The Girl in the Mirror (Sand & Fog #3) (29 page)

Milo Bassard’s head pops in. “Welcome to NBBC, Miss Harris. You give me anything less every day than you did today and your career here is over.”

The door slams behind him.

“Krystal”

My mouth heatedly moving on his, I flatten Jacob against the loft door, grinding my body into him, unable to get close enough.

I’ve been on fire since Milo Bassard informed me I would be part of NBBC this season, the high making me dizzy with euphoria and my flesh scorching with want. I’ve never felt the demand of my sex this way before. Success after painful years of failure, it’s like a potent aphrodisiac.

The wait to be with Jacob has been agony. I’m not waiting another second to fill myself with the feel of him as this wonderful sensation pulses through me.

I would have made love to him in the lockers at NBBC if he’d let me. I would have done him in the car if he hadn’t stopped me midway into the blowjob. The build of my sexual want during the drive here is nothing less than delicious torture. Home, finally. No, Jacob, not stopping this time.

Fucking him with my tongue, I work at his belt and he jerks his lips from mine. “Babe, we can’t. Cass and Xavier can’t be far behind us.”

“I don’t care. I’ve never felt anything like I’m feeling right now. I want to make love to you. Before it goes away. I want to feel you in me while I feel like this.”

His head rolls on the door as he tries to steady me while my mouth moves in bites and kisses down his neck.

“I don’t think fifteen minutes is going to be enough to get this out of your system, babe, and that’s probably all the head start we have on Cass. This happy ballerina fucking I think is going to last longer than angry ballerina fucking.”

Laughing, I free him from his pants and his cock springs out. The sight of it makes my lower muscles clench and I ignore his forceless efforts to put this on hold until later after our friends leave.

A shudder rolls him head to toe. Oh, he’s as heated up as I am. I glove his erection in my hand before crashing my mouth into his. One stroke and he groans, the sound muffled by our locked lips. His hands dig into my ass and he lifts me up into him as I wrapped my legs and arms around him.

“No play,” I whisper, nibbling on his earlobe. “I want you now. Don’t make me wait.”

He takes me to our room and spreads me on the bed. “You better be ready because I’m not waiting.”

Grabbing my ankles, he jerks me toward him, rapidly undressing us both between raging kisses and touches. The second we’re naked, he covers me with his body.

I feel his erection pushing in on my slit and I lift my hips as he plunges deeply. Cradling me with his body, he pounds into me. The hard thrusts are glorious, and my nails dig into his back, urging him deeper, harder as I revel in the sensation of dissolving into him.

My skin is on fire, my limbs are quaking, and without warning I tumble over the edge, clutching on to him as wave after wave of pleasure rockets through my limbs.

“Ah. Ah. I love you…I love you…” The words punctuate my pants as I shake with my climax.

His face moves from my shoulder to my ear. “I love you, babe. Oh, Krystal, I love you.”

Another hard thrust adds to the inferno inside me. My nerves are overly alert and my inner walls like an iron ring around his seeking cock.

His hands slip beneath me, scooping me into his rapid thrusts. Our sweat-slick bodies continue the frantic dance of our hips. Over and over again. Like there’s no limit for us, not even in this.

My head sways on the pillow, wanting more though my muscles are drained and languid. By the time he arches up, erupting inside me, we’re both breathless and limp.

His body eases down on me and his chest moves in quick jolts against my breasts as he struggles to take in air.

With one arm, he pushes up to stare down at me. “Are you OK, babe? You danced ten hours straight today. You’ve got to be sore. I shouldn’t have been so rough with you. But you got me crazy in the car with the blowjob.”

My cheeks heat as I laugh. “I’m sore everywhere now.”

He doesn’t laugh. “Seriously, Krystal. Did I hurt you?”

I bite my lower lip to hold back my smile. “It was exactly what I wanted. Needed. You never hurt me. Though I don’t think that was totally happy ballerina fucking. I sensed a little bit of angry Jacob fucking in that one.”

He grimaces. “Not angry. I never make love to you when I’m angry.”

“Then what was it? It can’t be horny Jacob because you got good love this morning. That leaves protective Jacob? Caveman Jacob? Or angry Jacob?”

He rolls his eyes at me, annoyed by my need to create definitions for everything, even his moods, before he turns us until I’m lying atop him.

