by Rachel Kane
"I don't know," said Mason. He stepped over to the bar. "Holy hell. When they were clearing out the house, they must not have known any of this was here. Look at these bottles."
Liam took a bottle and brushed it off. "Grand…Cru… Wait, shine your light back over here—"
"I mean, it's probably vinegar by now."
He set the bottle back down. "It's like a museum. It's like… It's like history."
Yeah, I’m the one who’s history. How did I miss this? I should’ve realized there was an extra room when I inspected the cellars…
But there was no time to beat himself up for missing it. The excitement in Liam's voice was infectious. Mason felt it too. Felt it in the most inappropriate way possible; that tightening in the groin that made him want to have a repeat of last night, the warmth of Liam's skin against his. The urge to strip Liam down and have him right now was a powerful one.
Of course, one that he couldn't give into at all, which just made it that much sweeter of a torture.
"We have to tell Mama," said Liam. "And Mr. Edwards. This is incredible."
His hand had strayed towards Mason's.
"Maybe we don't have to tell the world just yet," said Mason. "Maybe we could just stay here for a minute. Alone."
There was no way he could explain this feeling to Liam, but when Liam's arms wrapped around his shoulders, and his lips met Mason's, he knew he didn't have to explain.
"I know what you mean," Liam whispered against his mouth. "Okay. One minute. Just one."
22
Liam
“No papers, though?” Mama asked.
“None that I saw,” Liam said, “although there was hardly time to search. There’s just so much going on in this house. It’s going to take a while to cover it all, if we’ve got to check for secret rooms. I swear, I thought it was a ridiculous idea. What’s next, a torture chamber in the basement?”
They were outside, and the late morning had burned away the mists from the tangled garden. Mason had already left; he had a job to do for someone this morning, but promised to be back with more lights. Liam missed him already. He could still feel that last kiss. It had felt so forbidden in the abandoned darkness of that bar.
Roo, back in her stroller, reached out and tried to pluck a weed that grew nearby. Mama gave her a rattle instead, but that displeased Roo, who began to fuss.
“Time for somebody’s nap,” said Liam. “I guess I’ll head back to the motel.”
Mama put a hand on his, as he reached for the stroller. “Dear. Let me ask you something, and you feel free to tell me to mind my own business. Mason…is he… Are, should I say, are you…”
Liam blushed. “I don’t know. He’s not—” How could he even finish that sentence? There was too much left unspoken between them. He didn’t know if Mason would feel comfortable with his mom knowing. What were the rules?
If you’d just come out, we wouldn’t have to worry about it, he thought. And then, the worse thought, what if his mom found out that Mason was still keeping his orientation a secret? After the trauma Dad had put them through, she might think less of Mason, and Liam didn’t want that.
“He’s a very attractive man,” she said. “I’m not saying you should go after him. Lord knows your life is complicated enough right now. But…it’d be understandable, if you did.”
“Life is complicated,” he agreed, glad to have a way of veering past the subject. “Now I’m back to wanting to keep the house. Is that stupid? It is, isn’t it? But seeing that bar, it was like when I first stepped into the spring-house and saw the mosaic. I was just blown away.”
In truth, he had planned to head back again to look at the mosaic, before Roo had begun to proclaim her need for a nap. He hungered for another sight of the spring-house, with an urge he had never felt in himself. He’d never been a greedy man. Never cared much for material possessions, outside of what he found useful or comfortable. But the mosaic had changed him. The house had changed him.
Not in a bad way, he hoped.
He just wanted to keep this place so much.
Couldn’t time be frozen? Couldn’t this moment, this precious few minutes where he had the house—and Mason!—and both belonged to him, couldn’t it be captured in amber, never to change, never to have the real world and all its responsibilities and cares intrude?
But that was the thing about having a baby; Roo always brought him back to reality. “Okay, okay,” he said to her. “Let’s get you to the ol’ Motor Lodge so you can have a nap.”
