The apartment was relatively quiet for a Thursday night, and it was a rare occasion when I didn’t have to work or sing. I flipped through our basic cable stations but nothing caught my attention.
I got up and wandered to the fridge, but nothing caught my attention there, either. I considered working on my song, but my mind had not stopped turning over the problem with the demo and I had a feeling my muse wouldn’t come out to play tonight. I didn’t see a way to get myself into the contest. Not without a tape.
I grabbed a Diet Coke from the fridge and went to my bedroom. I’d listen to some music, get my mind off certain problems and certain people, and maybe the muse would make an appearance. Road Kill and me usually covered well-known stuff, but they let me work in a few of my own songs every now and then. Dillon wrote with me sometimes, working out the guitar parts while I was on the piano, the lyric-and-melody half of the writing team.
I turned on the radio and lay on my bed, closing my eyes. I listened idly for a while, just drifting, trying to relax, maybe even on the verge of sleep, when an idea struck me.
It was that first taste of passion, of connection, of chemistry. A passionate encounter that took two people by surprise with its strength, its unexpectedness. I pictured Dex, kicking out that spotlight. I thought about how good his hands had felt on my body. How his kiss had been like a lifeline to me at that moment, so caught up in the moment.
A new melody began to stream through my head. Harder. High energy. Driving. I sat up, switched off the radio and grabbed my notebook to write down what I heard in my head.
I liked the harder edge to the chorus that kept running through my mind as well as the softer parts in between. It had a driving bass, the kind you feel in the pit of your stomach. The kind that mimics the act the song describes. I liked the long looks, the sensuality of it. An hour passed, then two, and I was still scribbling, still hearing music in the silence of my bedroom. It was sexy and sweet, too. Sort of a look back, but also right in the moment.
The problem was the ending. A song was like a story, and I didn’t yet know how my story ended. What happened when that hot glow was over? Did my lovers part ways and only know each other in memories from that point forward? Or did that one-night stand turn into more? I didn’t know. I just didn’t know.
Images of Dex nude and smiling over at me invaded my scattered thoughts. I was getting warm just thinking about how hot he’d made me. How just hearing his voice on the message I hadn’t returned had made my gut clench and my body flush. His scent was still vivid in my mind. So were his taste and the way he’d held my head when he kissed me.
The jingle of my cell jolted me out of me thoughts. Flustered, I grabbed for the phone and answered it before I looked at the caller ID. “Hello?”
“What are you wearing?”
My eyes flew open. I recognized the deep, rich voice immediately, of course. I’d just been fantasizing about it. “Dex.”
He laughed. “Was it that obvious?”
I smiled, too. “Yeah. It was. I don’t get many obscene phone calls these days.”
“I guess I’ll have to call more often, then.”
I didn’t know how to answer. I knew he was a big-time flirt and could very well have had a blonde on his lap right now.
I decided to keep it light. “So what are you wearing?”
“Right now?”
“Yeah.” I rolled to my side and closed my eyes.
“Sweatpants.”
“Oooh. Sexy.”
He laughed. “I just got out of the shower.”
Now there was an image. Tingles raced up my spine and I knew he was remembering a certain shower we’d shared. “Did you have a show tonight?” I asked.
I heard ice clink and what sounded like soda filling a glass. “Yeah. Houston. We’re getting ready to head back East. We have a stop in Memphis tomorrow night, then we’re home for a few days.”
“Well, it must not have been much of a show.”
“Why?”
“I don’t hear a party this time in the background. Unless it’s just a party for two tonight.”
I bit my lip. I didn’t want to sound like I cared about what he did. It wasn’t as if we were anything more than a couple of people who had hooked up a couple of times.
I could hear the smile in his voice. “No, I’m flying solo tonight. You?”
“Nobody home but me and the cockroaches.”
“Damn, wish I was there.”
This was so awkward, like high school all over again, Only without the zits.
“Why?” I sounded a little too breathy, even to my own ears.
