Bedtime Confessions (The Chambermaid's Tales - Short Stories)

by Sarah Michelle Lynch

  He beckoned in a monotone voice, “Keys, Madam,” and I gave them to him, holding my hand out without thinking. He jumped in the car and drove away, taking my top-of-the-range machine to the back of the house, where I imagined a garage of some sort may reside.

  Clearing away the unsightliness, I thought.

  My vehicle would have probably cast a dark shadow on what was otherwise a perfectly sculptured, manicured house kept but not inhabited. Strange.

  I stood and looked at the property. Limestone, perhaps. Tall plate glass windows shined to perfection, glinting against the springtime sun. The front double door was a deep-red mahogany, all brass handles and a large lion-paw knocker.

  I reached the front door and prepared to knock, taking a deep breath. This was certainly an imposing residence if ever there were one. Before I even tapped the knocker, however, the door opened inwards and an equally stuffy housemaid opened up.

  Some time later, I found myself in a room made for purpose. All around me was dark wood and chandeliers, high ceilings, candelabra and gold mirrors. A four-poster bed that was already fitted with a harness and pulleys. The man, with dark hair and a handsome face, was spread-eagled over the bed. He wanted to be whipped fearsomely.

  I used the riding crop first to warm him up. I hit, thrashed and slapped him with the weapon. He hissed and whined. Next I pulled out a flogger and it drew a bit of blood. I watched the skin of his back easily slice open, yet he continued to need the lash. He hungered for it, groaning right from the pits of his stomach. This man wasn't in the mood for any kind of sexual contact. He wanted punishing and as I hit him, I felt my stomach baulk at what I was carrying out. This was enjoyable for neither of us, not really. He was asking for pain, not pleasure; for redemption, for something wild to be thrashed out of him. His howls echoed through the room and probably throughout the rest of the house. I felt sure the expressionless, emotionless looks those servants had given me were certainly evidence that they were versed in their Master's penchant for the dark arts. The flagellation of one's outer skin. This man needed immolation to the nth degree.

  Some instinct of mine told me to get it over with and leave, but his demands were unrelenting. He asked me to clamp his foreskin and his nipples, before flowing electron pulses through his most sensitive parts. I honestly thought I was surplus to requirement. He could have given himself the treatment, or, he could have gotten a servant to do it just as easily. I was just there, receiving his demands for more pain, more fierceness. He eagerly forced my hand to execute delivery. Like I said, I really wasn't comfortable with it. But I just kept telling myself… this will be over soon and that will be it. I shall be free of this work and free of this curse to love a man who doesn't love me. I knew we had the flights booked and the Jamaican villa was waiting for us, but something, would not be quietened inside me. I felt like I was in the devil's den and could not escape. I wanted to leave that house and go somewhere to wash the filth of it off my skin. All of it… none of it… seemed right.

  When I freed him of his shackles, and when he stood before me naked and scored with lesions of various degrees all over, he looked at me as though renewed. Though he had been broken open and thrashed, he seemed revived. He pulled himself up taller and he appeared to be refreshed rather than wrecked. I really had hurt him. But, he may have absorbed my strikes like Superman absorbs the sun. Rejuvenated.

  “Thank you,” he murmured. He seemed ever so indebted, panting breathlessly. Gazing at me gratefully.

  The man stood naked and yet there was nothing sexual in it. It was purely about his need for nullification. It reminded me then of my lover's similar penchant for such skills as mine. On occasion, my former lover had asked for the same, and it had always seemed to thrill him a little more than I had liked.

  The gentleman walked toward me and for the first time that day, I caught his eyes from a close-up perspective.

  I froze.

  I took a breath.

  I gulped.

  The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end.

  Green eyes.

  Sludgy in the dark light.

  Fanned with long lashes.

  But lifeless.

  These were soulless.

  They resembled eyes I loved.

  But they were devoid of any resemblance of the soul I loved that had these same eyes.

  My lover's eyes.

  I baulked. I tried to hold myself together.

  “Will you help me wash the blood away?” he asked.

  “Of course.”

