The Invitation
by Ann

He got the invitation from Ann. "Come to the house," she had said, "if a mellow and salacious evening is of interest to you."

As he drove through the setting sun amidst the riot of fall colors and falling rain drops, he mused. He speculated. He wondered happily. Ann the imp was so comfortable with her own sexuality. Ann the energetic, never doing anything by half measures. Ann of the crooked grin that always left him helpless to do anything else but return the smile.

He had in his shirt pocket a cassette of the music she had asked him to pick out for this night and it was the only thing he'd brought with him. A background sound, not strident, meaningful, instruments only had been the request. He thought about playing it as he drove but found that concentrating on his driving and his thoughts were enough. Ann was in control of the start of this evening and that left him in a curious position. He had no way to plan or figure out how things would unfold tonight. It was in a way the position she was most often in herself. Just as surely as he had tied her body and captured her mind, she held his mind a captive at this moment, unable to do anything but speculate. A very clear picture of a grinning and impish Ann formed in his mind and left him smiling, nearly laughing out loud at the thought of her planning to get to him this way.

Pulling up and parking in front of the house, he exited into the cool rain laden air. He immediately noticed the smell of wood smoke as it clung low to the ground in the evenings heavy atmosphere. Ducking under the sheltered front entrance, he knocked and was soon rewarded by the sight of Ann as the door swung open.

She waved him into the entryway, closed the door behind him and grinning, asked for his wet overcoat and his shoes. Without another word she took his coat and shoes and briefly disappeared from sight as his eyes adjusted to the limited light of nearby candles. With the coat hung out of sight, a jean clad and barefoot Ann quickly reappeared. A carelessly buttoned top was tied off at her waist baring a trim midriff and sleeves rolled up nearly to her elbows. Walking to him she placed a gentle kiss upon his lips and while looking in his eyes, told him how she smoldered inside, how her desire called for "a little less talk and a lot more action" this night (Re: Toby Keith, country singer.)

Ann escorted him to the leather couch in the den and indicated he should make himself comfortable there until her return. Asking for the music, Ann placed it in the stereo and exited the room as the music began to drift down from the ceiling speakers and gently filled the room.

He took in the granite hearth with its flickering flame and glowing embers, the candles placed around the room, the deep green oriental rug upon the floor, a built-in bookcase too far away to see the titles, oak floor, a tall plant in one corner, oak end table alongside the couch, an oak sofa table along the end wall with a group of trophies her kids had won at soccer and motto cross. It was a fairly small room with a chair rail and off white walls and raised panels about the hearth. Clearly the fire had possession of the room with its comfortable heat but he could feel the movement of air and detected the smell of the wet outdoors through the two windows that were cracked open. It made the air in the room seem alive with contrast and wispy movement.

It was as his eyes adjusted fully to the dim light that he swept the room for a second look when he saw the coils of rope and other bondage items that lay upon the lower shelf of the sofa table.

As he speculated about them, Ann walked into the room and followed his gaze. With a crooked smile upon her lips she announced her return with the words, "Slow the beat of your giijin heart."

As he turned to look at her, she delivered into his hand a large glass of what would turn out to be a most excellent wine. "Enjoy and watch," she said.

Ann backed up and with the firelight reflected upon her, began to take off her clothes before him. Not a striptease but a simple slow undressing allowing him to savor the wine and the sight. Sensuous, turning, stretching, moving slowly before him as the music played. First went the blue of the shirt and then the jeans, all dropped languidly from Ann's body to the floor. Stepping from the now crumpled jeans, she emerged dressed in deep green silk underclothes that seemed made to go with the Oriental rug and her blond hair.

Standing with the reflected light of the fire striking the contours of her body, Ann closed her eyes and with a gentle sway to the music, raised her hands in a sinuous stretch that seemed to roll from toe to fingertip. Then with hands clasped behind her head, she continued to sway and turn before him. As she slowly moved he could see the angles, curves and musculature of her body in an every changing pattern under the flickering light of fire and candle.

Mesmerizing moments passed for him, and then Ann removed the garments that remained and with a last full turn of her body, stepped forward to stand before him. Moving to kneel, Ann bent over to hold his knees together where he sat, and then lowered herself to kneel against his legs with her thighs on either side of his feet. Reaching for the wine glass with one hand, Ann took his now empty hand into her other hand and pulled it to her to draw his fingers across her lips.

Releasing his hand, Ann drank from the wine glass, returned it to him, then crossed her hands upon his legs and rested her chin there. A crooked grin, a happy sigh and then she spoke.

"I have played a song for you with my body and I know you have heard the need there. Now do this for us. Take the rope you have seen and bind me as I ask, do it slowly and with an eye to how it all will look when done. Take your time with the tying so there will be no struggle in my mind; savor the sweet joy of my submission. Take from me first my wrists; tie them together behind my back. Gather my elbows to each other as my shoulders roll back comfortably. Then loop around my chest both above and below my breasts so that with each breath I will feel the comfortable constriction and bind the whole at my back.

"Then as I kneel upon raised foot, tie each ankle to its thigh so my helplessness is complete. There to watch and admire as you wish, whatever other touches to perform as you wish. Then at the moment of your choosing, I want you to recline comfortably upon the floor and draw my kneeling body upon you so as to straddle you. I want to feel your hardness within me, your hands upon my skin. I want to gently move upon you and find a gentle and slow rhythm.

"I want to feel the heat of the fire upon my skin, I want to smell the wafting of the outside air, I want to lose myself sensually and take you with me. I want to share my moans and my shudders with you in such a way that it overtakes you as well and when your moment comes, at the very last, to pull me down upon your body. Hold me tightly to you as my muscles work and my body shudders its passion out upon you.

"Nurse the aftershocks and tremors with your words and your touch. Draw them out of me so you may feel them. Hold me as you will, play upon my body as you would an instrument and listen to hear and feel the song that we create."

Ann rose slightly even as she placed her hands upon his where they lay on his lap. She leaned forward, paused to moisten her lips with her tongue and kissed him softly and fully upon his lips. Never completely rising, she gently pushed back, turned sideways between him and the fire and knelt there. He now saw her body from the side and she was outlined against the firelight, a silhouette most charming.

He watched her lean forward, reach her arms to the floor and rock ever so slightly as she adjusted her kneeling position. Finished, she sat up straight, her arms at her sides and hands folded in her lap. She turned her head to him with her eyes open, the barest hint of a smile seemed to be upon her lips in the dim reflected light. A moment's pause, and then she lifted her hands from her lap and moved them to cross her wrists at the small of her back.

His eyes were drawn to the fire lit silhouette of her body. He could see the almost rapid rise and fall of her chest as she breathed; the outline of her breasts; the surface of her legs where the firelight fell. His gaze returned to her face to see that she had closed her eyes and he watched her turn to face forward. She shook her head even as she leaned back and her hair gathered to fall in a cascade down the center of her back. He watched as she rolled her shoulders back and once more rocked to adjust her position.

Ann became noticeably still even as he watched. He saw a quiver echo through her body twice as she settled, he watched the metronome movement of her breasts rising and falling become slower and slower. Finally she was so still that her breathing was barely visible in the firelight. So still was she that she appeared almost as a silhouette cut from the light of the fireplace, cut to such fine detail he could make out the line of her lips, and the nipples of her breasts.

He exhaled a long quiet breathe and studied the gift before him.