MustLoveMusic (4 page)

“Gayle, look at me. Did I hurt you?”

The fear in his voice only made her cry harder.

“Gayle.”

She shook her head no. Then yes. “Just a little. It was
worth it.”

“Then why are you crying?”

“Because I’m twenty-six years old, and I never knew an
orgasm could feel like that. If it hadn’t been for you, I never would have
known. I’d have grown old and died, thinking I knew what good sex felt like.
And I would have been wrong!”

Rikard chuckled in relief. “Oh, is that all?”

A giggle slipped out between sobs, then another, and soon
she was laughing instead of crying. She slapped weakly at his chest, until he
caught her hand and stopped her. Slowly, her laughter faded.

She wiped roughly at her eyes.

“God, I probably look a fright.”

“I think you’re beautiful.”

She stared up into his incredibly blue eyes, shining through
the black leather of his mask. The moment stretched out like a note held
impossibly long at the end of an aria.

Then her cell phone rang.

“Oh! Where’s my purse?”

Rikard pulled it from the back of the chair she’d been
sitting in and handed it to her. She fumbled for the cell phone, flipping it
open and pressing the button to answer the incoming call.

“Sorry it took so long. I couldn’t find my phone.”

“I was starting to get worried,” her friend Carrie answered.

“No, everything’s fine here.” Gayle covered the phone with
her hand and whispered to Rikard, “My safety call.”

“Take the call. I have to prepare the next course, anyway,”
he murmured.

Deftly, he slid out from beneath her. He cleared the table
of the salad plates and forks, and carried them to the sink. She heard the
clink of plates and a rush of water, followed by the throaty whoosh of a gas
range, and the soft opening and closing of kitchen cabinets.

“Gayle?” Carrie asked. “You sound kind of funny. Are you
sure you’re all right?”

“I have just had the most amazing orgasm of my life,” Gayle
whispered.

There was a moment of silence. “I thought you were having
lunch.”

“We are. The orgasm came after the strawberry salad. It was
to die for.” She turned and looked over her shoulder into the kitchen. Rikard
was spraying oil onto a griddle pan. He’d taken the cover off the platter he’d
placed on the counter earlier, revealing two red slabs of meat, liberally
coated with seasonings. “I think we’re having steak for the entrée.”

“You had sex right there among the salad plates?”

“No, it wasn’t like that.”

“You did it on the floor? Up against the wall?”

“On a kitchen chair, actually.”

“Gayle, honey, are you listening to yourself? You aren’t a
‘sex on the first date’ kind of girl.”

“Technically, this is our second date.”

“And you slept with him less than an hour into it! The man
is messing with your head somehow. Maybe calling him a Svengali wasn’t so far
off the mark.”

Vigorous sizzles came from the kitchen, along with a
heavenly aroma blending Asian spices and seafood. Gayle moaned, her mouth
watering, and closed her eyes to better focus on the delicious smell.

“Good grief! Is he touching you now?” Carrie demanded.

“No. He just put the steaks on the grill. I think they’re
tuna steaks. They smell so good.”

Rikard called, “Two minutes.”

“I’ve got to go. The food’s almost done.”

“I’ll call you back in an hour.”

“There’s no need. I’ll be fine with him.”

“Uh-huh. Then you won’t mind me calling back in an hour.”

“Okay, but if I don’t answer right away, it’s not because
something’s wrong. It’s because we’re having incredibly hot sex and I don’t
want to stop to answer the damned phone.”

“Hey,
you
asked
me
to do this for you. Don’t
get all snotty with me just because I’m doing what you asked me to.”

“Oh, Carrie, I’m sorry. I know, you’re just trying to help.
But that’s what I’m telling you. I don’t need your help on this anymore.”

“Humor me. Okay?”

“You’re wasting your time. But if it’ll make you feel
better, fine. Call back in an hour. I have to go now. Lunch is almost ready.”

“All right. But tonight, after you get home, you’re giving
me the whole story about what went on during this date.”

