It went on for several minutes, and then she whirled around and ran past me, out the door, holding her jeans up without pausing even long enough to button them. If it had occurred to me that I wasn't safe from his rage, I probably would have run after her, but he'd never hurt me outside of my dreams, and the pills had put a stop to those.
I still believe that the rest of the damage and the escalation of violence in the house were other spirits. That his violence was controlled and contained within the physical discipline that he doled out when he felt slighted. I don't know why exactly; maybe because in the dreams, he seemed so composed. Even when he punished me angrily, it never felt like he was out of control, just like he was delivering up what he'd decided was due.
I'd thought because her medium abilities allowed her to see and hear him that it enabled him to touch her in such an undignified way. So imagine my surprise when I felt a hand grabbing my hair at the nape of my neck and marching me towards the bed. I dug my heels in and tried to pull away from the grip when I realized what was happening, but it was firm, and when I swung my arms wide, trying to push off the attacker, I felt—nothing. Nothing at all; it was like air. Apparently, he could touch me, but I couldn't touch him. Maybe if he wanted me to feel him, it would have been different, I'm not sure.
What I do know is that he wasn't just invisible, he was incorporeal. He pushed me face first onto the bed, and I took the chance to try to crawl for the other side and escape, but a hand grabbed me by the back of the pants and yanked me back into place so I was bent over the side of the bed. I could feel—him unbuttoning my slacks, dragging them over my hips, and the panties went with them until my ass was bare naked. I felt the actions, I mean, but not the hand that must have been doing it. It was like the cloth was working its own way off my body. Fabric slithering like some kind of snake. I shuddered and started to cry.
I think the experience must have been scarier for me. At least she had some connection to what was happening. She could hear his voice and respond. She could see him swinging the leather belt, the one he must have been wearing when he died. For me, it was a different experience. As I huddled there, clutching the fancy coverlet I'd chosen to match the room, I felt disconnected from everything. I've been spanked before, I've even had a belt across my ass before, but this was—different. I kept waiting for the sounds. The whoosh of the leather flying through the air, the loud crack as it hit my skin, but there was nothing. It was quiet except for me. I made plenty of noise of all kinds. I think the silence made it so much more terrifying. I had no way of preparing for the strokes, and I can't even explain how leather that probably disintegrated a hundred years ago could wrap across my ass and leave lines of pain that I felt for days.
I choked on my own howls as a line of fire would just erupt across my skin without warning. Over and over it happened, and nothing could stop it. I kicked, I twisted, I pleaded, and finally I swore I'd leave the house and never come back. That was my breaking point, I think. I was incoherent by then, a sobbing mess, and it just stopped. It took a minute to realize I wasn't being held in place anymore. I slid to the floor and curled up on my side, continuing to cry.
When I got up, I carefully pulled my slacks back up. They felt tight and harsh against my ass, but I wasn't going to lie there half naked a second longer then necessary. My thighs were in agony where lines had crossed each other, and walking was miserable, but I tried to ignore it as I rushed to my room to pack up my personal belongings. I was out of the house within an hour, and I've never set foot inside since.
April shuddered, sucking in a lungful of air as she pulled herself out of the experience. She slumped back in her seat, eyes wide as she looked at the older woman.
"I—"
She didn't really know what to say. She was filled with so many conflicting emotions at the moment that she couldn't separate them enough to speak. She closed her eyes to minimize the sensory input until she calmed, slowly releasing her death grip on the iron scrollwork of her seat.
Fear and horror—those weren't her emotions, those were Elizabeth's, and she put them aside. She could understand the cause of them; she'd felt similar when John had accosted her on her first night, but at least she'd been able to see what was happening. She couldn't imagine how many levels of terror it would add to be in the dark about what was causing the pain. Anger and frustration at being kicked out of her own house were understandable, as well, and those she also set aside.
As she disentangled herself from the experiences that hadn't belonged to her, though, she found her own anger, and it was tinged with jealousy. But that wasn't something she could deal with at the moment, so she was forced to push those feelings off, as well. The clinical detachment of sorting through the memories and emotions settled her until she was able to speak.
"I can't imagine what all of that must have been like for you. I haven't experienced anything that unpleasant. The first night in the kitchen was bad, but I could see him, and he only used his hand," April said softly.
Her throat felt oddly raw, like she'd been the one screaming. And there was an itchy prickling sensation across her seat, phantom sensations from a belt that she'd never felt.
The blonde nodded. "I haven't told many people about it, obviously. It's embarrassing on so many levels, and I'm not sure anyone would believe it, anyway." She sighed, one elegantly manicured hand going up to play with her hair, worrying at it until it began to look disheveled. "This is why I'm willing to give the house up. Well, I can never go in there again, but I do intend to make the money back, every cent," Elizabeth assured her.
"Right. The video game? I don't know a lot about video games. I guess I never really got into them. Can you really make that much money off of one?" She looked over at the house trying to guess to the nearest million what it might be worth.
