? Flirt with his wife?” “That won’t be necessary,” she said, her voice sounding a little less shaky.

THE NIGHTGOWN was only the first of the garments in the box. There were seven nightgowns, in fact—one for each day of the week—of delicate silk, lovely georgette, and beautiful tiffany. As Alexandra pulled them out, she draped them on the bed. She’d never seen a nightgown that wasn’t white, but these were almond and pale blush pink, powder blue and soft peach, with delicate edgings of lace and intricate, exquisite embroidery. “They’re stunning,” she said. “Madame Rodale has nothing like them in her book of fashion plates.” Tris just grinned. He seemed different tonight. More relaxed, less worried. She didn’t know what had prompted his sudden good humor, but she didn’t want to question it. She’d rather enjoy it instead. After the afternoon she’d had—starting with Elizabeth’s letter and ending with three fruitless interviews—she wasn’t about to risk the one thing that seemed to be going right. “Are you going to try one on for me?” he asked. Her face heated. He chose a nightgown off the bed, palest lavender with black lace and violet embroidery. “This one,” he said, handing it to her. “Do you require assistance with your dress?” “Just the buttons,” she said, and turned to let him unfasten them. She shifted the nightgown in her hands. It felt so light. “There,” he said when the back of her green dress gaped open. He kissed her softly on the nape of her neck, then settled on one of the striped chairs, sipping from the glass of port he’d brought upstairs with him. “Use the dressing room. I’ll be waiting.” In the dressing room, she shakily stripped out of her frock, chemise, shoes, and stockings, then dropped the nightgown over her head and smoothed it down over her hips. The fabric whispered against her legs. She turned to see herself in the looking glass. Sweet heaven. She’d never imagined nightgowns like this existed. Her nightgowns all had high collars that tied at the throat. This one had a wide, low neckline. Her nightgowns all had long, full sleeves. This one had tiny puffed sleeves that began halfway off her shoulders. Her nightgowns were made of yards and yards of thick, billowing fabric. This one was a slender column that left no curve to the imagination. It was wicked. “Are you ready yet?” Tris called. Alexandra swallowed hard, reminding herself that he’d seen her in less clothing. And he was her husband. Still, wearing the nightgown for him somehow felt more intimate than wearing nothing at all. She was as ready as she’d ever be. Drawing a deep breath, she exited the dressing room, walked quickly through the sitting room, and paused in the bedroom’s doorway. She dropped her gaze, then raised her lashes, giving him the look—the one Juliana had said would make men fall at her feet. Judging from the expression on Tris’s face, it was a good thing he was sitting. The way he looked at her made her heartbeat accelerate. He rose and moved toward her. She met him halfway, licking suddenly dry lips. “Will you kiss me?” she asked softly, reaching up to sweep that always unruly lock off his forehead. It worked this time. He kissed her but good.

A third assumption: a commitment to monogamy is an admirable consequence of love, stemming from a deep-seated generosity and an intimate interest in the other’s flourishing and well-being. A call for monogamy is a sure indication that one partner has the other’s best interests at heart. To Rabih’s new way of thinking, it seems anything but kind or considerate to insist that a spouse return to his room alone to watch CNN and eat yet another club sandwich while perched on the edge of his bed, when he has perhaps only a few more decades of life left on the planet, an increasingly dishevelled physique, an at best intermittent track record with the opposite sex, and a young woman from California standing before him who sincerely wishes to remove her dress in his honour. If love is to be defined as a genuine concern for the well-being of another person, then it must surely be deemed compatible with granting permission for an often harassed and rather browbeaten husband to step off the elevator on the eighteenth floor, in order to enjoy ten minutes of rejuvenating cunnilingus with a near-stranger. Otherwise it may seem that what we are dealing with is not really love at all but rather a kind of small-minded and hypocritical possessiveness, a desire to make one’s partner happy if, but only if, that happiness involves oneself. It’s past midnight already, yet Rabih is just hitting his stride, knowing there might be objections but sidestepping them nimbly and, in the process, acquiring an ever more brittle sense of self-righteousness. A fourth assumption: monogamy is the natural state of love. A sane person can only ever want to love one other person. Monogamy is the bellwether of emotional health. Is there not, wonders Rabih, an infantile idealism in our wish to find everything in one other being – someone who will be simultaneously a best friend, a lover, a co-parent, a co-chauffeur and a business partner? What a recipe for disappointment and resentment in this notion, upon which millions of otherwise perfectly good marriages regularly founder. What could be more natural than to feel an occasional desire for another person? How can anyone be expected to grow up in hedonistic, liberated circles, experience the sweat and excitement of nightclubs and summer parks, listen to music full of longing and lust and then, immediately upon signing a piece of paper, renounce all outside sexual interest, not in the name of any particular god or higher commandment but merely from an unexplored supposition that it must be very wrong? Is there not instead something inhuman, indeed ‘wrong’, in failing to be tempted, in failing to realize just how short of time we all are and therefore with what urgent curiosity we should want to explore the unique fleshly individuality of more than one of our contemporaries? To moralize against adultery is to deny the legitimacy of a range of sensory high points – Rabih thinks of Lauren’s shoulder blades – in their own way just as worthy of reverence as more acceptable attractions such as the last moments of ‘Hey Jude’ or the ceilings of the Alhambra Palace. Isn’t the rejection of adulterous possibilities tantamount to an infidelity towards the richness of life itself? To turn the equation on its head: would it be rational to trust anyone who wasn’t, under certain circumstances, really pretty interested in being unfaithful?

