Blind Obsession

Chapter Eleven ~ Courage

That night, Phillipe stands at the kitchen window with a cup of coffee in his hand, staring out to the lit arbor. He can see Gemma out under the large branches, sitting on the bench he placed down there many months ago.

He wonders about Gemma Harris. What does she really think about everything she’s heard? She doesn’t really give him a good indication of her opinion either way.

One thing he does know is that, although she’s attracted to him, there’s definitely a wary and suspicious side of her when it comes to who he is. Oh, she lets me into her body, but there is no way that the woman who flinched away from me this morning trusts me.

Feeling a frown and a headache coming on, he places his empty cup in the sink, turning to make his way up the stairs. When he reaches the Rhapsody painting hanging on the wall, he stops for a moment and allows himself to look over her.

Taking in a deep breath, he sighs. As he lets it out softly, he shakes his head. “What am I doing?” he asks out loud. He knows he won’t get an answer, but he feels the desire to voice his request. Reaching out, he strokes his finger down the sweet curve of flesh on the canvas before dropping his hand as though the memory burned him. Turning on his heel, he makes his way to the studio.

Tonight, he is painting Armor. He is painting strength. He needs to remind himself of that, especially when familiar words keep running through his mind. Don’t let them make a villain out of you.

She is still in his head.

Spreading the drop cloth out under his easel, he moves to where he wants Gemma to stand and angles a soft spotlight on the area. Everything is ready. All he needs is her. The only problem is that he has no clue which woman he’s referring to at that precise moment.

I glance up to the studio window and watch silently as a light is turned on in the west turret. After what happened this morning, I am unsure of how this evening will go.

I know what Phillipe wants from me. He made that clear earlier today. I am finding it hard to garner the courage I need to actually go up there, remove my top, and stand before him—a man who, for very good reasons, is still annoyed at me.

Standing I look down at the bench and the inscription, Love looks not with the eyes, I try not to envy a woman who had eyes she could not see from. Because at this very moment, I would do anything not to have to stand before his perceptive and annoyed gaze.

Oh well, best to get it over with. I make my way inside and upstairs to extend my trust with the hope that he will give his in return.

When I reach the studio, I don’t wait for permission. I simply make my way inside, determined to prove to him that I can be strong—just as strong as Chantel. As I move through the room, I ask myself, When did this become a competition to me? No matter how long I think about that, I still have no answer, and now, the question itself is starting to disturb me. Noticeably, there is no music tonight, just silence. This, for some reason, pleases me.

“You came.” His familiar voice travels across the room. “I wasn’t sure you would.”

Straightening my shoulders, I try to remind myself that he is not referring to this afternoon when I brought myself to a spectacular climax, fantasizing about her. No, that dark secret still remains solely mine.

I make my way over to where he obviously wants me to stand, and I turn to him. “Of course, I’m here. This is why you invited me to the chateau, correct?”

He tilts his head to the side. Seemingly out of nowhere, he asks, “What’s different tonight?”

“Excuse me?” I query, tugging on the bottom of my shirt, a little nervous now.

This man constantly has me questioning myself. It’s hard to believe that I ever had a moment where I was comfortable enough to let him inside of my body—unless, of course, I hallucinated that whole episode in the vineyard as well. With the way my mind keeps playing tricks on me, it would not surprise me.

“What is different?” he repeats, moving toward me. His long legs cross the space in no time at all. “You seem defensive tonight, like you’re out to prove something…or perhaps you’re hiding something.”

Swallowing hard, I clasp my fingers together, fidgeting with my nails.

“I’m not hiding anything. How absurd,” I tell him.

I don’t feel he’s convinced because those shrewd sage-colored eyes narrow as he licks his bottom lip.

“Maybe I’m defensive because you challenged me this afternoon. Will you be wearing your armor? Does that ring a bell?” I snap in a tone far more bitchy than I expect.

His silence is unnerving, and his stare is unwavering as he slowly shakes his head. “No. That’s not it. You’re hiding something.”

Clenching my jaw, I stay stubbornly quiet until he finally turns and walks back to where he set up his paints.

“So, take off all my clothes then? We can’t work in sections?” I query, trying to decide what he wants.

“No we can’t work in sections. You need to remove it all.”

“Can’t I leave my pants on until you are ready for that part?” I demand instantly.

