Devil's Fire

by Melissa MacNeal

  ‘He’ll be needing some discipline, then!’

  His trousers hit the floor. Hyde climbed on top of me, kissing and prodding, but I rolled him on to his back before he could claim what he was after. Clambering over his chest, I spread my slickened lips with two fingers. ‘Got your eyes on the prize?’

  ‘Only long enough to see what I’m eating. And I’m a starving man, Mary Grace.’

  I squealed as he gripped my hips. Shoving his tongue between my fingers, he probed deep and hard, rubbing my inner ridges with broad strokes as I worked my hand up and down to mimic his rhythm. My head fell back, taking my body into a more advantageous angle. He responded by sucking hard, creating a vacuum that squelched with my wetness. Inside me, the spirals tightened. I didn’t want to come too soon, so I flipped over and faced his fine cock.

  ‘Yes, suck me,’ he begged. ‘Dear God, Mary Grace, don’t hold anything back!’

  His raw command made me obey. I slid my lips down his shaft and dragged them up again, over the rigid veins and tight pink skin. Sol was in his glory, thrusting against my tongue while Hyde made little groans in his throat. Then it was I who cried out, when his mouth found my pulsing sex again and began to work it mercilessly.

  We see-sawed, our heads and bodies rocking towards the release we both craved. I tasted the salt of his first droplets and ran my tongue around the hard ridge of his head. Cradling his sac, I rubbed my thumb around the root of of him, inhaling his heavy male musk while continuing to suck up and down.

  As we moved into a position where we could observe each other’s ecstasy, a prickling at the back of my neck told me we were being watched. ‘Have you noticed the cottage has no curtains?’ I whispered, again guiding him on to his back.

  ‘I’d much rather gaze at you than count the heads at the windows,’ he answered with a low laugh. ‘It’s your call, Mary Grace. We can give them the show they’re hoping for, or we can pull the coverlet up and fuck for dear life underneath it.’

  I couldn’t tell him how many times, in how many ways, people here had watched me climax, when just a week ago I’d considered lovemaking a private thing. Despite the way my modesty had vanished, my time with Hyde was too precious to be flaunted before the eyes at the window. I would beat Sybil at her own impish game.

  ‘Cover my bare arse and let’s get to it!’ I breathed. ‘There’s something to be said for keeping the audience in the dark.’

  Chuckling, Hyde hauled up the counterpane until we were immersed in a dim, airless heat that only increased our hunger. I straddled him, staying low as I slid down to his tip. He entered me with a muffled grunt, and I wriggled against him, squeezing his cock with muscles that had sorely missed Solomon’s girth. Hyde planted his hands on my backside to guide the slow, steady motion that gave our onlookers little to go on, yet increased the internal heat our bodies had been stoking like a boiler ever since we’d caught sight of each other.

  The air beneath the blankets grew heavy with our scents. We rocked together, keeping our movement to an absolute minimum. It had an astounding effect: stifling my senses of sight and sound, and limiting my ability to thrust, forced me to focus upon those inner subtleties, creating a delicious friction between us.

  Our climax took us by storm. No sooner had I begun to buck than Hyde hugged me close and lunged upward, sucking air through his teeth. For long, lovely moments we shuddered with spasms that made the bed creak like a field of mating cicadas, until we fell limp. Solomon oozed out of me with a little river of cream, and I chuckled at the tickling sensation.

  ‘I guess this juice dribbling down your thigh will be the memento Sybil requested,’ I whispered. ‘But right now I don’t care who’s at the window. I’ve got to have air!’

  The quilted counterpane flew off us before I could reach it. I squinted at the sudden rush of daylight, to see my room mate’s foxlike grin. She stood beside the bed naked, inhaling deeply on her cigarette as she gazed at our entwined bodies.

  ‘So you finally got to use the bed, eh?’ she teased in a smoky voice. ‘Seems only fair I should collect a little something for that — not to mention for asking my kitchen assistants to keep everyone else occupied at the dining hall. What’s my silence worth to you, Mary Grace?’

  I wavered, wondering what Hyde must be thinking about this jaded woman.

  ‘After all, I let you have Mr Fortune all to yourself, uninterrupted.’

  ‘But you eavesdropped the whole time, didn’t you? Dammit, Sybil, is nothing sacred?’

