The Floating World Pt. 03

She stepped away to look at him, this tall man in a quiet place, and wondered how he saw her.

The flow of her dress as Gabriela stood before him was like a veil of water falling. It was pale and cream, a contrast to her darker skin. The skirt of it flared over her hips and clinched into a tight waist, and the bodice hugged her full breasts pushed high. Adam counted eight buttons down the front, from high on her chest to just below the base of her belly, and two buttons on each cuff. Adam remembered her words, it's the first time I've worn it. The dress, then, was chosen especially for him.

Twelve silken buttons, and each to undo.

"Your dress, Gabriela, is beautiful. You're beautiful." Adam loved the brightness in her eyes and her smile as she heard his words. "Let's sit, that bench is shaded and cool."

The bench was under a timbered pergola, offering visitors a view of a raked gravel sea with islands of rock placed in a precise pattern, lichens and moss a tiny microcosm. Adam and Gabriela sat beside the sea. Tiny birds, wrens, substituted for seagulls and were tame, flitting to their feet then gone when no seed was dropped. Gabriela laughed at their quick, darting flight.

"Look, there's the male, bright blue." She touched Adam's arm, pointing. "See, on the branch."

Adam saw, but the young woman beside him interested him more. He said nothing, not knowing what she wanted. He knew this peaceful place would calm Gabriela, and when she was ready, she would find her words.

Gabriela wandered at first, telling him a little of home, a little of her work. Adam learned about Felicity, "my closest friend, she knows me so well," and saw the love in Gabriela's eyes for her.

"Will I meet her, your friend?"

"Oh maybe, one day. She knows about you...." Gabriela stopped, realising she had said too much. "I mean... I've mentioned you. One of my customers...." She stopped again, and looked at Adam for help. "Sorry, I'm...."

"Chattering?" Adam's voice was soft, gentle. He looked at the young woman beside him in her perfect dress, her hands gripped together in her lap to stop their movement. A sudden flash of instinct made him turn towards her, a quarter turn, and with one arm around her shoulder and a hand on her hair, he gently tilted her head so it rested in the crook of his shoulder, safe. "It's OK, lovely. Rest your head here. I've got you."

Gabriela sighed, tension spilling from her, and she relaxed against him. Slowly, she turned her head up towards his, her lips opening to just show her teeth. Adam looked down and saw her open mouth, her closed eyes, a faint flush on the side of her long throat. His lips touched hers, soft at first, and then their tongues touched.

Gabriela's hand went to the back of Adam's head, pulling them together, and their kiss was long and sweet. Hungry but slow, their tastes mingled. Adam grew hard, and Gabriela was wet for him, but she wanted it to take forever, slowly and forever.

But first, Adam had to know. Gabriela pulled back and looked up at this man, this man who surely would know what to do. "Adam," she swallowed, and found some words. "Adam, this will sound strange, but...." Her hand touched the back of his hand on her shoulder for comfort. "I want... I need to tell you something. About me. You need to know something about me."

"What is it Gabriela, what do I need to know about you?" He caressed her hair slowly, calming her like a cat, waiting for her revelation. "It can't be bad, I wouldn't believe that." He kissed her again, to encourage her thoughts. "I'm sure I can cope." Adam smiled, but his blue eyes narrowed just a little, tell me.

Gabriela took in a deep breath, pressing her palm against his hand on her shoulder for strength. Adam stopped stroking her hair, and she knew she had to go on, to bring the comfort back, to get it done.

"This dress, Adam, It was Flick's idea. I...." She stopped. "No, I'm being silly. It doesn't matter."

"Doesn't matter, Gabriela? Are you sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure. It doesn't matter."

Gabriela changed the subject. "It's nice being here with you though, I'm glad you bought me here. It's peaceful."

Adam looked at her, having watched a myriad of emotions pass across her face. She said it didn't matter, whatever it was, but he could see that it was important. No matter, he was a patient man, he could wait. He would find out sooner or later, it was just a matter of time. Adam had plenty of that, and was used to a slow pursuit. It made a seduction more satisfying, the longer it took.

Adam gazed upon her still beauty, sitting there in her beautiful dress, and decided yes, he would put his mind to this woman. She was different to other women he had known, some essence in her wasn't the same. He was intrigued by her, and that made her interesting.