For a few minutes he doesn’t speak.

“It’s hard for a man to watch his wife be treated by another man the way you were today. I felt useless when Milo Bassard was berating you, throwing things, and yelling during the audition. I wanted to stop it and I couldn’t. There’s something about him that makes my gut churn every time you’re near him. And I can’t even explain what it is for me when he touches you. I wanted to blot him from your mind and cover your body in only the feel of me. That’s what that was.”

I stare at him. He’s never said anything like this to me before. It’s my third audition with NBBC. How Milo Bassard directs is nothing new to either of us.

What’s stirring this up?

The reality that I’m now a member of the company?

Or is it Milo Bassard?

Jacob won’t say it, but we both know with his protectiveness there’s a little jealousy. That tic in his cheek twitches whenever a guy gets close to me or is a tad too touchy or flirtatious.

I close my hands on his face. “You don’t have to blot Milo out. All I ever feel or think about is you.”

“There are times it still doesn’t feel real that you love me. And when I watch you in rehearsals, I wonder what the hell you’re doing with me. You can have anyone, Krystal.”

I shake my head and surround him with my arms. “I have who I want. You and me. That’s all there is. All there’ll ever be, Jacob. Very real. Why do you think I asked you to marry me?”

He makes a short laugh, amused, before his hazel orbs grow intense. “Just watch yourself with him. OK?”

My eyes widen in surprise. “I don’t have to watch myself with him. I love you. Not Milo Bassard or anyone else is going to come between us. Not ever.”

His jaw tightens and it looks like he’s holding back on saying something.

“What?” I probe.

He shakes his head. “I don’t think he’s someone we should trust. He makes the hairs on my neck stand up. I don’t know why.”

I study his face, trying to figure out why this now.

Jealousy, or is it more?

That bodyguard thing that never sleeps, suspicious of everyone?

Or maybe it’s just that what happens in the studio is often incomprehensible to someone who doesn’t dance. Jacob’s not an artist, and he doesn’t know that both the mental and physical workout is part of how a dancer is pushed to reach full potential.

Ballet is not for the soft. I thought he understood that. He’s always seemed fine with everything before now. But maybe I was wrong.

I kiss him gently, my hands gliding in light strokes on his biceps. We lie for several minutes without talking then the buzzer on the intercom sounds.

He moves me until I’m tucked into his side and reaches to hit the button. “Yes?”

“A Miss Mendez and Mr. Padilla are asking to come up,” the doorman announces.

“Send them up in five minutes, Yuri.”

Jacob sits on the edge of the bed. “I’ll shower and dress first, babe. You take your time. I’ll entertain them until you’re ready. Do you need anything? Ice for your feet?”

Something in Jacob’s voice makes my insides sharply adjust. It’s like the glow has gone out of the evening and I’m not exactly sure how that happened.

I curl into his pillow, watching him move around the room. “No, baby. I’m good.” But I no longer feel good as Jacob disappears into the bathroom.

* * *

Thirty minutes later, laughter greets me as I step from the bedroom. I pause at the end of the hallway and my eyes go wide.

The lights are dimmed, every candle in the loft is lit, and music pours from the ceiling speakers. Where are Jacob, Cass, and Xavier? The kitchen is vacant. No one is in the living room area. The terrace doors are open.

I go to the glass and pull back the sheer drape. More lit candles surround them as they sit on the plush loungers facing the city. The smile and the light flush on Jacob’s cheeks makes my insides shimmy.

They’ve been drinking. I note the food set out on the low table between the chaises, a party on the fly à la Jacob, since we didn’t know today both Cass and I would be invited into the corps at NBBC and there would be a reason to celebrate tonight.

I lay my cheek against the frame of the patio door and watch them. Whatever that mood was in the bedroom it’s gone. Jacob looks happy and that strange uneasiness inside me is banked instantly. We’re good again.

“Krystal. Finally, you lazy girl.” I shift my gaze to find Cassandra’s brightly animated eyes on me. She smiles above the champagne flute dangling in her fingers. “We’ve almost killed the bottle without you.”

“Kill the bottle. I’m drunk on life,” I tease.

Her laughter sounds like tinkling bells. “No. You’re drunk on your husband. Your fabulous husband who did all this”—her hands flutter gracefully above the small buffet and candles set between us—“and takes such wonderful care of my dearest friend. You’re drunk on your husband. I would be, too.”

