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In recurring dreams Penelope came to him. Sometimes, a ghostly flicker of copper or a shred of satin left lingering in his hands before it fizzled out into transparency. Her laugh would echo in the near distance, disembodied, Colin’s footfalls in frenzied pursuit of it despite knowing it would only ever ebb out into silence. She haunted him, taunted him until the sound of his own exasperated mumblings roused him awake, drowning in tepid sweat. And though Penelope eluded him on almost every occasion, he vowed to find her.
This time was different. This time, Penelope appeared to him in her entirety, corporeal, hand outstretched as if she had been expecting him. A palpable sense of disappointment filled the space between them, as if the meeting had been priorly arranged and Colin had arrived almost a little too late.
“I have been waiting for you,” she revealed, flatly, a certain sadness painting her features. “I feared you had forgotten about me.”
A half-laugh breached his mouth at the thought of Penelope ever being exiled from his mind. He could not escape her, did not want to.
“I could never, Pen,” Colin ruled in earnest, his hand reaching to possess hers in the hopes of quelling her doubt. “You know that.”
Penelope’s jaw flexed for all but a moment, hastily replaced with a kindling smile that gradually flourished into one that he knew so well. Penelope stole a glance towards their hands, fingers interlaced, her face that of someone troubled, as though she wanted to bask in the moment a while longer but was simply not afforded the option.
“Time is not on our side, Colin,” Penelope noted, her joy dissipating as swiftly as it had arose. “Come, I want to show you something.”
Colin did not have the chance to react before the ground beneath ceased to exist, his body soaring weightlessly and somehow simultaneously fixed in place. Penelope seized his hand with bruising force as though she was afraid the two would be separated at any time. Pitch black saturated Colin's vision, dazed momentarily until the background transformed into perfect clarity, into something familiar.
A bizarre feeling gathered inside of him as he scoured the room and despite everything having materialised in its respective place, it felt alternate, askew.
“Do you remember the first time that you brought me here, Colin?” Penelope asked, softly, freeing his hand from her grip.
Colin’s brows were sewn together in contemplation, his breath hitching audibly as he regarded the teal silk that was bundled up on the edge of the chaise longue. The pin dropped in an instant. The state of the room replicated the exact way in which he had left it on the day of his first time with Penelope.
His gaze fell away from her in avoidance, trained on the mirror as he recounted that fateful day, recalled the way he had undressed Penelope so delicately in its reflection. The images remained unaltered in his brain and forced their way to the forefront more times than he cared to admit.
“Of course I remember,” Colin divulged, faintly, his chest tightening of its own accord as if Penelope’s internal pain was infiltrating his body, toying with him like a voodoo doll.
Penelope strolled around idly, her fingertips scaling the green fabric of the chaise longue with her mind cast backwards in remembrance. Every memory provoked another into existence, eager to take its place, the clarity unmatched, vivid.
“This house was supposed to be ours,” she mused, feigning a smile, though the melancholia poured out from behind the mask in torrents, unable to be concealed from Colin.
A cloak of unnerving quiet prevailed, a surge of sunlight seeping in through the window and painting Penelope’s silhouette in luminance. She drifted towards him like some kind of angelic entity, her face sparkling with a radiance he had never priorly seen, captivated all of a sudden.
“Why did you bring me here, Pen?” Colin pleaded, contritely, his expression that of someone perturbed, pained. “You have evaded me thus far and yet, you are here now. I see and hear glimpses of you and when I follow it, you run from me. Why, Pen?”
A sharp exhale burst from her lips in frustration. “Colin, you do not understand.”
“Then, make me!” Colin exploded, the resolution in his voice appearing to startle himself as he scrambled to recover his composure. “Why are we here? Please, tell me."
“Colin,” she smiled, cerulean orbs veiled with tears. “I do not wish to argue with you, nor fix the things that have been done.”
Her thumb lifted to scale the softness of his cheek, her touch ghosting, feather-like.
“I was a wallflower and you loved me, showed me things, inspired feelings that I could not even begin to imagine,” Penelope explained, her voice faltering with every word and yet staring at Colin as if he were the moon and stars. “I merely came here to remember how it was to feel such a love, to relive it just once as I am certain it will not find me again."
Colin opened his mouth to speak, but he was wiser, knew that words were futile, knew that Penelope was not searching for a solution but for closure. His heart pounded so violently that he was certain Penelope could hear it, convinced that it was the sound of it cracking into irrevocable fragments. In spite of the grief that held him captive, he pledged to surrender his pride and do what was noble, what was righteous, for Penelope.
