Masque (3 page)

Oh, shit.

Watching Rena become excited had Synn’s cock growing to
twice the size he remembered it ever being. He’d entered the Voyeur Room
earlier, before noticing her presence, and dematerialized just in time. He’d
seen hundreds of Eve and Jonathan performances, though they always made him a
bit uncomfortable. Jonathan made love to his wife, instead of having sex like
Victoria and Mathew on the couch. His lovemaking was too intimate for the
Pleasure Rooms.

The last place Synn expected to find Rena was in the Blue
Room after midnight. His hopes had risen at her continued presence, but though
it was apparent she had experience, it could not have been very adventurous.
Her blushes were many and she did nothing to relieve her own growing lust.
Still, watching her as she stared, hearing her breathing increase, smelling her
musky desire mixed with the tartness of the scent she wore, and knowing her
quim was wet with need, had him excited in a new way. He had to retreat to a
safer distance, unsure he could keep himself transparent while becoming so
hard. He was glad he had because from the look on her face, he was back to
being solid again, and she was mortified.

This could work to his advantage. He held out his arm to
her, much as he had earlier in the day. As she rose, Eve motioned for her to
stay, but he shook his head. Eve gave up and Rena shyly linked her arm in his.
He couldn’t help his smirk. “Are you ready for bed now?”

She nodded, refusing to look at him.

He wanted to ask if she was ready to come, but that answer
was already clear. More important, was she ready for the Pleasure Rooms? He
needed her to go through each one. The Blue Room was the Voyeur Room, the
beginner’s room. How the bloody hell would he get her through the other six?
Perhaps the fact she had begun the pleasure journey on her own proved her
potential.

As they ascended the stairs, he could see her mind working.
Was she thinking about how she would make herself come tonight? He needed her
desperate to orgasm in order to get her through the next room. To want it so
much, she’d do anything.

What a bloody fix. Why couldn’t a couple have braved these
walls? Then again, as he glanced down at her profile, her button nose barely
reaching his shoulder, he found her far too interesting and enticing to give
up.

“Synn?”

They had reached her bedroom and he had to let her go in.
“Yes.”

She disengaged herself from his arm, but stood before him
and stared into his eyes. “Why do you wear nineteenth-century clothes?”

Flummoxed, he remained silent, though his brain ran through
a number of possible responses. “It makes the residents here more comfortable.
Would you prefer I don modern wear?”

Distracted, she shook her head. “No. That’s fine. You can
wear what you want.” She continued to stand in front of him, her eyes on his
chest, her hand scrunching the side of her nightshirt.

He used his finger under her chin to bring her gaze to his.
Her eyes were heavenly. He’d noticed their green tint earlier in the day, but it
was their roundness with a slight narrowing at the corners that fascinated him.
They made her appear to be interested in everything. “Did you have another
question for me?”
Perhaps, will you kiss me?

Her eyes widened. “Yes, I did. How did you start the fires
for the light in that room? I didn’t see a propane tank.”

Damn, but she was a curious one. He hoped her curiosity
extended much further. “I’ll give you a complete tour in the morning. There is
little of the night left and I’m sure after the show you watched, you must be
tired.”

Even in the dimness of the moonlight filtering into the hall
from the floor-to-ceiling window, he could see her blush.

She turned away, embarrassed. “Yes. I’m very tired. See you
in the morning.”

She didn’t give him a chance to respond, but opened the door
to her room and escaped him.

He grinned at the closed door. The lady would need to find a
better barrier than that if she wanted to keep him away.

Rena leaned back against the door, embarrassed heat still
flooding her limbs. He saw her watching those couples. How long had he been
there? A few minutes? How could she face him? She should have said something
intelligent instead of asking random questions, but that had always been her
way when faced with an embarrassing situation. Usually, it worked to take
attention away from her predicament, but Synn hadn’t been detoured.

She walked to the bed and crawled in, leaving her t-shirt
on. She’d need a barrier between herself and her sex dreams. After her fiancé
had broken off their engagement, she expected her sexy dreams and wild urges to
go away, and the last month at home in Maryland, they had. But ever since she
stepped foot in Ashton Abbey, her libido had gone into overdrive. No, make that
since she met Synn. Maybe it was his name. It was like a subconscious
suggestion. Sin, Rena. Sin.

