“Even royals music-mooch off their friends,” Georgie quipped, stroking her fingers over the piano keys.
“Quite. I think she’s needling her brother, one of her favorite pastimes. I’m not even supposed to be here. I was supposed to leave town early this morning, but I stayed when Pierre told me that Wulfram was eloping today. I wouldn’t miss that for the world. I have lost a hundred Euros on him because he married before Harry, and I had to see this with my own eyes.”
“Yeah, I know him from somewhere else, and I’m shocked, too. I didn’t think he was the type to ever get married.” Georgie couldn’t imagine what Rae had done to trap him, but she bet it was kinky.
“I thought he was a kindred spirit, but oh, how the mighty have fallen.”
“So you don’t plan to get married either?” Georgie asked, and she felt her smile widen on her face.
“Music is a bitch mistress, Georgiana. I don’t think she’ll share me with anyone else.”
“Are you a professional musician, then?”
“Not to speak of,” Alex said. “And you? Are you married, and am I thus another victim of foot-in-mouth disease? I didn’t see any rings.”
“Oh, Hell, no,” Georgie said. “Marriage is the last thing on my mind. I’ve got far too much to do, and my life is already a mess without a husband or a relationship of any kind. I’m already working on my law school applications, and I’ve got some pretty serious other responsibilities.”
Alex grinned at her from across the piano. “Good. It’s nice to not feel like a freak. With all the weddings going on, one sometimes feels an odd pressure.”
“Oh, my God, yes. I hate that. With each one of my friends who falls to the mighty institution of matrimony, I feel like everyone’s staring at me, trying to figure out when I’m getting married or if I’m a freak who won’t.”
“That’s it exactly,” Alex said. “We should pal around at these things, when we see each other, to fend off the matchmakers.”
“Deal.” Not that they would probably ever cross paths again. Georgie’s fingertips rested on the keyboard, and her fingers felt heavy, wanting to press the keys and make music. “What do you want me to play?”
“I didn’t bring any sheet music with me,” Alex confessed. “My guitar is in my room. I could play, but that would not satisfy Her Imperious Majesty. You know that she will not relent until she hears you play, and it will be today.”
Flicka had convinced their piano coach at Tanglewood to let her change the concert program at the last minute because she was bored with Chopin and wanted to play something modern, Abiya by James Erber, and they had set up a specially tuned piano just for her piece.
Georgie said, “Yeah, I can see how that will happen.”
“We could establish just a few chords as an introduction, and I can sing a cappella.”
“I can play by ear,” Georgie said. “If you sing something for me, I can fake it.”
He scrutinized her again, his dark eyes evaluating everything about her, from her expression right through to her brain. “You can do that?”
“It’s not that hard, especially for popular music. It’s not like it’s complex or anything.”
“Right. I have a song, something I was fooling around with. You want to hear it?”
“Okay. Refrain first.”
Alex drew a deep breath, glanced at her, and sang, “Because while I live, Because while I breathe, Because while my heart beats in my body, I will love you like we live in Alwaysland.”
He still sounded a little hoarse, like his voice had seen rough use lately, but the dark timbre had a masculine sound, and when he reached for the higher notes, his voice took on a clear, open tone, all the hoarseness gone.
Every note he sang was dead-center on key. Listening to his voice was like listening to a perfectly tuned piano or a ringing trumpet.
Georgie managed to keep her mouth from hanging open and analyzed the song instead of gawking at his voice.
The song had a nice melody line, and the harmonies were obvious.
When he was done, she asked, “What key do you want it in?”
“G is fine.” Alex leaned on the top of the piano, waiting.
“How about this?” She played a harmony line back to him, just simple accompaniment with some flourishes between the lyrics to layer in some sound.
His glance at her over the piano was shocked. “That’s entirely different than how I wrote it, but it’s interesting.”