A unification of instinct and familiarity saw Colin draw Penelope further into him, close enough to hear every breath that passed through her lips. His fingers tangled themselves into her fiery strands, the faint scent of her perfume wafting up to enrapture him. Colin promised himself that he would remember her like this, ethereal, like art, every inch of skin, every bone crafted by the gods.
“I have missed you, Pen,” Colin professed, pangs of regret stabbing at him like sharpened knives that seemed to delve deeper, his abdomen forced into tension. “I cannot tell you how sorry I am.”
Penelope shook her head avidly in rebuttal and bundled together just enough courage to muster up a semblance of a smile in his direction. And then, she fled from him in haste, any looming words that he had readied instantly ripped from him once he realised what Penelope had prepared for him.
Penelope halted before the mirror, her eyes flickering briefly across her dress-clad frame, fingers cascading along the floral embellishments at a painstaking pace. Her tongue slid across her lips, coating them with reflective sheen as she regarded Colin’s footsteps stalking behind her, his tall frame lurking like a shadow.
“Pen, what are you...”
Every article of clothing vanished from Penelope’s body in an instant, a mere pool of material left tousling at her feet as Colin frowned in confusion. Questions swarmed in his mind, positively befuddled by the mystery and yet too enamoured by the subsequent sight before him to utter a word. His gaze tore itself into her nakedness, so fervently that it felt as though his irises shone in scarlet, searing and aflame.
“Just once, Colin,” Penelope reminded, the nod of her head signifying that the warning was not solely for Colin, but for herself, each glance exchanged between them only withering her self-control into nothingness.
A pensive aura clouded him, observing intently as Penelope settled herself onto the chaise longue, red tresses splaying over its arm. She was a vision, she always had been.
Colin promptly discarded his clothing, maddened by the tension that hung thickly in the air, his mind focused solely on having Penelope gasping below him. He lowered himself carefully, his addiction to her instantly reactivating as their bodies met, melding together as one. Penelope’s fingers were quick to take ahold of his face, stroking delicately as she admired him up close, his mouth parting as he relaxed into her touch.
“Kiss me, Colin,” Penelope urged, her lips merely a hair’s breadth from his, impatience rising with each passing second.
Colin abided with zeal, his lips capturing Penelope’s in a gentle embrace. He vowed to be mindful, to be soft, but the desire that plagued him seemed to spiral out of his control. The momentum built rapidly, his hand clutching at Penelope’s jaw to pull her in closer, deeper, snaking downwards to grope at her breasts.
“Colin, please.”
The taste of her lingered in his mouth, his appetite for her boundless, overwhelming. He felt every beautiful curvature of her body firmly against him, every sudden jolt of her hips, every erratic flexion of her muscles, dizzied by every enchanting sound that she made.
“I’ve missed this,” Colin revealed, breathlessly, his mouth only dragging itself from Penelope’s in search of something else to feast on, to worship.
Self-control slid from his grasp, his lips securing around her nipple and sucking like somebody starved, demented almost. The rosy peaks grew hard below his exertions as Penelope writhed below him, the blissfulness superseded by an agonising ache that persisted between her legs. Penelope groaned aloud, each thrashing manoeuvre thwarted by the weight of Colin’s mouth pressed against her, pinned helplessly in place.
“Please, do not make me wait, Colin,” Penelope blurted, mindlessly, her nails sinking into Colin’s nape in dissatisfaction. “I cannot bear it any longer.”
Colin retreated from her, admiring her in her state of nudity, of tortured despair, thighs dragged inward as a means of temporary relief. He throbbed painfully as he gawked at her, his strong hands forcing her legs into separation to catch sight of the wetness that had gathered. Thoughts evaporated from his mind, enchanted by the view as Penelope hid herself in embarrassment.
“Do not hide from me, Pen,” Colin whispered, regarding her with complete adoration. “You are so beautiful like this.”
“Colin.”
Penelope’s dazzling blue eyes darkened to a colour unfathomable, the sternness in her voice calling Colin against her once more, only this time the proximity was suffocating, delightful. A half-smirk tugged at the corner of his lips, devilish as he leaned in and speared her, a guttural moan fleeing from him.