Everything was blurry. She needed her spectacles. And it was awfully difficult to go looking for something when you couldn't see more than two feet in front of your face. Moreover, if one of the housemaids found the spectacles in Leo's room, or God help her, in his bed, everyone would find out. Abandoning the slipper, Dodger trotted to her and stood tall, bracing his long, slender body against her knee. He was shivering, which Beatrix had told her was normal for ferrets. A ferret's temperature lowered when he was sleeping, and shivering was his way of warming himself upon awakening. Catherine reached down to stroke him. When he tried to climb into her lap, however, she nudged him away. "I don't feel well," she told the ferret woefully, although there was nothing wrong with her physically. Chattering in annoyance at her rejection, Dodger turned and streaked out of the room. Catherine continued to lie with her head on the table, feeling too dreary and ashamed to move. She had slept late. She could hear the sounds of footsteps and muffled conversation coming from the lower floors. Had Leo gone down for breakfast? She couldn't possibly face him. Her mind returned to those blistering minutes of the previous night. A fresh swell of desire rolled through her as she thought of the way he had kissed her, the feel of his mouth on the intimate places of her body. She heard the ferret come back into the room again, chuckling and hopping as he did whenever he was especially pleased about something. "Go away, Dodger," she said dully. But he persisted, coming to her side and standing tall again, his body a long cylinder. Glancing at him, Catherine saw that something was clamped carefully in his front teeth. She blinked. Slowly she reached down and took the object from him. Her spectacles. Amazing, how much better a small gesture of kindness could make one feel. "Thank you," she whispered, tears coming to her eyes as she stroked his tiny head. "I do love you, you disgusting weasel." Climbing onto her lap, Dodger flipped upside down and sighed.

Giselle had woken up once already, to find that she was pinned to the bed by the weight of Saul‘s leg lying across her lower body and his arm holding her against his side. It was a welcome imprisonment, though, and it enabled her to lie silently within its captivity and marvel at the magical events of the night and the happiness they had brought her. Now she was awake again—this time to find that she had the bed—his bed—to herself, and that she could stretch out languorously in it, entranced by the sweetly heavy ennui that possessed her body as intimately and intensely as Saul had possessed it during the night.

Nothing existed outside of this bed. There was only the sensuous friction of tangled limbs and gently wandering hands. She whimpered as he cupped her bottom and brought her against the hard ridge of his aroused flesh. He guided her hips in a slow rhythm, rubbing her sensuously against him until she began to moan with each stroke. The soft place he teased began to swell and twitch with sensation, and she flushed with shame. She shouldn’t feel this way, she shouldn’t want…what she wanted. No matter how close she pressed to him, she needed more. She could almost have attacked him, the desire was so acute. As she squirmed against him, Devon flinched and gasped, and she realized she had inadvertently pressed against his ribs. “Oh…I’m sorry…” Kathleen began to roll away from him, panting. “No harm done.” He kept her in place. “Don’t go.” He was breathing hard--it must have been hurting him--but he didn’t seem to care. “We have to stop,” she protested. “It’s wrong, and it’s dangerous for you--and I feel--” She paused. No word in her vocabulary could account for the seething desperation that filled her, the agonizing tension coiling inside. Devon nudged her intimately, the subtle movement drawing a deep shiver from her. “Don’t,” she moaned. “I feel hot and ill, and I can’t think. I can’t even breathe.” She couldn’t fathom why Devon was amused, but as he brushed his lips against her cheek, she felt the shape of his smile. “Let me help you, love.” “You can’t,” she said in a muffled voice. “I can. Trust me.” He pressed her onto her back, his parted lips dragging over her throat and chest. She didn’t realize that he’d been working at the fastenings of her clothes until he spread her gown open. She started as cool air wafted over her bare skin. “Devon--” “Hush.” The word blew against the tip of her breast. She moaned as his mouth covered her, drawing in the tender flesh with a firm, warm tug. It seemed that his notion of how to help was to heap even more torment on her.