  We retreated to the en suite and I marvelled at the marble and granite that was everywhere. There was literally only one thing that wasn't constructed from one of those materials and it was the ceiling, which was tiled with white porcelain. So extravagant! A haven worthy of Neptune!

  As the blood swilled down the plughole, I watched it swirl. It irked me. It disgusted me and I felt like hell itself had set up home down that hole in the shower cubicle. I stood and sponged his back down with some anti-bacterial wash and carried out the ceremonial aftercare of his penance, which I had taken in full payment. With every second that passed, I grew more anxious. But I was very aware of hiding who I was. I was very certain that I needed to maintain my composure.

  Yes, this experience was making me more and more ready for retirement.

  Perhaps after some spanking, he was ready to chat. He started opening up, “I bet you wonder why a man like me lives here all alone, don't you? And why I need such treatment?”

  “I am paid to do what you say, that's it.” I really wanted to bolt and run. I was almost 100 per cent sure this was one of my lover's brothers.

  “I say, let's chat,” and he smiled almost innocently.

  “Okay,” I agreed, nodding slowly. My head was refusing to move.

  “I had a family, you know, but they left,” he said, so easily. Just telling a strange woman that! Quite normal for him it seemed!

  “Sorry to hear that,” I said, though I did not really care. I went on to tell him, “A lot of my clients had wives or girlfriends. They decided it wasn't for them. They like to pay for their activities and it makes life simpler.”

  “Indeed, exactly. I am so glad you understand,” and he smiled openly.

  “Not my job to judge,” I said.

  “You know, maybe you can help me…” and he smiled enquiringly. I nodded in return before he commenced, “I hear there's a woman known as the Chambermaid, who services a lot of my friends. But none of them will give me her details. She is apparently the best. Do you know of her, by any chance?”

  He smiled sweetly but malice lay behind those eyes. They were nothing like His. They betrayed the opposite of my lover's soul. The other side of the coin.

  “I hear she is a shy one,” I told him, smiling a little as I sponged the welts on his thighs.

  “I would really like to meet her. Are you sure you don't know her? Or know of anyone who might know her?”

  “No, I am really clueless,” I insisted.

  I gulped the bile down. I was terrified by that point and working on adrenalin.

  None at the agency knew I was the Chambermaid. They only knew I was good at what I did. They only knew me as Lottie, and, that is all they called me by. The Chambermaid was a myth, a legend, a character that swept in and out of hotel rooms. That was all.

  “She seems like she knows her stuff,” I said tentatively, breathing slowly to control my racing pulse. “She seems secretive,” I offered, eyeing him momentarily. I didn't want him to think I was afraid of him. But I was, I really was.

  “She learnt all she knew at the Lodge, apparently. My father was the main figure running it, when he was alive,” he said.

  “Oh, I am sorry, did he die?” I offered apologetically, when really I was scared out of my wits. The Baron looked kind of grave and I guessed his father had died recently.

  “He died, yes. About six weeks ago now,” he said, in his silken, calm tone of voice. He was anything but calming me, however
.

  “I have never been to the Lodge,” I say, feigning ignorance, “though I have heard of it.”

  I thanked my lucky stars that I listened to one of the girls who told me The Baron liked blondes. I had donned a wig that morning, so I resembled Marilyn Monroe. It was my wont to sometimes go in disguise. It made it easier to play the part. It was a pretty good rug too and he hadn't yet glanced at my hair as if to question whether it were fake. I felt sure he did not recognise me.

  “Well, if you do know anything about her and you change your mind, then, let me know. There would be a large reward in it for you.”

  “You are really desperate to find her, aren't you?” I asked.

  “Let's say, she interests me. She seems to have… connections.”

  With that, I knew it was paramount that I left as soon as possible. I helped him into a robe and I spared him some more time for samey chitchat.

  One thought was swirling around my mind the entire time, He's searching for the chambermaid and I don't like the way he looks when he mentions her name. Maybe he knows ‘the chambermaid’ was with… Him.

  It was clear this man was hiding sinister plans and an even more dangerous propensity to exact revenge. I was constantly calling on my abilities to appear the servile waif who was unreadable.

  When at last I helped him into bed, he watched me clear away all the equipment. He studied me carefully.

