by Dean Cole
But it was as if I had been possessed. Possessed by a horny devil. He’d had a taste, he wanted more, and he was intent on getting it. Will lifted his arms as the shirt reached his underarms, allowing me to pull it over his head and toss it with the other clothes piled beside the bed.
I ogled his naked torso in the atmospheric light, the sprinkling of wiry hairs growing in the middle of his chest, the nipples dark and erect. His olive skin was silky and flawless. With a sexual assertiveness I didn’t know I had I pushed him onto the pillow, and, as he was reclining backwards, climbed on top of him, slipping between his legs. The tables had turned. Wide-eyed, looking up at me, Will gulped the words, ‘Wasn’t expecting that.’
I was about to go in for another kiss when the lamp began to flicker on and off again, distracting me. ‘Why’s it doing that?’ I whispered.
‘Faulty wiring?’ Will offered.
The bulb started to flicker faster. It buzzed and flashed until there was a loud pop and an explosion of breaking glass. Will and I broke apart, scrambling to the other side of the bed to avoid flying glass. Then there was silence, punctuated only by the sound of our startled breaths. But not for long …
Another noise came from the shadows. Movement on the floorboards. Broken shards skittered across the floor, as if accidentally kicked by an unseen foot. One of the boards creaked. More silence. Was that breathing I could hear? The air became cold. Colder. Mist came out of my mouth. Then I could feel myself getting warmer. The thing, whatever the hell it was, was moving away. And then it was gone.
Other than moonlight glinting off shards of shattered bulb on the bedside table, the room was pitch dark. I glanced around, still wary of anything lurking in the shadows. Will was trying to see through the gloom too, squinting at the lamp in disbelief. But he was so drunk he’d probably forget about all of this come morning. I wouldn’t, though.
Shame hit me. What was I thinking behaving like that? Sure, people get off with strangers all the time, do regrettable things while driven by irresistible impulses. But I’m not your average person. I’m Quentin Strange. I make celibacy an art form. Did I have to behave like such a … man slut.
The whole thing, just like this sodding cursed room, felt wrong. I had to escape while I still had some dignity left. I clambered off the bed, cursing when I trod on one of Will’s boots. I’d almost reached the door when a faraway boom and crack broke the silence.
I froze. Stopped there in front of a Georgian Chippendale Will’s motorbike helmet was sitting on, my heart, already accelerating at a runaway rate, kicking into overdrive.
‘Fireworks?’ Will said stupidly.
I shook my head. ‘A gunshot.’
In response to this Will scrambled over the covers, but misjudging the location of the edge of the bed in the darkness, he pitched forward and crashed to the floor with a bone-crunching thud.
‘Fuck — OW!’ he yelped, before I saw his silhouette rise from the floor. He limped to the window and peered out at the driveway where he must have thought the noise had sounded from.
‘It came from the back of the building,’ I said.
‘Turn the light on.’
I flicked a switch and sconces dotted around the walls lit the room. Will rummaged through the pile of clothes until he found his t-shirt. He wrestled it on as he rushed around the bed, searching for his shoes. The wounded toe appeared to have miraculously healed, and even the drunkenness looked like it was dissipating, the gunshot shocking him into panic mode.
‘I’ll go and investigate,’ he said, knotting the lace of his boot. He snatched his phone off a chest of drawers.
‘Shouldn’t we find someone instead? That bloke who stays in the house overnight to keep watch on the guests. What’s his name? Rufus?’
‘Of course I’m going to do that. Do you think I’m stupid enough to put myself at risk? And I’ll call the police too if I have to. A lot of folks on rural land have guns, but robberies are common too.’
A robbery to add to a dark spirit being let loose on the place? God was having fun with us this evening.
Will eased the door open, checking the corridor for sounds before giving me a nod and slipping out. He looked comical in just boxer shorts wearing the boots, but modesty isn’t high on your priorities when you’re off to investigate a potential crime being committed.
