Hurts So Good (7 page)

"See you at five,
chere.
Try to get some rest. This was nothing compared to what's in store."

He pulled the door open, but she slammed it shut.

"I never liked a cheat either, Neil. I kept my end of the bargain—now it's your turn to ante up. You never answered the first question. Do you ever hurt?"

"You still have to ask? I'm hurting.
Bad.
Look between my legs if you want proof."

"What I want is an answer from your past. Your heart."

"My heart?" he repeated derisively. "You mean what's left of it? So little left I don't have one."

"I don't believe that."

"You don't
want
to believe it, that's your problem. Right now I've got a problem of my own I aim to satisfy."

"You're leaving here to go to a prostitute?"

"Don't
ever
suggest such a thing to me again. I have standards—hot damn, can you believe it?—as to who I screw. And
where
I screw them."

"I don't screw," she said between clenched teeth.

He looked her over, several times, before a slow, smug smile spread from his lips, lips that were incredible and, despite everything, still vastly desirable. Worst of all, he knew it.

"We'll see about that. Should be fun changing your mind. Even if you're in need of a few pointers, I'll be more than happy to oblige." He tweaked her nose. "Later,
chere."

"You cheat! You double-crossing cheat! Do you hurt?
Can
you hurt? Tell me or this is the last deal we ever cut."

His smirk disintegrated.

"Can I hurt?" he repeated distantly, his eyes turning into mires of desolation. "First, answer me this. Why do you think artists are driven to do what they do? Why do painters tell a story with drawings or writers paint a picture with words? Give you a hint. The same reason musicians express themselves in a language that speaks to strangers."

"Because... because they're compelled to express their emotions? Or it's their way of filling an empty spot inside?"

"That's a good part of it, but not all. The pain,
chere.
They work from the pain. The kind that hurts and never goes away. But no real artist wants it to, since that's the emotionally poisoned well they draw from. The more it hurts, the better they can be. Think of Van Gogh, Edgar Allan Poe, more actors than you can count, and...
me."

"Then you must hurt deeply," she said softly, recognizing his wise, jaded strength, feeling an empathy with him that even her resentment couldn't deny.

He reached for her, and though she cursed herself for it, she clung to him. The steady beat of his heart thumped against her cheek as she heard him sigh. "I do. But,
chere,
it hurts so good."

Chapter 5

Andrea locked her apartment door, barring any undesirable sorts that might have followed her home. She denied the immediate impulse to turn on every light and scanned the room by glow of the blinking neon sign outside. Assured she was alone, she hurried to the balcony and pulled back the gauzy curtains.

Frantically, she searched the street below. The bum she'd almost stepped on was still lying in the trash-strewn gutter. One of her neighbors, a female impersonator working at a local nightclub, stopped at a corner across the street and said something to someone in the shadows.

Was that the someone she'd felt dogging her steps home for the past week, only to disappear whenever she spun around? Or was it only her imagination making the fine hair prickle on her neck? Each night when she'd reached her building, she sensed her stalker pause. Heart pounding, she'd flooded her apartment with light then yanked back the drapes in silent challenge, but whenever she peered out she saw... nothing.

This time she left the lights off, rendering herself as invisible as her night stalker. The thin curtain trembled in her grip as she waited and watched. Her neighbor headed toward the apartment building. A match flared in the shadows, then went out.

A large man stepped forward.

Tilting up his head, he looked straight at her balcony.

Andrea let go of the curtain and pressed her back to the wall, her heart racing.
Neil.
She peeked out again and saw that he glanced at his watch, took several cigarette puffs, then strode in her direction.

Was he trying to scare her away or scare her back, since all week she'd been keeping a safe, not-within-touching distance from him?

Whichever it was, she was going to find out. She turned on the lamp beside her couch and prepared to do battle as she struggled with the stubborn lock on the French doors. It finally gave, and she stepped onto the balcony with a huff.

The sharp challenge on her tongue faltered when she found herself staring at his retreating back. She saw the somersault of his cigarette in the air, and then, like him, it was gone.

Andrea took several shaky breaths. And then she pulled out her portable typewriter from the closet. The sweat had yet to dry on her palms as she began to read her latest notes:

Who is
this man really? What drives him to perform and yet shun
applause from the masses, to create but let lesser artists revel in the glory of his compositions rather than take rightful claim?

These are a few of the contradictions defining Neil Grey. As a professional, he creates music that is beyond ambition. He captures the invisible grace that even auspicious peers miss. It's his signature, and no one can duplicate it, not even a master forger.

But as with Beethoven, it's a gift that seems misplaced in the hands of a man who shrugs off the honor, and those who would honor it. Many similarities exist between these two musical geniuses: the arrogance; self centered egotism; foul mouths, and even fouler manners. But Grey's disdain is more subtle, and it is that subtlety that makes the pain he seems driven to share keener and more offensive.

Rereading the last paragraph, she felt her palms grow more moist. She typed
XXXX.
As many
Xs
as it took to silence a half hour's angry work that was anything but objective.

