Page 12 of Treble

After her shower—that I’m regretting not joining her for—she changes into my clothes, not hers. Pride swells inside me seeing her in my shirt that’s several sizes too big for her. My lips tilt up but nervousness overcomes me. How is this going to end, especially if she moves to LA? None of this was supposed to happen. “Hey,” I rasp out. “Wh-what do you want to do for dinner?”

“No idea.” She shrugs, wrapping her arms around her middle. “I haven’t thought that far ahead.” The eagerness from this morning is gone. It could be Paul or maybe the novelty of all of this wearing off. For all the times I’ve followed her home and snuck into her apartment, I know so little about her. Some of it was for show, making me doubt everything.

“Want to order a pizza?” I offer.

“Depends.” Keri bites her lip and I want nothing more than to take it between my own teeth.

Do not maul her…

“On what?”

She glances back to the bedroom. When her eyes meet mine, all at once, I’m not in charge here. “I haven’t worked up an appetite,and my vibrators aren’t here, Victor. How else is a girl supposed to get off? I was left high and dry as fuck this morning. I might need to make a trip to the porn store—sex shop—whatever is the most PC term to call it.”

“Dry as fuck?” I scoff.

“Yeah.” Her eyes fall to my cock. “It was fun but it was the equivalent of hitting thebzz bzz bzzsetting on accident. Did it get the job done? Sure, but nothing beats the tried and truebzzzzzsetting at full intensity. You fell flat, or sharp. Pun intended.”

I’m stunned into silence, questioning everything. After starting and stopping a reply several times, I settle on, “You came.”

Keri barks out a laugh. “Women can come without toysoranother person. All we need is some good audio porn and our own hand. It’s not difficult, but it’s all about quality, Vic. My orgasm was a six out of ten. My toys aren’t here, so either we’re going shopping or I’m going back to my place.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“My audition piece is ‘Do You Hear the People Sing’ fromLes Misérables. I protest for women’s rights. Do you think I wouldn’t protest for my cunt’s rights too? What did you think was going to happen here? I would just move in and become your unsatisfied fuck toy? You did, didn’t you?”

“No,” I insist, but part of me wonders if that’s exactly what I was hoping for. Admittedly, my ego is a bit bruised by all of this.

“I should get a hotel for the night.”

Shit. Fuck. Nothing is going right. I never thought any of this through and now the one woman I’ve wanted for ages is callingme on my bullshit—even if it’s only partially true. And now she wants to leave. Do I let her? Kidnapping is a bad idea but is sounding better by the minute. “No,” I finally reply. “Don’t go. I’ll order a pizza and you’re going to show me exactly where I went wrong this morning.”

A smirk tilts her lips. “I don’t think you’re up for it.”

I’m about to counter her little challenge when there’s a loud pounding on the front door. Keri and I both glance in the direction of the sound. It stops only for a moment but starts up again, accompanied by a man shouting, “Don’t eat the pie!”

“What the fuck?” I mutter as I cross the living room to answer the door. I fling it open, finding Henry with his fist poised to knock. Behind him, Paul is nervously pacing. Henry’s boyfriend, Noah, is behind Paul, arms crossed over his puffed out chest like a damn bouncer. “What are you guys doing here?”

“I was having a drink at the restaurant next door to my bookshop,” Noah explains. “I overheard Paul telling one of the bartenders how he jizzed in a pie and gave it to his girlfriend. I texted Henry because I thought he might know who Paul was dating, since you’re all in the same ensemble.”

Henry interjects, “I saw him pass Keri a pie at rehearsal. Victor wasn’t picking up his phone, so I rushed to the bar to confront Paul. Sorry for stopping by like this, I wanted to make sure you and Keri didn’t eat the pie.”

“First of all, it wasn’tinthe pie. It was the whipped cream,” Paul defends, but the whole situation still has bile rising in my throat. “And second, I never said Keri was my girlfriend.”

I dodged a bullet by tossing it. I knew something was weird about that fucking pie, but it’s the least of my worries. I’m hung up on Paul claiming Keri is his.

“What the fuck?” Keri screeches.

Noah scoffs. “Fine, you saidyour girl.Same shit.”

“It was a mistake, okay?”

“It was gross,” Noah snaps. “That’s some dark romance shit. I called Henry because if it was one of my sisters, I would’ve wanted them to know before they ate cum pie.”

“Anyway,” Henry grumbles, pinching the bridge of his nose. “We have a concert coming up. I won’t let some weird cum debacle fuck with my audition or Keri’s. She’s the soul of the cello section. I can’t risk that Dana chick messing with my chances of playing for one of my favorite bands. So, we work this out right here, right now.”

“Like… an orgy?” Keri asks a little too excitedly for my liking. If she thinks I’ll share her with three other men, she’s out of her mind.

Henry and Noah turn up their noses. Noah shakes his head and admits, “You’re hot, but my girlfriend would kill me if I touched another woman.”

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