Matchmaker 07: July

We continued to the castle, touring the battlements proper and the grounds. Castles didn't affect me the way the cathedrals did, probably because they were designed for a purpose and not to inspire wonder, but the sheer age of the places never failed to impress. Kilkenny Castle, built six hundred years before Thomas Jefferson signed the Declaration of Independence, was no different. There was furniture inside the castle that was far older than the United States, which was humbling in the extreme.

The sun was touching the rooftops as we finished our tour of the grounds. We'd planned to visit Talbot's tower today as well, but with the sun setting, we decided to put that off until tomorrow and see it along with St. Mary's Cathedral. It looked like rain as we walked slowly back to the car, chatting about the castle.

As Brent drove us back to our hotel, I worked myself into a state, unable to get the idea of us in medieval times out of my mind. As the wipers thumped against the drizzle, I imagined I was a fair lady, dressed in my regal gowns, watching in terror from yon tower as my lover stood in the center of the castle gates, shirt shredded, muscles bulging, sweaty, dirty, and covered in his enemies' blood, roaring in challenge as he beat back attacker after attacker. Imaging Brent grunting and straining, swinging his sword with mad abandon as he exhorted his men on against the overwhelming odds in a last, desperate stand to protect me from rape and death was incredibly exciting.

Finally, he faced the leader of the attacking horde, the two bloodied and exhausted champions alone deciding the fate of the battle, their men dead and dying all around them. I softly caressed my breast as the two warriors joined in a final contest, their swords flashing and singing in mortal combat. As I watched, my heart thudding in my chest, Brent was disarmed, but he wasn't yet defeated, getting inside the evil king's blade and taking him to the ground. The men knew to falter was death. Their faces twisted in pain and effort, the muscles of their arms and chest taut and standing in stark relief as they strained against each other in frantic struggle. Rolling and tumbling, they pummeled each other as they roared and screamed in rage and agony, before freezing again in desperate contests of power and endurance. Finally, after seemingly hours of frenzied struggle, my hero staggered up as his vanquished foe lay at his feet. With the last of his strength, he retrieved his sword, and with a roar of victory, ran the dark king through, pinning him to the ground as a lepidopterist would mount a butterfly.

As he collapsed, I would run down the steps from my tower room. My hand at my heart, and fearing the worst, I would fling myself to the ground at his side, weeping with relief as I realized his wounds were superficial. He'd take me into his strong arms, pulling my lips to his as he ripped away my robes before making mad passionate love to me on the soft green grass, the echoing cries no longer of pain or terror, but passion and pleasure.

I smiled to myself as he pulled into the hotel parking lot. It was almost dinner time, but there was another hunger I needed to satisfy first.

"I want to freshen up before dinner."

He nodded. "Sure, if you want."

Our room was on the third floor, and as we rode up in damnably slow elevator, I was afraid I was dripping on the floor. The moment the door of our room was closed, I turned on him and yanked him into a ferocious kiss.

He was admirably quick on the uptake. We weren't on the soft green grass of a castle lawn, I wasn't wearing flowing regal robes, and he wasn't dirty and bloodied from combat, but having him roughly strip me and make mad passionate love to me on the bed was close enough.

As we lay panting, our hard and fast fucking leaving us breathless, I snuggled backwards into his chest. He pulled me in tight, wrapping me in his strong arms as his big hands cupped my breasts. I sighed in contentment as a small smile tugged at my lips. Biker Chick and Money Pit might have seen him as their knight in shining armor, but I couldn't entirely fault them for that. Not anymore. I'd just gotten the shit fucked out me while fantasizing about the same thing.

Maybe they were onto something, but before I could make a positive determination, I had a couple more weeks of research to do. My small smile widened. I wanted to rest here a moment, to soak up the closeness I was feeling for him, before we'd go grab a pint and something to eat. We'd need it to keep our strength up, because I planned to plunge myself deep into the research tonight.

Easton and I wandered through the Guinness brewery in Dublin. It was an amazing place, full of Guinness memorabilia, history, and culture. We were spending four days in Dublin, the longest single stop on our trip, and were taking a day off from the history heavy sites we'd seen over the past few days. I smiled that I considered a brewery that was only twenty years older than the United States taking a break from history.