One of his eyebrows goes up as he states very calmly, “No, Gemma, you know better. The piece is full nude—unless, of course, you aren’t brave enough. I don’t understand the problem. I have seen it all before.”

I curse my own insecurities. I’m not sure if I’m ready to be so vulnerable and so exposed to him again. I reach down, unbuckle my pants, and unzip them quickly, pushing them to the floor. I kick them to the side with a little more force than necessary.

“I suppose you need these off as well?” I question in a surly tone.

Phillipe looks at my fingers, which are touching the lace of my white panties. “Of course.”

I roll my eyes. It figures he would find a way to make me feel like I just asked a stupid question. Reaching down to the bottom of my shirt, I start to unbutton it, when I realize he is still standing there. He patiently watches me with intense eyes, pulling his lips into a pensive line.

I raise my eyes to his and decide to try and lighten the mood by joking. “So, I’m just supposed to bare my soul to you?”

In the blink of an eye, he darkens the moment. “Well, you’re asking me to bare mine.”

Contemplating his terse reply, I reach back to undo the clip of my bra. “That’s true in a sense, but what you are doing and what I am about to do are two completely different things.

His eyes have moved, focusing on my breasts and my arms, which are paused behind my back for the moment.

“Yet each of those two things requires an enormous amount of trust,” he reminds me.

I can see that he’s trying to teach me a lesson—something along the lines of, you blew my trust this morning by thinking I would hurt you, so take off your shirt, and maybe I’ll forgive you.

“So, Gemma, are you willing to trust me?”

I unhook the bra and slowly lower it, revealing my aching breasts to him. Moving my arm to the side, I drop the piece of lingerie on the floor.

“Yes, I am. Now, my question remains. Are you going to trust me?”

Courage ~

Tonight didn’t go very well.

My parents arrived at my uncle’s two nights ago. They had made a “special” trip in order to meet the man I had moved in with. They wanted to meet Phillipe, so we went over to Uncle Beau’s home.

I’m so annoyed right now because I feel like it has somehow put a wedge between us. He didn’t say much at all when we got home, and right now—well, I don’t even know where he is.

He left around ten minutes ago and told me he needed to go for a walk.

He’s never just left. I suppose this is our first fight. I keep reassuring myself that couples do that…right?

All I can think about is how upset he was.

“What do you want me to say, Chantel? That did not go well,” he told me.

“I’m sure they didn’t mean to make it sound the way it did.” I tried to reassure him as we made our way into the kitchen, but honestly, I knew that my parents weren’t being very welcoming.

“They accused me of brainwashing you, and you just stood there!”

“I did not!” I defended while I tried to convince myself that I didn’t.

“I hardly think ‘Mom, I wanted to go,’ was very convincing, especially after I just told them that I would look after you and I couldn’t help but want you close to me.” His voice trailed off as if defeated. “How could you let them make you question us, Chantel? They basically told you to leave, and when you said nothing—well, you might as well go and pack your bags.”

“Phillipe,” I pleaded.

He brushed by me. Suddenly, I felt more alone than I ever had before.

“Yes?”

“Don’t leave like this,” I begged. I hated that he was feeling this way, and I hated that I couldn’t express how I felt.

“I just need to be alone for a while. I’m going for a walk.” His voice softened as he asked me, “Will you be here when I get back?”

How could he think to question it? How had I made him question me?

“Of course. Where else would I go?”

I never received an answer. Instead, all I heard was the kitchen door as it slammed shut, making me jump where I stood. Why hadn’t I told my parents everything I felt? I didn’t understand my own reluctance and that annoyed me. Maybe it was because I didn’t want them to judge me—judge me like they had him. That didn’t seem fair.

It makes me wonder what kind of coward I am. I’m an adult. I’m a grown woman who found a man she loves. How dare they make me question that and how dare I let them make me.

I need to find him. I need to go and find him and bring him back.

Bring him back to me, to us, and to the world we belong in. I need him to come back and paint me as I am—strong, courageous, and brave.

Armor—that’s what I need when I deal with my parents from now on. I need a suit of armor and the courage to stand behind my convictions to fight for what I want. And, what I want is Phillipe.

I can feel my bare nipples harden in the cool air. They almost seem to be begging for attention, like they remember what they received earlier, and they want it again. I slip my fingers into my panties and slide them down over my hips, all the while, keeping my eyes on the silent man across from me.