The Book of the Grotesque The writer, an old man with a white mustache, had some difficulty in getting into bed. The windows of the house in which he lived were high and he wanted to look at the trees when he awoke in the morning. A carpenter came to fix the bed so that it would be on a level with the window. Quite a fuss was made about the matter. The carpenter, who had been a soldier in the Civil War, came into the writer’s room and sat down to talk of building a platform for the purpose of raising the bed. The writer had cigars lying about and the carpenter smoked. For a time the two men talked of the raising of the bed and then they talked of other things. The soldier got on the subject of the war. The writer, in fact, led him to that subject. The carpenter had once been a prisoner in Andersonville prison and had lost a brother. The brother had died of starvation, and whenever the carpenter got upon that subject he cried. He, like the old writer, had a white mustache, and when he cried he puckered up his lips and the mustache bobbed up and down. The weeping old man with the cigar in his mouth was ludicrous. The plan the writer had for the raising of his bed was forgotten and later the carpenter did it in his own way and the writer, who was past sixty, had to help himself with a chair when he went to bed at night. In his bed the writer rolled over on his side and lay quite still. For years he had been beset with notions concerning his heart. He was a hard smoker and his heart fluttered. The idea had got into his mind that he would some time die unexpectedly and always when he got into bed he thought of that. It did not alarm him. The effect in fact was quite a special thing and not easily explained. It made him more alive, there in bed, than at any other time. Perfectly still he lay and his body was old and not of much use any more, but something inside him was altogether young. He was like a pregnant woman, only that the thing inside him was not a baby but a youth. No, it wasn’t a youth, it was a woman, young, and wearing a coat of mail like a knight. It is absurd, you see, to try to tell what was inside the old writer as he lay on his high bed and listened to the fluttering of his heart. The thing to get at is what the writer, or the young thing within the writer, was thinking about. The old writer, like all of the people in the world, had got, during his long fife, a great many notions in his head. He had once been quite handsome and a number of women had been in love with him. And then, of course, he had known people, many people, known them in a peculiarly intimate way that was different from the way in which you and I know people. At least that is what the writer thought and the thought pleased him. Why quarrel with an old man concerning his thoughts? In the bed the writer had a dream that was not a dream. As he grew somewhat sleepy but was still conscious, figures began to appear before his eyes. He imagined the young indescribable thing within himself was driving a long procession of figures before his eyes. You see the interest in all this lies in the figures that went before the eyes of the writer. They were all grotesques. All of the men and women the writer had ever known had become grotesques. The grotesques were not all horrible. Some were amusing, some almost beautiful, and one, a woman all drawn out of shape, hurt the old man by her grotesqueness. When she passed he made a noise like a small dog whimpering. Had you come into the room you might have supposed the old man had unpleasant dreams or perhaps indigestion. For an hour the procession of grotesques passed before the eyes of the old man, and then, although it was a painful thing to do, he crept out of bed and began to write. Some one of the grotesques had made a deep impression on his mind and he wanted to describe it.

She had no desire to see Conall dead. She loved him. That was a thought that caught her by surprise. Claray had liked Conall from the start, admired his sense of honor and determination to look after his people. She also appreciated all he had done for her, rescuing her from Kerr, carrying her before him on his mount while she slept, no matter that he was exhausted. He'd also been most patient with her rescuing animals at every turn on the way home to MacFarlane when she'd known he hadn't wanted her to. He was a good man----he worked day and night here to build a home for them all, and he'd tended to her when she was injured and ill with such gentleness and kindness. And then there was his loving. Aye, at first Claray had worried that her soul might be in peril because of the pleasure he gave her, but she'd come to terms with that. It was just too beautiful and intimate to be something God would begrudge them. Surely, if He hadn't wanted them to enjoy each other like that, He wouldn't have made it possible for people to enjoy it as they did. At least that was her reasoning. Perhaps it was just a justification to allow her to continue to enjoy her marital bed without guilt, but since she found it impossible not to, she was happy to accept that justification. Whatever the case, with all that she admired, respected and enjoyed about her husband, Claray supposed it would be surprising if she did not love him. Conall was a man worth loving, and she simply could not bear the thought of this man ending his life.

Just between Us 15 MIN 1. You will want some privacy for this exercise. (You can wear your birthday suit if you like.)     While lying in bed holding each other, start by sharing some highlights from your day. 3 MIN NOTE: Avoid talking about anything upsetting. 2. Spend some time caressing each other while you share stories about your favorite intimate moments together. Include specifics about what made these times meaningful for you. 3 MIN 3. Next, take some time to cuddle and be quiet without caressing while you both place a hand on your partner’s chest to feel his or her heartbeat. 3 MIN 4. Now, continue the caressing for another several minutes followed by cuddling while you take turns listening to each other’s heartbeat. 3 MIN Then enjoy some relational sexual intimacy that brings you both smiles and satisfaction. (Take as much time as you need for this step!) 5. Have some time to rest, then close by expressing appreciation to your spouse about what you enjoy about his/her heart, mind, and body. 3 MIN