Or maybe it was the Abbey. Images of the loving couple on
the bed and the couple on the settee came back to her in a rush. It was easy to
block what she had seen when she was embarrassed down to the wrinkles in the
bottoms of her feet, but back in her silky sheets, she couldn’t help but replay
their actions in her mind.

Refusing to be sucked into any more erotic sensations, she
forced her eyes closed and made a to-do list in her head for tomorrow. She would
need to buy food and supplies. Synn could tell her the history of the ghosts.
She wanted to know every ghost in the building, their names, their life
stories. Oh, and she could name the rooms after them. The honeymoon suite would
have to be named for the couple on the bed from tonight.

He had undressed his wife so tenderly. She loved how he
kissed her, running his hands over her breasts and waist to eventually cup her
between the legs.

Rena squirmed, but then a featherlight touch brushed her
temple. It was gentle, like the husband downstairs, and she relaxed into her
dream. She turned her head away as light kisses tripped around her ear, past
her jaw, and along her neck. As her dream lover’s mouth found the hollow near
her shoulder, he licked. His tongue tickled and she brought her shoulder to her
ear.

The hand on her thigh surprised her. She almost opened her
eyes, but refrained. If she wanted to orgasm, why not be brought to it by a
dream lover?

As the hand stroked her leg, she took a deep breath, stepped
over to the forbidden side and let her legs fall open. The hand hesitated
before moving to her inner thigh, progressing upward until it reached the
crease between her labia and her leg.

Her heart beat faster and her muscles stilled as she waited,
anxious for the fingers to touch her pussy. She wanted them to play with her
clit and stroke inside her like the man downstairs had done for his wife. But
the hand remained motionless, and she moaned in frustration.

She needed to come. Couldn’t he feel her wetness? She lifted
her hips from the bed, hinting at her willingness. Finally, the hand moved.
Fingers deftly combing through every fold of flesh involved in the design of
her pussy. She pressed her pelvis against those exploring digits, her breaths
growing shorter. Then fingers found her clit and held it.

“Oh, yes.”

A finger slipped inside her opening and she bucked her hips
against it. More. She needed more. She gripped the sheets in silent plea. The
finger withdrew but then two entered her, spreading her more, invading her like
the woman in the Blue Room. She ground upward, desperate as her heated body
begged for release. The fingers moved out and in, in slow, tantalizing strokes,
building the pressure between her legs, tightening her core.

“More,” she ground out. “Please.”

Three fingers entered her.

This is what she wanted, needed. She panted, bucking against
the fingers moving inside her.

They disappeared.

Breathing hard, her pussy seeping, she opened her eyes and
whined after her vanished dream. “Nooo. You can’t leave.” She squeezed her eyes
shut, willing the dream to continue, but it didn’t. “Urgh.” Opening her eyes
again, she sat up and lit her lantern. She peered into the darkness just in
case it wasn’t a dream. She was alone. “Damn it.”

Synn stood frozen where he had landed, in the Purple Room
beneath Rena’s bedroom. He took deep breaths to make his raging cock more
comfortable, but it didn’t help. He glanced at the threesome on the stage
before striding through the door into the Blue Room. Far enough from Rena’s
room now, he dematerialized and floated straight up to the roof.

Stepping into the cool night air helped, a little. He leaned
against an embrasure and studied the moon. A few more days and the ghosts would
have more solidity to them along with their voices. This was the hardest time
of the month when he had no one to converse with. Convincing a man or a couple
to complete the Pleasure Rooms of the Masque would have been easier, but
bringing Rena through the gantlet of sexual experiences would be much more
pleasurable for him now that he had the need again.

If he was correct, her completion of the rooms would mean
the spirits’ release. Since ghosts were essential to Rena’s plans, she would
never allow that to happen. A nagging piece of conscience told him to tell her
and let her decide, but he couldn’t risk it. They had waited over a hundred and
fifty years to be released from their purgatory and Rena was the closest they
had ever been. She simply had to do it.

