4 Play

by Quinn, Cari

  Bella pressed her lips together. “I plan on being naked around eleven.”

  Nic burst out laughing. “Oh, this dude is good for you. Now, let’s go watch some music so I can indirectly get all worked up and attack my husband later.”

  “Stop putting naked images of you and Adam in my head.”

  She hooked her arm through hers. “You’re the perv that keeps getting the images. It’s not my fault.”

  They laughed their way down the stairs and wandered up Main Street. It wasn’t worth trying to drive up to the barn. Not with the streets clogged thanks to the festival. The main stage had a band from the city playing and the grass was overflowing into the street with people. Kids were running around in packs and tethered to parents.

  All in all, it looked to be a success. Sharon had been riding her ass for days, and she was pretty sure the mayor’s favorite number was Bella’s cell. But in the end, it had been worth it.

  Cam spotted her from the sound booth and waved her down.

  “Hey. Are you on your way to the barn?”

  She nodded. “I’m going up with Nic to check out the show.” She’d missed the chance to go up during rehearsals thanks to a Sharon meltdown about ice. They were going through it much faster than they’d planned. The humidity just wasn’t cooperating.

  “Good. Sharon is up there. Keep her please. I’m gonna kill her.”

  “What’s it worth to you?”

  Cam folded his arms on the ledge of the booth. “An hour with the kittens I just got in at the clinic and a steak on my deck.”

  “Oh, kitties,” Nic crooned.

  Bella squinted up at him. Cam had a very nice house on the lake with a wraparound deck. It was a good bribe. “Low blow, Harding.”

  “I’m a desperate man.”

  “All right. I’ll keep her busy.”

  “You are a goddess among women.” Cam grinned at Nic. “You both are.”

  “That’s better, Dr. Harding.”

  Cam waved. “Have a good time. I heard Cole and Lindsey killed the opening act.”

  “I heard that, too. I’m sorry I missed it.”

  They waved and kept on moving. It took another twenty minutes to make it up to the barn since every person she knew was out for the festival. By the time they got to the security checkpoint music was pouring out into the woods. After they were waved through they headed for the back door.

  The floor was packed. There was a line at the bar for the wine and beer that they’d been able to procure a license for at the last minute. Adam waved them over a glass of wine in each hand.

  “Good timing.”

  “How’s the show?”

  Adam lifted both cups. “They just started.”

  Nic took one of the glasses. He offered Bella the other, but she shook her head. She was too buzzy for more wine. She’d drank half a bottle to calm herself down earlier. No need to tip the scales.

  On the stage, Logan was winding down one of his singles from All the King’s Men. He was wearing his usual all black. This time he was wearing a tight black t-shirt instead of a dress shirt. The V-neck showed a triangle of tanned skin. The same skin she’d kissed and stroked that morning.

  He’d gotten a haircut sometime between the time he’d left her and the show, but shaving hadn’t been on the schedule. She was glad. She liked the almost beard. Her thighs definitely remembered just how amazing the scruff felt. She folded her arms across her chest to hide her instant reaction.

  “Welcome to our first show at the barn. We spent a few hours trying to find a name for this place, but everyone calls it the barn.” Logan shrugged. “Can’t mess with that. Might as well go with the flow, right? In fact, that’s what I’m going to ask you to do tonight.”

  The crowd cheered and Logan smiled. The crinkles fanning around his eyes deepened with his pleasure. He held up his hand. “All right. Enough. I’ve got tons of friends coming in tonight. Some you know.” He pointed to Emerson and Zeke.

  Whooping catcalls made Zeke step forward and bow.

  Logan grinned. “See, you can’t do that. He’s already way too full of himself.”

  Zeke moved back to his mic. “Lo’s just jealous because I get all the ladies.”

  The crowd got even more stirred up and Bella found herself smiling so much that her face hurt. Joy radiated off of Logan. He was in his element.

  “Some new faces.” He held out his arm for Lindsey to come forward. “You met Lindsey York earlier. Cole’s going to come back out a little later to play with us.” He hooked an arm around Lindsey’s hips. “I’m going to let this angel sing.”