“I think you know.” His voice was huskier now, an octave deeper. It sounded as if he was right there with me. Heat stirred low in my belly.
“Oh yeah?” I couldn’t resist. Working on that song about sex and passion and heat, well, it had gotten me a little hot.
“Yeah.” I heard the ice clink again and him swallow. “Are you sitting or standing?”
I knew where this was leading. I knew it was a bad idea. I just couldn’t remember why.
“I’m lying down on my bed.”
He groaned. “You’re killing me. Are you naked?”
“Not yet.” I rolled to my back and popped the button on my fly. “I’m unzipping my jeans.”
“Take them off.”
I pushed the denim over my hips and kicked them to the floor.
“What do your panties look like?”
It was laundry day. I was wearing a pair of ratty old cotton granny panties. “Satin. Black g-string.”
He grunted low in his throat. “Take off your top.”
I set the phone down and turned off the bedside light before tugging my tank top off over my head. I put the phone back to my ear. “It’s off.”
“I’m on my bed now, too. It’s dark and all I can hear is the hum of the bus’s engine and your voice.”
I closed my eyes. “Why don’t you take off your sweatpants?” I said in a slow, deep whisper.
“Okay.” There was a soft shuffling sound and my pulse went up a notch, just imagining him clean and damp from his shower, lying there in the dark in the middle of his bed wearing nothing but a pair of clinging boxer-briefs.
“Okay. I’m naked.”
“No underwear?” I amended my mental image and my pulse went up another notch.
“No.” I could hear the smile in his voice and warmth rushed straight to the pit of my stomach.
“Your turn,” he said. “Take off your bra.”
I smiled this time. “Not wearing one.”
He groaned. “Panties, then. Take off your panties, Sydney.”
My name on his lips sent a rush of heat straight to my sex. I was already lifting my hips to slide the granny panties over my hips and off.
“Okay. They’re off.” I rubbed a hand over my torso, my skin already heating, wondering how far he would take this.
I should have known by now that Dex was not the kind of guy to do anything halfway. It was all the way or nothing. And tonight, I was fine with that.
“God, Sydney. I can just imagine you lying there, all that gorgeous blond hair spread out over your pillow.”
I tugged out the band that had held my hair back into a messy ponytail and spread it out, just as Dex had described.
“Yeah,” I said softly.
“Touch yourself, Syd. Touch those gorgeous breasts for me.”
My hand went to my breast and I cupped it briefly before moving my fingers over my nipples. I shuddered at the easy pleasure of it.
“Are you doing it?”
“Yeah,” I breathed.
“Tell me what it feels like.”
“I feel tingly all over. Especially when I pinch my nipple a little.”
“I want to put my mouth on you. I want to feel that hard little peak on my tongue.”
“Me too.”
I was getting hot. My hips moved of their own volition and the sheet was getting all bunched up. My sk
in burned where my hand teased my breast and in the dark, I could hear every intake of Dex’s breath. Every movement he made came through clear as a bell.
I pictured him lying there on his bed. “Now you,” I said, still massaging my breast. “Touch yourself.”
“Where?”
“Run your hand down your chest. Slowly.” I took a shaky breath. “Now down over your abs to your cock.”
“God. Sydney.” He groaned and I knew he had that big, hard cock in his hand.
“Now stroke yourself. Slowly.”
I licked my lips, wishing my hands were on his body.
“I’m so hard for you, baby.” His breath whistled through his teeth and I squirmed, imaging him pleasuring himself, thinking of me.
“You. You, too.” He gasped. “Touch yourself.”
I didn’t need to be told twice. I slid my hands over my soft belly to the damp curls between my thighs.
“Are you wet for me?”
“Oh yeah,” I said, rubbing the slickness over my opening. “Really wet. And hot.”
“Oh, God. Put your fingers inside.”
I slipped two into my wet inside and couldn’t stifle the groan.