Somehow, he would make it happen. He owed them that.

Rena leaned with her back against one of the dining room
windows and stared hard at her friend. “Val. I’m not going to let you tell me
it can’t be done.”

“It can’t be done.”

She ground her teeth and stalked back to the table. Putting
both hands on the dark wooden surface, she scowled. “I said, don’t tell me
that.”

Valerie sat back in her chair and clasped her hands. “Look,
I know how important this is, but unless we can find a way to drill through
this stone that will take less time, there is no way you will be able to open
until next year.”

“My finances won’t make it until next year. I have to get
this place up and running by fall and I’d still be missing the entire summer
tourist season.” She dropped her head in defeat, a familiar sensation.

Valerie placed her hand on hers. “I know, kid. I’m doing the
best I can.”

“Can I help?”

Rena turned at the sound of Synn’s deep voice, loving the
way it reverberated through her like a well-played bass cello, chasing away her
inadequate reality. He stood leaning against the doorway of the dining room in
a pair of tight, muscle-defining tan leggings and a loose white shirt. Very
casual and very sexy.

At her inspection of his person, he returned the favor and
she wished she’d left her hair down instead of in the clip she’d thrown it in.
Her jeans and baggy sweatshirt didn’t exactly say “sexy” either.

Synn strode toward them to peer over Valerie’s shoulder at
her list of tasks. “What is it that is causing you trouble?”

Valerie glanced at him, and Rena had to smack down a little
green envy bug at the attention he paid her best friend. She should be
grateful. Valerie could be doing a dozen other jobs right now instead of
helping her with this bed-and-breakfast project.

Valerie circled two items on her list and pointed with her
pen. “These are our major projects, updating the running water and adding
electricity. The last, the electricity, is huge. We have to drill conduits into
these walls for every inch of line we need to feed, and that will take a lot of
time. From the size of this place, I’d say there are literally miles of
conduits we will need.”

Synn stepped back and looked at the walls. Without a word,
he strode over to a brass candlestick set upon a built-in shelf and pulled it
down. The wall moved.

She and Valerie scrambled to see inside.

Synn swept his arm toward the opening. “Will this help?”

Grabbing her flashlight off the table, Valerie walked
through. Rena followed.

“We’ve got a freaking racetrack back here, Rena. Look at
this!”

She did look. It was a narrow hallway built between two
walls, yet in the distance she could see a small window where light spilled
onto the floor. She stepped back and bumped into Synn. “Damn, but you’re
quiet.”

He steadied her with a hand to her shoulder. “These are the
servants’ corridors. They run throughout the Abbey. Can you use these as
conduits?”

Valerie couldn’t have smiled wider. “Of course! We can run
the lines high on the wall so the employees can still use these hallways. Then
all we need to do is drill through the thickness of the walls to where you need
the plugs and lights. It’s perfect.”

Rena dared to hope. “Really? Are you absolutely sure, Val?”

Her friend nodded.

“Yes!” She turned to Synn and gave him a hug. “Thank you so
much. I owe you one.”

He quirked his brow. “I like the sound of that.”

A shiver raced across her skin and deep inside her chest.
She still didn’t know what he thought of her little escapade the night before
and didn’t have the guts to ask. Nope. Not knowing would save her all kinds of
embarrassment. She glanced back at the hidden servants’ corridor. “Hey, wait a
minute. Why would an abbey have a servants’ corridor? Don’t priests or monks
take a vow of poverty or something?”

Synn waited for them to exit, then pulled the candlestick vertical
again and the hidden door closed without a sound. “As I said yesterday, the
name Ashton Abbey is a misnomer. This was always intended to be a Pleasure
Palace for the prince. At one point, over a hundred of his closest friends
lived here with him.”

Valerie sniffed. “Well, so far, I’ve only seen one ghost and
that’s not a very big haunting if you ask me.”

Synn turned his gaze upon Rena. Her body temperature rose at
the knowledge in his eyes, but he addressed Valerie. “You will not remain
disappointed for long. Rena has already—”

The sound of a dish shattering interrupted him. Rena looked
at him and Valerie. “Ghosts?”