  She rolled her kohled eyes and laughed, which made her breasts jiggle pertly. ‘Sacred? You have a lot to learn, my naïve little friend. Would you rather I keep your secrets — and keep your sweet little pussy safe from all the men who want to invade it? Or would you prefer another stint of solitary confinement with Father Luc?’

  My chest constricted. Sybil was saying far more than I wanted Hyde to hear, and she apparently intended to blackmail me with the abbot, as well. ‘You wouldn’t tell him what Hyde and I have been doing!’

  She arched an eyebrow. ‘In case you haven’t noticed, the abbot and I have a rather unique relationship. I’m only asking for something I suspect you really want to give me, Mary Grace,’ she whispered. ‘And I know Hyde would like to watch. But he must promise not to question you about our ways here at Heaven’s Gate. He must entrust you to my care for the duration of your stay. And you must give yourself over to me, too, pretty Mary.’

  Hyde had followed our exchange as he lay beneath me. He raised up on to his elbow, frowning. ‘Are you saying Mary Grace is in danger?’

  ‘Of a life-and-death nature? Of course not.’

  ‘Then why am I not to ask any questions?’

  Sybil grinned slyly, thrusting her breasts forward as she stepped closer to the bed. ‘Because I said so!’ she teased. ‘Because if you interrogate her too much, she’ll revert to that shy, unsophisticated state in which she came, missing the chance to develop her full potential as a woman — as a much more enjoyable wife for you, dear man.’

  ‘But I came here to sew. To establish myself as an artisan,’ I protested.

  ‘And you’re doing a beautiful job of it,’ my room-mate crooned. Then she smiled, cocking one knee up on the edge of the bed. ‘But think of all the other things you’ve learned this week, and how they might improve your enjoyment of marriage when you leave us. Hyde will never be satisfied with a submissive wife who lies flat on her back. He also loves to watch women who are hungry for each other.’

  Sybil caressed my dishevelled hair, her gaze intense. ‘If I live to be a hundred, I’ll never forget the way you threw me down on this bed that first night, and rammed your hand up me,’ she murmured. ‘And you’ll always recall the way I made you squirm and scream on the couch. Won’t you?’

  I swallowed hard, my eyes fixed on her slender face. She stood close enough that I caught the scent of her musk, and when her fingers trailed lightly down my neck I shivered with delight. Sybil wasn’t demanding anything more than she’d already given me; the same sort of shared pleasures Hyde had encouraged with Yu Ling. I thought back to being in the tub with the Celestial — to his guttural response when his serving girl guided my hand between her legs. I’d come a long way since then, on an inner journey that amazed me.

  So when Sybil gently steered my fingers beneath her russet bush, I didn’t jerk away. I explored her folds with a knuckle, watching her smile flicker as her honey wet my hand.

  ‘So — we’ve reached an agreement? Hyde won’t ask, and I won’t tell? You’ll become my protégée, and I your guardian angel?’ Her tight voice betrayed her arousal, yet she controlled her reactions until her terms were met.

  Fortune’s face, so alluring with that masculine shadow along his jaw, reflected his interest in what was about to transpire. ‘I can live with that, yes,’ he murmured. ‘And I’m getting out of your way, ladies, so I’ll have a better view.’ He shifted from under me and scooted an upholstered chair alongside us, as though the bed were a
stage.

  Sybil sprang on to the mattress, her eyes alight with triumph. ‘You won’t regret this,’ she breathed. ‘I’ve wanted you since you first came here, and I’m happiest when I get what I want! I can’t wait to feel your tongue driving into my cunt, Mary Grace.’

  She arranged the pillows against the wooden head board, and then sat back with her legs bent. After taking a last draw on her cigarette, she stubbed it into the ashtray on the vanity. Sybil made an engaging sight, with her honey-red waves falling over her bare shoulders and her breasts framed between her knees, but what I saw in the mirror stopped my heart.

  Brother Christy stood in the doorway.

  I’d been too surprised by Sybil’s ambush to notice his presence, and I doubted Hyde had seen him, either. Something in the monk’s expression told me he’d witnessed our entire conversation. His lenses caught the light in a way that obscured his eyes, but his stance suggested an avid interest in the protective partnership my room-mate and I had just agreed upon.

  Had Sybil asked him here? Or had he arrived in time to watch what he thought Hyde and I would be doing? I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.

