The Treble With Men

by Smartypants Romance

  I turned around, my voice cracking with emotion as tears balanced on my eyelids. “I’ve given you everything. It will never be enough for you.”

  “Liar.”

  “What?” I threw out my arms.

  “You keep saying that, but you aren’t. Something is stopping you. It’s the reason you hide yourself. It’s the reason you only really open up when you’re alone.”

  I couldn’t help it. I stepped toward him. I was shaking with anger and exhaustion. A tear spilled over, so I swiped it away. “I have given everything to this, but it will never be enough. And don’t you ever talk to me about hiding yourself away. You wear a flipping mask.”

  “That’s not real. You know that. You know more about me than anybody else. You can tell yourself it’s my fault, but you know the truth. You are holding something back. Until you let go of your demons, you’ll never move forward.”

  I stomped out of the room. Just the stubborn set of his jaw caused another wave of anger. How could he possibly put this on me? What a self-centered egomaniac. Sure, he was a genius musician in the body of a sex god. Yes, he had more talent in his pinky than most people could have after years of practice. But I was a strong, independent woman, and I was sick of his childish temper.

  “Kim.”

  I had made it about four steps down the hallway when he stopped me by grabbing my hand.

  I tugged it free from his grasp.

  “Please, don’t cry. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I’m sorry.” His thumb brushed a tear from my cheek. “When I get … when I can’t find the words … sometimes I get so angry … the yelling.” He took a deep breath. “I’m sorry.”

  “You can be so mean,” I snapped, as the tremble of my chin belayed my ferocity.

  “Please, don’t cry because of me. I’m not worth it.”

  “I’m not crying because of you. I’m crying because I’m mad. I do this. I won’t be ashamed.” I took a deep breath in. “Displaying emotion is a healthy way of dealing with things.” I sniffed.

  “You’re right.” He ducked down a little trying to get me to look at him. I was finding it very difficult to do that. Then he did that look-up smolder-frown thing, looking exactly like the Erik Jones of my adolescence and my heart just about threw in the towel. “I envy that about you. You’re so good at feeling things. At communicating them.”

  His words softened my anger. His brow crinkled with sincerity as his gaze moved over my face.

  “I really am trying, Devlin. This whole time. Since I started. I—I’m just not who you think I am.”

  He shook his head. I could feel him grow angry and then swallow it back down. He took a deep breath to steady himself. “God, Kim. If you could only see yourself as I do.” I shook my head as he kept talking. “But you are holding a part of you back and I don’t understand why.”

  “I don’t want to. Not anymore. I’m so tired.” The exhaustion of it all weighted my words.

  “When your guard is down you play beautifully, full of passion. You are grace and light.”

  I opened my mouth but had to swallow instead. With him standing so close and his man smell encompassing me, I couldn’t focus. Could I tell him the truth? No matter how ridiculous it seemed? I’d tried talking to Roddy about it, or with others over the years, but it made them uncomfortable.

  “You’re keeping something at bay. I can’t understand why when you have so much life in you, bubbling right here.” He placed a hand on my chest above my heart. The warmth and weight of his palm radiated through me. He had to feel my heart slamming against his hand. “You’re magic when you let go and really play. That’s why I chose you. That’s what you are capable of. I know this.”

  I closed my eyes and dropped my head back against the wall.

  “Why did learning about the solo upset you so much?” he asked. “I thought you might be happy.”

  How did I explain it to him when I hardly understood it myself?

  “It’s not that I don’t feel like I have earned it. I know that when I really try, I have potential.”

  He waited patiently for me to go on.

  “It’s that potential that scares me,” I said.

  We stayed in this safe space of the hall. It felt like if we moved, I’d lose any courage to speak.

  “You don’t feel like you deserve it?”

  I shook my head but met his gaze. “When I go after things, people get hurt.”

  “Explain,” he said.

  “It sounds ridiculous.”

