The headboard had been hitting the wall for the better part of two hours.

Sophie had said not to care about that, because the nearest occupied bedroom was her brother's, and he was two corridors away, and she frankly didn't give a damn if he heard.

She was on her back now, legs hooked over my shoulders, and I was holding her hips off the mattress with both hands and slamming my cock into her whilst she gripped the headboard above her head, and she was moaning a long, drawn-out groan with the occasional broken syllable.

I'd been close for a long time, and I could feel from the tension in her thighs and the way her breathing had gone ragged and high that she was closing in too.

Her back arched off the mattress.

"God," she said. "God, Andy, please, yes, please."

I kept going with a rolling movement that made her gasp. Her knuckles had gone white on the headboard. Her thighs were trembling against my shoulders, a fine continuous shiver that had started. I could feel every small contraction, every involuntary pulse around me; she was close.

"Please," she said again, which came out more as an exhale than a word.

I shifted my weight forward, pressing her knees closer to her chest. Her hips jerked upward. I felt the moment she tipped over the edge a sudden overwhelming tightness around me, her whole body seizing, and then she was crying out into the dark room with her back arched and her head thrown back and her hands white-knuckled on the oak headboard as it came through her in long rolling waves that I could feel with every part of me that was touching her.

I let myself go.

I'd been close enough that it took almost nothing. I buried myself as deep as I could and held pulsing cum deep inside her quivering cunt, my forehead dropping to her shoulder, her name on my lips. Pulse after pulse I emptied into her as she convulsed underneath me until, finally, we both stilled, trying to catch our breath.

We lay there for a while in silence.

Sophie laughed eventually, breathlessly, from somewhere under my left arm.

"Christ," she said. "That was...fuck!"

"Yeah. So ready to go again?" I asked breathlessly, giving a little thrust with my already softening cock. 

She laughed again, letting me fall from her and rolling over, draping one leg over mine. She smelt of sweat and sex and the faint ghost of whatever expensive perfume she'd worn at dinner. The room smelt of it too. She said something else, but her voice had already gone soft at the edges the way it did when she was dropping off.

Within three minutes she was gone.

I watched her, unable to fall asleep so quickly myself. I took the opportunity to admire her body. She'd rolled onto her back in her sleep, arms loose at her sides, one knee bent outward. The sheet was tangled around her ankles, her hair a dark cascade across the pillow, lips parted, and a small frown of concentration on her face that she got sometimes in deep sleep and that I found, for reasons I couldn't explain, extraordinarily endearing.

The lamp on the far side of the room was still on. Low, amber light. It caught the curve of her shoulder, the slope of her breast, and the smooth expanse of her stomach. Her breasts were perfectly sized for my hands; her stomach was flat and toned. On her back her hip bones were just visible and directed my gaze downwards. 

She had a neatly trimmed strip of hair that covered her vagina; it looked wet and dishevelled after our marathon session. There was a smear of my cum on her inner thigh, just glistening in the light. 

She was out. Completely. An earthquake wouldn't have moved her.

I, on the other hand, was absolutely, infuriatingly awake. I needed a drink. Sex with Sophie was draining in more ways than one. Honestly I could do with some food as well. 

I pulled on boxers and a T-shirt, found one sock near the fireplace, and found the other behind the armchair. I couldn't find my trousers. I eased the door open and set off in what I was reasonably confident was the direction of the kitchen.

The house at this hour was quiet. Ashworth Hall had seventeen bedrooms, a chapel, a library, a series of reception rooms that seemed to multiply every time I tried to count them, and corridors that blended together into a maze.

I could not find the kitchen.

Ten minutes later I was standing in a corridor I was absolutely certain I'd been in before but couldn't locate in relation to anything else, lined with portraits of Hartwood ancestors going back four centuries, all of them judging me wandering their halls trouserless after fucking their youngest descendant for hours.

I turned around thinking I must have passed the kitchen already. Celia Hartwood, Sophie’s mother, was standing maybe fifteen feet away in a burgundy silk dressing gown, a glass of red wine held loosely in one hand, watching me with an expression that reminded me, absurdly, of the portraits behind me, with a faint suggestion of amusement.

Her hair was down. I'd only ever seen it up during dinner and drinks, where she always looked immaculate. Down it fell past her shoulders, dark with threads of silver that caught the low light of the corridor sconces. 

I said, "I'm looking for the kitchen."

"You've gone completely wrong." Her voice was level, and I couldn't tell what she was thinking. "Kitchen's in the north wing. I'll show you."

She didn't wait for an answer, turning and leading the way down the corridor.

The kitchen was vast and cold and smelt of stone and old timber. She set her wine glass on the long oak table and watched me find a glass, fill it at the tap, and drink half of it in one go. I found the shortbread tin on the dresser and ate two pieces standing at the counter.

"You clearly needed to recover," she said. I thought I saw a slight smirk.

I blushed before just going with it. "I did."

"I heard." She paused. "It sounded exhausting."

I looked at her. "I like being thorough."

"I hope Sophie was just as thorough." She lifted her wine glass. "I'd hate to think we had a guest that was unsatisfied."

