“Cyn?”
“In here,” she called back and he came hurrying. He’d found her frankly old and tired but infinitely comfortable sleep shirts and as he entered she became suddenly and jarringly aware of her dowdy appearance. Not that he did. He just looked appalled. “You should have waited.”
“No, I’m fine. Or I will be once I’ve eaten and showered.”
“You can’t possibly be thinking of coming to dinner later. I was about to call my parents and tell them—”
“No.” She interrupted him before he could say it. “Is this dinner tonight?”
“Yes.”
Even now, dressed simply, with a smear of egg decorating his T-shirt, he looked hotter than any man had a right to and desire stirred sleepily deep inside her pussy. She ignored it. If they did that they wouldn’t get anywhere. For the first time in their renewed relationship they’d only slept last night, although she’d woken once to find him watching her, concern etched deeply into the corners of his mouth. She’d smiled, reached for him and he’d come to her, wrapping her carefully in his arms and she’d fallen asleep there.
“Come and eat.”
“Then I’ll shower and potter. The doctor told me to get some gentle exercise, didn’t he? Then I’ll dress. Will that black dress be all right?” Bracing herself, she used her hold on the vanity and pushed herself away, settling into the rhythm she’d established. She strolled past a frowning Riku, even managed a smile. “I’ve taken some pills. I’ll be fine, Riku. It’s only dinner.”
“I don’t think we should go.”
“Why not? Do you have something better to do?” For all she knew he had but she took a chance. He’d have press interviews and TV appearances coming up. Chick had promised to keep the schedule as light as he could, although they should do a few, to capitalize on the tour. He shook his head.
“Only care for you.” He followed her into the bedroom. She crossed to the window where he’d set up the tray on a small table and tucked a chair behind it so she could enjoy the view of downtown Manhattan. Which she did. Scrambled eggs were a great idea, she conceded, if a little bouncy.
They talked. She’d loved the way he followed her admittedly wayward mind, matching her observations with his own, taking her in directions she hadn’t thought of. The musician and the designer. Maybe they had the same kind of mind. Left, was it, or right? Who cared when they could do this? Bliss to talk to someone who understood.
“The Twin Towers were there, weren’t they?”
He nodded. “I wasn’t here when it happened. Not that day. I’m glad, because I wouldn’t have wanted to watch that. But we come back bigger and better in New York. Nobody gets us down for long.”
So confident, so strong, like the country he came from. She loved the land of her birth too but they had more doubts, didn’t see matters so straightforwardly, didn’t have that powerful sense of purpose she’d come across so often over here. She loved it, that intention to make something of their lives, the unapologetic energy prevalent in so many people.
Wow, she was turning into a poet herself. The new tower, thrusting into the sky until it owned it, symbolized that drive for her. Never give in.
“How far back does your family go in the States?” she asked now.
“My great-grandparents came over before World War Two. They were incarcerated in internment camps as hostiles during the war, which drove my grandfather nuts, because he wanted to join the army and fight for the country he regarded as his. After the war ended he started the business that kept the family going. Widgets, you know, turned engineering pieces. My father diversified into providing finely machined parts for computers and office machinery.”
She knew his father still owned a big chunk of the company he’d started, STS Industries. Going public had made the Shiraishis humungously wealthy. “And you spent years in poverty in London? From choice?”
“They gave me two choices. Either I went back to playing classical piano or I joined the family business. I said no, so they cut off my allowance. They wanted me to run back home with my tail between my legs.” He snorted.
“You wanted the rock lifestyle so much?”
“I can’t believe you asked me that.” His mouth settled into a straight line.
Her appetite gone Cyn laid her fork on her plate. “I’m sorry. I never belonged to that part of your life. I didn’t know.”
“I started to get disillusioned the last year at the institute. In Paris I was sure.” He hesitated and she saw the uncharacteristic doubt in his eyes.
“What is it?”
