Tag Archives: jet lagged and lusting

In Pursuit of Mr. Sands Part 1

There’s something about travel that inspires strange tales and the Muse has been poking me with her big stick again. I don’t mind the bruised ribs of inspiration when they lead me to such fun stories, and this time they’ve led me back to Mr. Sands.

Mr. Sands’ story, as I suspected, is far from finished. And as I certainly suspected, someone like Mr. Sands couldn’t sneak around very long without being discovered by Madga Gardener and her consortium. Remember, this is a work in progress, so be gentle with me. Enjoy the next instalment of Mr. Sands’ strange tale.

 

In Pursuit of Mr. Sands Part 1

 

I followed him at a safe distance. He was fast tracked through passport control at Heathrow, as was I, and neither of us had luggage. He was my job. I wasn’t about to lose him. Once through customs and in the arrivals hall, he made his way to the Wetherspoons, where he ordered coffee, and I did the same, discreetly watching him watch the woman who was ushered in by one of the first class flight attendants, who settled her into a booth and ordered her up a full English breakfast. The woman looked dazed and her hands shook with her first bite of food.

She had good reason to be shaky, and she had good reason to be half-starved. I knew exactly what the attendant was explaining to her in hushed whispers, and so did he. He was the reason for her weakened condition. The flight attendant knew that and so did I. The thing is no one knew that I knew.

My name is Elise North. I’m a PI. At least that’s what Magda Gardener calls me, and that’s what my business card says – the one I hand out when I need to look legit. Most of the time I work under cover, and my ID changes with the job. I don’t own a gun. It would hardly do me any good. I work on cases that need a delicate hand. I do, however, own a silver-tipped stake … more of a stiletto, actually, but I know how to use it, I guarantee you that. I’m athletic, I’m fast and well trained in martial arts because, in a field as specialized as mine, if things ever go south, about the best I can hope for is to escape and run like hell. None of those skills, however, are the reason Magda Gardener hired me. I have other gifts, gifts that in the kinds of circles Magda and her people run in, are highly coveted.

Those particular gifts are the reason I was just off the night flight from New York’s JFK to London Heathrow after paying an enormous sum of money to sit across from Daniel Emerson Sands in first class. Before we were even off the runway at JFK, all of the flight attendants made time to pay the man homage. A big name celebrity couldn’t have drawn more solicitous, yet quiet attention. Each one, whether male of female, approached him with a fan girl flutter of excitement, I observed in a flush in the cheeks, a quickening of the pulse in throats, in temples, in a moistening of lips with a flick of the tongue, in an acceleration in the breath.

He kissed the fingers of the female attendants, so delicately caught up in his strong grip. Each of the male attendants he offered a warm handshake, then a clasp of the shoulder as they bent forward, almost as though they were about to share a secret … or a kiss. While it came as no surprise to me that each attendant responded with a little gasp and then a grunt and a shudder of the body that would have been almost undetectable to someone less observant. Neither did it come as a surprise when, each time, Daniel Sands inhaled deeply and sighed as though he had just past a bakery with the door open allowing its delectable scents to fill the air. What also came as no surprise, the thing I had spent the most time preparing for, and yet still found disturbing, was the frisson of fear that accompanied ritual. Each attendant came to Sands eager and willing, but fear was as much a part of the formula as lust. They all knew what he was. If they didn’t, he couldn’t do what he does, what he must, on this flight … repeatedly.

While we taxied and took off, Daniel Sands sat quietly perusing a copy of The New York Times as though he were any other passenger in transit just wanting the journey to be over with and to arrive safely at his destination. But I knew better. I’ve known better since Magda Gardener assigned me to follow him, to learn all about him that I can. As I said, I handle jobs for Magda that are of a delicate nature. You see, Daniel Emerson Sands is an incubus, a particularly powerful one, and one Magda has set her eyes on. It’s a very dangerous thing to have Magda Gardener sets her eyes on you. Mr. Sands had no idea he was up against a master huntress. All he wanted was his special in-flight meal service.

The flight attendants and the woman at check-in, and all of the others that Sands had contact with before boarding, they were nothing more than nibbles, appetizers, if you will. There were only seven of us in first class, but only one was his chosen main course. As with all of his in flight meals, she was upgraded from economy. I stood behind her in the line at check-in, I watched while Mr. Sands, ever so subtly bumped into her, all apologetic for being so careless. I watched the way he rested a solicitous hand at the small of her back to steady her so she wouldn’t fall. I watched the way he smiled at her. I watched, and I knew from my research, that she was the one, that she would have a visit in the dream world she’d be very unlikely to forget. And she would wake up weakened and confused.

Just as I expected, there was no lingering over dinner in first class. everyone fell asleep almost immediately after they’d eaten, and the attendants made themselves scarce. What I hadn’t expected was that as soon as everyone was asleep, Sands rose up from his seat and walked among the passengers, touching each of them lovingly. I was just about to panic, not sure what he’d do when he found me awake and not under his spell. I was just about to throw caution to the wind, flee to the lavatory and lock myself in when his tender ministrations were interrupted by the unexpected appearance of the blonde flight attendant. “You’re here,” she said, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt.” And suddenly my own heart was racing as he took her face in his hands and kissed her. And I swear, it wasn’t his magic affecting me, it was just that – well the way he kissed her was so damned sexy. He tasted and tested and teased her mouth like she was dessert and she responded as though the kiss was a raw desperate fuck. And then with a deep intake of breath, he released her. She shivered out what I was sure was an orgasm and then left, shutting the curtain behind her as though nothing had happened.

Before I could heave a sigh of relief, I was in danger of being found out again. One by one he kissed everyone in first class, as though he sought something out, and each one of them writhed and moaned and sighed in his kiss. I’m pretty sure a couple of the men even came. But I knew exactly what he was doing. I knew that in their sleep, he took the kisses from them, stolen kisses, and yet no one denied him because it felt so damned good. Still, I sensed that same hint of fear I had with the attendants. The mix of fear and lust is such an intriguing blend.

