Chapter 22: Hayloft Payback
The deep, satisfied sigh still hummed in Felicity’s chest, vibrating against Rupert’s ear where it rested near her collarbone. Sunlight, thick and golden, streamed through the hayloft slats, illuminating dust motes dancing above them. She shifted, a rustle of straw, and propped herself up on one elbow. Her eyes, dark and still glazed with release, scanned his face, then dropped lower.
"Right," she announced, her voice rough but purposeful. "Barn bit's done. Time for the ploughing."
Rupert blinked, the pleasant haze evaporating. "Ploughing?"
Felicity chuckled, a low rumble. "Well, we're on a farm, aren't we? And indoors is… tidy." She swung her legs off the bale, landing with a solid thud. Her discarded knickers lay pale against the golden straw. She retrieved her jeans and vest top but didn't put them on, simply scooped them up. "Come on, accountant. Sun's out." She held out a hand, calloused palm up.
He took it, his own skin feeling suddenly soft and citified against hers. She pulled him to his feet, her grip firm. Without ceremony, she led him towards the wide barn doors, pushing one open to reveal the blinding afternoon light. Rupert squinted, adjusting to the glare after the loft's dusty dimness.
Outside, the air changed. The sweet hay scent was overlaid with the rich, pungent smell of damp earth and livestock. Before them sprawled a vast, muddy pen, bordered by a sagging wire fence. The ground was deeply churned by hooves, a patchwork of brown sludge and scattered, trampled hay. Puddles reflected the cloudless sky. A lone, grubby barn stood sentinel at the far end. Heat shimmered off the mud.
Felicity dropped her bundled clothes near the door frame. "This," she declared, gesturing at the expanse with a sweep of her arm, "is where the real work happens." She turned to him, a challenging glint in her eye. "You look far too clean for farm work, Rupert. Let's fix that."
Before he could react, her hands were at his waistband, efficiently popping the button of his chinos. He flinched as her fingers, surprisingly nimble, tugged down the zip. "Whoa, Felicity—"
"Less talking, more stripping," she ordered, her voice devoid of embarrassment, purely practical. She pushed the trousers down his hips. "Shoes off, too. Socks. All of it. You won't need 'em where we're going." Her gaze was direct, focused on the task of divesting him. His button-down shirt followed the trousers, pooled on the dry ground near the barn door. He stood in just his briefs, the warm June air suddenly intimate on his skin, acutely aware of the vast, open sky.
"Right," Felicity said again, now naked herself, a powerful, sun-browned figure outlined against the muddy expanse. She grabbed his hand firmly. "Come on." She stepped off the packed earth near the barn and into the mud. It squelched thickly around her bare foot, oozing up over her ankle. Rupert hesitated on the edge.
"Felicity, it's… it's mud," he managed, the absurdity crashing over him – the hayloft was one thing, but this?
"And?" She tugged his hand, hard. "It's warm. What we're about to do is dirty." She grinned, that mischievous, demanding grin he remembered from the WI meeting where Margot had unveiled the calendar. Felicity, June, among the barley, looking like she wanted to eat the photographer. "So let's get properly dirty. Earn the filth." She pulled again. "Like the animals do."
His other foot slipped into the cool, clinging sludge. It was surprisingly deep in spots, sucking at his heel. He stumbled forward, following her as she waded purposefully towards the centre of the pen, away from the relative cleanliness near the buildings. The mud was cool underneath, warmed on the surface by the sun. It squelched and gurgled with every step. The smell was intense – fertile, organic, alive.
In the middle, surrounded by the churned earth and the distant lowing of cattle, she stopped. She turned to face him, mud already streaking her shins, clinging to her thighs. Sunlight highlighted the sweat and dust still on her skin, the powerful lines of her body.
"Like this," she said, her voice dropping, losing its command slightly, gaining a different kind of urgency. She let go of his hand and simply lay back into the mud. Not gracefully, but with a solid, deliberate thud. The sludge accepted her, oozing around her hips, her shoulders. She spread her legs, anchoring her feet flat in the muck. The dark curls between her thighs glistened, a stark contrast to the brown earth. "Now you," she said, crooking a muddy finger. "On top. Proper ploughing position."
