Page 129 of Lethal Obsession

Or your laser eyes and endless questions.

When it comes to my father, security trumps privacy, every time. There’s no chance he’s coming to visit without looking over my house himself. The secure room might do a good job of resembling a sound studio. But that won’t stop Papa from asking awkward questions, and he’s a hard man to lie to.

I don’t like the secrets and deception any more than my brother does.

But I like the idea of my father and Alexei putting bullets through each other even less. And I don’t need Mickey to tell me that’s exactly what will happen if this gets revealed the wrong way.

Don’t ask me what the right way is. I have no fucking idea.

“Well, Sergei is here with me,” Papa says. “He says he would very much like to come, if that isn’t too much family for you?”

I sigh inwardly. “Fine.” Then, feeling instantly guilty, I adjust my tone. “I would love to see Deda Sergei.”

“Good,” he says briskly. “And tell your brother to call us. He’s barely sent a text since he came for dinner.”

I open my mouth to say I thought Mickey was with him on business, then quickly close it again.

My brother’s affairs are his own business—and I’m hardly about to betray his secrets when I’m relying on him to keep my own. And I seriously owe him for setting up the secure room, which has rapidly become my haven.

The truth is that since that first phone call, Alexei and I have spent almost every minute with the secure line open. I practice while he codes on his laptop, working on some project he and Lars are designing together. Sometimes I look up from my piano and find him just watching me with an expression that makes my entire being glow with happiness.

We don’t talk about what the future holds or when we’re going to see one another again. Sometimes we spend hours in silence, just coexisting in cyberspace.

And knowing that Alexei can see me has given my afternoon sunbaking sessions a whole new, incredibly hot dimension. I find myself playing to his gaze in ways I never could have dreamed I would before I met him. Usually, by the time I make it back into the secure room, he’s waiting for me, cock hard and eye blazing in the way that makes me shiver deep inside.

Phone sex might be a poor substitute for the real thing, but after only days, just the sound of Alexei’s lowered voice has me close to orgasm.

Despite my assurances to my father, I’m as nervous as I’ve ever been as I stand in the shadows waiting to take the stage.

Practicing La Vega over and over beneath Alexei’s caressing eye has taken my playing to new heights. But I’m still not sure how that will translate to a public performance.

Despite having gone over each note time and again, I feel like I understand the piece no better than when I played it for the first time. Isaac Albéniz’s “La Vega” is a poignant piece dedicated to the beautiful plains around Granada. Playing it before a critical audience of Granadinos, who consider the composer one of their own, is daunting at best—and utterly terrifying at worst.

I can sense the emotion within the piece. I can play the tricky passages without difficulty.

But I can’t feel it.

And for me, that’s where the gap lies—between giving an audience a performance versus creating an unforgettable experience.

Whether I’m playing on a high school stage or in the Alhambra, the joy for me comes from finding the soul of a piece. And right up to my last practice session this afternoon, that indefinable magic was still eluding me.

I wish Alexei were here.

If I could just see his face in the audience, sense his dusky scent nearby, I know I’d play with the same nuance I found on the yacht.

But the truth is that the moment I leave his gaze, he feels impossibly absent, our time together instantly fading into a golden bubble of fantasy that exists in a world separate from my own.

Especially now.

The marble floor of the Patio de Arrayanes is framed by a seven-arched Moorish portico, beyond which the audience is seated on either side of a long, still pool, hedged by the myrtle trees for which the patio is named.

If I wasn’t already terrified, the space is so intimate that I can literally hear the audience breathing.

The ensemble preceding me finish and take their bows.

The presenter takes the stage to announce me. Unfortunately, she doesn’t bother to explain that I’m filling in for someone else, resulting in a rustle of paper as the audience check their programs in confusion.

I walk out to a smattering of desultory applause and muttered asides. One of Granada’s more richly dressed matrons is fanning herself indignantly with the program in the front row. She eyes me as I pass, clearly skeptical about the last-minute substitution.