11. FIRE
11
FIRE
PENNY
I f it was one thing Penny loved, after her prized Stradivarius and her mother’s spiced apple pie, it was being proven right.
Or, at least, somewhat right. Her new favorite thing was the dazed expression on Jack’s face when he’d seen the couple fucking and the other bodies that were obviously naked under their robes.
The real question was, why wasn’t she more upset about this turn of events, right or not?
It was this place. It was seductive, like everything and everyone in it, like it belonged to another space and time entirely. The luxurious decadent décor of black velvet, crystal, and gold that sparkled into her eyes. The ripe apples and wheat in golden bowls on every table. The delicious drink that spiced her tastebuds on the way down. The tribal music that emanated from hidden speakers, a steady throbbing in the background that was infiltrating her senses. It was a strange blend of Celtic flutes played on a low register, along with uilleann pipes and cymbals layered over a sensual modern drumbeat. Even if she didn’t belong to this tribe, its music still captivated her and stole its way into her body.
The constant drone of Clarissa’s words wove through the score, at the same time soothing and compelling. Those almond-shaped green eyes barely blinked while she spoke. If Penny didn’t know better, she’d think she was being spelled.
Jack was feeling it, too. She could tell. He seemed to be fighting it, blinking several times rapidly and slightly shaking his head, but he was aroused again. The stretchy olive pants hid nothing.
Clarissa and Simon disappeared through a side door as the guests were ushered in the other direction. They filed out of the castle to the gardens in the back that Penny had surveyed earlier. It was nearly sunset. As the last rays of the sun pierced the overcast sky, the effect was strange, like lemon, lavender, and carnation pink tinting a cobalt gray painting.
The torches were flaming and illuminating the path to the pile of broken sticks and thicker chunks of logs. It was colder than in the city, crisper and quieter. They waited, mumbling and drunk, making off-hand jokes until the FitzGeralds suddenly reappeared, both wearing white cloaks wrapped with golden rope at the waist and carrying white sticks of wood.
Damn, they must be cold . Penny kept the joke to herself because everyone else had quieted at their appearance. Clarissa was given a torch by an older female server, who very solemnly stepped back. Clarissa then passed the torch to Simon, who stepped forward with equal solemnity and looked at each face in the crowd.
“We light this fire in celebration of the end of the harvest, the change of seasons from the time of work and play to the season of rest and reflection. The fire is a symbol of destruction but also renewal. May we burn those things that we no longer need and make way for the future, for the new. To embrace the way forward.”
Simon said more words in Irish, then turned to the pyre and set the structure on fire. The blaze whooshed high almost immediately, and the onlookers gasped and clapped.
“What would the good Judge and Mrs. Mayfield have to say about this?” Penny wondered aloud. “They would not like this pagan poetry, not one bit.”
Nope, they wouldn’t like anything about this place or this night.
“I don’t think I like it either. We should go back to the room,” Jack said quietly.
“Leave now? Hell no. This is just getting interesting,” she whispered back.
The servers ushered everyone back into the main body of the castle through a different entrance. They passed along a corridor and were now in a long, narrow room with a table that could sit at least forty. Clarissa placed her on one side of the table and Jack on the other, then took her seat at the bottom while Simon took the head.
Simon looked at the guests as they tittered and shifted like a crowd of high schoolers at a dance. But they froze when he suddenly shouted, “Feast!” and clapped his hands three times.
It was as though the sharp rapping of his hands released a soundwave that swept down the table, reaching all the guests and every corner of the room. It passed through Penny, and she felt its ripples like a physical touch. They quieted and sat in unison as if obeying a silent command.
The table was set with the finest china Penny had ever seen. There were crystalline goblets of dark, rich wine and centerpieces of grapes and plums on silver trays. Small bouquets of wildflowers were interspersed among tall, lit tapers in candelabra. The servers appeared, still masked, but their costumes had been replaced with velvet capes. They wore nothing underneath except for the occasional glimpse of swirling blue paint on their flesh.
Diarmuid came to her side, bowing slightly with his soft smile. His blue eyes behind his mask and his thin pale hair reminded her so much of Brendan.
Who didn’t remind her of Brendan in this country? Well, the hulking man sitting across from her, that’s who. Jack and Brendan couldn’t have looked less alike.
