Close Harmony

by Justine Elyot

  “Awkward.”

  “Very. But then we had shore leave, in Hamburg. We went to the Reeperbahn together and watched a blue movie in an adult cinema. The movie was a gay S&M feature. Hans suggested we might try some of that stuff and we went to a cheap hotel room and…tried some of that stuff.”

  “Which stuff? Who topped?”

  “This isn’t making you uncomfortable?” said von Ritter dryly. “Some girls wouldn’t like to hear about this.”

  “I’m not if you’re not. Like I said, I want to know you better. If it’s too painful, though…”

  “No, it’s fine. But talking of painful…that was a painful night.”

  “Did he top, then?”

  “He did. He didn’t like pain, or any kind of discomfort.”

  “Oh my God, so you were the sub?”

  “Yes. And I quite enjoyed it, I must say. For one thing, it was very valuable for me to feel the sensations I wanted to inflict. I wanted to understand what might be going through the mind of a submissive. I certainly found out.”

  “But did it arouse you?”

  “Yes, because of course I was in love with Hans. Whatever he wanted to do to me turned me on.”

  “I just… I’m sorry, but I can’t imagine it. I can’t imagine you, taking what you like to give.”

  “Well, I’d say I’m eighty per cent dominant, but there is a part of me that likes to submit from time to time.”

  “Only to another man? Or could you let a woman top you?”

  “The right woman, of course.”

  “Not me?”

  “I don’t think you have much domme in you, my dear.”

  “No. No, you’re probably right. So, what did Hans do to you?”

  “I’m sure you can imagine. But he took off his belt and whipped me with it. Tied me up and used me.”

  “Did you ever do it the other way round?”

  “The sex, yes. But he didn’t like to be whipped. He liked to be pandered to, treated like a king,” said Karl-Heinz.

  “And is he your only gay lover?” Lydia thought she could question Karl-Heinz on this fascinating subject forever.

  “He is the only man I have loved. I have occasionally had casual sex with other men, in play party situations. It’s been a while though. I tend to focus more on my dom side these days. Especially now I have you.”

  Lydia was quiet for a while, processing all this unexpected new information.

  “You’re a puzzle,” she said. “I sometimes think I don’t know you at all.”

  “Every man has a past.”

  “Do you think you still love Hans? He’s the love of your life? And that’s why you can’t…”

  “That’s quite a serious question, Lydia. I’ll try to think of an answer. And while I do…”

  He dropped to his knees in front of the chair and grasped Lydia’s helpless inner thighs in both hands. Before she could make a move, she felt hot breath on her pussy, then the warmth of his tongue.

  She melted into the long, slow build-up, appreciating his subtlety and his gentleness. She needed more time to get where he wanted to take her, having come so shortly before, but when she arrived, the destination was worth reaching. It was a place of near-oblivion, clouding her vision and wiping all other thoughts from her head.

  Once she came to herself, still breathing out tiny sighs, flanks trembling, skin sheened with perspiration, she heard his voice from afar.

  “You know, Lydia, I think you might have a point. I think I might need some help. I’m going to get counselling.”

  Chapter Nine

  “You can’t go. I, I…forbid it!”

  Lydia laughed in Milan’s face. “You don’t forbid things, Milan. You’re the most permissive man in the world. It’s not the sex, is it? It’s because of Julius Hackmeyer.”

  Milan sat up, rumpling his hair crossly, and leaned against the headboard of his bed.

  “That bastard,” he muttered. “I know his game. He wants to take you from me, just for spite. It’s time he fucked back off to Paris.”

  “He won’t,” said Lydia. “Karl-Heinz says he’s just bagged a professorship at the Royal Academy of Music. He’s staying in London.”

  Milan buried his face in his hands.

  “He has come here to torture me,” he said.

  Lydia laughed again. “Of course he hasn’t. He came for a job, and his girlfriend. Why must you always assume you’re at the centre of everyone’s life?”

