“I would’ve used those from the bathroom floor, but you’ve already written something, right?” I ask with a smile.
“Right. I’m going to pick them up in a minute.” He disappears back into his room. “Come on in.”
I follow him and then stop in the middle of the room. “I need only a few sheets.”
Alexis hands me a whole stack of paper anyway. “In case the muse doesn’t just kiss you, but maybe ravages you. Happens to me all the time when I write lyrics, so it’s always good to have more paper on hand.”
“Thanks.” I turn away and return to my own room. I leave the door open so he doesn’t have to knock when he comes to fetch his lyrics. I sit down on the floor, grabbing my iPad and the notebook from the bed, and then I get up again to find a pen. “Jesus, does this world want to drive me crazy today?” I whine when I don’t manage to wrestle up a pen or pencil anywhere.
“Here, take these.” Alexis has appeared in my room, and hands me a pencil case. “I always bring a whole load of pencils.”
"Maybe I should go to a grocery store or something, and get me my own set of everything I might need.”
“I can lend you one of the cars we have here.”
“Thank you, but I think I’m going to ask Ms. Cunnings if I can tag along with her on her next shopping trip. That way, I cannot get lost,” I smirk.
“That’s another option.” He walks over to the desk and picks up his own sheet music. “So, you’re becoming a songwriter now, too?”
“I simply wanted to try what I can do, so I wouldn’t get bored.”
He sits down in the office chair. “What do you have?”
“Just a little string of notes that I need to expand on.”
“Can I hear it anyway?” he asks.
I take a deep breath. “I don’t think I’m good at this, and I’m sure you’d criticize the hell out of me.”
He raises his hands defensively. “I swear all I will do is listen.”
“Alright.” I start to play the few notes. They’re basically just a variation of the normal scale.
“Have you written some words to go with that?”
“No, I wanted to find a melody first.”
“Sometimes, it helps if you have a few lines of text ready before you start with the music. Then you know which notes and chords to play with, to end up with something rounded and harmonious,” he explains without sounding patronizing or schoolmasterly. That is a great plus, since I often don’t do well with authority, and I surely wouldn’t take it too kindly if he behaved like my teacher.
“Okay, but that is going to take some time. I have no experience with this.”
“Do you want to work with some texts you have already written?” he asks, after sitting down on the floor next to me.
I flip the notebook close. “Yeah, I’ve got some thoughts I wrote down in the past. Maybe I can work with those.”
“Can I take a look at them?”
“They are kind of private, Alexis.”
“I’m not going to tell anyone what I’ve read, that’s a promise.”
I shake my head despite his promise. “I don’t want anyone to read my notes and ramblings.”
“Okay, I’m not going to force my help on you, since obviously, you don’t want it at all,” he smirks and gets up from the floor.
“Don’t get me wrong, Alexis. It’s nice of you to offer, but I want see if I can do this on my own.”
“Just let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.”
I look up at him and nod. “Thank you.”
He smiles at me before leaving me alone. Alexis closes the door behind him, which I am grateful for, because I don’t want anyone to hear me when I get desperate and angry with myself. I don’t get aggressive, but I still tend to swear like a sailor.
“If you think you know what love is, teach me. I have never loved, never saw the world with my heart, before you came. When you’re near me, I’m not myself, I’m a completely different person. I’m scared by the way you change me. I’m confused by the way you smile at me …” I sing softly, after I’ve found a speedier string of notes. The song is almost done, at least it feels that way to me. It’s nothing I want to sing or present anywhere in public, simply an experiment to prove to myself that I can do this. All I need is a chorus, and maybe a bridge, but the verses are done. “I’m soothed by your presence, being with you is everything to me now. Your eyes are so warm, full of kindness, and maybe even love? I don’t know, but please teach me what it feels like to love you.” I sigh. “That’s a crap bridge,” I grumble and start over.
The sun is setting when I’m finally done. It’s still only a rough draft that needs more time and tweaking to become a full-blown song, but now I’d love to hear it played on a real piano instead of the app. I jump up and rush down the hallway, knocking eagerly on Alexis’s door.
“Come in!” he calls.
I step into his room, feeling almost euphoric. “I’m done. I have a melody and I have lyrics … Would you come downstairs with me and play it on the piano?” I ask in a rush, almost tripping over my own words.
He lies on the bed and gives me a tired look. “Okay.”
Which reminds me of his burnout syndrome. Most of the time, he seems rather active despite his exhaustion. Maybe that is because he has no obligations right now. “You look tired.”
“I am, but I’m also curious to hear your song. Let’s go downstairs.” He gets up and comes over. “Are you sure it isn’t too intimate to share with me?”
“Right now, I don’t care.” I grin at him before grabbing his hand and pulling him along with me.
“Wow, you’re really eager to do this now.”
“Not at all,” I reply dryly and then giggle. “I’m just so incredibly happy that I did this. That I have a rough draft, even though it still needs finer tuning.”
“But the fine-tuning is the harder part.”
“I don’t care.”
We reach the living room, but he pauses at the door. “Wait a minute, Honor, don't you want to finish it first?”
“I only want you to play the melody for me. I'd do it myself, but I can't play the piano.”