For me, there was no escape, and when he came to me, I could do nothing else but pretend to be asleep. The fear I felt, well that was genuine enough, and so was the sense of arousal after what I’d just observed. All I had to do was exactly what everyone else had done, when he came to me, and I felt his closeness, felt the humidity of his breath against my lips. As he cupped my cheek with a large palm, as he mantled me with the heat of his body and all but pulled me into his arms, for a terrifying moment, I thought I had made a mistake. I thought it was me he had come to claim, even as I knew that was impossible. And anyway, sex has its own magic, doesn’t it? His kiss was slow and deliberate and deep. I responded by pressing up into his embrace, by sliding my tongue against his, by allowing the bruising of lips against swollen lips as my pulse raced and I felt my own humid heaviness down below my belly. When he sighed softly and settled me gently back into my seat, I was as disappointed as I was relieved as he turned his attention to the blonde who was to be his main course.

I had not expected to be required to do more than observe. I had not expected an up close and personal encounter. From the safety of my feigned sleep, I observed what appeared to be nothing more than him laying one hand low on the woman’s belly while he breathed in her breath in a deep kiss. But I knew it to be so much more than that for both of them. I could practically see the magic like heat waves roiling off of them. It was there, something far more than what was visible, something I remained safely on the outside of. And as I observed, I actually believed I had fooled him. I actually believed I might get away with the impossible that Magda Gardener had asked of me. In retrospect, I should have known better.

Will Mr. Sands Meet Magda Gardener?

Mr. Sands may well be getting a visit from Magda Gardener in the future. She, along with one of my faithful readers (you know who you are 😉 ) has been scheming behind my back to make this visit happen. Magda has always liked to badger me and tease me when I’m jet lagged. She loves catching me between time zones. When I’m not really any place or any time, when I’m in a plane for hours, or when I’m a long way form home.

After spending two glorious days walking and exploring the John Day Fossil Beds, how could I not be inspired? Not only was I in a different timezone, but , while walking in the glorious Blue Basin, I was in a different millennia. (More about that later) As promised, from the archives, I’m sharing with you the second part of The Strange Encounter with Mr. Sands  — a two-part story inspired in part from entering the twilight zone at Seattle International Airport last year at this time and wondering if I’d ever get out again. As I mentioned, Magda has her eye on Mr. Sands, so who knows how that will end. In the meantime, enjoy part 2.

 

 

The Strange Encounter with Mr. Sands Pt 2

Warning: Adult Content!

It was only as he turned his attention on me, lying there writhing in my first class seat/bed that I realized I was already anticipating his kiss, that my mouth tingled with desire, that my tongue darted over my lips making them moist, making them ready. I was more than anticipating, actually. I was desperate for his kiss. For a long time he stood watching me, and it felt as though there was no one else on the plane but the two of us. For only a second I closed my eyes, as though I could bask in his bright blue gaze, which felt like the only light in the plane, exuding a warmth that made me realize I’d never been warm until he looked at me that way. In the next instant, I felt chilled as though I might never be warm again, but it pasted almost before I was certain I felt it, and then his breath, sweet like summer over meadow grass, brushed my face, as I parted my lips in anticipation. “Not yet,” he whispered, against my ear. “We have time and I want to savour you, my darling.” His accent, the rhythm of his words was strange – not foreign, but somehow out of time.

And then I felt his teeth against my neck. Christ! Was the man a vampire? In my strange dream state, nothing really seemed impossible. But it was just a nibble, and then another and another raising a trail of goose bumps along my nape and down over my collarbone to the tops of my breasts. It was the chill of the cabin air that drew my attention to the fact I had unbuttoned my blouse and shoved my bra down to expose myself for him. I had no memory of undressing, nor of the fact that I was stroking and pinching my nipples to painful peaks and making desperate mewling sounds deep in my throat. “Please,” I whispered softly. “Please take me like you did them.”

“Oh no, my darling, not like them. I shall not take you like them, for you’re nothing like they are.” He drew my hands to his lips and kissed them in turn, then guided one to the bulge in his trousers. “I’ve only made them sleep. This I have saved for you and you alone, and it’s only fitting since you made me this way. Then he slid the blanket off me and, I couldn’t help it, I shifted my hips and let my legs fell open beneath my skirt.

“You’re ready for me, my darling. I knew that you would be, even as I saw you in queue at the check-in desk. You were like a beacon calling me to you. I knew then that I had to have you. He worried my skirt up with a large warm palm taking his time to stroke the outsides of my thighs and then fondling and insinuating his way in to the soft tender flesh between all the while I wriggled and squirmed anxious for his touch. When he’d scrunched the skirt was up high enough to reveal my panties, he planted a kiss on my still clothed pubic bone, the humid heat of his breath making me arch up to him. Then he sat back on his knees on the floor next to me. “Take them off, my beautiful girl. Take your panties off for me. I want to look at you, before I take you.”

When I was free of them, he opened my legs wide and kissed up the insides of my thighs in turn. “The smell of you is ambrosia to me,” he said, teasing me open and stroking me with two slender fingers until I felt as though I would crawl out of my skin if he didn’t take me. “Believe me, my darling, I need you as badly as you need me,” he said. Other than the soft whisper of the plane in flight, and our own desperate breathing, the cabin was filled with the sounds of sleep. The zip of his fly into the quiet night sounds made me jump and catch my breath, and then he kneed my legs open, grasped my buttocks and pulled me onto him with a harsh grunt. There was pain, more paint than I anticipated, knowing how ready I was to accommodate him, and I cried out, like I’d done the first time I’d had sex. That’s almost how it felt, like the first time, tight, virginal, a yielding grudgingly to his fullness, wanting it, wanting all of what he offered, and yet somehow fearing it at the same time.

For a moment he held still on top of me struggling to control himself, speaking soothingly, cupping my cheek as he did so. “There, there. It’ll be all right. The pain will pass quickly. It’s just in the beginning it hurts because it’s so new to you, but then comes the taking and with the taking comes the pleasure, and you’ll not be left wanting.” After a moment, when I could hold still no longer, when I needed him to thrust in spite of the pain, he sighed softly and began to undulate — gently at first and then building in intensity as I wrapped my legs around him and held on. “There now. That’s better isn’t it, my lovely. There now. It’ll be good, so good. You’ll see.” He spoke in tight little grunts, and with each thrust it was as though he were filling me still fuller until I could contain it no more and the spasms began, and they didn’t stop, only ebbed and yielded and rose again with his urgency.