  Lindsey went up on her toes and kissed his cheek.

  Bella’s fists tightened under her arms. A quick flash of temper flared over her chest and neck. That wasn’t good. She had no reason to be jealous. The more she tried to tamp it down, the tighter her shoulders felt.

  The moment Logan moved away from her, the feeling melted away.

  No way was she going down that road. Especially not with Lindsey. She was sweet and funny and didn’t have any designs on Logan. Even if she did, Bella didn’t have a hold on him.

  The lights went down and a single spotlight shone down on Lindsey making her blond hair even more angelic. A soft touch at the piano teased out a haunting song. Familiar lyrics to a powerhouse Faith Hill song soared into the rafters.

  When the intro finished the lights lifted and Logan had his twelve string guitar in hand. A new face was on the stage. He played the piano with a single-minded devotion to complement Lindsey’s voice.

  Logan slowly walked to the piano and played out the song on the guitar. When Lindsey’s voice drifted into the night, there was a pause before a dirty bass throbbed through the room.

  The new guy crowded his mic as he pounded on the keys and sang. Jet black hair hung low in his eyes. He wore a white dress shirt rolled up at the elbows. Ink climbed his arms. Music notes on a staff were the main art with splashes of color.

  He growled into the microphone as the entire stage came alive with the rhythm and heavy-handed bass line. The piano raged and his rough voice teased down her spine. The song was familiar, but it felt like this was a bastardized version of it. The kind that was jammed out in a grungy bar for four minutes one night or fifteen on another one.

  Logan draped his hand over his mic in the stand. His chest bellowed in and out as he sucked in lungfuls of air. “That, my friends, was Alexander Nash. He decided to come out of the bowels of New York City to help me out.”

  The murmur in the crowd surprised her.

  “We are even now, son.” Nash’s raspy voice scraped through the speakers.

  A soft thrum reverberated around the room. The lights went out and a black light set the room into a whole different tone. A dripping chord repeated and Bella’s chest tightened.

  Oh, no he didn’t.

  “I don’t really sing this one much anymore, but a certain lady told me it was her favorite, so I dragged it out of the old memory banks. This is ‘Tipping Point’.”

  Gritty guitars and a powerful drumbeat bloomed through her chest. The room went silent as Logan’s voice went tenor deep. It slowly built until it was more rumble than words. The guitars rose up with him, hypnotic and layered. The song had the ebb and flow of seduction and the lyrics of a sweaty, dirty fuck.

  The heat of the room and the throbbing rhythm of the song lured her closer to him. The crowd had lulled with the absolute control Logan had on it. The room wasn’t terribly big and she knew the moment he spotted her.

  Searing green eyes never broke away from hers. And as the song hit the climax and his voice was little more than a groan, she melted back into the crowd.

  The set continued on like that. With songs old and new driving the crowd into a frenzy. Finally the house lights went down. She’d been to enough concerts to know they had an encore to do, but she needed to see him—to touch him, just for a moment.

  Needed to know that this was only the beginning of the night.

>   An ache was growing inside her that only Logan could satisfy. She flashed her all access laminate to the security at the side stairs and snuck behind an amp, around a trunk of guitars. Was that the trunk she’d been so deliciously used on?

  That wouldn’t be enough tonight.

  She needed the total access of a bedroom—his room. Memories of the room she’d stayed in a few nights ago bombarded her over-sensitized flesh. He’d stayed away all night. Part of her was glad that he’d respected her wishes, but there’d been a huge part of her that wished he’d simply taken the option away from her. Just one push and she’d have caved. But that wasn’t Logan. She was starting to learn just what kind of man he was.

  In the middle of the night she’d caught him there, in the atrium, with his bottle of whisky and shadows. A man very much alone. She’d wanted to climb onto that super-sized couch and hold him, taste the whisky on his tongue, pour it over the corded muscles of his neck and collarbone, then drink it off his freckle-spattered skin.

