Moonlight Meetings - Three Erotic Supernatural Stories (The three first stories from Suzy's Adventures)

by Dorian Mayfair

  “Which one?”

  “Why you’re here.”

  He paused, studying her. “I am a caretaker of this forest,” he said eventually. He crossed his long, outstretched legs.

  “You’re hired to look after the trees?”

  “That is my work, yes.”

  “Like a hunter?”

  “In a way. Though I do not often hunt. I tend to the groves and look after its children. Sometimes I set wayward people on the right path.”

  “I get it,” Suzy said. “Cleaning up fallen branches, keep paths clear, things like that? Sounds like hard work.” Which explained those arms. “For a minute back at the cabin, I thought you slept rough. No disrespect.”

  He frowned. “’Rough’?”

  “You know. Like a homeless.” She hoped he did not see through the thinly disguised question.

  “Ah.” He smiled. “My home is nearby. But who wants to stay inside on a night like this? No need for ceilings with all these stars to blanket us.”

  “Oh. Right.” She cleared her throat. “Well, I like your forest. It’s real pretty.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Where’s your accent from? The UK?”

  “Well spotted. Although I know I often speak in a rather old-fashioned way.”

  “I don’t mind. I think it’s great. Me, I speak only New Yorkish. And a little Spanish, though I think I’m losing it. Every time I go to Puerto Rico, my relatives say I’m getting worse.”

  They looked at each other in silence. Suzy resisted the urge to move towards him, to throw herself into those dark, strong arms. He had a quiet gravity that pulled at her. This was ridiculous. Had she been alone for a year, she would have understood her feelings more. This sudden desperation was totally uncalled for, and not a little tempting to give in to.

  “Can I offer you something to refresh yourself?” he asked.

  “Huh? What?”

  “A drink.” He gestured at the bottle next to him and produced another wine glass. “I have made it myself. A good brew, I must say. A most successful year.”

  “Er, no. Candy from strange men and all that. But thanks.”

  “Oh.” The man poured a glass half-full and swished the golden fluid around. He turned and looked close at the glass in his hand. That infuriating smile was on his lips again. “You do not trust me.”

  “I do,” Suzy said, holding on to the rock with whitening fingers. “It’s just – ” She sighed. “Okay, I don’t. I mean, I don’t know you. And I have a habit of not drinking stuff I don’t know where it came from.” She sniffed. “What is that, anyway?” The scent of the drink seemed to wash over her in waves. Light, sweet and fruity but with a world of undertones. Acorns and berries, apples, leaves and flowers. She was sure, but she didn’t know how she knew. She was sure she’d never eaten an acorn.

  “Cider,” he said. “An old recipe.”

  “You brewed it yourself?”

  “Yes. Not far from here.”

  “In the forest?”

  “In a cave. Up there, where the stream starts.”

  Making his own cider in a cave. She would have thought he was a complete hippie, if he had not radiated a distinct un-hippiness. He dressed like a hobo but he talked and moved with the controlled manners of a prince. Not that she had met any, but still.

  “I understand your hesitation,” he said. “As men go, you must think I am strange. Here, I will drink. Will that make you less apprehensive?”

  “Not really.”

  He shrugged, raised the glass to his lips, finished half of its contents and then lowered the glass, looking at Suzy over the rim. She realized she stood only a step away. When had she moved?

  “Persuaded?” he asked.

  She really should not. If there was something nasty in the drink, he might be immune or have taken some kind of antidote. Or he might just be tricking her, making it look as if he drank. A cunning serial killer in a funny hat. But then, he had tried to protect her, which was both annoying and kind of charming. And the hat was gone.

  What the hell. The theme of the evening seemed to be total outlandishness, so Suzy decided to go with the flow. She reached out, took the glass and sipped, holding his eyes.

  The fluid washed down her throat and left a cloud of sweet aftertaste on her tongue. She sipped again and handed the glass back. “That’s really good.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I should go,” Suzy said briskly and stood up.

  “If you wish. I would rather you stayed. The night is warm, and young.”

