Unmasking Love: A Holiday for Romance Page 3
“Good. Oh, and there’s a party Friday night my girlfriend knows about. Someone from one of the smaller theater companies told her about it. I’m not sure who’s throwing it, but she says it’s open to anyone who wants to show up. Why don’t you go with us and meet some locals? Not sure who all will be there other than a few theater people she mentioned, but free beer and something to eat sounds good to me.”
“Are you sure it’s okay to bring an uninvited guest?”
“We weren’t formally invited either. Like I said, it’s some kind of open house or something. I’m sure it’s fine.”
“I don’t know. It doesn’t sound …”
“After being stuck in Portland with the terminally hip and marginally interesting, you should try something different. Come meet some of our friends. You’ll like them.”
“Okay, okay.” He finished off his wine. “Anything else you’d like to rearrange in my life?”
“Not at the moment, but I’m sure I’ll think of something.” Fred stuck the two wine glasses in the sink. “Oh, it’s a costume party. You’ll need something to wear other than a business suit.”
“Where’m I gonna get a costume on such short notice?”
“You’re in a theater town, bro. It’s not a problem. I’ll take care of it for you.”
• • •
Slumped in the only chair in his motel room, his tie loosened and his top shirt button undone, Trace closed his eyes and tried to find one coherent thought in his mind. It took less than five seconds to confirm what he suspected—everything was gone. He had nothing left in his head.
It had been a hell of a few days. Meeting after meeting, breakfast, lunch, and dinner with bank staff, business owners, and Chamber of Commerce types, a sprinkling of university leaders, and more non-profit groups than he thought could possibly exist in a small town. At every meeting he’d had to be his best, had to be “on” at all times. What was it he’d said to Fred about the difference between banking and the theater? If he hadn’t been on stage all week, making sure he came across as a reassuringly trustworthy businessman, he didn’t know what he’d been doing.
Fred. Right. He’d promised he’d go to the damn costume party tonight. No way was it going to happen. Not the way he felt. He’d call his friend and beg off, then take a shower, grab something to eat from the Safeway across the street, and make it an early night.
He was digging out his cell phone, when there was a knock at his door. Who the hell? He wasn’t expecting anyone.
He opened the door to a Roman soldier, complete with a dangerous-looking sword and a helmet topped with a bristly, red crest. “Brought you a costume I thought you’d like,” Fred said, holding up a suit bag.
“I’m not really up to this tonight. Maybe …” Trace started.
“I knew you’d try to chicken out on your promise. So I brought reinforcements. Here’s the surprise I told you about.” He stepped aside to reveal another man who was dressed as if he belonged in the Independence Hall of 1776.
“Damn, Watkins. If I’d known you’d be here, I’d have stayed home. No woman’s gonna look at me when you’re around,” the bewigged figure said.
“Kev? Where the hell did you come from, and what are you doing here?”
The Founding Father, in truth, Kevin Christopher, another fraternity brother, answered both questions in one sentence. “Came up from San Fran to see a few plays and hang out with Fred. I had hopes for scoring at this party, but now I don’t know. You’ll snake all the women like you always did.” After he followed Fred into the motel room, he guy-hugged Trace.
“Are you serious?” Trace asked. “You were the one with all the blondes hanging on you at fraternity parties. And why are you talking about picking up women? Where’s Alana?”
“Probably with her new husband. You’re a couple years behind in the news.”
Embarrassed he’d been out of touch with his friends for so long, Trace mumbled, “Sorry, I didn’t know.”
“Yeah, well … we haven’t been the best at keeping in touch, have we? And I didn’t exactly post it in the alumni magazine.” Kevin’s voice trailed off, and he almost lost his smile until he seemed to shake it off. “Anyway, it’s old news. Get thee into this outfit Fred found for you, and let’s go. It’ll be like old times again. The three of us on the hunt. Women of Ashland beware.”