It was only then that he kissed me. Long and hard and deep, he kissed me, and he kept kissing me, his tongue dancing with mine, his mouth taking my breath away with each lap and stroke and suckle, with each inhalation of his need until I had none left, until he breathed for me. It was as though he pulled the whole of me into himself. In kissing me, it felt as though he could read me, as though he had made me even more naked that I really was, exposing my inner workings for all the world to see. But there was no one to see but him, and I wanted him to see, I wanted him to see everything. “Almost there now,” he whispered against my mouth, and I could feel his body tensing above mine and the more he tensed, the deeper he kissed me, and the deeper he kissed me the more I opened to him until there was nothing in me that wasn’t revealed to him. When at last he exploded into me, me still orgasming as though I’d break a part, me still unable to draw breath of my own, consciousness slipped away completely, everything slipped away in an instant, and I simply ceased to be.

At the Wetherspoons where Maggie had taken me and bought me breakfast once I was functional again, I finished my coffee and looked up at her. “That’s what I remember. It was then that I woke up with you leaning over me. The blue-eyed man, Mr. Sands, I take it– he was nowhere to be found. If you hadn’t helped me, I don’t think I could have made it off the plane.”

“He’s an incubus,” Maggie said without preamble. Before I could respond, she added quickly. “That particular night flight between JFK and Heathrow is called ‘the Sands flight,’ by all of us who work it regularly.” She blushed hard and looked down at her hands next to her coffee cup. “We’ve all experienced what you have.”

“An incubus.” The words came out like a harsh breath, but they weren’t a question. Whatever he was, I’d known, or suspected in my gut from his first touch that he wasn’t human.

She nodded. “He always shows up in the queue at the luggage check-in desk and upgrades someone to first class – at least he does now. There was a time when he preferred to prowl the main cabin. He takes only one person, but leaves everyone else feeling particularly euphoric, like you do after really good sex followed by a good night’s sleep. The person he takes, however, well we’ve learned over time to watch out for them, to make sure they’re well cared for after. It’s … it’s sort of our job, the crew, I mean. Oh he doesn’t compel us or anything, but, well, we all know what it was like.”

“So why don’t you warn people?” I asked running a finger around the rim of my cup.

“It doesn’t work that way. We don’t usually know who it is, and even if we did, he has ways of keeping us from talking.” She waved her hand as though she were waving away an insect. “Oh, it’s nothing sinister. It’s just that he can make us forget … well just about anything.”

I recalled how he had affected her the past night on the plane when she accidently interrupted him. “So, now what?” I wasn’t sure I wanted to know, but I now had to cope somehow with living in a world where incubi were real. I needed to understand.

“That depends on you,” she said, leaning over the table. “Those Mr. Sands has visited can always welcoming him back. Obviously he needs to feed, just like a vampire does and, after the initial taking, you’ll never be so drained again. But he won’t come to you unless he knows he’s welcome and,” she smiled at me, “if you ever take the Sands flight again between JFK and Heathrow, well, he’ll just assume that’s permission to play.”

I felt a shiver crawl down my spine, but what began as a frisson of fear settled below my belly, between my legs and the way I squirmed, the slight acceleration of my breathing — well she caught it and nodded knowing. “He’s terrifying and yet too good to resist, believe me, I understand. And I can’t imagine life without him now. Besides,” she looked around the room as though she feared someone might be listening, then leaned closer, ‘there are other … fringe benefits to letting him in. My sex life is way better, and I’m just … well I just feel better about myself, I don’t know, more self-confident, more capable.” She looked down at her watch. “Look, I have to go. I have another flight in the morning and I need to get some rest. Are you okay now?”

I took a deep breath and thought about if for a moment. “I’m fine, yes. Thank you.” Actually, I felt terrific now, better than I could remember feeling in ages.

“Good. I’ll leave you to finish your coffee and order something else if you’re still hungry. Don’t worry, it’ll be okay. Honest.”

As she stood to go, I asked. “What’s his first name?”

“I have no idea. He’s never told us. We call him Mr. Sands because it’s like the whole plane has a visit from the Sandman, only with very pleasant dreams.”

That should have bothered me, I suppose, but it didn’t. I shamelessly ordered round two of breakfast, and when I was too sated to eat another bite, I headed home, anxious to write down my experiences on the Sands Flight. It just felt like something I needed to do. I paid my parking ticket and made my way to the car park feeling as though everyonearound me was looking at me, admiring me somehow. No doubt that was just residual from what had happened to me, but I found I liked that just find. As I stowed my luggage, then settled into the driver’s seat, I caught a glimpse of a tall dark man standing near a black Audi, who seemed to be watching me, and my skin prickled and the muscles below my belly clenched. I was sure it was Mr. Sands. I didn’t have to see him up close and personal to know. I just knew. I smiled to myself. “Hope you enjoyed your dinner,” I said under my breath. “I’m always happy to invite you over.” And I swear to God, the words were barely out of my mouth before I had an orgasm that shook the whole car.

Dry Canyon Dreams

airport9I’m once again somewhere in the air over the Atlantic as you read this, so the next episode of The Psychology of Dreams will be postponed until next weekend, but I won’t leave you bereft of jet-lagged travel entertainment. I’m sharing a story I wrote in last year’s High Desert visit with my sister. Central Oregon is always an inspiring place. I’ve always loved mountain lions, though never seen one in the wild, and when I heard that there were sometimes sightings in the dry canyon and along the walking trail, near where my sister lives, well there just had to be a story. I hope you enjoy.

 

Dry Canyon Dreams

The night of that first encounter I was restless, and my imagination had been running wild ever since I’d landed in the States two nights before. I had been having dreams, crazy dreams, lust-filled sexy dreams that had driven me from sleep to find myself in sweat soaked sheets aching and wanting and needing … something. ‘Be present,’ I kept telling myself. I needed be present. I needed to learn to be in the moment. That’s a part of what this holiday was all about. Being in the moment was something of a struggle for me with one tight deadline bleeding into another and then another. The insane pace had been going on for over four years and now, for the first time in a long time I had given myself space between projects, space to breathe, space to rest, space to regroup. The problem was; now that I had the time and the space, I didn’t know what the hell to do with it. I’m a writer. That’s not just my job, it’s my vocation, and my identity is tied up in it – very possibly more so than I had imagined.

