Covered In Lace

chapter FIFTEEN

Earl parked the stolen car in the side parking lot at O'Sullivan's bar. It was the first place he had found that was open for business this late at night. The rest of the town appeared to have closed up shop as soon as the sun set. He read the sign again. O'Sullivan's Sport's Bar. It had a nice ring to it. He might as well have a beer while he asked for directions to the recording studio, he thought.

He got out of the car and stretched before walking toward the front door. After pulling the door open, he stepped inside and looked around. The place was hopping busy, he thought, moving toward the bar and taking the last empty stool at one end of it. Behind him was a pool room, noisy as hell, and the dinner tables on the opposite side of the bar were filled with people enjoying a late dinner.

Earl signaled a pretty brunette working the bar and waited for her to come down to his end.

“What can I get you?” Emma asked.

“I'll take whatever you have on draft,” Earl said.

A slow smile formed on Emma's face. “Where you from, stranger?” she asked. “With an accent like that, I'd say somewhere down south.”

Earl's gut started to tighten. He eyed the girl with suspicion, wondering why she'd give a crap where he was from. Her smile seemed genuine and innocent, though, so he decided to give her answer.

“Virginia,” he lied.

“I thought so,” she said, sliding a mug of beer across the bar at him. “My name is Emma. The kitchen is open for another hour. Let me know if I can get you anything else.”

“Actually, Emma, there is something you might be able to help me with,” Earl said. The gleam in his eyes beginning to glow.

“What'd you need?”

“Directions,” Earl said. “I need directions.”

“Where to?” Emma asked.

“Hill Top Studio.”

Emma took the bar cloth and wiped down the wood in front of Earl. Too many fans over the years had stopped in to O'Sullivan's asking that same question and she knew the drill. The address to the studio was not to be on anyone's tour bus route. But this guy didn't look like the typical fan.

“What's your name?” Emma asked.

Earl took a sip from his mug. “You can call me Buddy.”

“Okay, Buddy,” she said. “Why do you need to know where the studio is?”

“Am I in the area?”

“Sort of,” she said. “Do you have business at the studio?”

Earl attempted a smile that he hoped didn't look like a sneer. “I've worked a bit in the past with Annie Logan and her friend, Lacey. I heard they were recording near here and thought I'd stop in and say hello on my way through.”

“You know Annie and Lacey?” Emma asked. She wasn't sure if she should believe the man, but he was aware they were working at the studio, and not too many people would have that information and that made his story semi believable. This was definitely a situation she would prefer talking to Flynn about, but since he was out of town visiting Lacey on tour, that wasn't going to be possible.

“Annie and I go way back,” Earl said.

“Is that so.”

“It'd be great to see her while I'm in the area,” Earl said.

“Well, Buddy, you're timing sucks,” Emma said. “Annie and Lacey are out on tour for the next couple of weeks. They won't be back in the studio until after that.”

“Hmm, that is unfortunate,” he said. “Maybe what I could do is stop by the studio after I finish my business in New York and catch her on my way back home.”

Emma nodded and filled two mugs of beer for new arrivals at the bar.

“So, how about those directions?” Earl asked.





Earl slowly drove past the recording studio for a second time; checking out the layout of the building and the connecting parking lot. He knew he'd have to come back again in daylight to properly scout the properties, but he was too excited to wait.

He looked at the bar napkin with Emma's handwritten directions on it and smiled. She'd been more forthcoming than he had hoped, he thought, reading the notes. Not only had she offered up the location for the studio, but also the address of the cottage Annie had been staying at while visiting Lacey. All it took was displaying two twenty dollar bills on top of the bar and she was putty in his grimy hands.

He made the turn onto Lake Street and started watching the house numbers posted on the mailboxes at the edge of the street searching for Lacey's cottage. It was difficult to see the cottages, due to the absence of street lights, but he managed to find the white cottage with the black shutters sitting just off the road with a long, dirt driveway sloping down along side it. Another cottage, slightly larger than Lacey's sat right beside it; the driveways nearly so close it almost appeared to be one in the same. He'd rather Lacey's cottage be surrounded by open acres of land – or even better a forest of trees, but he'd have to take his chances on there being witnesses.

Between the two houses, Earl could see the moon reflecting off the lake. Not a bad place for a vacation, he thought, slowly cruising past the houses. No lights were on in either house nor were there cars in the driveways; which was good. It would give him a chance to check out the area undetected. He glanced across the street and saw no houses, only what looked like an open field. On the other side of Lacey's cottage Earl saw a grove of tall pine trees. He pulled off the road and parked behind them, and got out of his car.

The place was so quiet it unnerved Earl. He could hear frogs croaking at the waters edge and random bugs buzzed by his head but that was about it. He gripped on to his handgun a little tighter and started walking toward Lacey's cottage.

He did a perimeter search around the house. It was locked up tighter than a nun at Easter, he thought, jiggling the door knobs and testing the first floor windows. Then he spotted a narrow window on the far side of the house pushed up about two inches.