  And since Sybil was simmering like a pot of chocolate, warm and sweet and fragrant, I didn’t want to stop what she’d started. Her gaze was riveted on my body while she toyed with the coarse hair curling around her cunt. ‘Isn’t she lovely, Fortune?’ she whispered, spreading her juice with a fingertip. ‘You’re a lucky man, and I’m grateful you’re willing to share.’

  Hyde smiled, dimpling his face. ‘I wouldn’t do that for just anyone, Sybil. You’ve made quite an impression on our Mary, while remaining aware of her sheltered upbringing. By the time she comes home to me, I’ll be greatly indebted to you. And I’ll appreciate knowing she hasn’t been ravished by every randy monk at the monastery.’

  Sybil glowed with his compliment. She focused on my face, her fingertip still working the moisture into her open folds. ‘You’ve never studied a woman up close, have you?’ she whispered. ‘What do you see, Mary Grace? Did you expect the intricate textures and scent? The delicate palette of pinks and crimsons? I’m so damned excited I could come, but I’m holding back…waiting for you to move much, much closer and touch me. Waiting for you to taste me.’

  My own slit quivered. I watched, fascinated, as cream the colour of pearls appeared around her open hole, pooling in the scarlet recesses. Sybil began to gyrate, sinking deeper into her pillow so she could display herself even more. Her sex was petalled like a poppy, with the deepest shades of red at its core, blending into the rosier hues of its outermost folds. With forked fingers she drew back her mound. Her clitoris stood proudly at attention, beckoning me.

  I leaned forward to stroke it with a curious fingertip. Sybil’s sigh filled the room and elicited a deeper one from Hyde, so I became bolder. Flattening on to my stomach, I eased towards her mesmerising sex and the slender finger she probed it with. Sybil slipped lower, until she was offering herself up, only inches away.

  ‘Lick me,’ she whispered. ‘Keep it light — just the tip of your tongue exploring the rim. I want to save that thundering little bud for last, all right?’

  I nodded, knowing how sensitive she would be there. On impulse, I blew a stream of air across it, and her desperate laugh urged me on. She smelled of a secret heat destined to scorch me like the fires of hell, yet I dipped my tongue where her fingers had been. My first taste was but a delicate sipping, which I paused to consider as I ran my tongue over my lips. When I looked up, above the curls so like my own and the rounded peaks beaded out with desire, Sybil’s intense gaze sent a tremor through me.

  ‘Take me,’ came her breathy command.

  I plunged my tongue inside her, rolling it into a point to stroke her upper wall. Sybil moaned and thrust against my mouth, opening further to receive every inch of attention I could lavish upon her. I pushed her cushiony mound higher, to reveal the folds and creases around an opening that pulsed with more cream. With firm, lapping strokes I pleasured her, alternating inner exploration with teasing circles around the crinkly red rim.

  She panted, spearing her fingers into my hair. ‘I’m so close…so close…oh God, Mary Grace, you’re driving me insane!’

  I pressed my lips against hers and sucked, flattening my tongue inside her, driving it in and out. Her cries rang around us and she writhed wildly, gripping my head between her flapping legs. When I sensed she was nearing her peak, I flicked her distended little clit. Just three light flutterings and Sybil screamed, undulating with a dewy delight that crested and ebbed, and then crested again for several moments.

  She finally fell back, panting. I kissed her thigh, amazed at the sleek muscles and the softness of her skin. When she relaxed her hold on my head, I glanced in the mirror. Brother Christy was gone. Hyde was fondling a cock that looked raring to go again, and when our eyes met he rose from his chair.

  ‘Point that arse in the air, woman. I want you from behind.’

  As he clambered on to the mattress, I was aware of my own sex throbbing for attention again, as well. He slipped into my cunt, until his blunt tip struck the sweet spot far up inside me. I rose on to my knees then, loving the wrap of his sturdy arms beneath my breasts. The spasms were gathering, coiled to spring, and I let my head fall back on his shoulder.

  I felt the lips of my sex being licked, and when I opened my eyes, the reflection in the mirror riveted me. Hyde held me from behind, his expression tense with imminent climax, while Sybil’s head bobbed between my legs. I felt her fingering Hyde’s sac as she lapped at me, felt his shaft pumping like a piston. Never had I been so deliciously helpless, nor had I experienced such a mix of sensations. I abandoned myself to them, letting them carry me upward on a rapture that suddenly flashed like white lightning inside me.