What could have possessed her to sleep with Matthew Swift?” “I doubt there was much sleeping involved,” Annabelle replied, her eyes twinkling. Lillian gave her a slitted glare. “If you have the bad taste to be amused by this, Annabelle—” “Daisy was never interested in Lord Llandrindon,” Evie volunteered hastily, trying to prevent a quarrel. “She was only using him to provoke Mr. Swift.” “How do you know?” the other two asked at the same time. “Well, I-I…” Evie made a helpless gesture with her hands. “Last week I m-more or less inadvertently suggested that she try to make him jealous. And it worked.” Lillian’s throat worked violently before she could manage to speak. “Of all the asinine, sheep-headed, moronic—” “Why, Evie?” Annabelle asked in a considerably kinder tone. “Daisy and I overheard Mr. Swift t-talking to Lord Llandrindon. He was trying to convince Llandrindon to court her, and it became obvious that Mr. Swift wanted her for himself.” “I’ll bet he planned it,” Lillian snapped. “He must have known somehow that you would overhear. It was a devious and sinister plot, and you fell for it!” “I don’t think so,” Evie replied. Staring at Lillian’s crimson face, she asked apprehensively, “Are you going to shout at me?” Lillian shook her head and dropped her face in her hands. “I’d shriek like a banshee,” she said through the screen of her fingers, “if I thought it would do any good. But since I’m fairly certain Daisy has been intimate with that reptile, there is probably nothing anyone can do to save her now.” “She may not want to be saved,” Evie pointed out. “That’s because she’s gone stark raving mad,” came Lillian’s muffled growl. Annabelle nodded. “Obviously. Daisy has slept with a handsome, young, wealthy, intelligent man who is apparently in love with her. What in God’s name can she be thinking?” She smiled compassionately as she heard Lillian’s profane reply, and settled a gentle hand between her friend’s shoulders. “Dearest,” she murmured, “as you know, there was a time when it didn’t matter to me whether I married a man I loved or not…it seemed enough just to get my family out of the desperate situation we were in. But when I thought about what it would be like to share a bed with my husband…to spend the rest of my life with him…I knew Simon was the only choice.” She paused, and sudden tears glittered her eyes. Beautiful, self-possessed Annabelle, who hardly ever cried. “When I’m ill,” she continued in a husky voice, “when I’m afraid, when I need something, I know he will move heaven and earth to make everything all right. I trust him with every fiber of my being. And when I see the child we created, the two of us mingled forever in her…my God, how grateful I am that I married Simon. We’ve all been able to choose our own husbands, Lillian. You have to allow Daisy the same freedom.

The beauty of our endless lovemaking was too invigorating to get out of bed into the cold of Tübingen city for nourishment. But our tummies needed feeding, so we reluctantly left the comfort of the King and showered together under a blanket of warm tinkling water in our host’s spacious bathroom. The closeness of our nakedness was too irresistible for us not to make love again. The entanglements of our body parts too titillating to forgo another intimate session, and we continued where we left off on the King.

When a piece of romantic music came on the air, my lover pulled me off the sofa and we began slow dancing cheek to cheek; while his father desperately averted his gaze with much chagrin. Although the patriarch did not stop our dancing, I could detect extreme discomfort toward his son’s act of defiance. As the evening drew to a close, the siblings politely bid their parents Gute Nacht and retired to their respective chambers. Thinking Andy had securely locked our bedroom door, I fell into any intimate embrace with my lover on one of the single beds, snuggling close to his warm, muscular chest. That night I gave myself unselfishly to my lover as we consummated our love many times over, until exhaustion overshadowed our youthful bodies in a holy night of restful slumber.

Christopher…” Her voice was trembling. “I wish…” “Yes?” It was terribly selfish, and yet she couldn’t help from blurting out, “I wish there had been no other women before me.” He looked down at her in a way that made her feel as if she were dissolving in honey. His mouth descended, caressing hers with tender, urgent warmth. “My heart belongs only to you,” he whispered. “It was never lovemaking before. This is a first for me, too.” She puzzled over that, staring into his bright, lambent eyes. “Then it’s different, when one is in love?” “Beatrix, dearest love, it’s beyond anything I’ve ever known. Beyond dreams.” His hand glided over her hip, fingers gently tugging the black gossamer aside to reach her skin. Her stomach tightened at the temptation and knowledge in his touch. “You’re the reason I live. If it weren’t for you, I never would have come back.” “Don’t say that.” It was unbearable, the thought of anything happening to him. “‘It’s all come down to the hope of being with you,’…Do you remember when I wrote that?” Beatrix nodded and bit her lip as his hand slid farther beneath the transparent silk panels. “I meant every word,” he murmured. “I would have written much more, but I didn’t want to frighten you.” “I wanted to write more, too,” she said shakily. “I wanted to share every thought with you, every--” She broke off with a gasp as he found the vulnerable place between her thighs. “You’re so warm here,” he whispered, stroking her intimately. “So soft. Oh, Beatrix…I fell in love with you by words alone…but I have to admit…I prefer this way of communicating.” She could barely speak, her mind dazzled by sensation. “It’s still a love letter,” she said, sliding her hand over the golden slope of his shoulder. “Only in bed.” He smiled. “Then I’ll try to use proper punctuation.” “And no dangling participles,” she added, making him laugh.

