His playing sounded even more transcendent than usual, if that were possible. But perhaps that was because Isabel heard it through the haze of her pleasure. Without knowing it, this was exactly what she’d wanted since the first time she’d heard Kurt play. There, at that distance, it was as though the music made love to her. She watched Kurt’s hands fly over his instrument and she could feel that touch on her own body.
Her legs shook and it became hard to keep them open. But every time they closed even a few inches, Kurt’s brow furrowed or his lips drew tight, and Isabel remembered herself and spread her legs wide again. She’d never cum like that before — legs spread apart instead of pressed tightly together — but she could feel it building now. Her body was shaking and her breathing was shallow. Her fingers moved at a frantic pace, sliding across the swollen, hardened nub of her clit. She was sure she’s leaving a wet spot on the couch, but she couldn’t be bothered to care. She was, after all, only doing what he’d asked for.
The tempo of the music increased — it was the first time Isabel had heard Kurt’s playing stray from the tempo markings on the page. As the piece reached its crescendo Isabel reached one of her own, clasping her free hand to her mouth to stifle her cries.
Kurt held still until the echo of the last note faded from the room and then he looked directly at Isabel. “Be here again tomorrow, ten pm.” He began playing the next piece without waiting for an answer. He didn’t need one, really. Isabel had shown she’d do whatever he asked.
♦♦♦♦
The following days passed in a blur. Isabel was more distracted than ever and her playing suffered. The one thing that changed was that Kurt no longer called her out in practice. Instead, she’d learn of his displeasure each night when she came to his room.
The tasks he had for her would vary. Sometimes he’d want her to rosin his bow, or to polish his cello case. Other nights she’d have to arrange his sheet music or write the rehearsal schedule. The one thing that didn’t change was that the moment she came through the door she was expected to strip. “When you’re in my room, you’re naked,” he explained to her on the first day of her service.
It was liberating, in a way. There were no hems to fiddle with, no bra straps to pull up. She didn’t have to worry if what she was wearing was flattering. She was stripped bare and on display — Kurt saw everything that she was.
Tonight, he saw that she was nervous. “Rehearsal today was appalling,” Kurt’s tone didn’t give anything away. Was he angry with her? “But you know that already.”
“Yes sir,” Isabel answered, not meeting his gaze. He’d never told her not to look him in the eye, but it didn’t matter. She couldn’t bring herself to look at him when she was like this.
“So…what should I do with you tonight?” Isabel’s mind flooded with possibilities, but she knew Kurt didn’t really want her to answer. “I need to listen to the recording of today’s rehearsal and take notes. Not a pleasant task, to be sure. Maybe you can make it a little more bearable for me?” As he spoke, Kurt raised his hand, gesturing for Isabel to come forward. She did as he indicated, stepping into the space made between his open legs.
Kurt pointed at the floor and Isabel knelt before him. Even though she knew what had to be coming next, she was shocked to see Kurt pull off his belt and undo his pants. This was further than they’d gone before and Isabel’s cheeks heated at the thought of what she was about to see.
She wasn’t disappointed; Kurt’s cock was as spectacular as the rest of him. Isabel’s mouth watered and she began to lean forward, her rising lust betraying her modesty. A hand on her shoulder stopped her. “I take it you know what to do. Be sure to watch your teeth.” Isabel bristled at the instruction. She might not have been as experienced as some, but she knew her way around a blowjob.
She leant forward again and this time he didn’t stop her. She paused for a moment, just letting her lips brush against the head of his cock to savor the moment, but a hand on the back of her head cut the moment short. He pressed her forward and she had to open her mouth quickly to accommodate the pressure.
The recording of that day’s rehearsal began to play and Isabel began to lose herself in her task, her thoughts drifting with the music. But then the first error became apparent.
Thwack. “You came in late there,” Kurt said, and Isabel almost didn’t hear him, she was so shocked that he’d hit her. “Don’t stop,” he instructed, thrusting his hips forward and almost choking her. Isabel began bobbing her head up and down again, not wanting to find out what would happen if she displeased Kurt further.
She tried to look to the side, to see what he’d hit her with, and just barely managed to see the belt he’d pulled off doubled in one hand. Seeing it frightened her, but upon reflection the strike hadn’t really hurt so much as it had surprised her. Even Kurt couldn’t be so crazy as to really hurt her when she was in a perfect position to hurt him back — badly. Perhaps that’s why he’d given the warning about her teeth. She wasn’t able to relax long before the next error played loud and clear.
Thwack. He did it again. “Sloppy articulation.” He wasn’t wrong but it still galled her to be told. She wanted to shout at him that her errors had been his fault. That she was off her game because of him, but somehow she knew he wouldn’t be receptive to that argument. In a strange way she found the punishment freeing. As if by enduring it she was being absolved for her poor performance.
Kurt was incredibly hard in her mouth. Her jaw was getting tired from accommodating his girth, but she was also enjoying herself. She’d always enjoyed giving pleasure and she found a special satisfaction in making Kurt feel good. On the one hand she felt like he didn’t really deserve this pleasure from her, but on the other it was one small way she had power over him. She was the one making him feel like this, she was the one who was going to make him cum. Even if for only a moment, he needed her.