"Oh, yes. That and more, if it sells, and I've been in the biz long enough to know what will sell. This is going to be the first of its kind. In many ways, actually. Your experiences and my own have me seriously thinking about taking a different track now, though. Originally, I was planning on a horror game. Something that would send people screaming, but now—" She trailed off thoughtfully, staring into the distance.
"But now?" April prompted after a couple of silent minutes had gone by.
"April, you know I have the legal right to all the footage and data from this house. I own every experience you have for as long as you are here, at least until the end of the month," Elizabeth said.
There was a darker tone to her voice that April couldn't pin down.
"Y-yes, I understand that. I agreed to it. I mean I didn't expect to be getting my butt spanked on camera when I signed the contracts, but I figured you wouldn't have any use for those images, anyway." She shrugged, for the money and house it was worth it, even if someone saw her getting spanked in the kitchen.
Elizabeth regarded her with a predatory look, and the younger woman was suddenly reminded that, despite the distant connection to her mother, this woman had brought her into a situation she'd known could be physically dangerous. She might feel bad about it, she might feel guilty, but Elizabeth would do whatever was necessary to be successful. She wondered if the blonde had been like that when she'd been friends with her mother or if it was something that had happened gradually during her career. There was a growing concern forming about where this was all going.
"We'll get to that in a second. Let me wrap up the story by saying I met with Maria a week later. I owed her the rest of her payment, and after what she went through, she deserved it, even if it hadn't worked. Plus, she'd told me that he'd given her a very direct message for me before she'd left, and that is why you're here." She opened her purse and pulled out a creased and folded envelope and held it out to April.
She accepted it and tugged the flap up; it was unsealed, and there was a piece of cheap stationary inside. The type with a cute design at the top of the page, in this case it was a couple of kittens playing with a ball of string. The letter
was short, addressed to Ms. Hagmaier, and contained only a few hastily scrawled paragraphs. Nothing in the short message was a shocking revelation to her, though it probably had been to Elizabeth at the time.
It could be summed up by saying that John had reiterated that it was his house. He warned her to never try evicting him from his property again. He suggested he would deal if she was willing to agree to his terms and, if so, she should send someone back in to discuss it like reasonable adults. She read it over a couple of times and then looked at Elizabeth in confusion.
"Okay? I mean I feel like I'm missing something. Did you send someone back in?"
The older woman nodded. She took her time continuing, feeling the need for another smoke. "Maria would not agree to enter the house again, no matter what I offered her, but her aunt Luisa was willing to carry the message for a large sum of money. She's a lot braver than me; I waited outside. He'd said he was willing to make a deal, and I needed time to think about what I was willing to agree to. I'll admit I was leaning strongly towards burning the whole place down, but then I had an idea. Why not turn the experiences I'd had into a profit? The things I'd seen, excluding the embarrassing parts, would terrify anyone. So, why not create a game using the new virtual reality hardware I'd been working on.
"When Luisa went into that house, she had my offer in her hand. We needed his cooperation, and it included some very juicy incentives for him that I knew would be too tempting to resist. After all, he didn't have to do anything he wasn't already doing—just scare the fuck out of people. Only he'd be doing it while scientists studied the phenomena, and in return, I would try to find him a companion he would be willing to live with and give her the house."
April's eyes narrowed. "Specifically her? Are you saying you agreed to find him a—mate?" Something about that made her feel like a slave who'd been sold for the price of a house.
"Not originally. In the beginning, I only offered him a companion. Luisa went in and out of the house several times that evening with changes and corrections from both sides, and in the end, we settled on a girl, yes. He said he was lonely. He wanted a companion, someone who might eventually become a lover. Sexual encounters with entities aren't unheard of; there have been many reports, but he wanted a woman with psychic skills so she could see him," Elizabeth admitted quietly. She knew that she was risking the whole arrangement with April by admitting that, but she thought the girl deserved the truth in this.
"So any girl who could see him was good enough," April murmured under her breath.
"I doubt that very much, April. I wasn't suitable for him, not even in dreams, but you seem to have a mutual attraction. You're not the first, by the way. There were several other women. One of them turned out to be a fraud; she didn't last one night. The next one experienced a series of escalating incidents, and it was clear she was being rejected, so we removed her for her own safety. The third lasted two weeks and seemed—happy, like you, but in the end, she left. She said it wasn't a happy house and she could never be happy living with a ghost.
"But you've stayed, and I have a feeling that you might be a compatible match, April."
Elizabeth's tone was soothing, and April relaxed, in spite of herself. She knew the woman had ulterior motives for talking her into completing the contract, but what she'd said wasn't wrong. There was a mutual attraction between her and John, and she had been happy in the house.
"Maybe," April said noncommittally; until she had it out with John, she wasn't agreeing to anything. She'd thought they had some kind of bond, like soulmates, as corny as that sounded, but now she wondered if it wasn't just that she was the only living girl available to him. She wanted him to love her for her, not because there was no one else willing to live with a ghost.