I concentrate on Phillipe as he makes his way to the shelves on the wall. He crouches down to reach into the bottom. I’m so focused on his broad back and amazing ass that I don’t even notice what he is holding in his hand until he stands. It’s an old music case.

Almost instantaneously, it feels as though the oxygen in the room has been removed. I can’t breathe as he stops at the desk just a few feet from me. He gently places the case down. Immediately, I know what is in there. He doesn’t have to tell me. As I stand there silently staring at him, my brain is screaming, Why? Why on earth does he have Chantel’s violin? How?

It has been reported that the astronomically expensive Stradivarius, which had been passed down for years through the Rosenberg family, was never recovered. It is still reported as missing to this day.

I have no idea how he has it, but I know that the instrument inside that case is a violin. I know it is Diva.

I’m also very aware of what he’s going to ask me to do. I have seen the collection and studied each piece for hours on end. None of that matters though, as the locks on the old music case are flicked open.

As he lifts the lid, my eyes are automatically drawn to the contents, like a moth to a flame. This right here is the other piece in the huge, distorted puzzle that is them, and it is about to be handed to me.

He reaches into the case, which is lined with what looks like red silk. He lovingly—yes, lovingly is the only way I can describe the way he is touching the instrument—cradles Chantel’s Stradivarius as he removes it from its resting place.

My mouth falls open as he turns and walks toward me. He’s cradling it as though it is his child. When he holds it out to me, I look at him as if he is insane, and I begin shaking my head.

“Apparently, I am going to trust you. Here, take this.”

Looking at the violin he’s now handing to me, I am very aware, all of a sudden, that I ‘m standing here naked. And yet somehow, that is not the most bizarre part of this equation. No, the most bizarre part is the fact that he thinks I can and will be responsible for hanging on to an instrument that is not only worth more than a million dollars but is also reportedly a missing family heirloom. Not to mention, it means more to him than the entire house we are both standing in.

Shaking my head again, I raise my eyes from the beautiful Diva. “No. I can’t use that to model with.”

“Here. You need it to model with,” he tells me, pushing it closer to me.

I literally step away from him, refusing to take a hold of what I essentially know to be his heart.

“No.” I refuse again. “Don’t you have a spare one?” I realize how stupid that sounds but so does the fact that he wants me to hold her violin.

He steps closer to me and reaches out. He takes my right hand in a firm grip and tugs me to him. Placing the neck of it in my hand, I have no choice but to close my fingers around it tightly. I’m afraid I might drop it, smashing it into little pieces.

“See, it won’t hurt you,” he reassures as he steps in closer. “You seem spooked tonight. That’s what it is.” Bending down until our noses are almost touching, he asks, “What happened this afternoon, Gemma?”

Denial falls smoothly off my tongue. “Nothing happened.”

“You’re lying.”

Raising my head, I bring the violin up close to my body. “How do you want me to hold this?”

Strong, nimble fingers grip my wrist where my pulse is beating a rapid tattoo. “Once you are seated facing the wall, cross your legs, rest the bottom on your calves, and let the handle nestle between these beautiful breasts of yours.” As he finishes that provocative statement, he reaches up to run the back of his fingers gently over the curve of one of the breasts in question.

I gasp. They are still sensitive from earlier. My eyes move up to meet his. As he repeats the move, I clamp my bottom lip between my teeth.

That’s when a seductive grin appears. “I like teeth,” he tells me before turning on his heel, making his way back to the easel. He’s letting me know that, all along, he’s been aware of the sensual journal entry I read earlier, and he knows, somehow, that I’m hiding a secret.

What he doesn’t know is that secret involves a dark-haired woman with talented hands. My secret involves the woman he so obsessively loved, a woman he himself has admitted to wanting close by at all times.

Well, that woman has crept into my mind. Somehow, she has stolen my very sanity because now I want her hands on me. I begged for her to touch me until I, too, lost myself in the beauty of a fantasy—a fantasy I still don’t fully understand.

She is aroused. As she sits there holding the violin, Phillipe can tell that Gemma is one-hundred percent aroused. Her breasts are beautifully flushed, and her nipples are nice and tight.