It would take some wiggling, but he felt confident he could get inside. He found a metal cooler and dragged it over to the open window and climbed up on it. He used his pocket knife to cut through the screen, then finished pushing up window. He was inside the bathroom in a matter of minutes.

Earl climbed out of the bathtub and smiled at himself. He could take his time now and look around the house, plotting the perfect attack and the best way to surprise Annie when she returned with Lacey.

He wouldn't risk being caught by a passerby and turn on a light. Especially with a neighbor living so close by and not knowing for certain if anyone was home there. He came out of the bathroom and started feeling his way along the hallway and found the kitchen. He searched the cabinets and discovered a jar of peanut butter and in the refrigerator he found half a loaf of bread. This would be perfect for sandwiches.

It wasn't exactly gourmet cuisine, but his growling stomach didn't care what he was eating as long as it was food. He took one of the sandwiches with him and fumbled around in the living room while eating it. He wasn't looking for anything in particular and what he was finding wasn't of any of real interest to him.

He saw a set of stairs and followed them to the second floor and two bedrooms. What little he could see in the dim moonlight filtering in through the windows, it didn't appear either bedroom was being used. Then he started to wonder if the barmaid had given him the address to the wrong house. He finished his sandwich and scratched his head, dismissing the idea the girl messed up. She'd had been dead-on right with the location of the recording studio so he had no reason to think she'd been wrong about the cottage.

He left the bedroom and walked back downstairs, navigated his way through the hallway again, inching past the bathroom he had crawled into, and found another bedroom at the very end of the hall. Soon as he stepped inside this room, he knew this had to be the room Lacey was using. It smelled like a woman. Jesus, he wanted to turn on a light to see better, but knew he couldn't. It was simply too risky. He tripped over something and realized it was a guitar sitting in a stand beside a dresser.

He kicked the instrument aside and started feeling his way around the dresser, opening drawers, as he went. He pulled a pair of silky panties from the top drawer and pressed the garment to his nose; inhaling deeply. It smelled real nice, he thought; girly and sweet. He tugged a few other items from the same drawer. Holding them up in front of him, he figured it to be lingerie, expensive satins and silks, some with lace trim. His cock began to harden at the thought of Lacey or Annie wearing them.

He ran the fabric through his fingers, toyed with the buttons and bows, then dragged it across his face. The cool fabric did wonderful things to him and his cock was now throbbing. He grabbed a handful of the nighties from the drawer and carried them over to the bed; setting them onto the edge of the mattress. The bed was unmade, the quilt and sheets rumpled and looking like someone had rolled out of bed quickly or immediately after having sex – the latter option being the one he wanted to imagine most.

He closed his eyes and inhaled the scents in the room; her delicate perfume still hung in the air. His mind started churning through various fantasies of Lacey getting f*cked in this bed, maybe while wearing the lingerie he had laid out before him. He reached out and ran his hand across the sheets; smooth and cool to the touch. His fingers touched a bed pillow. He lifted it and pressed it to his face. Again, the dainty smells of a woman greeted his nose.

He tossed the pillow back onto the mattress and unzipped his pants; reaching inside his briefs to grip his swollen cock. He squeezed himself tightly and every nerve ending in him came alive. He pushed his pants down onto this thighs and his erection sprang free. Taking one of the nighties off the bed, he circled it around the shaft of his cock loosely tying it. The sensation of the fabric on his skin made him shiver. He drew in a breath that made a hissing sound between his teeth.

God, what he wouldn't do to have Annie here with him, wearing the nightie, he thought. He started stroking himself, using the silky fabric as a lubricant, watching as his hand slid it back and forth over his hot flesh. He pulled his fist forward, squeezing out a good amount of precum from the tip of his cock and smeared it onto the fabric of the nightie.

A smile crossed his face, as he remembered doing this very thing as a teenager. He'd sneak next door to their neighbor's and steal the sexy undergarments off their clothesline. Those undergarments belonged to a high school girl Earl knew, that ordinarily wouldn't give him the time of day. She'd let just about anyone in school f*ck her except for Earl. His payback was to take her naughty underthings and run into the woods behind his house with them.

His hide-out in those days was a narrow passage-way between two enormous boulders protruding from the side of a small hill. The crevasse was just wide enough for Earl to shimmy into, remove his pants; sometimes he got completely naked, then jacked-off, using the panties to stroke his cock. Sometimes he'd beat-off half a dozen times or more, until the panties got too messy to work with and then he'd bury them in the dirt. Every few days new lingerie hung from the line, replacing the pieces he stole and Earl found himself sneaking across their yards to the clothesline to take more.

The more he did this, the bolder he became, needing more to quench his growing thirst. One time when he knew the house was empty he broke inside, raiding the laundry basket to take a pair of the girl's soiled panties. He ran into the woods to his hide-out with the hot pink panties, treating them like they were a prized trophy, and to him they were.

The pungent scent of her p-ssy on the crotch of the underpants was enough to make him want to come in his pants. He kept the dirty panties with him almost non-stop, hiding them in his bedroom closet in an empty shoe box at night, after sniffing them before bed while he beat his cock to climax. He nearly rubbed himself raw that summer, using the lingerie of his slutty neighbor as a lubricant.

