©2002 by WILDBEARIES

This story is based on characters created in the film, "Gladiator" and in no way intended to infringe upon those characters or the story of that film. References to real people are strictly the product of the writer's imagination and meant to entertain the reader.
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Lucilla persisted with trying to fondle him, so before they got much farther, Maximus pulled Leo up, jumped down and dragged Lucilla down onto the ground beside him. She gave him a slow, sensuous smile, pleased that he had responded so quickly to her stroking him and her suggestive murmurings in his ear. To her surprise, instead of caressing her in return, he grabbed her by the wrist and yanked her out of the way of the horse, who was busily rooting through the leaves for some green grass and didn't care if he walked over one small female to get it. "Leo!" he barked, smacking the horse on the rump so he'd behave.

"And you, Lady," he barked to Lucilla in the same tone, "you come to your senses and do it quickly, I have no time for your ridiculous sexual games."

Lucilla stared at him, her lusty feelings rapidly turning into fury. "What? How dare you!"

Maximus shoved her down onto a stone bench and stood over her, brows drawn down over angry silver-blue eyes. "I dare because of long acquaintance, Lucilla, and because I know you don't really mean this."

Eyes narrowing, she snapped, "Sit down so I don't have to break my neck to look at you." When he had, she continued, "That's better. I certainly do 'mean' this - and you cannot say that you are disinterested - that was not lack of interest I felt under your tunic just now."

When she made to reach between his thighs, Maximus forestalled her by seizing her wrist again and holding her hand away from his body. "Lucilla, do not touch me in that manner again. Just because I had a physical reaction to your groping doesn't mean I'm interested in having you."

"Liar," she said, the fury fading as she decided he was trying to convince himself as much as he was trying to convince her. "You know you want me - if you were really not attracted that big staff of yours wouldn't still be standing up like a randy boy's."

Maximus cursed and flung her hand back in her own lap, "You presume too much, Lady." He couldn't very well put her over his knee and wallop her backside, but he surely wanted to do just that. "Why now? Why proposition me now, after all these years? I thought you were true to your husband."

"Valerian? I was. Until he left my bed for the buxom little downstairs maid. Now he never even attempts to have me."

Ahh, Maximus thought to himself, wounded vanity, he should have realized. "So you thought to get back at him by bedding me?"

"Partly, yes, and partly because I've always wanted you - you know that."

He snorted in disbelief, "Lucilla, you only wanted me when it was convenient for you, otherwise you left me so rapidly that you didn't even leave a dust cloud in your wake."

She pouted, "That is very unfair, Maximus. I had to pretend disinterest in you to spare you Commodus' temper, and later, when he was totally crazy, to spare your life. That was hardly because of inconvenience."

"And when you left to marry Verus without even bothering to tell me you were betrothed to him - was that to spare my life as well?" He was amazed that he still felt bitter about something so far in the past, but there it was, he did.

"In a way it was, yes. I already knew I was carrying our son - but to admit that to my father would have been very dangerous for you, Maximus. Think! You weren't General of the Armies then - you were a tribune and hardly of royal blood. My father loved you, but even he would have felt you had over-reached yourself getting a child on his daughter."

"You rationalize everything," he commented.

"I've had to rationalize, dissemble and lie all my life to survive, Maximus. All you had to do was fight. It's almost the same thing, really. You fought with forged weapons, I fought with my own kind of weapons."

"So now I'm supposed to gleefully accept your advances just for old times' sake?" He shifted on the hard stone bench, still maddeningly aroused. He tried willing his body to behave.

Lucilla knew exactly what he was doing, and before he could react, she dipped her hand under the hem of his tunic and up onto his groin where his shaft swelled against the linen of his drawers. She grabbed hold before he could knock her hand aside. "I'd say this was more than apathy, Maximus," she said, smiling mischievously.

"Let go," he asked softly. "You're taking advantage of my enforced celibacy the past few weeks because of my wife's pregnancy. That's very unfair."

"Oh, twaddle," she said, shifting to face him directly, stroking him unashamedly. "Gods, I had forgotten how you are - Maximus - have me now."