Thwack. “Your dynamics are all over the place.” This time she groaned. He wasn’t hitting her very hard, but she was getting sensitive and each impact hurt worse than the one before. Kurt’s cock throbbed when he hit her. He was getting off on this. She could feel the blood pulsing through his veins and she knew he was close.
Isabel slowed her pace to feel one more moment of control before it would all be over. But he couldn’t even let her have that. Kurt’s hand returned to the back of her head, his fingers threading through her hair and tightening, guiding her movements. She knew there was one more mistake coming from the rehearsal — a big one. She wondered if Kurt would miss it in his distracted state. She should have known better.
Thwack. “You missed the coda.“ His words were strained and before he’d finished speaking he was flooding her mouth, cumming so hard she almost choked on it. She would have pulled off if his hand hadn’t held her tight. She squeezed her eyes shut against the tears threatening to spill out.
When he finally removed his hand, she pulled off quickly, gasping for air. “At least you do something well,” he said, and the comment stung more than the belt. Kurt stopped the recording and adjusted his pants. He didn’t need to tell her that she was dismissed, it was clear from his actions. Isabel dressed as quickly as she could and hurried out of the room. She’d left feeling bad about herself on other occasions, but this was a new low. Something had to change.
♦♦♦♦
The quality of Isabel’s playing continued to worsen, and with it her mood. She couldn’t stop thinking about her last encounter with Kurt. She knew she had to break out of this cycle — what she didn’t know was how.
She had to regain Kurt’s respect, and there was only one thing that really mattered to him — the music. Isabel vowed to throw herself into practice before it was too late.
The next day, rather than keeping to herself as she usually did, Isabel went down to the common room where she knew the other girls from the section met.
Freya, Ellie, Leah, and
Grace were sitting around the card table laughing about something, but they went silent as soon as they noticed her. Isabel almost lost her nerve and left the room, but she knew she had to do this. She smiled, steeled herself, and stepped forward. It only took the other girls a moment before the smiles returned to their faces and Ellie hopped up from her seat to pull up an additional chair.
Isabel released the breath she’d been holding and gratefully took the seat that was offered. As if Ellie could read Isabel’s mind and knew she didn’t want a fuss made about her presence, Ellie resumed the conversation without drawing attention to Isabel’s arrival. It didn’t take long for Isabel to catch the thread of conversation; the girls were talking about ways to make black concert dress a bit more personalized. Perfect. This was exactly the kind of superficial banter she needed.
As soon as there was a break in conversation Isabel interjected with her thoughts about sequins. This started a lively debate about whether sparkling on stage was a fair way to assert your individuality or a completely rude distraction to your fellow musicians. Ellie took Isabel’s pro-sparkle stance and they were joined by Grace. Freya and Leah were both anti-sparkle and a lively debate ensued. Before long they were shouting and laughing as though they’d been friends for the whole two weeks Isabel had been there — no apparent hard feelings remaining for her earlier standoffishness.
♦♦♦♦
Things got better as Isabel spent more time with the other girls. She changed her schedule so that she practiced during the day, and ate with the other girls in the dining hall at night. In the evenings she’d join them in the common room. Sometimes they’d get some additional practice in, but mostly they’d just talk and Isabel found that she really liked getting to know them. Best of all, Kurt would never come and interrupt the whole group to summon her to his room. Isabel’s nightly visits stopped and, while he sometimes gave her looks that were easy to interpret, he never actually said anything.
Isabel feared that he was only going easy on her now because he planned to get back at her later. It could be as simple as saying she wasn’t a good fit for the section when her probation period was over. Isabel just had to hope that ultimately the music would be more important to him than his own ego. It would be a close call for sure.
When Isabel got to the common room that night she found the other girls more dressed up than usual. She panicked for a moment, thinking she’d missed an announcement about a performance, but their outfits were all wrong for that.
“Isabel’s here, it’s time to go!” Grace announced, jumping out of her seat.
“Go where?” Isabel asked, confused. Now she knew for sure that she was missing something.
“Tonight we go out,” Ellie answered, coming up to Isabel and throwing an arm around her shoulders.
“Out?” Isabel asked, confused. She’d spent three weeks here and never once left the compound. Everything they needed was here, their food was provided for them, that was the whole point.
“Yes, out. It’s time we all blow off a little steam, don’t you think?” Ellie looked very excited about the idea as she spoke and Isabel already knew she’d lose if she put up a fight. Ellie didn’t put her foot down often, but when she did, she won. Isabel had actually been thinking of getting in an extra hour of practice and then calling it an early night, but she could see she was outnumbered.
“I’ll get my coat,” Isabel said.
“That’s my girl!” Ellie answered with enough enthusiasm that Isabel wondered if she’d already started drinking.
♦♦♦♦
Isabel started to relax as soon as they were out. The girls had been right — Isabel hadn’t realised how badly she’d needed a break. But now that she was out — away from the compound for the first time since she’d arrived three weeks before — it was clear that she’d needed this.
