It made sense. It also meant that trumpet had become her second favorite instrument.
When she was finally loose, she missed the sweet confinement of the ropes. Not for long, though. Peter pulled her close and she trembled with need. Wanting him. Wanting to be spanked and fucked, but also to curl up and listen as his heart beat, another layer to the music.
He swept her up and carried her to the bedroom. The few brain cells that weren’t entirely lost to sensation took the time to be astonished by the casual display of strength.
Astonished and turned on, as if she weren’t turned on enough as it was.
The bedroom was dark and he didn’t bother with a light. He set her on the bed as if she were a treasure, then lay over her, pinning her to the bed with his weight, teasing her dripping sex with his cock. The sensations were most overwhelming between her legs and where her nipples brushed against his chest, but everywhere skin touched skin, tongues of flame danced. Her breath came in gasps and sobs. She wanted to beg, but she wasn’t sure what she needed. Hell, she wasn’t sure what words were anymore, only music and touch.
“Kelsey, I…” She couldn’t make out his expression in the dimness, but she saw him shake his head.
Instead of finishing his sentence, he delivered the kind of kiss that made her forget all questions, forget that he’d even been trying to talk. As he kissed her, one hand reached out and grabbed a condom off the nightstand, rolling half onto his side.
“Help me.” It was half order and half plea. She knew he meant with the condom, but breathless in the dark, it seemed to mean so much more.
I’ll help you. Any way you need, any way I can.
It took her several tries to tear open the wrapper, its crinkle a counterpoint to the music pouring out of speakers she couldn’t see and sounding so intimate Chet Baker and his band might have been in the room. Her hands shook even more as she rolled it onto his hard, hot length. The weight of him in her hands made her crazy. She wanted to see him. Wanted to touch him everywhere. Wanted to put her mouth on him and taste him.
Wanted so much, but deep down just wanted him, however he chose. And this time he chose his cock inside her.
He lay over her again, sucking one tender nipple into his mouth and playing it like he would his instrument. Notes of flame played from the nipple to her cunt. She opened her legs, wrapped them around Peter’s slender, strong hips.
As he entered her, he bit down on the nipple. Pain and pleasure crescendoed through her body, driving all the night’s desire to her clit and cunt. “I… Please… I’m going to… Please, may I…?”
“Come for me, Kelsey. Come now,” he crooned, and not a second too soon. She wasn’t sure she could have held back if he’d told her to wait.
The orgasm broke over her, wave upon wave. Just when she thought she’d exhausted herself, another wave caught her, broke her sweetly against Peter. And when she could come no more, she moved into a realm somewhere beyond orgasm. She couldn’t stop moving her hands over Peter’s skin, couldn’t stop moaning. Her world had narrowed to him, his body, his vetiver-and-vanilla scent, the texture of his skin and hair. And his cock, oh his cock filling her. Yet while her focus narrowed, it paradoxically expanded so she rode every change in the music, soaring and falling and spinning as the notes did. Intensely in her body yet having an out-of-body experience.
Surely she couldn’t have another orgasm. She’d soar along, flying on pleasure and music, drunk on Peter. And that was fine. His skin was suede on steel and she could touch it forever, listen to his strangled, pleasured noises for eternity.
When she brushed his tight nipples, he groaned, “Oh, yes. Just like that,” through clenched teeth. His hips snapped faster, another wild, hard burst, but this time one where he raced toward a finish line. She tightened her inner muscles, was rewarded by the most beautiful sounds and a hoarse, “Come with me, Kelsey. Come as I come in you.”
Now she didn’t need to think about clenching, because her inner muscles were doing their own sweet, hot thing and Peter reared up, arching his back and roaring like a lion claiming his territory. “Kelsey, I…”
He sank back down onto her, head buried on her shoulder. His lips moved on her skin. He was kissing her but she swore he was continuing to speak, a whisper so soft she wasn’t sure she heard it or imagined it.
