Season 1—Seduction—Episode 12
As though sensing this, Jax stepped into the huge archway and said, “Fully clothed. Bring me my jacket while I finish up, please.”
A sliver of disappointment over not having caught Jax in any stage of undress made her pout slightly, but then she reminded herself it was a good thing he was already in his suit pants and crisp white dress shirt.
She crossed the suite, gathering up his jacket from the rack outside the door to his dressing room, and entered the bathroom.
Jax was at the vanity running his fingers through his thick black hair, giving it a roguishly disheveled look that kept an insistently erratic beat thrumming through her veins.
Goddamn! What horrible timing for all of these sparks to be flying!
Catching her reflection in the mirror, Jax said, “I suppose I have you to thank for the new bottle of Hugo Boss?”
“You were nearly out so I had it sent over from one of the town square boutiques.” It was her favorite manufactured smell these days. While Lex forwent cologne in favor of all that sexy male heat he radiated, Jax preferred the more refined scent of Hugo Boss. She could close her eyes and inhale both aromas and probably orgasm from that alone.
But thoughts such as that didn’t help her plight any, now did they?
She said, “Mr. Alexander would like you to meet him downstairs in five minutes. Three-and-a-half at this point, actually.”
She assisted Jax into his jacket as she had Lex.
Jax straightened his tie and turned to her, flashing his devilish grin. “Perfect, right?”
Her stomach fluttered. “Almost.” She went to the oversized, raised sink, flipped on the tall, twenty-four-karat-gold-plated faucet, and collected a few drops of water on her fingertip.
Returning to Jax, she dabbed at the very minuscule crease in his shirt collar that had recently occurred, which likely no one but her would notice. She was that meticulous.
And that was what they paid her for.
She tugged gently on the material and said, “Not enough starch. I’ll speak to your cleaner about the appropriate blend to keep this from happening again. This will dry before you’re even downstairs.” She stepped back to take him in with a professional eye. Nodded and told him, “Now you’re perfect.”
Lily smiled up at him.
Jax said, “It’s really too bad I have someplace to be.”
“Lex felt the same way,” she daringly said. For better or for worse.
“I’ll bet he did. You sizing us up with a critical eye because it’s your job doesn’t keep us from wondering what’s really going through your mind.”
“You already ascertained that—and told me so at the party.”
“Mm, true. Which means I’d better get the hell out of here or you’re going to end up naked and in my bed in two seconds.”
Excitement burst against every vertebra, stealing her breath. Making it damn difficult to say, “Don’t get me in trouble for not getting you out the door on time.”
His pewter eyes smoldered. “That’s not at all what you want to say to me, is it?”
“Not at all. But I’m saying it anyway.”
He let out a low groan of frustration. Then leaned in close and murmured, “You are a temptation harder to resist with every passing moment.”
And oh, God how she wanted to feel his hands on her body!
Despite the exhilaration humming through her veins, she crooked a brow and said, “Tick-tock.” Unfortunately, this time she wasn’t talking about him making a move on her.
“I’m going,” he grumbled. And shook his head as he disappeared through the archway.
Lily inhaled deeply, trying to get all her raging hormones under control. The stellar orgasm Lex had delivered should have helped to quell her desire, at least a tiny bit. But no . . . she was more lit up than ever before. Hotter for both men. And starting to feel a desperate need that had her inner thighs flaming and her stomach flipping.
Focus!
She straightened up the bathroom and went about her other activities, grateful for a reprieve from the sexual innuendos and tension bouncing off the walls of this wing of the mansion. Though she was still wound insanely tight.
Something had to give.
Sooner rather than later . . .
~ * * * ~
Every time Lily passed through the entryway of the music room, Jax thought she couldn’t be more beautiful. But every night, she proved him wrong.
The music was coming along fluidly, mostly driven by Lily’s reaction to it. Jax and Lex felt much more optimistic about the outcome of the CD. And had Lily to thank for it.
This evening they intended to play a new arrangement for her. One that had fully come together in the wee hours, when they’d sent her off to bed and were alone.
