Chapter 8

Things settled down that autumn. Cassie gained her master's degree and obtained a position in a publishing house. It was work she loved, being immersed in assessing the work of aspiring writers, and some more well-known authors.

Ged for his part resigned from his job, and was surprised when he was told that if he ever considered returning, to get in touch. Thanks to the recession the company were looking to let someone go, and Ged saved them from an unpleasant task. Though he had only served for a year, the company gave him three months salary in lieu of notice, and it tided the couple over the time before the money from the band would begin to roll in.

Since the album and the single were recorded in Manchester, he was able to return home each evening, and the same applied to the individual gigs they were offered. Rarely did he have to stay overnight.

Cassie was delighted. His membership of the band had turned out better than she could ever have hoped for, and she was a happy woman with a job she loved and a boyfriend she adored and who was often at home doing his writing. Life was good for both.

Christmas came and went and the young couple visited both families as they did the previous year. Once again they celebrated the New Year with Cheryl and Brian, but there was no party this year, just a few friends, since there was now a three month old daughter, Sarah, in the house. Viccy and the group were there, and Ged joined them in some quiet music.

In February, Leo announced he had finalised the European tour. It would begin in August and take about six months. Cassie shrugged at the news; after all it had been expected. She did not like it, but Ged suggested that she join him at Christmas in Italy or Greece, and she found that an attractive proposition.

Ged had been thinking, and realised that six months was a long time to be apart. At the beginning of March he bought a ring.

On the weekend of the ninth of March he took her by first class rail to an exclusive restaurant in London, and after dessert, he went down on one knee in full view of the whole place and asked her to marry him.

She burst into tears and nodded vigorously, to the applause of the whole place. He took out the ring, a huge solitaire diamond, and slipped it onto her finger. Champagne followed for the whole restaurant.

When they returned to the hotel, she told him to have one drink in the bar and then join her in the room. When he arrived she was in the bathroom. There was a note on the bed telling him to strip naked and lie on the bed, which he was delighted to do. Then the bathroom door opened and Cassie emerged.

She was a vision in ivory. She had a long semi-transparent nightdress, with spaghetti straps and a deep V between her breasts, showing that she was wearing a sheer lacy bra beneath. She stood before him quite shyly, and he obligingly gasped and held out his hands to her, his already half-mast penis rising to attention to reinforce the effect she was having on him.

She shrugged off the straps to the dress, which fell to the ground, revealing her lacy bra and briefs set in the same ivory colour, set off with a pair of ivory thigh high stockings.

"Oh, God," he gasped. "You're so beautiful!!"

She smiled at this and walked to the bed, climbing on and kneeling astride his thighs. It was then that he noticed the briefs were split crotch, and now gaped enticingly.

"Oh, yes!" he sighed, and delved within with his eager fingers, bringing a sigh of pleasure from Cassie in his turn. She grasped his penis, now at full stretch, and began to sink slowly onto it.

Ged moved his hand out of the way, and she impaled herself on his erect member, groaning as he filled her to the fullest. Then she slowly rose and fell, extracting every sensation from his withdrawal and refilling of her inner space. She felt as if he was touching her soul, and rose and fell over and over, enraptured at the feeling of him deep with her.

Ged for his part felt he had died and gone to heaven. The vision of the woman he found excruciatingly beautiful, dressed in this demure and at the same time erotic underwear, with her eyes closed in ecstasy and a smile playing on her lips, was almost impossible to bear. He desperately wanted to topple her from her perch on him, and take her violently, but he somehow knew that this was all part of her full acceptance of him, his mind, his soul and especially his body; it was her physical assent to his proposal.

After what seemed an eternity of exquisite pleasure for both of them, while at the same time building intense frustration, she gave him what he wanted – her orgasm. She rolled to the side, pulling at him to stay buried in her as she fell under him.

"Now, my lover, my darling," she ordered, "Take me. Make me yours."

Ged needed no further encouragement. He plundered her body, biting her nipples through the ivory bra, until she undid the front fastening, and allowed him full access to the globes he so adored. She revelled in his assault on her breasts, the way he mauled them, bit on them, and stroked them; lightning flashed to her sex and made her giddy with desire.

He devoured her neck, leaving love bites before mashing her lips with his own, while their tongues did their dance.

All the while, he was moving quite gently in and out of her velvet sheath. Then she sharply pushed her hips against him. It was a signal. He raised himself off her onto his arms, and began to thrust deeply and hard, pushing her up the bed with each slamming penetration, until her head was being knocked against the head board.

Concerned, he abated his attack, but she grabbed his buttocks and pulled him hard against her. It did not take long before they were both becoming vocal, her female cries melding with his masculine grunting.

The pitch and intensity of the noises they made crescendoed until he lost his rhythm completely as he orgasmed and provoked her second, and she bucked and shook all over with the climactic sensations.

When the feelings receded they opened their eyes and gazed at each other. Then they began to laugh. It was soft laughter, born of utter success in lovemaking. It was triumphant.

"We really are one now," she said, "and I will never let you go."