When I'd approved Ireland as our destination, I'd wondered how Easton and I would fill our time. Ireland is one-tenth the size of Texas, with twenty million fewer residents, and I'd worried we'd run out of things to do before the month was up. After all, we could only fuck so often and for so long. Now I was feeling the time pressure of trying to fit everything in. It was amazing there could be so much to see, so much to do, in such a small country. I smiled to myself. I guess that's what over a thousand years of history did for a country. That wasn't counting all the truly ancient sites from Neolithic times, back when the island was inhabited by nomadic tribes, and before the Emerald Isle could be considered a country. Sites from that period, like the Hill of Tara or The Burren, were far older than the pyramids in Egypt.

Not that we'd given up fucking so we could see more of the history. If anything, our sex was becoming more passionate and explosive every night. Things were definitely changing between us. The coolness I'd sensed from her after my mother called with her crisis du jour was completely gone. More than that, she was turning into quite the snuggler. Not that I minded. In fact, I rather enjoyed it.

Over the last two days, we'd toured Dublin Castle, St. Patrick's Cathedral, and Trinity College. We'd seen some amazing castles and cathedrals as we explored Ireland, but nothing could compare to what we'd seen in Dublin. Easton was far more into the buildings than I was, but I was positively gobsmacked by all three of the locations, and though she'd tried to hide it, I'd seen the wetness in her eyes while in St. Patrick's Cathedral. I'd said nothing because, though I didn't cry, I'd felt the power and history of the place myself. You'd have to be a cold, stone-hearted bastard to not be moved in the presence of such history.

Dublin Castle was equally impressive. As we toured the fortifications and grounds, Easton dribbled out bits of a fantasy in moments of privacy, a fantasy where a gallant knight protected the woman he loved against an evil, marauding king. She spared no details, and there were several times I had to change the subject by pointing out some detail of the castle just to shut her up for a moment so my rising boner had a chance to go away. She knew exactly what she was doing, the bitch, and every time I shut her down, she'd take the next opportunity to be even more descriptive as she explained how she'd rewarded her gallant knight for his bravery.

We'd acted out her fantasy later that night in our room. We'd skipped over all the fighting and maiming and gone straight to the fucking. Easton was a quiet fuck. Her soft sighs as she climaxed and her occasional whispers of passion were the only sounds she makes. That had changed that night, when she'd moaned into my mouth as we kissed, our mutual orgasm during the kiss savaging us and leaving us gasping for breath. I smiled with the memory. The next day she'd quietly started calling me Sir Loins in private, and that evening, as we tucked in, I'd had to labor long and hard into the night to prove myself worthy of my lady fair.

Yesterday, we'd toured Trinity College. As we marveled at the library, I had the strangest feeling of déjà vu. I'd never been to Ireland, much less Trinity College, and I hadn't seen any pictures of the place, but I felt like I'd seen the library somewhere before. While we waited our turn to see the Book of Kells, it came to me. The Jedi Archives in one of the Star Wars movies was the Trinity College library. It seemed fitting, somehow, that all the knowledge of the fictional universe a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, should look like the library. Even in real life, the library looked like the place that would house the summed knowledge of humanity.

When we reached the Book of Kells, something I'd never heard of until we'd arrived at the college, it was a bit underwhelming. Until I gave it some thought. After thinking about it, I realized it wasn't the book so much as the history of the book, and I was completely flummoxed that it was written and illustrated a full thousand years before the American Civil war. Trying to wrap my mind around the time scales gave me a brain cramp.

Later, while Easton and I ate dinner, we did some reading and discovered the Book of Kells was older than gunpowder, the fucking Mayan's were still around and at the height of their power and sacrificing virgins to volcanoes or some shit, yet we'd seen ruins that were five thousand years older. By the time we were done with our impromptu research, I felt small, insignificant, and stupid. For the first time in my life, I wished I'd paid more attention in history class.

I shook myself out of my reverie as we paused to watch a fish ride a bicycle, a reference to an old Guinness ad. "Well, that makes me feel needed," I murmured close to her ear.

