by Virna DePaul
“There is nothing simple about you, and your piece should match that enigmatic, unpredictable style that is you.”
Swoon. Flattery would get him everywhere.
“Oh, yes, unpredictable, that’s me.” I often wished I could act more spontaneously instead of sticking to my tried and true ways.
We turned the corner and paused before a storefront that had a barrel tile awning. Liam looked up to make sure we had stopped at the right place. “Here we are.”
“Good evening, Mr. Collier. Happy to meet you, sir.” The maître d’ of the upscale Cuban restaurant La Cocina Cubana ushered us to a semiprivate room upstairs in the back, away from gawkers but close enough so we could still enjoy a view of the dining room, not completely blocked off.
“Abby, trust me, you’re complex. Straitlaced but passionate, practical but artistic. That’s key to creativity. Nobody can pin you down. I like that about you.”
“I never considered that. You’re the same way.” I noted the crinkle in his eyes that seemed to appear only when he was with me.
“Two peas in a pod.” Liam worked my chair back and in again as I sat.
Our waiter, Hector, handed us menus and told us about the specials. The Bistec de Palomilla sounded delicious. Paired with platanos maduros and white rice, I probably wouldn’t eat it all, but I loved that I’d get to try it, that he’d chosen such a unique place. All around were pieces of art on the walls depicting scenes of Havana and potted palm trees. Romantic and enigmatic, like Liam.
“Listen…” He took my hand. It was hard not to feel like I was in some fairy-tale dream. “You’re more spontaneous than you give yourself credit for.” He leaned forward to whisper, “And that blow job you gave me last night? Second to none.”
“Stop, you’re lying.” I looked down, knew I was blushing.
“Abby, I swear to God. It was beautiful. I didn’t expect it. That just goes to show that you can be impulsive if you feel like it.”
“Must have been something in the air, Liam, because I’m not usually like that. You make me feel that way,” I said, goose bumps creeping up my arms and neck. I couldn’t believe the things I was doing and telling this man. Putting myself so out there for him to analyze. And possibly destroy. So dangerous.
“I’m glad that I do that for you. What’s it normally like for you then?”
“Normally?” I exhaled slowly, considering the question. “Normally, I just practice cello, perform, cook, maybe hang out with Rosemary. Nothing much, really.”
“So maybe you were ready to try on a new skin.”
“I am. I mean, I was, and I’m glad I did with you, Liam, honestly. I’m just…” I couldn’t tell him everything. From all I’d seen in movies and read in novels, once you divulged every last feeling, that’s when someone betrayed you.
“What?” he asked.
Something in Liam’s eyes told me it was okay to talk, though. He was just a person, and I was just a person, and there was nothing to be scared about. There was that word again. “Scared. If I seem at times like I’m not sure how to proceed, not sure of what I want, I hope you’ll have patience with me. I just came out of a relationship,” I said to silent eyes regarding me with admiration. “It scared the hell out of me.”
“What was so scary about it? He wanted to get married and you didn’t?”
I shook my head. “No way, I couldn’t even think about marriage with him. My mom never married. My father left her while she was pregnant. I was the reason she had to quit the New York Philharmonic.”
His eyes grew wide in surprise. “Your mother played, too?”
Smiling, thinking of Mom, I nodded. “The best cello player around. Better than I am.”
“Damn, then I should have hired your momma,” Liam said, winking.
“She wouldn’t have come.” I smirked. “When I was born, she pretty much stopped thinking of herself. Because my dad left, she had to throw it all away to raise a baby. It never would’ve happened had my father cared for her, provided for her. She might be Principal Cello now. She might be playing to audiences every other night. Like you.” I smiled.
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
I shrugged. “He was already married. My mother began seeing him without knowing he had another family. It’s a long story. I won’t bore you with it, but he’s one of the reasons why I can’t allow myself to be too impulsive, because I know it’ll lead to heartbreak. It did for my mom. I can’t let the same happen to me.”
He watched me for a long time, until our plates arrived, then he snapped out of his trance. Maybe he was thinking how depressing that was, what a pathetic girlfriend I would make, but at least now he knew.