“If you don’t like that one,” Georgie felt the need to show off, a stupid, stupid need, “I could play it like Chopin wrote it.” She clanged dramatic harmonics on the piano and ran the arpeggios hard and fast, syncopating some of the notes to increase the tension.
Alex laughed the full, ringing laugh of a singer with an over-developed larynx. The peals echoed off the marble floors and thick plaster moldings around the white ceiling.
“Or like Rachmaninoff.” Georgie turned everything down and played a sumptuous, romantic melody, filling the notes behind where his voice would be with floating harmonies.
Georgie watched his lips part. An impulse to grab him and kiss those luscious lips roared through her, and she lifted her hands from the ivory piano keys.
Alex said, “That’s gorgeous. Should I know who you are?”
She pulled her hands off the keyboard. The silence filled the air around them like thick smoke, like she couldn’t see through it to look at him. “No. I’m nobody.”
“You’re a professional musician, stage fright notwithstanding.”
“Nope. I’m a pre-law undergrad at Southwestern State.”
“Bullshit.” Alex stared at her, looking hard at her. She felt like he saw entirely through her when he did that. “If you’re not a professional classical musician, someone has profoundly missed your talents. You should have been auditioning for soloist roles in symphonies for years.”
Georgie folded her fingers in her lap. “Nope. I’m going to be a lawyer. Pianists do not make the fat stacks.”
“How old were you when you started playing?”
“Four.”
His dark eyes had turned very intense as he watched her, like he was noting every little finger twitch and flicker of her gaze. He asked, “Your parents, were they very strict about practicing?”
“Oh, yes. Two hours a day or else I couldn’t watch TV.”
“Two hours? And just television?”
“Once I was ten or eleven I practiced for four or more hours a day by myself.”
“But the way you played that—” He gestured to her hands on the keyboard.
“Was nothing,” she finished for him. “Sing the verses, so I can figure out how to accompany that part of your song.”
“Do it like Rachmaninoff. That was amazing.”
Georgie nodded. At least he liked Rachmaninoff.
“I’ll do my best,” she said, but even she could hear that her voice had started shaking again.
“Just keep your eyes on me.”
Georgie looked up into his warm brown eyes, exotically long with long, rich lashes. They practically glowed with dark fire.
Alex said, “You know what I’ll be thinking about.”
Georgie’s First Performance
Georgie
Georgie sat at the piano in the corner of the wide room, her skin prickling from everyone staring at her.
Alex stood beside the piano, but where he should have been looking out at the audience clustered around their dining tables, he looked straight at her, his dark eyes blazing.
The music flowed through her head, and her hands drew it out of the piano.
But all she saw was Alex watching her, singing to her, telling her that he would love her like they lived in Alwaysland.
His eyes, his voice. Georgie was fascinated down to her core. Even though he stood across the piano from her, she could feel his hands on her waist holding her against his body, and on her leg, his fingers spread and almost sliding her dress up.
&
nbsp; Rae and Wulfram von Hannover watched from the head table while Lizzy held up her phone and the other wedding guests watched him, but Alex sang to her.
Camera flashes lit Alex from the side and blotted out her vision for a moment, but his voice never faltered. Georgie held on. The padded piano bench felt firm under her thighs, and Georgie leaned forward to depress the pedals while her strong, limber hands danced over the keys, leaping between octaves and pouncing on the light notes.
In a few moments, the song was over, and Alex was holding his hand out to her. She reached over the piano, and her fingers found his. Alex led her around the piano, and dear God, people clapped.
Georgie kept her expression composed, a chilly New Englander who was unmoved by such emotional expression, but Alex’s slow smile and the fire in his eyes made her smile. The room wavered around them, almost ceasing to exist, as she stared into his eyes.
Charisma was not a strong enough word to describe how he endlessly fascinated her when he sang.
Alex led her back over to Flicka, and they sat at the round table crowded with china and crystal.
The nobles and royals congratulated her and Alex, though their comments seemed just a little snarky and condescending to him, but his easy smile remained amused as he took it in.