She smiled up at me. "I needed you last night... and again this morning." She paused, her smile spreading. "And if there weren't so many people around, I wouldn't mind having you now, Sir Loins."

I snickered as we slowly moved on, a small tingle dancing in my nether regions. "That could be arranged," I whispered when we had another bit of privacy.

"Uh-huh," she grunted.

"There are plenty of bathrooms around."

"Uh-huh," she grunted again.

"Try me," I rumbled.

She looked at me, her lips twisted in teasing mirth as she looked around, took my hand, and started dragging me toward the restrooms tucked into a corner. I let her pull me along until her hand touched the door before I decided she was going to do it. My bluff called, I hauled her to a stop. She laughed quietly at me.

"I knew you were full of big talk. What's that saying, 'all hat and no cattle'?"

I chuckled. "Would you have really done it?"

"Try me," she murmured, serving my words back to me as she held my gaze.

I thought about calling her bluff but decided she might actually go through with it. I didn't want to be thrown out, or worse, thrown in jail, for doing something stupid. I backed down with a sheepish smile.

"How about I make it up to you later, when there aren't so many people around?"

She broke into a beaming grin as she dragged her hand down my arm. We were standing in a throng, so there wasn't much she could do, but even that simple touch, along with her apparent willingness to fuck me in a public place, caused a hardening in my groin.

"Looking forward to it," she purred, her tone and cadence adding to the rush of blood.

"Shit. Now I do have to go to the bathroom."

As I entered, I heard her giggle. I stepped into the first stall, adjusted myself, and then joined her again, her smile clearly indicating she knew what I'd done.

"Better?"

I grinned. "Much."

We circled through the public areas of the brewery, ending up in the Gravity Bar perched atop the Guinness storehouse. As we enjoyed our free pint, we worked our way to the windows where we had a commanding view of Dublin below.

"This is such a beautiful country," she murmured.

"Beautiful," I agreed, but I wasn't looking at the surrounding city. She smiled at me, picking up my double meaning.

I smiled as I took another sip from my glass. When I'd picked Easton up at the Dublin airport, I'd recognized she was an attractive woman. I'd noticed right way she had a great ass and a pretty face, but in the past, I'd preferred more fully figured women, and if they had long hair, that was a bonus. Now, after three weeks with her, I thought she was, by far, the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen. She might not have the lush figure of Lynn or the long hair of Mandy, but she was radiant, shining with an inner beauty that elevated her above all others. And her smile. When she smiled at me in that way she had, my heart softened as my cock hardened.

She stepped in close and I wrapped my arm around her waist, holding her to me as my hand rested possessively on her hip. We were a day over three weeks into our trip, with less than a week to go. I'd worried about not having enough to do. Now I didn't want to leave. I wanted to stay in Ireland with Easton for at least another month. I wanted to explore all the nooks and crannies of the country that we'd bypassed. I wanted to see her eyes light up as we explored some ancient building. I wanted to laugh with her over a pint as we talked with the locals and swapped stories about our home countries. I wanted to kiss her under the crumbling arch of a thousand-year-old ruin of a castle, to sit on a giant rock and gaze over a pristine lake as the sun set, and to watch her wipe her eyes, trying to hide her tears, as some grand cathedral moved her. We'd done all those things, but I wanted to do them again, and again, and yet again. I wanted to be at her side, to bask in her joy and excitement as we explored, and to have her at mine so I could touch her, to feel her warmth and the smoothness of her skin.

I wanted to do all of that and so much more. We only had a week more together, and I found as I contemplated our impending separation, I didn't like the hollow feeling that rose like a specter in my soul. I took another sip of my beer, marveling at the turmoil raging inside me. I'd dated Amber for a year, and she'd lived with me for six of those months before she bailed. I'd known Easton for only three weeks, and already my feelings for her were as strong, or stronger, as they had been for Amber. I hadn't loved Amber, and I didn't love Easton, but simply thinking about Easton returning to her life in Wisconsin and never seeing her again filled me with the same sense of loss I'd felt after Amber left.

"You okay?" Easton asked.

"Yeah. Just thinking."

"Uh-oh. That's dangerous," she teased. "About what?"