This time his laugh held no humor. “Typical Cyn. You’re a bulldog, you know that? Never satisfied until you’ve got the truth.”
“I don’t like subterfuge. It makes me itchy. You don’t have to tell me any more. I understand enough. They didn’t support you and you made it on your own. Which is amazing, you know. To make all this yourself—”
“I failed,” he said abruptly. Her words petered out and she stared at him, mouth ajar. Riku never failed. He was a brilliant student, everyone said so and she’d heard his brilliance for herself. He could render the trickiest pieces by Chopin and Liszt and pound them into submission. “In Paris they told me I’d never make the top rung. I’d never be another Ashkenazy but I could have a glittering and lucrative career if I worked it right. A pianist with a concert orchestra, or a touring soloist. One examiner even said that I could play pop classics, probably become more famous than the purely perfect classical star.”
“Like an opera singer who has her own TV show.”
His gaze met hers, startled. “They told you to do that?”
“No, they didn’t tell me that. They said I was headed for great things. Just not the great things I wanted.” She pulled a face. “That’s over now. Gone for good.” He frowned and opened his mouth to speak but she wouldn’t let him distract her by talking about her problems, which she’d worked out to her satisfaction. “So being good but not great wasn’t enough for you?”
“It wasn’t good enough for my parents.” He paused, staring at her. “It wasn’t good enough for me. You’re right. My parents would’ve taken that, if I’d sold it to them the right way. I’d have done the pop thing or become a regular with an orchestra, maybe worked my way up. But, Cyn, here’s the thing. I was majorly sulky. How could all that work result in failure? How could I not succeed? I was a brat. I behaved like a brat when I walked out.”
He heaved a sigh. “My parents didn’t help. My mother insisted I deserved a year out but not yet, after I’d finished my training. Then she reasoned I could go into my career refreshed. Only I didn’t want it and I knew I didn’t. It wasn’t that I wasn’t good enough. I realized playing other people’s work, interpreting their vision, however great, didn’t do it for me. I needed time to think.”
His words came in a rush, as if he’d breached a dam and it was all coming out. Cyn stayed completely still, afraid he’d stop and clam up about what she was beginning to think of as Riku Shiraishi—the Lost Years.
“I needed to find out what I really wanted to do. I went to London and sometime that winter I stopped being a brat. I met Zazz and we roomed together, slept in the streets and parks sometimes. I learned what it felt like to have no money. None at all. We played on the street, made more together than separately and I made some hard choices.
“We met Hunter then, who was playing with bands in pubs and making what we thought was a decent living. We joined him. I had no fucking idea then that Zazz was the son of one of the most innovative and inventive jazz trumpeters who ever lived. I found out much later and things slotted into place. Zazz taught me jazz. He taught me to think unconventionally.”
That made sense. “And then you applied your own slant to it.”
“I gave him the discipline and fire of classical music in return. Together we made great music and I don’t mean in any metaphorical sense. We clicked. Hunter has the same attitude, the need to do something different. Restless. He j
oined Murder City Ravens first and developed his craft. Two years later Murder City Ravens was in the toilet, drugged into oblivion, two of its members in rehab. When they came out Jace rejoined the band and tried to revive it, and Matt started the production company. He never wrote music, he was and is an interpreter and he’s a genius at it. Hunter suggested us. We were doing okay, some session work, some small gigs with bands but hell yes we were interested. You know why Hunter thought of us, apart from the fact that by then we’d become a tight musical unit?”
“Tell me.” She had the feeling the reason wouldn’t be straightforward. Nothing about Murder City Ravens ever was.
“Zazz didn’t drink or take drugs.”
She blinked, startled. “What?”
“Nothing. His dad, you see, was a big-time addict and Zazz wouldn’t touch them because he’d seen the worst. Hunter knew they needed something fresh and they asked us for a trial.” He shrugged. “It worked.”
“And how.” She recalled the symbiosis of the concert Saturday night, when everything coalesced, the members truly becoming one entity. “It was as if you thought with one brain, acted as one body.”