  “Just talk. It doesn’t have to be perfect or make sense. Just share. Is it just because of Jethro? Did he do something? Because that’s where you went on hold as far as I can tell. You were vibrant at camp. I went away on my first tour and when I came back everything had changed. You had changed. You went from this bright, ambitious cello player to this grayed-out shape of a person.”

  “No.” I pressed icy fingertips to my burning cheeks. “Jethro was more of a symptom, I think.”

  “People don’t just shut down. They don’t just mute their lives for almost ten years without something to cause it. Talk to me.”

  He wouldn’t stop staring at me. I knew he wouldn’t relent. “That last summer at camp, before senior year. You were already gone. Something happened.”

  His nostrils flared. “Roddy?”

  “No, it’s not like that. Roddy and I were sort of dating by then.” My heart was pounding. I wrapped my arms tight around my middle. I didn’t want to share this. It made me feel sick. He’d know what an ugly person I was. People loved to tell me I was beautiful, but if they only knew how ugly I was on the inside …

  “I’ve never told anybody this. You’re going to think the worst of me, and I deserve it. I was this poor little rich girl through and through. And I just fucked up. I just fucked up so big.” My voice cracked.

  “Tell me,” his face was open and listening.

  “The stuff with Jethro. All that that came after. That was me freaking out. The rehab helped bring me back to a middle place, but I was never okay again.”

  He nodded like he understood.

  “Remember how the camp voted for the soloists at the year-end talent show?” I asked.

  “It was a pointless popularity contest.”

  “Yes. But I wanted it. I wanted it so bad. I had something to prove. I wasn’t first chair—Ariana was.”

  His face softened to pity. He remembered her.

  I went on. “She was perfect. I was so intimidated by her. She was everything I wanted to be. I wanted that solo. I had to prove to my parents, to myself, to everyone that I was worth it and that I was going places.”

  “Kim,” he said softly.

  “Let me get it all out.” This was the part that changed everything. “I asked Roddy to fix the votes. To make sure that I got everything I wanted. I didn’t care who I hurt in the process.”

  “Okay.” He moved to leaned against the wall, facing me.

  I stayed facing forward. It would be easier not looking at him.

  “I got it. I played the solo. That night Ariana went to the lake and drowned. She left a note. She was miserable.”

  “Kim—”

  “I know what you’re going to say. I didn’t kill her. She took her own life. It was just one solo. I understand that rationally—I do. But I was the straw that broke the camel’s back. My ambition. My cold hard ambition. For what? Just to play a freaking solo at a summer camp? Ridiculous.”

  He reached out to rest a hand on my arm. “You can’t know why somebody takes their own life. It’s tragic and confounding, but it’s unknowable. You are not responsible.”

  “She was me. I knew the stress she was under. I knew what it felt like to go after everything with blind ambition. I could have shown her kindness. I could have been her.”

  He pushed my shoulder to turn me toward him. “You were a kid. Everybody at that age is completely stuck in their own head.”

  “But …”

  “And now you think your success
will ultimately come at the cost of someone else?” he asked.

  “It’s not sound reasoning.”

  “We can’t help how our minds handle trauma.” He squeezed my shoulder. “We can’t help how we view things through our own lens of experience. We manufacture truths to keep ourselves safe. You fear doing well, making choices, because of one mistake. But you’re more than that one misjudgment. You’re so much more.”

  “I feel so scared all the time. One wrong move and who will pay the price?” I squeezed my eyes close. I was so tired and lonely and scared.

  “I can’t believe you’ve carried this around for so long. I understand now. About Carla and the solos. Why you’ve held yourself back.” He let out a low breath. He rubbed up and down my arm. I didn’t feel like I deserved comfort when I was the one that was here.

  “I remember when that happened,” he said, referencing Ariana.

  “You do?”