She thought he’d whispered, “I love you.”
She considered asking what he’d said, forcing him either to repeat it out loud, whether it was the words she wanted to hear or something else. A lesser endearment. A stunned “Wow”—which would certainly be appropriate.
No, if it was “I love you,” he hadn’t meant for her to hear it. Not yet. He was practicing, getting ready to say it out loud.
She knew how seriously he took practicing and how long he’d work on a new piece before he took it public. She might have to wait a while before he was ready to speak the words out loud for her.
But by then, it would be the most beautiful “I love you” ever.
Chapter Eleven
Peter stalked around the music room, full of energy that wouldn’t let him sit still. He wasn’t exactly restless. He was excited but in some strange way calmer than he’d felt in weeks, because he’d reached a decision.
In the end, it hadn’t even been a scary decision. He’d been anxious while he’d been trying to make up his mind, but last night, the rope and the music had decided for him.
No, they’d made it easier to admit his mind was made up. It had happened in the bayou bar as Kelsey followed him around the dance floor. She hadn’t known what she was doing, but she followed his lead and ended up dancing like she belonged there.
Because she did belong there. In Louisiana. In his arms. In his life.
Which, frankly, scared the hell out of him. But he was going to face that fear like an adult. Today he was going to ask Kelsey to move in.
And damn it, he was going to say he loved her. Third time was the charm.
She wasn’t Deneice, following her family out of New Orleans in the wake of Katrina. Even at eighteen, he’d understood why she chose never to come back, but understanding didn’t mean it hadn’t broken his heart.
Most importantly, Kelsey wasn’t Alison. Alison had also been a northerner and sexually submissive, but that was about all she and Kelsey had in common.
Kelsey got New Orleans and wasn’t using it as a stepping stone to get where she really wanted to be. Alison had been transferred here because of a promotion at the airline and never really learned to love the city despite Peter’s best efforts; she’d been relieved when her next opportunity for promotion sent her back north again.
Kelsey hadn’t declared love too soon, or said she wanted to be his after the second bout of kinky sex. In retrospect, he should have realized Alison had mistaken a good case of lust and the rush of BDSM for love, but he’d gone right along with her. Terrific sex could confuse guys as much as women, Doms as much as subs.
He and Kelsey might have started out with hot kink, but they’d built a relationship. Hell, even his mom liked her, and Mom was fussy.
And Kelsey had never mentioned that damn song.
Maybe it was superstition on his part—growing up in New Orleans, you developed a little magical thinking—but it was part of why he thought maybe, this time, he’d fallen in love and it could work like the song claimed.
Kelsey was due over after the school groups visiting the aquarium had gone home. He’d talk to her then.
But first he’d finish her song. Now he knew how it should end: with a sweet, sustained note that hinted it could go on and on. Maybe he’d play it for her before he tried to talk. If he choked on the words, maybe the music could speak for him.
***
Peter was playing something when Kelsey arrived. Despite the cold drizzle, she stood outside the door, listening to the hints of music that drifted out through the poorly sealed vintage windows.
He was playing the song he’d called “Kelsey, All Tied Up.”
Of course he’d be playing that now, when she needed to make a huge decision that would affect their relationship.
Tears prickled in her eyes and she blinked them away. She had to go in and talk to him. One way or another, everything would be fine.
She started to talk as soon as she walked in the door, before Peter could touch her, before she’d even slipped off her coat. It was the only way she was going to get the words out.
“The good news is I got offered a full-time job.”
Peter set his sax down and hugged her. “That’s terrific! Was it the one at the World War II Museum? We’ll miss you at the bar but I know you prefer working with kids to mixing drinks. Also paying bills is important.”
It was good news—in a way. She had all kinds of rational reasons to think so. None of them seemed as compelling as Peter’s music in the rain.
She squirmed out of his embrace. “The bad news is it’s in back in Massachusetts, at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem.”