Flicka’s husband Pierre held Georgie’s fingers just a beat too long while congratulating her, and she plucked her hand out of his while thanking him. Nobody else seemed to notice the creeper vibes.
Georgie downed two tall glasses of champagne, trying to stop the shakes, and then she was afraid she was going to belch like an elephant.
Alex lounged in his seat beside her, drinking champagne, and they did indeed have a few moments to talk about Wolfgang Rihm, both of them expounding their theories and having lots of examples to back themselves up, and then laughing because Wolfgang Rihm had composed over five hundred pieces and they could support any crazy theory they wanted.
Alex’s eyes glittered with good humor, intelligence, and heat the whole time they talked. That gorgeous man riveted his full attention on her. He had intelligent ripostes for what he should but conceded other points gracefully.
He reached over and toyed with her finger, a subtle approach.
Georgie rubbed her thumb over his fingertips, which were rough and deeply callused on the ends, and his nails were trimmed back short. He played some sort of string instrument, and he played it a lot.
As she rubbed his fingertips, he stopped speaking for a minute as if he had lost his train of thought, then held her hand more firmly in his.
Georgie was having a hard time not leaping into his lap and necking with him. They both drank flutes of champagne as if to drown inappropriate urges.
A DJ wound up some good music, so she danced with Flicka, Rae, and Lizzy, still amazed that no one was laughing and pointing at her.
As Georgie wove on her feet and through the crowd back to the table, she felt a tug on her elbow. When she started to turn, Alex pulled her away from the crowd. She grabbed her purse hanging off the back of her chair as she trotted after him because even though she was tipsy, she still kept track of her passport and phone.
She tightened her hand around his, and he led her out into the corridor, the blond ends of his long hair fluttering around his shoulders as he strode ahead of her.
Once out the huge doors near the elevators, Alex whirled, shoved her up against the wall behind a plant, and kissed her hard, his tongue forcing her mouth open and his hands first on her arms, then behind her neck and around her waist. Georgie slid her arms around his neck and curved her body to his.
He broke away, his breathing ragged. “You were magnificent. I know how hard performing was for you, and I waited as long as I could stand so as not to scandalize Flicka and company. God, I want to touch you,” he growled near her ear, his lips on her neck. “I want to fuck you until you scream. Your room or mine?”
“Yours,” Georgie gasped as his hand cupped her breast through the thin silk of the dress. Lizzy might not think to check for their hair-scrunchie-around-the-doorknob signal in Paris.
“Bold. I like that.” Alex kissed her again, his hand almost sliding up into her hair, but he stepped away and led her to the elevator.
#GetARoom
Georgie
In the elevator, Georgie stood against the back wall while Alex slid a keycard into a slot above the buttons, backed away from her, and stared at the flickering floor display the whole time, which just about drove her insane until she saw the black dome embedded in the ceiling.
Okay, Georgie didn’t want to end up immortalized as a GIF entitled #GetARoom, either. She twirled her purse dangling from her wrist to pass the long, drawn-out, agonizing seconds while the elevator ascended, the increased velocity dragging at her feet.
Far up in the hotel, the elevator doors parted, and Alex seized her hand again and tugged her out of the elevator. Three doors led off the short hallway, and Georgie realized they were up in the suites.
Alex said, “It’s small. The hotel was sold out. Flicka and her wedding party booked the better suites months ago, so I was only able to get a deluxe.”
Georgie’s heart jumped in her chest, and her hands felt empty because she wasn’t touching him. “Just get us in there.”
His grin bore a touch of desperation as he flung open the door and pulled her inside after him.
Georgie caught a glimpse of a blue and white living room and a dining room with a table for six, and the scent of the white rose bundles filled the rooms as Alex pulled her through the suite. In the bedroom, golden silk draped the bed, and a breeze fluttered the white curtains over the window that was open to a view over the skyline of Paris. She tossed her purse on a nightstand.