“He’s got a date,” Trace said, pointing to Fred, “and I’ve had a long week. I was thinking maybe I’d have a quiet dinner and …”
“Fuck that shit. Get your ass into this costume, and let’s go. Fred’s date means there’ll be more women for us. Let’s get to it.”
Fred was grinning. Kevin was smirking. Trace was apparently going to the party. He grabbed the garment bag Fred was holding. “All right. For an hour or two. Then I’m coming back here.” He glared at his two buddies. “I’ll change in the bathroom. I’m not stripping while the two of you watch and point.”
“Oh, hell, Watkins, and here I was hoping. I haven’t seen a good package like yours since the fraternity house at UNM.”
“Jesus, Kev, you’re still a perv, aren’t you?”
“Hell, yes, and proud of it.”
Trace slammed the door to the bathroom, pretending he didn’t hear the guffaws from his college friends.
He opened the bag and flinched. The tights, the buckles for his shoes, the snug fitting doublet with slashed sleeves, and the soft velvet hat with a feather swooping down the side all screamed only one name: Romeo. The only thing worse would have been a Shylock costume, which Trace had been worried Fred would find for him. He stared at the costume for a few moments before yanking off his tie and pulling his shirt out of his pants. The least he could do was try it on. Maybe it wouldn’t be too bad. He had made a commitment to his friend, after all, and he always kept his commitments.
When he was fully costumed, he looked at himself in the bathroom mirror. It wasn’t as bad as he’d thought it would be. It was worse.
Oh, the costume fit, all right. Fit too damn well in all the wrong places. This was hardly the image he wanted to project to people he didn’t know but who he hoped would let him handle their money. Commitment or not, he wasn’t going out in public wearing something that left nothing to the imagination from the waist down.
He threw open the door and growled at his friend. “What the fuck were you thinking, Arnett, when you picked this out for me? Or were you thinking at all?”
Fred said, “It looks great. It fits perfectly. I had to guess at your sizes, but I think I got it just right.”
“You got fuck-all right. You can’t really expect me to wear this in public in front of a bunch of strangers?”
“You’re insulting a very fine costume designer I know who was quite pleased with what she did for Romeo and Juliet. Besides, you look outstanding in it.”
Kevin looked up and down Trace’s body. “Oh, good, you stuffed a sock in your tights. That should draw the ladies. I’ll stand beside you, latch onto your rejects, and we’ll for sure need these condoms I picked up this afternoon.” He offered a handful of his purchase to Trace who wouldn’t take them. Kev threw them onto the table between the two beds.
The condoms were the last straw. “This is not happening. We’re not in college. I’m a banker, for crissake, about to start a new job in a small town, not a teenager out to score. You guys go without me. I’ll give you back the costume …” Trace turned for the bathroom, but Fred grabbed his arm.
“Don’t let Kev’s needling get to you. You look great in the costume. Besides, no one in Ashland knows you.”
“But I want them to know me—as a reliable banker, not someone looking like he’s out to get laid. How will anyone in town ever take me seriously if I parade around in this … this … getup?”
“Getup? Does anyone under the age of sixty use that word? You really have turned into a stodgy old banker, haven’t you, buddy?” Kevin said.
“Back off, Kev,” Fred said. “Trace, don’t worry about the
costume. Everyone in Ashland celebrates Halloween in a big way. The mayor was Carmen Miranda last year, for God’s sake.”
“Maybe she …”
“He. The mayor’s a ‘he.’ He dressed as Carman Miranda.”
“Still, is this the way I want to be introduced to Ashland?”
“That’s why I have this for you.” Fred handed him a black cloth mask large enough to cover his face from the nose up to his hairline. “No one will know who you are unless you want them to.”
Trace looked at the two men who’d been his best friends for four years. They’d seen each other through drunken nights and hung-over mornings, a pregnancy scare with Kev’s then girlfriend, now ex-wife, numerous academic successes, and, eventually, offers of their dream jobs. Trace had almost forgotten how much he’d enjoyed their friendship and what they’d meant to him. He’d never had friends like them, before or since. All the business colleagues in the world couldn’t replace these two men.
