Page 41 of Your Masked Haunting

It’s a bit of a tough subject to casually slip into conversation, especially when a majority of them are about hockey, or the shared stories of our rebellious years … or arrests when we were delinquent teens.

I’m sure they’ll know the true us soon enough, especially at this rate. They didn’t question Bates’s or my mask at the Halloween party. Didn’t even bat an eye.

But none of that matters right now because we’re up next, and I’ll get to breathe Mona in again, bathe in her aroma, getting flashbacks of the last night we spent together.

I wonder if she’ll remember me from the store or if I was just a face of another man who approached her, uninvited. One unicorn later, and the chair is ours. I shrink to the back of the group, wanting to go last.

She’s focused, homed in on her craft as she works through Serena, Kerrigan, and Haley, giving them their requested matching vampire makeup. Bates is up next, opting for the dragon. Kol chooses the skeleton, which actually looks pretty sick when it’s done. Ledger and Ransom both get the spider in a spiderweb, leaving me.

I know this isn’t Mona’s end goal for her makeup career, but she’s still incredibly talented at it.

Her customer-service smile is in full force when she spins around to face me, her long black hair whipping through the crisp fall air. “And what can I do for—” Her voice falls. The recognition is clear in her scowl. “You …”

Wetting my lips, I try to not let my amusement completely take over my face. “Hi. Moore’s Crafts, right?”

She glares at me, probably debating how she wants to act to a paying customer.

“If you’re here for the event, fine. If you’re here as some weird creep who found out I was working here, I’ll have security escort you out promptly.” Her eyes narrow, and she purses her lips with a lifeless smile.

Clearing my throat, I chuckle, holding my hands up in surrender. “I am absolutely not here to be some creep.” I gesture toward the table and chair. “I’m here for …”

“A skeleton?” She fills in the blank, clearly making the decision for me.

I nod. “Right. Exactly. One skeleton, please.”

She smacks her chair, harder than she intended, clear from the sudden, widened expression. “Right here. Have a seat. One skeleton coming up.”

Her eagerness unsettles me, but I know who she is behind this playful mask and snark. It’s her shield, but I also know it’s her weapon.

“Thank you.”

I smile, stepping toward the chair and looking straight down at her, her green eyes peering up through her lashes. My view is unshielded, unobstructed by the mesh of my mask. Her eyes have never looked prettier.

Without backing down from her planted stance, I lower myself to the chair, her legs between my knees. Now if she would just crawl into my lap, I’d enjoy the next part that much more. My dick awakens when I think of her straddling me right now, remembering her bare body pressed against mine.

She grabs her brush and smiles, uncomfortably kind. “You’ll have to close your eyes if you want it to look good.”

I chuckle. “Are you just nervous if you look into my eyes for too long, you might realize you actually like me?”

She sneers, “No, not one bit. Now close them.”

Tucking my tongue between my teeth, I do as told, my eyes drifting shut. “Better?”

“Much,” she mutters, her face closer now.

I don’t need to have my eyes open to know exactly what she looks like right now. Somehow, through the music, I hear her breathing, her clicking her tongue as she gets to work, dragging the cool, wet brush across my skin.

Inhaling deeply, I breathe her in. “You smell nice.”

“Now you really sound like a creep,” she sasses back, a playful undertone in her voice.

I desperately want to tell her who I am. Tell her I know how sweet she tastes. How I know her mouth falls opens and her jaw quivers when she comes and I’m buried inside of her. How she twitches when she sleeps, mumbling occasionally. I know all there is to know about her, and it’s taking everything in me to not reveal that on the spot.

I’m lost in my reflection of her, floating in her decadent scent, and time seems to fade away as her mere presence calms my every racing thought and quickened breath.

Until she clears her throat aggressively, snapping me from my stupor.

“All done.”