by Hughes, Mary
Something rose in me, the thing that lets me do my job playing solos and leading the wind section. It stood up inside me and said, This is not right. I snapped, “I may be poor, but at least I’m not a snob like you.”
The thin woman in red slapped me.
Fire sheared through me, burning away any awkwardness. I leaped to my feet, snatched up my nearly empty glass of water and threw it in her face.
Barely enough to splash her, but I dropped the glass immediately, covering my O of a mouth with one hand, staring at the water dripping off her nose in silent horror, my cheeks starting to sting. I rarely had a burst of temper. This was why. “I’m sorry—”
“How dare you.” The woman grabbed Dragan’s glass—and threw it full-force in my face. Ice cubes hit me hard enough to leave a mark. Hopefully Dolly could cover it with makeup for the ball.
I throttled my immediate reaction, which was to go all Bruce Lee on her ass, and turned away.
“Don’t you dare ignore me.” She grabbed my wrist yanked me back, sweeping up Dragan’s plate of Portobella mushroom–stuffed pasta in red wine and tomato sauce.
She smashed it into my white sweatshirt.
Red goo slopped down the pristine cloth. “My mom made this!”
“Your mom’s a stupid rube.” She didn’t actually say that. Her words were much coarser, making me wonder who the hick really was.
I drew myself up with dignity. “I’m sorry you feel that way.” You unmannered boor.
I caught sight of Dragan in the doorway, returning from his phone call. Good, because I didn’t know if it was okay to use the fancy napkin to wipe off my shirt, and the sauce was soaking through and making me uncomfortable. I wasn’t terribly worried if the stuff would stain; Mom had a lifetime of experience getting art projects out of clothes.
He saw me and zoomed through the dining room so fast the carpet smoked. “Raquel! What goes on here?”
“Maestro Zajicek,” the thin woman enthused. “We were dealing with this trash for you—”
“You have insulted my protégée?” His gaze roved over me and his expression hardened. “How dare you mistreat her?”
They looked like he’d shoved salt blocks down their throats.
The woman in orange was the first to regain her voice. “But she’s nobody. Look at how she’s dressed. No money, no jewelry—”
“She is a phenomenal flautist, as beautiful inside as out and worth ten of any of you. Are you planning to attend the Grand Vienna Woods Ball? It is the social event of the season.”
I could see by their faces they weren’t sure if this was a change in topic. The thin woman said, “Why, yes, we all are.”
“Good. Unless you apologize and leave immediately, I will report this insult to Eleanor herself.”
With flustered apologies, the women disappeared, almost as fast as he’d appeared.
“Raquel. I am so sorry. They are dirt beneath your feet. Don’t let them upset you.” He brushed my cheek where the ice cubes had hit, his fingers gentle, his dark eyes filled with concern. He snatched up a napkin, wrapped ice in it and applied it to the bruised area as a pricey compress. Then he snapped his fingers at the waiter. “Water.” When the man returned with a pitcher Dragan pressed my hand over the ice-filled napkin and grabbed another, dunked it in the water and used it to wipe my sweatshirt. If that wasn’t enough, when the pristine white silk turned pink he snatched another napkin off a nearby table and repeated the procedure, tossing them onto the table liked used tissues.
Pain and humiliation melted in all his fussing. “It’s okay. I just want to go home.”
“Of course. A hot bath, a glass of wine—”
“Beer,” I said firmly. “But the bath is a good idea.”
He took me directly home. He didn’t try to take me to a motel first or even kiss me on the stoop. I once would’ve thought that was because I’d made a scene. But I’d come to believe he truly was attracted to me, that his scowl and brusqueness was because of his outrage at those women.
The incident reminded me why I wasn’t keen on going to the ball. But strangely, the thing that bothered me most?
No nookie.
Julian must have learned from Tuesday because after Thursday’s rehearsal, my pests…I mean, my friends not only walked me to my car, they followed me home. I was jumpy the whole way, expecting Dragan to leap out of nowhere.
But he didn’t show. By the time I made it home, the only one upset was me.
I mean, I was relieved. Of course I was.