“I’ll be serving you tonight, ma’am. Anything you need, just say the word, ma’am.”
“Thank you, Diarmuid.”
He poured her more water and wine, and without further instructions from her, he left.
“More mead?” Penny’s neighbor said.
This was the famous Serena Gardner, a lithe, long-legged actress with a dazzling smile and super short hair arranged in smooth, platinum finger waves. Penny knew she originally hailed from Texas. One of the top-earning Black entertainers in Hollywood as well as an award-winner, Serena had been labeled one of the most beautiful people in Hollywood several times. Like Penny, she was in her early forties and hadn’t been seen on screen as much after a high-profile marriage and divorce to someone Black social media denounced as “beneath her.”
Despite looking every bit the diva in a beautiful red ballgown with a glimmering gold leaf crown, she was sweet and humble. She made sure Penny’s cup was full by pouring it herself.
“ Go raibh maith agat ,” Penny said, then giggled. “ Sláinte .”
“You speak Irish? How long you been here, girl?”
Giggling again, Penny took a sip. “I know a few words. I’ve been here eight months or so. I’m working on a book and when it’s finished, I’m heading home.”
Jack’s face reddened; he must have overheard her despite the chatter on his side of the table. Penny didn’t want to start assuming she knew what was going on in his head, but he didn’t look happy to hear that.
“Are you here solo like me?” Serena asked, taking a delicate sip from her own cup.
“No, I’m here with my, um, husband.” Another giggle erupted at the word. “There he is.” Penny lifted her chin in Jack’s direction while he dourly lifted his wine glass in a sarcastic salute.
“Oh,” Serena said with a slightly disappointed shrug. “I’m always the single gal these days. That’s why I come to these things. I’d never do this back home. Too many eyes and ears.” She gave Jack a polite smile. “Your hubby is one good-lookin’ man. I saw his last fight in Vegas. Whew! You’ve got a bruiser. Simon told us he’s this year’s Hunter.”
Penny had zero idea what that meant, but she played along. “Mm, yeah, Jack is so hot, isn’t he? I don’t even know how all this happened, but here we are, yay.”
Okay, now she was definitely more than buzzed. Everything seemed overbright and humming with that music throbbing in her veins. She drank at least two more cups of mead anyway, knowing she probably ought to stop and march her butt upstairs to the room.
But she didn’t, arrested by the decadent opulence, the silky feel to the air that suggested something was going to happen.
Something wild and irresistible.
In between the courses of roast venison with rosemary, small white potatoes and succulent glazed pork with a side of mushroom rago?t, Serena chatted about American politics while Penny ate and drank and “mm-hm’d” at the right moments. Across the table, Jack drank his wine, staring at Penny with lustful resentment.
It was when Serena turned back to sports that her words pricked Penny’s ears.
“Can I call you Jack?” Serena asked him. He nodded once, and she continued, “I saw an interview with Derek La Roque last night on SportsZone. He says his team has been reaching out to you for a title fight. You’ve even been offered a new contract, but you haven’t confirmed. Is he telling the truth? Are you really considering getting back into the cage? I hope you are. I can’t stand that man, even if he is handsome. Somebody needs to beat his ass .”
Jack flushed while Penny looked between him and her new friend with her mouth parted. She couldn’t have heard that right. Jack, considering getting back in the octagon? When he’d told her fighting would be dangerous for him?
He wasn’t answering. Penny was about to ask who the hell was La Roque and what was Jack going to do about the offer, until the ring on her hand flashed into her eyes, and she remembered she was his “wife.” A wife would know about an offer like that. A wife would have been informed and would have already told him to forget about doing anything like that, ever.
Finally, Jack spoke. “There are a few other fighters I think could take him down. DeMonte Shaw from London, Diego Montoya of Mexico. Two Nigerian fighters coming up in the ranks. I’m far from the only game in town.”
Eyes shifting to his empty plate, Jack seemed more than ready to drop the topic.
“That’s a shame. You were phenomenal, Jack. I mean…don’t you miss it? People cheering your name…bein’ the best of the best…” Serena asked, her smile wistful.
Again, Jack was slow to answer, eyes still down on the table.
Penny jumped in. “Jack and I are both enjoying being out of the spotlight. His gym is his life now. He’s going to debut two excellent fighters, so keep your eyes peeled for some announcements with that. And I admit I’m selfish. I prefer that handsome face just the way it is.”
