Work Text:
“Well, at least your method of stress relief was effective.” Emma rolls on her side to face Paul, who’s still recovering from the intense orgasm he just had.
“See, don’t you feel so much better now?”
“Yeah, I guess so. I’d be better if you didn’t hog all the blankets tonight.” Emma reaches over him and pulls the down comforter over herself, snuggling into her boyfriend’s side. “Ah, much better.”
Of course, she’d be warmer if she actually wore something to bed, he thinks. But he doesn’t say it because when Paul looks down at the petite woman cuddled up to his side, he can’t keep the smile off his face as he curls his arm around her shoulders and pulls her in for a kiss. “I love you so much, Em.”
“Love you too.”
“Get some rest, okay?” She nods as he flicks the bedside lamp off and returns to hugging her close.
Emma does try to sleep, she really does. With the impending deadline of her midterm research paper for Hidgens’s class, it’s been keeping her up into the wee hours of the night. Between working double shifts for the last week since Zoey’s been out with the flu and still having to attend classes on top of that, Emma’s exhausted, to say the least. However, it doesn’t stop her from stressing about her paper, which is why she slips out of bed after she hears Paul’s light snoring next to her and works until the words in her document begin to blur together. She ends up slumping over her computer at the kitchen table, too tired to trudge back to Paul’s bed.
The next morning, she jolts awake for her early shift at Beanie’s and laments her choice to sleep at the table when her stiff neck protests even the slightest turn of her head. Emma normally leaves before Paul wakes up on her early days, but she does stop and give him a kiss on the cheek before leaving.
Paul comes in for his afternoon coffee like always with a smile on his face. “Hey Em, when do you finish up today?”
“I’ll be off around 6:00, but I have to go to campus to turn my paper in. Why, what’s up?”
“Just curious. I might have a surprise waiting for you at home.”
Emma’s ears perk up at that. “Oh, a surprise? For me?” Paul nods as she hands him his coffee. “Can I have a hint?”
“Nope,” Paul says, popping the P, “if I gave you a hint, it wouldn’t be a surprise, would it?”
“You’re no fun,” Emma grumbles. She pouts, but Paul quickly vanishes it with a kiss.
He keeps his mouth close to her ear and whispers to her. “I won’t leave you in suspense for too long. Don’t worry, you’ll get what’s coming if you’re patient.”
Emma pulls away with a confused expression. “Wait, what? What do you—“
“Ah-ah. No hints,” Paul tuts.
“But Paul—“
“Bye, love.” He winks at her, and with a smirk, he’s out the door, leaving Emma confused behind the counter.
It left her to wonder what the hell he could be talking about, and her mind raced through the rest of her shift about the meaning behind his cryptic message.
She turns in her paper to Hidgens just before he leaves his office, and while it isn’t her best work, it does get the job done. At least that’s over with now.
Just after 7:00, Emma enters the door and calls for Paul, who lets her know he’s in the kitchen finishing up dinner. She wraps her arms around Paul from behind and kisses his shoulder as he’s stirring something over the stove.
“Whatcha making?”
“Spaghetti bolognese, your favorite.”
Emma gasps and squeezes him tighter into a hug. “Paul, that’s so sweet, thank you!” She pauses and then asks, “Wait, is that it? Is that the surprise?”
Paul laughs and stops stirring for a moment, turning around to face Emma and kissing her lips. “No, absolutely not. No, what I have in mind is... juicier. And something you’ll want to do with a good meal in you.”
Judging by the tone of his voice, her mind immediately travels down the gutter. “So, it’s a sex thing?”
“Like I said, no hints. It could be, but it also might not be...”
Emma pinches Paul’s nose playfully. “You’re a shit liar, Paul Matthews. You’re planning something sexy, I know it!”
“Do you?” Emma scoffs. Of course she’s right, why wouldn’t she be? Her bullshit detector is like her sixth sense, so she knows there’s something sex-related going on in Paul’s head; it’s just figuring out what it is. “We’ll see if you’re right, Emma.”
“I am!” She kisses his cheek and goes to set the table while Paul finishes up the sauce.
After dinner, Paul lies with Emma on the couch cuddling while an episode of Chopped is on in the background. He’s sitting up, and Emma is underneath his arm with her arms around his waist when he pats his legs, motioning for her to sit on his lap. Emma scoots over with a content sigh, and Paul hugs her close and pulls her close to him.