“That’s right, baby. In and out.” He was out of breath and I imagined him stroking himself faster and faster, his movements matching mine.
I bit my lip and squeezed my eyes shut. Pressure built inside me and I squeezed my legs together. Usually this wasn’t enough to get me off, but here in the darkness, with Dex’s voice in my ear, knowing he was touching that big beautiful cock of his at the same time my fingers were inside me – well, it was more than enough.
“Feel good, baby?”
“Yeah.”
“Faster now.”
I squeezed my eyes shut as pressure built and built inside me. I wedged the phone between my shoulder and my ear and used my other hand to rub my clit. Pleasure spiked through me.
“I’m…using both hands, now. God. It feels so good.”
“I know, baby.” He was almost panting now.
“I’m so wet for you Dex…I don’t think I can –”
“I’m right with you, baby. Come on, Come with me.”
My nipples tingled, my skin burned. Blood pumped through my body fast enough to make me dizzy. The friction of my fingers, the pressure on my sweet spot, the heat, the wetness, the sound of Dex stroking his cock right in my ear, it all coalesced in an instant in a blinding flash.
I cried as the pleasure overtook me in hot waves and wanted to sob with the pure sensation of it.
I heard Dex’s deep groan and gasp, too, and knew that he’d come. Thinking of all that juice squirting over his hot, hard abs made another twinge of pleasure reverberate though my sweaty body.
“Are you okay?” I asked after a moment.
“Yeah. You?” He was still panting.
“That was…I’ve never done that before.”
“Never gotten yourself off?”
“No. I mean, yes, but not…over the phone.”
“Me neither.”
I brushed a sweaty tendril of hair off my forehead and sat up.
“Really?” It gave more sort of a perverse thrill to know that he wasn’t burning up the lines every night of the week talking dirty to a different girl. It made me feel a little less like a groupie.
“Nope. Never.”
“Huh.”
“I think I’m going to need another shower. I’m a sticky mess again, thanks to you.”
Yum. “You stared it,” I said playfully.
“Yeah. I did.” He didn’t sound the least bit sorry. I wasn’t either. “But that’s not why I called.”
I swung my legs to the side of the bed and turned on the light. “Why did you call?”
There was a long pause. “I just wanted to talk to you.” Another pause. “You left pretty suddenly the other night. I thought we were going to grab some dinner.”
“Well, I…remembered something I had to do,” I said. It sounded like a lie, even to my ears.
“Okay,” he said after a minute. “Fair enough.”
I cleared my throat. “I’m glad you called, too.”
“You are?” The smile was back in his voice.
“Yeah. I left my tape in your dressing room, and I kind of need it back.”
“Oh.” Was that disappointment?
“There’s this contest I want to enter and that was my last copy.”
I heard him take a drink. “Did you write those songs on the tape?”
“Yes.” I fidgeted. It was hard sharing your stuff with someone whose opinion you cared about. “Mostly.”
“They’re good, Sydney. Really good.”
My chest fluttered at his praise. My cheeks burned and I’m sure I was blushing. “Thank you.”
“Tell you what. I’ll give you back your tape if you’ll have dinner with me at my house on Saturday night.”
A little thrill of anticipation shot through me. “At your house?”
“Yeah.” He paused and I could tell he was uncomfortable. “Sometimes it’s hard to go out. Especially if you really want to talk to the person you’re eating with. Get to know them better.”
I swallowed. This was dangerous territory and I was slipping fast. “What if I say no to dinner?”
“I’ll still give you the tape.” He paused. “But I’d really like to see you again, Sydney. Show you my place.”
“Okay,” I said before I could overthink things. “What time do you want me there?”
“Eight.” I heard Dex’s smile again. “And wear that black g-string.”