With a grateful smile, Jack nodded. “My wife is right. I’m excited about my fighters. But she’s leaving out the best part of retirement. I get to come home to her. She’s my life now.”
That was taking the act too far. Jack’s direct gaze was too heavy and went too deep. Emotion flooded the most tender parts of herself, for him, for the sincerity in his voice that rolled through her.
“Wow,” Serena breathed with her hand to her chest, her golden-brown eyes misting. “Penny, does Jack have a brother? Maybe a cousin?” They laughed.
After the last few courses and the berry compote dessert, there was no offer of the usual coffee. Instead, there was tea, which Penny sniffed when it was poured.
“Mm, what’s in that?” she asked, taking a deeper whiff.
“Lavender, ma’am, with rose petals and other herbs, ma’am,” Diarmuid informed her.
“That smells good. Yes, please.” She noticed his dick through the opening of his robe. It hung long, but not erect.
Penny laughed. Jack’s nose flared. He swigged the tea he’d just been served, too, and blinked slowly. His face was flushing again like it had when he’d been lavishing attention on her pussy. Suddenly she wanted him to finish the job. Desperately needed to feel him again, his thick fingers, his tongue, any part of him. But even in this altered state, somewhere between drunk and stoned and a little bit over the rainbow, she resisted the pull of him, the satisfaction she knew he could give her.
This was too intense. He was too intense.
As if he knew what she was thinking, the corner of Jack’s lips curled with an almost cruel amusement. His eyes were dark tonight, nothing green-gold in them now, and narrowed to the point where she no longer saw white. He raised his cup to his lips and drank more spiced tea, then paused. He put the cup down, raised his hand to his face as if he’d caught the scent of something and inhaled. He inhaled it again, putting his fingers right up under his nose. It was the finger he’d used to fuck her earlier. Jack wouldn’t release her from his captive gaze as he sniffed that finger and her pussy flooded even as her face went aflame.
She was disgusted by him. She wanted him so badly she was going to incinerate from desire.
“It’s nothing, it’s nothing…” Simon was saying from his spot at the table. A guest was complaining to him in muted but agitated tones. The servers had cleared up the dishes and silverware and were now going down the rows, bending and murmuring in each guest’s ear. “It’s just a formality. Something we, unfortunately, in modern times, are obliged to address. You are more than welcome to adjourn to your room…”
The argumentative guest turned and gestured to his much younger companion. Both men left the room, the first angry with the second looking very sorry to go. People hardly noticed the dust-up, too busy polishing off the remnants of their drinks and dessert.
“Ma’am. Your clearance, ma’am.” Diarmuid was back, bending by her ear.
“Clearance for what?” Penny asked, weaving in her seat. The haze in the room wasn’t smoke from the fireplace; it was inside her head. She shook it, and the haze cleared a bit.
“A first-timer, huh?” Serena said with an amused grin. “He needs to see your health info, hon. To make sure you’re in the clear to participate in the festivities tonight. Do you have it on you somewhere?”
“My phone,” Penny said stupidly. “My phone.” She laughed, then went to dig her phone out of the secret pocket Aoife had added to the gown so she wouldn’t need a purse. “Yay for pockets in ball gowns!”
Unlocking the phone and finding the info was tricky with her fumbling, slow fingers, but finally, she managed.
Diarmuid checked it and bowed. “Very good, ma’am. If you please, turn off your mobile.” He held up a silk bag and waited for her to drop the phone inside. “Thank you, ma’am. This will be returned to you upon your departure. Have a wonderful evening.”
Across from her, Jack did the same. He was staring at her, ignoring the woman sitting next to him, who was dragging her finger along his arm. There was a look in his eyes that warned her, again, that maybe they should leave before lines were crossed that couldn’t be uncrossed.
She didn’t want to leave. She wanted to see what was there, at the event horizon, beyond which she just knew something momentous waited if she had the courage to go exploring.
“Everyone. Now we have dined and dined well. It’s time to dance and celebrate!” Clarissa made the announcement this time and nodded to Simon, who nodded back.
