Unholy Obsession

Chapter 1; The man with the mask

Hannah's POV

How would you feel if your ex broke up with you for being too vanilla in bed? I mean, ouch. My feelings were hurt. Besides, it wasn't my fault that men didn't know how to communicate their feelings. Especially Lance. My pending situation and a piece of unhelpful advice from Ashley all seemed to have led me here, a masked party.  And surprisingly, the crazy girl was nowhere to be found despite being the one who brought me here. 

The bright disco ball cast sharp lights on the bodies of people conversing over cocktails and wearing bright and defined dresses that emanated a sharp sense of beauty and elegance. "Do Like That" by Koredo Bello was playing in the background and I bobbed my head. I didn't know whose party it was. When you had a friend like Ashley,  attending parties uninvited was a daily occurrence. 

 She had told me to wear this abomination of a dress that clung too close to my brown skin and was so skimpy it left little to the imagination. Thereon, she designed my face with so much cosmetics that made me feel somewhat heavy before pushing me out the doors with the invitation in hand. At first, I didn't want to go. Things like this were not my scene, and I had work very early tomorrow morning, but at the same time, what was the worst that could happen?

Maybe attending late to your new job which we both know you won't want to lose. 

Nah, I would deal with that later. I was frustrated and needed a good release. 

And that proposed the agenda for tonight: getting laid. 

I wasn't a fan of one-night stands, not that I have actually experienced one. Simply, it was the thought of giving yourself off to someone you didn't know for an entire night as if you were worth nothing that fettled me. My conservative Catholic mom would kill me if she ever found out I did something that silly. Sex was supposed to be a passionate affair between lovers, intertwining mind, body, and soul, and not a sport. But honestly, I didn't care anymore. All I wanted to do was to find company and successfully prove my ex-boyfriend wrong. 

I will show him I'm a freak in the sheets. 

Okay, that sounded totally wrong.

A few men had spoken up to me, but we dived into curt, rather boring conversations that gave no hint that they wanted to take it further, not that I did either. One of them had a rotting mouth odour, but at the same time, this made me discontent, standing at a far corner of the room swirling my cocktail in my hand—Sex on the Beach—with my eyes scanning the hall, completely questioning my life decisions. 

I wanted to go home. 

But I could not give up now, over my dead body. I would leave this place a new breed, and finally become someone who would defy all notions set against her and prove to Lance and myself that I was not who they thought I was. 

"Hey," a baritone voice said, sending shivers up my spine.

A smile played its way across my lips. 

"Hello," I greeted back, with a nervous voice pitch, straightening my back and angling my head to see who had spoken to me. I was met with a green cat-like mask, with hooded dark eyes that gazed back at me with unrelenting interest as if gobbling me up. Sharp, angular features made his beautiful face almost inhumane, for it was totally absurd that a man could be this good-looking. Black, almost blue in the hues of the dimly lit hall adorned his head and swept the side of his face. 

My throat had suddenly gone dry. 

“That's a very long dress you're wearing," he joked, his rough baritone holding a refined British hint at the edges that sent my knees trembling. He delivered those words like he had been wanting to say them for a very, very long time.