Alone, I felt vulnerable. Useless. I needed to act. Through the window I could see land stretching far into the distance. For the first time I felt frightened not by Hilderley Manor’s ghosts, but by the remoteness of our location. You’re vulnerable in a remote place, where people can’t hear your cries for help. No one knows that more than me. I had been here before. On a lake. And I hadn’t acted then. Well, not this time.
I opened the door and followed Will out into the corridor. He was nowhere in sight. The corridor was empty, lit by sconces lining the walls. One of them flickered on and off. A cool breeze coming from the direction of the staircase told me Will had reached the front door. But I heard no voices. No commotion.
The door to the room across from me was open, the lights off inside, a window that overlooked the rear of the manor visible. I dashed inside, rushed over to the window and looked out at the garden. Without my specs I had to squint at first, but lights dotted on either side of the gravel path guided my eyes to the caretaker’s cottage. Stan Crouch was standing at the entrance, his face illuminated by two lanterns hanging over the stable door. And in his hand he was holding a shotgun.
I watched him for a moment. Watched the shifty eyes redolent of a man with much to hide flit around the garden. Stunned by what I was looking at, I almost didn’t see the other people descending the steps down to the courtyard. Will had found Rufus and it looked like they were on their way to ask Stan if he knew where the gunshot might have come from.
Stan, spotting them approaching, went back inside the cottage. A second later he was back, minus the weapon. He waved at the two men. Waved. A gesture that was noticeably out of character for a man who had been acting like the guests were pests he’d like to stamp out up until now. I’m no psychologist, but I understand enough about human behaviour to know when someone is putting on an act to hide their guilt.
Will was safe at least. But something else was now troubling my mind. I leaned closer to the window, the better to read the caretaker’s face. My breath misted the cool glass. ‘Just what are you up to?’ I whispered.
- CHAPTER TEN -
The Face in the Cellar
I’M JUST ABOUT to lose the towel and step in the shower when there’s a knock on the bathroom door. I open it to find Will standing there in t-shirt and chequered boxer shorts, hair tousled like he’s just rolled out of bed, eyes sober as they stare intently at mine. There’s something else in that stare, I notice. A devilish glint. When he doesn’t speak, I blink.
‘Erm, hello?’
He just smirks. The cocky gesture makes me feel a little nervous. I swallow.
Then it’s all so fast. He lunges forward and grabs me, kicking the door shut with his foot. One hand cups my face as I find myself walking backwards, my bare feet slipping on the moist floor tiles. My naked back meets the cold, perspiring tiles on the wall.
‘Will, what the —’
My words are cut off by his mouth diving in to silence them. The kiss is firm, purposeful, intense. A release. My body relents to the madness of the situation, to Will’s determination to get what he wants. That thing being me.
His hands move from my face to my chest, the tips of his fingers raking my skin. Before long they’re near my navel, and deft fingers are untying the knot in the towel. The modesty covering piece of fabric slips away, pooling at my feet.
Will’s hips press into mine as the kiss becomes firmer, his warm, wet tongue exploring my mouth. When his lips pull away I’m surprised to feel my mouth trying to find them again, begging for more. They work their way southward, short breaths heavy, oh so heavy, against my neck.
In the intoxication of my aro
usal, I see how much I have craved and yet resisted this for so long. But now that it’s here, my body doesn’t fight it, surrendering completely.
Will grips my shoulder and spins me around. My hands slap against the wall. I stand there with my cheek pressed against the cold tile, my fingers splayed, blood pumping through my veins, my breath heavy. I know Will is removing his underwear, and I’m ready …
‘Quentin Strange!’
My eyes flipped open at the shrill voice exclaiming my name. Kat, draped in a bathrobe, her hair coiled in a towel like an ice cream whip, blurred into focus at the foot of the bed. But her eyes weren’t fixed on me, they were fixed on my groin, and her mouth was wide in a look of horror. Following her gaze, it became clear why: my penis was currently standing to attention, creating a teepee in the bed covers.
My hand shot beneath the duvet and I scooted up to the headboard, pulling the covers with me, a vain attempt to preserve any modesty I had left. But it was too late. The sinking feeling in my gut told me I’d be struggling to live this moment down for a very long time to come.