Simon stood, and everyone followed him down a passageway to another huge, high-ceilinged room with smooth, polished hardwoods that beamed. There were some chairs lined up around the oval, but the space in the center was clear and open for the dance. In a gallery above, musicians waited to begin their seisíun with an array of traditional instruments. Penny smiled at them, holding Jack’s arm.
“Now we’re talkin’,” she whispered. “Wish I had my phone on me to record them.”
“Taking our phones. Don’t you think that was strange?” he asked softly. Around them, the other guests were talking about the bonfire and the meal, holding their cups out to the passing servers for another pouring of mead.
“Oh, so Mr. Skeptical, who told me I was wrong for assuming these people were freaky is now suggesting something’s weird?” Penny swallowed from her refreshed goblet. “Mm, so good. Thank you.” The masked server winked at her and bowed.
“I think you’ve had enough. We’re going upstairs,” Jack announced and took her hand. She resisted his pull.
“But you’re the most popular man in the room,” Clarissa said, suddenly appearing and winding her arms around his neck. Penny couldn’t tell if she was drunk or what, then decided Clarissa had to be on something because she pressed herself against Jack’s hard body.
That snapped Penny out of her amused calm. “Hands off, lady,” she said, matter-of-factly pulling Clarissa’s arms off her so-called husband.
Clarissa laughed, turning to her and wrapping her arms around Penny in turn. “Don’t worry, Penelope. The three of us are going to be very good friends, yes?”
She winked and turned to signal the musicians, who lifted their instruments and began to play a joyful Irish reel.
“Holy shit, it’s like we’re on the Titanic. It’s about to go down!” Penny exclaimed to Jack, exuberant again from a fresh hit of mead.
Penny snatched Jack’s goblet and tossed back her own. Dropping them both on a nearby small table, she grasped his hand and pulled him onto the floor to begin dancing and spinning with the others.
“I don’t dance,” he told her loudly over the music, shuffling awkwardly.
“Stop it, wallflower. You better shake that thang.”
Jack groused, but he complied, swinging her on the floor. After a while, it seemed like he’d forgotten about leaving and might have been enjoying himself, gazing at her and cracking a big smile with sweat dripping from his forehead. When the first reel was over, he’d thawed enough to clap with everyone else, his smile wide.
Penny loved it when Jack smiled. She loved him.
Whoops, wait, no. That was the mead and the wine talking, this fairytale castle, this whole beautiful, dreamlike evening. Not love love.
Nope. Not even close.
“Another dance,” she demanded, and Jack took her out on the floor again.
After several fast dances, the musicians slowed down to play something soft and sensuous, with a sly, teasing fiddle and percussion. Jack pulled her against him, taking her hand in his and wrapping his arm around her waist. Smiled into her eyes and filled her slowly with his heat, his deep woodsy scent, and his sheer vitality.
But then the music changed again. It went faster but it was almost all flutes, horns, and bodhrán, the drumming pounding a beat into her chest, into her head, which was so light yet so clouded at the same time. The room was shimmering, the chandeliers throwing sparks into her eyes while the walls pulsed. That pulsing was her heartbeat now, a throbbing in her belly that moved sinuously down to her pussy. She gasped when Jack gripped her by the waist tighter, pulling her against his hips.
His eyes were glazed. Something hard pushed against her stomach. With effort, he stepped back, putting more space between their bodies.
“We should go back to the room, Penny.” Jack’s face was strained, as though he was exercising tight control over himself, control that he was about to lose.
“Why, so you can wait till I’m ‘sleep and then come back down here to look for our new friend? I think you were protesting too much. She’s sexy. I bet you already got some of that,” she taunted, pointing her chin at Clarissa, who smiled at them from the entrance of the ballroom.
Penny knew she was provoking him for no good reason. Pushing all his buttons to see what would finally set him off.
This was wildly irrational. Dangerous. And she no longer cared.
“Come on, Penny, I’ve had enough. Back to the room,” Jack ground out. His eyes now seemed slightly off-focus.
“I said no.”
Abruptly, the music stopped mid-note. The sudden silence was a shock to the system. Everyone went motionless as if this was an adult game of freeze tag.
Clarissa stalked through the guests and nodded at the cloaked servers, still in the masks. The servers took each guest and placed them in rows facing each other. Some were eager to obey, others were slow. But no one resisted.