He watched what she did through slitted eyes as if he was a third party observing himself instead of occupying his own body. "Gods," he breathed, when her hand worked further magic on him and made him swell so big he thought he would burst. "Lucilla, stop it."

"No," she said throatily, and yanked the trousers open to get at him without the fabric in between. "Oh, gods," she praised him as she felt the heat of his burgeoning flesh directly against her palm. She moved to straddle his thighs, pulling her stola out of the way, folding back his tunic, holding onto his shaft as she came down onto it, clasping him inside her heated channel. She groaned aloud and moved on him, grasping his shoulders, looking into his face where she saw conflicting emotions even as she rode him. "Maximus, move in me - you know you want to."

"Gods," he groaned, and grabbed hold of her hips, thrusting up inside her despite his earlier resolve to resist her. "Edepol, you're hot as fire," he gasped out, ramming up, sliding out and ramming up again.

Lucilla moaned and rode him more and more rapidly, quickly reaching her peak with a harsh gasp of pleasure. She climaxed, her inner muscles milking his shaft as he shot his essence up inside her. He was almost silent, but his breath panted in her ear and she knew from his quivering muscles it was as intense a finish for him as it was for her. She relaxed against his chest, still full of him, his seed trickling out of her onto her thighs. No worries now about getting with child, she thought in some distraction, she was past childbearing, but not at all past taking pleasure in the fucking. "Kiss me," she ordered, tipping her face up to his.

"What have we done?" Maximus whispered, but he kissed her just the same, instantly remembering her taste and the delicious slide of her tongue in his mouth. He had been about to pull out of her body's lubricious clasp, but instead he felt himself harden and lengthen, and when she raised her head, he saw the triumphant look in her eyes, the curve of her lovely swollen mouth, and he groaned in pained lust. "I do not want this!" he protested, but he turned so Lucilla was on her back on the bench, her stola up about her neck as he bit and suckled her still luscious breasts.

"For someone who doesn't want this, Maximus, you're being most thorough in having me," she teased, wrapping her legs about his hips and urging him into motion. "Fuck me," she ordered him, "take me again, fill me up with you."

He growled, driving into her over and over, conquering her, rough and fierce, using no sweetness, no tenderness in his thrusting or his touch. He suckled her breasts and bit down until she screamed, he pounded his shaft into her without mercy until she screamed in an entirely different tone. "You bitch, take this," he rasped, and poured himself into her again, not stopping the violent thrusts until he was done and past done with her.

They lay panting on the hard bench, sweaty and tangled, no kisses from him, no passionate murmurs. Lucilla thought he was magnificent now. The years had made him what he was, and if he suffered guilt over cheating on his little wife, well - she didn't really care. She would dare anything to have him again. "I want you again," she murmured.

Maximus couldn't help the short bark of laughter that escaped him. He sat up, disentangling himself from her, pulling his disordered drawers back into place, buckling them firmly. "Lucilla, you may want me all you desire right now, but I'm 51 years old and you cannot expect me to respond like a 16 year old boy thrilled with his first conquest."

She giggled and sat up, pulling her dress down and reaching up to find her hair had come down and was in a tangle. "Gods, I look like what we've just been doing." She took the ivory combs out of the auburn curls and swiftly righted them, hoping she didn't look too well-used.

Maximus, meanwhile, was pacing back and forth in front of the bench, not sure what had just taken place except he had broken his marriage vows. The hell of it was, he thought, he hadn't had such fierce pleasure in ages. "Cheating," he said aloud, "it must be because of that - Lucilla," he stopped in front of her, brow furrowed, "This can never happen again, and Ana must not find out, although the gods know how I'll keep it from her, she can read me like a letter from a friend."

Amused at his dismayed expression and his guilt, Lucilla merely shrugged, and answered, "You'll keep it from her because it will make your life a living hell otherwise. I'm sure you'll think of a way to keep silent and keep that face from betraying you." She bounced up off the bench, energetic and renewed, to kiss him soundly before he could react and push her away. "Now, let us go back, I'm suddenly starving."