"May I, Gabriela?" Adam took one of her hands in his, and undid one button. His lips whisper kissed her wrist, and a tiny pulse heated the scent she had dabbed there earlier. Her scent rose, and Adam breathed it in deep. Her wrist was everything, it was the first moment of Gabriela's seduction, the first place.

In a Japanese garden, a thread of moments began, silken threads twisting around tightly; twelve silk buttons to be undone....

***

"Good god, Flick, his gentleness with me, I couldn't believe a kiss on the inside of my wrist could be so exquisite. Adam kissed my wrist, his lips like a butterfly quivering. That's all he did, Flick, there in the garden. I felt like those pictures of a hundred year's ago, where the women flirt behind a fan and drop a handkerchief. He was so gentle, so delicate."

"What did he do next Gabs? What did he do?" Felicity wanted to know everything, every word, every tiny gesture. She couldn't wait.

"Goodness, Flick, you're so impatient!" Gabriela paused, teasing her darling girl, knowing what happened next and re-living it as she retold the moment. "Adam's so wicked, Flick. He knew exactly what to do."

"What, Gabs, what?"

"He undid another button, Flick, two buttons now. Both cuffs."

"Gabriela, you tart, you're shameless. Two!" Felicity could imagine the gorgeous smile on Gabriela's face, she could hear the joy in her friend's voice. "Oh, Gabs, can I have him when you're finished? I've never been undressed slowly, never. I'm so jealous." Felicity was worldly and knew men, but she'd never known a man like this man. "Oh Gabs, where did you find him?"

"In Ruth's cafe. In the mornings, just like that. Amanda served him first, and I could see how, when he spoke to her, nobody else existed. And then I served him for a week in a row. And he was the same with me. He'd talk to me, and all I wanted was for him to look at me again and again. It was only ever a minute or two, but I'd melt each time. I felt like a silly swooning school girl, but all I wanted was his smile. Just for me."

"And then you wore red lipstick and matching nails. Gabriela, you're a total slut. You've started your witchey ways on him." Felicity was impressed. "How could he resist you?"

I couldn't resist you either, thought Felicity. Fuck, I'm jealous, she thought twice.

"When are you seeing him next, Gabs?"

I'm going to torture myself if he seduces her slowly, Felicity thought, thrice. And another witching woman awoke, and tendrils moved through the ether towards Adam, weaving a spell slowly.

***

Adam shivered, a ghost walking over his grave. He looked up, but no-one was there. It was a familiar touch, from long ago and tomorrow. He shook his head, clearing his thoughts.

His mind turned to Gabriela, and Adam pondered his next step. A long, slow approach might be best, tantalising and teasing, moving ever closer to the prize that was Gabriela, so many delightful stops along the way. He thought of those brilliant Japanese woodcuts from the nineteenth century, where seduction was hinted at behind closed screens, shadows and rain and blossoms falling.

And then Adam thought of another type of Japanese woodcut, where the sex was huge and joyous, with massive cocks and long hairy cunts, a maid stealing a glance from behind a screen, and luxurious cloth. Ah, so much inspiration.

And Gabriela herself, there was something divine and beatific about the young woman that entranced Adam, that made him adore her. He wanted so much to be held in her arms like some fallen angel, his own darkness purged by her grace, held safe. She wasn't the same as other women he had known, there seemed a different gentleness about her, some inner peace. He craved for it, to be held by her.

***

"Gabriela, come, stand before me."

Adam gazed upon her as she stood before him, her hair long and dark and falling down over her breast, nearly to her waist. Her dress, as before, had swayed and swirled as she walked beside him, her heels clicking on the pavement. Now the flow of cloth was still, but the bodice swelled high with her breath.

From a pocket of his coat, Adam produced a black velvet box, and turned it towards her. Gabriela undid the small clasp, and lifted the lid.

"It's beautiful. Thank you."

"It's the first thing I'll place against your skin, Gabriela, and the last thing I shall take off. With it on, you'll stand nude before me; with it off, you'll stand naked." Adam moved towards her, lifting her face to his in a kiss. "If you'll let me, that is."

She stood still before him; and his fingers moved to the highest silken button on her bodice, undoing the button and revealing her throat. He swept the long weight of her hair into his hand, and coiled it up high and away from her neck. "Hold it up," he said, "and look at me."

Gabriela held her head tilted proud, and bared her throat to receive his gift. Adam took the black velvet choker from the box and undid its catch. He placed it around her throat and it was a narrow band of darkness against her dusky skin. He claimed her with it, and his promise of dropping it away from her skin was a sign of his confidence Gabriela didn't debate.