It had been the dreams that had driven me to the dry canyon in the middle of the night. In my dreams someone I never saw, someone holding me in a close, sensual embrace, someone nuzzling and cupping and caressing, kept whispering in my ear that I needed to write the story, that I needed to get it all down, but they would never tell me what story I was to write, and when I burst into wakefulness restless and uncomfortable in my own skin, the feeling of being stretched and expanded and then shoved back into myself was overlaid with a shimmering patina of arousal. Feeling like I’d suffocate if I didn’t get some air, I’d dressed quickly and left the house, leaving a note on the kitchen table for my sister just in case she should wake and find me missing.

In ten minutes I was in the dry canyon alone in the middle of the night wondering why I wasn’t at least a little bit nervous about my choice of how to spend my time in the wee hours. My sister said that in spite of the fact that the canyon ran through the center of the town with five miles of paved walking path from one end to the other as well as other footpaths meandering along the canyon’s edges, in spite of the fact that the canyon was almost never deserted, occasionally there was a mountain lion spotting, occasionally warnings were posted. There had never been an attack, never been even a threat, but it wasn’t all that uncommon in areas where human habitat encroached on puma territory for the two to come in contact with each other. But not now, I told myself. In my visits to my sister’s I’d seen deer in the canyon, myriad birds, rock chucks and other wildlife, but never a mountain lion. And if I were being completely honest, I found the shiver up my spine at the thought of seeing one of the beautiful cats at least as exciting as it was frightening. The full moon hung heavily just over my head, almost like I could reach out and touch it. It gave off enough silver light that I could see in exquisite monochrome layers, juniper and sage and the rise of the steep volcanic cliffs of the canyon walls.

IMG_5578The dry canyon splits the town of Redmond, Oregon right down the middle and until recently the only way to get around it was to drive to the end. Now there’s a huge bridge that spans it joining the two sides, the architects and builders having taken particular care that the bridge should blend in with the canyon and the high desert’s natural beauty. The bridge glistened pale in the moonlight, giant concrete arches rising like the bones of some graceful prehistoric monster whose death throes had spanned the canyon in rib-boned arches. It’s the landmark I always walk toward. And that night, when I got there, I drank deeply from the water fountain placed strategically in the shade for passing bikers, runners and walkers. There’s even a fountain for dogs next to it. Then I settled on the lone picnic table beneath the bridge, lie down on my back and look up at the shadowed underbelly of sinuous concrete.

I heard the runner before I saw him. I heard his heavy breathing, I heard the scuff, scuff of his feet against the ground, and I stayed still, listening, not wanting to startle him. I knew I should make good my getaway, or at least make my presence known, but I didn’t. For some reason I just lay there and watched as he drew near. The moonlight glistened on his bare chest, and I didn’t even pretend not to look. He was light footed, slender of build, long and well muscled. His hair was tawny pale and unkempt, clinging in wet curls around his ears and onto his shoulders. At the fountain, he drank long and deep, then tossed several cupped handfuls of water onto his head, down the back of his neck and onto his face. His nipples beaded, and goose flesh bloomed and spread across the rise and fall of his pecs where the water dripped onto his chest and over his taut belly. It was then that his gaze lit on me and the little breath of his surprise sounded like a soft growl in the muted night.

‘Strange dreams,’ I said in response to his unasked question as to my presence. I made no attempt not to stare at him, which didn’t seem too impolite, since he stared right back at me. ‘I needed some fresh air.’ Frankly I was surprised I could speak at all, let alone that I can be so brazen about it.

He bent for another drink, and I noticed he was barefoot. My insides quivered at just how little clothing the man really had on. The running shorts were thin and rode low on his hips revealing his navel and the slender path of soft hair disappearing into his waistband, a path I found myself wanting to follow with the stroke of a palm.

I was surprised when he moved to the table next to me, and settled a large hand in my hair, fisting it and stoking it until I sighed softly and moved against his palm. I was even more surprised when he stepped back, stretched his arms high above his head, yawned deeply, and then lay down beside me, settling himself around me in a spoon position. The dry desert air had dried the sweat from his flesh almost entirely. He was surprisingly warm and he smelled of desert heat, juniper and sagebrush. For a second I panicked as his strong arm snaked around my waist and pulled me back tight against him. Then I felt his mouth on the back of my neck, first parted lips, then tongue, then a slight nip of teeth. I found myself inexplicably calming under his touch, calming to the low rumble of satisfaction deep in his chest, to the steady hard pumping of his heart as he pressed his chest tight against me.

Once he was certain I wouldn’t run, his hold on me relaxed and his palm, flat against my belly, slid beneath my tank top and up to cup my breasts. I caught my breath in a startled moan as he thumbed my nipples alternately until they rose stiff and sensitive against calloused skin. I’d not bothered with a bra when I left my sister’s house. I never expected to meet anyone in the canyon. Easy access for anyone’s hands other than my own had not been my plan. While he cupped and kneaded and pinched, his mouth went back to work on my neck. He raised himself on one elbow to tongue and nip the hollow of my throat and I could feel the shape of him, hard and urgent, beneath the thin fabric of his shorts.

I barely had time to think about the hard rub and shift of him pressing against the back of my sweat bottoms before his hand migrated back down my belly and eased under my waistband with me shifting forward into the cup of his palm as he fingered and worked his way down. My legs parted and shifted and moved of their own volition to allow him access, and the shiver down my spine was not from the cool of the night as he stroked and fondled, all the while nipping and tonguing the back of my neck and the lobe of my ear, an effort leaving me weak and trembling with need that felt bone deep.

I don’t know how his hands could be everywhere, but they were. He slid my sweats down over my hips and, for a split second, I felt the cool night air against my bare bottom. Then I felt him bare and hard and anxious against me. The biting of my neck became more urgent and, God, I wanted him to bite me hard, I wanted to bite him back. I was only half conscious of the sounds he was making, animal grunts and groans, growls deep in his chest, sighs that I felt hot and moist against my skin. Then the nipping and the suckling and the caressing migrated down the length of my spine, and strong arms lifted me onto my hands and knees until my bottom was raised high in the moonlight and, before I could even think to protest, he continued his explorations, spreading me and kneading me with strong hands until his tongue found what he was looking for — me wet and restless and needing. I don’t remember much beyond that point except intense desperate pleasure, except his breath hot and fast against the swell of me, except him tasting me in hungry, lapping mouthfuls. And when I was boneless and weak from his efforts he pulled away, rose up and bit me on the shoulder, bit me hard enough to make me cry out, then he plunged into me, crushing me to him, holding my hips tight against his body, wrapping his arms around my waist, burying his face in my neck. I remember rearing back against him with each thrust, matching him growl for growl, holding my breath, bracing for impact, anticipating the breaking and shattering and falling apart as we came together and collapsed in desperate gasps back onto the table. Then he curled around me and we slept.