“Deal.”

Gayle closed the phone and stuffed it back into her purse.
She hadn’t realized Carrie was such a worrywart.

Although usually Carrie was incredibly laidback, unless it
involved a shoe sale. Maybe there was something to her concern. Now that Gayle
thought about it, she
was
acting out of character. She normally took
forever to make important decisions, preferring to thoroughly research all the
aspects of whatever she was deciding. She should have spent hours debating the
pros and cons of having sex with Rikard, instead of just opening her legs and
melting beneath his touch.

And letting him fist her! Never mind that it had been the
most mind-blowing experience ever. The point is, she hadn’t even kissed him
yet. She’d jumped right in to the kinky sex, with no thought other than
satisfying the raging need churning within her. That definitely wasn’t like
her.

The sizzling stopped, and she heard the rapid strike of a
knife against a cutting board. Then Rikard carried two plates to the table.

“Take your seat,” he prompted.

She blushed, realizing she was still in his chair. Hanging
her purse over her chair back, she switched seats.

He set her plate down on her charger, then put down his own
plate and sat. She’d guessed correctly. A slab of tuna steak, coated in red,
brown, black and white spices, rested on a colorful bed of sliced cucumbers and
radishes. The tuna was sliced in ten narrow pieces, each one shading from gray
through pink to a hint of red, then back to gray. A golden brown sauce was
drizzled decoratively back and forth across the entire plate.

Gayle closed her eyes and inhaled the sharp aroma. Her eyes
watered, and she blinked rapidly.

“Does this have a lot of pepper in it?”

“Wasabi.”

“Pardon me?”

“Wasabi paste. It’s Japanese. And
very strong. Really opens up the sinuses.” He smiled. “If hot foods aren’t to
your taste, just avoid the sauce. But you ordered chai at the café, so I
figured you’d like it.”

A warm glow suffused her. He’d paid attention to what she’d
ordered at the café, and used that to decide what kind of lunch she’d like. He
really meant it when he’d said he wanted to care and cosset any woman who
became his submissive.

Carefully, she separated one of the slices of tuna. Feeling
his eyes upon her, she lifted the fork up and slid the fish into her mouth.

Flavors burst to life on her tongue. The sauce held a hint
of acidity—soy sauce or vinegar—and heat, which must be the wasabi. But the
tuna itself was seasoned with warm spices like cinnamon and ginger, and the
unexpected taste of licorice, as well as the more prosaic salt, pepper, onion
and garlic.

Gayle groaned. “Oh God, that’s good.”

“Try the vegetables.”

The radishes and cucumbers were crisp and crunchy, perfect
counterpoints to the sharp sauce. “Fabulous.”

Rikard relaxed and picked up his own fork. “I hope you’ll
have room for dessert.”

She gulped and swallowed her mouthful of tuna and cucumber.
“There’s more?”

When she’d fantasized about him serving a three-course meal
on her body, it had been just a fantasy. She hadn’t seriously expected such a
lavish lunch.

“Of course. But if you’d prefer, I can show you the rest of
the house first, then we can come back for dessert later.”

“After I’ve worked up more of an appetite?” she teased.

He laughed. “I’ll show you the playroom. Then you can decide
if you’d like to work up an appetite or not.”

His molten gaze scorched the skin of her neck and chest, her
nipples tingling and tightening as his attention slipped lower. Her pulse beat,
slow and heavy between her thighs.

“I want to play,” she whispered.

Rikard smiled at Gayle’s admission. “We can play after
lunch. But we’re supposed to be learning about each other. Tell me about some
of the productions you’ve been in.”

He listened attentively, asking pointed and intelligent
questions, as she described her theatrical background. She’d had lead roles in
a slate of standard musicals—
Annie Get Your Gun
,
Oklahoma!
,
Fiddler on the Roof
,
My Fair Lady
,and
Camelot
—as well
as innovative and experimental works like
Merrily We Roll Along
, which
started at the end and went backwards to the beginning, and
archy and
mehitabel
, the story of Don Marquis’ literary cockroach and the cat who
befriended him.