“What you wore when you came in here… those garments made of silk and satin. Buttons, wires, ribbons.” Clarissa’s words were measured, delivered in a voice that carried through the space. “Those were costumes designed to shield you. To cover up your real self from the glare of a judgmental, unforgiving world.” They all gazed at her, mesmerized. No one dared make a sound; not even a sigh escaped. “But our way is to reveal the truth. Our way strips us of our masks, our need to stay in control. What you will wear now is the truth. What you will expose of your inner selves to everyone here is the truth. And we will love one another. We will love who we really are.”
Penny was opposite Jack, whose face glowered fiercely in the golden refracted light. His chest heaved as he glared at the server, who drew a blue line from one cheek to the other over the bridge of his nose. Another server fixed deer antlers to his head. Their tips were like bare tree branches, tall, elegant, and sharp. Deadly. None of the other male guests received a pair.
Clarissa stopped in front of him, looking up with searching eyes. Softly she said, “Who you really are.”
She moved on to the head of the rows. The female servers attended to Penny and the other women. They, too, were given horns, but the much smaller, more delicate pairs of a doe.
But then her server turned her face up to Penny’s. Her eyes were black. Her jet hair was matted, and her fingers were gnarled. Not young like the others; far from it. She held a shell up to her lips. As Penny suddenly realized she knew her, dressed in her old green rags, the woman winked at her with mischief in those onyx eyes and blew a powder right into her face. It was diamond-white and when it filtered through the air, it showered Penny in pink, indigo, and purple iridescent sparks that fell gently on her face down to the tips of her shoes.
Penny gasped and inhaled more powder into her lungs. The head rush was literally out of this world.
The woman in green turned and did the same to Jack, whose head whipped back slightly at the contact. When she passed on with a laugh, he was unsteady on his feet.
The woman dressed in green had vanished. It was Clarissa who now stalked between the rows, looking at each face with satisfaction. At the head, she focused her gaze on Jack. When she gestured, he followed, along with all the others. Penny went with them, mute, the shimmering kaleidoscope whirling in her head, replacing rational thought.
They were now in the Great Hall again. Couches, settees, the floor, every surface was covered with soft furs and silk sheets. There was fluttering all around her. Penny realized it was the guests, shedding their clothes like trees in autumn shed their leaves. Then they found each other and sank down, pairing off into twos, threes, fours, all undulating movement and moans.
She wandered, her mind overcome with the sights and scents in the room of hardcore fucking. Her own arousal was piqued and became liquid, pooling in her panties as she stopped to watch a man and a woman go at it vigorously on a chair, the woman’s small breast in his sucking mouth. Another man licked a server’s pussy while a second man serviced his cock, the trio moaning and writhing together on a silk divan. Over on a settee, a woman sucked her curvy partner’s nipples and pleasured her with fast fingers while three men lavished love on each other in a tangle with deep groans.
Fast hips snapped as a woman was getting pounded from behind, her breasts bobbing over the back of the chair she was holding onto. It was Penny’s new friend, Serena, who managed to grin at her before the haze of ecstasy overtook her.
Penny squeezed her own nipple, wanting only Jack, only needing Jack to touch her. She turned to look for him. There he was, standing on the golden circle in the middle of the room. Someone had placed a bed there, and two of the servers were already lying on it fully nude. Clarissa was sitting on the bed, too, wearing her own set of doe horns and nothing else but gold paint on her nipples.
Jack looked from the scenes around them back to her while three of the does slowly undid his clothing. Two went to work on his vest and shirt while the third snapped open the buttons of his trousers. It was easy to see he was growing even harder through the thick yet stretchy material. When his shirt was off and his pants gone, even down to the shoes and socks, everyone — everyone in that room — stopped to gaze upon what had been revealed.
Penny had only seen his unclothed body in videos and photos for promo shots and in the cage during battle. But Jack Valentine’s nearly nude body in the flesh?
What a man .
“Breathtaking,” someone murmured.
The lighting above him cut his angular cheeks to an even more razor-fine masculine beauty. His tattoos stood out, black and shadowy, chaotic. His shoulders were absolute works of art. Even his arms were beautiful, a network of ink overlaying a map of veins she wanted to trace with her tongue. On his torso, there were no designs save for what hard work and nature had carved, with abs that tapered down to his delicious V. Penny wanted to lick all of it, every bit of him, even the curve of his ass and his strong thighs.
