Disclaimers and Warnings:
Well here it is, part three. Thanks to those who emailed, encouraging this ongoing and tawdry little saga...and yes there will be a part four and hopefully it will turn up a little quicker. Thanks again to beta readers.
This story depicts a love/sexual relationship between two consenting adult women. If you are under 18 years of age or if this type of story is illegal in the state or country in which you live, please do not read it. If depict ions of this nature disturb you, you may wish to read something other than this story.
And also the other obligatory disclaimer re the characters, although I couldn't see MCA/Universal or Renaissance wanting to claim this version of the warrior princess and the bard.
Xena, Gabrielle and any other characters featured in the actual TV series
are copyrighted to MCA/Universal and Renaissance Pictures while the rest
of the story is my own.
Keen to have feedback. Comments to : Karen
Malevich
Gabrielle reluctantly entered the ballroom of the Four Seasons. This was the kind of event she loathed but was required to attend in her role as CEO of a major publishing house. Elegant people, fashionable food, fine wine, but to Gabrielle it was an agony of small talk, working the room, sucking up to people that she neither liked nor respected.
The large room, a picture of bland refinement, was buzzing with conversation. Gorgeous women in colourful designer gowns, men uniformed in tuxedos, hotel staff circulating with trays of drinks and exotic finger food. A string quartet played unobtrusively. Standard corporate affair, thought Gabrielle, let's get in, be seen to talk to those that should be talked to and get the hell out.
Gabrielle snagged herself a glass of champagne from a passing waiter and joined a cluster of people who were discussing how much the author of the latest boys blockbuster novel was likely to receive for the film rights. Keeping half an ear on the conversation she scanned the room.
She found who she was looking for, James Gibbston, majority shareholder and Chairman of JGL Holdings, the company that ultimately controlled Garbrielle’s publishing business and who was, in effect, Gabrielle’s boss. She excused herself from the group and made her way across the room to the executive. A tall, thin man in his mid forties, he looked exactly what he was - urbane, rich, comfortable in the world and well in control of his part of it.
“Good evening, James. When did you get into town?”
“Hello Gabrielle, good to see you, I got in around noon yesterday. Geneva is freezing at the moment, I’m pleased to be here. We still on for lunch tomorrow?”
“Absolutely. I’ve got a couple of new authors that I think will get good results for the company.”
“Good, good, but lets leave work until tomorrow. You’re looking lovely…you here by yourself?”
And indeed Gabrielle did look lovely. A dress designed by Karen Hunter left little to the imagination, clinging to the curves of her well toned body. It was cut low in the back and sleeveless showing off smooth rounded biceps hard won from regular and gruelling gym visits.
“Yes, I’m here by myself, and you?”
“No..... I’m here with a friend, she had to step out for a moment, she’ll be back shortly… in fact here she is.”
James Gibbston looked over Gabrielle’s shoulder and smiled as his date returned to join him. Gabrielle, momentarily unsighted, turned to meet the woman and came face to face with her worst nightmare.
James extended his hand to his date. “Let me introduce you, Gabrielle, this is Xena.”
Gabrielle was struck dumb and doing a fairly convincing impersonation of a goldfish. She felt hot and her stomach lurched.
Xena on the other hand was doing her job and doing it well. She reached out to shake Gabrielle’s hand.
“Pleased to meet you, Gabrielle,” Xena purred, simultaneously shaking the blonde woman’s hand while slipping her other arm through the crook of James’ elbow. Xena gave no indication that she had ever laid eyes on Gabrielle before.
“Uh…um hello,” Gabrielle managed.
Xena was intent on playing her part. “And what brings you here, Gabrielle?”
“Gabrielle runs one of my publishing concerns,” James answered on Gabrielle’s behalf, bemused by her uncharacteristic lack of conversation.
“Hmmm interesting.” Xena leaned closer into James while connecting to Gabrielle with her eyes, her baby blues coolly running the length of Gabrielle’s body.
“Will you excuse me for a moment? I’ve just seen someone I need to talk to.” The oblivious James left Xena and Gabrielle alone.
“You didn’t call,” Xena’s tone was neutral.
“I did. Several times…I just didn’t wait for you to pick up.”
Xena raised an eyebrow but didn’t reply.
Gabrielle was debating whether to raise the topic of James, on the one hand not wanting to know what Xena’s relationship was with her boss, but on the other, like a painful cavity in a tooth that you can’t help but run your tongue over, she couldn’t keep away from the topic either.
“So…um …how do you know James?” she asked the taller woman tentatively, knowing the answer already.