Softened breaths sprung from Penelope, methodically punctuated by a drawling moan each time Colin drove his hips into her with reckless abandon. Her orbs pierced him with lust, with repressed infatuation, as if she was disallowing herself the instance to be truly unbridled, to tell Colin everything she had wanted to say.
“Oh, Pen,” Colin grunted out, shamelessly, loudly as he drowned in the sight of her, consumed by the pleasure that had begun to take ahold of him.
Colin felt himself hurtling into oblivion, the pressure building within him until it could not be contained, though he was determined not to relinquish, not yet. His natural instinct to go forth screamed out in protest as he halted his movement, Penelope merely staring at him in confusion.
“Why did you-,”
A finger pressed itself to Penelope’s full lips, occluding the question, a low hushing sound from his mouth forcing her into stunned silence.
“Trust me, Pen.”
Colin’s hand meandered expertly between their bodies, lower and lower until he landed between Penelope’s legs, his length still buried in the depths of her. His thumb circulated softly against her clit, marvelling at the way her eyes grew wide in excitement. Penelope’s nails dug callously into his back and etched aimless streaks, the scorching pain darting along his spine but failing to deter him. Whines of contentment freed themselves into the air, each one brimming with more desperation than the last as she threw her head against the arm of the chaise longue.
“Do not stop, Colin,” Penelope gasped, a few stray tresses bonded to the perspiration that spotted upon her brow. “Please, do not stop.”
Without a hesitation, Colin anchored himself in position, invigorated with newfound energy. He thrust with ardor, with devotion, Penelope clinging onto him with every modicum of strength that she possessed. The chaise longue rocked forcefully below them, no heed paid to it as Colin jostled his forehead against Penelope’s and felt his vision fade into static, engulfed in white hot.
Breathless pants flooded the silence, Colin’s nose nestled into the crook of Penelope’s neck as he battled to catch his breath. He expected Penelope’s fingers to caress him, to pull him closer, to fiddle mindlessly with his hair but she did not. When he drew back to regard her, she was vacant, her hands reaching not for him but for the teal silk to conceal her nudity.
“I must go, Colin,” Penelope informed, shortly as she fixed the silk around herself, unable to find the strength to meet his gaze.
Colin was frantic in his efforts to thwart her, though when he tried to take possession of her wrist, she flinched in avoidance, merely widening the distance between them.
“Stay with me, Pen,” Colin pleaded, his voice subdued, as if he knew his attempts at convincing her would only lead to rejection.
“You left me, Colin,” Penelope stated, soberly, any essence of lingering happiness disintegrating until it reanimated in the form of flaring anger. “It is time for me to leave you.”
“No!”
And just as Penelope had emerged from nonexistence when she had first appeared to him, she vanished, abandoning him in an instant. Cold air engulfed the room, fraught with ambivalence, the walls seeming to creep closer to imprison him. He clutched at his chest, noting its emptiness, resigning himself to the idea that Penelope had hollowed out his heart and taken it with her.
A sharp jab of consciousness knocked him to his knees, the forces unyielding and extracting colour from his vision. He felt himself slipping to someplace else, wondering if Penelope had changed her mind and would be awaiting him there.
Suddenly, a gasp dragged him from slumber, his heart pumping with ferocity. A hand immediately fused itself to his chest, its soothing touch calming him in an instant.
“Are you alright?” A voice called out, the bedsheets shifting as a familiar warmth settled beside him.
“Well, I am…” Colin hesitated, “aside from the fact that dream you is intent on traumatising me.”
Penelope chortled, unabashed in her amusement of the situation as she delicately peeled Colin’s sweaty pyjama shirt from his body.
“I assume she is still bitter about the annulment,” Penelope commented, playfully, unable to stifle her laughter. "I cannot blame her."
Colin shook his head in faux disapproval, lips jutting out sadly for a moment before reaching to pull Penelope flush against him. His wife beamed, a fleeting kiss placed to his lips before she wriggled out of his grasp, regarding him with suspicion.
“I want you to be honest with me, Colin,” Penelope sighed, feigning seriousness. “Did you allow her to seduce you?"
Penelope caressed the bulge that lay below her roaming hands, Colin merely groaning out in embarrassment.
“Pen, she was very convincing!” He exclaimed, his hands held up in surrender, a coy expression flooding his features.
“You are a simple man, Colin Bridgerton,” Penelope chuckled, a kiss pressed to his temple “A good man,” she corrected, “but simple.”