“I called around instead. What did you expect?”
“I told the guy who took me home to let you know I was ill.”
He could believe that now he saw her. It didn’t affect his decision to come here tonight. “Migraine sufferers can usually feel an attack coming on.”
“There are sudden attacks.”
“How long have you been getting them?”
She turned around and let him see her. The lights in this compact but nicely furnished apartment were bright and he smelled fresh food. Pizza, maybe. A tub of ice cream stood on the counter of the kitchenette.
People with migraines didn’t eat and that ice cream had condensation beading on the outside.
She’d washed off her makeup but her eyes were clear, not red-rimmed or squinty in the light. Her hands didn’t shake. He tried to recall the other symptoms of migraine but he knew it was a complex illness, not easily defined. She seemed to have none of them.
“You don’t have a migraine, do you?”
She shook her head.
Dull anger swept through him, rising to tighten his throat, send his temples throbbing. “Why, then?”
She shrugged. “I wasn’t in the mood.”
He opened his mouth to reply and paused. “What are you talking about? You had to have bought those tickets six months ago when they first came out, because they were sold out in an hour. That means you really wanted to see us. They’re not cheap either. They paid for all this.”
He spread his arms, displaying the elaborate embroidery on his deep-blue kimono. The diamonds in his ears winked as they caught the light. Studs right up one ear and a single stud in the other.
“How the fuck do you perform dressed like a Samurai warrior at court?”
He shook his head. “Clever adaptation. I’ll show you.” The clothes stifled him. He pulled at the fastenings, tearing off the outer garment before tossing it across the nearest chair.
She’d been sitting there with an old movie on the small TV. It still played, the actors mouthing their words. She must have muted it to answer the door or she was watching in silence. “What happened, Cyn?”
“I told you. I didn’t feel like it.” She stuck out her bottom lip. He ached to bite it and not just from a desire to punish her. Full and lush. She saw him looking and sucked it in. That only made his need worse. His desire fed his anger and a growing bafflement.
“Tell, me, Cyn. I’m not leaving until you do. Why did you run away? What went wrong?”
“Can’t you just forget it?” She picked up a remote from the table and switched off the set. The lack of distracting movement intensified the burning atmosphere between them, concentrated it. She tossed the device away, heedless of the damage she might do to it. It fell with a startling clatter.
Riku’s ears still buzzed from the gig. Modern technology minimized the potential damage to musicians’ ears these days. But he pushed everything he did to the edge and some of the sounds he’d made tonight could have woken the dead. He’d done it for her, to show her what he could do. And she hadn’t been there to witness it.
Show-offs never prospered. In this instance, in any case. “No, I can’t, not this time. Cyn. Do you run away all the time?” Did she fear intimacy, was that it?
“What?” She frowned, her eyes flashing danger at him.
He ignored the warning. “Here, now. The truth, Cyn. Do you? Why did you do it tonight?”
“My business. One fuck doesn’t make you entitled, Riku.”
“Sure it does. If it didn’t, our lovemaking eight years ago does. You walked away tonight.” He paused and then decided he’d tell her. “I played for you.”
She gestured at the screen. “I saw the report on the news. Not that I was watching for it of course. I wanted to see the movie and I got you. They said you performed brilliantly.”
“I did.” He knew when he played well. “So did the others.” He also remembered when to shut his mouth. If he gave her enough rope she might finally tell him why she left him eight and a half years ago. They’d start with tonight and he’d keep her on topic even if it killed him.
“Then you didn’t play for me. You did it for you.”
Ah, fuck, yes, she’d know that. A musician herself, she’d understand the rush, the glory of hitting a high note and sustaining it, keeping the level of performance so elevated it could give a hit better than any drug. “You know it. But I felt you out there.”
“Then we’re not as linked as you might have imagined.” She crossed the room, picked up a teakettle. “Do you want a hot drink?”