Jack made no move to hide that he was rock-hard. She wanted to test the weight of it in her hands. She already knew it was heavy when he’d rubbed it between her legs. Her pussy was flooding, remembering the pleasure it had massaged out of her.
All the while Jack stared directly into her eyes across the space, daring her to look away, challenging her to come to him.
“No,” Penny said. For some reason, she seemed unable to raise her voice. That music, dammit, that music was making her clit throb in time to its incessant beats.
From behind her, Penny heard men talking. She turned to look. It was Simon sitting in a chair, naked and erect, while his friends flanked him on their own chairs, also naked. Simon didn’t touch himself; he merely sat while the other two stroked their own cocks, surveying the scene.
“I’ve been waiting for this for months,” Jafar said. His body was shockingly white and hairy. The limp pink worm in his fist was probably so sleepy from his drinking it wouldn’t do more than flop around. “I’ve got to hand you all your props on getting him here. I can’t wait to see him in action.”
“If there was a book titled The Little Engine that Couldn’t , my wife’s picture would be the cover art,” Simon said with a chuckle of disdain. “She fails at everything she tries, so her failure to get him here sooner was par for the course. I thought she’d failed again until he walked in the door. Just look at him. What a magnificent animal…” His voice was almost reverent.
Animal ? Penny pointed at them and slurred, “You raggedy sons of bitches.” But apparently, her lips hadn’t moved. None of them addressed her. She’d become invisible to them.
Unaware of their insults, Clarissa was staring at Jack’s big, strong body as she licked her lips, looking nothing like a deer. More like a wicked wolf from an old tale, about to howl at the moon and claim her long-awaited prize.
“Come here, Jack. Our girls are waiting,” Clarissa cajoled in a teasing voice.
“Piss off,” he spat out savagely, turning toward her with flaming eyes. “I wouldn’t let you wet my cock if it was on fire. Find your magic wand and go fuck yourself with it.”
Simon and his idiots laughed as Clarissa’s face went brick red.
While Jack roundly insulted her, warm hands touched Penny’s arm, sliding from her wrist to her shoulder, then grazing her neck. Long, pale, elegant fingers that belonged to a man.
“Mm, beautiful. Most of the time, I hate this job. I hate my lady and my lord boss. I can sense you do, too. But tonight, when Mrs. FitzGerald assigned me to you, I thought I’d never been luckier in my life, ma’am. Or can I call you by your name? Penelope. It’s a gorgeous name, like the woman who bears it.”
It was Diarmuid under the mask, the man who’d ushered them to their room, the same who’d been her server at dinner. He was tall, and with his robe gone, he was lean-cut. But the blond hair and his pale blue eyes were confusing her. He leaned in and kissed her throat, nimble fingers going to work on the row of buttons at her back.
“I can’t wait, Penny Lane. You’re so lovely…” He palmed her shoulder, then her back, pressing a hot, sizzling kiss on her throat.
A breeze blew in from the opposite direction. Penny felt the chill on her bare arms and rubbed them, sudden confusion clouding her head.
“Wh-what did you call me?” Her breasts rose and fell sharply. Penny turned to stare at him.
It wasn’t Diarmuid. It was Brendan. Her Brendan, naked and waiting to love her again.
“But…you’re dead.” Penny suddenly wanted to cry. “Are you ashamed of me?”
The Irish accent was gone; in its place was that same old voice she’d known, always on the verge of self-deprecating laughter. “Penny Lane, I could never be. I came here to see you. You know, crossing the veil and all that mystical jazz. Come with me. Stay with me until sunrise, baby.”
He took her hand with that sweet, sarcastic smile that was all Brendan and tried to lead her to the nearest unoccupied settee.
Until she turned her head and saw Jack. He was frozen, staring at her in disbelief.
“Penny,” Jack growled her name in outraged warning.
Now his nose was flaring, his eyes narrowed to total darkness.
He was beautifully savage.
Utterly terrifying.
Resisting the primal pull to go to him and let him have her right there in the center of that room, to give in to the delicious carnality that everyone was indulging in so freely, Penny ran. Away from danger. Away from him.
“Penny!” Jack bellowed.
Simon’s laughter rang out, following her through the hall and out the door. “Let the Hunter and the Hunted become one.”