The kitchen clock read a quarter past three. I ate another piece of shortbread thinking through my answer. I had been joking when I asked Sophie if she was ready to go again. I had been shattered, but now, now I wasn't so sure. 

"Oh, I can't complain," I said. “Sophie was the perfect hostess and made sure I was well taken care of.” I should have just left it there, but something made me continue. "Of course I'm sure all her hosting skills were from you; she really is a credit to you."

Celia held my gaze. "I'm glad to hear she kept you well entertained," she said. "But make no mistake, she has a lot to learn."

I couldn't stop myself saying, “I'm sure her skills pale in comparison to yours, of course.” I took a breath. “I would be honoured if you could show me them sometime!” I took the risk; I was sure I could see it in her eyes. It's what she wanted me to say. Why else would she be talking about my sex with her daughter?

She set down her wine glass and walked to the door. I thought maybe I had gone too far until she looked back. "Come on, then."

She led me along a low passage behind the kitchen and into a small panelled room I hadn't seen before. A snug of some kind. Two armchairs, a low sofa, and a fire burnt down to deep orange coals, still throwing some heat. The lamps were off, but the dim orange glow from the fire was enough.

She turned to face me, reached for the belt of her dressing gown, unknotted it, and shrugged the silk from her shoulders in one movement, letting it fall in a puddle.

I didn't move immediately. I just looked at her, and she stood in the firelight and let me, which took on a quality of confidence I found more arresting than the nakedness itself.

She was quite different from Sophie. Sophie was lean, small-breasted, her figure slim and tinned in a way that didn't seem to take obvious effort. Celia was also slim but tight in a way that looked like it took constant effort to maintain; she was wider in the hips than Sophie, and her breasts were much larger. They were extraordinary, high and full in a way that doesn't come from luck alone at fifty-two, and I was looking at them openly enough that she noticed.

"I had work done," she said. "After Sophie was born. Best surgeon in Harley Street." A pause. "Worth every penny."

She was right about that.

The caesarean scar was faint and silver, low on her stomach. Her skin everywhere else was smooth, carefully kept, and the body of a woman who had spent decades taking very good, expensive care of herself. Whatever it had cost her, the result was worth it. My cock was hardening at the sight of her body. My pulse raced as I imagined touching her, tasting her. 

I stepped forward and kissed her, bringing my hand to her face. She pressed herself against me immediately. Her hands went to my T-shirt, and I pulled it over my head, and her palms ran down my chest and stomach with undisguised interest, fingers tracing the lines of my abdomen slowly and deliberately.

I walked her backwards to the sofa, and she sat, and I knelt and kissed her throat and her collarbone and worked my way down. I got my mouth around her left nipple, drawing it in slowly, my tongue circling the hardening tip, and she made a sharp groan. I sucked harder, then eased off, then harder again, feeling her breathing shift with each change in pressure. I moved to the right breast and did the same, my thumb brushing back and forth across the left nipple whilst my mouth worked the other, and her hips rose off the cushion.

"Yes," she said. "Yes, please."

I spent a long time there until she was shifting restlessly beneath me. When her breathing had gone ragged enough, I moved down her stomach and pushed her thighs apart and lowered my head.

I opened her labia with my thumbs first, drawing the outer lips gently apart, and ran my tongue from the base of her pussy upwards, just on the inside of the outer lips. She gasped through her teeth, and her thighs pressed inward. I did it again, the same slow stroke, and she made a sound low in her throat.

I worked the inner lips next, drawing each one gently between my own, my tongue tracing along them, circling inwards. She was very wet and trying to hold still and failing, her hips tilting upward in small, urgent increments. I slid my tongue shallowly into her entrance, just the tip, pressing and withdrawing.

I left her entrance without breaching it and moved to her clit. I found it with the tip of my tongue, circled it once before pressing it directly with my tongue, and her whole body arched off the sofa.

"There," she breathed. "Andy, there, yes."

I settled into a rhythm, swirling my tongue in slow circles, varying the pressure, pulling back whenever her breathing said she was getting close, then returning. I slid two fingers inside her, pressing them in slowly, feeling the way she opened around them, her body welcoming the intrusion.

I worked my fingers in steady strokes with a forward curl on each one while my tongue kept its circles on her clit. The pitch of her breathing climbed. Her thighs closed around my head. She was shaking.

"Yes," she panted. "Yes, yes, yes, please, Andy, yes."

Her hips rolled in short, urgent pulses against my face, and I held my position and kept the pace, fingers and tongue, steady and relentless, and let her fuck herself on my face.

She came quietly.

She'd been vocal as it built, but when it actually hit her, she went nearly silent, back arched, one hand twisted in my hair and the other pressed to her own mouth. Her body shook through it in long waves that seemed to reach from her head to her toes.

I had got the impression that it had been a long time for her; despite her proclamation of skill, I suspected that her husband was not a particularly attentive lover. Which I thought was a crime considering the effort she went to to look this stunning.

I stayed gentle through her climax until she pulled me up by the hair with hands that were not entirely steady.