He sighed. “That would be Mrs. McMurray. She is frustrated
with her inability to help you after waiting so long to have guests. My guess
is she tried to move something even though she should wait at least a couple
more days. I’ll go look in on her.”

Rena watched Synn’s ass as he strode through the doorway
leading to the kitchen. She barely contained her sigh, but Valerie wasn’t
fooled.

“Ree, are you seriously thinking of pursuing that man?”

She shook her head. “I know, I know. I need to stop falling
for upper-class men.”

Valerie grabbed her arm. “You listen to me, girl. I don’t
know what Bryce told you, but you have twice as much class as he does. But this
guy here? There is something he isn’t telling us. I can feel it in my bones.
Can you wait until we figure out what it is before you rebound into another
relationship?”

“Hey, who said anything about a relationship? I think I need
a good year before trying another one of those. I was thinking more along the
lines of a little rebound sex. I mean, come on, you have to admit, the man is
hot.”

Valerie narrowed her eyes.

“Okay, okay.” She threw her hands up. Valerie was right. She
needed to get control of her sexual interest and focus on her main objective.
No sex until the Abbey was complete. She nodded with assurance as she made the
pact with herself.

Valerie gathered up her pad and pen. “Let’s take a look
across the hall. The downstairs will need to be done first, and I want to see
what I’m up against.”

“Oh shoot, I almost forgot.” Heat suffused her cheeks at the
memory of her nighttime visit. “I think the rooms down here are bedrooms too.
You are never going to believe what I saw last night.”

They strode from the dining room and into the entryway.
Valerie shook her head. “What the hell were you doing up last night? I slept
like the dead after that drive.”

“A ghost woke me.”

Valerie halted at the doorway to the Blue Room. “A ghost?
Really?”

Rena grinned. “No, not really, but when I came downstairs,
there were plenty right in this room.”

They both entered the room at the same time. Rena stopped a
few steps in as Valerie continued through it.

“Where’s the bed?”

Her friend turned from opening a curtain on the front wall.
“What bed?”

Rena stared at the empty space in the middle of the room.
“There was a round bed with blue satin sheets on it in here.”

“Can a bed be ghostly too?”

She shook her head. It appeared too real while the ghosts
were not solid. She strode to the middle of the room and scanned the myriad
settees and fainting couches.

Valerie sat on a settee. “Wow, this is comfortable. This
looks like a parlor to me. The walls in this room have been plastered and left
white. When did you say this place was abandoned?”

She shook her head, still confused by the missing furniture.
“I think around 1861 or so.”

“Well, then this is a parlor. You know, for the ladies to
chat after dinner.”

“Okay.” Could she have imagined the whole episode? Did Synn
see what she did or did he find her in an empty room sitting on a couch? Maybe
she had no reason to be embarrassed. Her excitement at their exploration
resurfaced. “You should see how this room is lit at night.”

Valerie examined the area as only the daughter of the owner
of the largest construction business in Maryland could. “It looks to be lit by
braziers behind these blue stained glass windows. Quite ingenious because it
gives color to the walls, like it is now with the sunlight coming through the
outside window. But at night, it would need two light sources because a fire is
not as bright as the sun.”

“Wow, you are good.”

“No, I’m the best. If you want, we can keep a similar
atmosphere by eliminating the need for the fire and placing frosted spotlights
to shine on the glass from the brazier sides. This would give you a steady blue
glow and free up space in the corridors for the employees.”

Last night the flickering color had been mesmerizing.
Perhaps that had been what gave her the sexual vision she had. After all, she’d
come here after her sex dream, so it made sense. “I think that would be
perfect.”

“Great, and a lot less work. Besides, after the first year,
you can always make changes based on what you like and don’t. Let’s check out
the next room. I want to have a basic idea of what I’ll need before we head
into town.”

Rena nodded, and they moved through the next archway into
another room. This one had purple stained glass, but it contained a stage at
one end with upholstered chairs of various designs set in rows before it, like
a theater.

She ran to the front row and faced Valerie. “Oh, can’t you
see an old-fashioned big band up there with a 1940s-style singer. I could add
cocktail tables and rearrange these chairs, and offer regular entertainment.”

