He glanced around. The place was empty. The waitress—Beth—and the bouncer at the door must’ve gone home.
His gaze landed back on the woman who was the last remaining customer at the bar.
“She asked if she could stay. I told her it was fine with me as long as it was all right with you.”
Watching the woman, who was watching him, Chris nodded. And as he heard the back door click behind Cody, he started another song.
* * *
SHE COULDN’T SPEND the night in a bar. But what difference would it make if Emma checked into a room, with nothing but her purse, at one-thirty in the morning or three-thirty?
Piano man—Chris, Cody had told her when he’d poured her last glass of wine, on the house—continued to play. But he watched her, not the keys beneath his fingertips.
That was fine. She was watching him, too.
She wondered about Chris’s shoulders, so broad they stretched the long-sleeved white dress shirt he wore. Wondered if playing piano was what he did for a living.
She could have asked Cody.
She hadn’t.
Chris raised an eyebrow to her. She tilted her head.
Her breasts felt twice their size as she sat there, staring at him. Her nipples tingled. She had been freed for the night by wine. And music.
She was dangerous.
In that moment Emma liked the change.
As much as she didn’t want Chris to stop playing, she wanted him to stop even more. He had to at some point.
And when he did, what then?
Would he speak to her?
Or simply motion for her to leave so he could lock up and disappear into the night?
Lifting a hand from the piano keys, continuing his auditory art with one-handed playing, he raised his glass to his lips. Sipped slowly. Her fingers shook on the stem of her wineglass as she also lifted her glass, and folded her lips around the rim.
He put down his glass, and she listened for the message the keys would send out as he returned his hand to them. Soft? Sweet? Intense? Deep, dark chords?
But his right hand didn’t return to the piano. He held it palm up, and folded three of his strong fingers inward. The fourth, his index finger, he crooked, calling to her.
The new Emma, the one who was refusing to go home to her mother’s house, stood. She maintained eye contact. And with desire spiraling in private places, she started toward the piano man with no thoughts of turning back.
CHAPTER SIX
CHRIS HAD NO REAL idea what he was doing. It was late. He had to be on the docks before sunrise—a few short hours away. He’d already missed a day’s catch and couldn’t afford to miss another.
He started to play another song, his fingers moving naturally over the keys, sending a harmonic rendition of “Send in the Clowns” out into the deserted room. With most of the lights off, he could only make out the first circle of tables around the dais. The rest of the space was black.
Except where the track lighting from the bar—lights that were always left on—accentuated the softly sculpted features of the goddess slowly approaching him.
He switched chords and without pause started in on “Seduces Me”—a song written by Dan Hill and made famous by Céline Dion. He’d heard it many times but had never played it before.
The deceptively simple, sexy melody filled the air around them, sending shivers down his spine. The woman faltered a step, but didn’t look away. Neither did he.
When she reached the dais, his gaze landed for an instant on the vee between her thighs, and then immediately rose to meet the questioning but undeniably sultry look in her eye.
His hands slowed and then stilled completely. He moved sideways on the shiny black bench, watching her, waiting to see what she would do. He wasn’t completely sober. He should have stood. Thanked her for her patronage and secured his exit.
But he couldn’t. More important than sleep, more important even than the catch, was knowing what she would do next.
* * *
EMMA TRIED TO think. She stood outside of her body—a spirit in the air above that dais—and she saw someone with a body who looked like hers, wearing her clothes, standing alone with a man she’d never met.
He’d moved over. And was waiting for her.
He was older than she’d first thought—in his late thirties or early forties. His skin was as leathery as the woman’s from the bar earlier that evening. His hands were well worn, too. Rougher than she’d expected for a man who played the piano so beautifully. The dichotomy spoke to her.
Chris was not just a pianist. Emma was not just a safe bet.
She sat down.
* * *
HER BODY WAS warm. Chris’s body buzzed with anticipation.
“What’s your name?” He’d been making eye contact with her all night. Now he looked down at the keys in front of him.
“Emma.”
Her hands appeared on the keys, as well. She had slender fingers. Unadorned, although there was a white band against the tanned skin of her left ring finger.
“I’m Chris.”
“I know.”
He glanced at her. She turned her head. Their gazes were only inches apart now.
“Cody told me,” she explained.
“You hungry?”
She licked her lips. “Not really.”
“Your glass is almost empty, you want more?”
“Okay.”
“The bars are all closed, but I have a room. It’s across the street.”
He didn’t promise to be a gentleman.
“Okay.” Her tongue flicked across her bottom lip. His body thrummed his response.
“You want to join me there?”
He would never, ever force himself on a woman, but he wasn’t about to turn down any opportunities this beauty—Emma—was willing to offer.
“I think I do.”
He had a condom in his wallet. She’d recently had a ring on her finger. Safe enough for him.
“Good,” he said, and lowering the lid to protect the piano keys, he rose, took her hand and led them out the back door.
* * *
EMMA WASN’T STUPID. She knew what she was agreeing to by leaving the bar with Chris. She just couldn’t seem to make herself care.
Because she was numb? Hurt beyond good judgment?
Because she was drunk?
Or because the piano man made her body sing in places a tune had never played?
The warm night air didn’t sober her. Or instill her with any better sense. It caressed her skin, heightening the surreal sense of vibrancy she felt as they walked hand in hand across a quiet street lit with old-fashioned gas lamps.
They reached the other side.
“I don’t…”
“Don’t what?” They were the first words he’d said since he’d locked the door of Citadel’s behind them.
Who was she kidding? This was no love tryst. She didn’t know anything about