Chapter 30: Cleansing of Sins
The steam rising from the bath wrapped around them like a damp ghost, condensing on the black marble walls. Iris lay in the hot water, a towel wrapped tightly round her head, her skin was flushed pink.
Ben knelt on her left, studying her itinerary on his phone. Alan was on her right, a sponge and a bar of sandalwood soap in his grip.
“Okay,” Ben said, his voice a study in forced normalcy. “Your things are all squared away. Wardrobe unpacked, everything ironed or steamed. Your cocktail dress for tonight is hanging by the window.”
Iris gave a faint nod, her eyes half-closed. The deep, pleasant ache between her legs was a constant hum, a background noise to her exhaustion.
Alan dipped the sponge in the warm, soapy water. He began washing her left calf, his movements slow and methodical. The cloth moved over her skin, tracing the delicate bones of her ankle.
“Your meeting with the gallery director is at four tomorrow afternoon,” Ben continued, scanning the page. “Car’s booked. Your portfolio is on the desk in the study.”
“Mmm.” Iris leaned back, letting her head loll. Alan’s hand moved up her thigh, the warm, soapy sponge gliding over the soft inner skin. He parted her legs gently with his other hand, the gesture clinical and intimate at once.
“Friday morning, you have the preliminary sketch session with the architect at the new cultural center site,” Ben said, his eyes fixed on the paper. He couldn’t look at Alan’s hand, at the way the sponge was now circling higher, soaping her freshly shaven pubic mound. “Lunch is provided.”
Alans set the sponge aside, rinsed a terrycloth flannel, and wrung it out. He didn’t reapply soap. Instead, his fingers, slick and warm, began to trace her folds through the damp cloth. Iris inhaled sharply, her hips shifting. A soft sigh escaped her lips.
Ben’s jaw tightened. He forced his voice to remain level. “Saturday is open. No official commitments. I figured you might want to… recover. Or see the city.”
“The Prado,” Iris murmured, her voice thick. Her hand came down, not to stop Alan’s wandering fingers, but to guide them, pressing the cloth more firmly against her vulva. “Put the Prado in. For the Goyas. The El Grecos.”
“I did,” Ben said softly, finally looking at her face. Her eyes were closed, her lips slightly parted. “It’s tomorrow morning. First thing. We can go when it opens, beat the crowds.”
“We?” she breathed.
“If you want.”
She didn’t answer. Alan had dropped the cloth. His fingers, now bare and slick with the soap’s residue, slipped inside her. Two fingers, curling deep. Iris’s back arched, a silent gasp catching in her throat.
Ben looked away, down at the itinerary, the words blurring. He heard the soft sound of lapping wavelets as Alan’s fingers moving in her, the rhythm slow and probing. He could smell the sandalwood soap. He could see her arousal, on her face, within her nipples, upon her lips as as a soft little gasp escaped them.
“Keep talking,” Iris whispered, not to Alan, but to Ben.
Ben cleared his throat. “Sunday’s flight is at 10:35 PM. Business class this time for you, Iris.” He tried to inject a note of dry humor, failed. “Perhaps a less… eventful journey home.”
Alan added a third finger, stretching her gently. Iris moaned, the sound low and guttural, reverberating in the tiled room. Her head tilted back further, exposing the long line of her throat. “Fuck,” she whispered. “Yes. Just like that. I love feeing so… full.”
Alan’s other hand reached around her to fondle her breast, his thumb rubbing over her nipple until it peaked into a hard, tight bud. He leaned right over her, taking it into his mouth, sucking roughly.
Ben stood up abruptly, the itinerary forgotten. The movement was sharp, loud in the steamy space. Iris’s eyes fluttered open. She looked at him, her green gaze clouded with a pleasure that excluded him completely.
“I’ll just…” Ben gestured vaguely towards the door. “I’ll check the room service menu.”
He didn’t wait for a response. He left the bathroom, closing the door softly behind him. He stood in the cool darkness of the bedroom, listening to the muffled sounds from the other side of the door: Iris’s escalating cries, the slap of skin on skin as Alan presumably replaced his fingers with something else, his low grunts.
Ben walked to the window. Madrid glittered, indifferent. He pressed his forehead against the cool glass.