Elizabeth hesitated; maybe it was because she could sense April's disquiet or maybe she just couldn't get up the courage to explain the new direction her work was going to take. Whatever the reason, she gave the girl a searching look and shook her head.
"Look, I have to go and I have a feeling there are some things you need to work out inside." She shot a nervous glance at the house, fingers twitching on the table surface. "I'll tell you what—why don't we make a plan to meet for lunch next week, in town. By then, I'm sure you'll be going stir crazy, locked up in here," Elizabeth suggested.
She tapped her fingers on the binder, drawing April's eyes to it. She wondered what was in there; Elizabeth had clearly brought it for a reason.
April's eyebrows went up and she narrowed her eyes. Was this a trick to make her give up the chance for the house? But that made no sense. How could the woman benefit from that in any way? She still needed April for the footage and research.
"I don't understand," she said slowly. "The contract—"
Elizabeth frowned, pursing her lips. "Damn, I'd forgotten."
She paused and shook her head. It was for her own selfish reasons that she wanted to meet off the grounds; even just sitting close to the house was making her heart race, and she didn't want to come back and do it again. It wasn't just the male chauvinist ghost and his belt, either. That had been horrible and humiliating, but she truly believed he was nothing more than a pervy dominant guy getting his kicks from living women.
But there were darker things in that house. Things that wanted to rend and tear, to kill if they could. She, without a psychic bone in her body, had been able to feel the oppressive anger in there. She believed John when he said that he controlled them, held them back from wreaking damage on the house and anyone inside. But it hadn't been until he'd lost his temper and taken his belt to her and her medium that she'd realized what a thin line that was.
If he couldn't control her. If the spankings and threats and whatever else he concocted to scare her into compliance hadn't worked, then what if he'd just decided to stop holding back those other forces? Or what if what she was doing angered them so much that they broke free of his control? He hadn't been the only one who'd been riled by all the construction and changes. She'd have known that, even if the medium hadn't confirmed it. That had been the most terrifying thing. It was what sent her flying out of the house, and it was why she wouldn't return—ever.
"I'll take care of the details, don't worry. Next Thursday we'll have lunch out. Not that there's a restaurant worth eating at in the whole town. Worst thing about leaving California is the complete lack of decent food. Closest thing you can get to sushi is in the cooler at the gas station, and I'll never be that desperate, trust me." Elizabeth laughed and got to her feet, casually scooping up the folder. Just standing up to leave seemed to lighten her mood.
April's lip quirked, curving up at the corner in a lopsided grin. "Never been fond of sushi, personally, but I have a feeling that if I was, I'd avoid getting it from the gas station, too," she said. She walked her employer back to the front gate while they talked, making idle conversation, mostly about her mother.
"Get things sorted out. I want you in a good state of mind when we discuss this next week, April. I've got big plans and they include you." She opened her car door, started to get in, and then stopped with one foot inside, looking at the younger woman seriously. "And I know it's embarrassing. But you can't hide in the bathroom for hours, not unless you want me to put a camera in there. I get it; I do. But the deal was for you being on camera twenty-four hours a day. I'll give you two hours a day to hide out with your ghost Romeo so you can talk, get to know each other. Whatever. But the rest of the time you're on film. I want to see action, and that includes whatever sex you're having," Elizabeth said firmly.
April's face heated to a vivid crimson, and she frowned as she began to protest. "I'm not an adult film star! I never agreed to have sex on camera for you," she blurted, embarrassed. A sinking feeling in her stomach told her she was going to lose this fight. She remembered that the contract had been pretty inclusive of all activities. She hadn't even expected privacy in the bathroom at first, and it had been a relief to know there was that one place where she wouldn't be
filmed.
"Honey, I know it wasn't what you expected. I get it, but for everything to work out like we want it to, I'm going to need you to cooperate. Fuck in the bathroom if you want, but I want to see things happening on camera too. The data will be invaluable for the professor, and I have my own reasons for wanting this." She gave the girl a searching look, and something she saw in her hazel eyes must have reassured her, because she nodded and got into the car.
April gave her a disgruntled look in return and stepped back so the door could be shut. "I don't like this," she said sullenly.
"I know you don't. I'll be sending Charlie around in a day or so to sort out our afternoon excursion. You'll feel better with a break, I think. I'll ask around for a good place to eat." Her expression said she doubted she'd find one and had all the suffering of a West Coast girl dealing with the trials of surviving in a small town. At least half of it was fake, an act to present a certain image to the world. You couldn't really hide those things from a psychic, but April wasn't going to point that out to her.
It took her a second to figure out that Charlie was the lawyer, Charles, and she sighed, tucking her hair back behind her ears nervously. She'd gotten an odd vibe from him during the house tour. The way he'd turned from professional to flirty had been so weird and uncomfortable. Still, there wasn't much she could do about it. She couldn't very well complain about his behavior when everyone knew she was letting a ghost spank her ass and fuck her. They'd probably say she'd led the lawyer on or something if she tried, and he hadn't really done anything. It was just a feeling, so she shrugged it off.
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