“You're working with this app, right? You probably know everything you need to try it if you managed to write a song with it.”
“Alexis, please,” I whine, before stepping behind him and pushing him slowly in the direction of the large white piano. “Just do this for me and then I’ll get off your back.”
“Alright.” He sits down on the stool and pats the space next to him. “But first, you give it a try.”
“Okay.” I sit down next to him and wait for him to open the keyboard lid. “That looks a little more complicated than the scale on my iPad.”
“You have digital keys on your tablet, virtual ones, but this is analog. Old school, if you will.” He folds down a small sheet music holder. “Did you bring the music?”
I nod and hand the sheets to him.
He puts them in the right order after noticing that I numbered them. “Wow, and here I thought my handwriting was a dreadful scrawl, but yours is worse than a man's.”
I laugh softly. “You don't want to see the initial drafts.”
“Probably not.” He leans forward to read the notes I put on the paper. “Do you want me to play it once for you, and then you give it a go?”
I nod at him. At least that way I can focus completely on the melody one time, instead of paying attention to each individual note and key. “Yeah, that would be great.”
Alexis hits a few keys. “And now try to sing along, Honor.”
I read my own words. “Love has always been a foreign word to me, never knew its meaning, never yearned to feel it, but you have changed all that. Your attention was enough, pulled me into a vortex of unbidden feelings. Your smile made my heart beat a different rhythm,” I sing the first verse.
“It’s really good.” He looks at me with a smile and continues to play. “Go on.”
“Can I offer a suggestion here? You don't have to follow my advice, and I don't want to be a wiseass, don't worry,” he says, reading the words again.
“Okay. What is it?”
“Don't use too many unfinished sentences, that kind of … breaks the flow. It doesn't carry the kind of emotion you try to put into your voice when you sing it.” He points at the bridge. “I would change it to: ‘time spent with you is not the same as time spent alone, I am soothed by your presence and your words full of love have the power to enchant me, like no one else could’. It's longer, but it does have a better flow.” Then he sings his suggestion, and I feel the goosebumps prickle on my skin in response.
“That really is better.”
Alexis smiles at me. “Then go ahead and try it.”
I sing the words he just made up, and I falter briefly when his voice joins mine. That leads us to continue working on the words and the music, rearranging the sentences so they sound simpler and have a softer, more natural flow.
“Now, why don’t you try both playing and singing it at the same time?”
I give him an overwhelmed look. “Can we at least sing it together?”
He nods. “Okay.”
I start to play, but I keep hitting the wrong keys, until Alexis grips my wrist to stop me. “That bad?”
“No,” he says with a smile. “But I want to try something else. Get up.”
I stand up from the stool. Alright, he's going to play it again.
But instead, he positions himself squarely on the stool and pats his leg. “Sit down on my lap; we're going to try a different kind of piano lesson.”
I do what he says, and right away his scent hugs me like an invisible veil. He smells so damn good - like a very masculine cologne, some shower gel or deodorant, and mint.
“Put your hands on top of mine, so you can feel my fingers hitting the keys. Just lightly on top of them,” he says, his lips close to my ear.
His breath tickles me, and I struggle to refrain from shivering with the sensations he draws from me.
Alexis puts his hands on the keys, and I put mine on top of his. “Close your eyes so you can feel it.”
“Can you read the music at all, with me in the way?” I want to know, and I'm bummed that my voice is so small and shaky.
“I'm playing freestyle, just to give you a sense of how it's done.”
“Okay.” I seem to have lost the ability to utter anything beyond that single word.
He starts to play and I close my eyes. It feels as if the music is speaking to me. A very familiar feeling. Alexis's voice is soft, but this isn't my song. It's not any song I recognize. Your eyes, clear as a mountain lake, look straight into my soul. You watch over me, though I don't want you to, but you won't be dissuaded. You're my guardian angel, always by my side … I let the words echo in my head.
His breath keeps brushing my ear. “If anyone dared to take you away from me, that would be my undoing,” he finishes, and shortly afterwards, the piano music fades away, too. “Did you feel it?”
I slowly open my eyes. “I think I did.”
When I try to get up, he stops me. “And now we do it the other way around. You play your song, you sing and I feel.”
I nod slowly.
“I'm going to help you with the keys you have to play.”
“Thank you,” I breathe, looking at the sheet music once again. It's hard to read the words, since Alexis penciled in the changes in his tiny script. The whole thing is nothing short of confusing, but I can copy it again in a more legible fashion later.
“Ready?”
“Ready or not, here goes,” I smirk and put my fingers down on the keys. He guides them with his hands resting on top of mine, and I feel pretty confident until he starts kissing my naked shoulder. “Alexis, you're distracting me.”
“Imagine that this is a video shoot and we're doing a sexy scene,” he murmurs, before the tip of his tongue caresses my skin.
“I've never done a video shoot before,” I reply in a shaky voice. Throwing me off balance like this is not exactly fair play, but I can't deny that I revel in his obvious desire for me.
“Keep playing,” he whispers into my ear, and then he nibbles softly on my earlobe.
I close my eyes and tilt my head back. “Alexis, please, you know we shouldn't be doing this.”