  “People keep telling me that.” Move, feet. Move, I said.

  “Would you like to swim?”

  “Swim? What, here? With you?” The questions flew out of her mouth so fast she had no chance to stop them. If he thought she would jump into that pond with him, he was out of his mind.

  Only it was pretty clear he did think just that. Suzy’s pulse began to whisper in her ears. That’s because I’m scared. Right? But she was not. Despite his height and build, she felt perfectly at ease, and she had done so long before she tasted his cider. At the cabin, facing the boys, he had been a different being, all raw intimidation and threat. Now he was relaxed and casual, if still pretty imposing.

  The man started to unbutton his shirt, seemingly intent on bathing whether she planned to or not. What if he meant to drown her? But if he meant to, why the cavalry-to-the-rescue-act at the cabin?

  There was, of course, the possibility that he hoped to do something entirely different.

  Suzy bit her lip. She could not have been gone more than half an hour. Three more hours before Catherine and the rest of the hopeless brigade arrived.

  “Sure,” Suzy said, wishing her pulse would slow down. “Just a quick dip. There are people waiting for me back up at the house.” She prided herself over the lie. Now he knew she was not alone, or at least she hoped he did. She turned around, kicked off her shoes, unzipped her tracksuit top and flung it over a stone, followed by her pants and her socks. When she turned back, the man was already in the pool, the water reaching up to his waist as he leaned at a stone, head tilted back, eyes closed.

  Suzy made a strangled sound. She did not think of herself as body-fixated in any way, but there was no keeping her eyes of this man’s physique. Whatever work he did in the forest, it had left him with a build that made her think of those weird athletes that hung from rings and did somersaults. Dark veins outlined every single muscle on his torso, and his skin was the hue of dusky, polished bronze.

  Suzy wore a T-shirt and her underwear, and damn if she was taking them off. Yet. Hush you, voice of depravation.

  Tearing her eyes away, Suzy dipped a toe in the pool. The water was warm. With a move less graceful than she had hoped for, she slipped into the water. The water, clear and fresh, reached to her chest. Should not a pool like this be stale and smelly? Apparently not.

  She leaned her back against a stone across the pool from the man, and then laughed.

  “What?” he asked, opening his eyes to look at her.

  “I haven’t even asked what your name is.”

  “Greene.”

  “That sounds English, all right.”

  “Are you comfortable?”

  She worked her mouth and then shrugged. She was, in fact, very comfortable. “I guess.”

  He smiled. “I am glad. Company such as yours is rare.”

  “What, you don’t often meet nervous girls in tracksuits? Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “I mean the company of you, Suzy. A guardian. The first I have met in many years. Decades. It is a privilege.”

  She stared at him. “I have no idea what you are talking about, but you’re freaking me out a bit.“

  “It is an honour to meet a woman like you. There are no many who dare to cross these days. Once – never mind. And you came to warn me. I am in your debt.”

  “Cross what, exactly? And warn you of what? And what’s a ‘passer’? Something English?”

 
; “Have you not heard the name before? It is an old term. I suppose it may have changed.”

  “You better start to make sense, or I’m leaving right now.”

  He paused, sat up straight and gazed at me. His eyes widened a fraction, and that bemused, irresistible smile returned. “By the Goddess and the Holly King,” he said softly, “you do not know.”

  “Know what?” Suzy tried to rise up but she remained sitting, as if she was rooted to the spot. Had there been something in the drink after all? Stupid, stupid! She shouldn’t have drunk it. “Look, you’re really nice and everything, but I’m getting seriously creeped out.”

  “Please, do not worry. I am sorry if upset you.” The man gestured with a long finger in Suzy’s direction. “It is your arm. The symbol.”

  Suzy looked down on her arm and the black tribal dragon that twisted its way down its length. Its body was made up of intricate, interlocking patterns, and it had its claws dug into a round, Celtic-looking symbol on her wrist. Done just before her trip to New Orleans, it was her latest ink job. And it still itched. That worried her a bit; it should have healed by now.