  Milan took his hands away from his face and looked long and hard at Lydia. “It would be nice to be at the centre of somebody’s life,” he said petulantly.

  “Milan, you are at the centre of mine. Right at the bullseye.”

  Appropriately enough, given how often I want to throw darts at you.

  “But it’s too crowded there. How can you have more than one bullseye?”

  Lydia wriggled her way into his arms. “You’re right,” she said. “I need to choose. But things have got complicated with Karl-Heinz. I think he needs someone to be there for him at the moment. It’s not a good time to…”

  She trailed off. She realised that she had given Milan her decision. She had chosen him.

  “So you will leave him?” Milan picked up on it straight away. “Maybe I can find him somebody else. Another lover. He likes the submissives, right? I’ll see who is available.”

  “Milan,” sighed Lydia. “Don’t go setting up any honeytraps. It’s not that simple. He’s told me things in confidence that he wouldn’t share with somebody new.”

  “Oh yes? Sailor boy has skeletons?”

  “Keep your big nose out,” said Lydia. “And tell me about you and Hackmeyer.”

  “I don’t like to talk about that bastard.” Milan removed his arms from Lydia and lay back down on his side, facing away from her.

  “I know. But why? What did he do to you?”

  “It’s his fault I have had to spend all these years stuck in orchestras when I should have had a solo career.”

  Lydia leaned over his shoulder, her breasts pressing into his back. “Really? I always wondered about that. You’re so good. You have to tell me what happened.”

  “It’s a long story.”

  “The night is young.”

  Milan turned onto his back and grabbed hold of Lydia, crushing her down on his chest. “I’d rather make love to you again,” he whispered seductively.

  “Not until I’ve heard this story.”

  “Really?”

  Lydia felt the stroking of his hand on her flank then it moved in between her thighs, already hot and damp from the earlier sex.

  “Really,” she said decisively, although she couldn’t pull his hand away because her arms were caught underneath her, pressed against Milan’s chest.

  “I’ll do everything you like the best,” he wheedled. “I’ll make you come until you faint.”

  “Christ,” said Lydia with feeling. “I’m not sure I’m up for that, to be honest.”

  “Oh, it used to be so easy to make you do what I want,” complained Milan. “What happened to you?”

  “You did.”

  “I created a monster.” He pouted and kissed the tip of her nose.

  “You’ve made me stronger. And now I can match you.”

  “Oh, what have I done?” he groaned. “Okay. But this story needs coffee. A lot of coffee. I’ll go and make some.”

  A little later, sitting up in bed with tousled hair and a cup of strong Italian coffee, Milan was ready to begin.

  “You know I studied in Paris, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And so too was Hackmeyer at the Académie with me. We were pupils of Auguste Mallelieu.”

  “Wow, were you?”

  “You know his reputation. Before his death he was the most powerful man in the world of European music. You know he wrote for the papers, and one bad notice from him could ruin a musician or an orchestra. Also, he made a lot of stars. Very many of the best musicians in the world have been
taught or patronised by him.”

  “I know. Including Julius Hackmeyer.”

  “You are right. He made Hackmeyer. He was the star pupil in his composition and conducting classes, right from the start. I tried to compete, but I was always more a violinist first, you know.”

  “Like me.”

  “Uh-huh. But, because I had a talent, I was also a favourite of Professeur Mallelieu, and Hackmeyer doesn’t like this. He is threatened. So we are rivals, right away.”

  “You were never friends.”

  “Never. But Mallelieu has always a little inner circle of his favourites, his acolytes, and we were both included, so we saw quite a lot of each other. We go to the same dinners, the same concerts, the same parties. And always there is a tension between us, because we both want to be number one with Mallelieu.”

  “Typical.” Lydia shook her head. “There’s plenty of room for both of you. Why have a pissing contest over it?”

  “Lydia, we are young men, nineteen, twenty years old. We are full of stupid ideas.”

  “Most men grow out of them.”

  “You are very severe today, miláckŭ.”

  “I’m sorry. I think Karl-Heinz is rubbing off on me.”