  “Why do you bleach your hair? It would be better your natural shade. Dark brown?”

  “Yes,” I smiled. I made up some story, “I just love Hollywood glamour, I guess.”

  “Umm, I guess so, pretty lady.”

  He lit a cigar and I passed him a cognac from the drinks cabinet that he had earlier asked me for. He was at peace then. At one. He seemed as gentle as a mouse at times, and as fearsome and untameable as a lion at others. This man irritated every inch of my soul. He upset my hackles with just one breath or one look. I just felt, scared.

  “So, will you be okay if I leave you now? There is another gentleman I must attend to this night.”

  There wasn't. I was dying to get home.

  “Yes, I think I feel satisfied.”

  “Okay, I shall leave you to relax,” I said, and I gathered my things to leave.

  “Just remember, if you know who she is, let me know. Okay? I only want to help her. She can help me greatly. She would be rewarded too. Very well rewarded. She could help me immensely. I'd pay over the odds. Well over. Even just for one night.”

  I wondered whether he was suspicious of me. I wondered. I brushed that terrible feeling away.

  “I really would like to help, but she is so secretive. None of the other girls have ever mentioned her to me. Sorry I cannot be of any more use.”

  “Okay,” he said softly, taking another puff on his cigar.

  I left the house on a cloud of fear and I swished out of there as if I were leaving just any old job. I was as calm as a cucumber. When I was ten miles down the road, I felt safe, finally. I pulled in a lane and parked up the car. I ran up into the middle of an abandoned field. Feeling sure there was nobody around for miles, I screamed at the top of my lungs. I fell on the earth, on my knees. I wept. Every pore shed tears or sweat.

  That thing was his brother.

  The possibilities terrified me.

  Flo mirrors the fear I felt that day. The fear I still carry and obviously exude as I tell her that tale.

  “If He ever calls again, don't mention it to him, Flo. Do not ever mention anything about that to him. It would kill him. Apparently one of his brothers slept with his wife.”

  “I won't,” she assures me, gathering me in her arms. I rest on her shoulder and breathe my shame away.

  “We need to get away. You know now, we really need to get away.”

  “I understand. He would be so hurt to hear you serviced his brother.”

  My brain is whirring with questions and possibilities.

  “Exactly. Let me ask, Flo, did you know the Grandmaster was dead?”

  “In passing, I'd heard about it, yes. But I think I pushed it to the back of my mind. It was just another thing that reminded me of my own time at the Lodge and I don't need any more reminders.” She shrugs and folds her arms tightly behind my back.

  “He never spoke of his father. Never.”

  “Mark said they were estranged… Edward Yeardley and his eldest, I mean.”

  “This is starting to make sense, Flo. It's all starting to make sense.”

  “The twins, they were from a different marriage.”

  “There's so much about my lover's past that he never wanted me to know. It's killing me not knowing…” I say, taking deep breaths to control myself.

  “Which was it? Did he have dark hair or blonde?”

  “Dark,” I say.

  “Ah. Jarrod.”

  “Fuck,” I say.

  “Fuck indeed,” Flo replies, holding me close.

  The Author

  Sarah Michelle Lynch is the author of five novels.

  She also busies herself writing short stories, poetry and articles.

  She previously worked in journalism before becoming obsessed with creative writing.

  She's a full-time mother who also writes science-fiction romance.

  Meet the author:

  www.facebook.com/SarahMLynch

  www.twitter.com/SarahMichelleLy

  www.sarahmichellelynch.wordpress.com

  www.goodreads.com/author/show/6518742.Sarah_Michelle_Lynch

  Meet the Chambermaid:

  www.twitter.com/TheChambermaid

  Also by the author:

  Beneath the Veil

  Beneath the Betrayal

  Beneath the Exile

  The Complete Ravage Trilogy

  A Fine Profession

  A Fine Pursuit (coming soon…)

  Table of Contents

  The Master Who Haunts Me

  Introduction to the Service

  Controlling My Desire

  The Fledgling Spreads Her Wings

  A Small Request

  Anticipation Is Paramount

  The Day Everything Changed

  The Baron