I remember waking alone on the picnic with the moon setting and dawn just beginning to gray the rim of the canyon, or at least I think I remember. I was barely aware of the walk back to my sister’s house, and the stripping off of my clothes and the falling into bed and into unconsciousness. In fact when I woke later in the morning snuggled down in the bed with the cool desert breeze blowing the curtains at the open window next to my bed, I figured I’d probably dreamed the whole experience. I mean the whole experience of dressing and walking in a dark canyon in the middle of the night alone, of sharing my body with a man I didn’t know, a man who never spoke, it wasn’t me at all. Surely it wasn’t the kind of thing I’d do. It was my imagination, I was sure. Jet lag often makes for powerful dreams, though it was strange the way my body felt that morning, I woke to the achy tenderness that follows rough sex, that follows a ravenous encounter too wild to really be just fucking, and yet just tame enough not to scare me into running away in fear of being completely devoured.

After breakfast my sister and I walked the canyon – her anticipating a good bit of morning exercise and me wanting to see if just maybe something would jog my memory, if just maybe something would bring the vividness of the encounter back to me. The dry canyon has been one of my favorite parts of where my sister lives for a long time. Walking it together has been a major part of our visits. We’d just descended the side road into the canyon and I was admiring how the bridge shown in the morning sun, thinking about my dream encounter, when my sister drew my attention to a sign on the notice board.

mountain_lion_petroglyph_photo_print-r1c1d777189c04e63a2426808aab6f0e1_wyy_8byvr_512Caution: Mountain Lion Sighting.

 

The breeze that had been warm felt suddenly chilled and the hairs on my arms rose.

‘There hasn’t been one in awhile,’ she was saying when I finally managed to turn my attention back to her. ‘Usually people see them at dawn or at dusk, people out for a late or an early run. They’re nocturnal, you know?’

‘Yes, I know.’ I said, remembering with a shiver low in my belly the nip of teeth on the back of my neck and the rough push and shove of flesh against flesh.

Horse Power: Another Jet-Lagged and Lusting Story

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I promised fun and travel frolic during the two weeks I’m on holiday in Oregon with my sister, and as my time draws to a close, I’m very pleased to bring you another travel and jet-lag inspired story. We didn’t get to the Oregon Coast this year on my visit to my sister, but my visit last year inspired visions of night rides on wild horses along a windswept beach. I’ve wanted to write a story set in that lovely landscape ever since. Horse Power is the result of that inspiring place. Enjoy!

 

Horse Power

I didn’t think it strange when I first saw the horse running on the beach in the middle of the night. That in itself was strange … that I didn’t think it strange, I mean. It was a very high tide and the wind was just blowing out the tail end of a storm, which was not going out peacefully. I didn’t think it strange that the white horse, who looked almost silver in the moonlight, was alone, frolicking in the waves. I didn’t even think it strange when I glanced away long enough to pull on my bathrobe and looked up to find a man standing where the horse had been. That he was naked and that the horse was nowhere in sight I didn’t think was really all that strange either. I just figured as jet lagged as I’d been the past couple of days I was dreaming, and a disappearing white horse and a hunky naked man on a midnight beach well that was a helluva lot better than some of the jet lagged dreams I’d had.

 

I had rented a cottage on the beach near Lincoln City for a bit of holiday and some much-needed downtime from my hectic schedule. I’ve often wondered how different my life would have been if I’d gone to the mountains instead. But hindsight is always better than foresight, and it’s better not to dwell on what I can’t change. I spent a lot of the first couple of days wandering the cottage in the middle of the night and sitting on the deck watching the ocean. That’s what I’d been doing when I saw the horse and then the man. As I watched, suddenly a wave high enough to cover a house swept over him, and I cried out, dropping the untied sash of my robe and pressing my face to the sliding glass door of the cottage. I had no idea what to do. No one could swim in that high sea. I didn’t even know who to call – 911, the Coast Guard, the police. As the wave scoured the beach, I stood nose pressed to the glass, heart racing. I had to do something. But what? And who would believe me? Surely anyone I did call would think that I was on something, or drunk, or … jet lagged. If there had been a man on the beach such a wave would have washed him far out to sea by the time anyone got there to check out my call. Still, I couldn’t just do nothing.

 

Straining my eyes to make out the darkened beach, I fumbled for my phone on the table next to me. I only glanced away for a split second to grab the device, but when I looked back, as the waves receded, the man was standing unmoved exactly where he had been. No, I think he was even closer. His back was to me, and he seemed to be looking up at the moon, his arms raised, his head thrown back. For a moment the thought flashed through my head that he might have been a marble sculpture standing there on the sand.

 

But then he turned, and honestly, I forgot all about my speculations. He was magnificent, unruly hair tossed around his head in the wind, water glistened and sheened off his arms and torso and dripped down the curves of his elbows and buttocks. He was muscle and sinew – not like a body builder, more like a dancer. But even a dancer couldn’t move like he did. He moved like the waves and the water. He flowed, muscles undulating beneath taut moonlit skin. I was so mesmerized by the look of him, the move of him that it took me a second to realize not only was he walking toward where I stood inside the cottage, gawping at him, robe wide open, but he was looking right at me.
Horse waterhorse 2storm.510x599I should have stepped back out of view. I should have pulled the curtains. I probably should have been terrified, but I just stood there staring. As he moved across the sand it was impossible not to notice his heavy cock becoming heavier with each step until he rested a protective hand against it, a hand that both protected and caressed, and the clench and tremble below my belly was a sign of just how aware of his cock I was. I was far more aware of my body warming and moistening and swelling to the sight of him than I was of the fact that a strange naked man on the beach was watching me with hunger in his eyes. By the time he reached the deck that led to the sliding doors of my room, the arousal I felt was liberally laced with fear, but when he vaulted the railing as easily as if it hadn’t even been there, I let out a shriek, dropped my cell phone on the floor in my efforts to jerk the curtains shut and fled into the bathroom. It was only after I locked the door behind me that I realized I had stupidly trapped myself. There was no window in the bathroom, no escape route if he did find a way in. Every horror film I’d ever seen rushed back to me along with every serial killer tale I’d ever heard. Abductions, tortures, kidnappings and white slavery all ran through my head for a split second. Be calm, Sadie! Be calm. It’s just your imagination. Surely it’s just your imagination, I told myself.

