by Julia London
And in the next moment, the house was plunged into darkness.
“Here’s a flashlight,” Matthew said, finding her hand and thrusting it into her hand. “I’ll go look at the breakers.”
“Matthew, wait—”
But he’d had already gone. Unsteadily, Hillary started for the hallway. She made it as far as the foyer, her whole body trembling with an unearthly fear. “Matthew?” she called out, but the rain made it too hard to hear.
She heard a noise at the door and jerked toward it. The front door flew open, banging against the wall. At the same moment, something brushed past her. Hillary jumped back, knocking up against the wall.
She saw her then, the apparition of a woman with wet hair, rushing up the stairs. Hillary screamed.
“Hillary!” Matthew shouted. She saw the light of his flashlight rushing from the opposite end of the house toward her. But she heard footsteps behind her, too, and bolted for her husband.
“I saw her! I saw her, Matthew—she went up!”
Matthew looked up the stairs. He let Hillary go and raced up, taking the steps two at a time. Hillary ran after him. Matthew marched down the hall to the room at the end of the hall and threw the door open just as another bolt of lightning hit and illuminated the room. Hillary saw what Matthew saw then—the woman hovering above their bed.
She screamed and grabbed his arm; a rush of icy cold hit her squarely in the face, and a sour smell permeated the room. The rain sounded louder, and Hillary looked to the windows. “Look!” she cried, pointing. The windows were open.
Matthew started for the window, but as he moved, an icy cold invaded Hillary’s body, passing through her. She gasped at the sensation; in the next moment, she suddenly felt on fire. Matthew whirled around and looked at her. His chest was heaving with his breath. His ravenous gaze raked over her and that thing, that hot, lusting thing, was swirling through Hillary, and she held out her hand to her husband. He dropped his flashlight and walked to her in the dark, taking her face in his hands, kissing her hard on the lips.
He lifted his head and pressed his forehead to hers. “I want you,” he said, his voice deep. “Now. This moment. Say that you want me, Hillary. Say it.”
“I want you. Desperately.” She looked at his mouth, his lips. He was a powerfully magnetic, desirable man. “Make love to me, Matthew,” she moaned.
Matthew grabbed her up in his arms. His lips found hers as he stooped to pick her up, moving to the bed and depositing her there. The ghosts, the storm, the lights—everything ceased to be of importance. Nothing mattered but this, of knowing her husband again.
Matthew crushed her to him as if he was afraid she would fly away if he let go. Hillary didn’t recognize them—the passion, so absent from their marriage in the last months, flared and erupted between them. The touch of his lips jolted her every bone. She was scorching with need and grabbed for him, filling her hands with his flesh. They quickly removed their clothing, desperate to feel each other’s skin, clinging to the warmth of their lips.
The staccato of the rain seemed to grow; it thrashed the house as hunger thrashed between Hillary and Matthew, all coming together in a perfect storm of sensation.
Hillary’s heart pumped furiously; she eagerly explored his mouth with hers, his body with her hands as if she’d never known it, her fingers dragging through his hair, stroking his face, cupping his chin.
Matthew’s mouth moved over her, exploring, as his hands caressed her. His body moved lower, his lips searing her skin in their wake. He took her breast in his mouth and a white-hot shiver of anticipation shimmered down her spine. His hand swept the swell of her hips, and he pushed the hard ridge of his erection against her.
Hillary’s breath grew ragged.
Matthew’s hand slid down her leg, to her ankle. He lifted her leg and put it on his shoulder, kissing the inside of her knee. With his other hand, he caressed the soft flesh of her inner thigh, then sank his fingers into her folds and began to stroke her, driving Hillary to a madness she she’d never felt like this.
She fought for breath as Matthew transported her from Whitstone House, from the rain; from everything but the carnal pleasure he was giving her. She could feel the pleasure building in her, groaning with the intensity of it. His strokes grew fevered, his eyes intent on hers as he watched her succumb to his touch.
“Matthew,” she said, her voice rough and hoarse and strange to her own ears.
He whispered something, words she couldn’t grasp, as he moved his hand so intimately between her legs. And just as her body began to shatter, he thrust into her. Hillary cried out with the exquisite sensation, arching into him. She felt the waves of pleasure spilling over her, through her, until Matthew cried out, too, his body shuddering into hers.
In that moment, she knew what it meant to be one, to be loved by her husband. All her doubts about their marriage evaporated. Their lovemaking was surreal, ethereal, and powerful. It was, quite simply, the best lovemaking of her life. She stroked Matthew’s head at her breast as they both sought their breath, slowly swimming to the surface of some very deep emotions.
Matthew lifted his head and looked at her. Something swam between them, something intoxicating and uniting. “That was different,” she whispered.
“That was of some other plane, baby,” he agreed, and kissed her.
The rain continued to fall, lashing at the windows and stirring the trees wild with it, but Hillary and Matthew slept in each other’s arms, oblivious. They didn’t fear the apparitions. They both knew, in that way of knowing those things, that the ghosts were gone.
Matthew and Hillary never saw the man or woman, or felt the strangely unsettling energy in the house again. They finished their work on the house and headed back to the States, their marriage revitalized.
Two months later, Mrs. Browning sold the Whitstone House for two million pounds.
Matthew had enjoyed the work on the Whitstone House so much that he opened a renovation business and left banking behind. He began to renovate houses that Hillary would sell. Every once in awhile, Hillary and Matthew talked about what had happened in England the night of the storm, and the feeling of being inhabited by something unworldly. They privately joked about their ghosts, yet they never mentioned what had happened in England to anyone else.
But every time it stormed, they would look at one another and smile, and make love with the energy of two lovers who had waited one hundred years for that very moment.
The End
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