The composition featured Jax’s violin. The notes held a mysterious, eerie quality to them. A hint of wanting, but also the fear of losing. Emotions he’d once seen in Katarina’s eyes, when she’d first met Jax and Lex. The look that had been in Lily’s eyes from that first time they’d stumbled across each other in his bedroom.
She had thoughts and maybe even secrets that she had not been inclined to divulge since she’d come to the mansion. Both Jax and Lex had dropped a few questions. She’d deflected, turning to her work as a means of escaping any sort of personal inquiry. Jax wasn’t wholly sure what that was all about, especially given the nuances of their arrangement, the sensuality and intimacy of their evenings together. He surmised, however, that because this was a temporary assignment for her, she didn’t want to become too emotionally invested.
But he could see that she already was.
She strolled into the room wearing a full-length, sparkling silver gown. Strapless with a structured, sweetheart bodice that plumped the tops of her breasts over the material and revealed a teasing glimpse of the inner swells at the dip in the middle. The dress clung to her curves and then pooled slightly at her ankles in a short train. The jewels were a perfect complement. Along with the loosely knotted hair at the nape of her neck, a few silky strands left softly curled at her temples and bare shoulders.
Her crimson lipstick balanced out her dark eye makeup and paired exceptionally well with the gown.
She headed to the wet bar and Jax told her, while still playing, “Open the Cristal in the refrigerator, please.”
“Of course,” she said in her tantalizing voice.
While she popped the cork on the bubbly, Jax and Lex poured their hearts and souls into their music.
She set out a glass on Jax’s table. Added one on Lex’s piano.
As she returned the tray to her station, Jax said, “A glass for you as well, Lily.”
She looked at him over her shoulder. “I’m still on the clock.”
With a crooked brow, Lex inquired, “Do you do that just so he’ll command you?”
She smiled beguilingly. “Perhaps.”
“Fine,” Jax said, drawing the bow slowly across the strings and pressing on the fingerboards with his left hand. He more assertively insisted, “Have some champagne, Lily.”
“Put like that . . .” She did as instructed.
Jax and Lex continued on. She sipped. Gave herself over, as usual, to the music.
This particular arrangement had the darkest tone of all their compositions. A more compelling theme. And a few minutes later, there were tears flooding Lily’s tawny eyes. Cresting the rims and spilling over.
The fat drops tumbled down her cheeks. Her breaths were shallow, her lips partially open, her highly tempting mouth quivering at the corners.
While he and Lex continued to play, she suddenly realized she was crying. She stood and crossed to the long table to the right of the entryway and reached for a tissue. The sight of her was a gripping one, moving him as much as the composition had moved her.
“Wait,” he said to her. Jax returned his violin to its stand. Lex didn’t stop.
Jax joined her. The backs of his fingers swept over one cheek. She gazed up at him, myriad emotions in her eyes. His thumb whisked away tears from the other cheek.
Things moved and shifted inside him. His chest tightened. His groin throbbed. Everything about Lily aroused Jax and touched him on a level he’d long since forgotten about.
She swallowed down a lump of emotion. Quietly said, “You are both so broken inside.”
“Yes.”
His immediate and very honest response filled her eyes again.
“Hey,” he quietly said. “Don’t cry.”
But a few more tears fell.
Her gaze, though, did not falter.
“I know you have incredibly high standards for this CD,” she said. “Yet I don’t think you truly understand how gripping it is. You want more from it, because you’re expressing something meaningful from deep down. Maybe something you and Lex have suppressed for a long time. I get that. But . . .” Finally, she glanced around him and looked at Lex. “I’m not a dramatic person by nature. I love music, but I’m not used to it speaking to me this powerfully. I swear, you are not going to disappoint your fans. I found your individual work captivating. Yet this . . . It’s astonishing. It makes my heart hurt as much as it stirs a very dark passion within me.”
Her gaze slid to Jax again. His hands cupped her face.
She said, “Take it from a woman who knows how to keep all things emotional at bay . . . You both break through those barriers.”