“I thought you’d decided not to apply for more jobs in New England.” His voice was harsh, but it was the kind of harshness that came from holding back sorrow. She’d heard his sax sound like that, on certain songs, ones about love gone wrong.
“I’d applied impulsively at Thanksgiving because I was homesick, but I didn’t think I was close to qualified. I forgot to tell you at first and by the time I thought of it, I decided it didn’t matter, that I’d never hear from them. But they called when I was up north for Christmas and I had the world’s shortest interview.”
“You never mentioned that either.” He sounded cold as a winter wind off Gloucester Harbor, but she could see why. She’d been foolish not to say something.
“I’m sorry. That was dumb of me, but I wasn’t trying to hide anything. We didn’t see each other for a few days after I got back and when we did, we had better things to do than talk about a really remote possibility. I didn’t think the interview went well. I had doubts about whether I wanted the job and I figured it showed enough that I’d get a ‘thanks-but-no-thanks’ e-mail. And on some level I wanted to believe if I pretended it hadn’t happened, it would assure nothing would come of it. Only I got an offer this afternoon.”
Peter began to pace the length of the room. Usually he walked like a lion stalking across the veldt, but this was quick and jerky. Angry. “Great.” His voice was curt. His face, when she could see it, looked frozen, as if something inside him had entirely shut down.
“I haven’t decided if I’m going to accept it. They’re still saying we’ll have funding at the aquarium in the spring, but no one knows if we can believe it. The job I’ve been offered is creating education programs, not hands-on education, which is what I enjoy. But it pays decently and has benefits. Since the Peabody Essex isn’t far from my parents’ place, I could live there while I got my finances under control. On one hand, practical. On the other hand, potentially murder-inducing. And the area is nowhere near as great as New Orleans. Salem’s claim to fame is some seriously twisted history. Gloucester isn’t even that exciting.” The real sticking point is I love you. But I’m not saying it. I’ve put it off too long and this is so not the time, when I’m talking about maybe leaving.
“I’m sure you’ll love it once you get settled in. Just like you say you love New Orleans, or like you’d love Des Moines if someone offered you a job there. Any job, whether you’ll enjoy it or not, apparently, as long as it’s full-time with benefits.” He stopped abruptly and glared at her. “It doesn’t matter to you, does it? None of this matters.” He gestured broadly, a swing of the arm that took in his house, his music, his city, himself.
She hadn’t expected Peter to be thrilled with the prospect of her leaving town, but she hadn’t expected this level of fury.
“That’s not true. I…” I have absolutely no idea what to say. She’d much rather stay with Peter in a city of music and magic than go home to New England with her tail between her legs. But it took a special kind of stupid to pass on a good job in her field for the sake of a relationship with a man who couldn’t say how he felt. “I haven’t made up my mind yet. I don’t want to leave,” she finally managed. “But I’m working three part-time jobs and still having trouble making ends meet. It makes sense to move on instead of waiting to see if the aquarium job gets funded again. Not sense I like, but sense.”
“You enjoy all those jobs. Isn’t that important?” His voice was gentler now, and he put his arm around her. “What if …” He sighed and seemed to let go of whatever notion he’d had. “No, let’s not confuse the situation by throwing in crazy what-ifs. You have enough to figure out.”
“Then let me keep thinking aloud at you. I want to stay in New Orleans, but I can’t spend the rest of my life working multiple jobs just to live where I want to live. It doesn’t feel right.”
Wrong thing to say, apparently. He’d seemed like he was calming down after the initial shock, but his spine stiffened and he drew back. “It’s good enough for me. What makes you so special?” If his scorn dripped with any more acid, he’d burn a hole in the floor. His eyes had darkened to the color of a stormy sea.