Rikard didn’t seem to care all that much about the staging
or dance details, although he did listen politely. But when she described the
songs, he came alive.

All too soon, the delicious lunch was consumed. She set her
fork down, and drank the last of her water.

“But I’ve been going on and on about me. What about you?
What are some of the things you’ve worked on?”

Gently, he sang, “Everything’s sweeter in the dark of night.
Dark desire. Dark chocolate.”

“Earworm!” she shouted. “I’m going to have that stuck in my
head for days, now.”

“I told you the jingles paid the rent.”

“Do you have any idea how many bars of Desire chocolate I
scarfed down because of that damn jingle? I’d be in the store, see the candy,
the tune would start running through my head, and next thing I knew, I had half
a pound of chocolate in my cart.”

His warm gaze stroked her body with admiration. “It couldn’t
have been too many bars.”

“That’s why I have to go jogging every morning.”

“Every morning?” Horizontal creases formed across his
forehead, even though his raised eyebrows were hidden behind the mask.

“Yeah. The office only opens at nine o’clock. The last place
I worked started earlier, and I had a longer commute, so I’m used to getting up
at six. I have a nice jog and leisurely breakfast, then shower and dress for
work.”

“I never worked a regular schedule,” he admitted. “Sometimes
I’d spend all day slaving over a single phrase, twisting and turning it every
way possible until it sounded like how I wanted it to sound. And sometimes
everything would flow so perfectly, I was done in two hours. That was for home
days. During tours, the schedule was more regimented, although still not what
anyone would call regular.”

“Tours? I didn’t know composers went on tour.”

“I did.” He stood, and cleared the table. “Speaking of
tours, are you ready for your tour of the house, now?”

A shiver rippled over her skin. “Yes.”

Taking her hand in his gloved one, Rikard led her out of the
kitchen.

“Hey, your glove’s all wet.”

“Damp, not wet. I washed my hands earlier, before cooking
the tuna steaks.”

“With your gloves on? Can you do that?” She hadn’t been
paying attention, since she was on the phone at the time, but she’d just
assumed he’d taken the gloves off while cooking, then put them back on when it
was time to serve the meal.

“They’re deerskin. It’s washable.” They returned to the open
entryway, and he led her through the arch opposite the music room. “This is the
home theater.”

A huge flat-screen television that was at least four feet
across was mounted on the wall. A modular reclining sofa with built-in cup
holders and snack tables faced the television. Trim black speakers were mounted
in the corners of the room and bolted to the floor. The only other furniture
was a wrought iron cabinet, filled two-thirds of the way full with DVDs.

“Do you watch a lot of movies?”

“Not so much now. For a while that was pretty much all I
did.”

She nodded. That would be after his car accident, while he
was recovering from the injuries that had nearly blinded him. He probably had
broken bones, too, and wasn’t supposed to move much.

He turned and led her out of the room, back to the foyer.
She followed him up the stairs to the spacious landing. Four doors radiated off
it, two before them and two to the sides.

“My bedroom and the master bathroom,” he indicated, pointing
to the left-hand door before them. Then he pointed to the right. “The guest
bedroom. It shares a bathroom with my recording studio.”

Gayle tensed with anticipation, knowing where the remaining
door must lead. Rikard turned her to face the door, and gave her a gentle push
forward.

“The playroom. Open the door.”

Unlike the other doors, this one had a heavy silver lock,
with an antique key in it. She tested the doorknob, and when the door didn’t
move, turned the key. The lock snapped open with a loud click of its tumblers,
and the door swung outward.

“I warn you, it was decorated in a fit of self-indulgence,”
Rikard cautioned.