Christopher went still. After a long hesitation, she heard him ask in a far more normal voice, “What are you doing?” “I’m making it easier for you,” came her defiant reply. “Go on, start ravishing.” Another silence. Then, “Why are you facing downward?” “Because that’s how it’s done.” Beatrix twisted to look at him over her shoulder. A twinge of uncertainty caused her to ask. “Isn’t it?” His face was blank. “Has no one ever told you?” “No, but I’ve read about it.” Christopher rolled off her, relieving her of his weight. He wore an odd expression as he asked, “From what books?” “Veterinary manuals. And of course, I’ve observed the squirrels in springtime, and farm animals, and--” She was interrupted as Christopher cleared his throat loudly, and again. Darting a confused glance at him, she realized that he was trying to choke back amusement. Beatrix began to feel indignant. Her first time in a bed with a man, and he was laughing. “Look here,” she said in a businesslike manner, “I’ve read about the mating habits of over two dozen species, and with the exception of snails, whose genitalia is on their necks, they all--” She broke off and frowned. “Why are you laughing at me?” Christopher had collapsed, overcome with hilarity. As he lifted his head and saw her affronted expression, he struggled manfully with another outburst. “Beatrix. I’m…I’m not laughing at you.” “You are!” “No I’m not. It’s just…” He swiped a tear from the corner of his eye, and a few more chuckles escaped. “Squirrels…” “Well, it may be humorous to you, but it’s a very serious matter to the squirrels.” That set him off again. In a display of rank insensitivity to the reproductive rights of small mammals, Christopher had buried his face in a pillow, his shoulders shaking. “What is so amusing about fornicating squirrels?” Beatrix asked irritably. By this time he had gone into near apoplexy. “No more,” he gasped. “Please.” “I gather it’s not the same for people,” Beatrix said with great dignity, inwardly mortified. “They don’t go about it the same way that animals do?” Fighting to control himself, Christopher rolled to face her. His eyes were brilliant with unspent laughter. “Yes. No. That is, they do, but…” “But you don’t prefer it that way?” Considering how to answer her, Christopher reached out to smooth her disheveled hair, which was falling out of its pins. “I do. I’m quite enthusiastic about it, actually. But it’s not right for your first time.” “Why not?” Christopher looked at her, a slow smile curving his lips. His voice deepened as he asked, “Shall I show you?” Beatrix was transfixed. Taking her stillness as assent, he pressed her back and moved over her slowly. He touched her with care, arranging her limbs, spreading them to receive him. A gasp escaped her as she felt his hips settle on hers. He was aroused, a thick pressure fitting against her intimately. Bracing some of his weight on his arms, he looked down into her reddening face. “This way,” he said, with the slightest nudge, “…is usually more pleasing to the lady.” The gentle movement sent a jolt of pleasure through her. Beatrix couldn’t speak, her senses filled with him, her hips catching a helpless arch. She looked up at the powerful surface of his chest, covered with a tantalizing fleece of bronze-gold hair. Christopher lowered further, his mouth hovering just over hers. “Front to front…I could kiss you the entire time. And the shape of you would cushion me so sweetly…like this…” His lips took hers and coaxed them open, wringing heat and delight from her yielding flesh. Beatrix shivered, her arms lifting around his neck. She felt him all along her body, his warmth and weight anchoring her.

felt something open and blossom inside of her at the expressions she found there: strength, desire… hunger. And she’d known, deep in her heart, that it would be only a matter of time before she and Ethan became joined in the most intimate manner possible. Now Lettie blinked, allowing her eyes to slip from Ethan’s jaw to the breadth of his shoulders. He’d flung an arm above his head during his sleep, and her eyes lovingly traced the firm contour made by his ribs as they swept in a beguiling arc to the narrowness of his stomach. Her breath paused, then quickened. The sheet had slipped low upon his hips. So very low. Lettie straightened, her chin lifting from her knees without her really being aware of it. Her eyes widened ever so slightly, and she found herself tracing the dark hair that feathered down his stomach from his chest, swirling around the slight indentation of his navel before slipping lower. Lettie felt herself growing warm. Though the sheet covered Ethan where it counted, there was no denying the washboard honing of his stomach, the flat scoop of his pelvis, and the masculine jut of his hips beneath the sheet. Lettie’s eyes grew wider still. Her heart began a slow, methodic pounding at the base of her throat and the pit of her stomach. Impulsively, she pushed aside the covers and slipped from the bed. Her bare feet made no sound on the hooked rug in the center of the floor as she padded across the garret to where Ethan lay beside the wardrobe. Slowly, silently, she knelt beside him, her nightgown puddling onto the floor beside them. Her hair became a curtain of honey-brown waves as she bent toward him.

He longed to settle peacefully on his own quiet perch and drowse, with his tired head under the soft, feathery shelter of a wing. He had never conceived of love as an ever-wakeful, restless flame, casting its strong, flickering light into every nook and corner of existence, making everything seem fantastically large and strange. Love to him was more like the quiet glow of embers on their bed of ashes, spreading a gentle warmth, while the faint dusk wraps all distant things in forgetfulness and makes the near seem nearer and more intimate.

