Garters

It was late when they came home from the wedding, and he had been driving half-asleep for hours. The moon was up, bathing the front lawn of the bed-and-breakfast with light, and he spent a moment simply taking it all in before he woke the sleeping girl in the seat beside him.

They had to sneak in; everyone else was long since gone to bed. Luckily, they had foreseen this happening and asked for a key, so they quietly let themselves in and tiptoed across the dimly-lit lobby to the stairs. Her skirt rustled around her legs, and, half-giggling, he told her to shush. She held back laughter as well, skipping up the stairs before him, making almost no sound where his dress shoes made every step creak.

A light was burnt out in the hallway, but there was a line of light from beneath the door that allowed him to find the knob quickly and let them in. A small shaded lamp on the bedside table was lit; and they cast long, spiderlike shadows up to the ceiling and over as they crossed past it. He tapped her shoulder so she would see, and stretched his arms over her shoulders, moaning like a ghoul. The dam burst and she laughed out loud as they both fell to the bed, fully dressed.

"Well, we made it," he said, staring at the circle of light the lamp was throwing on the ceiling, marvelling at the likeness of it to the moon he had watched moments before. Slowly, he undid his tie, slipping it from around his neck and dropping it to the floor. "The longest reception in the history of the institution of marriage, but we're finally home."

"Thanks for coming," she murmured, reaching up for a pillow and pulling it under her head. Her voice was muted, as if coming from another room, though she was right beside him. "I hope it didn't suck too bad for you." She lay one hand on his chest, her fingers sliding into the gap between shirt buttons, fingers undulating gently. She felt as if she were deep underwater.

He chuckled, deep in his chest, the sound vibrating through her fingertips. "You were having fun, and it's always worth it to watch you. You were so damn beautiful today." He reached up and stroked the back of her hand, finding her soft skin addictive, as always. "All day long all I could think of was pulling you into a back room of the church and taking you." He looked over and her eyes were closed, her breathing slow, but she was smiling. "Particularly when you were dancing," he added, sitting up to unbutton his shirt.

"...you didn' think I was horrible?" she mumbled, her palms sliding down over her breasts, over her belly, smoothing her dress subconsciously. "Flirting ... drinking ... taking m'stockings off ...." She raised one hand out to touch his bare shoulder, but halfway there it fell to her side. Her lips were parted, as if waiting for a kiss.

Seeing this, he bent down and covered those lips with his own for a moment, feeling the slight twitch of her response. He stood up for a moment to slide off his trousers and his boxer shorts. As he did so, his cock sprang out, fully erect, and he only realized at that moment how aroused he was feeling. He looked down over his body and noticed that his nipples were stiff and he had goosebumps that weren't from the slight chill in the air. He couldn't resist trailing one hand down his chest, down over his belly and further, until he could stroke himself a few times. With each downward stroke, he watched curiously as the foreskin pulled back flat against the shaft of his cock, then appeared again to cup the head as his hand slid back up.

Behind him, he caught a slight rustle, and he spun around still holding his cock. She lay there, breathing slow and steady, her chest rising and falling, breasts compressed and pushed up by the neckline of the dress. Her hands were folded over the slight curve of her belly, one pinky finger twitching. He looked down further, seeking out the shape of her legs beneath the rumpled folds of the skirt, pulled high above her knees.

I'd swear that was the whole way down a minute ago

, he thought, and he said her name softly.

Her head lolled to one side across the pillow, and her lips moved slightly, but there was no other sign of recognition. He realized he was still holding his cock, his thumb moving slightly over the head while he stared at her, and let go, blushing. Gently, he knelt before her and undid the buckle on first one shoe, then the other, sliding them off her bare feet.

As he slid each shoe off, cupping her foot in his palm, he bent down and kissed, just above the toes. Even the soles of her feet seemed soft and inviting beneath his hands, and he couldn't help but stroke the sides with his fingertips while he knelt there. Leaning forward, he could feel his cock rub against the carpet pleasurably, and he kissed each foot again, further up.

****************

Oh yes, she had taken off her stockings, sitting right there in full view of everyone at the reception, but particularly in full view of him. It had been the high point of his night.

Tipsy but certainly not drunk, she had been out to the dance floor and back several times, once with him and then with other partners, but always looking back to make sure he watched, to make sure his eyes were on her as she twisted and turned and pulsed to the beat, not letting any partner touch her too long, losing herself in the song but not losing control. At each gap between tunes, she came back to him, a smile teasing the corners of her lips, her hair damp and tangled, and sat down for a few moments. "You don't mind, do you?" she said the first time, laying her hand on top of his.

For a moment, the electricity of her touch distracted him, but he finally responded. "Of course not. I'm just ... enjoying the view." She had kissed him, briefly but fully on the lips, deliberately giving him a glimpse down between her breasts, and then spun away again, grinning, to dance and look back periodically at him watching.

Finally, she sat with him through a few songs, and they talked a bit – it was really only a second or third date for them, though they'd spent months before that sharing everything, doing everything that was possible through a computer screen. He'd told her things his family and friends didn't know, and learned her secrets as well ... and of course, they'd made love through words dozens of times before she first touched his hand, but everything seemed utterly new as she sat at the table across from him and held that hand in both of hers, explaining just how she knew the bride and why the ceremony had been the tedious affair they'd sat through hours before.

He heard the words, absorbed the information, but at the same time he was simply lost in wonder at her presence in his life, in his world, and he watched her lips move completely removed from what she was saying. His eyes traced the swell, the curve, the upturned corners as she talked and smiled at him. He watched her face, learning each angle, each smooth line, diving to the depths of her limitless eyes. In his periphery, he watched her hands folded around his, fingers intertwined intimately, and his eyes slid down between her forearms to her lap like wayward children, insistent on rushing to the naughtiest possible conclusion.

