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She’d had plenty of male admirers. Chris would guess just about every adult male in the place had given her the once-over. More than once.
“Someone probably stood her up,” he said, taking another sip. The liquor was warm going down. Felt good. “Can’t imagine why, though. She’s a looker.” In a nontarty sort of way. Long legged, and even in the conservative black slacks and jacket her curves caught his attention.
The woman didn’t need jewelry or makeup to call attention to herself. Hell, he’d bet she’d look good in an old robe and shower cap.
But what a shame it would be to hide that head of hair. He couldn’t seem to push away the image of those long dark curls splayed across a rumpled white pillowcase. He sipped again, enjoying the mental image for another second.
“She’s sure been looking at you, man,” Cody said, turning to eye the woman, who was holding her almost-empty wineglass by the stem with both hands.
Chris had noticed. He’d made eye contact a time or two. Had nodded and received a nod in return.
“She been talking to anybody?”
“Nope.”
“No one?”
“Nope.”
“Not even on a cell phone?”
“Nope. No texting, either.”
“An out-of-towner?”
“Here on business? Knows no one? Most likely,” Cody said.
She glanced their way. Held up her glass with a smile that was more shy than flirtatious.
Chris tapped a chord. And taking one more sip of whiskey, he started to play again.
* * *
SHE WAS THE sixth-to-the-last patron in the bar. Two separate tables, a couple at each, were still occupied. And the leathery-skinned woman who still sat at the other end of the bar. The woman talked to pretty much anyone who sat near her, but so far she was alone.
Maybe she wasn’t a working girl as she’d first assumed. Maybe she was the wife or girlfriend of the piano player? Used to sitting by herself all night while her man worked?
Keeping watch over him?
Like she should have kept watch over Rob?
One o’clock in the morning and Emma still had no place to be. Or desire to go.
She couldn’t drive anywhere. That decision had been made with her last glass of wine.
One of the hotels on the block was going to be her accommodation. Didn’t matter which one. They were all nice. All clean. In a safe area. And, because it was fall and not summer, they’d be sure to have rooms available.
Piano man glanced at her. Again. Emma should have looked away. Any other time she would have.
His glance called to her. She heard him. Those eyes said he found her interesting. She told him his music moved her.
He felt her pain. She was aware of his depths.
They were two intense people meeting on a level that no one else could share.
Or at least that’s how she translated their silent communications.
She’d never been intense before. Never even gave herself a chance to see if she could be.
She was different tonight. Allowing herself to just be. Watching, as if from afar, to see who might emerge. Maybe, just maybe, she was finding the person inside of her that she’d kept locked up tight since the day Claire went missing.
And even if this woman was only allowed out of her cage for this one night, Emma was determined to give her life.
So she sipped her wine. And she participated in nonverbal conversations.
She’d go get her hotel room. As soon as piano man was done for the night. As long as he was going to play for her, she was going to stay and listen.
* * *
CODY WOULDN’T TELL him to leave. Don Carmine, Cody’s boss and owner of Citadel’s, would have his hide if the bartender in any way offended the provider of Citadel’s discounted lobster supply. One of the best deals Chris had ever made—his lobster in exchange for 24/7 use of the baby grand, accomodations across the street when he wanted them, and whatever he wanted to drink. Chris didn’t abuse those privileges.
He didn’t usually stay late, either, but tonight he couldn’t bring himself to leave. Not while the long-legged woman still sat at the bar watching him.
His mystery woman played him just right. She made no demands or requests. Nothing he’d have to reject. She was just there. And she was exquisite.
Chris softened his touch on the keys, caressing them, telling the woman through his playing that she moved him.
He found it curious that she didn’t seem to have much awareness of her effect on other people. He hadn’t seen her so much as make eye contact with a single one of the men who’d been buzzing around her that night.
A woman alone keeping to herself wasn’t so unusual—what struck him was the way her shoulders pulled in slightly instead of squaring off, her air of hesitation, the fact that every time he caught her eye, she always glanced away first.
A glass appeared on the cork-lined black tray sitting on top of the piano, within hands’ reach, as he played. A set of keys followed.
“Lock up when you’re through.” Cody’s words could be heard over the ballad Chris was playing.
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.”
