Secrets After Dark (16 page)

I look over enviously as Anna starts dancing with Dominic, and think crossly,
To hell with this secrecy! I know what I want – I don’t see why we have to dance to Dubrovski’s tune
.

At that moment, the man himself come up close and speaks loudly in my ear so that I can hear him over the noise. ‘Come on, Beth, let’s get another drink.’

I don’t really need another drink but I don’t feel as light-headed as I did a while ago – in fact, I feel quite sober – so I suppose it can’t hurt. We make our way through the dancers, and I glimpse couples who are already embracing with a passion I wouldn’t usually expect to see on the dance floor. I see the white rabbit woman from before, her body pressed against a masked man who is kissing her chest just above the low neckline of her dress. As I watch, he gently pulls the white silk down an inch, and runs his tongue over her breast and nipple.

‘Perhaps we should go soon,’ I say as we approach the bar, although I can hardly bear the idea of leaving Dominic here in this place that’s heaving with sexual possibility.

‘Yes,’ Andrei replies. He signals to the barman. ‘The house special, please.’ He turns to me. ‘After this drink, we will go. We will stay at the hotel tonight. I’ve arranged a driver to return us there.’

The barman puts two drinks in front of us, pale pink liquid over ice cubes. I have no idea what they are. Andrei hands one to me and clinks his glass against mine.

‘To your very good health,’ he says.

‘And yours.’ I take a sip of the drink. It’s fruity and sweet, almost like a glass of cordial, but I’m sure that it must be more potent than it seems.
I won’t drink much
.
We’ll be leaving soon
.

Anna appears through the crowd, her cheeks hectic and her eyes sparkling. ‘I’m thirsty!’ she declares. ‘Barman, a glass of water please.’

I look behind her, straining to see if Dominic is following but there’s no sign of him. The barman serves Anna quickly, and she gulps her water. Then she puts her arm around my shoulder. ‘Are you enjoying yourself, Beth? Are you having fun?’

‘Yes,’ I say, ‘it’s certainly interesting.’

She throws back her head and laughs, showing her perfect teeth, her hair rippling down her back. ‘Interesting? Perhaps. You should dance. But I warn you, the dance floor is turning to mud. Look at my shoes!’ She lifts her skirt and raises one of her slender calves to show Andrei and me that her satin shoe is coated in a yellowish mud. With her foot lifted, she overbalances and falls against me so that I have to put my arms out and hold her up. She clutches me, giggling. ‘Whoops! I’m sorry, Beth, I nearly made you spill your drink. It looks good – let me taste it.’ She takes my glass and sips at it.

‘I’ll get your own drink if you want one,’ Andrei says. He is watching her impassively, neither amused nor irritated by her evident tipsiness.

‘Don’t bother. Where’s Dominic?’ she cries. ‘I want to dance! Can you see him?’

We look over at the dance floor but it’s a sea of bodies and masked faces. I can’t see him anywhere.
What’s he doing? Dancing with someone else?
I imagine him in the arms of another woman, perhaps the rabbit girl with her slinky white dress. It’s a horrible but irresistible picture.
I’ve got to keep on top of this jealousy... it’s ridiculous.

Anna gives my drink back and grabs her skirts and lifts them up around her thighs, shaking them like a Spanish dancer as she returns to the dance floor.

‘She’s enjoying herself,’ remarks Andrei. ‘Perhaps a little too much.’

I watch as she disappears into the crowd, wishing I could be as free and unrestrained as Anna. I’d love to be dancing in there with Dominic, our bodies pressed close, our mouths meeting... it’s frustrating to know he’s so near and yet I can’t be with him.

The effect of the lights and music is hypnotic. The volume has been turned up until it’s almost too loud to talk, and we stand at the bar, sipping our drinks and watching the crowd. My eyes are drawn to the flashing lights, the snippets of film, the black-and-white movie playing on the wall, and when I try to see Dominic in the mass of dancers I can’t make him out at all. Some people have discarded their masks but most are still wearing theirs, and I become entranced by the sight of so many anonymous figures moving in time to the music. They look strange now, their masks bizarre, everything seems weird. I turn to Andrei and he’s not there. I’m surrounded by people and all the men look like him, in dinner suits and masks, but none of them are him, I’m certain. I would recognise those blue eyes and the jutting lower lip and I can’t see them. I begin to push my way through the throng at the bar, looking for him.
He was right here, he was just beside me a moment ago. He must have moved a few steps away, I’ll soon find him.