One sleepless night shortly after the boy’s arrival, I was going through a tough time, missing you. Bernard heard my sobs and crept into my bed. We held each other close. I could not help but relish his intimacy and his warm body next to mine. Wrapping my arms around the boy, we were aroused by the passionate auras surrounding the both of us. As an experienced ‘big brother’ I took charge. I kissed his tender lips before planting soft kisses on his closed lids, and soon I was nibbling at his delicate earlobes. He groaned with pleasure, desiring to do the same to me. Before I knew it, we were taking turns caressing each other’s nipples. Our seductive foreplay lasted for a long time until we could stave off our sexual urges no longer. He engulfed my manhood, licking, suckling and engorging mouthfuls of my rod. I could hold back no longer. Pressing his head against my crotch, I released my abundance into his orifice with forceful intensity. Yet he continued to nourish himself on my length; unwilling to relinquish his feed, he greedily guzzled the last drop of my seed down his yearning throat. His sensuality propelled me to share my lingering sustenance from his delectable tongue. We French kissed until we were drunk with the elixir of love. His youthful beauty did not fail to arouse me to another bout of sexual vitality. As I flipped him on his stomach, he lifted his derriere to receive my pulsing organ. He hungered for my entry and I – I was deliriously ready to feed this angelic sprite with my protruding protraction. Gently and lovingly I submerged myself into his person, gyrating slowly to the rhythmic flow of our entangled bewilderment. He opened willingly to my warmth as I plunged inside him, at times fast and furious and at others slow and gentle. In the process I ground his manhood onto the bed, coercing him into ecstatic moans before giving in to cries of whimpering ecstasies. My hand reached around his slender torso, working his hardness to the point of no return. He could not hold off any further. Jets of oozing cum shot onto my stroking palm. His sexiness sent my ejaculation spewing deep inside his opening as he swallowed my dripping seed between his pining fissures. He devoured his own seed from my fingers as I planted caresses on his amorous mouth, sharing every creamy bead of his milkiness between us. He wanted me in him, like I did you, long after our tantalizing desires had subsided. Our friendship took on an intimate significance that night, which we shared over and over again during our time together before Bernard left for Scotland and I to my new dig. Keep your news coming, Andy. Like you, I look forward to receiving your uplifting messages. Love and kisses, Young, Xoxoxo

The names of your informers, what backstabbing campaigns you’re embarking on, where you store your guns, your drugs, your money, the location of your hideout, the interchangeable lists of your friends and enemies, your contacts, the fences, your escape plans—all things you need to keep to yourself, and you will reveal every one if you are in love. Love is the Ultimate Informer because of the conviction it inspires that your love is eternal and immutable—you can no more imagine the end of your love than you can imagine the end of your own head. And because love is nothing without intimacy, and intimacy is nothing without sharing, and sharing is nothing without honesty, you must inevitably spill the beans, every last bean, because dishonesty in intimacy is unworkable and will slowly poison your precious love. When it ends—and it will end (even the most risk-embracing gambler wouldn’t touch those odds)—he or she, the love object, has your secrets. And can use them. And if the relationship ends acrimoniously, he or she will use them, viciously and maliciously—will use them against you. Furthermore, it is highly probable that the secrets you reveal when your soul has all its clothes off will be the cause of the end of love. Your intimate revelations will be the flame that lights the fuse that ignites the dynamite that blows your love to kingdom come. No, you say. She understands my violent ways. She understands that the end justifies the means. Think about this. Being in love is a process of idealization. Now ask yourself, how long can a woman be expected to idealize a man who held his foot on the head of a drowning man? Not too long, believe me. And cold nights in front of the fire, when you get up and slice off another piece of cheese, you don’t think she’s dwelling on that moment of unflinching honesty when you revealed sawing off the feet of your enemy? Well, she is. If a man could be counted on to dispose of his partner the moment the relationship is over, this chapter wouldn’t be necessary. But he can’t be counted on for that. Hope of reconciliation keeps many an ex alive who should be at the bottom of a deep gorge. So, lawbreakers, whoever you are, you need to keep your secrets for your survival, to keep your enemies at bay and your body out of the justice system. Sadly—and this is the lonely responsibility we all have to accept—the only way to do this is to stay single. If you need sexual relief, go to a hooker. If you need an intimate embrace, go to your mother. If you need a bed warmer during cold winter months, get a dog that is not a Chihuahua or a Pekingese. But know this: to give up your secrets is to give up your security, your freedom, your life. The truth will kill your love, then it will kill you. It’s rotten, I know. But so is the sound of the judge’s gavel pounding a mahogany desk.

Do women in love feel as men do? Do men love as women love? His virgin bride shared her pipe-frame bed all smiles and laughter. When they were intimate to the last degree on that bed, did Lou's experience join his, did his experience match hers, during this moment and that moment?