“No.” He’d drunk enough water to sink the Titanic. He always did onstage, otherwise he’d be the one getting the migraine. The costumes, the makeup and the intensity often did that to him. “Put it down and talk to me. You’re running away again, aren’t you?”
She replaced it carefully, making only a slight noise when it struck the hotplate. “No.” She turned, facing him straight-on. No more distractions. Only the counter stood between them but he didn’t try to breach it. Enough that she’d stopped picking things up and putting them down again. “Tonight I felt like an extra wheel. Unwanted and unneeded.”
Shock sliced through him, scattering the intensity of his anger. “What are you talking about? Who treated you that way?”
“Everybody. They closed ranks. They were all perfectly nice.” She exaggerated her English accent, so it came out ‘naice’. He’d heard Brits do that when jerking someone around. Just the tiny emphasis would do it.
He hated it, hated the superciliousness. Didn’t like it in her either and it struck a false note now. He let her speak, didn’t try to interrupt her, although it killed him to keep his trap shut. Now he’d forced open the floodgates he had so much to say.
“I didn’t belong there. I saw no other strangers. You obviously keep the last hours before a gig very tight and I shouldn’t have been there. You shouldn’t have brought us.”
Now he’d speak. “I’ve never done it before. Not in those circumstances, but you’re different.”
“Someone told me you liked your women in pairs.” There, she dodged his implication that she was special.
“Who?” he rapped out. “Tell me who.”
“No. They didn’t know they were saying anything wrong.”
“More than one person?” Oh, shit, oh, fuck. Yes, he preferred his women in pairs but not for the reason she was thinking. Well, he admitted to himself. Not entirely because of that. Yes, two was fun but not essential. He could make do with one, especially when it was Cyn.
“No, not more than one. I didn’t want to reveal the sex of the person who said it. It’s not important. They took it as normal.”
“You don’t like the idea?”
She glanced down then back at him, her eyes hard. “No. Not when it’s you.”
Honesty. At last, raw and unapologetic. Thank fuck. “Would you mind if it were anyone else having two women? Another member of the band?”
She shook her head, touched the worn surface of the counter, apparently grounding herself. “Probably not. At least, not if they’d cleared it with me beforehand. I was always too—too everything with you, Riku. Yes, it scared me. Of course it did. At twenty-one you’re supposed to play the field.”
“There are rules?” He watched her, waited. She might have rules. He didn’t. “I’ve always taken things for what they are.”
“You’re supposed to have a passionate, often unrequited crush at fourteen, probably on a teacher. Then another and then you learn it’s not the one and only time. Then lots of boyfriends, lots of kissing and fondling. Learning. After that, the hymen goes. And then more but education should come first until you’re nearly thirty.”
“Whose laws are those?”
“Mine.”
He might have known. “And you’re the person who makes them are you? I always preferred to break them.”
She grimaced, a cute tweak of her nose. “I know.” She folded her arms across her chest, a
gesture that plumped up her breasts beautifully. “I made my own laws. When I was sixteen. I’d had the crushes, so I decided to go along with the plan. Everything worked until I was eighteen and I met you. Then everything went to shit.”
“Thanks.” His turn to grimace.
“I didn’t mean it that way.” A smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. “You look like one of those cute Japanese masks.”
He knew. “It’s not supposed to be cute.”
“You decided to go elaborate after all.”
“I did. I couldn’t resist the kimono and you can’t wear one of those onstage without makeup. Besides, the eagle’s flaking.” He turned his head away so she could see. He’d lost the tips of his wings. “Good experiment but not entirely successful. It’s done its job. For some reason I was feeling great.”
She grunted. “Huh. That didn’t last.”
“It lasted right ’til I got offstage and discovered you’d gone home.”
“I sent my apologies.”
So defensive. He had her on the ropes, so to speak. The notion gave him ideas he shouldn’t be experiencing. Not part way through an argument. Although with her in this state maybe more pressure would help her tell him more. Changing his angle of approach might work.