I skirt the bar, craning to see over the broad backs of the men or the slim shoulders of the women, but he’s nowhere to be found. It’s hot now. I realise that the walls are shiny with moisture and that great drips, like giant tears, are sliding down them. The floors are getting muddy and slippery. The heat generated by all the dancers and their bodies is condensing inside the old catacombs. Suddenly I long to get away from the damp heat and breathe some fresh air, to shake out the dizziness in my head.
But I must find Andrei, where is he?
I decide to go back to the room we first went to. Perhaps he’s gone back there to sit down quietly for a while. I head back in the direction I remember we came from, but after a moment it dawns on me that I must have taken the wrong pass. I’m stumbling along a dimly lit, low-roofed passage, past people who are locked in embraces, some pressed against the walls regardless of the wet or the white lime coming off on their clothes and skin. I pass nooks and crannies where there is more activity: shadowy forms joined together, moving in rhythm, some standing, some lying entwined on a floor of cushions. Skin glows white or gleams darkly where dim light catches it, hands reach for bodies, fingers are caressing, tongues sucking, licking and lapping. I keep on, not knowing where I’m going but feeling I mustn’t stop in case I’m absorbed into one of those dark places to become a body like the others, pulled in by the anonymous hands and made one of them even if it’s almost tempting to surrender myself to it all, to become simply a body devoted to bodily pleasure. I could close my eyes and let my hands and tongue go where they wanted...

No. Don’t do it.
I have the horrible feeling I’ll be lost for ever if I step inside one of those caves.

My heart is pounding and panic is beginning to take over. I’m lost. I must find... I don’t care about Andrei any more, I must find Dominic. If I find him, I’ll be safe.
But he’s behind me, in the big cavern, dancing... I must go back there.
I spin around in the gloom and start stumbling back the way I came, feeling the fetid heat rising from below as though I’m approaching an oven. I come to a fork in the passage and can’t remember which way I came from, or even seeing a fork before. I choose the most likely and press on, past the couples kissing and caressing in the passageway.

Oh no, I must have chosen the wrong path!

I’m heading off in the wrong direction now, turning away from the centre of the catacombs and towards somewhere quieter and cooler. A sob of panic catches in my throat. I can’t think clearly, I can’t decide what to do. What if I never find my way out of here? What if I’m doomed to wander lost among these caves until, at last, I fade away down here in the darkness, alone? My breathing comes faster. I can’t keep going on like this. I must stop. Turn back. Try to find my way back to the cavern.

I start to retrace my steps. If only the booming didn’t resound from the walls and deceive my ears, cheating me into taking the wrong way. Suddenly I’m in a passage that’s very quiet and dark. I press forwards and put out my hands. I touch a wet, cold, hard wall. I’ve reached a dead end. I’m completely alone.

I gasp out loud. How did I arrive here? I can’t understand – I seem to be losing small patches of time. I hear a rustle behind me and whirl round. Against the dim light from the way I’ve come, there is a tall dark solid shadow. A man.

I stare at him, my eyes wide, unable to make a sound. I’m trapped in a weird nightmare over which I have no control. Only moments ago, or so it seems, I was at the heart of the party.
How did I get here?

‘Beth?’ The word is hardly more than a whisper, but it is the greatest thing I’ve ever heard.

Dominic!

‘You found me!’ I say, my voice catching. ‘Thank God, you’ve found me.’ I throw myself into his arms and reach up for his head, pulling his face to mine. ‘I’ve been so stupid, I got lost, I thought you’d never find me! I’m so glad you’re here.’ I kiss him fiercely with all the passion of my relief and joy at seeing him. He pulls off my mask and discards it on the floor.