  “I was already gone, but I’d heard all about it. Everybody saw how much pressure she was under. Her parents put so much on her shoulders. She was miserable. They found her journals after. Apparently, she’d been struggling for a long time. Nobody knew how bad it was.”

  More pain tightened my chest. “I wish I’d offered her support. My parents never pushed me. I always pushed myself. The pressure she must have felt if she couldn’t imagine living …”

  “She needed help. All of us felt partly responsible. Had we known, or asked, maybe things would have ended up differently.”

  “Nobody knew,” I whispered to myself. Digesting all this terrible new information. “It’s so sad.”

  “It is sad. But it is not your fault.” His voice was firm.

  I would tell somebody the same thing. But it was because of me. I was that final straw. I pushed and pushed. I thought I was so totally untouchable. I was not a good person.

  “How am I ever supposed to trust myself?”

  “You aren’t malicious. Plenty of people go after their dreams without hurting people.”

  “It was my ambition that drove it. I was going to be big. No matter what.”

  “It was more than that. I know what greed looks like. I know when somebody takes at any costs for themselves. That’s not you. If you’ve been feeling this way for so long, it may be hard to hear all this. But it wasn’t your fault. She wasn’t happy. She took her life. You’re a good person. Playing well and with purpose won’t change that. You think you will want to be eighty years old knowing you were given a second chance at life and you wasted it?”

  I winced but knew he was right. I wasn’t living. Rehab had been my wake-up call, but I wasn’t out of the woods yet.

  “I’m sorry you’ve been feeling this way for so long. I’m sorry your guilt has marred reality. You’re kind and good. Embracing your talent won’t hurt anybody and hiding it sure as hell won’t change the past. Come here.”

  He hugged me tightly. I squeezed him back.

  “Thank you,” I said. It was though somebody had stopped standing on my chest and I could take a full breath again.

  “Thank you for sharing with me.” He held me for a long moment before speaking again. His voice rumbled in my ear. “When people hear you play it brings them joy. That’s the light you give.”

  I looked up into his eyes. “I’ve never thought of it like that.”

  “That’s the only mark we leave on this world.” He cupped my face. “The only lasting thing, is how we leave people feeling.”

  “That’s a lovely way of looking at it.”

  I’d been making myself small. I didn’t feel like I deserved a legacy.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  “I wish I could take the years of pain away.” His face was inches from mine. His eyes burned with such intensity that I had to break the hug, but I didn’t leave his arms completely. It was too much to be this close to him.

  And then … then I thought about this position we were in. This physical position. How my body was trapped back against this wall. How his arm was around my waist. He held me to him like I was an instrument made of glass. Sturdy but delicately. I was trapped but not at risk of breaking.

  I wanted to break. I wanted to shatter into a million pieces. I felt excitement and potential brimming right under the shell I’d been wearing.

  His head was bowed and apologetic, like a mourning saint in a Renaissance painting. His face was so close to mine that if he just leaned lower he could graze my neck. He could rub his nose up the column and inhale deeply. And I would let him. God, how I wanted him to. I wanted his body pressed hard with the same pent up energy I was feeling. I wanted him shaking for me as I shook for him.

  But I wouldn’t be out on this ledge alone. It was like holding on to a single branch with an abyss underneath me. I couldn’t let go unless I was absolutely sure he was there to catch me.

  And then.

  The tiniest shift in the air. A feminine awareness. I swallowed. Too afraid to lift my gaze to see what he was doing. But he watched me. Not watched—memorized me. I felt his gaze moving over my skin as though he dragged a feather against it. Goosebumps prickled down my chest.

  “Kim.” My name was a pained whisper.

  His was closer than ever. Heat permeated me. Please, just touch me. Kiss me. Do anything.

  Chapter 28

  I wish you could see yourself as I do.

  DEVLIN

  Kim had been suffering for so long. I knew that something had been holding her back. How could nobody else in her life see it? Why hadn’t anybody stepped in sooner? I wanted to put her back together.