Jax’s head dipped and he claimed her mouth.
He couldn’t help it. Couldn’t let another moment pass without tasting her lips.
He’d never lacked self-control. Until now. With her.
Lily’s lips parted. Jax’s tongue pushed inside, twisting and tangling with hers.
A moan lodged in her throat. His insides sizzled at the strained sound. And the feel of her—all of her.
He kissed her fervently as she clutched his biceps, shivers racing through her that resonated deep in his soul.
When he eventually, very reluctantly, pulled away, she stared up at him with wide eyes that were still misty.
“This is what we were talking about the other night,” Jax explained. “The part that goes beyond musical inspiration to . . . arousing. This sort of heady combination isn’t something either of us has experienced in quite a while, Lily.”
“It’s still surreal,” she confessed.
“Let’s simplify it. Tell me you want me,” he quietly demanded.
Her neck pulled taut again as her breath caught—the way it had when she’d stolen a glance at his bare chest that very first night.
Her gaze slid to Lex once more. Jax’s back was to him, but he had no doubt that his friend’s attention was on the two of them, despite the fact that he was still playing.
It took several suspended seconds for her tawny eyes to return to Jax.
He said, “Tell me you want us.”
She let out a small gasp.
“Yes or no, Lily,” he urged. “There has to be consent here. Because this is no ordinary affair.”
“I—”
“Lily.” This from Lex. His gentle coaxing that countered Jax’s adamant cajoling.
“Yes.” Her eyes widened further, in surprise. “Oh, God. I just said that out loud.”
Jax grinned, though it was a tight one, given the coiling of his gut and the strain of his cock against his boxer briefs. “You did.”
His hands dropped from her face. He circled around behind her. His lips grazed her delicately scented skin, along her nape. Another tremor ran through her.
His fingers clasped the zipper of her dress at the middle of her back and he whispered in her ear, “May I?”
She only had one word for him—and it came out a desperate plea:
“Please.”
It was a sweet surrender on her part. One that gripped Jax emotionally as much as it did physically. He knew it had the same effect on Lex.
Jax slid the tiny silver piece down its track. Then slipped his hands behind the material, around to the front. His cock thickened unbearably as he palmed her bare breasts. Squeezed a bit insistently, making her gasp again.
He gently shoved the dress down and she stepped out of it. Jax laid the garment over the back of a chair. Then helped her out of her lacy thong.
She stood facing him and Lex, naked save for the diamonds and sparkly sandals.
Lex let out a long breath. “Jesus.”
Her lips pressed together. As though she was still shocked they both found her so desirable. Jax couldn’t fathom it.
Granted, her humility was one of the most appealing things about her. Perhaps because both Jax and Lex had been brought down a peg with their struggle over the new compositions. They could relate, in a sense. And it didn’t hurt to have a reality check from time to time, he’d recently learned.
He took Lily by the hand and led her to the wall of windows. They kept the heat on in the evening so they could open the doors and let in the fresh sea breeze. The sheers billowed and collapsed, slowly, languidly. The waves added a subtle backdrop to Lex’s haunting music.
Jax gestured for Lily to sit on the settee. She eased back against the plump pillows in the corner. He admired every inch of her as he peeled his tank off and tossed it aside. Then he knelt before her and spread her thighs wide. One foot rested on the floor, but he lifted her other leg so that her foot was on the plush-white, tufted cushion. He didn’t give a damn if her high heel pierced the sofa. She was fantastic. And he was mesmerized.
His lips skimmed over her belly, up to her breasts. His tongue curled around her nipple, then flickered over it, eliciting a whimper from her. Then he suckled deep and she moaned, low and throaty. Another soul-stirring sound. Jax continued upward to her collarbone, then her neck. He nipped softly. Her fingers sank into his hair, twining in the strands. He raised his head and kissed her. Deeply. Passionately. Until they were both breathless.
Then he murmured against her lips, “No more Mr. Sterling or Mr. Alexander when the three of us are alone like this. Lily,” he softly implored, “I want you to say our names while we’re both making love to you.”