She stepped inside, her eyes going wide. Any windows the
room had once possessed had been blocked up. The walls were covered, floor to
ceiling, with
trompe l’oeil
paintings that gave the appearance of being
in a rocky cave, softened by sweeps of burgundy velvet. She glanced upward. The
ceiling was painted, too. Flickering torches were mounted on the walls, and
branches of lit candelabra were scattered around the room. Despite knowing that
she was on the second floor of a modern house, her mind insisted she was
standing in a cave belowground. Even the air seemed different, cool and damp.

“Isn’t all this open flame a fire safety violation?” she
asked, the mundane question the only thing she could think of to say in
response to the bizarre setting.

“They’re not real candles or torches. The candles are a
flickering bulb designed to simulate candlelight. And the torches are just
orange satin, blown by a fan.”

She glanced over her shoulder and saw his gloved hand
resting beside the doorway, where a light switch would normally be. Where a
light switch no doubt actually was, camouflaged by paint, to control the
candles and torches.

She nodded, allowing her eyes to focus on the contents of
the room. Black padded benches in different heights, with triangular leather
pillow wedges, occupied much of the floor space. A wrought iron wine table had
been repurposed to hold a collection of floggers instead of stemware and
paddles instead of wine bottles, with two black woven baskets hiding their
contents from view inside the base cupboard of the unit. And a number of heavy
eyebolts had been screwed into the wall and ceiling. Some had chains dangling
from them, while others were bare.

“I feel like I’ve stepped back in time,” she whispered.

“To a time when a man was truly the lord of his castle, and
had the power to enforce his desires?”

She nodded, her legs beginning to tremble. “You said you
were interested in scene play. What scenes play out in here?”

He stepped up behind her, hands wrapping loosely around her
waist to pull her against him. His masked cheek rested against her hair.

“What scenes would you like to play?”

“I don’t know. I told you, I’d only ever done a little
bondage before. And that was straightforward, let’s-tie-you-to-the-bedposts
sex.”

“Then perhaps you are a lovely Victorian maid, innocently
sailing to Spain, when your ship is attacked by pirates. The pirate captain is
captivated by your beauty.” Rikard reached up and stroked her cheek with the
back of one gloved finger. “And so, rather than killing you, he takes you back
to his hideout. He will spare your life, if you can convince him that it is
worth his while to keep you as a slave. A slave to service all of his sexual
needs.”

She shivered, leaning against Rikard’s warmth. In his black
mask, laced leather pants and poet shirt, he looked like a pirate. Her
imagination ran wild, inspired by his words, until she smelled the cordite, and
squinted against the fog of gunsmoke that blurred her vision. Distantly, she
heard the cries of men fighting and dying.

“And if I am unable to convince you, Captain?”

“Then I will give you to my men. They deserve a treat.” He
trailed his finger between her breasts, down to her pussy. “I’m afraid you
wouldn’t survive the experience.”

Fear flushed her body, even though she knew Rikard was not a
pirate, that there was no crew waiting to ravish her to death if she failed to
satisfy him. Her heart pounded, and her palms sweated, as if the scene he’d
described was real.

He stroked her cheek again, turning her face so that he
could read her expression.

“So, my sweet pirate prize. Do you want to play?”

“Yes, Master Rikard. I want to play.”

“Pirate booty does not wear clothing. Take it off.”

He released her, stepping back so that he was out of her
way. Quickly, Gayle pulled off the clinging top, then unzipped the leather
skirt and stepped out of it. She dropped her clothing to the floor, and stood
naked before Rikard.

His blue eyes gleamed within his mask as he approached her.
Softly, slowly, he reached out and glided his gloved fingers over her
shoulders, down her arms, around her breasts, across her nipples, down her
stomach, over her hips, and around her ass. Closing her eyes, she tilted her
head back and sighed with pleasure.

Something warm and wet touched her shoulder, and her eyes
flew open. Rikard was kissing her, with a gentle openmouthed kiss that was
barely firmer than a breath. He licked her shoulder, then traced the line of
her muscles and vein with his tongue, placing another soft kiss in the hollow
of her neck.