He well remembered that from their past. Take her until she stopped grabbing at him, and then feed her before she shouted the roof down about how hungry she was. He shook himself mentally to get out of the nostalgic mood, and stalked over to get Leo. Grabbing the horse's bridle, he had to resist the urge to turn and shout at her that she'd ruined everything with her concupiscence. He mounted and held a hand out to her, "Here, grab my hand, put your foot on my boot and mount behind me."

"I'd rather mount on you again," she purred, laughing at his fierce expression. She let him lift her onto the horse behind him and grabbed hold of his waist once more. "I promise not to touch your precious private parts."

"Oh, leave off," he snarled, and kicked Leo into a canter. How in the world, he wondered, was he going to not give himself away to Ana? And how in the world was he going to live with himself after this?

"Edepol," he cursed under his breath, a fine predicament he'd gotten himself into now. All the years of never giving in to temptation - and there had been many - and now, while his wife was in labor with their child, he was in the orchard tumbling the one woman of all who could drive him to distraction with one selfish word, one haughty toss of her head.

Lucilla, who heard his muttered imprecation, just smiled, already planning how to get him again. Maximus, she thought, you're so very aptly named, my big Spanish stallion. She laughed aloud, the wind blowing her curls back off her face as they rode up the path to his villa.

Gemma's son Gaius came to take Leo's reins, "Master, the ladies are looking for you." The young man gave Lucilla a hand down, then led the horse off to the stables to be cooled out and groomed. Lucilla was already gone, having whisked herself indoors as soon as her feet touched the ground. Maximus followed her in on leaden feet, sure that what he'd been doing must be plain as day to anyone who cared to look.

Marcella, Gaius' sister, met him in the atrium, "Sir, my mother and your lady want you in the birthing room - they sent me to bring you as soon as you came home."

Maximus would have preferred to at least bathe Lucilla off him, but he had no idea how long ago Ana had requested his presence, so he tamped down his guilty feelings and strode down the hall to the guest room. Steeling himself, willing his face to an expression of innocence, he went in.

"Where were you, husband?" Ana asked, immediately waving away his explanations to hold up a bundle wrapped in purest white linen. "Our son, Maximus - is he not worth every risk?"

He forgot all about guilt and guilty pleasures as he took the bundle in his hands. Wrapped in linen was a tiny red-faced infant, his head covered with black fuzz, long black lashes fringing impossibly blue eyes, tiny arms and legs waving in indignant protest as he began yelling his head off at being awakened. "Our son," Maximus murmured, then he looked up at Ana, smiling widely, "look what you've made, Ana - he's wonderful!"

At her proud look, he lifted his son for everyone in the room to see, proclaiming, "A new son of my house - Aurelius Meridius - welcome, little boy." And he kissed the soft forehead, tears of joy falling onto the baby's face.

"Come, give him back before you drown him, husband," Ana teased, holding her arms out for the baby. Maximus gave her a crooked smile but did as she bade, setting the bundle carefully into her arms and moving him so he could take her breast. The baby promptly latched on and began suckling, little hands kneading Ana's plump bosom. Maximus felt his heart turn over with love for both of them, then he remembered what he had done and that very heart fell down to his boots.

Ana saw his expression change and gave him a questioning look. "Maximus?"

He gave her a smile, but she saw it didn't reach his eyes. Something was bothering him. "What is it, darling?"

He shook his head, straightening up, already moving away from her toward the door. "Nothing, cara, I -um - have something I need to do. I shall return shortly." And he was gone, shutting the door carefully behind him.

"Well," Gemma huffed into the silent room, "you'd think he sired a son such as this every day of the week!"

Ana turned her face down to the infant suckling at her breast and kissed the tender little head. She was troubled, but perhaps she was reading something that wasn't there because she was tired. "Leave it be," she told Gemma. "He is just busy, that's all."

Gemma and her daughter exchanged speaking looks, but neither said anything further on the subject.

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Copyright 2002 by wildbearies

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