“I think I’ll wander through town,” said Mama. “It looks so charming, but I haven’t had a chance yet to explore.”
“If you see Alex at the bookstore, say hi. He’s a nice guy.”
The motel room was quiet, the light very dim; he’d closed the blinds and pulled the curtains, so that only a faint glow around the borders of the curtains betrayed that it was day. Roo was on her mat, with her hippo, softly breathing with her mouth open, her wet thumb almost, but not quite, in her mouth.
When the knock came at the door, her little eyes opened, shining with surprise, then fear, then frustration that she had not been allowed to sleep.
You’re kidding me, Liam thought, sliding his computer off his lap and onto the bed. Half an hour. That’s all I needed. Roo’s arms were up, but her hands were in little fists. He knew how she felt. Downtime was important. Whoever was at the door was going to get an earful from him. Unless it was Mason. Hell, even then.
Superbia Motor Lodge, unfamiliar with the world of crime and the dark alleys of the human soul, had not seen fit to put a peephole in the door. Every visit would be a surprise, especially for those who couldn’t work the blinds while holding a squirming, sleep-deprived child in one arm. Liam finally jammed a hand through the slats and opened his fingers, creating enough of a gap to see who the interloper was.
Justin Fucking Mulgrew.
“Seriously?” he said to Roo. His anger was beginning to match her own.
“Well, hello,” came the voice from the other side of the door. “I assume that’s Liam spying out at me? We need to talk.”
“This isn’t a great time,” Liam said, keeping the chain on the door but letting it open a few inches. “Nap-time.”
“Awww. Coochie-coo, little sweetie.” His voice was eerily flat. Roo did not like him at all, and struggled in Liam’s arms. “I think you’ll want to hear what I have to say. Give me five minutes.”
Now that the baby was fully awake, it was going to be hell even if he shut the door on Justin’s face right now. “Come in.”
An unexpected reticence crept in, a mild bashfulness at the state of the room. The thermometer of that bashfulness didn’t reach all the way to the fires of shame, hovering more at a sort of ambient room-temperature need to apologize for not having gotten a better room, a suite, something without a sad painting of a sailboat listing on a choppy sea. Justin took it all in without comment, although his gaze at the single chair, currently occupied by three stuffies and a box of baby wipes, made Liam rush to it to clean it off for his guest.
“Sorry,” he said, angry at himself for giving in to the need to apologize. It was exactly the way he’d felt when Justin’s mother had violated their privacy with her visit.
“Not a lot of room here for a child,” Justin said. He didn’t take out a handkerchief and scrub down the chair before sitting, but he clearly would have, in different circumstances. “But I assume you’ll be on your way shortly, back home to the big city, a much more exciting life than anything we could offer you down here.”
“It’s a lovely town. We like it a lot.” Get to the point, please.
“Charming, in its way. But a surprising amount of secrets. You’d be surprised what goes on when a family has been here for enough generations. Scandal doesn’t begin to describe it. Your father was lucky to escape all that.”
Liam had never wanted anything less than to hear Justin mention his dad. “Look, if you’re here to make another offer on the
house—”
“Oh, no, no. Look at you, you’re so ready to turn me down! You’re going to give me a complex, Liam. Make me feel like the spotty fat boy asking the homecoming queen to dance. I’m not here to dance. Let my mother handle the business, that’s my motto. No, I’m here for your protection, even if you might not believe that. Word is, you have been spending time with our mutual friend, Mason Tisdale.”
He said Mason’s name like there was a little machine in his mouth, clicking out metallic syllables.
Not as much time as I would like, he thought. Roo interrupted his reply, wanting to get down onto the floor to play. He smoothed out the blanket on the floor, and got her blocks out of the bag for her to bang together.
“Why are you asking about Mason?”
Justin’s smile was bright and genuine, alive with amusement. “Oh dear, now that I’m here, I’m not even sure how to say this! I should have prepared better. Let me put it this way: Mason has secrets.”
Secrets. He said the word with real delight, like a bug collector putting a pin through a prized butterfly.