  My cries reached fever pitch and I felt Hyde convulse. Warm, creamy wetness filled me and I relaxed against him, panting. Sybil knelt before us, running her hands lightly over my thighs and belly, following her fingertip trails with airy kisses. She cupped my breasts, worshipping each one with a fervent mouth while I watched, fascinated. And when Hyde eased out of my slit, she smiled slyly.

  ‘Hold her there, Fortune. Let’s see how many more times she’s good for.’

  I was too surprised to protest — not that Sybil would’ve listened. Like a thirsty dog, she lapped the juices running from my cunt. The room was redolent with all our scents, an intoxicating blend that drove her on. With fingers and lips and tongue she plied me, spreading my thighs further with the help of her accomplice. I scarcely regained my breath before I began to pant again, rising like a phoenix from the remains of my first release. Hyde was kissing my neck, whispering encouragements, as I reached a shattering peak. I rode on waves that rushed ashore and eased back, to rise higher and then linger in enticing little ripples before crashing yet again.

  When I fell slack, Hyde caught me. His chuckle rumbled against my back as he held me close against him. ‘Oh Mary, sweet Mary Grace,’ he murmured. ‘You’ve only begun to discover what loving can do. And I was lucky enough to be here for it. But I really must head down the mountain now.’

  ‘Come again,’ Sybil quipped. She fell back on to the bed, landing in the pillows with an exhausted plop. ‘I think we’ve convinced her that, while others can walk her down a path of promises, Hyde and Sybil will deliver her…into ecstasy, and out of mischief that can’t possibly measure up.’

  Fortune smiled at me as he dressed. ‘I’ll be back next Friday, with money from your finished quilt. What shall we call it? “Pussy in the Garden”? Or, “Pussy on the Prowl”?’

  I laughed weakly and let him kiss me, already aching with goodbye.

  ‘I’ll see myself out, ladies. Do try to behave in my absence.’

  The door closed and silence filled the room. Sybil sat up, raking her unruly waves back from her face. I lay there watching her subtle, supple movements, the golden skin flowing over well-toned muscles. And while I admired her beautiful breasts and the f
lat of her belly and the flare of her hips, I rested content in the knowledge that Hyde excited me more.

  She patted my calf as though she’d read my thoughts. ‘You don’t mind that I’ve appointed myself your guardian angel, I hope?’

  ‘I may need one some day,’ I replied, wondering about my answer if Father Luc asked how I’d spent my afternoon. ‘You realise Brother Christy witnessed our pact?’

  ‘It’s just as well, since I can’t be your constant shadow. If you wish to remain chaste for Hyde, Christy can be trusted above the others.’ She smiled quizzically. ‘The kitchen crew sometimes speculates as to whether he’s been unmanned, or was born without all his parts. He doesn’t have the same…urges as the rest of us.’

  I nodded, wondering if I had enough energy to dress. It was only mid-afternoon, so I had to account for my time with the abbot. ‘He’s shown an interest in my quilts, though,’ I remarked. ‘Gave me a good idea for my next one, and has offered to take me where they store the discarded clothing. With four more to sew, I’ll be needing a variety of fabrics and ideas.’

  ‘The catacombs, eh?’ Sybil glanced away, her expression furtive. ‘Be careful down there, Mary Grace. You never know what might spring out from those old crypts and crannies.’

  Chapter Fourteen

  A Snake in the Garden

  Although I still thought of Sybil more as a fallen angel than a guardian, my life at Heaven’s Gate settled into a cosy routine over the next several weeks. Whatever she’d said — whether in the form of warnings, threats, or ultimatums — I was no longer the target of every monk’s lust, nor were my times with Hyde considered opportunity for group entertainment. I sat with my room-mate and her kitchen crew during Sunday services. I completed my second quilt, as well as the splendid Noah’s Ark design Brother Christy had suggested. I was no longer an outsider, nor a woman to be tricked and ridiculed.

  Best of all, because Hyde auctioned my garden quilt for five hundred dollars, and sold the second for almost as much, Father Luc allowed me to work unhindered, and to assist in the kitchen whenever I desired other company. It was the scene Hyde had sketched before bringing me here — or at least a closer match than I’d known my first week. And when Mr Fortune presented us with a cheque for three hundred and fifty dollars — half of what he’d convinced Delores Poppington to pay, to donate the Noah’s Ark quilt to Papa’s church — no one was more delighted than I! Mary Grace Michaels was becoming a recognised name about town; a respected talent whose work commanded a pretty price, and a woman who now had her own growing bank account.