  “That is what made me certain,” he continued. “Though I have known since I saw you at the house. And you found me, too. Not anyone can.”

  “Certain about what? And you were singing, right? So finding you was pretty easy. And this is just a tattoo.”

  He shook his head. “The dragon may be. The circle is not. It is special, to say the least. Who made it?”

  “A tattoo parlour near Lafayette. So what?”

  “Fewer and fewer pass on the lore to their apprentices. It is good to see someone still versed in the lore.”

  “And you’re not making sense. Get to the point.”

  “What were you told of the round symbol? Did the grafter mention its origin?”

  “I brought it to him. I found it in this old book at a second-hand bookshop and I liked it, so I copied it. It’s a neat job. I’ve never been before, but I’ll go back.” In fact, she’d never even seen the parlour before; she been dizzy with caffeine and in the mood to do something, so when she walked past the place, she’d entered on impulse. She knew what she wanted; the sketch had been in her notebook in her bag for weeks. The owner – also the tattoo artist – had an opening, so Suzy went for it.

  “Did you read the book where it was depicted?” the man asked.

  Suzy made a face. “That would’ve given me a headache. The letters were small as ants and really old-fashioned. I can’t even remember the book’s title.”

  “I see.” The man studied Suzy for a moment, then set his glass onto a stone and lowered himself into the pool until only his head was above the surface. With a single stroke, he swam closer to Suzy and stopped in the middle of the pool. Under his hair, his eyes reflected the moon as two brilliant pinpoints. “Let me ask you this,” he said. “Has something out of the ordinary happened to you since you had it made?”

  “No,” Suzy said, poised between fleeing and swimming towards him. Then the memories from her night in New Orleans and the Courtyard Hotel came rushing back, speeding up her already quick pulse. Those were out-of-the-ordinary enough. But she couldn’t share that. Or could she? The man was odd enough as it was. It couldn’t hurt to tell him. “Okay, maybe a few weird things. Nothing too strange.”

  The man said nothing. His eyes were twin pools of absolute night.

  “Well, maybe this one really weird thing,” she mumbled.

  “Something inexplicable, I wager? Something you have not mentioned to anyone else?”

  “You could say that.”

  “Was it dreadful?”

  Suzy, lost in reverie and starting at nothing, grinned. “It was amazing. I’ve never – ” She snapped back to where she was. Had the man come ever closer? When had he moved? He was only a swim stroke away. His wide chest filled her world. His nipples were small, dark circles on a pale field. The moon outlined every muscle under his ebony skin. He was an ideal hero, if on the tall side, sprung from a gothic legend. His lips were blue and full in his royal, proud, impossibly gorgeous face. His eyes poured warm honey through her bones, making her unsteady. His arms could break trees like twigs. Really, really small twigs.

  Some part of Suzy told her, in an urgent but awed voice, that she should be scared, or at least intimidated, but she felt only jittery and longing. She flexed her hands not to reach out to touch him.

  “No, not bad,” she said hoarsely. “Just weird. And kind of great. What’s that got to do with this?” Suzy raised her wrist to show him the symbol.

  “Much.” Slowly, he lifted one of his long hands and held Suzy’s lower arm. His grip was gentle but strong, as if he was aware of his strength. Suzy shuddered, and not from annoyance. How can anyone so pale be so warm? Her heart redoubled its effort to bang its way out of her ribcage.

  “This symbol marks you as a guardian. It is a plain name for an old term – it is in Gaelic, so it will not mean anything to you – but its purposes is the same as it has even been.”

  “Purposes?” Suzy breathed.

  “In part, it is a sign of trust. A show of alliance.”

  She swallowed. “With what?”

  “The unseen. Those that walk beyond the corner of your eyes. The ones linger in the mirror when you look away. The beings who listen to your dreams as you listen to an instrument.”

  She paused, blinking. “Ghosts. You’re talking about ghosts.” God, I want to touch him. Just once.

  “Spirits of all kinds, woman. Phantom and of flesh. You are walking the sunlit side of a leaf. The rest is hidden, but you can feel the tremors.”