When he handed her the violin, her eyes dilated, and he could have sworn that he could smell her arousal and he is reminded of the passage she must have been up to. A moment in time that had literally changed him as a person.

He wants to talk to her about what she read.

Once he is behind the easel, he looks over to where she sits. The violin’s handle is resting against her skin, and her hands are holding it with so much care that he can’t help but feel moved by her attentiveness.

“So, tell me, Gemma. What did you learn this afternoon?”

Her eyes focus on him, so he lowers his on purpose, giving her the space she might need to open up.

“I’m here to ask you questions, not the other way around.”

Raising only his eyes, he tells her, “Well, you are being so quiet, so I’m trying to start an open forum.”

“Well, I don’t need one,” she tells him firmly. “If you weren’t so disagreeable this afternoon, I wouldn’t feel this way.”

“And how do you feel?”

“Confused,” she admits immediately.

“What are you confused about?” He genuinely wants to know.

“You. Her. Both of you together,” she tells him, licking her lips.

She shifts where she is sitting, and he wonders for a moment if she is aroused by what she just said. I believe she is.

“What is it about us together that’s confusing to you?”

“I don’t know.” She quickly adds, “That’s a lie, and I promised myself I wouldn’t do that.”

“What? Lie?”

“Yes.” She nods. “You seem so different through her eyes.”

Silence stretches between them as the weight of her words float across the air.

“Interesting choice of words. How do I seem different?”

He watches her red fingertips caress the side of the violin as she continues looking down at it.

“With her, you seem…happy.”

Phillipe acknowledges that with a nod. He explains simply, “I was happy, happier than I had ever been. I guess it showed.” He stops and asks, “What do I seem to be now?”

Gemma turns her head and looks at him with narrowed eyes. “Angry, sad, hurt.”

Placing his brush on the easel, he moves over to her. He’s tired of not being able to do what he wants, and right now, he wants to touch.

“Angry?” he asks, stopping and crouching down before her.

She raises her eyes to his. “Yes, that day I saw you, you were in your room and...”

Phillipe cocks his head and waits. Let her say it.

“And you were hurting yourself. Why? Why are you hurting and punishing yourself if you didn’t do anything to be sorry for? I don’t understand. I’m confused.”

Reaching out a finger, Phillipe traces the pad of it against the turgid tip of her ripe breast.

“Have you ever had a moment of passion that was so deep and so fucking perfect that you know you will never have it again?” he asks.

Gemma’s eyes move to his lips before shifting back to his eyes.

“Have you?” he presses.

She shakes her head as she returns the question. “Have you?”

Phillipe feels the side of his mouth pull up into an ironic smirk. “Yes, and no matter what I do, I can’t seem to capture it again.”

I’m holding the violin so tight that I start to think I might accidentally crush it. What is he trying to tell me? He is so close to me that I can smell the scent that always seems to cling to him. It’s making my head spin.

“I don’t understand.” I finally manage to push out of my mouth.

His right hand moves to stroke my hair, gently tracing it to the tip where he twirls it around his finger. His heated stare wanders all over my face but never dips below my neck. I can’t explain why, but it makes me even more aroused that he doesn’t feel the need to outright stare at the obvious. It’s almost as if he has memorized it already.

Dropping the ends of my hair, Phillipe stands and walks around my body, tracing the tip of his finger against my shoulders, until he’s behind me where he kneels down. I can feel the fabric of his clothes pressed against my back and bare skin.

“What I mean, Gemma, is that I’ve experienced a moment so perfect that it remains unequaled.”

I think about that for a minute as a shiver runs down my spine, starting where his warm fingertips are touching the base of my neck.

“So, what you’re saying is that because the moment was perfect, you can’t feel that pleasure anymore?” I try to make sense of his words while his fingers trace across the curve of my shoulder and move down my arm.

“What do you think I mean?” he queries, his mouth now joining his fingers on my left shoulder.

My fingers tighten against the violin as I dare myself to say it. Just do it. Don’t be a coward. “I think you have been ruined since the night Chantel took you in her hands and pleasured you. I think you have trouble doing that on your own now, so instead, you punish yourself. You hurt yourself, trying to get where you want to go, and you get frustrated because you can’t.”