“With lots of limbs, like a giant spider.” He laughed. “Not a bad idea. We don’t write together, not completely. Zazz writes most of the songs and he and Jace get those sumptuous melodies. I work on them and twist them and distort them. Occasionally I write. It just works. Donovan and Hunter lace it together. Usually.”
“That’s why I love the music. You’re not predictable.” She loved telling him this, a fan explaining why she enjoyed what they did.
He reached for her hand, grasped it warmly. “I don’t know why the fuck I’m telling you all this. I never talk about it.”
She smiled. “I’m probably your oldest friend. You’re certainly mine.”
“You don’t have any school friends?”
“Do you?”
He shrugged. “Acquaintances. People who try to get into the gigs free because they knew me at school. I went to a swanky place I hated and I spent most of my time in the music labs.” He glanced away then back at her, his eyes full of the truth. “Girls came anyway. I don’t know why.”
“You want me to tell you?”
“Fuck no.” He gave an embarrassed laugh but then heat entered his gaze. “But you can show me when you’re feeling better.”
“I could show you now,” she said. “Prove to you I’m well enough to have dinner with your parents.” She still wanted to go. Since she’d learned more about his relationship with his family she wanted to see it for herself and assess it. Riku didn’t seem unhappy with the current situation but she knew better.
Her parents had never lavished her with affection. She still found it difficult to be totally open.
Careful not to jar her injury she got to her feet, using the table for support. “We both need a shower.”
“I don’t,” he responded. “I had one…I’m wrong, you’re right. A shower it is.”
He took a chair into the shower, one of those plastic ones meant for invalids but like the rest of the furnishings it had style. She liked that someone had thought the designs through. It pleased her sense of aesthetics.
He propped the chair in the corner and came outside to help her strip. She only needed help with her bra. “I’ll have to get some front-fastening ones,” she murmured as he popped the clasp for her.
He slid the straps down her arms and then cupped her breasts from behind. “I’ll enjoy helping to size you.” He kissed her shoulder, nipped the base of her neck. She shuddered.
Gently he urged her into the glass enclosure and touched the panel on the wall to turn on the faucet. With a sigh of sheer pleasure she stepped under the warm spray. “I love this place. I could live in your bathroom.”
“Not unless I’m here too.” He turned her, pressed her back against the cold wall and eyed her greedily. “How do you want to do this?”
“Use me.”
He groaned. “Fuck, Cyn. Do you know what I’m thinking about?”
“Tell me.”
“Things I shouldn’t. Not while you hurt.”
She cupped her breasts, lifted them to show them off, then opened her legs so he could see her clit, teasing him with the sight. “You won’t hurt me. I’m not made of glass.”
“Cyn!” He stepped forward and lifted her. She noticed he’d already grabbed a condom from somewhere, the orange packet a lurid flash of color in his hand. This shower was fashioned from the same material as the bath, honey-streaked, creamy white marble with touches of pink and peach. The orange didn’t work, the only jarring note in the scene. She welcomed it. Perfection should always have something to remind the onlooker of the flaws of its maker. She never trusted perfection. That was why she never strived for it herself, even in her singing career. Voices should sometimes break at moments of high emotion.
Exactly as hers did now. She could hardly speak and her voice came in a husky croak. “Fuck, Riku, I want you so much.”
“Wrap your legs around me.” He’d sheathed himself, and the packet was now a shred of color on the tiled floor. Leaning against the smooth, heated wall, she did as he told her, bringing her pussy in close proximity to his cock. They both watched as he guided his straining shaft to her entrance and nudged inside. Neither lifted their gaze and Cyn watched him enter her. She was wet enough for him to easily glide deeper and deeper until their bodies joined in the most elemental way.
And the most satisfactory. “Riku…” she forgot what she meant to say and raised her gaze to his face.