  Milan paused and raised his eyebrow, causing Lydia to blush at what she’d just said and the no doubt filthy interpretation her lover was putting on it.

  “Not like that,” she said, grimacing into her coffee.

  “Never mind Karl-Heinz. In our third year, the game gets serious. We are both invited to Mallelieu’s home, to perform at a private concert for an elite audience. While we are there, we meet Mallelieu’s daughter, Sophie.”

  “Oh God, tell me you didn’t try to seduce her!”

  Milan took a deep breath and gave Lydia his best poker face.

  “You know me, Lydia,” he said.

  “Milan! You’re mad.”

  “Well, it was more complicated than that. At this concert, Sophie and I flirted a lot, but it was no more than that. Hackmeyer, on the other hand, he is like a bull at a gate. Insists on getting her number, taking her out. And he is so forceful, she feels she cannot say no.”

  “But what did Mallelieu think of that? Wasn’t he angry with Hackmeyer?”

  “No. And do you know why?”

  Lydia shook her head, enthralled now by the unfolding saga.

  “Because Mallelieu is a snob. And Hackmeyer is a member of one of Europe’s oldest and richest families.”

  “Is he?”

  “You didn’t know? You’ve met him and he hasn’t mentioned yet that he is descended from the Hapsburgs? Never mind, he will tell you at this dinner, I’m sure.”

  “He’s old European aristocracy?”

  “Oh yes. And Mallelieu, he likes the idea of his daughter marrying into that. He gets a place in the elite of society and Hackmeyer gets patronage from one of the great music scholars of the world. Everyone’s a winner. One problem—his daughter is just not that much into Hackmeyer.”

  “Oh dear.”

  “We bumped into each other one day in the Luxembourg Gardens. She was crying, she had tried to tell Hackmeyer she wasn’t interested, but he would not listen. I comforted her.”

  “Comforted her? And the rest,” said Lydia with a shake of her head.

  “Well, yes, we went back to my room.”

  “You’re incorrigible. Did you even like her?”

  “Very much.”

  “As much as you hated Hackmeyer?”

  Milan shrugged. “I didn’t hate him so much then. I didn’t like him either…”

  “So you and Sophie started a secret affair?”

  “Yes.” Milan lay back, his eyes misting. “Those were great days. The tension, the passion, my God. Secret affairs. But I am too old for all that now. I couldn’t do it again.” His eyes misted over.

  “Good. I can always start sending you mysterious notes and waiting for you in alleyways if it turns you on.”

  He laughed and kissed her.

  “You are kind to me. But I don’t think it will be necessary, do you?”

  He gathered her in his arms again and pinned her to the mattress for a long, steamy smooch. Lydia, kissing him back, running her tongue along his lips, wondered what the twenty-year-old Milan would have been like as a lover. Had he been less skilled? It was hard to imagine him being more eager. She pictured a lean, charismatic youth on an unmade bed in a dark attic, surrounded by music stands and manuscripts, like something out of La Bohème. A tiny flicker of regret that she had never known him like that passed through her.

  She was jealous—not of his other lovers, no, but of his past. Of all the life he had lived without her. Of never knowing him as an idealist, a romantic, an innocent. Perhaps she would never now be truly able to understand him. He was fully-formed, his identity forged in her absence. And yet he had had such a bearing on her personality. He had had a hand in making her. It seemed so unfair that she couldn’t repay the service.

  “All that secret love talk is getting you hot, isn’t it?” She arched her back so that her pelvis rubbed against his burgeoning erection.

  “No, talking to you while you’re right here beside me is getting me hot,” he said. “Having your warm little body smelling of me and what I did to you not long ago. Is your pussy still wet? Hmm?” He reached down to investigate.

  Lydia let him part her thighs, let him explore the dark, sticky in-between.

  “Mmm, I’ve had you. I want you again,” he said.

  “Finish the story,” insisted Lydia, but her body conveyed a different imperative, twisting in his hand.

