A cruel smile came to his mustachioed lips. For all his digging around fifteen years ago to locate Lilith LaFey after the robbery and murders, the files over at DCSF had been locked up tight, a veritable dead end. The electronic age made it so very easy to breach protocols now.
“Gotcha,” he whispered mockingly, his fingertips brushing along the photo.
Chapter 5: Promissis (Promises)
Mallory laid a piping hot baking tray full of butterscotch scones on the kitchen counter to cool. Sister Eileen and the others would be here in a few hours for their bridge night. Meanwhile, Dawn was upstairs getting ready for a night out in Harrogate with some girls from the school. The stomping of the young woman’s feet through the ceiling caused Mallory to roll her eyes upwards, figuring Dawn was dancing around like she used to at eighteen.
Removing her oven glove and hanging it back on its small hook under the spices cupboard, she picked up a small, serrated knife to cut the scones. Mallory paused, hearing the faint sound of Dawn singing along to a song, the words of which she couldn’t make out from downstairs. Yes, definitely dancing… and singing.
“…bad but I’m perfectly good…”
Curious, Mallory moved out into the hall.
“...Sex in the air I don’t care I love the…”
Creeping up the stairs a little, she could hear more clearly.
“…And stones may break my bones, but Mal-ehr-ree excites me, na na na come on!”
Awe struck at the sound of these lyrics coming from Dawn’s mouth, Mallory darted to a concealed spot on the landing. Her jaw dropped at the sight that met her eyes.
In the bedroom was Dawn, clad only in a black bra and panties and straightening her long hair. She kept singing loudly and obliviously to “S&M” by Rihanna, which blasted from the iPod hooked up to portable speakers. With the aid of very strong concealer, she had successfully managed to cover the numerous love bites, which had been so visible on her skin previously.
Mallory watched, entranced. Dawn finished with the hairstyling equipment, and thrust her breasts out in time to the music, sashaying across the large bedroom to reach her dress. She was still unaware she had an audience.
Shimmying into a black thigh length dress, Dawn turned to see Mallory sneaking to sit down on the bed.
Looking down at the floor, Mallory sighed primly, “You aren’t going out in that dress, Dawn.” An ominous laugh then escaped her lips.
Dawn opened her mouth to protest, wondering for an awful moment if Mallory was actually forbidding it.
Mallory stood up, delectable darkness clouding her thoughts. “Face the wall,” she ordered, her tone brooking no argument.
Bewildered, Dawn obeyed anyhow, with a giggle to boot.
Sliding her hands onto Dawn’s hips, Mallory’s fingers pressed lightly against the thin layer of flesh there as she rested her chin on the younger woman’s shoulder.
“How much do I excite you Dawn?” she asked, her voice husky as she ran her hands up the front of the thin fabric to hover over where pert breasts spilled over the bodice. The proximity allowed her exhalations to waft over Dawn’s ear, and she was delighted when her question elicited a shudder.
“Um…” Dawn stuttered. Her nipples tightened traitorously inside of her bra, and rubbed against the hands caressing them.
Deciding it would be a shame to ruin the effort Dawn had put into her appearance, Mallory moved her hands away, tracing fingertips slowly between Dawn’s bare shoulder blades, earning slight moan in response. “When you get home, I’m going to rip that dress off and take you on the floor, understood?”
Leaning her forehead against the cool wall, Dawn laid a palm flat against it and groaned. “I don’t want to wait…”
At the abrupt loss of the warm body behind her, she spun around and sulked at the sight of Mallory leaving the bedroom.
“Tease!” Dawn called at her retreating figure.
“Says the girl wearing the ‘fuck me’ dress!” Mallory’s retorted with a grin as she headed down the stairs.
Once Dawn shoved on a pair of strappy heels, she galloped down the stairs after her. “So what time is the God Squad coming?” she asked, clicking her way into the kitchen a few moments later.
She lifted herself backwards up onto the kitchen counter across from Mallory, and watched as another batch of scones was lifted from the oven. "There's enough to feed an army!"
“Not for another couple of hours,” Mallory informed her while spooning equal amounts of jam and cream for the scones into separate containers. Oddly comforted by the gentle domesticity of the moment, she continued the line of questioning - not to be controlling, but more to reassure herself that Dawn would indeed return. At that thought, her eyebrows scrunched together. “What time do you have to be in Harrogate?”
“Not for at least an hour. I’d best call the cabbie soon, though.” Dawn replied. Hopping down, her heels made a loud ‘clack!’ on the wood floor.
Spooked by the noise, Mallory swore as the spoon she was using fell from her hand into the jam tureen. A blob of strawberry flavoured jam launched from the counter to splatter all over her white oxford shirt and chest. “That’s all I fucking need,” she grumbled, turning to go upstairs and change. Finding something restraining her, she looked down to see Dawn’s hand on her wrist in a vice like grip.
Leaning forward, Dawn smiled before tugging the edge of her shirt down to reveal the area where the jam had fallen. Both her hands slid up Mallory’s back, and she moved forward to lick the jam from the exposed flesh.