 

I woke in the morning stiff and sore and sprawled on the bathroom floor in my robe. There was nothing I could use for a weapon, and my watch read 9:00. The wind had died down, and if the forecast was right, the sun would be out and it would be a beautiful day. I cinched my bathrobe tight around my waist and, with fingers none too steady, unlocked the door, took a deep breath and poked my head out. The cottage was deserted, everything exactly as I’d left it, curtains hastily drawn, phone on the floor near the edge of the bed. After gathering enough courage to open the curtain and venture onto the deck, I discovered everything exactly as it had been the evening before. There were no footprints on the decking, no footprints on the sand beyond. There was no evidence of the naked man at all.

 

I dressed hastily and walked out onto the beach behind the deck. There were no footprints of any kind up close to my cottage, just lots of strange odd-shaped indentions in the sand. In my muzzy-headed condition, it took me a few minutes to realize they were hoof prints. I just figured someone had been out for an early-morning ride, though I thought it was a bit cheeky for them to come this close to my cottage.

As I went through the day, a little shopping in Lincoln city, a drive up the coast, lunch at Tidal Raves in Depoe Bay, my thoughts about the naked man on the beach became less thoughts of the scary stalker kind and more thoughts of wondering what might have happened if I’d invited him in when we were both clearly aroused by the situation. After a long walk on the beach in the afternoon sun, the man constantly in my thoughts, I masturbated in a long steamy shower leaning up against the tiles pretending the spray was the rain and the waves, that it was his mouth making my nipples tingle and rise, that it was his fingers opening me, stroking me, finding all the places that made me grind and shift and buck like a mare waiting for a stallion, that it was his fingers spreading me and making me ready for his cock. Thoughts of his cock reminded me of the white horse on the beach, and that made me wonder at the enormity of my need thinking of him vaulting my deck railing, thinking of the horse frolicking in the waves, thinking of the ebb and flow, of the undulation of sex, of his body penetrating mine; thinking of the overwhelming wave of release I might have had if I’d simply opened the sliding door and let him in.

 

When the sun set, I became ridiculously bold – perhaps it was due to jet lag, but certainly a couple of glasses of good Oregon Pinot Noir didn’t hurt. I stripped out of my clothes and wrapped myself in a blanket, then I settled in the chaise lounge with my glass of wine and my Kindle. I always had several erotic novels pulled up for my reading pleasure. I had a lot of sexual energy and at that point in my life, I was my only outlet, so I read a lot of erotica and watched a bit of porn now and then, but the man on the beach was even better than porn, and he was my own fantasy story come to life And then I’d ran away from him! I couldn’t really believe he was real, and yet if he was a dream, it really pissed me off that I’d done something so stupid as to run away rather than to stay and let him properly fuck me. I didn’t place much stock in lucid dreaming. I figured you get what you get, and your unconscious has a vicious sense of humor when it comes to the dreams you get, but I really, really wanted to revisit the man on the stormy beach. Instead, I got the horse.
It was the soft whickering that woke me. The moon had risen in a bright disk painting the pale horse in a silver grey dance of light and shadow. He pranced and sidestepped just beyond the edge of the waves, tossing his main, tail flowing like a kite behind him as he frolicked. Then suddenly he stilled, as though he were aware of my wakefulness. Seeing that I was no threat, he moved forward toward me. I stood, pulling the blanket tightly around me and moved to the rail, then I remembered the bowl of fruit on the kitchen table. “I’ve got something for you, boy,” I said. “Wait here, I’ll be right back.”

 

HorseUnknownI was only gone a minute — just long enough to nab an apple, but when I returned, the horse wasn’t alone. The man from last night sat astride him, just as naked as he was the night before. But this time I wasn’t scared. This time I felt myself in control of the dream. He watched as I strode boldly down the steps onto the sand and offered the apple to the horse, feeling the soft velvet of his muzzle against my palm as he took my offering.

 

Then the horse gave me a gentle head butt and I lost my grip on the blanket. As it slid away, the man offered me his hand. It was a dream, I told myself. It had to be, so I lifted my hands to him letting the blanket fall away as he bent and scooped me one-armed onto the broad back of the horse and settled me in front of him. I gave a little gasp as, with the flat of his large hand low on my belly, he pulled me back against his hard naked chest.

 

And then we were like the wind racing down the beach dangerously close to the swell of the waves. The spray took my breath and stung my eyes and for a moment I saw nothing but a blur. He slid his hand up my belly to caress my breasts, and on upward to cup my throat and my jaw, drawing me around, and I twisted and arched toward him as he mantled me and took my mouth and I breathed in the fresh breath of the storm humid and wild on his kiss, a kiss that lingered and deepened as the rhythm of the horse drove me back against his body, back against the urgency of his cock pressed to the small of my back.

 

Once he was certain I wouldn’t pull away from the dance of his tongue, his caress migrated downward again, thumbing my nipples until I squirmed and ached, stroking my belly in little kneading circles, each one lower than the one before, until he shivered his fingers down through my tight pubic curls. Even spread wide as I was mounted on the muscular back of the horse, unconsciously, I opened still wider as he teased and worried his way between my legs.

 

I pressed hard back against his body for leverage to get long thick fingers into places slick as seaweed and more heated than the laboring back of the horse. He intuited the depths of me where the hungry places begged and wept for release. With fingertips and the broad flat of his thumb, he explored the valleys and folds, the swells and depths until I growled and arched and forgot how to be civilized. The salt spray that had misted us now rose above us in glorious curling waves, higher and higher until we road in the dark rise of their foamy shadows. The horse screamed and reared and I fell back against the man, who was now guiding the animal with only his knees, one hand teasing and making me ready, the other cupping my buttocks and lifting me until I could feel the insistent press of him pushing, prodding, opening me. Then with a loud, inhuman cry like a warrior at conquest, he plunged home deep and hard, forcing the breath from my lungs in a desperate cry for relief just as the horse turned headlong into the roll of the wave and took us down to the deep.