His arms wrap around me tightly and he begins to kiss me back with great intensity. I close my eyes, yielding myself to his tongue, and feel as though I’ve lifted off my feet and am floating in the air, as though we are both spinning magically through space, or as if the whole universe is revolving around us and we are the only still point in it. It’s a wonderful feeling but very strange, and the kiss is beautiful but not like any kiss we’ve ever had before, with its fantastical power to make me feel like this.

I’m hungry for him in a way I cannot resist and I press my hand against him, feeling his erection strong and hard inside his clothes.

‘Do you want this?’ he whispers.

‘Yes, oh yes, please...’

‘You didn’t want to before. Are you sure this is right?’

‘I want it now, right now.’

He murmurs to me: ‘No more games’ and clasps me around my waist. It feels as though I’m flying as he lifts me up and turns me round, setting me down so that my back is to him. He takes my arms and lifts them, putting my hands out and against the wall. The rock beneath my palms is chilly and hard but I barely notice. I’m too focused on what is happening elsewhere as Dominic pushes down the top of my dress with one hand, and pulls up the skirt with the other. My breasts are released, fully exposed as the dress had built-in cups and I’m not wearing a bra. One of his palms cups me roughly and I hear a harsh growl of pleasure from him as his hand rubs around my naked bottom and then round to the front, where he brushes his fingers lightly across me.

It’s electric, and with every touch he seems to be setting off a riot of coloured stars around me. My body responds enthusiastically, almost slavishly. There’s nothing I can do to stop the fevered longing for him to possess me. The way he touched me in the play dungeon was just a preparation for this, and it’s as though I’m an engine already warm, waiting to roar into life and speed to its limits. Everything in me thrums under his hands and to the rough, needy fingers flicking over me, rubbing my nipples into stiff peaks, burning a trail over my belly at the sensitive point where it meets the soft thatch of hair below, and tantalising me as he nears my most secret places.

I know that he’s ready too. He’s squeezing and caressing my breasts, kissing my back at the base of my neck, but I know we won’t be playing for long, our desires are too urgent. He pulls my bottom into his groin and moans, relishing the feel of me pressing against him. Then with one arm around my waist, he’s pushing my legs apart with the other hand. Another instant and I feel the heat and hardness of his shaft pressed between my buttocks, and I let out a low sound of neediness. He’s so close, so tormentingly close. All I can think is that I want his iron hardness inside me now, this instant. ‘Please,’ I say, a begging note in my voice. ‘Please, I’ve waited so long...’

‘It’s all yours,’ he says, his voice low and whispered. ‘Just for you.’

He presses my legs further apart and I lean forward. My breasts touch the old stone of the wall and my nipples rasp against the rough surface. They are so sensitive with arousal that the rock scratches and burns them with a delicious kind of pain. I put my head back, knowing that I’m open and ready now, just waiting for the touch I’m desperate for.

He pulls away just a little and then I feel it: he’s pressing against me, nudging at my entrance, teasing me with the hot, velvety head of his erection. When I think I can’t stand it any longer, he pushes forward and his shaft enters, sliding easily inward with my readiness, giving me the most delectable sense of completion. My hands tense on the rocky wall, my head goes back with the desire to have him entirely inside me. I want to surrender everything, take him as far as he will go. He’s deep within me now and his chest is pressed to my back, one hand below my belly, tickling at my wetness, the other on my hips. He drops his head and bites at my neck and shoulders until I’m whimpering with the need for him to start fucking,
now.
Then he pulls back just a little and thrusts forward hard. I cry out as he seems to reach right up into my belly.
Oh God yes – as far, and as hard as you can.

It’s as though he’s read my mind. He thrusts again and then again, pulling back on my hips so that I’m brought deeper on to his hard penis. My breasts hit the hard rock with the force of his inward drive, but I relish the heat and pressure of his body at my back and the cold stone at my front. He’s getting a rhythm now, driving in and out, every thrust making me cry out involuntarily. My eyes close, and I’m all sensation now, greedily taking him in again and again, and wanting more. The pleasure is beginning to possess me, I’m starting to know nothing but the rise of ecstasy climbing inside me and then lifting me up into that place where I totter on the brink of coming.