There was something else bothering me, though, something on my mind, and I needed to know before I proceeded with him. “What about you? You must have some skeletons in your closet, Ghosts of Liam Past.” I chuckled from the nerves more than anything.
“Me? Nah. What you see is pretty much what you get.”
“That’s not what I heard.” I gave him the Arched Eyebrow of Disbelief. “Is it true you’re just a drama geek?”
He poured black beans onto his rice and mixed the two around. “You’re not going to make me go there, are you?” He laughed.
“Hey, I went to what scares me! Don’t you have anything that scares you, Liam Collier? Keeps you from showing your real feelings sometimes?” I asked, propping my chin on one hand, wanting him to confide in me about the something in his past he’d mentioned the other day. “Surely you must have some ex-girlfriends or heartbreak in your past.”
I didn’t want to come right out and mention the supermodel I’d heard people talking about, but it appeared I didn’t have to.
“You want me to talk about Giselle. Is that it?” He didn’t seem too happy to discuss it.
Maybe this wasn’t the best time for it, but I needed to know what I was up against. “Well, weren’t you two involved last year, and she lives here in Vancouver?” I asked. “I have to admit, it makes me nervous. I mean, I saw…” I hesitated to mention the tribal thorned tattoo on his back. “A design that might’ve been about her.”
“You talking about my ink?” He pointed to his back. “Because if you are, you don’t have to worry. It’s not about Giselle. Giselle was a distraction. She was fun to hang around with last year when I was just doing my thing, living life to the fullest, the craziest. She was good for press. She made me the front man everyone wants to see, but she’s not who I need in my life.”
“Okay. Because I saw Veni, Vidi, Vici at the bottom and figured it was about Giselle because of her last name.”
His eyes narrowed a moment as he thought. Then he smiled and shook his head. “Oh…God, no. That means I came, I saw, I conquered in Latin,” he said.
I knew what the phrase meant, but I’d thought it might also be a double entendre.
“It’s there because of my high school girlfriend,” he went on. “She told me to live life to the fullest. She’s the one who made me come out of my shell, taught me that if I wanted to be someone else, someone bigger, I needed to visualize and become that person. Become the change you want to see.”
Ah, so the tattoo wasn’t about Giselle, but it was still about a woman from his past. A woman who’d given him confidence. Enriched his life. “Gandhi.”
“Exactly.” He nodded. “And then I broke her heart by breaking up with her.” He set down his fork. For a moment, he looked lost in the past. He swallowed softly.
“Why, if she was so special to you? If you don’t mind my asking,” I said.
His eyes focused on me again. “Point Break had just taken off, Ab. I felt that being on tour all the time would be a challenge for her and me. I wanted to live the rock ’n’ roll lifestyle, make it big. A girlfriend didn’t fit into that picture.”
Ouch. So he’d let her go. “You didn’t want a ball and chain.”
He shook his head, seemingly angry at himself. “I hate that phrase, too. No, that’s not i
t. I didn’t want to hurt her when I knew I most likely would.”
“Is that why you got into a fight with Tucker when he called me that?” I cocked my head.
“In part, yeah. But also…” He shook his head. “I can’t believe I’m admitting this, but I feel I’ve known you a long time, so what the hell.” He took a sip of water and set it down again. “I carry around a lot of guilt, Ab. Just a part of me, I guess.”
“About what?”
“About letting her go.”
“Your high school girlfriend?”
“Yes.”
“But why? It’s not like you meant to hurt her.”
“I know, but she was there for me, and then right when she needed me, I bailed on her. The band was starting to get serious attention. Girls were coming out of the fucking woodwork, and I knew—knew…it was a matter of time before I’d succumb to the partying, the playing, the exploring women. I didn’t want to cheat on her, Abby. I didn’t.” His face fell. “And then—ugh.”
There was more. I took one of his hands in mine. “What?”
I thought maybe he would pull into his shell and refuse to talk, but he took a deep breath and went on. “I found her. On my bathroom floor at my parents’ house. She overdosed on sleeping pills. This was after our big fight.” He released my hand and pushed it through his hair. “She survived, but…” Liam shook the memory from his head. “She never talked to me again after that. I lost a friend. I caused her to hurt herself.”