  Thoughts crashed in waves through Suzy’s mind. I’m dreaming. But while she had managed to tell herself that her New Orleans Experience, as she liked to call it, was a hallucination, she was sure she was awake now. Wide awake. The man’s hand, the water against her body, the cool rock against her back – it was all too tangible. No. I’m not dreaming.

  “But there is more to this symbol,” he continued. “It bestows its bearer a way of passing through the surface. Hence the name ‘passer’. You can see though the veil. And in turn, what is behind the veil can see you.”

  “Oh God,” Suzy whispered.

  “Pardon?”

  “I actually sort of believe you.” She did. Suzy had always been in two minds about the idea of ghosts – some things she had heard were obviously lies and frauds, but there were, she thought, many things that were outright strange. Now she had the whole truth – or a version of it – in a few sentences. The concept was too big for Suzy to grapple with in one go. She shuddered, turned her wrist to look at her tattoo, and then her eyes widened so much they hurt.

  The symbol had changed. The knot of intricate lines had moved to retie itself into a new, different pattern. To boot, the ink was now bright red. “What the – ” Suzy said weakly. She poked at her skin.

  “It has transformed? That is common among the designs. It is because of me.”

  Her mouth went dry. His hand was still around her wrist.

  “The symbol rearranges when one from behind the shroud is close,” he said. The deep voice made her lick her teeth. His breath smelled of storms and flowers. Suzy’s self-control was strained to a taut string.

  “Now you will always know when one of us is near,” he continued. The corners of his cobalt lips rose. “Expect it to happen often, Suzy. You are a tantalizing woman. I sensed you as soon as you entered my woods, long before those men came to trouble you.” At the mention of the drunken boys, a shadow flashed across his face and was gone, but not before Suzy had seen the cords of muscle along his neck and arms harden fleetingly. A large cat tensing to leap.

  She opened her mouth to say something, anything. She knew his words were strange, but she had stopped looking for meaning many sentences ago. The one thing on her exhausted mind was to stop herself from moving closer to him. Dangerous. But rationality had been wrestled to the floor of her mind by the heavyweight champions of desire
and curiosity, which had very different suggestions as to what she should do.

  He let go of her hand and instead ran a finger from the tip of her jaw, down between her breasts and stopping – or pausing – at her bare skin, just where her T-shirt ended. His touch was that of a feather, but the strength behind the stroke shot jolts through her body.

  “I had planned to visit you before they arrived,” he said, his voice hushed. “But then I feared my appearance left you uneasy. I am glad you came to find me instead. It has been long since a woman like you – ”

  Suzy snapped. With a whimper, she lunged out of the water and moved towards him, thinking only of closing the distance as fast as possible. She felt as if she had flung herself against a rock, but he shifted just in time to soften the impact. With one of her hands around the back of his head, she pressed her body against his and covered his mouth with her own.

  His body was soft, warm marble and his tongue a live electric wire that sent jolts throughout her being. Below the water surface, he was stark naked. Suzy hooked a leg around his back and pulled him closer, wanting him beneath her skin, and she felt how he grew hard. Her hands screamed for her to reach under the water to touch him.

  I really shouldn’t. This is insane. This is unbelievable. Ghosts, wine, strangers and midnight swimming. Of course, it was precisely the lure those things that had kept her from leaving, and now she wanted only to taste this eerie, mysterious man, ghosts and weirdness be damned. It was not as if it was the first time Suzy had been with men she did not know, though this time was probably the craziest. At any rate, this man was easily the most stunning she had even met. A Godsend to reckless single girls with black nails and good taste in music.

  With a deep growl of surprise or something more primal, he wound his arms around her, held her close and met her desperate kiss. His hands were vices, gentle but firm. Suzy raked her fingers over the cords of muscles on his back. Her body was a coiled spring. She pulled back, gasped for breath and stared into his face.

  His eyes was large, full of barely restrained hunger, and he smiled. A wolf’s smile, showing perfect, brilliant teeth. Again she had that vague notion that they should be pointed, but they were perfectly normal.