My back against the headboard, the covers bunched to my chin, I waited, unblinking, for further reproach from my startled bedfellow. I knew my face was beetroot red from mortification. I’d also been called by my full name, a moniker I hadn’t heard since I was waist height. And it had brought about the same fear it had struck in me then.
But no punishment was forthcoming. Instead Kat shuffled on the spot, her legs unsure which direction her brain wanted to take. Finally she made up her mind and hastened over to her side of the bed. She knelt down in front of her suitcase and began stowing away the toiletries clutched against her chest.
The awkwardness that followed was palpable. I wished a great hole would open in the floor and swallow me up. I trawled my brain for something, anything, that might break the tension. But how do you respond to your most intimate appendage being exposed in its most explicit state? Apologise? Make a joke about it? That’s surely the first time a gay guy has been that happy to see you. Has to be a compliment, right? Kat broke the ice first.
‘I’ll pretend I didn’t see that.’
In a pointless attempt to save face, I replied, ‘We are staying in a shared room.’
‘Yes, well, that won’t be happening again.’
She rose from the floor, carried a selection of clothes over to the changing screen and slipped behind it. The bathrobe fell over the top a second later.
‘I want you to take some exterior shots of the manor today,’ she said. ‘Explore the rest of the building, too. See if there’s anything of interest you can find to shoot. I found out there’s access to the roof terrace. Maybe there’s something up there. There’s probably a cellar, too. Look for things particularly unusual or creepy. Especially creepy. Shouldn’t be hard in this godforsaken place.’
‘Does Mr Mendy usually request this many photos for an article?’ I asked the dark oak latticework of the changing screen, which was giving away Kat’s movements but retaining her modesty.
‘You collect a ton of images to get a handful you can use. It’s just the nature of the editing process. Plus, the reference material will help me with my writeup.’
Kat reemerged in tight pants, a white shirt and a velvety maroon blazer, the towel still coiled atop her head. She eyed me heedfully as she grabbed her boots from where she’d left them at the foot of the bed and slipped them on. But there was no danger of her finding me in any more compromising positions. The bed covers remained clenched to my chest, covering my now very deflated privates.
‘What will you be doing this morning?’ I asked.
She unravelled the towel and her ordinarily silky locks fell to her shoulders like damp rat tails. ‘I’m interviewing the location researcher, Annie, about the history of Hilderley Manor. I thought over what you said about scaring the crap out of the reader. Hopefully there’s a dark legend surrounding the place I can elaborate on. Something grizzly to really put the shivers up the readers.’ Kat clutched her chest and made a high-pitched noise of excitement. Her eyes twinkled dreamily. ‘Who’d have thought sweet little me would have such a flair for this horror gig? I’m totally channelling Anne Rice and Shirley Jackson right now. Providing those creepy ghosts stay well away from me, that is.’ She used the towel to squeeze out the remaining moisture from her hair, looking smitten with her mental fantasy.
I didn’t quite remember having that conversation. Nor would I have used the adjective ‘sweet’ and Kat in the same sentence. Nor was I sure that writing an article for a magazine distributed by the local rag put you in the echelons of the literary horror genre. Nor was I willing to burst her self-aggrandising bubble.
I said nothing as I watched her carry a hairdryer and curling tongs over to the dresser. In half an hour she’d transformed her locks into something straight out of a hair product commercial. Next was makeup, which appeared to be more of an art than a routine, and one at which she was very skilled. Looking pleased with the final result, she grabbed her handbag and left to join the others for breakfast, leaving me alone in the same position on the bed. It was so much simpler being the male of the species, I thought vaguely, erection mishaps or not.
Autumn rays shone through the misted panes of the window. Hot water gurgled through the radiator pipes. The smell of fried food and freshly-brewed coffee drifted in through the door. Others were up and about in the building. But along with having no appetite, I felt reluctant to go downstairs and join them. Join someone.