I parked in front of my flat. Emersons waved goodbye as Mr. Hinz drove past my car. I waved back. The limo turned the corner and I reached for my door handle.
A hand clasped my shoulder.
“Yikes!” I jumped, nearly cracking my skull on the roof, and cranked around to see Dragan in the backseat. In the navy v-neck sweater and slacks he’d worn to rehearsal, he was one with the darkness, only his silver lock glowing. I hissed, “What are you doing? What if Julian and Luke had seen you? They’re not too happy with you, you know. Not since you’ve abducted me twice.”
“I didn’t abduct you. You agreed to come with me both Sunday and Tuesday.”
“Well, yes,” I grumbled. “But they didn’t know that.”
“Didn’t you explain?”
“I tried. They didn’t believe me. Why are you here?”
“We didn’t finish our last lesson.”
I flushed, remembering how Tuesday’s dinner had ended. “Sure we did. Napkin in the lap, forks from outside in, the whole shebang. I even practiced.”
“I’m talking about your sensual education.”
My larynx seized up. “You mean sex?” I said, only it came out a breathy huuwheee.
“I believe you missed an experience which every young person has in high school. I’d be pleased to remedy that.”
“Team sports?”
His eyes twinkled. “Why, Raquel, how adventurous.”
“Wha…? No! I didn’t mean…whatever it is you’re thinking. Especially if it rhymes with bang gang.”
“Such delightful surprises in your education. No, it rhymes with take-out in the sack beat.”
“Sack beat? Oh, backseat. Rake-out in the backseat, lake-out in the backseat, make-out in the… You want to make out in the backseat?” A shudder of lusty response went through me. “Your car doesn’t have a backseat.”
“Which is why we will use your car.” He patted my bench seat. “It’s very nice back here.”
I swallowed my tonsils. Croaked, “What if I say I don’t want to?”
“I’d say you’re lying. But I’d respect your wishes. Do you want me to leave then?”
“Um…maybe?” I turned fully in my seat to search his gleaming black eyes for the answer to a question I barely knew I was asking. This went so far beyond a trust exercise where my friends didn’t catch me and all I got were a few bruises.
“Raquel.” He cupped my face with one hand. “I can’t promise you won’t get hurt. But you are special to me. I promise I’ll treat you as such.”
His honesty reassured me more than flowery pledges of forever. “Okay.” I turned around and started the engine. “Where to?”
“Head toward Mr. Miyagi’s dojang.”
I went west. “How do you know about the dojang?”
“I know Miyagi because he is a damned fine cellist. The school is all he talks about.”
I turned south. “So we’re going to make out in my teacher’s parking lot? That’s kinda creepy.”
“Fear not, Raquel.” His tone was amused. “We will not caress in front of your mother, Miyagi’s dojang or anywhere that might remind you of people you know. There’s a public park north of the dojang on Pine. Several mature trees ring the car lot. The nights are getting chilly, and the trees will not only protect us from prying eyes, but give shelter from the wind.”
“And you know about this, how? Since last I knew, trees don’t play cello.”
“I took a quick survey of
the Meiers Corners area last night.” The amused tone grew. “As I said, you’re special. I didn’t want to leave things to chance.”
I warmed at that. Groping in the backseat isn’t normally the way to a woman’s heart, but he’d already done the fine dining and flowers bit. In a way, the variety was actually more exciting.
As I drove into the southwest quadrant of the city I frowned. “Julian and Nixie live maybe half a mile from the park. Considering vampire senses, aren’t we a bit close to them?”
“Deliberately so. Julian won’t expect me to be within shouting distance of his castle. Don’t worry. Between the wildlife and late flowers, they won’t pick us out. Pull in here.”
Much of the park was a lawn flat and green enough to make a golf course jealous, dotted by huge trees. Evergreens curtained the parking lot. I turned into the drive and found a space notched into a particularly dense growth of firs.
Turning off the ignition, my skin prickled with nerves. I sat in that front seat as stiff as my mother’s concrete moose. It was all so much easier when he made the first moves.