Alex grabbed her arms, whirling her around, and he pushed her against the closed door and kissed her. The scent of sweet champagne flooded her mouth, and she breathed deeply. His forearms were braced against the door around her head, almost caging her as he bent to her. Georgie wound her arms around his neck, her fingers sliding into his long hair at the back of his neck. Alex groaned against her lips and reared back, then dipped his head to run his teeth over her neck. He shrugged his suit coat off behind himself, the dark blue fabric falling on the carpeting
She dropped her hand, caressing his side through his shirt. Bulges of muscle rippled under her fingers. Even while his hot mouth blew champagne-scented breath on her neck, Georgie explored his body with her hands. She grabbed fistfuls of his shirt, pulling the fine cloth out of his waistband, and she ducked her hand under his shirt and soft undershirt beneath.
Ridges of muscle met her palm. He panted against her shoulder as she ran her palms and fingers into the furrows between his abdominals and up to the lean bulges of his pecs.
His hands smoothed over her hips, reaching for the zipper down her backside.
This felt tawdry, a quick fuck at a wedding with the guy she had performed a song with, and that was fantastic. Long-term relationships and even repeat sex weren’t on her agenda. Alex probably lived in Europe, and if they ever ran into each other again, they could be amicable and polite, and he would be just another guy that she used to fuck.
Perfect.
She slid her arms around his waist and down, stroking her hands over his tight ass. He gasped against her neck, then he found the zipper down her butt, unzipped it, and had unhooked the clasps that held the neckband up. The black silk slithered down her body and fell to her feet.
She was wearing only a thong under it because her boobs were small and her legs were tanned, plus she hadn’t wanted panty lines, and Alex’s fingers slipped over her bare skin, feeling her skin and flesh. “You’re strong,” he whispered.
“You bet.” Georgie was sliding the buttons of his shirt through the tiny buttonholes while his hands roamed her body, kneading her flesh. She struggled to reach the button under his tie. “Just so you know,” she panted, “I’m on the pill, but I always use one, but I don’t have any in my purse.”
Alex wrenched his tie to the side, loosening it, and he dragged his shirts and tie over his head and threw it all aside. From under his shirt, the scent of his green, woodsy cologne and masculine musk—like he was a forest beast—puffed into the air, and she leaned toward him to breathe him in. A fine down of manly chest hair brushed her cheek, pale brown silk threads the color of his hair above the bleached ends.
Blue and green feathery tattoos crept over his shoulders and down the backs of his arms and covered his back in watercolor shades like the sea.
Georgie only glimpsed what she really wanted to spend some time looking at—his broad shoulders, long, lean body, and abdominals like a brick wall—before he was on her again, lifting her against his strong chest and behind her knees and carrying her to the bed. Georgie brushed his hair back behind his shoulder and kissed his skin, and his thick pecs rose and fell beside her.
He laid her on the bed and stripped her panties off, and his hungry gaze lingered on her before she whispered, “Your pants, take them off.”
Alex pushed his pants off, taking his shoes and socks with them, and he clambered onto the bed beside her. Again, he moved so fast that she only caught a glimpse of his thick cock, rosy on top and thick down the stalk, nested in brown fuzz at the base. He grabbed at the lid of his suitcase and threw a long ribbon of condoms on the bed beside her.
Oh, she liked ambition like that.
He was on her again, and Georgie clutched him around his neck. Under her hands, the skin on his back was rough, like furrows ran across it. Must be his tattoos.
His ravenous kiss and clutching hands stoked her passion, and within minutes, she was keening for him, desperate. She pushed at his hard, lean body, trying to shove him between her legs, but he mouthed her breasts, drawing them up with his hot mouth, as her body hummed with desire. She whispered, “Please.”
He picked his head up, and his grin may have been blurred with passion, but he licked three fingers and reached down between her legs, still watching her eyes.
[Billionaires in Disguise 01.0] Every Breath You Take Page 9