“Just like you…he’s my employer, well from time to time. I guess I’m more of a contract worker …just a different skill set utilised…I presume. ”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“It means I fuck him for money and sometimes act as his escort - and I presume you don’t do either of these things”
Gabrielle gasped. “Jesus Xena why don’t you just put a knife in me…it couldn’t be more painful than this.” She felt the tears come to her eyes and angrily brushed them away.
Xena feigned a sudden interest in her shoes. She didn’t really want to hurt Gabrielle but the rules of the game kept changing and the only way she could hang on to a modicum of control was by lashing out, maintaining a chilly mask of seeming indifference. She looked up and made eye contact with the desolate woman in front of her.
She melted. In the face of Gabrielle’s evident pain there was no way she could maintain the facade. In time to come she wasn’t sure if making that eye contact was a mistake or a blessing, but in the here and now all she could do was reach out and take Gabrielle’s hand.
“Come with me” Ignoring the curious glances of some of the other guests, Xena led Gabrielle by the hand out of the ball room. Knowing that James would be at the party, pressing the flesh for a number of hours yet, Xena made for his suite, it being the only place that would provide some immediate privacy.
They finally made it to the floor of the hotel where the suite was located. No further words had been exchanged. The butler servicing the suite recognised Xena and escorted the women from the elevator and opened the door for them.
“Thank you, Carl.”
Once inside the room the stoicism Gabrielle had managed to maintain since leaving the ballroom crumbled. The tension and stress and misery of her situation overwhelmed her and she sank into a chair weeping, her hands covering her face.
“Ssh.... its ok” Xena knelt beside Gabrielle and put her arms around her, tucking the blonde woman’s head under her chin and stroking her back.
Xena’s surprising tenderness only reminded Gabrielle of the hopelessness of their situation and she began crying harder, her shoulders shuddering within Xena’s embrace.
“Come on Gabrielle, we’ll work this out I promise, its ok, I’ve got you.” Xena held the smaller woman tightly, doing her best to calm her.
Gabrielle felt the warmth of Xena’s arms and heard the soothing tones of her deep voice and slowly regained her composure.
“I need a tissue,” she sniffed pitifully.
Xena smiled and got to her feet and walked into the bathroom. She returned with a damp face cloth and a box of tissues.
Gabrielle blew her nose and looked up at Xena.
“I must look like a racoon,” a small wry smile sketched across her features.
“Well I’ve seen your make up look better…here.....” Xena again knelt beside Gabrielle. She took her by the chin and gently washed her face, removing the streaked mascara, cooling her heated face.
“What are we going to do Xena?” The stark vulnerability in Gabrielle’s voice was almost too much for Xena to bear, it was clear that she had put herself in entirely in Xena’s hands.
Xena couldn’t find the words to answer Gabrielle, so as was often her way she chose instead to act. Still holding Gabrielle’s chin in her hand she closed the remaining space between them, hesitated, then quietly, gently kissed the green eyed woman, in that simple move telegraphing for the first time a future full of possibility, ambivalence eliminated.
Their kiss deepened, became hard, it was as if Gabrielle was trying to absorb Xena through the contact, a process of human osmosis that might bind them together forever. Her tongue explored Xena’s mouth, her hands grasping her shoulders tightly, their breasts pressed together.
Maintaining the contact of their mouths, Gabrielle slid her hands under the shoulder straps of Xena’s dress and pulled them off her shoulders, peeling the fabric off her body, exposing her breasts. Almost reluctantly she ended their first kiss and lowered her mouth to Xena’s right breast, her tongue wetly exploring its gentle rounded surface. Gabrielle’s hands ran up and down the soft skin of Xena’s back, tracing the lines of muscle definition. She sucked an already hard nipple into her mouth, her tongue exploring the small valleyed universe of Xena’s aureole.
Xena took a deep breath, a mixture of sigh and moan and arched into the feeling, the pressure and warmth of the blonde woman’s mouth. She ran her fingers through Gabrielle’s hair, revelling in its softness.
Gabrielle hands found the zipper of Xena’s dress and lowered it. She raised her head and captured Xena’s eyes, simultaneously sliding her hands between the cool material of the dress and the warm, warm skin living beneath. As easily as that the dress was discarded.
“Come here, I want to lie down with you.” Gabrielle stood up and lead Xena by the hand to the bedroom. “Sit down”. She moved into the intimate space between Xena’s legs and quickly divested herself of her clothing, her dress and underwear tossed impatiently away. She leaned into Xena, the contact of skin on skin, perfect.
Xena still seated on the bed trailed kisses over Gabrielle’s breasts, her hands cupping her buttocks. Again the two women moved, this time together, and finally they lay down face to face, arms and legs entwined, the distance between them, for the moment, eliminated.
Gabrielle again took the initiative, rolling Xena on her back claiming her mouth, relishing the kisses previously denied her.