Her eyes when I reached her face were very bright.

She kissed me once, deep and slow, tasting herself on my lips without any self-consciousness at all.

Then she put both hands on my chest and pushed me onto my back.

She stripped my boxers off with the purposeful air of someone who had waited long enough and was not interested in prolonging that waiting any further. She looked at me in the firelight for a moment, her hair falling around her face, and her expression was one of hunger.

She straddled me, reached down and wrapped her hand around my cock, positioned me at her entrance, and sank down slowly, her breath leaving her in a long, shaking exhale. She held herself still for a moment, eyes closed, and there was something in her face I hadn't seen before. Not only pleasure. Relief. 

"Oh," she said. And then, "Oh God!"

She rolled her hips with long, deep strokes, both hands planted on my chest for balance, shifting her weight fractionally until she found the right position, and then she drove forward with a short, hard rhythm. Her eyes closed and her head dropped back, her breasts moving with each stroke.

She opened her eyes and looked down at me, and saw me watching her. She smiled, thrusting her chest out. She rode me harder.

She was panting and groaning, leaving her dignity somewhere behind, and she didn't seem to care, much like her daughter. I pressed my thumb against her clit, resting it there, letting her movements work against the pressure.

"Yes," she said immediately. "Yes, Andy, yes."

I kept the thumb still and let her set the pace; the combination of that pressure and the depth of each stroke building something in her that I could feel in the way her body tensed against me. She dropped forward, hands either side of my head, hair falling around both our faces, and moved faster, her hips working urgently.

"I'm going to cum," she managed. "I'm very close, yes, yes."

She came with her face buried in my neck, hips stuttering in broken rhythm, the orgasm shuddering through her. Her body convulsed and twitched as she gasped for air.

When she came back to herself, she was trembling. She stayed still for a moment, cheek against my shoulder, catching her breath. I trailed my hand slowly up and down her spine. 

She lifted her head.

"You," she said, "are not finished."

I shrugged. “I already came a few times tonight.”

She lifted herself off me and moved to the arm of the sofa, kneeling with her hands braced on the cushioned back, looking over her shoulder. “That may be true, but if you can get as hard as that still, then you have at least one more load to give. How about you show me what you can do?”

I stood and moved up behind her, taking my cock in hand and pressing the head between her lips from behind, dragging it slowly through the wetness, feeling her shiver, before pushing inside. I gripped her hips and started to thrust; in each thrust, I shunted her into the sofa, and she pushed back against me to meet it. I got one hand up her spine and into her hair, pulling her hair back slightly. 

I reached round and found her clit with my free hand. It was still swollen and sensitive from her last orgasm. I kept my fingers in slow circles and my hips driving forward. She pressed her forehead to her own forearm and let out a string of moans and gasps.

I fucked her like this for quite a while. I wasn't lying; I had already cum multiple times that night with Sophie. So I was ready for a real endurance run. She seemed eager for every thrust; the way her body responded to me was utterly captivating. 

But she was right too. I did have another load in me. I could feel it bubbling to the surface. Slowly but surely my climax was building. Watching her ass bounce with each thrust, hearing her moans and cries, and feeling her body clench round my cock were ensuring that. 

It was clear that she was getting close too. That final climax was being built, feeding off each other as we raced towards the final tipping point. 

"Please," she said eventually. "Please!" I drove forward harder, pushing her over the edge. She cried out into her own arm, loudly, and I felt it all through her, around me, shaking and pulling tight.

I followed her. I couldn't have held on another second if I'd wanted to. I gripped her hips and buried myself as deep as I could and finished inside her, my cum shooting deep into my girlfriend's mother, groaning in ecstasy at the feeling as I buried my face against the back of her neck.

Afterwards, the room was very quiet.

She straightened slowly. Found the dressing gown where it had fallen. She wrapped it around herself and retied the belt, and I could see her hands weren't quite steady, her face was still flushed, and her hair was in a state. She took a moment with her back to me, breathing.

I lay next to the sofa and looked up at the ceiling, trying to catch my breath.

When she turned back, she seemed back to normal. She retrieved her wine glass. Looking at me as if nothing had just happened.

"Take the back staircase, the way we came. Turn left at the top; the third door is Sophie's."

I turned my head and looked at her.

"Sophie takes her coffee black," she added. "In case you were considering being thoughtful in the morning."

She looked at me for a moment, and something in her expression settled into something I couldn't quite name.

"Good night, Andy," she said.

"Good night."

She walked to the door without looking back.

I lay there for a while longer than I needed to. Then I went back upstairs. Sophie hadn't moved. Still on her back, hair splayed, knee fallen open, breathing in the deep, slow rhythm of complete unconsciousness. I undressed, turned off the lamp, and slid in beside her.

She moved without waking, some deep instinct registering my return, and she rolled into me and pressed herself against my side and put her hand flat on my chest with a small, contented sound. I put my arm around her. She settled.

I lay there with her warm and breathing against my ribs, and I listened to the house settle into its nighttime silence, and, without quite deciding to, I slept.