She knew how to turn his attention to more pleasurable things.
Christine approached him quietly, noticing as she always did the way the broad sprinkling of hair dusted his square, molded chest, and trailed into a slender line into his trousers. The column of his neck, wide and long, curved above his throat's tender hollow… one area on his sleek body that was as vulnerable as her own.
She reached, lifted the mask, and pulled it off quickly and smoothly.
What she saw was horrible—horrible!—and she screamed as his eyes flew open and he launched himself off the chaise.
"Damn you, Christine!Damn you!" he cried, covering his horrid, disfigured face, scrabbling for the mask that still dangled from her fingers as she stared in terrified shock. "How could you?" he shouted, snatching at the mask and jamming it back on his face, grabbing her arm and throwing her to the chaise.
She stumbled, fell, crying as he raged and shouted, shoving papers off the piano, sending them cascading over the floor. He was crying, shaking, clutching at his middle as though he'd taken a bullet there, even as he shouted obscenities at her, his eyes wild and wide, his mouth curled in an irate red twist.
"Damn you!" he cried over and over. "Damn… you… Christine."
He collapsed on the floor with great, jerking sobs that came from somewhere so deep they were nearly inaudible. But his entire folded body wrenched with each ruptured breath, and when he raised his flat blue eyes to stare at her at last, Christine knew she'd done the unforgivable.
Chapter Ten
Christine Daaé had disappeared more than seven days earlier and Maude knew Erik had taken her to where he might introduce her to more… personal tutelage. She smiled at the thought of the pleasure Christine was to receive from Erik's strong body.
Since then, Carlotta had returned to grace the stage with her impossibly high, trilling arias, and the Opera House managers jumped at every shadow or every loud noise.
Maude felt it was her duty to find ways to help alleviate their tension.
She'd been anticipating her own pleasure when she finally got Monsieur Firmin Richard alone and at her mercy, but the moment never seemed to materialize. The man was always surrounded by people—stage managers, singers, dancers, musicians, even patrons. Maude had no choice but to take drastic measures.
It was the seventh night after Christine had disappeared, and the production of Faust was in full swell, with music filling the chamber and the dancers swirling about the stage. The Opera House was crowded to bursting—whether it was due to curiosity about the Opera Ghost and his abduction of the ingenuous singer, or desire to see the performance, no one was certain.
Maude wondered if anyone other than Carlotta had realized that, along with Christine's disappearance, the Opera Ghost seemed to have gone away as well.
She stood in the shadows of the backstage area, between two of the five black curtains that hung parallel to one another on each side of the stage, from the front to the back wall. Each curtain was wider than the one in front of it, giving the stage a triangular appearance and affording various passageways where the cast might exit or enter from the performance area.
Beyond the black curtains, off to the side of the stage and beyond the sight of the audience, were the props and scenery from the production. And standing just in front of the large papier-mâché and wood construction that represented Hell was Maude's target.
Firmin Richard was tall and lean, with an equine face, long fingers, narrow wrists, a long bony nose, large, narrow feet… and the promise that this tendency would be repeated elsewhere. Maude's quim moistened at the mere thought of what his trousers must hide.
She worked her way between the curtains until she stood in the shadows behind Richard. His attention was focused on the performers, and he stood with his hands clasped at the back of his waist, his elegant foot tapping in off time with the music.
Maude moved closer to him, hiding in the folds of the black curtain carefully so that it wouldn't move and attract the attention of the audience, and so that she could remain out of his sight for the moment. She wanted the element of surprise on her side. Thus, stepping just behind him, she walked right into his clasped hands, aiming her opening right where his fingers twiddled.
When her crotch brushed up against Richard, he fairly jumped forward, and would have blundered into the craggy Hell scenery if she had not grabbed his coattails.
"Now, now, Firmin, you know you have been waiting for this for many weeks," she whispered boldly into his ear, holding him in place, back against her. She tipped her hips toward his ass and felt, to her satisfaction, his fingers take up twiddling again just where she needed it the most. Despite the fact that the little twitching motions were on the other side of three layers of fabric, Maude's nib lifted and stretched there as she pressed forward.
"Now, let us see what you have here…" she murmured into his ear, and slid her hands from behind under his coattails and jacket, and into the front trouser pockets. To her delight, the right one had a hole in it, and it was no large task to force her fingers through the fraying seam and onto the warm, hairy flesh of his thigh.
Richard jumped again when she touched him, and craned his long neck to see behind him. Maude pressed her breasts into his back and slid her hand through the opening of his drawers and found what she was looking for.
Oui, tout a fait!
She smiled, and smiled more as her fingers closed around his slender, pulsing length… and slid longer, and longer, and… mon Dieu, longer!
"Out" she murmured, tears of joy springing to her eyes as her sex throbbed. "Oui!"
No one could see Maude and Firmin. Hell stood between them and the audience, and the performers were all in front of the massive set structure.
She slipped around to the front of him, already beginning to unfasten the buttons of her staid black gown. Firmin tried to resist, but no sooner had she opened the high collar and exposed her generous, red-tipped breasts than he was reaching for them.
Those long, elegant fingers closed, one over each breast, and hefted them, thumbs rippling over the pointed nipples. Maude, still smiling, unfastened his trousers and released the longest cock she had ever seen. Mon Dieu, if it were not pulsing and stretching so straight out, it would hang to his knees!
Liquid flooded her lower lips as she thought about the long, smooth strokes she would get from him. Pulling him toward her, she toppled back onto the orange and red mountains of Hell, and leveraged him off-balance on top of her.
Firmin did not seem to mind that she was in control; he appeared to be as enthralled by the size of her breasts as she was with the length of his cock. He did not wait to be directed; as the music swelled around them, camouflaging Maude's groan of satisfaction, he closed his mouth over one thrusting nipple. Making little circles around it, over the tight, hard wrinkles of her areola, his tongue flicked and twitched against her nubbin. Long-anticipated pleasure washed over her, flowing straight to her belly and then her pip below.
"Ah," she sighed gratefully, allowing her head to tip back onto the papier-mâché ledge behind her. She had not released his cock, and as he continued to suck and lick at her nipples, she felt his member grow harder and longer… and longer still!
The air around them was cool on her wet nipples, stirred by the activity onstage only metres away. The dancing and the raising and lowering of scenery backdrops sent little gusts of breeze over her flesh, raising every hair and heightening the sensation of his hot mouth.