Valerie raised her hand in front of her. “Whoa, whoa, let’s
not get too grand on the first go-through or I’m going to have a hard time
prioritizing. Are you saying you want the stage to have theatrical lighting?”

She grasped her sweatshirt bottom in her hand as she contemplated.
“I see what you mean. I definitely want the purple lighting like the blue, but
I’ll leave the stage to your discretion and our budget. That’s not a high
priority.”

Valerie scribbled on her pad. “Right, got it. Moving on.”

They stepped through another archway and found the library
complete with green stained glass. Rena glanced at the many bookshelves before
walking to the large desk in the corner. “This desk would be great for an
office. I guess I’ll have to choose a room for that so I can pay bills, order
food and hire employees.”

Valerie wrote more notes on her pad. “This feels like a room
for old men and student types.”

Rena wandered over to a nearby bookshelf. “I wonder what
topics they read about in the nineteenth century.” Studying the leather-bound
volumes, she picked one at random and opened it to a middle page. A very good
sketch artist had drawn a man and two women having sex.

She gulped and glanced at Valerie who inspected the
fireplace at the other end of the room. She returned her attention to the
drawing. The man knelt with one woman’s legs wrapped around his waist. She
imagined the thrust he would have in such a position and her body flushed, her
sweatshirt suddenly too warm. The woman lying on her back had another woman
sitting on her face and the artist, to be fair, had drawn an enlarged cutaway
of what happened there. Rena’s pussy warmed at the tongue pictured delving into
the vaginal opening. The woman sitting pulled at the other woman’s nipples in
ecstasy.

“Anything interesting?” Valerie strolled toward her.

She slammed the book closed and stuck it on the shelf. “Uh,
not really.”

“All right, then let’s keep going.”

Rena let her friend go ahead and whipped off her sweatshirt.
As she followed, she glanced back to note where the book had come from then
pulled her attention away. No, she wouldn’t even look.

* * * * *

Synn sat at the kitchen table across from Mrs. McMurray.
Sadie, the cook, was also in the room, but she refused to sit, floating back
and forth in front of the ovens.

“I know you are all anxious to help. Our new guests are
pleased you wish to assist them, but you must wait. If it makes it easier for
you, I suggest you stay hidden for two more days.”

Both ladies shook their heads.

Synn sighed. “Very well. If you want to interact with the
ladies, then you must keep your actions to showing them where items are kept.
Agreed?”

Both women bowed their heads in agreement, but Mrs. McMurray
pointed to him and then to the doorway.

“You want to know if I think we can break the curse with one
of the ladies?”

She nodded solemnly. Sadie stopped to focus on his answer.

He wished to tell them he could, but he wouldn’t give them
false hope. He rubbed the back of his neck before he met their gazes. “I don’t
know. There are indications from Rena that I may be able to complete the
Pleasure Rooms with her, but it is delicate. If I move too quickly, she may
back away or even leave.”

The women gasped in unison, though they made no real sound.
He understood their fear. To have waited this long and have a chance slip by
would be more heartbreaking than to be trapped in the first place. “Hope” was
indeed a Pandora’s box.

He stood. “But you have my word I will do the best I can.
Please keep the others hidden until they have their physicality back. In the
meantime, I will work with the masqueraders at night. That will be all.”

The two women curtsied as he left.

Striding through the Abbey, he searched for his own Pandora.
Picking up his pace, he breezed through the Green, Orange, White and Violet
Rooms. He found her and her friend entering the Black Room. She wasn’t remotely
ready for the nighttime version of this room yet.

He leaned against the archway and enjoyed the rear view of
his soon-to-be lover. She’d discarded the bulky shirt she had on earlier. The
fitted sleeveless shirt she wore now drew his attention to her slender arms and
the curve of her waist. The deep-blue pants hugged her rounded hips and butt as
she bent over to touch the braided rug on the floor. Would her ass be tight?
His cock stirred as images of having sex with her in this room crowded his
mind. He shook his head to clear it. Not yet. “This is the smoking room.”