 

I came to myself in the semi-doze of the place where fantasy happens, naked breasts peeking to break the surface of the calm ocean undulating beneath me as I let the waves carry me in. It didn’t seem strange to me that I was naked and unafraid in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, nor did it seem strange when I realized I wasn’t in the middle at all, but gently riding the swells in toward the beach next to my rented cottage. It didn’t even seem strange that the sun was rising in the sky when my last memories had been of heated sex and full heavy night. What did seem strange, as I waded up the beach and wrapped myself in the discarded blanket that lay exactly where I’d left it, was that my cottage was swarming with police.

 

From my deck, two uniformed officers spotted me and the place went wild. Before I could speak, I was swarmed by EMTs trying to shove an oxygen mask in my face while one kept telling me just to relax and breathe deeply. When I was finally able to convince everyone that I was all right, a plain clothes detective named Dirk Snyder shooed the EMTs away and guided me the chaise lounge.

 

“What’s going on, detective? Why are all these cops in my cottage?”

 

He took a bottle of water a uniform handed him and gave it to me. When I’d drank most of it back in thirsty gulps, he settled onto his haunches next to me and held me in an earnest gaze. “Ms. Gibbons, you’ve been missing for three days.”

 

“What?” Suddenly the deck felt more like the deck of a ship as the memories of the wild ride on the beach came back to me. “How can that be?”

 

“The cleaner came Tuesday morning and found the place wide open. Several of the neighbors thought they saw you walking into the water. The tides were still high. They feared the worst.”

 

Since that night five years ago, I’ve read everything I can about the gods and goddesses and the spirits of the deep. I’ve read all the mythology and fairy tales I can find about water and water deities. I’ve read about water horses and mermaids and how sometimes they seduce people and take them down to the deep never to be released again. I guess I was lucky. But I’m more inclined to believe there was a reason for my survival. That reason is my daughter, conceived sometime during those three days I was supposedly missing. Every once in a while I have faint recollections, intimations of dreams of a place beneath the waves, of a man and a horse nearly interchangeable — always insatiable, and of me always ready and full of longing. The memories leave me aching with a desire I have no name for, and when I
can stand no more and give myself relief beneath my sweat-drenched sheets or in a foamy bath or a steamy shower, I horseswish I could bring it all back to me – those three days. The child who bears little resemblance to me but is a constant reminder of her father is the beautiful gift he left me, and yet I want more. Every day I want more, and yet I can’t bring myself to return to the sea because I’m afraid he’ll come for us, but I’m even more afraid that he won’t. Someday I’ll gather my courage and take the child he gave me back to that beach at Lincoln City and tell her about her father, and when the tide is high and the storm blows out on the heels of a full moon, we’ll wait for him together. Someday.

The Strange Encounter with Mr. Sands Pt 2

airport 3I’m safe and sound at my sister’s house, clean, well fed, semi-well rested with my head abuzz from the remains of jet-lag, which I hope will further inspire, and nearly recovered from my harrowing experience in Seattle International Airport. Why yes! I am rather resilient 🙂 I figure any experience that I can pull a decent story out of was worth it, and Mr. Sands turned out to be a lot of fun, even if my time in SeaTac was not.

Today, as promised — in celebration of the lust, romance and adventure of modern peregrinations, I’m posting part two of The Strange Encounter with Mr. Sands. Enjoy the read, and have sexy dreams.

 

Warning: Adult Content!

The Strange Encounter with Mr. Sands Part 2

It was only as he turned his attention on me, lying there writhing in my first class seat/bed that I realized I was already anticipating his kiss, that my mouth tingled with desire, that my tongue darted over my lips making them moist, making them ready. I was more than anticipating, actually. I was desperate for his kiss. For a long time he stood watching me, and it felt as though there was no one else on the plane but the two of us. For only a second I closed my eyes, as though I could bask in his bright blue gaze, which felt like the only light in the plane, exuding a warmth that made me realize I’d never been warm until he looked at me that way. In the next instant, I felt chilled as though I might never be warm again, but it pasted almost before I was certain I felt it, and then his breath, sweet like summer over meadow grass, brushed my face, as I parted my lips in anticipation. “Not yet,” he whispered, against my ear. “We have time and I want to savour you, my darling.” His accent, the rhythm of his words was strange – not foreign, but somehow out of time.

And then I felt his teeth against my neck. Christ! Was the man a vampire? In my strange dream state, nothing really seemed impossible. But it was just a nibble, and then another and another raising a trail of goose bumps along my nape and down over my collarbone to the tops of my breasts. It was the chill of the cabin air that drew my attention to the fact I had unbuttoned my blouse and shoved my bra down to expose myself for him. I had no memory of undressing, nor of the fact that I was stroking and pinching my nipples to painful peaks and making desperate mewling sounds deep in my throat. “Please,” I whispered softly. “Please take me like you did them.”

“Oh no, my darling, not like them. I shall not take you like them, for you’re nothing like they are.” He drew my hands to his lips and kissed them in turn, then guided one to the bulge in his trousers. “I’ve only made them sleep. This I have saved for you and you alone, and it’s only fitting since you made me this way. Then he slid the blanket off me and, I couldn’t help it, I shifted my hips and let my legs fell open beneath my skirt.

“You’re ready for me, my darling. I knew that you would be, even as I saw you in queue at the check-in desk. You were like a beacon calling me to you. I knew then that I had to have you. He worried my skirt up with a large warm palm taking his time to stroke the outsides of my thighs and then fondling and insinuating his way in to the soft tender flesh between all the while I wriggled and squirmed anxious for his touch. When he’d scrunched the skirt was up high enough to reveal my panties, he planted a kiss on my still clothed pubic bone, the humid heat of his breath making me arch up to him. Then he sat back on his knees on the floor next to me. “Take them off, my beautiful girl. Take your panties off for me. I want to look at you, before I take you.”