  Kim was loose and languid as she leaned back against the wall, barely held up by my arm wrapped around her waist. She didn’t blush or pull away. She waited. Almost patiently, as though she’d wait all night if needed. But the heat would consume us long before then. My want for her was a real presence between us. The closer I inched, the more it saturated into my skin.

  Her face was tipped toward the ceiling, hiding her expression from me as a flush spread over the tops of her breasts. The sweet, long column of her throat was exposed to me. Her pulse fluttered there, gentle compared to my own thrumming heart. Her chest heaved up and down.

  She felt it. That shift when we went from talking to other. The other was the thing between us that had the most power. It always had.

  “Kim,” I said.

  It was all that I could manage. I was going to cross a line that we would never come back from and I couldn’t form any other sound beside her name.

  She was beautiful. She was more than that. She was everything. I couldn’t wait a moment more.

  I stepped closer, moving with slow decisiveness. If this wasn’t what she wanted, there would be plenty of time to stop me. I leaned forward until every part of her was pressed against me. Every bit of me, against her. Let her feel my want for her.

  She gasped so lightly I wouldn’t have heard it if not for her mouth being just below my ear.

  Her neck called out to me. I bent and inhaled deeply there, tracing the flushed skin. So soft. The tip of my nose tracked up her neck as I moved up to take in her sweet essence. She smelled so damn good. Like woman and desire. My mouth watered to taste her.

  Her body shuddered as I moved, perfectly responsive in every way, in learning and listening, and talking, and I knew this, what we were about to do, would be no different. My left arm had her pulled close, my right arm began to dance up the skin. Slowly, delicately, like she was a new piece of music for studying.

  My lips lingered just under her ear where the small soft hairs grew in under the dark length. I brushed the long strands behind her shoulder, and she tilted her head, opening to me, gifting me with room to explore.

  I sucked gently at that delicate transition.

  Another soft gasp escaped her. Both our bodies thrummed to the same fast melody. She drove me to movement. I moved to kiss her jaw where it met her neck. I moved to her cheek and kissed it softly too. I kissed her closed eyes. I gently tilted her
head and showed similar attention to the other side of her neck and shoulder. All the while, my left hand moved from her lower back to caress and squeeze her full ass. I cupped it and pulled it harder to me.

  She melted into me. My right hand continued to trace up and down her arm until I made a choice.

  I leaned back to put distance between us.

  “No,” she gasped out, her eyes shot open.

  “I just need … I need more.” I pulled my shirt off over my head. I wasn’t thinking clearly but I needed to feel her cool skin against my burning body.

  “Oh,” she said. “Good idea.” Without another second passing, her own shirt was off and tossed aside. She pulled off a lace bra and threw it down as well. Not a moment’s hesitation. An unexpected bonus that spoke of trust and desire.

  We stood naked from the waist up. I tried to memorize the shape of her. Her breasts were … perfect. My mouth watered for them. I needed hours to study them.

  She threw her arms around my neck. I wrapped my arms around her. I felt bulky against her lithe frame. Her skin was soft, but not cool as I’d expected. It blazed as hot as mine. She was so soft. She tasted so good. I knew it would be like this. I knew she would feel this good to me.

  We held each other, in awe of how amazing it was to have our skin bare and blazing like this. She loosened her tight hold and I used the opportunity to slide my hand up between our bodies and around her neck. My thumb pushed up her chin. Her eyes were closed again, like she was too afraid to watch.

  “Kim,” I whispered.

  “Hmm?”

  “Open your eyes.”

  She needed to watch this. She needed to know it was me when I brought her pleasure. She needed to associate this person with happiness for once. Nobody else.

  She blinked her eyes softly open. “Hi,” she said.

  “Hi.”

  My thumb grazed over her lips as we stood staring into each other’s eyes.

  “What is even happening?” she asked with a dazed smile.

  “I have no idea.”

  “Should we stop?”