Free The Crescendo (The Musical Interlude) by Kasonndra Leigh Page B

to the jugular, I see. Yeah, that’s a good place to start. With you explaining your plans for me and my fiancé ,” I correct.
    “Fair enough,” he replies, slipping his key into the coded lock and opening his door. “I’ll see you then.”
    “Sure.” I turn around and head back downstairs to my room with my thoughts racing and my stomach twisting.
    There’s no way he couldn’t have known whose career he was going to be managing when he accepted this job. Sam’s motives bother me almost as much as Katerina’s. At least with Alek’s mom, I understand her motivations; but I can’t shake the feeling that Sam showing up on my doorstep after almost a decade since we last saw each other means something more than developing the reputation of a new repertory company.
     
    ♡♥♡♥♡♥
     
    Later that night, Alek returns to the room and practically drags himself into the shower. Between grueling rehearsals, performances, interviews and dealing with whatever secret thing has him so on edge, I no longer worry about losing the man I love to someone else. Instead, my anxiety comes from a fear of losing him to the darkness hovering over us—the same way his family has lost Nikolai.
    We’ve been living together long enough for me to know when something’s weighing on his mind. I keep telling myself I can be patient as the weeks continue to add up, moving closer to the busiest season of all the performance houses. The time when the demand on our lives will multiply, and then we really won’t have any time for each other, let alone to plan a wedding. Losing his best friend’s support affects Alek more than he realizes. I can’t lose him to the shadows silently inching into our lives, and I’m definitely not going to rub dirt in his wounds by blabbing about the true identity of our new booking agent right now.
    “I think someone needs to relax,” I tell him as he walks out of the bathroom, a black towel wrapped around his waist and his dark hair deliciously rumpled on top. Holy moly, he’s hot. Beads of water slide down his bronze colored skin, making the vivid colors of the red Phoenix tattooed on his right arm stand out as though the bird might truly rise from the flames surrounding its body. I once again cannot believe how freaking lucky I am to be able to call this man my own.
    “Over here, now,” I order, pointing to the area of the floor in front of me. “Masseuse Angelo has entered the building.”
    At once, he focuses his attention on my body, taking in my appearance from head to toe, narrowing his eyes as his gaze rakes over me, eye-fucking me inch by inch. Yes, it’s hard to describe the way it tears through my soul when he looks on me with such need, such raw passion. He is a man who not only wears his heart on his sleeve, but all over his body, in each cell, and inside every breath he takes for me. It’s during these darkest moments of his that I get a hint of the other thing that lives inside him—the man I watched beat someone to a pulp six months ago.
    Over the years, Katerina has done all she can to mold the best part of her son, nurturing him and doing things to build on his musical talent rather than bolster the prowess of the killer inside him the way he has told me his father wanted to do.
    I’m wearing a skimpy, hot pink negligee designed by Versace, a huge step up from my days of Aeropostale and Victoria’s Secret sleeping tees. Alek loves to see me dressed in vivid hues, especially hot pink, because the color highlights my dark features and skin, turning me into a sexy siren without being too much the way red sometimes is. I don’t mind at all because this shade of pink was also Jada’s favorite color. Wearing it makes me think of my sister and how far I’ve come from my days of obsessing over the Gothic.
    Alek’s gaze darkens; he’s completely tuned into me right now as he stalks toward me. He still doesn’t say anything, though. He’s a silent lion. This silence kills me