She began to pound the keys, putting one word in front of the other, until day broke and her back ached.

Andrea stretched and sighed as she read the new pages. She'd given up the vain quest for objectivity, but at least she had managed to be fair. Most of it would have to be rewritten, at least a page trashed, but the last paragraph she knew she'd keep:

He
is
the rarest of breeds, a visionary who casts a giant shadow but hides it to walk among men. He hides it well, and for reasons unknown—but his purpose, elusive like his music, is there. He is a rebel with a cause who likes to shake things up, then disappear to watch from the wings...

* * *

It was dark, pitch-black, the way he liked it when he had something to think about. That's when the music usually came, with everything silent except for the melody filling his head.

Like a sparkler on the Fourth of July, the glowing red tip of Neil's cigarette slashed the air while his foot tapped to the beat.

"Dammit, and damn
her
while I'm at it. That's not it." He stopped the cigarette in mid-arc and swooped it to his mouth.

He breathed in the strong smoke and cursed her some more. Who did she think she was, getting under his skin and messing with his brain? He hoped she was satisfied; this was one of the worst dry spells he could remember since when.

If something didn't give and give soon, he wasn't going to be able to pack in pigs, much less a full house of paying guests. No one had to tell him—though Lou already had—that he wasn't up to snuff. He didn't have the same swagger onstage, and it didn't help matters that every time he glanced at the bar, his mouth went dry and his notes went flat.

Neil lit a smoke with the one he was about to crush. At this rate he wouldn't need to worry about overhead and Christine, since he'd have emphysema before the year was out.

Then again, maybe liver disease would get to him first.

As he reached into his back pocket, a soft knock sounded at the office door.

"Yeah?" he yelled. "Who is it and whaddaya want? Unless someone died, scram, 'cause it's gonna be your funeral."

The door cracked open, and a thin stream of light cast a slender silhouette onto the floor.

"Neil? I'm sorry to bother you, but Lou had to get home early and everyone else is gone." She paused as if waiting for a reply that didn't come. "I brought you the money from the cash register—the club manager was out, and you forgot to empty it when you closed up."

He didn't forget. He just hadn't wanted to get that close to his Achille's heel, and damn Lou, too, since he'd promised to bring the money himself.

The silence stretched long and thick between them, and even from where he sat, he could see her shift uneasily.

"Neil, the tray's getting a little heavy," she said, breathless. "Where should I put it?"

"On my desk."

"I can't see. Where's the light switch?"

"Leave it off and take your best shot. Proprietor's prerogative."

"But I'm afraid I'll trip and drop it."

"Trip, and I'll pick you up. Drop it, and we'll have more fun than scrambling for throws from a Mardi Gras float."

"If you insist,
boss."
Gone was the soft tone; her voice was back to its hoity-toity clipped accents. "But if I do fall, don't bother to catch me. I can pick myself up." She added on a whisper he didn't think he was meant to hear, "Lots of practice."

He watched her move in while his mind cast about for some way to end their stalemate. That kiss had turned him inside out, but he couldn't bring himself to take back the rules she wanted nothing to do with. Some rules could be bent, most couldn't. He never made one without having a good reason to make it.

The cash box landed with a
thump
on his ledger.

"Care to take me on for a game of darts?" Dumb idea, but it was the first thing that came to him. "Darts in the dark. I get black, you get red. Forget the navel, we'll vie for either nipple or thereabouts. You rack up the most zaps, and I'll raise your wage. But if I win, you give me a kiss. Make it good enough, and I just might raise your wage anyhow."

"I don't think so, Neil. Catch me later, when I'm up to taking you on. I'm ready to crawl
alone
into my bedbug infested bed."

"Wait." He crushed out the cigarette and quickly got up. "I'll walk you home."

"No thank you," she said politely. So politely he wished she was back to calling him names. Then he'd have an excuse to be a bully again—only he'd be a slyer bully, one who knew she didn't take to ultimatums.

He beat her to the door. Shutting it, he sealed them in darkness. She was so close to his chest, his thighs, he felt her body heat, lush and defiant, mingle with his. Her scent was fresh and feminine, some lemon-and-lavender smell he'd never detected on any woman but her.

"Not even if I let you buy the
beignets
and coffee on the way? You did offer, and I'm calling in my rain check."

"And I'm taking a rain check on the rain check."

He didn't know how to deal with her evasion. The shoe was on the other foot, and he didn't care for the fit.

"You don't seem to want my company. My 'inflated ego' takes exception to that. Tell the truth,
chere.
Afraid I might melt some of that ice you've wrapped around yourself? It's so thick I don't even pick up my own money for fear of frostbite."

"Careful, Slick. A woman might get the impression that she's managed to intimidate the master string-puller himself."

He stepped forward; she matched him with a back step.

"Either it works both ways or we're dancin' in the dark." Swiftly, he secured a hand at her waist. His other hand brushed a breast before sliding down her arm to grip the hand he expected was ready to take a swing.