Her words trailed off suddenly, and he was certain she'd caught him. He looked up, guiltily, but there was a wicked smile teasing at those perfect lips. "You really are enjoying the view, aren't you?" For a moment, her tongue darted out, then disappeared again. Even with all possible restraint, his eyes dropped again, and she had slid her legs as far apart as possible within the restraints of the dress.

After swallowing, he decided honesty was the best policy. He met her eyes and said, "Damn right I am." When she grinned again, he felt a wave of warmth wash through his whole body. Another song began, and she stood up.

"I should give you more to enjoy, then," she said, and bent down – at first, he thought he was being given another chance to look down her cleavage, and he took full advantage of that. His eyes traveled the sweet, shadowed curves of her breasts several times to where they met, pushed together beneath the dress, before he realized what she was

actually

doing. Skirt pulled halfway up her thighs, she was unhooking her stockings from the garters and sliding them down, her palms rolling them down past her knees, down her finely-muscled calves, and sliding her feet out of her shoes to finish the job.

She twirled around, barefoot, bare-legged, holding her skirt as high as was decent, and he couldn't have pulled his eyes away if a fire alarm had gone off. Visually, he traced the lines of each strong, sleek leg, the jutting curve of each calf muscle, the shadows falling over her inner thighs and making them even more secretly inviting, the dimples revealed in her knees as she shifted her weight from one foot to the other.

He realized he was hard, instantaneously, and he dragged his napkin back into his lap, surreptitiously shifting himself beneath it. She laughed knowingly, said, "Back in a bit. Watch me," and ran back to the dance floor. The first time she kicked up her heels, he realized that she was still barefoot, and had done something to her dress to keep the skirt hiked above her knees. The rest of the night, she was obviously performing, and he was her rapt audience.

*********************

Coming back to the present, he realized he was caressing her foot, hands covering it top and bottom, sliding smoothly from toes to ankle and back again, then up past the heel, up to her calves and back down. They moved in long, smooth strokes, brushing over her skin, each time rising the slightest bit higher. Embarrassingly, he also realized that he was hunched forward, thrusting his cock against the carpet in time with each movement of his hands. The fibres were rough against his most tender flesh, but even that was somehow pleasurable. His face felt flushed, and his heart was pounding.

It was as if he couldn't control his hands – moving higher and higher now, now reaching her knee, now rising above that – and it took all the will he had to finally slow and stop, holding her foot once more, tracing the lines of it with his fingertips but not moving any higher. Looking up, he spoke her name again, once, a question in his voice. There was no reply.

Her skirt seemed to have risen even further up her thighs now, and he could see her garters from a distance, like ribbons at a finish line. They were a soft, faded green, standing out like the first leaves of spring against her skin. The fabric was gathered and bunched, casting rippled shadows where the elastic met her flesh, and nothing had ever looked more inviting in his life than her thighs, spread beneath them. Slowly, he lifted her foot until her leg extended in a straight line from that point, and began by kissing just beside her big toe.

The kisses trailed up the side of her foot, tongue teasing out to trace the arch, ringing her ankle completely and then moving up. Inch by inch, his lips caressed her, claimed her, following the ridge of her tendon up to her calf muscle, covering it in kisses, feeling her twitch at the slightest touch to the back of her knee. He couldn't help but do it again, then again, even though he was afraid he might wake her. Or maybe he was doing it

to

wake her; he wasn't sure. He was stroking his cock again with his free hand, long, smooth, strokes ... just as he'd been caressing her leg a moment before.

It didn't make any sense, this sudden obsession with her legs; it wasn't anything he'd ever felt for another woman, and certainly it was far from the only thing he'd admired in this one; they had made love several times since meeting in person, and he had spent hours kissing her breasts, her neck and shoulders, even the soft rising curve of her belly – then sliding into her embrace, first above her then below, and while he'd enjoyed her legs he'd never particularly focused on them. But tonight, for whatever reason, he was incredibly aroused by this one aspect of her beauty, and all he could do is continue.

Her thighs seemed softer, almost insubstantial, like kissing clouds or the breeze – and yet at the same time, the contact of skin to skin became more electric. It was like being inside a building thunderstorm, and it couldn't help but affect how he touched himself – his hand moving faster, clutching tighter as the shaft became slick and slippery, feeling the heat rise through his body until he moaned softly against her thigh in between kisses. He brushed his lips over her, feeling her body shiver involuntarily as he inched higher, and he fantasized that she was actually awake, her hands twisted into the bedspread, waiting for him. As he came closer, he could see the smooth white fabric of her panties, stretched tight, and the scent of her became stronger, as if she were aroused and his touch were making her wet.

He continued to kiss her, one hand on his cock, the other beneath her thigh, caressing until he came to the barrier of the garter itself. Instead of going above or taking a return path below, he followed the line of it, circling her thigh with kisses once, then again. Slowly, his palm slid up, lifting her thigh, exposing it fully to his ministrations, his fingertips at the crease where her leg met the downward curve of her bottom. He continued to kiss her, not certain whether to cross that line, but feeling his arousal building higher, higher ... he switched to the other thigh, still not certain of how to proceed but unable to stop, the image of her dancing in his mind, bare legs flashing in the light.

Suddenly, he heard her yawn, and her body lurched beneath him. He froze, his lips a millimetre from her skin, his cock pulsing against his unmoving hand.

A minute passed, and she did not move again; still, he was fearful. One more time, he spoke her name with no reply.

Better give up while I'm ahead

, he thought, and sadly let go of himself, moving back to the foot of the bed. The heat that he'd thought might burst through him began to dwindle.

But then, he heard her voice. There was no hint of sleepiness in it now, but there was a laughing slyness behind the words:

"You know, the garters come off, too."