“I also know that I want you as badly as I shouldn't want you at all.” He pulls his hands off mine and caresses my belly, until his right hand disappears into my sweatpants, while his left spreads my legs further apart. “Let yourself go, Honor.” His lips let go of my ear, kissing a trail down my neck and then biting softly into the flesh above my collarbone. His fingers slip in between my labia.
I moan when he touches my clit. “Alexis, please.”
“Please what?” he asks softly. “Do you want me to stop taking care of your little nub?”
I know I would regret it if I stopped him now. I sigh heavily. “No,” I gasp as his massage becomes more insistent.
Alexis breathes feathery kisses against my heated flesh. My nipples react, peak with a tugging sensation. Then he pulls back his hand. “Get up and sit down on the piano.”
After he has closed the lid, I follow his orders. He lifts me up onto the grand piano. Then he pulls off my pants. When I look down at him, I register the huge bulge in his pants. He wants me just as badly as I want him. I’m desperate for his touch. Alexis drops my sweatpants on the floor, then my panties follow. He props up my feet on both sides of him on the stool, before leaning forward. He kisses the insides of my thighs, closer and closer to my center, and then his lips glide up and down my cleft, and the tip of his tongue penetrates it. My arms tremble as I struggle to rein in the moans that want to escape my mouth. “You taste so damn sweet,” he murmurs, pausing for a second in his attentions.
“Don't stop,” I beg softly, which he answers with a small smirk.
“You're going to end up begging me to stop instead.”
“Don't be too sure about that.” My words are drowned in a drawn-out moan, because he puts two fingers inside of me, stretching me.
“Lay back, Honor.”
I obey, but I feel that I am at his mercy now more than ever. Alexis licks my clit again, lets the tip of his tongue nudge it and play with it. I want to grab hold of something and dig in my fingers, the sensation is that intense. I don't know where to put my hands, but then I think of his hair. I run my fingers along his cheeks, finally raking them through his thick strands. When I claw and hold on, he sucks my swollen nub between his lips. The sensation is incredible, too delicious for words. Nothing could describe this and do it justice. His fingers thrust into me, following the rhythm that his mouth dictates. I rotate my pelvis to intensify all of it even more, to rush the impending orgasm. I hear a rustling sound, maybe his pants, but then it is followed by a tearing, so I know he's just opened a condom. His thrusts become more insistent, until I feel the warm waves sweep over me again, for the second time today, spreading out from my pussy, and all through my body. My orgasm is a flood of sensations, and I moan loudly as it wracks me. He doesn't grant me a moment to catch my breath, but instead pulls me down, right onto his hard cock. When he penetrates me, we both moan at the same time. I put my lips on his, sealing our mutual lust in a passionate kiss. I push my tongue into his mouth, and he dictates a rhythm that I happily follow. He lays his hands on my butt, pulls my cheeks apart, which makes his penis feel even larger than before, because he tightens me with this actions.
“God, you're freaking hot, woman,” he growls when I break the kiss for a moment to allow us both to catch our breaths.
“Thank you,” I breathe.
Alexis wraps my hair around his hand, pulls my head back, and kisses my neck. I
continue to move with him, against him, to increase the friction. It is still as wrong as it was this morning, but if it happens anyway, at least I want to enjoy it. Savor it. Maybe he and I can have an affair, if we're both wary of anything more serious.
We continue to whip each other into a mounting frenzy, until he seems to lose patience. He lifts and lowers my body, and penetrates me again and again with each lift. It drives me absolutely crazy, insane with lust. He lets go of my hair, and I wrap my arms around his neck, finding my own rhythm that makes him gasp and moan in return.
And then we both explode, but we drown out the cry with another devouring kiss. When he finally pulls away from me, I put my head on his shoulder. “Oh boy.” My body is covered in a sheen of sweat, which causes each breath of his to hit me with the impact of a chilly breeze.
“Oh woman,” he murmurs and strokes the back of my neck. “I'm sorry if I took you by surprise.”
“I could have stopped you if I really wanted to,” I whisper as I turn my head to plant a kiss on his neck.
“We shouldn't let this happen too often though, or we won’t be able to work together on a professional level.”
I sigh. “You're right.”
“I know.”
“Because you're Batman?”
“Because I'm not stupid,” he smirks. “We should go upstairs.”
I nod in agreement, but Alexis doesn't budge, doesn't let go of me. “It's not gonna happen if you hold on to me like that.”
“But I don’t want to let go of you.”
“Mr. Kingston … Alexis!” Ms. Cunnings cries out in shock.
I lift my gaze and am immensely glad that at least I’m in his lap, because that prevents her from seeing most of my naked body.
“Yes, Ms. Cunnings?”
“Would you please cover up, both of you. The others have arrived,” she urges.
I look at Alexis. “I thought they were coming after the weekend?”
“That’s what I thought.”
“Please try to stall them for a moment, Ms. Cunnings.”
“Alex– oh my god!” Mike cries and then bursts out laughing. “Guys, don’t come into the living room, they’re buck-naked!”
Alexis: In love with a rockstar (The Hamptons Series Book 2) Page 10