As my speech comes to a definite end, his fingers stop tracing, and his mouth stops the lazy kisses. He lowers down on his knees behind me as his hands smooth around my waist and move down between my thighs to cup my aching sex. All the while, I am clutching her violin, just as she once did. The only difference in this scenario is that I know I am using it as a shield. Against what though, I have no clue.

Removing his hands from between my legs, he strokes his palms up my thighs to run his fingers over mine where I still hold the violin. He traces each finger, slipping in between, and then his mouth is by my ear.

“What makes you think I don’t get there? And, let’s be clear here, Gemma. Say exactly what you mean.”

Taking a breath, I feel my breasts rise on each side of Diva, reminding me that she’s here in the room again. “The morning I saw you.”

“Yes?” He breathes softly.

“You didn’t—”

“Didn’t what, Gemma?”

Looking back over my shoulder, my eyes connect with his. “Come. You didn’t come.”

“But, in the vineyard, inside of you, I came,” he reminds me.

I feel my core clench, and I have to shift because there is no way to tighten my naked thighs with my legs crossed as they are.

“Yes, but you were with me, not by yourself.”

His left hand traces back down to my leg to my inner thigh. “I like you like this. Your legs are already open for me.” He growls.

I once again shift mindlessly.

With a wicked smooth voice, he questions, “Do you know your inner thighs are wet?”

I nod silently, trying to remind myself I am asking him something. “So, why do you hurt yourself?”

I feel his fingers slide between my legs, moving up to touch my pouty wet lips. I shiver as my mouth parts on a moan.

“Because I deserve it,” he tells me.

My fingers hold the violin in place as I look down to see his right hand tracing the strings now, almost as reverently as he’s stroking me between my thighs.

“Why?” I sigh, wanting to part my legs further for him. “Why would you think that? You didn’t—”

“Shh.” He hums as he has before, while his hand on the strings comes down to where I am cradling the violin. “Give me this,” he instructs.

I let go of Diva. He accepts it and leaves me abruptly. I take the moment to stand and face him. I’m completely naked and quivering with need as he places Diva in her case. As he turns, my eyes can’t help but fall to below his waist. He’s as aroused as I am, and I can feel the tension in the room like it’s a live wire.

“Tell me what happened this afternoon.”

He completely catches me off-guard. Shaking my head, I refuse. Instead of answering, I take my hand and press it down between my legs, trying to ease the ache. His eyes glance done at the apex of my legs before they move back up to my eyes.

“This portrait for Chantel and me was about regaining trust and finding strength, yet you still hold yourself back from me, Gemma,” he explains, stalking toward me.

I step back as he moves forward, and my naked back bumps up against cool, rough bricks. I have nowhere to go, and he’s a solid unmovable force in front of me. I’m achingly aroused, and at the same time, I find myself fighting the instinct to take flight and run.

“You want me to trust you and tell you why I do something, yet you won’t tell me what happened to you this afternoon,” he continues.

I open my mouth to lie, but I find his index finger up against my lips.

“Don’t tell me it was nothing because I don’t believe you.”

Blinking up at him, I remain pinned to the burnt copper bricks, like a trapped butterfly. Removing his finger from my lips, he opens his palm and places it on my chest at the base of my throat where I know he can feel my pulse beating nervously against his fingertips.

“Do you trust me, Gemma?”

I have no idea. I want to. I don’t have any reason not to, but as his eyes narrow and methodically trace down over my nakedness, I find I can’t answer him.

My needy body is responding to every word he’s saying while my mind is screaming at me to get out of here. It’s telling me over and over that he’s playing with me, yet my weeping sex is yelling at me to shut the hell up and let him have me.

His hand grips my shoulder, gently pulling me forward an inch, and he turns me so I’m now facing the wall.

“Stay? Or run?” he questions mimicking the thoughts in my head. “Trust me or trust them?”

Trust them? Who? The public? The people outside of the world I now find myself immersed in.

I really want to ask him, but I don’t have the chance because he’s urging me closer to the wall.

Unrelenting, he instructs, “Put your hands up on the wall, Gemma.”

Thoroughly confused and shaking, I raise my hands, placing them palms flat against the wall. It feels as though I have no choice but to obey him, and then he’s all up on me.

His hands smooth up my naked back on both sides of my spine to my shoulders where he squeezes them for a moment, right before his fingers twist into my hair, tightly gripping it. I gasp at the unexpected bite of pain.