Ahhh, so that was it.
“Liam, I’m so sorry,” I said, taking his hand again. “That sucks. But that was not your fault. You did the right thing by letting her know ahead of time, by breaking up with her before you had the chance to cheat on her. Instead of betraying her, you told her you weren’t ready. That was well done, Liam. More than my own father did with my mom.”
Now I was the one to drop my head and almost lose it. I hadn’t thought about my father much over the years. It was something I’d just accepted, so I’d moved on and focused on the things I could control about my life, but sitting here talking to Liam about it, I guess I hadn’t realized just how angry I was. Tears stung my eyes, and I couldn’t finish my food.
If I had any reservations left about Liam, they disappeared at that moment. I knew if ever I was in the same situation with him, he’d give me fair warning, and that was huge peace of mind to me.
Soft fingers lifted my chin to look at him. “Then you have to realize that your mom not getting that cello position wasn’t your fault.” He peered into my pathetic face, shaking my chin like he was talking to a child. “Okay? Say okay.”
A burst of sad laughter escaped me. “Okay.”
“Geez, what a downer of a dinner date I am, huh?” He grinned, scooped up a forkful of his rice and beans, and extended it across the small table toward my mouth. I opened up despite my big smile, and he fed me his dinner. “Good girl.”
I could laugh and cry hysterically at the same time. Maybe it was the way he said my name, or the way he took care of me, drove me around, made sure I’d practiced my song, given up a forkful of his own meal… Maybe, just maybe, I’d been holding in more than I realized, and all it took was one conversation with Liam to suck it out of me. I had officially crossed that line—I was in deep. If he hurt me now, I might never recover.
“You know what we need?” He slapped his cloth napkin on the table dramatically. “After flan and espresso, of course.”
“What?”
“A relaxing night. No show, no hurrying, no janitors nearby ready to intrude on us in public rooms.” He snickered. What a beautiful smile he had, the way it lit up the darkness of our little corner. “I say we go back to my room, take a long bath, and I give you a fantastic full-body massage.”
A massage. Suddenly, all the dreams and fantasies I’d created involving me massaging him invaded my brain. And my body. “Hmm, that doesn’t sound opportunistic at all…” I pursed my lips at him.
He folded his hands in front of him like a well-behaved schoolboy. “You don’t have to return the favor if you don’t want. I just want you happy and relaxed. Shit. I can’t have my solo cello player fucking up during our song, breaking a string, crying, blaming me for it. Next thing you know, we lose the next record deal, the band breaks up, fans the world over want their money back… Complete anarchy.” He made a big show of waving his hands and doing a bunch of fake scoffs.
I laughed out loud, throwing my head back. Rarely had I laughed this way with Samuel. “I knew you had an ulterior motive, mister.”
He leaned up and out of his seat, just to kiss me. His delicious scent filled my nostrils. “Only to make you happy, Abby. Nothing more, nothing less.”
*
Rosemary would be proud of me.
I texted her, letting her know I wouldn’t be coming back to our hotel room at the end of the night. I signed on for the full pampering session in Liam’s suite, which looked more like an opulent apartment for a family of five. The bath was as sweet and innocent as two naked adults sitting in a tub could get. Except for the part when he sucked on my toes. That was something no one had ever done to me before, and it made me wetter than I already was sitting in that warm, sudsy water.
The massage was delightful. True to his word, Liam didn’t take advantage of my bare body, although it was probably torturing him since I kept catching glimpses of his hardness as he worked his hands into my stressed-out muscles.
Good God.
But the night could not have ended on a better note. “Care to sit on the balcony?” Liam asked, wicked grin sparkling on his face.
“What do you mean? Oh—you mean…”
Standing next to the enormous California king-size bed, vein-roped arm outstretched so I could take his hand, Liam Collier was the most beautiful specimen I had ever laid eyes on. He seriously got better and more gorgeous-looking every time I saw him. I didn’t have to have a million sex partners before to know he was something special. It was in the delicate way he asked me to join him. He was all about pleasing me.