  “Finish fucking you? Is that what you said?” He made a little mock-pounce.

  Lydia felt his cock butt her thigh.

  “No!” she yelped, pretending to push him off. “I want to know what happened next.”

  “What happens next? Well, I think I suck your nipples, my dear.”

  “Stop it.” She batted his face with one escaping hand.

  He caught it and held it down again, then bent to take a nipple in his mouth and give it a long, hard suck.

  “Poor Sophie,” Lydia sighed. “Nobody stands a chance against you.”

  “That’s right,” he said, looking up, leaving Lydia’s nipple wet and hard. “Accept it. Don’t fight it.”

  “But then you’ll tell me?”

  “Of course.” He moved above her and suddenly she was filled again.

  She whimpered and bent her knees, letting him deepen the penetration. Sometimes it felt raw, sometimes it stretched her, sometimes she feared it was more than she could take, but none of that ever detracted from the sweetness of the sensation. Nothing felt more natural than having Milan inside her.

  She crossed her ankles underneath his bottom and dug her heels into his upper thighs, in a gentle encouragement of each new thrust. The fact that it was their second go lent the coupling a delicious languor. The first fuck was always frantic, the subsequent ones relaxed and luxurious, revelling in every decadent moment.

  They kissed greedily and messily all the way through and rolled around the mattress, pulling the sheet out and grabbing at the pillows. They changed positions half a dozen times, now with Milan on top, now with Lydia, now on their sides. They grabbed at each other’s limbs and locked tongues and pinched and stroked until the steam covered them and their second, gentler but more sustained, orgasms released them from their exertions.

  Beached together on the rumpled, ruined bed, they dozed off for a while. They awoke to find the room dark and the day gone.

  “You didn’t finish your story,” Lydia accused.

  “Ah, no. Where was I?”

  “Shagging Sophie in your student garret.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Milan had to take a few moments to unpeel himself from the bed and shake a bit of energy into his limbs.

  “My God, I am dead,” he said. “And I need a shower. No. A bath.”

  “Story first.”

  “You are a hard taskmaster
.”

  He found ‘taskmaster’ hard to pronounce, which always gave Lydia an extra little stab of love.

  “Taskmistress,” she corrected.

  “Don’t make me say that. Okay. So. Sophie and I, we had this secret affair which went on for a few months. She kept saying she would finish it with Hackmeyer, but she was afraid of her father and it was harder and harder.”

  “I know that feeling. Well, similar.”

  “You do? Right. We didn’t know that Hackmeyer knew about us. He knew for a week or so and said nothing. He waited until we were going to meet, and he brought Mallelieu up to my apartment.”

  “Uh-oh. Busted.”

  “Yes. We were in bed, of course. We pretended we were not there, but soon we realised that they were not going to leave. We got dressed and we had to let them in,” said Milan.

  “I bet that was an awkward conversation. Poor Sophie. She must have been mortified.”

  “Well, yes, poor Sophie, but her life carries on as before. Mine…”

  Milan made a gesture of sweeping everything away.

  “What happened?”

  “Well, nothing much. I had a fistfight with Hackmeyer, right there, after Mallelieu and Sophie left, until my landlord called the police and we got arrested.”

  “Christ. This gets worse.” Lydia’s eyes were saucers.

  “There were no charges. And no repercussions at the Académie either. I thought I had got away with it. Until I left and started trying to make a career for myself. No agent would work with me. I found that I was on a blacklist. All I could get was very small, provincial gigs with unknown conductors and orchestras.”

  “That’s awful! Just because you had a fling with Sophie?”

  “Just because of that. Mallelieu had lost his chance to be an aristocrat-by-marriage.” Milan’s voice was contemptuous.

  “But he could have supported you and helped you to be a famous virtuoso. Wouldn’t that have been good enough for his daughter?”

  “Not at all.” Milan laughed mirthlessly. “Have his daughter marry some penniless scholarship student from the backwoods of the Eastern bloc? No way.”