“From now until the end of the scene, you will address me as
Captain. If you need to stop the scene for any reason, refer to me as Master
Rikard.”

“Yes, Captain.”

“The first thing I must do is make sure you can’t jump ship
and try to swim to safety.” He opened the wine cabinet and dug in one of the
baskets. Triumphantly, he turned to her holding a pair of black leather wrist
restraints and a rough length of hemp rope.

“Turn around, and put your hands behind your back.”

Quivering, Gayle did as he instructed. She was giving him
her trust and belief in addition to her obedience. With her hands bound behind
her, she’d be unable to fight him off if he decided to try something she didn’t
want him to do. But she had no doubt that she could stop him with a word.

Getting into the game, she pleaded, “Please, Captain. Don’t
tie me up. I promise I’ll do everything you ask.
Everything
.”

He chuckled. “Saucy wench.”

The length of rope flicked out, rasping lightly across her
ass cheeks. She gasped, more surprised than pained.

“You’ll do everything I demand anyhow, or I’ll see you walk
the plank.”

A delightful tendril of fear skittered up her spine, her
skin turning icy. Her nipples tightened into hard buds, from the cold, her
growing excitement, or both.

Rikard’s gentle hands placed the restraints around her
wrists, testing the fit and ensuring that her shoulders were not pulled too
severely. Then he wrapped the length of rope around the restraints, not tying
it, but letting the rough hemp brush against her wrists and forearms. Her mind
transformed the padded restraints into heavy loops of rough rope.

He circled around her, admiring her naked body. Gayle held
up her head and stood rigidly beneath his examination.

“Yes, you’re a proper lady. I can tell. But you’re my
prisoner now. I’ll break you of that soon enough, and have you begging and
moaning like the commonest of gutter trash.”

She tipped up her chin in defiance. “Never! I am a lady,
Captain. And nothing you do to me will make me less of one.”

He sucked in a deep breath, a slow grin lighting his face.
“I do love a challenge. But I can’t have you disagreeing with me. This is my
ship, and what I say goes. If one of my crew dared to contradict me as you’ve
done, it would be twenty lashes of the cat, until he learned to keep a civil
tongue.”

Rikard stalked closer, his gloved hand shooting out and
gripping her chin in a firm hold. She couldn’t pull away or twist out of his
grasp, but his fingers merely rested against her skin rather than digging into
her flesh.

“But I’ll forgive you this time, if you beg. Get down on
your knees and beg me not to whip you.”

Gayle stiffened her back, completely lost in character. “A
lady does not beg, Captain.”

He laughed, deep and low in his throat. “Right. It’s the cat
for you, then.”

Grabbing her by her upper arm, he dragged her over to a
waist-high bench, and bent her across it. He loosed the rope and unlinked the
wrist restraints, then pulled her arms out to the side, clipping the restraints
to rings at the top and bottom of the bench. Gayle tried to lift her upper
body, and found herself unable to move. She had never felt so completely
helpless.

Hot fluid gathered between her legs. When Rikard slipped his
booted foot between hers and kicked her ankles apart with a gentle nudge,
flattening her completely against the bench, a trickle of fluid coursed down
the inside of her thigh.

He moved away, returning a moment later swishing something
back and forth through the air with ominous snaps. Narrow strips of leather
trailed across her shoulder blades.

“This is the cat. Twenty strips of leather, each with an
edge sharp enough to rip open that delicate skin. And you’re getting twenty
lashes with it. You’ll be nothing but a bloody wreck from your graceful neck to
your sweet, tight ass. Sure you don’t want to beg?”

Gayle trembled. Rikard wouldn’t really slice her back open.
She remembered his desperate panic in the kitchen when he feared he’d hurt her.
But stretched across the bench, the lashes of the cat sweeping back and forth
across her quivering skin in teasing caresses, she had trouble believing she
was not at the mercy of a bloodthirsty pirate.