Sarge was silent a moment, but when he spoke, he sounded different. More… aware. Heated. “I can hear your legs moving in the sheets.”
Jasmine turned her face into the pillow to release an unsteady breath. “You shouldn’t be listening that closely.”
Another heavy beat passed. “Who’s to decide what we shouldn’t do?”
Lord save me from this guy. Had this seductively masculine man been hiding under the surface the entire time she’d known him, just waiting for an almighty growth spurt to make the results known? Because goddamn, someone needed to alert Guinness to make Sarge’s changes a matter of public record. Her eighteen-year-old self would have called him “diesel” and sucked her teeth when he walked by. “Do you always have trouble sleeping?” Jasmine asked weakly.
“No,” came his voice. “The trouble usually comes when I’m awake.”
Crazy enough, she knew exactly what he meant. Sleep was the time to block everything out. Forget all the self-doubt and fear of the future and just…drop off for a while. But why would Sarge have a need to block out anything? He was internationally renowned, loved, and emulated for his work. If she’d reached his heights, she would never want to sleep again. “Maybe it’ll help if you play your guitar.” No answer for long minutes. “Sarge?”
“I can play you something, but I can’t sing.”
She arched an eyebrow toward the ceiling. “Why not?”
His laugh sent her right hand fluttering to her belly, where it flattened and rubbed in a needy circle. “You banned me from using my gutter mouth around you.”
Her hand stilled. “All your songs require gutter mouth?”
“All of them,” Sarge said huskily, making the darkness pulse around her.
Before she could stop herself, Jasmine trailed her fingertips up her stomach, to the valley between her breasts. No one could see her. It was fine. The shame was hers alone to bear. “Fine. Just play something slow.”
For the next few minutes, she could hear Sarge getting out of bed and padding over to his luggage before flipping open the locks on his guitar case. The guest bed creaked as he sat back down and plucked a few strings. A trail of cohesive notes danced in the air, accompanied by his steady breathing, the gentle tap of his hand against the wooden instrument, as he kept time. The melody was so bold and full—almost tangible—she could feel every pluck of the strings in her middle, deep, deep, deep down. She tried to keep her legs still in the sheets, but they wouldn’t stop moving with the beats and pauses. Her eyes drifted shut, heightening her sense of hearing…and swore his intakes of air grew shorter as the music swelled.
Ay Dios. The music wasn’t the only thing swelling. The seams of her underwear felt abrasive against her sensitive areas, so close to the epicenter of need at the juncture of her thighs. When it occurred to Jasmine that a whispered plea into the darkness could bring Sarge into her bedroom, where he would weigh her down with his aggressively hot body, she almost gave in and used restless fingers to stroke at the thrumming ache. But the music cut out suddenly, the abrupt silence having the effect of a fluorescent light being flipped on.
“Why did you stop?” Jasmine called, when she’d regained her relative composure. “I liked that one.”
She thought she heard Sarge say something in the neighborhood of you should, but couldn’t be positive. Her eyelids were beginning to droop, even as the sounds of Sarge replacing his guitar in its case filled the small apartment. How odd that the song had relaxed her, even as it excited her body. But the oddity of the situation lay in the fact that it didn’t feel odd at all. A mixture of comfort and confusion seemed to fit perfectly with her new perception of Sarge.
Jasmine reached for the forever-unused pillow propped beside her on the bed, wedging it between her thighs in an attempt to cull the rush of sensation. Just before she drifted off, she heard Sarge say, “That was the last censored version you’re getting, Jas.”
Her pulse skittered in her veins, sending her into tumultuous, heated, and forbidden dreams. They were full of disjointed groans and grabbing hands. Gratified grunts and straining bodies. A man was there, grappling for the upper hand, but her dream self continued to close her eyes—attempting to block him out—while luring him closer with her body. Until…oh God, until he grew tired of her mixed signals and struggled her into submission. Pinning her wrists at her sides, his hair dragging a trail over her belly button as he licked down to a core that had never felt so empty.