Suddenly she could find all the words she wanted, though even as she spoke, she knew they weren’t the words she needed. “I’m not special, Peter. Not like you. You have an amazing talent. It’s worth struggling and working a crazy schedule to make music like you can, and to bring music to kids who couldn’t otherwise get lessons. I don’t have anything like that to drive me. I enjoy living here enough that I want to make it work—and you’re a huge part of that. But I have student loans out my ass. I need to grow up whether I want to or not, and it doesn’t look like New Orleans is the place for me to do it.” Good lord, this is coming out all wrong… “Not that you’re not a grown-up. You handle your responsibilities and still make music and live the life you want. I admire you, because I know it’s not easy. I haven’t figured out that balance. At least if I take this job, I can pay my bills—and then try to figure out everything else.” Including how to fill the hole where you belong.
“Fine. Go back if that’s what you need to do.”
Upset as she was getting, Kelsey couldn’t help wondering if he knew how adolescent he sounded. Almost as if he was saying words he’d said in the past to someone else. And despite his tone, the scorn earlier and the anger now, she thought his eyes looked more confused and frightened than furious.
“It’s not ideal, but we can work it out. There’s this thing called the Internet, and these other things called phones. And you won’t wither if you leave New Orleans to visit me.”
“I might.” He lowered his gaze, and his voice. “You weren’t here long enough for your blood to turn to jazz and bourbon and spice. You should be safe enough leaving. A native like me…it hurts to be away.” He looked up again. She thought she saw tears in his eyes. His posture was rigid with something she had to assume was anger, though it looked more like fear. “Good-bye, Kelsey, and good luck. I’ll miss you, but if you don’t feel you can make it here, it’s better we find out now. Seriously, I hope this job’s great for you and you can build the life you want.”
“I haven’t accepted the job yet. I haven’t even decided if I want to.”
“You sound like you’ll regret it if you don’t. You need to do what’s best for you.”
Without willing her feet to move, she staggered a few steps toward him, but he gestured toward the door and turned away. “Just go. A clean break’s better for both of us.”
For a second, she froze, breathing hard, letting what happened wash over her.
Then Peter stepped forward, took her arm, and gently but firmly led her to the door. “Good-bye,” he repeated. He gave her a tiny shove out onto the stoop and shut the door behind her before she could say anything.
Kelsey stood in the rain. In an hour or so she figured it would hit her and she’d cry. At least by then she might be somewhere private.
For now, she was still in New Orleans. And nothing
said “I got dumped dramatically for reasons I’m not sure I understand” like a dimly lit dive bar before five o’clock, a strong cocktail, and a bluesy soundtrack to her melancholy.
She thought she could make it as far as a bar on Frenchman Street.
But as she stumbled down the street, strains of “When I Fall in Love” drifted out of a passing car. She only caught a few notes, but it was enough to defeat her efforts not to cry in the middle of the street.
At least the rain would hide her tears.
***
As soon as the door slammed behind her, Peter knew what he’d done.
Basically ruined everything. He loved Kelsey. Despite that, or in a twisted, stupid way, because of it, because he’d let his love make him afraid, he’d lost his mind, opened his big mouth, and created a disaster.
He sank down onto the floor and hid his face in hands. She’d come to him with a piece of news, a decision she needed to make. He’d reacted as if the decision was already made—that she’d inevitably leave New Orleans like Alison and Deneice.
She’d been trying to make up her mind. He’d panicked and made it up for her, in the worst possible way.
He’d promised he’d do that the next time she couldn’t make up her mind, only he’d meant he’d do it over something trivial, in a way that led to control games and kinky sex. This wasn’t trivial, and it had gotten him exactly the opposite of what he wanted. Maybe the opposite of what she wanted too, but if you were trying to decide whether to stay here or take a job somewhere else, getting dumped could put you on the next flight out.
Maybe he could have been more of an asshole if he’d set a goal to be the biggest jerk in the South, but he doubted it. He’d managed to out-mean and out-stupid even the worst southern politician, and they were a special breed.
The Lion of Frenchman Street Page 7