Rupert stared, mesmerized by the sheer, muddy reality of her. The scent of her arousal mingled potently with the earth and the distant livestock. The cool sludge sucked at his ankles. He heard Margot's voice in his head, cheerful and slightly manic: 'Think of it as experiential accounting, darling! Balancing the books of desire!' This felt less like accounting and more like primal bookkeeping. He stepped forward, his feet sinking deeper. The mud was cool and slick between his toes. He knelt awkwardly, one knee sinking deep beside her hip, the other trying to find purchase. He lowered himself over her, bracing his hands in the mud on either side of her shoulders. It oozed between his fingers. Her warmth radiated against his belly, his chest.
"Yes," she breathed, her eyes locked on his. She reached down between their bodies, her own hand slick with mud. She found him, hard and ready despite the absurdity, and guided him. The thick, cool mud coating her thighs and belly couldn't mask the intense heat as he slid into her, deep and slow. She gasped, arching her back off the ground, lifting her hips to meet him, grinding down. "Oh, fuck yes. Deeper."
They moved. It was awkward, slippery, strenuous. The mud resisted, then yielded, sucking and pulling at their limbs with every thrust. Rupert pushed, his feet seeking purchase, finding only shifting sludge. Felicity met him, her powerful legs wrapping around his hips, locking him to her, her heels digging into his muddy flanks. She groaned, low and guttural, her hands coming up to smear thick, wet earth across his chest, his shoulders. "Filthy," she panted, a fierce grin splitting her face. "Good filthy."
She pushed against his chest with surprising strength. "My turn to ride," she growled. Before he could react, she was rolling him, leveraging her hips and the slippery mud. He landed on his back with a heavy squelch, the cool ooze enveloping his shoulders, his back. She straddled him instantly, sinking down onto him in one fluid motion, impaling herself fully. Mud coated her thighs, her belly, her breasts. She threw her head back, the tendons in her neck standing out, and began to move.
This was different. Commanding. Powerful. She rose and fell, using the leverage of her thighs planted firmly in the mud on either side of him. She gripped his shoulders for balance, her fingers digging in, leaving muddy crescents. She rode him with a fierce, workmanlike rhythm, her gaze fixed somewhere beyond the fence, then snapping back to his face, demanding his attention, his participation. Mud dripped from her hair, her chin. She leaned forward, bracing her hands on his chest, and deliberately smeared a thick trail of sludge from his collarbone to his cheek. It was cool and gritty against his skin. She laughed, a rich, earthy sound. "See? Covered. Proper."
He was lost in the sensations: the hot, wet clench of her around him, the cool, yielding mud beneath and around him, caking his skin, the powerful flex of her thighs, the smell of sex and earth and sweat, the sight of her, a wild, mud-streaked goddess riding him under the June sun. Her movements became more urgent, less controlled. She slammed down harder, grinding against him, seeking her peak. Her breaths were ragged gasps.
"Now… Rupert… Now!" she commanded, her voice thick, strained.
He was there. The coil that had been tightening since the hayloft, since the first sight of her straddling that bale, snapped. He surged up into her, his own cry muffled by the mud near his temple. He felt her inner muscles clamp down, a fierce, rhythmic pulsing that dragged his orgasm deeper, wringing every spasm from him. She threw her head back and shouted, a raw, unfettered sound that echoed briefly across the quiet fields, startling a crow from the fence post. She collapsed forward onto him, her body shuddering, her breasts slick with mud against his equally filthy chest. They lay locked together in the cooling sludge, gasping, the only sounds their ragged breathing and the distant cattle.
The mud was cool now beneath his back, strangely comforting in its total embrace. Felicity buried her face in the crook of his neck for a moment, her breath hot on his skin, then pushed herself up on trembling arms. Mud plastered her cheek, her forehead. She looked down at him, a slow, satisfied smile spreading across her face, transforming her exhaustion into triumph.
"Proper bloody ploughing," she declared, her voice hoarse but satisfied. She shifted her hips slightly, still impaled. "Filled the furrow nicely, accountant." She gave a low chuckle and glanced towards the sun, now noticeably lower in the sky. "Shit. Is that the time? Derek needs his feed." She patted his muddy chest, a companionable thwack. "Right. Bath time. You stink of farm, Rupert. Proper job."
She dismounted, the movement causing a thick, wet sound, and stood up in the mud. She offered him a muddy hand, hauling him unceremoniously to his feet. He stood, dripping sludge, feeling it cake his back, his legs, his hair. He looked down at himself, then at Felicity, equally coated. The absurdity, the sheer, overwhelming mess of it, hit him anew. He started to laugh, a disbelieving, slightly hysterical chuckle that echoed in the quiet pen. Felicity grinned back, wiping a smear of mud from her chin.
"Welcome to June, sunshine," she said, turning towards the barn and the promise of a hose.