Angel Manor (Lucifer Falls Book 1) (6 page)

The woman in the nightgown beckoned him to walk further, and she led him to a large over-lit dining area, where hundreds of guests, dressed in beautiful gowns and three-piece suits, dined on delicacies served by at least a dozen waiters.

I want this,
Oliver thought,
I have dreamt of this for so long, and seeing it makes me long for it even more.

“This can all be yours. And there is so little you need to do in return, Oliver.” The woman played with the strings of her nightgown. “I can be everything you want me to be… everything. I ask so little from you. But you can’t leave me again, you bad boy. I miss you when you’re gone.”

“What do you want from me?”

“I want you to make me beautiful again. Can you do that?”

“Are you… are you the house?” He rubbed the bridge of his nose and looked at her through squinting eyes. Her face was so delicate, her symmetrical features making her look like a porcelain doll.

“I gave my essence to this house a long time ago. I bonded with it, as you have.”

“What is it that you want from me?”

“Fill the house with life. That’s what I want. That’s what we all want. A house needs the living. And this house is special, Oliver. This house guards secrets.”

“What kind of secrets?”

She just smiled at him again and licked her lips.

“Bring us people. Let them walk on our floors and under our roof. That is all we want from you, and then you can have this…” she spread out her arms, showing him the people who sat eating and laughing in the dining room – eating
his
food, “…all for yourself.”

“I want that.”

“I know you do…” The pale hand pulled at another string of her nightgown, and milk-white breasts spilled from the fabric. They were modest, but enough for Oliver to feel his masculinity stir against his black cotton boxer shorts.

He couldn’t quite recall what happened after that. All he remembered was the woman wrapping naked legs around him, the cold of her pelvis against his, and the welcoming wetness of what lay beyond her thighs. And how at some point she whispered in his ear: “Stay inside me.”

As he lay on his side, eyes wide open, his thoughts wild, he realised that the house needed him. Being in this hotel felt like cheating, and Oliver was sure this was why he felt so sick. He wasn’t meant to be here, and would have to return as quickly as possible. If he was going to turn the manor into the hotel of his dreams, he needed to be committed. The dream woman was right. A house, or in this case a hotel, needed life, and the only thing that could bring life to a building was people. He needed to get the hotel up and running as quickly as possible. Nothing would stand in his way. Not Bam with her bullshit and not even Freya. His thoughts were barely lucid, his eyes glazed over, and he turned to his other side as fitful sleep overtook him once again.

***

It had been Oliver’s idea to return to Angel Manor the next day. Freya and Bam had struggled to get out of bed, and Freya had pleaded with him to let them sleep until they felt better. He admitted that he felt as sick as the girls, but he was eager to get started and somehow convinced Freya that the fresh air would do them good. Freya thought that he was probably right, because as soon as she stepped out of the car and onto the courtyard she felt the nausea retreat, and both Oliver and Bam looked decidedly less peaky.

The house looked different. She wasn’t sure how, but for some reason the building looked more…
awake.
Her limbs felt heavy as she slid the old key in the lock. Sunlight streamed into the entrance hall, and to Freya’s surprise, the place smelled different… fresher, as if someone had cleaned overnight, though there was still a hint of decay hanging around.

Freya pushed past Oliver and inspected the nearest wall. It was clean, and although the wallpaper was still torn and faded, the crack underneath it appeared as nothing more than a scratch. “I must be losing my mind.”

“This was a huge crack yesterday, bleeding brown snot, right?” Bam said, her eyes wide as she looked from Freya to Oliver.

“Perhaps it wasn’t that bad.” Oliver made his way towards the wall and let his fingers glide over the crack. “I mean, it was pretty dark in here yesterday. The light must have been different or something. I think we saw it wrong.”

Bam hugged her own arms “We saw it wrong? All three of us?”

“It was pretty dark in here.” Freya shrugged. She wasn’t even sure if she had seen the brown substance or if it had just been an optical illusion. “The light must have played a trick on our eyes.”

Bam shook her head and took a step back. Freya moved towards her and wrapped her arms around the smaller girl.

“Come on, Bam. We were all pretty shocked by the state of this place yesterday. Can you honestly say you remember seeing anything clearly?”

Pink hair tickled Freya’s nose as Bam shook her head. Freya exhaled with some relief, knowing full well that they had just avoided a healthy dose of drama with their friend. Bam was easily rattled.

“I’m rather glad that our assessment of the place yesterday seemed a bit over-exaggerated. I think the appearance of the house just took us by surprise and we made it worse than it really was in our heads. It’s still a mess, but it’s not as bad as we thought.”

Oliver cheered up, and put his hands on his hips and puffed out his chest. “True, we can clean most of this up, but I will still want my contractor to look at it.”

“When’s he coming?”

“Next Monday. He’s Rudy’s cousin, and he’ll give us a good deal.” Oliver pouted and placed his finger on his chin just below his bottom lip. “According to Rudy, the guy will do anything for him, and apparently Rudy will do anything for me, so yay us.”

“Oh yeah?” Bam bumped her hip into Oliver’s, and to Freya’s relief she saw that the tension had been broken. “I remember Rudy. He was a hottie.” Bam licked her finger and touched her bottom, making a sizzling sound between her teeth.

“Yes, thank you. Swell.” Oliver ran his hand across the back of his neck and smiled shyly. “Laugh at me all you like, but I think it works to our advantage that this guy has the hots for me, and I don’t mind using my good looks to further our goal.”

The girls laughed and hugged Oliver from either side.

“How refreshingly open-minded of you, Oliver. I took you for more of a lad than that.”

His hands brushed his sleeves with demonstrative strokes. “I’m confident about my sexuality and therefore not threatened by gay men.”

The girls laughed again and shook their heads. Then they looked at the debris scattered over the entrance hall, and the laughter died on their lips.