She didn't break eye contact with Mallory though, and the brashness paired with the ever present blush on the young woman's cheeks was an intoxicating combination. Every day since Dawn had come to the cottage, she'd opened up a little bit further, and glowed a little bit more. It was enough to make Mallory wonder if her former student thought she was now the teacher, and the need to show dominance snaked its way into her mind. “Minx!” she admonished with a hiss, her chest and arms erupting into goose flesh.
Grinning like a cat that got the cream, Dawn stood back up. “Pot, kettle, black,” she sassed back.
'Oh yes,' Mallory mused internally, and bit back a frown at the insubordination. It wasn't really fair for her to expect Dawn to keep up the standards of respect shown in the classroom, but truth be told, she enjoyed it when the girl at least tried. The frown escaped when she realized that she almost enjoyed the show of defiance more. After all, had she not spent months coaxing Dawn out of her shell of misery and despondency?
That reminder would serve her well in the next weeks, if the events which she suspected would occur did indeed come to pass.
_____________________________________
“Jesus, is this the only nightclub in Yorkshire?” Felicity shouted over the thundering beat of the music. “Half the school is in here!”
“As long as Sister-mental-case doesn’t show up and raid the place,” Lisa Harper added, twirling the straw in her fizzy drink.
“It’s not like she could do anything anyway!” Dawn raised her voice over a particularly loud part of the song. “We’re less than two weeks away from our final exams. School is technically over.”
“Yeah, but we’re still boarding there until the last exam,” Felicity reminded them. “I don’t want to piss those bitches off anymore than I already have, after getting caught at that rave the other night.”
Lisa turned her attention to Dawn. “Speaking of which…where did you go the other night when the rave was busted? We saw you legging it off into the woods.”
Dawn jumped up as the next set blasted out from the club’s sound system. “I love this song!” she announced, grateful for the distraction. Her classmates watched suspiciously as she hurried down the steps from the alcove where they were sitting.
Lisa’s face was particularly pleased at the obvious avoidance tactic. “I heard she spent the night with one of the teachers,” she blatantly informed the group of girls as soon as Dawn was out of earshot.
/>
The eyes of several classmates widened and they all gathered closer. “Where’d you hear that?!” Serena Windsor gasped, craning forward.
“I over heard Sister Amos and Sister Williams discussing it outside the staff room the other day when I was on my way to the library to study," Lisa shrugged nonchalantly, but grinned.
“Overheard…” Felicity snorted. “As in: stopped to listen.”
“Fair enough,” Lisa acknowledged. “But, they were talking about a student who was clearly carrying on with her teacher, and how it was a living disgrace!” she crowed.
“Where’s your evidence it was Dawn they were talking about?” Serena jabbed, while crossing her arms. Intending to take law at University, she questioned Lisa in a manner worthy of a practiced lawyer.
“Maybe it was about Miss Sørensen,” someone else suggested, referring to their beautiful Physical Education teacher.
“Sørensen?” Felicity scoffed, but then looked thoughtful. “I heard she was caught snogging Miss Moore last Christmas in an empty classroom.”
“Moore and Sørensen lezzing it up?” Serena screeched, not noticing Dawn's arrival back from the dance floor. The happy smile on her face faded as she caught what Serena had said.
Felicity puffed triumphantly at the view of Dawn’s scowl. “Yeeeeees, well. They probably got into a shite-ton of trouble!” she speculated lewdly.
A pang of vicious jealousy stabbed at Dawn’s heart at the implication. Sure, Mallory had a life before her, but Miss Sørensen? Dawn had fancied the sexy Norwegian the moment she had laid eyes on her in gym class, but that feeling lasted all of two hours before she’d entered Mallory’s classroom for the first time.
Feeling the irrational sting of tears in her eyes, Dawn tried to ignore the wild emotions swirling around inside her. Her mind needing answers, she just wanted to go back to Mallory’s cottage. She wanted to go home.
Home...
_____________________________________
Mallory huffed, her hand of cards surely God's way of mocking her. Hearts, straight across the board. All major cards, it would be tough to make any minor bids without giving herself away. If someone bid another suit, her hand would be void.
The cottage bustled with all manner of women this evening – nuns, other educators, novitiates, and even some Eucharistic minister ladies from the town. One in their group had brought a child no older than eight months old, and the little thing squalled for attention every so often. Each time, Mallory would wince.
Stuck at the card table with Sister Williams, Sister Eileen, the baby woman – ‘her name is Joan,’ she reminded herself – and the Antichrist in a frilly pink frock and bib, her patience was wearing thin.
The baby cried again, and Joan smiled sweetly at the terrifying little dictator. Standing up, the woman held the infant aloft and made to give it to Mallory. “Would you hold her a minute, Mal… ehm, Miss Moore? I think she’s hungry, and I’ll need to go prepare a bottle.”
Joan nearly tossed the baby at her, ignoring her horrified expression. Unable to refuse, Mallory reached up quickly to hold the babe well away from her. Her alarmed gaze was met with a calculating stare, the baby unable to refuse as well. It also appeared unable to decide whether to smile or wail.
‘Not today, tiny Satan. Not today…’ she growled in her mind, and tried to smile at it. It must have been more of a grimace, because the baby whimpered, but thank heavens did not cry.