This is the thing: When you hit 28 or 30, everything begins to divide. You can see very clearly two kinds of people. On one side, people who have used their 20s to learn and grow, to find … themselves and their dreams, people who know what works and what doesn’t, who have pushed through to become real live adults. Then there’s the other kind, who are hanging onto college, or high school even, with all their might. They’ve stayed in jobs they hate, because they’re too scared to get another one. They’ve stayed with men or women who are good but not great, because they don’t want to be lonely. … they mean to develop intimate friendships, they mean to stop drinking like life is one big frat party. But they don’t do those things, so they live in an extended adolescence, no closer to adulthood than when they graduated. Don’t be like that. Don’t get stuck. Move, travel, take a class, take a risk. There is a season for wildness and a season for settledness, and this is neither. This season is about becoming. Don’t lose yourself at happy hour, but don’t lose yourself on the corporate ladder either. Stop every once in a while and go out to coffee or climb in bed with your journal. Ask yourself some good questions like: “Am I proud of the life I’m living? What have I tried this month? … Do the people I’m spending time with give me life, or make me feel small? Is there any brokenness in my life that’s keeping me from moving forward?” Now is your time. Walk closely with people you love, and with people who believe life is a grand adventure. Don’t get stuck in the past, and don’t try to fast-forward yourself into a future you haven’t yet earned. Give today all the love and intensity and courage you can, and keep travelling honestly along life’s path.

Wow,” he breathes. “You like her that much.” I nod. “Yeah.” I scoff. “I’m not in love with her or anything”—I might as well be honest—“but I can’t get her off my mind.” “You done her yet?” Pete asks. “Done her?” I repeat. He makes a crude gesture with his hands. “Done her,” he says again. “God, no,” I breathe. “I haven’t even kissed her.” “Wow,” Logan says again. “Would you stop saying that?” I gripe. “You want to kiss her,” Pete says. “I want to do all sorts of things with her,” I admit. “But she’s special.” “Wow,” Logan says again. “Cut it out!” I shove his shoulder. “I remember when I brought Emily home. She slept in my bed for a long time before we ever had sex. It wasn’t about that. It was about those quiet, intimate moments. Those were what mattered. They fed my soul.” Leave it to Logan to hit the nail on the head. “Yeah,” I say. “Like that.” “I wanted to fuck her, too, but not until I knew it was permanent.” His comment is crass, and someone else might find it crude and uncaring, but I find it honest. “Same here,” Pete tosses out. “That’s how you know she’s the right one. When you would take hearing her voice over getting your rocks off.

Then they huddle on the bed and remove Sibylle of Cleves from the catalog and balance the painting intimately on their palms, no frame, no glass, no crowd, no guards. They regard the back of the portrait too, embossed with wax seals, each stamped with the coat of arms of a family that had owned it, charting the 450-year journey from Cranach’s hands to theirs. Holding the piece, the one and only copy that will ever exist, he’s infused with happiness, he says, released from the stress of the crime and able at last to fully savor a gift they intend to keep hidden from everyone else.

As a result men—even men she has been intimate with—do not now gaze upon her with dismay, as upon a beloved landscape devastated by fire, flood, or urban development. They do not mind that Vinnie Miner, who was never much to look at, now looks old. After all, they hadn’t slept with her out of romantic passion, but out of comradeship and temporary mutual need—often almost absent-mindedly, to relieve the pressure of their desire for some more glamorous female. It wasn’t uncommon for a man who had just made love to Vinnie to sit up naked in bed, light a cigarette, and relate to her the vicissitudes of his current romance with some temperamental beauty-breaking off occasionally to say how great it was to have a pal like her

..I took in the perfection of his chest, the feel of his weight on mine. And then...and then...GOSPEL! A medley of riffs piercing the air. Mary Mary, doing vocal gymnastics for Jesus, in the middle of this most intimate moment, in the middle of an act I still thought of as an abomination. JESUS being sung at full volume, in front of the sachets of condoms and lube I'd retrieved from under the bed. The shame shot through me as I leapt to switch off the speaker and fumbled for my clothes. After years of hiding Jesus away from my sexuality -- and vice versa -- the two had collided. How could I have been so careless?

She clasped his shoulders, pulling him close, her body pressed to his, sending her blood pounding hotly through her veins. “I never did thank you for saving my life,” she whispered. “Leaving you there would have been like my own death,” he answered in a rough voice. He brought his mouth to hers for a kiss that said everything he hadn’t yet put into words. When they came up for air, she said, “I think we need to get rid of these clothes.” They discarded jeans, T-shirts, and underwear quickly, then rolled toward each other again. She made a small sobbing sound as he clasped her to him, overwhelmed by the feel of his naked body against hers. He held her for long moments, then reached between them, shaping her breasts in his hands, then playing his fingers over her nipples, bringing them to throbbing points of sensation. When he took one hard peak into his mouth, drawing on her as he used his thumb and finger on the other side, she cried out with the pleasure of it. And when he stroked his free hand down her body and dipped into the hot, slick folds of her most intimate flesh, she came to a jolting climax. As she caught her breath, she looked into his grinning face. “That took me by surprise.” “Me too,” he agreed. “But it was kind of fun.” He began to kiss and caress her again, and this time she was better able to focus on each thing he did as he aroused her to fever pitch once more. He dragged in a ragged breath, raising his head so that his eyes could meet hers. “Are you ready for me?” “More than ready.” He covered her body with his, and as he sank into her, emotions flooded through her. He began to move inside her, and she matched his rhythm, her breath coming hard and fast. Again, climax grabbed her, and she heard him gasp, “I love you” as he joined her. “I love you so much,” she answered, as she came down from the heights, stroking her hands over his sweat-slick back. He shifted off of her, and they lay together on the bed, both breathing hard. “You are so good at that,” she murmured. “I could say the same thing.