He kisses her neck and presses his thumb into a knot at the base of her neck near her shoulder. Emma moans and arches into Paul’s touch. After the awkward way she slept last night, Paul somehow knows exactly what to do to make it better, not to mention his kisses are turning her on more than she cares to admit. She’s lost in a blissful haze when suddenly,
“Did you think I didn’t notice that you snuck out of bed last night,” he whispers.
“Wh-what? What are you talking about?”
“I woke up in the middle of the night expecting you to be there, but you weren’t, so I checked the bathroom, and you weren’t there either. So I went into the kitchen, and lo and behold, there you were asleep at the table.”
Emma shifts guiltily, looking down and wrapping her arms around herself. Paul notices her nervous response and hugs her tighter while petting her back.
“I’m not mad at you, Emma. I could never be mad. I just want to make sure you’re taking care of yourself.”
“Paul, I’m fine, I got the paper done. And yeah, I may have lost a night of sleep, but it’s not that big of a deal.” He kisses her neck and cheeks as she talks, and she’s quickly growing aroused by his breath warming her skin. “Paul...”
“You work so hard all the time, Em. Let me take care of you for once. Please?” His voice is low in her ear, and it makes her breathing accelerate at his suggestion.
“How?”
“Come with me, and you’ll see.”
Emma turns to face him, her legs situated on either side of his hips, and kisses him passionately with her arms around his neck. She underestimated how strong he is because he stands up from the couch with little trouble while still keeping her legs around his waist and carries her to his bedroom.
He sets her down just outside the door and opens it up to let her inside. Curiously, Emma walks over to the object laying on the bed and picks it up to examine it. A black silk tie.
“Is this the surprise, Paul?”
He’s behind her after a few moments, his hands on her hips, and presses her back against his now bare chest. “Only if you want to. I know you mentioned wanting to try it, so I figured now might be a good time.”
“Now’s perfect.”
Emma leans back into his embrace when he kisses her neck again, and his fingers come up to untie the bow underneath her collar.
“Might hang onto this for later,” he mumbles.
“Why?” Emma begins to multitask, her hands unbuttoning her shirt while Paul’s hands rub her shoulders. Suddenly, she feels her hands yanked behind her back, and she gasps.
“That’s why. Be patient for me. Can you do that?” Emma nods. “Good.” He holds up the thicker tie to her. “Are you ready?”
“Yeah.”
Carefully, he wraps the silk band around her eyes, and her vision is shrouded in blackness. Even so, it’s safe and warm and welcome with Paul behind her. His touch is feather-light as he finishes opening her shirt and slips it off her shoulders, letting it fall at her feet.
Her shorts come next, and once she’s free of them, Paul slides his hands up her legs before settling them at her hips once more. Just when she thought she had memorized his touch and the way he caresses her body, nothing could have prepared her for the electricity radiating from his fingertips. She shivers and reaches for his hands to stabilize herself.
He leads her to the bed, guiding her to lie down and scoot back. She settles and expects Paul to kiss her when she feels him on top of her, his breath only a few inches away. Emma tips her head up for a kiss just as she thinks Paul is about to meet her halfway; instead, he diverts to her jawline up to her ear. She lets out a pathetic whine against her better judgement.
“This is going to be so much fun,” Paul chuckles, relishing in her desperation.
“I fucking hate you,” Emma groans.
“You don’t mean that, Emma.”
“I will if you don’t hurry up and get a move on.”
His voice is husky in her ear. “Remember what I said about patience? You’ll get what’s coming, Em, I promise.”
Paul kisses his way back down her neck and along the curves of her breasts, continuing to tease her. Emma tries her hardest not to roll her hips upwards to gain some friction where she needs it between her legs, but she’d hardly call herself successful when Paul’s fingers trace the line from her knee up past the dip in her hip and around to her ass. At that point, she’s so aroused that she doesn’t care about how needy she looks, and Paul holds her hips still while his lips follow the curve of her bra around her chest.
He pulls his mouth away from her skin briefly to bring it back up to her ear. “Don’t come until I say so.”
Emma smiles. Paul can’t be the only one doing the teasing. “Or what?”
In an unusually aggressive response, Paul nips Emma’s lower lip. “Careful what you wish for. Your work tie would look nice around your wrists cuffed to my headboard. My tie might also look nice inside your mouth, but I’d hate to have to do that since you make the prettiest sounds.”