Inside the bathroom, Alan was on his knees before her. He’d helped her out of the bath and set her down on the edge of the ottoman. His tongue was on her, lapping at her with a fervor that was more hungry than skillful. He ate her pussy like a man starved, his hands gripping her thighs, holding her open wide.
“Deeper,” Iris panted, her hands tangling in his hair, yanking. “Get your tongue in my cunt. Lick me clean. Make me come.”
He obeyed, driving his face into her, his nose buried against her, his tongue fucking into her hole with frantic strokes. The obscene, wet sounds filled the steam-choked air. Iris’s cries climbed higher, sharper. She ground herself against his mouth, her body coiling like a spring.
When she came, it was with a choked scream, her whole body seizing, her thighs clamping around Alan’s head. He kept licking, gentler now, through the shudders, until she pushed his head away, over-sensitive and spent.
She slid off the ottoman, her legs shaky. She looked down at Alan, his face glistening with her, his breath coming in ragged pants. His cock strained against his trousers, thick and urgent.
“Stand up,” she said, her voice raw.
He did. She didn’t kiss him. She unbuckled his belt, unzipped his fly. His cock sprang out, hard and angry-looking. She spat into her palm, a crude, dismissive gesture, and grasped him, pumping him slowly.
“Iris,” he groaned.
“Quiet.” She turned her back to him, bending over the edge of the vanity, her hands flat on the cold marble. The fog on the mirror had cleared slightly, showing her reflection: flushed face, wild hair, and behind her, Alan, his eyes dark with lust. “Just fuck me. From behind. Hard. Don’t stop until you’re done.”
He needed no further invitation. He positioned himself, the blunt head of his cock pressing against her soaked entrance. He pushed in, one brutal, deep thrust that buried him to the hilt. Iris cried out, a sound of pure, ravaged satisfaction.
He set a punishing pace, each thrust slamming her into the vanity, making the bottles of perfume rattle. His hands gripped her hips, his fingers digging into her flesh. The sound of their collision was a stark, rhythmic slap in the tiled room.
“God, your cunt is so fucking good,” he grunted, his voice tight. “So tight. Even after all that. Take it. Take all of it.”
Iris pushed back against him, meeting every drive. Her mind was beautifully, mercifully blank. There was no art, no loneliness, no Ben sitting hollow-eyed in the next room. There was only this: the stretch and burn, the raw physical shock of being filled, the crude, shouted filth in her ear. It was a battering ram against the walls of her own mind.
Alan’s thrusts became erratic, frantic. He was close. One hand left her hip and snaked around to her clit, rubbing in rough, frantic circles. The dual sensation, the brutal fullness and the sharp friction, tipped her over the edge again. She came with a guttural sob, her inner muscles clamping down on his cock in rhythmic pulses.
That undid him. With a final, deep roar, he drove into her, shuddering, and she felt the hot, sudden gush of his release flooding her insides. He stayed there, pulsing, buried deep, his weight sagging against her.
For a long moment, there was only the sound of their ragged breathing and the drip of a distant tap. Then, he softened, slipped out of her. A trickle of his spend followed, dripping down her inner thigh.
Iris straightened up slowly, her body feeling both shattered and strangely light. She caught her reflection in the mirror. Her eyes were empty. She turned, looking at Alan as he tucked himself away, avoiding her gaze now, already shrinking back into just a boy.
“You can go,” she said, her voice flat.
He nodded, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and left without a word.
Iris stood alone in the vast, steamy bathroom. The high was already receding, leaving the familiar, cold quiet in its wake. She looked at the fog on the mirror, at the vague outline of her own form. She thought of Goya’s black paintings, of visions of madness and despair locked behind glass. She thought of tomorrow morning, of walking through silent, hallowed halls with Ben.
She turned on the tap, splashed cold water on her face. The taste of solitude was back, metallic and familiar. But there was the Prado to look forward to. And after that, the next thing. And the next. A faint, ghost of a plan formed in the stillness. Maybe, after the gallery tomorrow, she would find a church. A old, dark cathedral. She could sit in a pew, alone, and see if the emptiness there felt any different from the emptiness inside her. It was something to do.