Liam wouldn’t take the bait, although he could feel that first moment of vertigo that secrets always caused. It was not an easy life, always worrying that you were on the verge of a shocking revelation you didn’t want to hear.
“We all have secrets,” he said. “It’s just part of being an adult.”
Justin pursed his lips and shook his finger at Liam. “You do like him. Oh my. Listen, no, don’t say a word. I’m not prying into your business.”
“Really? It sounds a little like that’s exactly what you’re doing.”
The amusement, the lightness and ironic detachment, left Justin all at once. What remained was something colder, something flatter, sinister in its lack of emotion. “There is no need to take a tone, Liam. I am providing you this information for your own good.”
“I don’t think you are,” said Liam, keeping his voice carefully still, a Roo-safe volume. It made their conversation sound robotic, two diplomats from opposing countries keeping the discussion on a cold-war footing. “I think, Justin, that you’re here to make trouble. I’m not sure why. It seems like you’d realize I’m even less likely to sell to your family, if you try to get involved in my personal life.”
“What’s that phrase people use, putting your cards on the table? I’ve always hated that. You put your cards on the table at the end of the hand, when you’re toting up who wins and who loses. I’d rather be honest before the end of the game, and I don’t think anybody needs to lose here. Forget the house. The property is not part of this. I am simply telling you, Mason is not the man for you. He’s not what you think he is. He’s not…”
There are no silences when a baby is in the room. Silence is what the new parent craves, but also what he fears, because he gets used to hearing the constant small sounds of life. The little snore, the little clack of toys, the fuss and the laugh and the murmuring. So what filled the space between him and Justin now wasn’t silence, but it had the weight of silence, the sense of a portent, an omen of disaster. He wanted to fill that space with words. Tell Justin to get out, leave him alone. I’m not interested in your small-town gossip. Then spend an hour on the phone with Mason, being soothed by his low, rich voice.
He restrained himself. The only thing to do was to let the man speak his piece and be on his way. It was an effort of will to keep his mouth shut, as he watched Justin consider his next words.
“Life is different up there,” Justin said finally, gesturing vaguely north, encompassing the entire modern world with a wave of his hand. “You can just be gay up there, you know? Places like this, little towns like Superbia, we’re not like that. We have old-fashioned values, values like hate. Hatred of outsiders. Hatred of difference. Oh, we dress it up, we put on our Sunday best, we smile and say bless your heart, but what we say behind your back would scald your soul. We all know to toe the line down here. Mason knows that too. He’s never going to be what you want him to be. He’s never going to be, what’s the phrase, out and proud. The two things simply don’t go together down here.”
Liam hadn’t said a word to him about being together with Mason. Hadn’t mentioned a relationship or anything. How could he? As much as he liked Mason—really, really liked him—and as much as he wanted to spend constant time with him, things were still early. And…Mason wasn’t out. That was true. It limited what Liam could comfortably say. He didn’t even want to respond to Justin now. It felt wrong, like he’d be speaking out of turn.
“Mr. Mulgrew, I’m not sure what your point is, but I’m going to ask you to leave now. I’m going to ask that you not interrupt me again while I’m here.” Still keeping that carefully modulated voice, although Roo could tell something was going on. She was staring from one man to another, as though considering whether this conversation were stressful enough to be cry-worthy.
Which meant it was time to wrap it up.
Justin picked up on it too. He wasn’t insensitive, just…evil. Probably evil. Definitely. He stood, and smoothed his pants legs.
“Of course. As you like. I’m not wrong though. If you’re thinking of a future with Mason, you’re barking up the wrong tree. He’s very much a Superbia boy, and he’s never going to march out of the closet and into the open. You’ll have to trust me on that.”
Once the man was gone and the door was closed and locked, Liam pressed his back to the door and sighed, looking down at Roo. She gnawed on her block, staring up at him.
“I think I’m the one who needs the nap now,” he said.
23
Mason
“We’ve got to stop meeting like this,” said Mason.