And please me he did.
With the lights off and me giggling like an idiot, we ventured out onto the hotel balcony. “Won’t someone see us?” I asked, hoping I wouldn’t chicken out.
“Maybe. But the lights are out, we have this blanket and…” He held up both the swiped bed comforter and a condom packet for me to see. “You can’t worry too much about what will happen, and who will see us, and who will talk about us. You have to just live your life.”
I could have argued with him, brought up points about indecent exposure, but I didn’t. It wasn’t the time. Liam sat in a comfy outdoor sofa, pulling me down with him. I landed happily in his lap, which made him groan, slide both his hands underneath my hair, and kiss me deeply.
God, I wanted him like I’d never wanted anyone. The raw passion, the slow, carefully executed kisses, the way his hands kneaded my waist, my thighs, and my backside.
“You have the best ass,” he whispered against my cheek.
Wow, definitely not words I had ever heard directed at me before, and maybe he didn’t even mean them, but I couldn’t let my self-esteem get in the way of enjoying him right now, so I kissed him deeper to let him know I appreciated it. When I broke away, it was only to confess what a great ass I thought he had and how I’d imagined myself massaging said ass—his entire, glorious body—from the moment we’d met. I promised him that soon I’d return the favor of the massage he’d given me, showing him in explicit detail all I’d done to him in my mind. He groaned, and we kissed for what seemed like hours. I loved it.
I was so ramped up, I could’ve just orgasmed right then, squeezing my thighs together while Liam’s hands roamed all over my body. “What do you want, Abby?” he asked, sliding down to reach my breasts, squeezing them softly and gently sucking on my nipples.
“I don’t know,” I said. It was true. There were a thousand ways I could have enjoyed him right then, and not one way made its preference known. I w
as hot, wet, and aching for him. His fingers slid down between my legs, dipping into me and pulling out to rub my clit in circles. “Oh, God,” I mumbled. It would be perfectly fine if he wanted to make me come just like that.
“Oh, God, what?” he asked.
“Oh, God, that feels amazing.”
“Yeah? Tell me what you want.” He laid his head against my chest, seeming to listen to my heartbeat as he pushed his fingers deeper into me.
“I want you,” I sighed.
“Where do you want me? How? Tell me. I want to hear it.”
“Between my legs.”
“My body or my face? Tell me what you want, baby.”
Crap, this was hard for me, but I didn’t care anymore. I’d already decided that Liam was the man who would hear me talk this way, the only man. I didn’t have to feel embarrassed, because he wanted it, relished it. “I want you to…”
“To what?” He moved his body lower, looking up at me with those amazing honey eyes. Whatever he did, he wouldn’t have to do it for long, because I was ready to come just from hearing him talk to me. Just from feeling his fingers inside of me. “Say it, Abby.”
I reached up and took hold of his shoulders, kissing his defined chest and stomach. I pushed him down, and he followed my wordless request by kneeling in front of me.
“Say, ‘Liam, I want you to…’”
“Liam, I want you to…lick me.” There, I said it. At least I thought it was my voice, asking for something I’d never had before.
“That’s my good girl. Say please.” His smile was wide and mischievous now.
“Please lick me, Liam.”
“As you wish.” Pushing my legs up and back, making my bottom lift off the sofa seat, he kissed my inner thighs. I braced for first contact, anticipation making me quiver. And then his tongue slid from the very bottom of my hot, wet pussy up to where my pulsing clit was dying for his touch.
He settled in, licking me with strong leisurely strokes for what seemed like hours. I arched my back, turned my head, and closed my eyes, barely stifling a moan when he closed his lips around my clit and sucked it into his mouth. At the same time, he slid his fingers inside me. Then out. Then in. I bucked my hips, forcing his fingers deeper. The hot wet feel of his tongue against me, licking and flicking—coupled with the strong pressure of his fingers—had my release building so suddenly I wanted to weep. I didn’t want this to end. I wanted to feel his face between my thighs, his mouth on me, forever. But my body betrayed me.