“Raquel.” Dragan’s purr was as dark as the backseat. “Come join me.”
My heart went into overdrive.
Chapter Thirteen
“Um, couldn’t you come up here first? And maybe we could, um, talk?”
“Normally, yes. I delight in talking with you.” He paused. “Which is odd, now that I think of it. My amoureux rarely interest me.” He said it more to himself than to me. “But in this case, you’re delaying.”
He was right, which made me blurt what I was actually thinking. “Why do I have to make the first move?”
To my surprise, he sighed. “Because, my dearest Raquel, this is for your sake, not mine. While taking advantage of a sweet innocent amuses me, I am trying to do the right thing by you. In my own small, misguided way, I’m trying to empower you. That won’t work if I continue to steal your favors instead of you choosing to give them.”
“Oh. Um. Well.” I tucked my keys into my purse in my flute bag on the passenger seat. With a deep breath for courage, I got out the driver’s door, clicked it shut and opened the rear door.
Dragan slid over on the seat and patted the space he’d vacated. It looked even darker and more treacherous. Another breath. I slid in.
He reached past me to shut the door. I caught an elusive woodsy scent from his long hair. “Now.” He wrapped hot arms around me and pulled me into his chest. “You’ll remember this from last time.” He opened his mouth on mine.
I’d been waiting for this since Sunday. Expecting it, and deep down, wanting it desperately through all the delays. My need was a natural gas leak building through four days, steadily increasing pressure waiting for exactly this. His taste, his heat, his scent.
At the first touch of skin, desire ignited and lust exploded through me. It burned away any fear of rejection. I grabbed his head and tried to torque my tongue down his throat.
I was awkward. Instead of a deep, sensual kiss I cracked teeth with him.
He clasped my head in his hands and pulled back slightly. Embarrassment ran cold tingles up my neck and face. He laughed and my insides crumbled. He said, “I have kissed courtesans and queens and their artifice bored me. You are so beautifully fresh, honestly eager. Kiss me again, my Raquel. Just like that.”
“Cracking teeth? I don’t think so.”
“Drahý.” He pulled me to him and teased my mouth open with his tongue.
I was embarrassed and didn’t want to play, but he coaxed then withdrew, coaxed and withdrew, until I poked a grouchy tongue at him. Immediately he captured it with his lips and wouldn’t let go until I laughed too.
“That’s better.” He burrowed his long fingers in my hair and held me in place and ravished my mouth with every bit of expertise he possessed.
I was gasping and limp when he finally raised his head. “Now you. Kiss me like that.”
I raised incredulous eyes to him; he thought I’d been paying attention to what he was doing through that whirlwind of teeth, lips and tongue? “You’re insane,” I panted.
“Perhaps.” He smiled as he took my hands and thrust them into his own long hair, the warm silken strands caressing my fingers. “Kiss me.” The tips of his fangs flashed as he spoke.
I wondered briefly if clanking my teeth against his fangs would hurt worse than hitting his regular teeth…and some imp possessed me to lick one elongated canine.
He growled, crushed me to him and devoured me in a kiss so hot the windows instantly steamed. His hands thrust under my top in back and tore my single good bra open. The only reason the cups didn’t fall away was he had fused my front to his.
My hips still faced half-forward, and my body was awkwardly twisted. The hump between seat wells pressed uncomfortably against my ankles.
He simply pulled me onto his lap. Skimming hands raised my top and bra in one move, leaving my breasts bare. His head swooped down to suckle my already awake nipple into a tight snap.
He stopped. “Now me.”
I blinked, uncomprehending, but in my defense he’d just turned my brain into primordial goo. “Now you, what?”
“Touch me. Kiss me. Suck me.” He pulled at the hem of his sweater, indicating I should raise it.
“Me?”
“You.”
Tentatively I reached for the bottom of his sweater. “I don’t have that much experience with men’s clothing.” The couple of times I’d done it, the guys in question had stripped themselves while I undressed. “Won’t I pull it out of shape?”
“Who cares? Do it.”