When I was free of them, he opened my legs wide and kissed up the insides of my thighs in turn. “The smell of you is airport 8ambrosia to me,” he said, teasing me open and stroking me with two slender fingers until I felt as though I would crawl out of my skin if he didn’t take me. “Believe me, my darling, I need you as badly as you need me,” he said. Other than the soft whisper of the plane in flight, and our own desperate breathing, the cabin was filled with the sounds of sleep. The zip of his fly into the quiet night sounds made me jump and catch my breath, and then he kneed my legs open, grasped my buttocks and pulled me onto him with a harsh grunt. There was pain, more paint than I anticipated, knowing how ready I was to accommodate him, and I cried out, like I’d done the first time I’d had sex. That’s almost how it felt, like the first time, tight, virginal, a yielding grudgingly to his fullness, wanting it, wanting all of what he offered, and yet somehow fearing it at the same time.

For a moment he held still on top of me struggling to control himself, speaking soothingly, cupping my cheek as he did so. “There, there. It’ll be all right. The pain will pass quickly. It’s just in the beginning it hurts because it’s so new to you, but then comes the taking and with the taking comes the pleasure, and you’ll not be left wanting.” After a moment, when I could hold still no longer, when I needed him to thrust in spite of the pain, he sighed softly and began to undulate — gently at first and then building in intensity as I wrapped my legs around him and held on. “There now. That’s better isn’t it, my lovely. There now. It’ll be good, so good. You’ll see.” He spoke in tight little grunts, and with each thrust it was as though he were filling me still fuller until I could contain it no more and the spasms began, and they didn’t stop, only ebbed and yielded and rose again with his urgency.

It was only then that he kissed me. Long and hard and deep, he kissed me, and he kept kissing me, his tongue dancing with mine, his mouth taking my breath away with each lap and stroke and suckle, with each inhalation of his need until I had none left, until he breathed for me. It was as though he pulled the whole of me into himself. In kissing me, it felt as though he could read me, as though he had made me even more naked that I really was, exposing my inner workings for all the world to see. But there was no one to see but him, and I wanted him to see, I wanted him to see everything. “Almost there now,” he whispered against my mouth, and I could feel his body tensing above mine and the more he tensed, the deeper he kissed me, and the deeper he kissed me the more I opened to him until there was nothing in me that wasn’t revealed to him. When at last he exploded into me, me still orgasming as though I’d break a part, me still unable to draw breath of my own, consciousness slipped away completely, everything slipped away in an instant, and I simply ceased to be.

At the Wetherspoons where Maggie had taken me and bought me breakfast once I was functional again, I finished my coffee and looked up at her. “That’s what I remember. It was then that I woke up with you leaning over me. The blue-eyed man, Mr. Sands, I take it– he was nowhere to be found. If you hadn’t helped me, I don’t think I could have made it off the plane.”

“He’s an incubus,” Maggie said without preamble. Before I could respond, she added quickly. “That particular night flight between JFK and Heathrow is called ‘the Sands flight,’ by all of us who work it regularly.” She blushed hard and looked down at her hands next to her coffee cup. “We’ve all experienced what you have.”

“An incubus.” The words came out like a harsh breath, but they weren’t a question. Whatever he was, I’d known, or suspected in my gut from his first touch that he wasn’t human.

She nodded. “He always shows up in the queue at the luggage check-in desk and upgrades someone to first class – at least he does now. There was a time when he preferred to prowl the main cabin. He takes only one person, but leaves everyone else feeling particularly euphoric, like you do after really good sex followed by a good night’s sleep. The person he takes, however, well we’ve learned over time to watch out for them, to make sure they’re well cared for after. It’s … it’s sort of our job, the crew, I mean. Oh he doesn’t compel us or anything, but, well, we all know what it was like.”

“So why don’t you warn people?” I asked running a finger around the rim of my cup.airport9

“It doesn’t work that way. We don’t usually know who it is, and even if we did, he has ways of keeping us from talking.” She waved her hand as though she were waving away an insect. “Oh, it’s nothing sinister. It’s just that he can make us forget … well just about anything.”

I recalled how he had affected her the past night on the plane when she accidently interrupted him. “So, now what?” I wasn’t sure I wanted to know, but I now had to cope somehow with living in a world where incubi were real. I needed to understand.

“That depends on you,” she said, leaning over the table. “Those Mr. Sands has visited can always welcoming him back. Obviously he needs to feed, just like a vampire does and, after the initial taking, you’ll never be so drained again. But he won’t come to you unless he knows he’s welcome and,” she smiled at me, “if you ever take the Sands flight again between JFK and Heathrow, well, he’ll just assume that’s permission to play.”

I felt a shiver crawl down my spine, but what began as a frisson of fear settled below my belly, between my legs and the way I squirmed, the slight acceleration of my breathing — well she caught it and nodded knowing. “He’s terrifying and yet too good to resist, believe me, I understand. And I can’t imagine life without him now. Besides,” she looked around the room as though she feared someone might be listening, then leaned closer, ‘there are other … fringe benefits to letting him in. My sex life is way better, and I’m just … well I just feel better about myself, I don’t know, more self-confident, more capable.” She looked down at her watch. “Look, I have to go. I have another flight in the morning and I need to get some rest. Are you okay now?”

I took a deep breath and thought about if for a moment. “I’m fine, yes. Thank you.” Actually, I felt terrific now, better than I could remember feeling in ages.

“Good. I’ll leave you to finish your coffee and order something else if you’re still hungry. Don’t worry, it’ll be okay. Honest.”

As she stood to go, I asked. “What’s his first name?”

“I have no idea. He’s never told us. We call him Mr. Sands because it’s like the whole plane has a visit from the Sandman, only with very pleasant dreams.”

That should have bothered me, I suppose, but it didn’t. I shamelessly ordered round two of breakfast, and when I
was too sated to eat another bite, I headed home, anxious to write down my experiences on the Sands Flight. It just felt like something I needed to do. I paid my parking ticket and made my way to the car park feeling as though everyone airport 4around me was looking at me, admiring me somehow. No doubt that was just residual from what had happened to me, but I found I liked that just find. As I stowed my luggage, then settled into the driver’s seat, I caught a glimpse of a tall dark man standing near a black Audi, who seemed to be watching me, and my skin prickled and the muscles below my belly clenched. I was sure it was Mr. Sands. I didn’t have to see him up close and personal to know. I just knew. I smiled to myself. “Hope you enjoyed your dinner,” I said under my breath. “I’m always happy to invite you over.” And I swear to God, the words were barely out of my mouth before I had an orgasm that shook the whole car.