I smiled as I stared out of the floor to ceiling windows. "This place, this country. I think all the history is starting to get to me."

"What do you mean?"

I glanced at her and shrugged. "I don't know, exactly. I guess I'm just thinking about my past and the decisions I've made."

She looked at me, her face softening. "Don't sell yourself short."

"Yeah."

"I'm serious, Brent. Look what you've accomplished, despite what you've had to deal with."

"Yeah."

Her face hardened. "What's gotten into you?"

"Nothing." I turned my attention back to the windows. "Maybe you're rubbing off on me. Yesterday at dinner, I felt like a dust speck screaming 'I'm significant!' I look around and see what these people accomplished four hundred, five hundred, a thousand years ago, and I guess I'm starting to wonder if I've wasted my life."

"Brent Austin, you cut that shit out right now," she ordered, her voice soft but full of steel. "You're a good man, better than many, and you've overcome hardships that would have broken most people." I snorted. "I mean it!"

"Yeah." She looked at me, pulled my glass from my hand, and took a sip before handing it back. "What?" I asked, confused over her actions.

"Just checking to see if there was something in your glass."

I snickered. "No, it's not the beer. It's just... something."

"But you don't know what?"

I did, but I shook my head. "No. Like I said, I think you must be rubbing off on me. You seem to grasp the history of the place, and maybe now I'm beginning to as well."

She held my gaze for a moment before she smiled softly. "Good. We should celebrate our past, the things we've accomplished to get us to where we are. Take you for example. Instead of bemoaning what you haven't done, you should be celebrating what you have. You've broken away from a bad family situation and made something of yourself. That's more than most can say."

"Yeah, maybe, but I didn't go to school and—"

"So the fuck what?" she snapped. "Do you think I'm smarter than you, better than you because I went to school? More educated, maybe, but education and intelligence aren't the same thing. I've met plenty of educated idiots, and I bet you have too."

I smiled. "One or two."

"You know one of the things I admire about you?"

"What?"

"That you made it on your own. You scratched and clawed and fought your way to success. Let me let you in on a little secret. If I'd had to deal with the shit you've had to, I'm not sure I'd have made it. Getting through school was hard, even with my mom standing behind me cheering me on the whole way. I can't imagine how tough it must have been dragging that trainload of shit along behind you when you were just trying to survive. Don't sell yourself short, Brent. In my opinion, what you've done is just short of a miracle."

I held her gaze for a long moment, her unstinting praise making me slightly uncomfortable. "Thanks," I said softly.

"You're welcome, but it's the truth." She looked into her beer. "You want to know what else I like about you?"

There was something in her voice that told me she was about to zing me. "What?"

She rose up on her tiptoes, her lips close to my ear. "How you make me feel at night, when we're alone."

I smiled, the gloom that had been settling over me dissipating. "And how's that?"

A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. "Like the sexiest, most desirable woman in the world."

I held her gaze for a long moment. "That's easy to do... because you are."

She smiled at me, her bedroom smile, and that tingle passed over me again. "Are you going to take me dancing tonight?"

I nodded with a smile. "That was our plan, wasn't it?"

Her smile spread. "I want you to show all the guys and girls how a real cowboy does it." She leaned in close again. "I want you to make all the women jealous because they want to be with you, and all the men jealous because they want to be you." She leaned closer still. "Then, I'm going to take you to my bed, and you're going to prove to me again how a real cowboy does it."

"Why, I'd be honored, little lady," I said, turning on the accent.

She giggled, then pulled my ear close to her lips. "Let's see how long you can keep that accent while I'm fucking you blind later tonight."

I chuckled. "Challenge excepted," I drawled.

We were going to eat at Buckaroo's, the country and western bar that billed itself as the place for country music and dancing in Dublin, but we returned to the hotel to freshen up first. Brent dressed much as he had when he'd picked me up at the airport, exchanging his slacks for jeans, but he was wearing his string tie with a sport coat.

He'd helped me dress, choosing the most westerny looking of my blouses, jeans, and a scarf he tied into a bandanna. After looking me over, he added one of his belts, running it through the loops on one hip, but leaving it hanging loose on the other, like a gunslinger might have worn a gun belt.