Ever since college, he’d led a careful, organized, and terribly ordinary life. Like he told Fred, he was a banker. He followed the rules. Did what he was supposed to do. Maybe he was overdue for a little fun. Maybe it was time to do something other than what was expected of him. What would it hurt for one night to try and recreate what they’d had in college, when they were less encumbered with the weight of expectations? In this costume and with the mask, even if the people he’d met with all week were at the party, they wouldn’t recognize him.
He took the mask Fred was holding out to him and tied the strings around his head. “What the hell? I’m here. I’m in this stupid suit. I might as well go to the damn party.”
Chapter 4
Julie was reasonably sure there were more people crammed into her living room, dining room, and kitchen than the number she’d expected from the RSVPs. Dozens of people laughing, flirting, having conversations about the future of the theater, who should run for mayor, and God knows what else, drowned out the carefully chosen background music. Most of the catered food had disappeared in the first couple hours, so she was down to crackers, chips, the remains of a wheel of brie, and a few lonely olives, carrots, and celery stalks on the dining room table. However, since the wine and beer were holding out, no one seemed to object. Her first party in Ashland appeared to be a success.
She should have been smugly satisfied. Instead she couldn’t shake the sense there was something going on, something more to the evening than friends, food, booze, and good conversation. The atmosphere felt charged. Not some scary the-dead-walking-the-earth-on-Halloween feeling, but something exciting in a good way. The energy in the crowd gave her goose bumps. She tried to talk herself down with reminders of what a practical person she was, a lawyer, for God’s sake. She didn’t believe in woo-woo or spirits. The only thing in the house right now was half the population of Ashland, Oregon.
But she couldn’t get it out of her mind. There was something going on. She scanned the room, trying to figure it out. All she could see was a mind-boggling array of people in fabulous costumes, no two dressed alike. There was, for instance, only one Queen Elizabeth, one Princess Leia. One Santa Claus, one Napoleon. One Easter and one Playboy bunny.
Could her feeling be based on something as simple as seeing the mix of time, place, and reality in what her guests were wearing? The time warp of a NASA astronaut chatting up an Elizabethan woman? The clash of cultures as a belly dancer walked in with her Puritan date?
Maybe that was it. Maybe it was just the comfortable way everyone seemed to inhabit a different persona for the evening. Well, except for the guy across the room, the one who looked like he’d stepped off the Elizabethan stage of the Shakespeare Festival. He seemed ill at ease in the costume, or maybe in the crowd, hanging back, not looking at anything or anybody except the bottle of beer in his hand. She should probably go make him feel at home. He was her guest, after all, even if she had no idea who he was.
But then, he wasn’t the only one of her guests she couldn’t identify. Thanks to the masks and costumes, few people were immediately recognizable. Unless she heard a familiar voice or someone gave her a name, she wasn’t sure who she knew and who had come as the guest of a guest. Part of the reason for the party had been for her to meet new people, although she hadn’t yet figured out how she planned to recognize the new people who’d come to the party unless the next time she saw them they were still in dressed in character and wearing masks.
The guy in the Elizabethan costume had arrived with a woman and two men about twenty minutes earlier. Julie thought the woman might be Amber Lake, a member of one of the theater companies she’d given some minor, pro bono legal advice to. Amber had played Helen of Troy in a recent production at the theater, and the woman was dressed in Helen’s costume. Her long hair was in an elaborate up-do woven through with gold ribbon, and she wore a simple gold mask. The man in the Roman centurion costume, who Julie didn’t think she knew, seemed to be her date. At first, Julie thought the other two men might be a couple, but when the guy in the George Washington suit hit on the half-drunk woman in the fortuneteller costume, it became obvious they weren’t.
For some reason, she was happy the Elizabethan hunk wasn’t paired up. She didn’t know why he fascinated her. It was more than his looks—what she could see of them with his mask on—it was something else. She didn’t really believe in auras any more than she believed in magic spirits. But if she did, she’d believe in his. He radiated … something. Something attractive, seductive. Could he be what was tickling the edge of her mind into thinking the night was magic?