He leaned toward her, put his weight on his forward foot. She tilted her body back. Ha. “Not enough, Cyn. Not nearly enough. Now I know you didn’t have the hint of a migraine. I want to work through this. First, I’ll tell the band exactly who and what you are. And what you mean to me.”
He’d deliberately left the comment open but she didn’t take his lead and ask him what she meant to him. Just as well, because he didn’t want to define their relationship. Not yet, for he wasn’t sure himself. He badly wanted to find out though. Since her, no other woman had meant as much, which was weird to say the least because he’d met and fucked some awesome females. They’d fucked him. He couldn’t remember what one of them had looked like now. Not when he was in the same room as she. The woman of mystery.
Not for much longer. He’d have answers this time.
She swallowed. “I can’t go back.”
“You can. Whatever else you are to me, Cyn, you’re my friend and you’re part of my life. I’m not letting you leave unfinished business again.”
That sent her hands to her hips and she pushed her chin forward. “I get no say?”
“Sure you do. Tell me to fuck off and consider me gone.” He paused. “For a while, until I work out another way to get to you.”
“Stalking?”
He laughed, short and sharp. “Me? C’mon, Cyn, you know me better.”
She had to. He didn’t care about anything but the music and he could do that in a place in the middle of nowhere. Except he’d found the people who worked with him and each other to make something even better. He’d miss that but he didn’t have to worry about money. Never had. He came from wealthy parents, had the wherewithal to do what he wanted, a factor he’d always been painfully aware of. Especially when meeting Zazz, who slept in squats because he had to, not out of a need for life experience or a grudge against his folks.
True, Zazz’s father had been one of the most amazing musicians the jazz world had ever known but he’d shot most of his money and reputation up his arm or tossed it down his throat before Zazz had grown out of short pants. Not that Riku could imagine the edgy Zazz wearing short pants. Except on stage sometimes for effect.
“Besides, what’s with the amateur shrink? I don’t do that!”
“Isn’t that what you did tonight?” He kept his voice quiet, carefully controlled. “You didn’t face them.”
She sounded as hushed as he did but he heard the tremor when she spoke. Just a single quiver but it was enough. “I didn’t feel like music.”
He breached the divide, taking the steps that brought him around the counter and to her. He reached for her, settled his hands on her upper arms. A ripple eased through him, a release of some of his tension. If she did this when he merely touched her then what more could she do? He already understood and he wanted it. More than he cared to admit. “I’m sorry. But you should have told me.”
“A couple of hours before you were due onstage? How could I do that?”
He understood but only because she’d shared some of his past. “Did you feel like that about performing, too?”
“Always.” Auditions, performances, most of their fellow students, however talented felt that way. Nervous stage fright. They’d said they had to experience tension to perform.
“I don’t. I’m excited. Know when I’m nervous? When I’m presenting a new piece to the band. In the old days, it was auditions. But not when I perform. Then I’m fine. Want to show people what I can do.”
She smiled. “You showed them tonight.”
He grunted. “Yeah. So they say. I only wanted to show you. Which was stupid.”
“Why?”
She wasn’t shying away from him now. She unclasped her arms and reached for him, resting her hands on his hips. It was all he needed to draw her close. He bent his head then drew away again. “I can’t kiss you. We’ll both end up looking like clowns but I really want to.”
“I don’t care but I have a shower. It’s small but we can fit in there.”
“Is that an invitation?” He hardly dared breathe. He knew he’d nearly lost her tonight. Her bathetic no-show reminded him too strongly of what she’d done before and he didn’t want it to happen twice. Ever. If they parted he wanted them to part with full understanding of why and how. No lingering mysteries this time.
Fully aware she’d use sex to avoid a deeper connection, he couldn’t resist her and she knew it. But he wouldn’t forget his objective, not this time.
She sighed, a sound of consent. “I owe you that, at least.”