  In the dark of night, a safe life with a stable guy wasn’t nearly as alluring as this intense man with demons crawling just under the skin. He was holding something back and she’d wanted to dig those details out of him.

  The fact that she’d wanted more, wanted to learn what made him tick, had scared her enough that she’d run out the door at first light instead of facing him.

  Tonight she wouldn’t hold back.

  She’d let that side of her out again. And she’d own it. Let him own her.

  She took a deep, appreciative breath when Logan came off the stage. Sweat soaked his shirt, making it cling to every muscle, a towel was draped over his head. She came up behind him, slipping her hands under his shirt.

  He jumped and he swung around, his eyes blazing with…something. Was that fear? He had his arm up, a bottle of water angled as if he was going to impale her with it. She took a step back, her arms coming up. “Hey, there. Whoa, I was just trying to—”

  He cut her off, dropping the bottle before lifting her off her toes into a kiss that matched her song in every way. She latched onto his shoulders and gave a startled groan when he pinned her to the wall. He swept his tongue into her mouth, drawing hers out so he could suck her tongue before stroking every corner and crevice.

  He pulled back, his shoulders heaving with deep breaths to match the jackhammer beat of his heart. “When I saw you down there, it took every ounce of willpower not to jump into the crowd.”

  She dangled off his shoulders, completely at his mercy. “They’d have torn you apart.”

  “Would have been worth it.”

  She pressed her forehead to his. “Take me home with you and show me.”

  He groaned and gripped her ass, to tip her hips so his shaft rubbed along the heart of her. “Yes.” His mouth was aggressive and his embrace a breath away from brutal. “One more song, then just us.” He set her down. “Don’t move.”

  Her chest heaved with the inability to catch her breath. “Not moving.”

  So not moving.

  Eighteen

  High on the crowd, on the magic and sexual current of a perfect show, he went back on stage with Izzy’s taste on his tongue. He lifted his hand over his head and made a whirling gesture.

  Zeke swore and ducked back out for a different guitar. Under the cover of darkness, he felt the rumble of Emerson’s bass and then Nash at the ivories. When Zeke and Johnny’s guitars joined in, he sauntered up to the mic.

  He hurtled the first verse into the darkness. The crowd erupted and the lights flared as he, Johnny and Lindsey went into the second verse of “Come Together”.

  Still no sign of her—of Aimee.

  He wound his hips in a slow circle as Johnny and Zeke hammered out a lengthy solo. He caught a pair of topaz eyes from the shadows of backstage. He performed for her. Lowered his voice and turned a song that had many interpretations into one that he could pour his frustrations and joy into.

  The show infused him with a freedom he hadn’t felt in too many months to count. When the song ended, they gathered at the front of the stage and bowed. The thunderous applause seeped into him. He smiled and waved to the crowd and turned to her.

  Right now, it was all about Izzy.

  “Where are you going? Aren’t we going to celebrate?”

  Logan grinned at Zeke. “Oh, I am. And if you know what’s good for you, all of you will steer clear of the house for the next few hours.”

  Zeke laughed. “All right. I’ll spread the word. I’m sure we can find something to keep us busy until this sleepy little town closes down.”

  Logan didn’t even bother commenting. He found Izzy at the edge of the stage and linked their fingers. He drew her into the bowels of backstage, to the door that lead to the small parking lot they’d corded off for a quick getaway.

  He opened the driver’s side door and lifted her inside. Christ, what was she wearing? Shorts. Leather shorts. A long expanse of tanned thigh made his mouth water as she slid across the seat.

  He got in after her, found his keys in the ashtray, and started the truck. “Anyone looking for you?”

  “I came with Nic and Adam, but I texted them not to wait for me.”

  “Good.” He reached across the seat and palmed the back of her head, dragging her to his mouth. The clash of lips and tongues revved his already molten blood to red-line levels. He ripped his mouth from hers. “Not sure the gentlemanly side of me is home right now.”