“You don’t know if you should trust me, do you?” His big body crowds in against me, pushing his hard cock through his pants against my ass. “That’s probably smart. You’re trembling.”

He’s right. I am.

“You’re trying to scare me,” I whisper.

“I’m trying to warn you,” he admits.

If it’s possible, his voice dips lower, so low that I can feel it stroke between my thighs.

“I’m not what you want, Gemma. You seem to be confused and struggling to understand who I am, but shouldn’t you be questioning yourself? Why would you want someone like me?”

I squirm against him and try to fight against the grip in my hair.

“Let me go,” I tell him. I want to leave and get away from him and the words coming from his mouth. He is hitting too close to home.

“I would…” He pauses for a moment and I hear a belt unbuckling. I know what he’s about to do. My body wants it, but my head is telling me to get the fuck out.

“But I don’t want to,” he whispers.

Swallowing, I try as hard as I can to push back off the wall.

“I don’t want this,” I deny feebly. I feel his hand loosen my hair. “Let me go, Phillipe.”

I think he’s about to do as I’ve asked until he moves. His whole body is flush up against me, and I move slightly. My breasts are pressed against the chilled wall while his hands trap mine at my sides. His body is wrapped up close behind, like he’s trying to crawl inside of me.

“You’re lying again,” he rasps into my ear.

His voice is edgy and almost sinister in its frustration, but what frightens me the most is that I can’t explain why it makes my soaked pussy clench so hard that I almost come.

Releasing my arms, his hands slide around both sides of my hips and cover my bare mound. Pressing my hot cheek against the wall, I start to pant as I try to sound believable, needing to convince him and myself. “I’m not. I don’t want this right now.”

But, I moan as one of his hands slides down between my thighs, and I feel his hard, hot cock throbbing insistently against my ass crack.

“Yes, you do. You just don’t want to admit it,” he persists.

As he voices one of my biggest fears, I feel two of his fingers slide down over my distended clit through my soaking wet lips. Shifting a little, I bring my legs together, and I feel his mouth on my shoulder.

“No. Keep them apart, Gemma, so I can get inside of you.”

Biting my bottom lip to stop myself from screaming, I leave them where they are, but still, those clever fingertips start to push up into me.

“Okay then, have it your way. Drenched.” He groans. “Absolutely drenched.”

I find myself finally giving in, embarrassed by the way my traitorous body is responding to this man — a man I don’t want to need right this minute. He moves back and pulls my hips away from the wall, tilting my ass up toward him.

In a voice I hardly recognize, he tells me, “Your body is begging for me to fuck it, Gemma, and I think your mind is too.”

I can’t help myself from responding. “I think you’re already doing that.”

“What?” he quietly demands.

“Fucking with my mind.”

I feel him dip his legs a little. His cock begins sliding through my hot, wet folds from behind, pushing through to meet where his hand is stroking my clit. I wish I could see down between my legs because I know he is also touching the tip of his own cock as it slides back and forth, teasing my entrance with the promise of a good hard fuck.

“Hmm, your ass is perfect,” he states, stroking a warm palm across my cheeks. The tips of his fingers are on my crack, and they grip tight, gently pulling my cheeks apart. “So fucking perfect.”

My breathing is out of control now as my hands support me against the wall. My breasts are swaying with each torturous slide of his cock between my needy pussy lips, and all I can think about is what he’s looking at. Closing my eyes on a moan of my own, I wait for his next move.

“All I am telling you, Gemma, is that maybe you should heed what the stories have told you. Maybe you should run. Run far away from me.”

I’m about to respond when his cock suddenly penetrates me with a long hard thrust. I gasp and bite my lip as he growls and lets go of my ass to grip my hip.

“But, for right now, it’s too fucking late,” he enlightens me, punctuating each word with a hard thrust.

His left hand moves to my ass, and his finger strokes over the dark pucker he’s looking at.

“Right now, you’re mine, just like she was mine. I’m going to pull you under and drown you in me until you can’t forget.”

His words are darkly disturbing. They’re too close to everything I have read. It’s too close to everything I have heard or been told about.

He flexes his hips, and his cock strokes deep inside of me. All I can do for the immediate moment is brace myself and hold on for the storm.

After all, if I am going to drown, this isn’t such a bad way to go.

Isn’t that the biggest mindfuck of all?