Armor—that’s what I need when I deal with my parents from now on. I need a suit of armor and the courage to stand behind my convictions to fight for what I want. And, what I want is Phillipe.
I can feel my bare nipples harden in the cool air. They almost seem to be begging for attention, like they remember what they received earlier, and they want it again. I slip my fingers into my panties and slide them down over my hips, all the while, keeping my eyes on the silent man across from me.
I concentrate on Phillipe as he makes his way to the shelves on the wall. He crouches down to reach into the bottom. I’m so focused on his broad back and amazing ass that I don’t even notice what he is holding in his hand until he stands. It’s an old music case.
Almost instantaneously, it feels as though the oxygen in the room has been removed. I can’t breathe as he stops at the desk just a few feet from me. He gently places the case down. Immediately, I know what is in there. He doesn’t have to tell me. As I stand there silently staring at him, my brain is screaming, Why? Why on earth does he have Chantel’s violin? How?
It has been reported that the astronomically expensive Stradivarius, which had been passed down for years through the Rosenberg family, was never recovered. It is still reported as missing to this day.
I have no idea how he has it, but I know that the instrument inside that case is a violin. I know it is Diva.
I’m also very aware of what he’s going to ask me to do. I have seen the collection and studied each piece for hours on end. None of that matters though, as the locks on the old music case are flicked open.
As he lifts the lid, my eyes are automatically drawn to the contents, like a moth to a flame. This right here is the other piece in the huge, distorted puzzle that is them, and it is about to be handed to me.
He reaches into the case, which is lined with what looks like red silk. He lovingly—yes, lovingly is the only way I can describe the way he is touching the instrument—cradles Chantel’s Stradivarius as he removes it from its resting place.
My mouth falls open as he turns and walks toward me. He’s cradling it as though it is his child. When he holds it out to me, I look at him as if he is insane, and I begin shaking my head.
“Apparently, I am going to trust you. Here, take this.”
Looking at the violin he’s now handing to me, I am very aware, all of a sudden, that I ‘m standing here naked. And yet somehow, that is not the most bizarre part of this equation. No, the most bizarre part is the fact that he thinks I can and will be responsible for hanging on to an instrument that is not only worth more than a million dollars but is also reportedly a missing family heirloom. Not to mention, it means more to him than the entire house we are both standing in.
Shaking my head again, I raise my eyes from the beautiful Diva. “No. I can’t use that to model with.”
“Here. You need it to model with,” he tells me, pushing it closer to me.
I literally step away from him, refusing to take a hold of what I essentially know to be his heart.
“No.” I refuse again. “Don’t you have a spare one?” I realize how stupid that sounds but so does the fact that he wants me to hold her violin.
He steps closer to me and reaches out. He takes my right hand in a firm grip and tugs me to him. Placing the neck of it in my hand, I have no choice but to close my fingers around it tightly. I’m afraid I might drop it, smashing it into little pieces.
“See, it won’t hurt you,” he reassures as he steps in closer. “You seem spooked tonight. That’s what it is.” Bending down until our noses are almost touching, he asks, “What happened this afternoon, Gemma?”
Denial falls smoothly off my tongue. “Nothing happened.”
“You’re lying.”
Raising my head, I bring the violin up close to my body. “How do you want me to hold this?”
Strong, nimble fingers grip my wrist where my pulse is beating a rapid tattoo. “Once you are seated facing the wall, cross your legs, rest the bottom on your calves, and let the handle nestle between these beautiful breasts of yours.” As he finishes that provocative statement, he reaches up to run the back of his fingers gently over the curve of one of the breasts in question.
I gasp. They are still sensitive from earlier. My eyes move up to meet his. As he repeats the move, I clamp my bottom lip between my teeth.
That’s when a seductive grin appears. “I like teeth,” he tells me before turning on his heel, making his way back to the easel. He’s letting me know that, all along, he’s been aware of the sensual journal entry I read earlier, and he knows, somehow, that I’m hiding a secret.
What he doesn’t know is that secret involves a dark-haired woman with talented hands. My secret involves the woman he so obsessively loved, a woman he himself has admitted to wanting close by at all times.
Well, that woman has crept into my mind. Somehow, she has stolen my very sanity because now I want her hands on me. I begged for her to touch me until I, too, lost myself in the beauty of a fantasy—a fantasy I still don’t fully understand.
She is aroused. As she sits there holding the violin, Phillipe can tell that Gemma is one-hundred percent aroused. Her breasts are beautifully flushed, and her nipples are nice and tight.
When he handed her the violin, her eyes dilated, and he could have sworn that he could smell her arousal and he is reminded of the passage she must have been up to. A moment in time that had literally changed him as a person.
He wants to talk to her about what she read.
Once he is behind the easel, he looks over to where she sits. The violin’s handle is resting against her skin, and her hands are holding it with so much care that he can’t help but feel moved by her attentiveness.
“So, tell me, Gemma. What did you learn this afternoon?”
Her eyes focus on him, so he lowers his on purpose, giving her the space she might need to open up.
“I’m here to ask you questions, not the other way around.”
Raising only his eyes, he tells her, “Well, you are being so quiet, so I’m trying to start an open forum.”
“Well, I don’t need one,” she tells him firmly. “If you weren’t so disagreeable this afternoon, I wouldn’t feel this way.”
“And how do you feel?”
“Confused,” she admits immediately.
“What are you confused about?” He genuinely wants to know.
“You. Her. Both of you together,” she tells him, licking her lips.
She shifts where she is sitting, and he wonders for a moment if she is aroused by what she just said. I believe she is.
“What is it about us together that’s confusing to you?”
“I don’t know.” She quickly adds, “That’s a lie, and I promised myself I wouldn’t do that.”
“What? Lie?”
“Yes.” She nods. “You seem so different through her eyes.”
Silence stretches between them as the weight of her words float across the air.
“Interesting choice of words. How do I seem different?”
He watches her red fingertips caress the side of the violin as she continues looking down at it.
“With her, you seem…happy.”
Phillipe acknowledges that with a nod. He explains simply, “I was happy, happier than I had ever been. I guess it showed.” He stops and asks, “What do I seem to be now?”
Gemma turns her head and looks at him with narrowed eyes. “Angry, sad, hurt.”
Placing his brush on the easel, he moves over to her. He’s tired of not being able to do what he wants, and right now, he wants to touch.