“Your playing is incredibly arousing.”
“It’s not the drums that have me aroused. Not the music either.”
Her breasts swelled, her nipples tightening. She opened her eyes again, found his gaze centered on her, hungrier than before. “Pacey?”
“Yeah?”
She recalled what he’d said last night about his other talent with his sticks, and her belly seemed to flip upside down. “You don’t really do that with your drumsticks, do you?”
“Oh yeah, beautiful. I really do.”
He held her gaze for just a second too long, and the air between them filled with a deafening silence. So silent, Eve feared Zachary would hear her heart pounding.
She crossed one leg over the other, squeezing her thighs together, but that only increased the ache and the throbbing. “Ouch.”
The drummer blinked. “Ouch?”
“Ouch,” she concurred, then explained in detail, “Splinters.” Yeah, actually, no. Splinters were the furthest thing from her mind.
Zachary chuckled hoarsely. “Splinters?”
“Believe me, no one wants to get splinters down there.” Her throat felt like sandpaper.
“The sticks are varnished. No fear of splinters there.”
“And your unvarnished ones?”
“I choose my tools carefully, oh, cautious one.” The air snapped and shimmered. “You know, I could make you come without laying anything more than my varnished tools on you.”
Eve blinked. “Prove it.” Her belly tumbled once more, this time in anticipation.
His voice had dropped, the deep baritone coming out soft and low, like a rumbled caress. “It’ll be my pleasure. And yours. Step closer.”
She did. Walked over until all that separated them were his drums and cymbals. She placed her hands on one of the drums and leaned forward. “Can’t get closer than this.”
“Close enough. For now.”
Jonah tapped his foot once, the rise and drop of his knee the only clue that he’d moved. That, and the reverberation through the drums as a low, soft boom echoed through the foyer.
The sound vibrated through her arms and down her body. She jerked in surprise. “Wh-what are you doing?”
“Proving a point.” And his drum boomed again, a little harder.
This time the vibrations hit not only her arms, but her lower body as well, where it was pressed against the drum. The sound and feel echoed through her hips and groin.
She blinked.
Zachary smiled a knowing smile.
“Zach—”
“Shh. Just feel the beat.”
He began to play then, continually, a soft, sexy beat. Slow and seductive.
She tried to concentrate. Tried to identify the song but in the end gave up. The vibrations shivering through her made thinking too difficult.
The tempo was hypnotic, and Eve closed her eyes, letting it draw her in, letting her heart pick up the rhythm of the sound and pulse in time with it. But it wasn’t just the music that caught her. It was the movement of the drum. The gentle, ongoing throb. It wasn’t just her heart pulsing. Her groin pulsed too. Each beat shuddered through her pussy, a gentle tap against her clit. Or maybe it was around her clit, or under. No, the tap seemed to surround it, surround her whole groin.
The slow, steady vibration that had begun as a pleasant beat soon changed, increasing in tempo. Her pussy pulsated harder, and she clenched, realizing, almost belatedly, how arousing the rhythm had become.
A heartbeat in her pussy, stimulating, teasing.
She opened one eye and looked at him, stunned. “Za—”
“Uh-uh, Eve. Not one word. Close your eyes.”
She obeyed, speechless as moisture pooled between her legs. On some level she tried not to let go, not give herself over to the sweet harmony of Zachary’s drums, but on another level, a deeper one, she knew she didn’t stand a chance. She shifted closer, pushing herself harder against the drum.
He rewarded her by playing a little harder, a little faster.
The contented sigh that escaped her lips melded with the sound of percussion in the air around her.
And then the beat changed, slowed. Rather than a cacophony of sounds and taps, only two remained. One deep and steady, the other lighter, from the drum she rested against.
Before she could question it, something tickled down the front of her shirt. A soft whisper from her throat to her waist.
She tugged heavy lids open.
Zachary’s arm was stretched toward her, and as she watched, he drew his drumstick up again, this time tracing the outline of her breasts.
Her breath caught.
“You’re very beautiful when you’re aroused.” The tip of the drumstick found her nipple, circled it in a whispered caress.
She hardly noticed. Zachary’s brown eyes had darkened. They held her spellbound.
“The way your lips part, and the tip of your tongue wets the lower one?” His gaze dropped to her mouth. “Sexiest thing I’ve ever seen.”
His drumstick drifted over to her other nipple.
Eve’s chest felt heavy, as though her breasts had swelled beneath his attention. Her nipples were stiff beads of pleasure, and each sweep of the stick over them made her tingle.
“It makes me want to know how those lips would feel around my shaft, how your tongue would wet my cock.”
Eve swallowed at the image he painted. It made her want to wrap her lips around his shaft, lick him from root to tip.
“Here’s what I need you to do, Tiny.” He stroked the tip of one stick up her chest and neck, and traced her mouth with it.
How he kept the touch so gentle, so erotic, Eve had no idea. Years of experience with his sticks was her only answer.
“Lose the skirt. Get rid of it. Good as you look in it, and…” He stopped, cleared his throat. “And you do look edible in it, for this I need it out of the way.”
Trapped by the greed in his eyes, Eve reached behind her, unfastened the skirt and shimmied out of it so she stood before him in her blouse and panties.
Zachary said something, a nonsensical word that came out like a growl. And then his drumstick trailed carnally down her front, down between her aroused breasts, down over her navel, down to where the edge of her shirt met the elastic of her panties.
And that’s where it stopped trailing.
“I’ve played many instruments before.” His gaze was focused on the point where his stick touched her panties. “Made music on everything from violins to saxophones, drums to didgeridoos, but never…” Again he cleared his throat. “Never have I anticipated creating symphonies like right now.” His voice alone was a tempestuous assault on her nerves. “Never have I wanted to make music like I want to make music with you.”
Eve’s knees turned to mush. Wet heat pooled between her legs. She had to clutch the drums to ensure she stayed upright.
And her weakness only increased as he dragged the tip of that maddening drumstick lower, finding her clit, and pressing with just the tiniest amount of pressure against it.
Eve almost climaxed on the spot.
She closed her eyes, ground her teeth, clenched her fingers over the rim of the drums and held every muscle rigid in an effort not to.
Zachary’s hum of satisfaction told her he’d noticed. He eased the pressure minutely. Long seconds passed where all Eve heard was the sound of her breath and his, hers fast and shallow, his slower, softer.
And then the tip of the drumstick was gone. But not for long. Zachary flattened the stick so he held it parallel to her legs, the tip resting on her clit.
He strummed her pussy. Strummed it with his drumstick like a cellist strummed strings with a bow. He played that stick over her, drawing it up and down, ever so gently, ever so erotically.
And she stood there, panting, her legs trembling, her pussy pulsing as he created his music.