She’s never heard him talk so dirty before, but she’ll be damned if it isn’t the hottest thing she’s heard from him. “Jesus, Paul…”
“What’s coming will be you if you’re patient.” Emma moans and reaches up for him, her hand finally finding his hair to pull him in for a kiss. He should have tied her hands up for doing that, but he lets it slide. Paul works his hands down to her underwear, hooking his fingers underneath them. “Still okay?”
“Yeah, I’m good.”
“Good. Just say the word if you need me to stop or slow down or—“
“Paul, babe, I know how safe words work. Can you please just go back to what you were about to—“
Well, what he was about to do was tease her panties down her legs and slowly but surely kiss his way back up to the apex of her thighs until she squirmed with delight. But what he does instead is pull her panties to one side and immediately cover her pussy with his mouth. Two of his fingers curl inside of her, and Emma cries out in overwhelming pleasure. He moves his mouth away but keeps his fingers inside of her while he drapes his forearm over his girlfriend’s hips.
“Don’t come, baby,” he half-taunts, half-demands.
“Fuck you, Paul,” Emma groans, more malice in her tone than she intends.
“Nope, I’m fucking you tonight.” He presses his right thumb into her clit and smiles as she arches her back to increase the pressure, but it only makes him push her further into the bed. “God, you’re so wet. You want me to fuck you?”
Emma nods. “Please?”
She doesn’t mean to sound so high-pitched and desperate, and though she can’t see it, Paul loves it, already sliding his pants off. “Are you gonna come?”
Emma doesn’t answer, just lets out a series of moans in varying pitches, which means she’s probably close. She’s trying so hard to hold off her orgasm, but he’s certainly not making it easy on her.
He doesn’t like her lack of a verbal response. “You better not because if you do, you won’t stop coming, Em. Sounds like a dream, but you’re gonna come until you’re sore if you don’t have my permission.”
Emma whimpers when he pulls his fingers out of her, but it’s only to set himself up to fuck her. “Paul, please...”
“Please what? I want you to say it.”
“I wanna come, please. Please, can I come?”
He kisses her softly, one hand cupped around her cheek. “Not yet. Just a few more minutes. Can you wait just a little longer?”
“God, do you hate me or something?”
“Of course not. I love you, Emma. It’ll be worth the wait, though, I swear.” Emma doesn’t have time to retort that it better be because Paul is easing himself inside of her, and any snark she would have given him withers with a gasp on her lips. She works to control her breathing and focus on anything other than letting herself orgasm. “That’s it, baby. You’re doing so well.”
They kiss slowly, their tongues tangling together in each other’s mouths, and Emma is grateful she has the use of her hands. She loves to run her fingers through Paul’s hair when they kiss. It’s a little longer since he hasn’t cut it in a while, so it sends extra tingles down his spine when she pulls at it to kiss him deeper.
“Shit, I’m so close,” Emma whispers.
“Me too.”
“Please, please can I come now?” Emma’s quickly growing restless and hopes Paul is merciful enough to grant her some relief soon because she thinks she might die if not.
All of a sudden, light hits her eyes, and she realizes that Paul took off her blindfold. She’s staring up into his eyes and smiles when she sees him looking down at her. God, she’s so beautiful, he thinks. So beautiful and she doesn’t know it.
Paul kisses her forehead and gives her permission. “Go ahead.”
Worth the wait it is indeed. Emma moans, arching off the bed, her eyes screwing shut. She wraps her arms around Paul’s back and lets the release flow through her. It seems to stretch on for a few minutes, and she can feel the sensation travel from the top of her head to the tips of her toes. Paul comes with her, sighing her name into her neck, and stays with her until her aftershocks fade.
“Hi, angel,” Paul says, brushing some hair off of her forehead. Emma smiles and holds his other hand. “Feel better?”
“Much,” she sighs.
“Worth the wait?”
“Oh yeah.”
They clean themselves up and cuddle together in bed, kissing every so often but mostly just holding each other and letting the stress melt away. She does give him major props for his surprise because role reversal is fun every once in a while; she’s certainly willing to try it again sometime. Paul won’t complain either.
Maybe Paul and Emma aren’t the best at taking care of themselves, but lucky for them, they never neglect to take care of each other.