Liam took his lips away from Mason’s throat, and let go of his open shirt, hands trailing down his body. “Do you feel a little like you’re on stage?”
“That’s exactly what it’s like,” he said, after meeting Liam’s kiss.
The hidden bar behind the secret door was all alight. He’d brought a generator, which was chugging away outside, so far away that it wasn’t audible at all from here. Cords snaked their way through the house, through the secret door, down the secret stairs, to here, to a bank of lights that cast a sun-bright glow, bringing the room to a crisp, clinical life. And yeah, it was like standing in the spotlight, but nobody was around to see.
Closer to the door, Mason had set up a HEPA filter, because it was seriously dusty down here. But it was also the most private place they knew of, a place they could be absolutely alone, away from prying eyes, so while waiting for Liam to arrive, he’d spent some time cleaning, getting the floor vacuumed, the bar and some of the chairs wiped down. He’d thought of it like a gift, a way for Liam to see the beauty of the place without that layer of abandonment and disuse.
“So did you add the bar to your big estimate?” Liam asked.
“Nah, I’ll throw that in free of charge.” His hands went around Liam’s trim waist, and lifted him onto the bar. He pressed his mouth against Liam’s abs, tasting the salty warmth of his skin. “All you have to do is stay.”
Something was on Liam’s mind. He could tell. Liam wasn’t good at holding anything back. That solid, practical honesty Mason had come to enjoy would always drive Liam to say what he needed to say, eventually. But Mason found he needed this physicality right now, more than he needed to hear whatever news Liam had. When Liam had walked through the bar’s door, the look of delight on his face had inflamed Mason, made him feel like a starving man in view of a meal. In this case, what he wanted to eat was Liam.
He heard the man’s pleasured hum as he kissed a random path across his skin, first up towards his ribs, then back down to where his skin disappeared into his jeans. Mason was going to get those jeans off of him as soon as possible. Every second Liam stayed clothed was a little agony, a sweet torture. Liam, his head back, twined his fingers into Mason’s short hair. “God, do that again…no, that, yeah…”
They spoke in whispers even though they were entirely alon
e; the bar seemed to require it, part of the admission fee for this safety and secrecy. Mason thrilled to the sound of it, to that low, husky whisper he could almost feel through Liam’s flesh. His hands found Liam’s back, felt the muscles flex there as his lover pushed his hips forward, a clothed offering, ready to be bared.
He’d been dying to get back here all day. When they’d parted before, even though he understood, even though he knew Liam had real responsibilities that could not be set aside, he’d felt the most delicious jealousy at not having him all to himself. It was something he’d never really felt before. It wasn’t anger, there was nothing dark about it, it was an almost joyous coveting of Liam’s time. Stay with me, spend another minute with me, an hour.
Yet even though they had plenty of time tonight—Liam was nothing if not good at making practical arrangements—Mason found himself rushing forward, letting his eagerness surpass his desire to stretch these moments into something long, lazy, languorous. He could feel his heartbeat low in his belly, as though the core of his being had slid down inside him, closer to where he wanted to join with Liam.
Liam leaned down from the bar to kiss him again. He wrapped his legs around Mason’s arms and chest, trapping him in the kiss, a willing captive in their private dungeon.
The room pulsed with energy, with memory. Other kisses had happened in this room, surely. It was a room engineered for secret pleasures, hidden from the outside world. What they were doing now, what Liam was doing to him, had a long lineage, stretching back to when the first guests had descended those stairs with their slightly anxious laughter, their gasps of amazement as they saw the space opening before them, gasps surely replaced by those softer sounds as unspoken passions were allowed to take hold.
Liam’s tongue teased and touched his own. Mason tasted red wine, the sweet acidity of the bottle he had brought for Liam, that he had packed with his tools and the lights. Couldn’t drink the bottles that had been down here for decades, after all. Bring your own, that was the rule of the day, bring your own, drink your own, taste your own on your lover’s lips.