Erotic dreams. It was so … adolescent. And even worse after what had happened last night. Kissing a straight man I’d known barely forty eight hours. Will might have looked like an Adonis straight out of the pages of a fashion mag, but with behaviour like this I was on a fast track to becoming a brazen hussy, or whatever the male equivalent of one of those is.
At least, I assumed Will was straight. That was only because of his straightforward mien, the rugged edge he exuded, that slight kink in his nose that indicated he’d had a few punch ups in his youth (and with that candid tongue was it any wonder?) — and the best looking ones are usually straight. But I couldn’t deny it: men just didn’t kiss other men on the lips unless they were a little bit bent. Was my gaydar off-kilter after so many years of being out of use? Did he like women and men? I should have asked Kat what she thought, especially when she’d been so spot on guessing my ‘preferences.’
On the plus side, depending how I looked at it, at least normal dream function had returned, telling me I didn’t need to make an immediate appointment with a neurologist. There was last night’s nightmare. Not the most pleasant of visions, but the first dream I’d had in weeks that wasn’t a memory about Elliot. And the naughty dream I had just woken from. That certainly wasn’t a memory from my past. Was it forgoing the pills that had caused it to return? Nah. Too soon. But it would explain the return of my libido. Come to think of it, I hadn’t had as many of those crippling headaches. Or did it have something to do with the house itself?
A cold shower and brush-up banished these questions, and quarter of an hour later I was joining Kat in the dining hall, the DSLR around my neck, Ethereal tucked under my arm. The weather had taken a turn for the worse and in fear of getting the camera wet taking the exterior shots Kat had requested, I planned on reading some more in the sitting room until the rain passed. I started having cold showers not long after Elliot’s death, remembering what he’d told me about cold water’s benefits. The showers increased my emotional resilience and improved my immune response. And the one I’d just had had brought about a lift in my mood, evident by the increased spring in my step and renewed appetite. Unfortunately, all that was dampened the second I spotted Will sitting at the table over Kat’s shoulder.
Affability, it seemed, was not on the breakfast menu this morning. Will, avoiding my gaze, got out of his chair and fled from the room like a man in a very deliberate hurry. He even abandoned his buttered crumpets.
I sat down across from Kat, star
ing over my shoulder as the hem of the grey trench-coat billowed out of sight.
‘Do you think I’m getting smoker’s lines?’
‘What?’ I said, distant, listening to Will’s footsteps tapering through the hallway. I turned back to the table and saw Kat staring into a hand mirror, stroking the outer edges of her lips with a frown.
She rolled her eyes and dropped the mirror in her handbag. ‘Never mind.’
Coffee was poured and the catering staff wheeled trolleys of food from table to table. But my appetite had vanished as fast as Will had left the room. I sipped black coffee, grabbed an apple and took off for the sitting room with Ethereal. But the cosy retreat I had stumbled upon yesterday wasn’t to offer the solitude I hoped it would. Someone was in there. And there was a problem.
Mrs Brown was sitting on one of the plush sofas, sniffling into a handkerchief, her face red and blotchy. She jumped to her feet when she saw me and rushed to where a trolley full of cleaning products was standing in front of a handsome side table. With her head dipped low she began wheeling the trolley towards me, heading for the door. ‘Heavens, this hay fever will be the death of me,’ she said with a snuffly chuckle.
Hay fever in October? The tactic was fooling no one. I blocked the doorway before she had chance to make her escape. ‘You’ve been crying. What’s the matter?’
Her wide, bloodshot eyes wandered sheepishly to mine. For a moment it looked like she was going to say something, but then her eyes returned to the floor and whatever had been about to leave her mouth remained unspoken.
‘Is it Mr Crouch?’ I guessed. ‘I heard you two arguing yesterday. The window was open.’
I didn’t expect the reaction that followed. Mrs Brown’s shoulders curled forward like an autumn leaf and strangled whimpers burst forth from her chest. Concerned, I took hold of her arm and guided her back to the sofa. She looked as vulnerable as a small child as she lowered herself onto the chintz upholstery. I sat down beside her, placing the apple and Ethereal near my feet.