“You owe me nothing, Cyn. I strolled back into your life this afternoon half expecting you to walk into my arms.”
“Which I did.”
“Which you did. But I walked into yours too. It’s always that way between us. Nobody gives in to the other, unless they want to.”
She seemed to know what he meant. They’d understood each other, however abstruse the other person got. “Yes. I’m tired, Riku. I’m sorry I didn’t stay but I didn’t want to. If I went to the gig, stood in the audience, everything would sour. What I felt in that room tainted the way I felt, brought me right down. I do love your music and I didn’t want it taken away from me. I’d like to put on a Murder City Ravens album and enjoy it like I always have.”
“You have? You can tell me how much in the shower.” He drew out his phone and the card. “I need to call my driver. Tell him to go back to the hotel. I’m hoping we’ll be a while and then if you want to kick me out I’ll get a cab.”
“I’ve got a double bed.”
He whistled. “A spacious apartment you have here.”
“For Queens it’s not so bad. But I don’t have a long lease. I can move.”
An idea percolated through his mind but if he wanted her to listen to him he’d need to take care. Otherwise she’d ask him to leave. Enough. He had a glimmer of understanding why she’d left, tonight, and it wasn’t just being mistaken for a groupie.
Nobody had been unkind. Chick had sat with them. Cyn, who knew something of his world, had noticed the closeness, the way musicians excluded others before a performance. And she wasn’t part of it.
She’d never related to him what they’d told her in her final audition. He’d always taken it for granted and never pried. But she hadn’t joined him. Just dumped him with that email and letter. The letter he still had. Maybe he’d find some clues there. Because he knew he wouldn’t get any more information from her tonight.
Chapter Five
As she’d promised, her shower wasn’t the most spacious. She didn’t have a tub, so the cubicle took the space a bath must have once occupied in the miniscule bathroom. He stripped, throwing his clothes over the laundry basket. When she laughed he glanced at her
in inquiry.
“You have a purple embroidered kimono, a yellow under-kimono and a pair of orange pants and a green shirt—how are you getting home tomorrow? On the subway?”
“Cab.” He grinned. “I’m heading home, not to the hotel. Right now I’m going nowhere, except in here with you.”
She put her hand on his, where it rested on the drawstring waistband of his silk, wide-legged pants. While he hadn’t gone to the elaborate lengths of the original samurai, his outfit was still jaw-dropping. “Let me.”
He let her with absolute pleasure. She pulled the bow undone and his remaining garment slithered down his legs. He’d worn plain black pumps, since what was on his feet wouldn’t show much. Sneakers seemed a bit wrong for this magnificence, so it was a matter of seconds for him to slip them off and help her with her robe.
Thick and fluffy though it was, she didn’t wear anything underneath it and it instantly became the sexiest outfit he’d seen for some time. Since that afternoon as a matter of fact. When he told her she only laughed, as if she didn’t believe him, but he did. Every word.
He hustled her to the shower, pushed her under and turned the lever to one side. The shower had an old-fashioned turning lever to switch it on and—his thought processes came to a violent halt. He yelped.
“I did try to tell you but you were too quick. It takes the water a good five minutes to warm up.”
Even the icy blast didn’t do a lot to quiet his erection, although he supposed it was a good thing. “Do you have condoms? Please tell me you have condoms.” He had some but in his inner kimono pocket too far away, the other side of the eight-foot expanse that formed her bathroom. He needed them now.
She slid open a small, mirrored cabinet, revealing a box. He grabbed it, relieved to find it nearly full and took out an orange wrapped packet. “I need you, Cyn.” His hand shook with the cold but the water had grown lukewarm, on its way, he sincerely prayed, to hot.
“No, you don’t. You want me. That’s different.”
Rivulets of red makeup poured down his chest as he turned his attention to his cock, concentrating on getting the protection on fast. The lip paint and the bright red he’d used to put blush on his cheeks in the traditional Japanese fashion were dissolving under the stream.
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