Their wide-eyed staring match sent the nuns into gales of laughter. Sister Williams slapped her knee and chortled. “Don’t you look bonny holding a baby, Mallory? I think the little one’s taken quite the shine to you!” she wheezed, falling back into fits of snickering.
Sister Eileen poured some more tea for the table in the interlude, suddenly serious. “Yes, Mallie. You’re nearing thirty soon. When are you going to settle down and have some wee ones of your own, then?”
Just as she was about to answer, Joan returned with the bottle. After hastily handing Lucifer over to her mother, Mallory frowned. “I beg your pardon?” she raised an eyebrow at Sister Eileen. “I don’t like children, you know that.”
“That’s not what I hear,” Sister Williams muttered under her breath.
Joan’s eyes volleyed between the two nuns and the Latin teacher like she was watching a tennis match, and chuckled nervously. “You know, Miss Moore… My brother is single too.” Clearing her throat, she began to bounce her restless child after laying down her card. “He’s the youngest of our family, twenty eight years old. He’s very gentle, and was going to go to seminary before he decided on studying ornithology…”
Observing the card play, Mallory suspected she knew what the group was up to, or at least had an idea of why the poor woman been hustled into playing this round with the “Spinster of North Yorkshire.” Frankly, Joan looked petrified of her, but the nuns must have wheedled her into it.
‘Gentle, indeed! He’s probably queerer than the Queen’s knickers, more like,’ Mallory thought at the woman's description of her brother. But then, that was probably the entire point, and that made her even angrier. Wishing for nothing more than an end to the awkward situation, she laid her last card down quickly, obviously the loser.
Turning slowly towards the woman and the nuns, she felt an icy smile spread across her face, and stood up. “No, thank you. I think we need more tea,” she responded plainly, and gathered the tea carafe to make for the kitchen.
_____________________________________
The alarm she’d set to go off at 1:00 AM to warn her of the nightclub’s last call and Dawn’s impending arrival blared from the bedroom, and Mallory groaned. She was stuck in the shower, still rinsing the blasted dark brown dye from her hair. Her dishwater blonde roots had begun to show, and Sister Eileen had reminded her not so politely on her way out that slovenliness was not the way to attract a gentleman. It was the most obvious code for 'do your damned hair,' if ever she heard one.
After the guests left at 11:45, she had made a quick stop at the linen cupboard to fish out the requisite disguise and apply it, and then cleaned the kitchen. At 12:30, the insufferably stinky liquid had finished its job, and she hopped in the shower.
Mallory even shaved her legs for the second consecutive time in a week, and the reason why made her smile.
There was brown dye water everywhere on the white bath tile, and it made her inner-control freak twitch. Shutting off the faucet, she grabbed the squeegee that hung on the wall and wiped down the shower walls until satisfied.
She managed to exit the bathroom and wrap a towel around herself just as the squealing of brakes and crunch of gravel outside alerted her to the cab’s arrival. Scuttling towards the bedroom, she hid the dustbin with the box of dye in the back of her walk-in wardrobe, just as the door to the room creaked open to reveal a very put-out Dawn.
Grabbing at a shirt to rough it up a bit, Mallory stepped out of the wardrobe to fold it again in an attempt to look normal. “Rough night in Harrogate?” she inquired crisply.
Dawn huffed and sat on the end of the bed to kick off her strappy heels. “You’ve no idea,” she groaned, flopping back against the mattress. Doing so made her already short dress hike up higher on her thighs, and Mallory bit her lip at the sight.
“Felicity and Lisa went on and on about how some student is apparently shacking up with her teacher and living in sin. It’s all the rage in the hallways at school, apparently.” Dawn continued to grouse gloomily. “And then to top it all off, she had the nerve to say that you and Miss Sørensen were snogging last Christmas in a utility room or some nonsense!”
Mallory’s eyes widened as she sat on the bed next to Dawn, tracing a finger down the valley of the girl’s breasts that had nestled so nicely while laying down. “It wasn’t the utility room. Miss Sørensen accosted me quite drunkenly in a classroom,” she corrected, a wry grin lighting up her face as she remembered. “Too much eggnog.”
Blue eyes brightened at that. “So, it wasn’t wanted?�
��
Pursing her lips, Mallory lowered her towel and threw it in the clothes basket. Elisabeth Sørensen was one of her dearest friends, and had been for some time, but she didn't elaborate on that to allay the immature jealousy on display. “No, dear one. Is that what had you in such a dither?”
With a slightly numb expression, Dawn nodded from her place on the bed. Her gaze grew excited as it followed the trails of wetness from Mallory's hair and onto her naked flesh.
Intent on changing the subject once and for all, Mallory was glad to see her distracted so easily. "I seem to recall promising you something very specific if you were a good girl, and arrived back promptly from your dancing. Were you good?” she purred, dragging the spaghetti straps of Dawn’s dress slowly over pale freckled shoulders.
“Y-Yes. I was good,” Dawn panted as she felt her dress being tugged lower and lower still to reveal her lace-clad breasts.
Peccatum in Carne: Sins of the Flesh (The Three Sins of Mallory Moore Book 1) Page 6