“I knew you’d be a great kisser,” Gabrielle smiled at her dark lover, drawing breath.
“I have many skills.”
A shadow passed over Gabrielle’s face as an unwanted image of just how Xena utilised her many skills intruded into the blonde woman’s consciousness. She gave a small sigh, seconds passed as she gazed down at Xena’s beautiful face. Almost regretfully she ran her hand down Xena’s cheek tracing her distinctive cheek bones with her thumb.
“What’s the matter?”
“Nothing, its just …I think I’ve fallen in love with you and I think its gonna hurt… actually it already does.”
Yet again Xena was caught by Gabrielle’s willingness to wear her heart on her sleeve. Used to long years of playing a part, keeping a tight leash on her emotions Xena felt ill-equipped to engage with Gabrielle’s emotional guerrilla tactics, however genuine they were.
“Let me make you feel better…let me make love to you.”
“You think that will make it all all right?
“No, but its probably the best we can do here and now. I want to be close to you.”
Xena reached up and wrapped her arms around Gabrielle’s shoulders. Gently she rolled the woman over onto her back. Her long form stretched out beside the smaller woman, she ran her hand down Gabrielle’s body, softly stroking her smooth skin, gently massaging her breasts, running her fingers over rib cage and stomach muscles, her hand was unthreatening, soothing almost. Long fingers ran through soft blonde pubic hair but did not rest there, travelling on to explore toned thighs.
“Let me make love to you,” Xena repeated as she lowered her head to kiss Gabrielle.
Gabrielle’s eyes stayed open for some moments, before she surrendered to the sensations of what was a sensational kiss.
Xena ended the kiss, instead trailing her tongue over Gabrielle’s chin and down her neck. She nibbled her way along a beautifully curved collar bone reaching a similarly gorgeous shoulder.
“You are so lovely, Gabrielle,” Xena raised her head and drank in the sight of the exquisite body stretched out on the bed. She smiled “I want to taste you. I want to drown in you.”
Xena straddled Gabrielle’s body, on all fours above her. Again she lowered her head and with her tongue she painted a line down the centre of small woman’s body, retreating down the bed as she did so. Her tongue took the same path earlier travelled by her hand, from Gabrielle’s neck, between breasts, over tight abdominal muscles, through pubic hair. But her tongue had the sense to stop its journey there, finding an ideal home buried in Gabrielle’s cunt.
Gabrielle groaned and tensed raising her ass off the bed. Xena took the opportunity to slide her hands underneath her, firmly massaging buttocks as she swirled her tongue over Gabrielle’s clitoris.
“God you taste so good,” Xena murmured, as she slid one hand from underneath Gabrielle’s buttocks so her thumb could enter the action. Gently she massaged Gabrielle’s anus and pressed her thumb inside.
Tongue and thumb worked in synchronisation, a persistent rhythm inexorably marching Gabrielle towards her orgasm. Xena removed her other hand from underneath Gabrielle, reaching upwards to a breast, palm teasing a hard nipple, fingers massaging soft flesh surrounding it.
Gabrielle’s breath was labored as she groaned in pleasure. “Please… Xena I want your fingers inside me."
Xena instantly complied with the heartfelt request, withdrawing her thumb, she shifted her position slightly allowing her self room to smoothly slide two fingers inside her lover. She pumped her fingers fiercely, her own level of arousal eliminating her previous gentleness. She needed to fuck Gabrielle hard, to make her come, to somehow make her know that while sex for Xena was commonplace, making love was not.
The shift in intensity, the hard fingers pumping inside her, the tongue still persistently attending to her clitoris and the hand on her breast pinching a hyper sensitive nipple was more sensation that Gabrielle could stand. Her body went rigid, legs taut, toes stretched out. Her head and shoulders raised off the bed, her hands shot down to grab Xena’s head, pressing the dark haired woman’s face into her cunt as she came.
Xena opened her eyes, maintaining what was now a comforting pressure against Gabrielle’s clitoris, fingers still buried deep inside her. She looked up the body stretched out in front of her. Gabrielle’s eyes were closed, her bangs plastered against her forehead, sweat visible on her face, her normally pale skin flushed.
Xena raised her head, causing Gabrielle to whimper slightly.
“I love you, Gabrielle.”
Green eyes flew open to meet blue. Gabrielle choked back a sob.
“It's true.... I love you.” Xena crawled up the bed and enfolded the small blonde weeping woman into her arms.
Xena kissed Gabrielle on the forehead, then glanced anxiously at the door which lead out to the living room.
The unmistakable sounds of a door opening and Carl the butler’s voice filtered through to the bedroom.
“Yes sir, Mr Gibbston, they came up here about 40 minutes ago.”
“Shit,” said Xena.