"Come, Gabriela, sit with me."

Gabriela sat beside him, and the buttons on her sleeves were undone, her wrists bare and slender. Adam took one hand in his, kissing the tips of her fingers one by one, then eased them, two at a time, into his mouth. His mouth was hot and her fingers heated. A nerve ran from each of her nipples to the base of her clit, and all three nerve centres peaked and tightened. Gabriela sighed, and fell against his chest, a hand against Adam's heart.

They kissed for a long moment, their tongues exploring each others' mouths. Gabriela crept sideways onto Adam's lap, half on and half off, and she felt his shaft hard against her thigh. She pressed herself against it, and was rewarded with a small intake of his breath. She pressed again, and took a tight tip of Adam's tongue into her mouth.

Gabriela closed her lips against the thrust of his tongue, and for the first time Adam forced her. She softened against his will and was not taken. She gave herself up, wanting him, her first time resisting him then letting the man in. Adam savoured the moment, and held her body against his.

Still curled on his lap, Gabriela touched the cuffs of Adam's shirt and undid the buttons, each cuff at a time. She said nothing, no permission sought, no permission given. Adam stretched out his arms to make it easier for her fingers, and she rolled each cuff up one turn. Gabriela took his fingers to her mouth and repeated the same tip suck that he gave her, and felt the length of his cock shift. She looked up at him, her eyes bright but less of a smile, concentrating on learning the length and angles of his fingers.

She splayed her hand against his broad palm, and her hand was smaller. She'd thought she wanted longer fingers, but his curled over the top of hers and then interlaced, so it didn't matter. Their palms touched and were warm, and Adam placed his other hand over the back of hers and her hand was safe between his. Gabriela's free hand reached up to Adam's cheek and cradled his face. She watched his eyes close and felt an ever so slight change in the weight on her palm; and Gabriela knew some small tension in him was given up to her, that he too could soften and relax and sleep in her hands.

They were wordless, tiny flickerings of trust moving back and forth as their fingers made trails over skin and cloth and each other. Gabriela's eyes never closed, she took him all in, learning every small scar and line on his skin, learning a man.

Adam knew more, and was looking for something else, so his touch was different, less tentative. He undid two more of the silken buttons on the front of Gabriela's dress, and his fingers moved upon the upper curves of her full breasts, finding the divide of her cleavage and the long line to her throat. She was still curled on his lap so his exploration was uneven. Gabriela wriggled, wanting all of her skin to be touched, she was becoming hungrier now.

Adam gently turned, and lowered Gabriela to the couch so she lay there, her throat flushed, her mouth slightly open, oh for her sighs. He took a step back and stood upright and she lay before him, the long flow of the dress covering her legs, hiding her hips. Adam stood quite still for a moment, studying Gabriela, savouring her beauty, her quiet presence.

Gabriela's gaze on him was steady, she didn't look away, her eyes were black. Her eyes narrowed, so subtle he nearly missed it. A slight prickle went up the back of his neck, and what he thought was the want of her became a need for her. The air in the room shifted, and Adam felt a slight spin of vertigo. He tensed his legs, pushing down to the floor to steady himself, to catch his balance. Could she save him?

***

"Tell me, tell me, Gabriela, what happened next?" Felicity held the phone close to her ear, Gabriela's voice fading and falling with the distance, a faint echo doubling their voices, voices.

"He just looked at me, Flick, and it was like some strange light switched in his eyes. God, the way he looked at me." Gabriela's voice dropped to a whisper, as she remembered the moment. "The intensity of his gaze, I didn't know what it meant." She paused. "I just reached for him, I reached up to take him in my arms." Talking about it brought an explanation she'd not seen before.

"He seemed lost, Flick, so lost. I just wanted to hold him in my arms. So I did, Flick, I opened my arms to him and he came to me, and lay his head on my breast. Before, he'd held my hand in his, but now it was my turn to hold his hand between mine. His head on my breast, like a baby."

"What happened next, Gabs?" Flick whispered into her phone, not really believing what Gabriela was saying, but aching to hear every moment of it. She did not know Adam, but was astonished to hear of this intensity in the man, this vulnerability, and Gabriela's natural reaction. "Did you just hold him forever, Gabs? This man of yours?" Felicity ached for a man like him, who needed a woman so much. She'd never found one.