  She lifted the hem of his shirt up, scraping her teeth over his pecs. She peered up at him in the dome-light. Her attention to his nipple made him hiss and tighten his grip on her hair. “Leave him outside. We don’t need him tonight.” She pulled his shirt back down, flicking her nail around his nipple. She tugged the collar lower so she could get to his neck. “I’m so amped right now.”

  “Adrenaline.”

  She licked her way up his throat to his ear. “I like it. Drive fast.”

  His dick pulsed in time with his racing heart. “Fuck me.”

  “Oh, I will.” She slid to her side of the bench seat and crossed her legs.

  He drove. Evidently they were both of a same mind tonight. Blood swelled and lengthened him, his cock hardening until the throbbing was the only thing keeping him together.

  If he didn’t pull it together he was going to go off in her like a fucking fourteen year old with his first taste of pussy. He took the old access road around the Bennett farm and managed to skip most of the foot traffic on Main Street. It took everything to concentrate on navigating the winding roads that climbed to his cabin.

  Even the rush of the falls couldn’t sway him from his goal. He pushed his engine for more, to go faster, and the truck roared up the steep incline. Finally, they came to his gate. He stopped to put his access code in, then parked as close to the house as he could. He rounded the truck, lifted her out, and slammed the door.

  She backed her way up the long walkway that lead to his front door. The floodlights highlighted the curve of her bare shoulder, the tips of her breasts that stood out under the tissue paper fine material of her shirt.

  With a smirk, she hooked her finger into his belt loop and led him up the flagstone steps. He felt eyes on them. His spine tingled at the ever present telephoto lens tainting her playful seduction.

  Instead of ruining her fun, he quickened their steps to the door where thick vegetation hid them. He placed his palm on the scanner, heard the click of the locks disengaging, and hoisted her up. Butter soft leather slid along his palms as she hiked herself higher on his waist. The heel of her shoes dug into backs of his thighs, but he ignored it in favor of her wicked mouth.

  He tipped his head up to catch her smile. He wanted to taste that excitement. Formalities fell by the wayside as he climbed the stairs. Wine, whisky, water—he should have offered her something. He couldn’t wrap his head around the English language just then.

  At the top of the stairs, she wiggled down. He felt along the wall to turn on lights, but she shook
her head. “I like the moonlight.” She drew him deeper into the atrium. “I came out here that first night. You were asleep on one of the couches.”

  He groaned. “I wanted you so much that night. I finished a bottle of whisky so I wouldn’t go in your room.”

  She lifted his t-shirt and Logan grasped the material between his shoulder blades to help her. Up, and over his head, the sweat-drenched shirt dropped to the floor. She lowered her mouth to his belly and he hissed out a breath.

  Silvery moonlight glinted off the curve of her cheek and made her eyes shine in the darkness. Otherworldly. Like a witch that had complete control of him. She smiled up at him and used the tip of her tongue to draw a line up the middle ridge of his abs, then over to his nipple.

  She slowly turned them until a leather chair bumped the back of his knees. She pushed him down and knelt between his thighs. She raked the tops of his thighs through the microfiber material of his pants. With a flattened palm on his belly, she inched higher.

  Moonlight teased the line of his silver chain, drawing her attention to it. She drew a half circle around the small charm that sat between his pecs. Many people asked about his necklace and he rarely gave an answer. But she didn’t ask. She trailed the back of her hand up his belly to the charm and then the pads of her fingers on the return trip down.

  Two passes, and she was getting ever closer to the sliding hook of his dress pants. His cock was excruciatingly hard. He wished he was strong enough to hold back the groans, but what man could when a beautiful woman was teasing him within an inch of his life?

  Finally, she grasped the material and peeled it open. She twirled her tongue along the thin line of hair that gathered under his navel. She lightly grazed her nails across his belly to his ribs and around his back.

  “Lift.”

  The word, so simple, and yet it spiked his temperature and sweat popped out along his brow. He wanted her mouth on him more than breath, but he was far too close to the edge right now.

  When he didn’t move, her nails dug into his skin. “I want you in my mouth, Logan. Didn’t we agree to kick the gentleman side of you to the curb tonight?”