“Come on, it’s about time you loosened up a little,” Ellie said, putting a third cocktail in Isabel’s hand. With her last sober thought, Isabel worried about having a hangover during rehearsal the next day but Ellie’s brilliant smile persuaded her. Isabel could follow that smile into all kinds of trouble.
She took a sip, and then another, and the last of her worries melted away. She was laughing, the other girls were laughing, and everyone was swaying to the music. Every now and then one of the girls bumped into her and they all burst into laughter.
“So,” Freya started, “you were spending a lot of time with Kurt.” There was some bite to her words, but it was softened by the fog of alcohol. Leah shot Freya a look, and the other two girls grimaced, but no one tried to change the subject. They clearly wanted to hear what she had to say.
“Yeah,” she offered, lamely. The four inquisitive looks aimed at her were clearly not satisfied. Her impulse was to run away, to hide her secrets like she usually did, but the cocktails had done their work and she was feeling reckless. “I showed up in his rehearsal space every night, stripped, and then did whatever he told me to,” Isabel said in a rush, before she could lose her nerve.
A few eyebrows went up in response to her confession, but it wasn’t nearly the reaction she expected. They were looking at her like there should be more to the story, like she hadn’t gotten to the punch line yet. “Sometimes he made me touch myself while he watched,” Isabel stuttered out, waiting for a big reaction, but none came. “And sometimes he made me go down on him while he listened to the playback of the rehearsal.” The shock wasn’t coming, the girls just looked bored now.
“He had Grace cooking for him and bringing him dinner every night so he wouldn’t have to stoop to the dining hall with the rest of us,” Ellie announced. Grace swatted Ellie in the arm almost before she’d finished speaking. “Hey! Watch the drink!” Ellie shrieked when a few drops escaped from her glass and hit her shoe.
“At least I didn’t take it in the ass,” Grace retorted, glaring at Ellie.
“Hey!” Ellie shrieked again. They were starting to draw attention from the other bar-goers. Isabel was the one who was shocked now. She had felt so used, so ashamed, and her experience wasn’t even unique.
Leah and Freya had matching constipated looks on their faces, perhaps worried that their own follies would be revealed next.
“So what you’re telling me is that he does this to everyone? This is nothing new?” Yeah, Isabel was being a little slow, but she had been drinking.
“Yup. Every new girl goes through some kind of hazing. It’s always different but it’s always the same. Eventually he gets bored, or another new girl shows up, but nothing changes.” Ellie gulped the last of her drink as she finished talking.
“Can’t something be done about it? We could go to the musical director…something.” The girls all looked at Isabel like this had never occurred to them. “He should have to pay for this, shouldn’t he?” Isabel began to see the faces around her light up — she was getting through to them. “If we came forward together, they couldn’t accuse us all of lying.” The girls were listening, considering even, but Isabel could tell she hadn’t won them over yet.
“That’s a career killer, don’t you think? Even if we do come forward together, who’s going to want to hire a musician who went up against their section leader? There are so many people competing for every position, we’d never be able to prove bias if someone decided not to hire us.” Leah said, and Isabel was afraid she had a point. But she was also still high on the idea of making this stop, making Kurt pay for what he’d done.
“I don’t think it has to come to that. There’s no way the symphony wants a scandal like this to come to light, they’d probably be willing to keep things quiet — handle the issue internally.” Isabel could tell she was starting to lose her audience, but she wasn’t ready to give up yet.
“What if we don’t go to the music director?” Four faces perked up. “What if we just threaten to…. We go to Kurt directly and handle this our own way?” Isabel had them back; al
l the girls were focused on her and what she’d say next.
The plan formed as she spoke. Isabel didn’t even know what was going to come out of her mouth until she heard the words herself. Four sets of eyes widened as the girls listened, and they got closer to Isabel to hear every word. Isabel felt powerful for the first time she could remember. Not only were these girls looking up to her, listening to her and willing to follow her plan, but she was going to stand up for herself, get revenge for being wronged for the first time. She began to feel a warm glow inside that had nothing to do with the cocktails she’d been drinking.
♦♦♦♦
The girls spent a few late nights working out the details of their plan. Isabel walked around so excited she was practically vibrating. Her playing improved and she was making friends she knew she’d have for life, no matter what happened with Kurt or with the symphony.
Freya drew the short straw and the girls sent her to tell Kurt they would be rehearsing in the smaller practice space that night. It was just as well that the task fell to her, she’d been around the longest and he had the least reason to suspect she was up to something. This part of the plan was vital because they couldn’t be assured of privacy on the larger stage.
Isabel paced around her room several times, checking her reflection in the mirror each time, before finally going to meet the other girls in the common room. They’d agreed to meet there and walk to the practice space together in case anyone was losing their nerve or had any last minute questions.
Isabel entered the room and all eyes turned to her. Happily, all the other girls looked excited, rather than scared. As long as they stuck together, they’d be fine. Cello cases in tow, they made their way to the designated practice space for that night. They timed it so they’d be set up before Kurt arrived, but there was always the chance that he’d be early.
Well Played Page 2