I swallowed hard and pulled up. I revealed the hardest, thickest row of abdominal muscles in the world. They marched up his belly, clenching and releasing as he shifted under me to make it easier to raise the sweater farther.
Or I could even take it off.
My body fired at the thought. The sweater was already halfway up his torso. A tug would take it over his head and I could explore his big chest to my heart’s content. Touch him, kiss him, suck him.
My hands didn’t wait for me to decide. Or rather, I decided and let myself know only after the deed was done, so I couldn’t back out.
I yanked his sweater up. It caught on his elbows. I was pulling the material so hard it nearly tore. He was laughing again, something I felt more than heard as his abs rippled against me. “Raquel, your enthusiasm undoes me. Wait, let me get myself untangled. All right, now pull.”
I yanked the sweater over his head. He appeared from under it, his dark hair sexily tousled, his eyes twinkling, his grin infectious.
But his strong neck grabbed my attention, and below that his powerful collarbones, winging wide. And the full, hard thrust of his pectorals, covered in acres of smooth skin and a feathering of dark hair. I stared; I couldn’t help it. When you’re used to a face on top of a white tux shirt or black sweaters or even casual Oxfords with loosened ties, seeing that same face over a powerful naked male animal is unnerving. Especially when you’re sitting on top of said wild animal and have ripped it loose of its civilization yourself.
Deep inside, that primitive me want stirred.
I dropped the sweater and bent, fingers groping, mouth open, wanting to touch, kiss and suck everything all at once. He stretched his body out to make it easer for me to grab, lick, tongue…I went a little crazy. Hours compressed into a singularity of hot velvet skin over rock-hard muscle, tangy dew against my lips, woodsy scent in my nose and hard little pebbles of tight male nipples under my tongue.
He thrust his hand into my pants and wriggled hard against my clit and time blew apart.
My fingers tightened where they clenched his pecs. “What…what are you doing?”
“Making out in the backseat.” A half-smile played on his lips but it was the kind that said he was deadly serious about his play. He continued to wiggle.
“Making out is kissing and fondling. Not—” I squealed as he got the pressure and rhythm just right, “—not th
at.”
“It’s not all kissing and fondling. There’s some of that. And this.” His hand surfaced long enough to unsnap and unzip my jeans.
“But…there’s not enough room.”
“Not enough room for this? Or that?”
“That. Laying down. Intercourse.”
“Yet young people have been making do for decades.” He bumped me on his lap and somehow my pants were peeled over my hips and my panty-clad butt was on his powerful legs. “But in this case, no intercourse. When we make love it will be romantic, remember? And on a bed.” A yank and my jeans joined his sweater on the floor.
When we made love. When, not if. And not sex but lovemaking…I nearly orgasmed just from the thought.
He thrust his long fingers between my clenched thighs. His hand was dark against my skin and I nearly came unglued from the sight. If he moved his clever fingers I’d climax.
Not yet. I wasn’t ready. Surprisingly it wasn’t because I was frightened, but because I wasn’t.
“Wait.” I panted it as I lifted one leg and straddled him. “If I’m empowered, shouldn’t I be doing you?”
He sat straight, his gaze fastened to my face. I waited, heart kicking. I’d had sex, but I’d never touched a penis. Never held a guy in my hands as he came apart in climax.
I found I wanted to do that to Dragan Zajicek, with a strength that startled me.
He smiled into my eyes. “Oh yes. I’d be honored and delighted.”
One-handed, he unbuttoned and unzipped. His cock sprang free. The guy didn’t wear undershirts, and he wasn’t a boxers or briefs kind of guy either.
I reached out tentatively. This was my first experience fondling a man. I slid the tips of my fingers onto the shaft. It bobbed under my hand.
I jerked back in surprise. What a contradiction. His cock was hard but the skin was supple; it was warm, but sleek. And the thing could move without either of us touching it. I hadn’t expected that.
“Raquel.” That dark lion’s purr ruffled his voice. “Touch me again. I love the feel of your fingers on me.”
If it felt as good as his hand on me, I could almost believe him. “Like this?” I ran my fingertips experimentally along the length of his shaft.
