Page 39 of Protect Your Queen

“How good of a pianist are you?” He looked at me and lifted his brow. He did that a lot – the one-eyebrow thing. It was cute.

“Competent. But nothing professional.” I looked at the extravagant piano in front of me, and admitted, “I just know enough to understand the value of a Baldwin.”

His left hand started a new melody. This one sounded more classical. It conjured images of woodland fairies and had a lightly Irish folk sound.

“Well, the upper registers were thin and tinny. The bass was weak, and the pedals didn’t work properly.” That was when I finally noticed that his foot was holding down theuna cordapedal, or the “soft” pedal. That’s why the music had not been that loud. It reduced the sound of the instrument before us. “Jarrett had also been traveling all day and had just performed in Zürich. He had to wear a back brace because the drive was so terrible, and he hadn’t slept.”

I was fascinated by his right hand, and how the tips of his fingers lifted from his lap, as if there were invisible and inaudible keys on his knee cap.

“I would have refused to play,” I said, honestly. I didn’t accept imperfection in venue staff any more than I accepted it in myself. If they didn’t follow directions, then someone was liable to get hurt. Maybe they didn’t follow fire codes. Or they didn’t get the lighting right, and a keylight might fall right on top of me.

“It was a good thing he didn’t… refuse to play, I mean.” I finally heard it. The little roll in the notes he played. The distinctly bluesy sound. “He usedostinatosand rolling left-hand rhythms to strengthen the bass notes and had to concentrate on the middle of the keyboard. He had to change his style entirely and go out of his comfort zone.”

“I bet it was awful.”

“That concert became the best-selling piano album of all time.”

I smiled, a little embarrassed. I was getting used to being humbled by Christopher Ambrose. He was never mean. He didn’t even show interest in me. But maybe that was why I wanted his attention so much more.

I looked at his throat, and the pulse that sat there. My tongue got thick at the prospect of leaning in and kissing it. I wanted to taste him. Was he salty, and musky? Was his skin as smooth against the tongue as it looked? Were his hands as good at playing a woman as they were at playing the piano?

“You were a pianist?” I said, clearing my throat, as I tore my eyes away from him.

I could feel the racing pulse in my ears. They weren’t like the usual, slow, steady rhythm that I would hear on those empty, silent nights. I felt frantic and heated. Breathless, even. But the deeper I inhaled, the more I caught of his musky, woodsy scent, which fogged my mind even more.

For fuck’s sake, why hadn’t he put a shirton?

“I wanted to be.” Jesus, he was answering a question I had asked eons ago. “Actually, I was. I even played Carnegie Hall once.”

My eyes widened in surprise, and I turned to him again. I wanted to see if he was telling the truth, or if he was sporting that sarcastic smirk. But he was serious. I would bet my royalties on it.

“Impressive.” Then I looked at that right hand. I had seen the scars there before, but thought nothing of it. Now, I realized that it could be more… “What happened there?”

He stopped playing, his head tipping forward in resignation as he brought up his right hand. He flipped it so the palm looked up at me. The huge jagged scar was so much more obvious, andbignow that I was looking for it. It looked like a tree, starting at the side of his hand, and blossoming as it crawled downward to his thumb.

“I was in Syria, and got into a bit of a… a…” He looked up at the ceiling, as if trying to pick the word out of thin air. “A kerfuffle.”

I balked, almost laughing at his choice of word.

I think that encouraged him because he chuckled as he added, “Afracas, if you will.”

He pointed at the scar with his good hand, tracing along the main line.

“Nerve damage and limited mobility through my right hand means that I can barely spread over an octave.” He lifted his hand, palm towards me so I could see the scar more clearly. But I didn’t look at it. Instead, I placed my palm against his, marveling at the size of his fingers. He could curl his fingers completely over mine, even with my long, rounded nails.

I gasped when his fingers relaxed, his digits almost bending to intertwine with mine. I realized that I wanted nothing more than to hold his hand. It was an urge I had never felt before.

I looked at his eyes. He was staring at where our palms joined. His tongue darted out, moistening that thick lower lip and I wondered if he felt the electricity that moved between our bodies.

Then just as quickly as the moment came, he took it away, pulling his hand back to the piano.

“So, you see, my music career was dead in the water.” He put his right hand back down on his knee, and his left started again, mindlessly playing soft and gentle chords to an old familiar tune.

“Why join the military in the first place?” I was shocked. “Why endanger your talent like that?”

“Music education wasn’t really attainable for my family,” he shrugged. “I was going to use Green-to-Gold to try for Julliard, or some other music school. When that wasn’t a possibility, I just stayed in the Army, which wasn’t so bad.”

“Do you regret it?”

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