Chapter Five
Beyond the major interstates and the city blocks surrounding my apartment, I was hopelessly lost when it came to navigating Nashville. So many freeways crisscrossed, ran on top of each other and had signage that made no earthly sense that it usually rendered Internet-produced directions useless. I had literally thrown them out the window on a couple of frustrating occasions. So after spending way too much time picking out a little black dress, doing my hair and applying makeup, I left my apartment plenty early for the dinner date at Dex’s house.
Dex lived south of Nashville in an area where many wealthy music industry people lived, and passing all the mansions and gated communities and fancy shopping malls with store names I only saw on Sex and the City, I was feeling completely nervous and totally out of my element.
What the hell was I doing? A hookup – okay, two – and a little phone sex was one thing. Going to his house for dinner, that was something else. A moment of weakness after an amazing phone-sex orgasm, maybe. Sure, I needed that demo tape back, but if I was honest with myself, I wanted to see him, too. Sex with him was becoming like a drug. The more I had, the more I wanted, even though I knew it was a very bad idea. I wasn’t a fuck-friend kind of girl and that was the only place I could see this thing going.
Google directions didn’t fail me for once and I headed west out of Brentwood. I passed multi-million-dollar gated homes, beautiful mansions set high on hilltops, peeking through trees, and long, winding driveways with intricate landscaping that probably cost more in upkeep than I made in a year.
I eventually found myself on a tiny two-lane highway. On one side of the road, trees and thick forest crowded the asphalt. On the other were open green fields that rolled to the horizon, just as I remembered from back home. Black cows dotted the span of green and the sun dipped low in the sky, casting a golden glow over everything.
No wonder Dex liked it out here. It was quiet and open and you felt like you could breathe. I began to relax a little. I kept driving, passing farmhouses and barns and more livestock and was just beginning to think Google had led me astray again when I came to a long, wrought-iron fence. I slowed down. I had to be getting close.
When I got to the gate, I saw the street number on a small black plaque and my heart did a quick flip-flop. I was here.
There was an intercom box but the gate was open, so I drove slowly down the winding gravel driveway,
squinting against the gathering darkness to see his property.
The driveway angled up and as I climbed the small hill, the trees got thicker and thicker until I felt like I was Little Red Riding Hood going to meet a wolf deep in an enchanted forest. It got darker, the trees blocking out what was left of the sunlight. I leaned forward in my seat, wondering if there really was a house back here. Then I rounded the final curve and the house came into view.
I stopped the car.
Damn. Country music sure paid well.
Constructed of wood, stone and glass, Dex’s house was like log cabin castle. It was two stories high, with sort of an octagonal tower in the middle and two wings jutting out at forty-five-degree angles on each side. Light blazed from walls made almost entirely from glass in the left side, while the right side, which I guessed was probably bedrooms, was dark.
I pulled through the circular drive to the front of the house, not really knowing where to park. Flipping the visor down to check my hair, I took a deep breath and told myself again that this was just dinner. No biggie. I grabbed my purse off the passenger seat but before I could reach for the handle, the driver’s side door opened and there stood Dex, smiling down at me.
“You’re here.”
He said it as if he wasn’t sure I’d show. Hell, even I wasn’t sure I’d have the nerve.
“Yeah. Only about three U-turns this trip.”
He took my hand and helped me out of the car. “I should have offered to pick you up.”
“No, it’s fine,” I said thinking of my shabby little apartment. “I made it.” I pulled my skirt down a little and tucked a tendril of hair behind my ear.
“You look beautiful.”
I should. I’d spent way more than I could afford on a new outfit. It was no designer gown, but the shortish skirt and V-neck top set off my blond hair and hugged my trim figure. Okay, so I’d sexed it up a little. The band boys would be proud.
“Thanks. So do you.”
Dex wore black pants and a light blue button-down shirt, open at the collar. He wasn’t wearing the hat, but a pair of shiny black boots were on his feet. His hair was a little damp at the ends and he smelled like he’d just showered. He’d shaved and there was no trace of that shadow beard he’d practically trademarked. He looked younger and almost innocent.
Nashville Heat Page 6