He was looking at her as if she was his salvation. No, she wasn’t that. He felt vulnerable now he’d told her the things he’d kept close to his chest for so long. Nothing else. Not her, he could have told anyone. She wouldn’t let him say more, not until he’d had time to think. Did he want to tell her more or would he feel vulnerable?
Ignoring the pain from her ribs as best she could, she leaned forward and kissed him. He responded like a man possessed, kissed her and kissed her with a passion and desperation she’d never known in anyone before. He angled his mouth over hers, broke off to change to another angle, exploring her and opening himself to her. She wrapped a hand around his head, digging her fingers through his thick, dark hair to his scalp, then slid her palm down to grasp the back of his neck. He broke for air, gazed at her, kissed her again.
All the time his cock drove in and out of her like a pile driver, relentless, heading for the inevitable orgasm with singleness of purpose. If this fuck were a song it would be one with one singer, one piano and one tune. No distractions. Except at no time did he forget her bruises. He never pressed on them, as if he’d memorized every one and worked out how to do it, cradled her carefully, his hands under her bottom, holding her securely without pressure on her injuries. For that matter he probably had memorized them. His attention to detail was part of what made him Riku.
She kept her back hard against the wall for support, used her body below her hips to respond to him, thrust against him as he fucked her. The regular rhythm helped her to respond without distracting her with pain, and although it didn’t disappear under his onslaught, it nearly did and she dismissed it as unimportant.
Her excitement rose, her juices wet them over and above the water powering down and she gave a series of sounds, noises. Not at all musical, nothing but raw passion in her tone. He seemed to like them. “That’s it, Cyn. Shout, scream, let me know how much you need me. Because I sure as fuck need you.”
“Yes, Riku, if you keep doing that I’ll come and come. God, you don’t know what you do to me.”
“I have an idea.” He panted between each word but didn’t stop his drives. When he leaned back, just a little, he caught her sweet spot better, his cock caressing it with every stroke. Up and up and up until she caught her breath, only to release it in one long yell as she convulsed around him, milked him to his own conclusion.
She watched him come, wonder in her gaze, together with something
else she wasn’t ready to articulate yet. Fear, reticence, the emotions that had kept her whole during her secure, boring and cold childhood came to the fore without her volition and stopped her saying what she felt.
They came together this time and she released with unabashed joy, gave herself to the moment.
He withdrew and stared with dismay at the shredded condom. “Fuck, Cyn. What do we do now?”
Chapter Twelve
“We don’t panic,” she said.
He carried her to the chair he’d brought in for her and gently placed her on it. She laughed and a shard of anger moved him. “So what’s so fucking funny?”
“Just that I was thinking I’d like to go on the Pill again. I mean, I’m already on it but recently I haven’t exactly taken it regularly, so to be honest, we can’t rely on it.”
He swallowed and took in some of the water still cascading over them. “What do you want to do?”
“Morning-after pill, you mean?” She frowned. “No prejudice, Riku. If it’s what you want, then that’s fine.”
“What about you?”
“I don’t know,” she said slowly. “I should be more shocked than I feel. Maybe it hasn’t sunk in yet.” She laughed shakily. “So to speak.” She wrapped her fingers together, flexed them. “I don’t want to tie you down or anything. Nothing permanent, okay?”
“Fuck, Cyn.”He didn’t know what the hell he wanted or didn’t want. Sure, he’d had a thought or two, imagining her with his baby, but that came from the same mind that dreamed up angels with furry feet and talking cats for the occasional lyric. What the fuck did he know? Fantasy was his business. When it crossed into reality it seriously fazed him.
But the thought warmed him inside and like her, he wasn’t shocked.
He grabbed the shampoo and rubbed a dollop over his hair before helping her. Lifting her hands that high hurt her.
Did he want to pick up a morning-after pill? Hell, he didn’t know. The idea of a baby filled him with panic because, fuck, he could hardly take care of himself much less a helpless human being. He choked back his panic. “I’m not ready.”
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