"Not forever, but a long time. I think he almost slept on my chest. Then he stirred." Gabriela stopped talking, and Felicity could imagine the look on her face as she remembered. "Oh God, Flick, his care for me, I couldn't believe how gentle he was with me."

***

Adam hadn't slept. He'd listened to the quieting hush of Gabriela's heartbeat as it calmed to a steady beat. Her breath was even and slow, and she matched the slow caress of his hair, her hand over the curve of his skull, to her breathing. He felt a natural stillness in the woman, so at peace with herself that she calmed him, soothed him.

Gabriela was a resting place for Adam. There were times in his life when he met a woman unexpectedly, when he wasn't expecting anything or seeking anyone; when a woman simply arrived in his life. He might be drinking coffee, reading a paper, and would look up at a sound, a movement, even a shadow; and there she would be, a newcomer in his life. Inevitably, he would be seduced by the magic the woman wrapped around him until he was helpless like Merlin trapped in Nimue's tree, until she grew bored and set him free.

This time though, Gabriela sold him the coffee and cleared away the paper after he had gone, and he was the newcomer coming into her territory, her cafe. Perhaps it was a reversal of the roles this time, where he cast the shadow, where it was his movement through the door that made her look up, that turned the moment around. Was he simply arriving in her life? He'd not thought of it like that before. Was he Merlin unbound, this time?

There was a mystery to Gabriela he couldn't place, a hesitation in her and something tentative. Several times now Adam had seen her fingers twisting around her wrists in a nervous motion, repeated and repeated. But she knew when it was right to beckon him into her arms and simply hold him, and he wanted to be held by her.

Adam lay with his head on her chest, his cheek pillowed inside her shoulder. He could see the faint beat of a pulse on her throat and if he listened closely, her heartbeat by his ear. Adam pushed a curl of hair away from her neck and felt an intake of breath. He stroked his fingers gently against her throat and heard a faint sigh, and the tiny pulse on her skin quickened. Ah yes, Adam thought, her heart beats a little faster for me.

Gabriela's fingers gripped part of her dress, and her eyes fluttered closed. Her hand stopped moving through Adam's hair, and there was a second reversal in the room. Adam pushed himself up onto his elbows and looked down at the woman below him. Gabriela's eyes were closed, long lashes black, the colour in her skin rising. Her red lipped mouth was slightly open, her lips full and inviting. Adam kissed her softly, and her hand left the folds of her dress to find his, but his hand was gone.

Adam reached for a button on Gabriela's dress, two buttons undone down the front and now a third. The tops of her breasts were showing, the delightful spray of freckles descending into the shadow of her cleavage. The cut of the dress was deceptive, hiding the fullness of her breasts. With the buttons undoing, undone, her curves were full and enticing.

Adam passed a single finger down into the cleft, following the freckles but losing count, and was rewarded by a shiver of goose-bumps and another sigh, louder this time. Gabriela licked her lips, just the tip of her tongue, and Adam rewarded her with another kiss.

"Gabriela, we should eat. If I undo another button, we'll never make the restaurant on time." Adam got to his feet, and reached for her hands to pull her up. She swayed, and gripped his arm. "It's OK, I've got you."

He held her close for a moment, pulling her body to his and enjoying the press of his cock against her. He stepped back, placing both hands on her waist which was small. Gabriela delighted him, and Adam's eyes were blue, a smile in his eyes for her. She was real before him, not a dream. Adam adjusted the spread of her collar, pushing back the cloth to show her perfect cleavage. Gabriela smiled to herself and Adam saw it.

"Tell me. Am I amusing you?"

"No," replied Gabriela, "not at all. I was just thinking of Ruth's instructions."

"Ruth's instructions?"

"Yes. Just one button, she'd say. To entice them in the morning."

Gabriela saw herself in the mirror, and put her hand to her chest, spreading her fingers over the length of the buttons undone. "Three buttons, Adam. What would she think?"

"Clever woman, Ruth," Adam replied. "One for the morning, two by lunchtime, three buttons for dinner." He kissed her lips again, and wanted her.

Gabriela listened to the logic of his words, and knew there were five more buttons on this dress. Her breasts ached and her nipples were hard, and there were only three silken buttons undone on the bodice.

In the base of her belly Gabriela's wetness was full and ready, but he still didn't know she didn't know men. He was undoing her buttons one by one. She knew it was a seduction now, and she didn't know what to do.