“Hey,” Xavier rebukes good-naturedly. “I’m sitting right here, Cass. I can hear everything.”

“Of course you can, darling,” she purrs, closing her face to his and shimmying her nose to his nose. “That’s the point. To make you love me how Jacob loves her. I want to have everything like Krystal does.”

They laugh, and color crowds my cheeks as I cross the patio and sink down close to Jacob.

Xavier fixes me in an intense stare. “What is it your husband does? He won’t tell us. No matter how often we ask. He doesn’t look like a banker or a criminal or even old money, but you live like this when no one has money these days.”

I shrug as I pour a glass of champagne. “He loves me. That’s his job. Cass already told you.”

Cassandra shakes her head until her dark curls dance. “Yes, but his work. Three years and as far as I can tell, you’re the only thing Jacob does. He’s like a balletomane on steroids. He takes you to Juilliard and picks you up. He’s at every audition—by the way, you can thank me later for not letting him hit my father—and as far as I can tell, you two are never apart. I can’t figure out when he has time to work.”

I pretend to find this amusing, but I don’t. “What do you think he does?”

Cassandra’s brows shoot up. “I think he’s a criminal.”

Jacob laughs. “I’ve already told you. I’m her husband. That’s my job.”

Xavier leans into Cassandra, grinning. “I should marry you then because I’d like to live this way.”

Laughing, Cassie falls into him. “Trust me. We’re not living this way on a corps salary from NBBC.”

Xavier pouts. “No?”

She kisses him. “No. The paperwork we got today said something like 42K annual salary. We can’t even live how we already live on what I’m going to make as a professional dancer. I need to find you employment like Jacob’s, only they’re so mean they won’t tell us what he does.”

I sneak a glance at Jacob from the corner of my eye as I scoop a small serving of brochette onto a plate. Christ, they’re drunk, and I worry about Jacob’s reaction to
this
conversation—the rude
where does the money come from
chatter Cass frequently subjects us to—until his hand closes on my thigh and gives me a light squeeze. Fire runs the surface of my flesh, warming my entire body, telling me we’re OK even with this overly invasive nonsensical prying from our friends.

Clumsily pulling herself from Xavier, Cassandra holds up her glass. “We need a toast.” We all lift our glasses. “To the two newest Milo Bassard Ángels.”

We clink glasses.

“Who would have thought we’d finally make it, Krystal? Three years.” She giggles over her rim. “That first day at Juilliard I didn’t even like you. The only reason I talked to you is I wanted to fuck your husband.”

It’s awful, but they bust up laughing in a crazed way as Jacob chokes up his champagne into his glass.

His eyes alertly search my face. “Is she serious?”

It’s not exactly how I remember the day I met Cass, but Cassandra weaves truth like macramé, into shocking and somehow humorously spontaneous utterances.

“No, she’s just giving you crap. Besides, I decided to keep you so it doesn’t matter anymore,” I tease, kissing Jacob’s nose.

His forehead resting against mine, his shimmering hazel eyes block out the world around me. “I’m glad you did.”

“Me, too.” I lean in to claim his mouth and his kiss runs down my throat and shoots through my body.

“Look!” Cassandra cries, springing from the lounger and going to the concrete terrace edge. “It’s like being in
Les Misérables
. Only we don’t die. We drink champagne and become ballerinas.”

As I stare in the direction she’s pointing, the laughter clogs in my throat. Fires glow in the distant night. A sign that there are riots somewhere.

Xavier climbs from the chair. “You’re absurd, Cass.”

She lays her head on his shoulder. “All we have is our humor, Xavier, and my 42K-a-year corps contract. What’s left to do but laugh? Even the ballet companies are going bankrupt. NBBC has been in the red for four quarters now. All this work, the years of sacrifice and pain, and I might be unemployed and we might be on the streets with the protesters sooner than you think. The world we live in
is
absurd.”

Xavier stands at the rail, holding Cassandra against his chest, and I melt into Jacob, wanting him to hold me as well.

His lips touch my hair. “It’ll be all right, Krystal. This can’t last forever.”

Tears burn my eyes. “I feel bad that I’m happy.”

“Don’t,” Jacob chides, painting kisses across my face. “You’ve worked so hard, babe.”