Csitri--little one. He put a wealth of love in his summons. You are better? Relief. I am getting there quickly. Are you in bed? Always the bed thing. I heard you earlier, your fear for Jacques. I know it was Jacques. You have affection in your thoughts of him. Is he okay too? He is tired. He gave me blood. It was draining to make the contact, to cover the distance, but he needed it desperately for both their sakes. I can hear your weariness. Sleep now. You’re not to worry about me, she instructed softly. She ached for the touch of his fingers, the sight of him, and that gave him satisfaction. She was already missing him--just as he was missing her. “Mikhail, you are speaking with her,” Eric thundered. “You cannot.” Jacques waved a dismissing hand at Eric. “You should have known he would do so. Mikhail, if you wish it, one of us can send her to sleep.” It will be uncomfortable for you. You will find it difficult to sleep, to eat. You will need to be with me. Your mind will seek mine, yet you will be unable to reach me. I do not have the strength to aid you this night in sleeping. Will you allow Eric or Jacques to command you? Mikhail didn’t like the idea. Raven found herself smiling. He had no idea how much she could read of him. He wanted her safe, wanted her asleep while he was, but he didn’t like the idea of another man doing something so intimate as commanding her to sleep. I’ll be fine, Mikhail. The truth is, it’s hard enough for me to accept that kind of thing from you. I could never accept it from one of them. I’ll be fine, I promise. You are--sivamet--of my heart. I love you, little one. Those are the words of both your people and mine, and they come from my heart. Mikhail used a last burst of strength to send a plea to the only human he could trust to ensure Raven’s safety. Raven closed her eyes, knowing she had to let him go before his strength was gone. Sleep, Mikhail. In the words of your people, you are my lifemate.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’m a wimp. I admit it. But it hit me, just now, what a good person you are. How noble you are. You’re down-to-earth and likable. I see it everywhere you go. Me? Yeah, not so much. People fear me, even if they don’t know what I am. Those who do? Yeah, then they really fear me. “So I sit here looking at you, thinking what a wonderful person you are, and it hits me right between the eyes. I need you like I need blood to survive. I need you to survive. I didn’t believe I could fall this fast for somebody, even though I know about the mate-draw thing. I don’t deserve you, but I’ll damn sure fight to keep—” There was a blur of movement, and I found myself flat on my back, both of my arms held above my head. I stared at Remi. Whoa. “You love me? You tell me that while I am spread out and helpless?” “Um, not looking too helpless now.” “I ought to shake you senseless. No, I ought to chain you down and beat your ass, then shake you senseless. And what was that rot you were spewing about me being so good and you being so not? Do not put me up on some damn pedestal. I’m not perfect. I’m as far from perfect as I can get. I’m no better than you, you fanged fucker.” “Fanged fucker?” I snorted, then got serious. “Look, I—” Remi released my wrists and put a finger to my lips… a finger with a nice sharp claw on the end. Well, hell. I found myself looking into the brightly glowing electric-blue eyes of his cat “I love you too. I don’t care what you’ve done in your past. Also don’t care about whatever you’ve done to survive. You are all I care about. “When that asshole stabbed you, I thought I lost you. I thought I lost everything. Yes, what I feel hit me quickly, and the intensity sometimes scares me, but I’ll fight tooth and nail to keep you. I’ll also gladly kick your ass when I think you need reminding.” I hiked an eyebrow at him. “You’ll try to kick my ass.” “No, I will.” Remi rubbed his cheek against mine, then sat up. “Together we can handle anything.” I caressed that strong jawline of his. “You love me?” “I love you. In fact, I love you more.” “Not too sure of that.” My world finally settled in place around me. He was right. Together we could handle anything. “I love you too.” “Good. Now that we’ve got that straightened out, let’s go take a shower. I, ah… yeah.” Remi pulled me up off the bed. “To the shower we go.” Laughing, I followed him. I had every intention of helping him get totally and intimately clean, then taking his ass back to bed.

And when you lay in bed with your wife, are you mentally there or with the women on TV? Or the women who you've been intimate with though the screens? You not only compare your wife to these women but also love her as though she was someone else Physically present when making love to her but mentally absent from her You kiss her lips while your heart kisses the "screen woman