Freya eyed the broken furniture. “We should try to get as much stuff cleared out of here as we can before he comes.”

Oliver nodded. “I’ll order a skip this afternoon. I think we need to try and save up our money and make a space to live in the house. Hotel costs will eat at our budget.” He looked at her, an anxious expression on his face. “Is that okay with you guys? Otherwise, I’ll just stay here on my own for now and you can share a room.” His eyes pleaded with them, and Freya felt a small pang of concern. There was something in Oliver’s brown eyes that unnerved her.

“Stay here? Now? We don’t have proper bedrooms yet. Nothing is clean. I think we should wait.” She looked at Bam, who seemed just as doubtful, but her friend kept her mouth shut.

“Your aunt had to sleep somewhere. And what about her kids? I’m sure there are bedrooms somewhere.”

“They could be in the same state as everywhere else. I really think we should sort out the mess before we think about living here. What about that brown shit we saw yesterday? What if it’s some sort of toxic crap? Bam could be right.”

“We saw it wrong. Do you see any sign of it now?”

“All three of us saw it wrong? What do you think it was, mass hysteria?” Freya folded her arms and straightened her shoulders.

“We probably saw something else. For all I know, it was just a big slug or something. I never investigated it… did you?”

“No, but—”

“Freya, the house is fine. Honest. You need to stop finding excuses. I know you don’t like this place, but we’re going to have to live here eventually. Might as well be sooner rather than later.” He took a step towards her and gently grabbed her chin between his forefinger and thumb. “Face your demons, and all that lark.” His smouldering eyes looked in hers and, for a moment, Freya remembered the brief time they’d dated as teenagers. She didn’t want to stay in the house, especially not in this state. She didn’t trust it somehow, and she knew it was insane not to trust a building… but there was just something about this place. And yet… Oliver had always held a strange power over her. When she told Ollie and Bam she had inherited the house, it had been him who had convinced her not to sell. Freya struggled to deny him anything, and she knew Bam was the same.

“I just don’t know, Ollie. This is not what we planned.”

“Well, I’m going to stay here.” There was conviction in his voice. “I’d rather have you two stay with me, but if you won’t… well, that’s your choice. Bam? What say you?”

“I guess we can stay here.” Bam looked miserable, but Oliver clapped his hands together.

“Splendid.”

“Splendid? You sound like a villain from the old Batman series.” Freya shook her head and muttered “kapow” under her breath.

“Ladies… let’s go find the bedrooms and see if they’re habitable. Then we can get our stuff from the B&B tonight.”

He led the way and the two girls followed. Freya felt Bam’s cold, clammy hand slip in to hers.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, I actually feel better.” Bam smiled brightly, but Freya wondered how genuine it was.

Chapter 3

Clearing the house was less arduous than Freya had feared, and by the time the contractor came, most of the debris in the entrance hall and the central room had been thrown into skips. There was no way in hell they could get Bam to touch anything with cobwebs on it, so they sent her to collect anything that looked valuable instead.

“I wonder if we can get an internet connection all the way up here.” Oliver grunted as he pulled a heavy bin-liner over his shoulder and made his way to the door. “That would be awesome.”

“I wouldn’t hold my breath for that.” Freya wiped her arm across her moist forehead. “I can’t get mobile reception up here, or anywhere around here, really. Lucifer Falls seems to be a bit of a dead zone. I know my aunt did have a phone line, though I think it only worked half the time. Mostly, she just used the landlines in the nearby towns. Hooking up Internet seems like wishful thinking to me.”

Oliver smirked. “We could go retro, maybe get a modem?”

“Do they even make those anymore?”

“We’ll do some research. I’m sure there’s something that will work.” Oliver patted her cheek in a condescending manner. “There are plenty of rural homes that have Internet; I don’t see why this one would be any different. We just have to check it out.”

“Yeah, I guess.” Freya bit her lip and wrinkled her nose. “Though it would be easier to check it out if we had Internet. I need to get a UK mobile phone anyway. Mine is still Dutch, and it’s costing me a fortune to use 3G.”

Oliver didn’t seem to hear her. Freya thought about how isolated they were all the way here in Lucifer Falls.

“I wonder what it was like for your mom to grow up in this place. Was it as crazy as it is now?” Oliver sat down on the floor, his hands shovelling bits of debris into a bin-liner.

“It was nuts, but not
this
nuts. Not like living in cobweb paradise. The house wasn’t like this the last time I was here. I never met my grandparents. My mom made sure of that.”

“She didn’t like your grandparents?” He leaned his elbows on his knees and gazed at her.

“Mom hated them.” Freya waved her hands to emphasize her point. “She didn’t even go to their funerals. She told me stories from when she was a kid, and I don’t blame her. Her parents were pretty sadistic.”

Oliver stopped shovelling and looked at her with renewed interest. “What did they do?”

“When Mom was little, she and her sister were homeschooled by my grandmother. Mom told me that Gran would expect them to learn a part of the scripture each week, and if they got a single word wrong, Gran would whip them across the palm with a birch twig.” She held up her hands and ran her fingers across her palms. “My mom still has scars on her hands. There were weird rules too, like they had to get up in the middle of the night to see if all the locks were still in place.”

“Locks?”

“Yeah, Mom used to tell me the basement scared the crap out her and Aunt Miriam, and her parents would make them go and check if it was still locked. There was supposed to be a secret down there, but my mom never found out what it was. I guess Aunt Miriam did, because she walled the place up. Must have been pretty bad. I suspect my grandparents were into freaky stuff.”

“Like a sex dungeon?” Oliver stared at her with raised eyebrows.

“God only knows. They were pretty fanatic religious people so I doubt it was a sex thing.”

“Repression can do weird things to people.”