Maybe if she watched him for a while she’d figure it out. Luckily he wasn’t paying much attention to what was going on at the party, so she had a chance to inspect him without his knowledge. No question he had a great body. Tall and broad-shouldered, he had the best legs, the nicest ass, and, unless his Elizabethan costume included a codpiece, an impressive … well, if she’d forgotten what a well-equipped man looked like, he sure reminded her. If ever there was a reason to bring back men in tights, he was it.
The mask was a shame. It hid most of his face. More than the Lone Ranger job many of her guests wore, his reached up to his forehead, bridged his nose, and skimmed the top of what might be a pair of attractive cheekbones. What wasn’t covered was a strong jaw and a full-lipped, sensuous mouth, eyes almost as black as the mask was, and, topping it all, hair that definitely was black, if the bits peeking out of a soft velvet cap with a large feather were any indication.
As if he could feel her watching him, he looked up from his scrutiny of his beer bottle label, and their eyes locked. He smiled and lifted the bottle in a salute to her. Dear God, his smile could melt the panties right off a girl. At least, if the way she reacted was any indication. Her mouth dried up. But other parts of her made up for it by getting moist and achy.
She started to take a step across the room to see if the jolt of electricity now circling her breasts and peaking her nipples got stronger when he got closer. But her recently cultivated cautious streak stopped her. No, that’s what Greer would have done, a very stern voice in her head said. You’re not Greer anymore. You’re Julie, and Julie doesn’t do things like that. Ever. Not when you have no idea who he is or what he’s like.
She nodded to the stranger. When a woman dressed as a serving wench asked her where to find another bottle of wine, Julie went to the kitchen to fetch it. And while she was there, to get herself a glass of cold water.
• • •
Who the hell was the woman with the long, black hair? Whoever she was, Trace thought, she was stunning. Tall, with proud posture and a killer body. When the light was behind her, as it was now, the sweet curves of her breasts and hips showed through her almost-transparent, lace-trimmed nightgown. He wondered if she knew how much she had on display. He hoped not. If she knew, she’d move back into the crowd, away from the light. And the only direction he wanted her to move was toward him. So he could find out if there was any chance he could see more.
Jesus, he wanted her even though he had no idea who she was. Had he ever wanted someone this way? It was like being struck with lightning. As he imagined a lightning strike would feel like, the impact of seeing her hit everyplace on his body. Except he didn’t fall down. And he didn’t know whether lightning would give him an erection like the one now pushing against the tights he was wearing.
He had to find out who she was. Find a way to get introduced. Maybe Fred or Amber knew her. Looking around, he saw the couple huddled, or cuddling, in a corner and made his way there. Barging into whatever they were doing, Trace tapped Amber on the shoulder and asked “Sorry to interrupt but do you know who the woman with the dark braid is? The one in the nightgown?”
Amber raised her head from Fred’s shoulder and scanned the room. “You mean the one dressed as Juliet who’s talking to the servant girl?”
“You’re kidding. She’s supposed to be Juliet?”
“Of course. I remember the costume. It’s the nightgown for the balcony scene. One of the theaters did the play a couple years ago. Caused quite a sensation because the actress playing the role didn’t wear anything under it.” She looked again at Juliet. “Whoever she is, she doesn’t seem to be wearing underwear either.”
“You don’t recognize her?”
“I’m not sure. Not with that mask and wig. It could be the actress who played the role but I thought she was out of town. Want me to find out?”
“Could you?”
“I’ll try to find someone who knows and get back to you.”
By the time he turned back to undress his Juliet more thoroughly with his eyes, she’d disappeared. Disappointed, he mingled with the crowd to see if he could find her or ask someone who she was. But he didn’t know anyone and didn’t have much to add to any discussion about Ashland, which made it difficult to get into a conversation long enough to ask about her.