Soon after school started that Fall, rumors of the girl being pregnant circulated around town. Not long after, the girl was gone from the house and Earl lost his source of underwear for his fantasies.

It had been years since he'd acted on his first-ever fetish. He'd forgotten how illicit it felt to have the slippery material wrapped around his cock and what a high it gave him for hours after he had unloaded. It was a rush like no other, and offered the best orgasms he could remember from of his youth.

He smiled in the darkness of Lacey's bedroom, his cock thickening further at the debauchery he was about to unleash all over Lacey's bed. He pulled his t-shirt over his head and bent forward, laying down bare-chested on top of the other nighties he had spread out on the sheets. The shimmery fabric slipped beneath his chest and his nipples jerked to life.

This felt too good not to fully enjoy. He sat up and untied his boots, then removed his pants and briefs and stood naked beside the bed. He looked down at his cock pulsing in the air, the nightie still tied around the shaft. Then he moved onto the bed, making sure the lingerie was directly under him; the cool, smooth garments rubbing against his chest and cock like curious fingers wanting to explore him. His eyes rolled back in their sockets from the pleasure of it.

He started rocking on the mattress, slow at first, back and forth, side to side; his face buried into the sheets inhaling her scent and imagining she was beneath him spread wide as he f*cked her. He slid his arms over his head and gripped the sheets, gradually humping with more force, as the silky undergarments worked him closer to climax.

When he was too close to hold off, he sat up on his knees, gripped the piece of silk tied around his shaft and started pumping his cock. Several quick jerks twisted the fabric around and around his length and Earl groaned loudly; shooting off all over the nighties spread on the bed and the one in his hand.

He looked down at the bed; wishing the moonlight was brighter in the room so he could see the mess he'd just made all over Lacey's things. When the last tremor faded from his body, Earl removed the bunched up camisole from his shaft and rolled off the bed to explore the room some more. Naked.

Walking around Lacey's house like that had Earl stiffening again in no time at all. After a quick walk back to her bedroom to retrieve another silky underthing, he returned to the living room. He stood in the center of the room facing the couch; f*cking his fist like a crazed man, then shooting all over the garment and the floor.

Earl smiled as he shook the last few drops of come from the tip of his cock onto the couch. If the bartender was right about Lacey and Annie being gone on tour, that meant he had plenty of time to work his way around the cottage; leaving his mark in every room. He tossed the wet nightie onto the couch, feeling like he was fifteen years old again; the summer he happily hid in the woods spraying the earth with his youthful excitement.





Lacey tossed her bags into the backseat of her rental car, thankful Flynn had left her car there for her during the week before he flew out to see her in Ohio. She pinched her cell phone into the bend of her neck, as she chatted with her cousin, Taylor, and sat in the driver's seat. It hadn't been a long flight from Cincinnati, but she was still reeling from her break-up with Flynn and anxious to get back to the cottage. She hoped to catch a few hours of sleep before he arrived at his house and knew it was important she was well rested before she went next door to talk to him. No matter what, she had to make things right with him.

“I don't get it, Lace,” Taylor said. “This guy has bent over backwards for you and you still seem determined to keep him at arms length. Why? What are you afraid will happen if you actually commit to him – and I mean fully commit?”

“Annie asked me the same damned question,” Lacey said.

“Well, I'm serious,” Taylor said. “From everything you've been describing to me over the last several weeks, Flynn sounds like a phenomenal guy. I thought you wanted what he's offering you?”

“I do,” Lacey said. “I want a life with him and I'm on my way back to the cottage to try and fix this.”

“And how do you plan on doing that?”

“I left Annie's tour early so Flynn and I can talk this out,” Lacey said.

Taylor sighed loudly. “Lace, you've been wanting to quit touring for a few years now. And if I remember correctly, you always said: if you found someone worth staying home for – you would. Why did it take Flynn calling things off for you to leave Annie's tour?”

Lacey turned the key in the ignition of her car and started driving out of the regional airport parking lot. At this early hour of the morning, she didn't expect to encounter any traffic; which meant she'd be at her cottage and in bed in less than twenty minutes. Sleeping.

“I love him,” Lacey said. “And I want to make this work.”

Lacey talked with Taylor for the entire trip back to her cottage, then she pulled into the driveway and chatted a while longer before getting out of her car and walking to the house. She unlocked the kitchen door and pushed it open with her foot.

“So that's my plan,” Lacey said, stepping inside the darkened kitchen. Her hand flipped on the overhead light and she froze; dropping the bag she was holding. “Who the hell are you?” she asked, and then she saw the gun.

“Lace? Who's there with you?” Taylor asked.

“Hang up yer f*cking phone,” Earl said, aiming his gun directly at her face.

“Taylor, I need help,” she blurted, then Earl grabbed the phone and used it to hit her on the side of her head. As Lacey blacked-out and fell to the floor, her cell phone went dead.