9 - Hurts So Good

Jon silently watched Cassidy, much as he had all day, noting that her smile didn’t flow quite so easy now that Obie had stopped her for the fifth time in the middle of Patsy Cline’s “Walking After Midnight”.  Her teeth were still showing as she took another cleansing breath, centered herself and agreeably tried to perform it to Obie’s specifications, but the smile didn’t quite reach her eyes anymore. 

Ten long hours in the studio was taking its toll on Ms. Starr.

“Obie, let her finish it.” Jon requested quietly.  “She sounds fine.”

“No shit,” his buddy snorted.  “She nailed it the first time.  Now it’s a matter of seeing how far I can push her.”

Okay, at least there was a method to the madness, and Jon could admit that it was a reasonable one.  Checking out her character and disposition under pressure was constructive, but she’d passed the test with flying colors three takes ago, in his opinion.

“Enough is enough.”

Again, she drew his gaze.  Tousled and tired, he still found her as captivating as he had the first time, even though her pull on him today didn’t affect him quite like it had that day at Tully’s.  Her cloud of happy was still undeniably present, even after being tortured with retake after retake, but it didn’t infuse him with energy today.  Today’s cloud made him feel like he was at the beach, basking in a contented relaxation that came only as a product of sand and sun.  Different, yet equally appealing.

It, combined with everything he’d witnessed of her during this studio stint, was enough to reinforce what his instincts had screamed at him days ago.

He wanted her. 

It wasn’t right to ask her for participation in making a mockery of his wedding vows, but he itched to find out whether, if he buried himself deep enough inside her, she might infect him with her joy.   If he might get to experience a taste of that bright aura she carried with her.  If he’d come away with something to revitalize the existence he’d allowed to become so dismal.

If so…

What?  You’d leave your wife?  Get real.  You’d fuck her as long as she allowed it.  End of story.

“Jon?”

He slid his eyes sideways to his very annoyed friend, himself annoyed at being deprived of his eye candy.  “Huh?”

“I’ve been talking to you for two solid minutes, jackass.  You gonna sing with her or not?”

Jon rolled the desk chair backward and reached for the soft-sided guitar case he’d propped in the corner upon arrival.    No, it wasn’t right to ask her participation, but it wasn’t going to stop him from doing it, anyway.  And, seeing as there was no greater foreplay than music, he planned to exploit that undeniable fact to the hilt.

“Yep.”  He unzipped his favorite Takamine and secured the familiar curve of her neck in his palm before standing.  His eyes were still locked on a weary Cassidy, who had finished the song and was now rubbing the back of her neck.

“What are you gonna do?” Obie called after him.

“That depends on the lady.”  The knob turned easily under his touch and Jon joined Obie’s protégé in the intimate confines of the booth, pulling the door closed behind him.  “Ready for a little fun, Cassidy?”

Surprise lit the eyes which had been slowly dying through the evening, and the smile that stretched over her face was reflected in them once again.  “Always, darlin’.  Whatcha got in mind?”

That whole teeth sweating thing was starting to make sense now.  He could vividly imagine that drawled response spilling from her lips in an entirely different context, and it had him compulsively dragging his tongue across his front teeth. 

“Let’s see if you can sing harmony,” he proposed, pulling up a stool in front of her so that the mic dangled between them.  The Tak settled comfortably on his knee, as it always did, and he gave it a light strum.   “You know any Mellencamp, or is that before your time?”

A restless hand pushed through her coppery mane, as it had a hundred times throughout the day.  “Jack and Diane?”

“I was thinkin’ somethin’ that rocks a little more.  ‘Hurts So Good’?”

“I just happen to know that one by heart.” 

The grin that blossomed was the very one he coveted.  It was the one he wanted to steal from her and keep for himself, taking it out when he couldn’t find his own smile – which seemed to be happening more and more lately.    

After quickly conferring over lyric assignments, he harshly raked his fingers back and forth over the Tak’s strings, finding the chords and the beat that would guide them.  Then he took the lead.

When I waas a youung boyy

Said put away those... youuung. Boyy. Waays.

Now that II'm gettin' old-er, so much older

I looong for those youung booy daays

With a giirl like yoou

With a giirl like yoo-uu

Lord. Knows. There are thiings we can doo, ba-byy

Just me and youuu

Come on and make it hurt

He nodded his head, and Cassidy seamlessly added her voice to his, intuitively creating the perfect harmony. 

Hurt so goood

Come on baa-byyy, make it huurt so goood

Some-tiimes loove don't feel like it should

You make it. Hurt so goood.

Her execution was flawless, and the way she chose to infuse a little more personality into her solo lyrics coaxed a smile from him.  Cassidy laced her delivery with a grittier tone, almost a growl, and worked her shoulders like she’d been born to this.  She looked into her eyes and sold the words until he had no choice but buy them.

Don't haave to be soo ex-ciit-in'

Just tryin' to give my-self a lit-tle bit of fuun, yeah

You aal-ways look soo in-vii-tin'

You ain't as green aas... You. Are. Youngg

He stepped in, giving as good as he’d gotten, then fitted himself to her harmony on the chorus.   

Hey baa-by, its youu

Come on, giirl, now, its yoo-ou-uuu

Sink your.  Teeth. Right. Through. My bones, ba-byy

Let's seee what we caan doo

Come on and make it hurt

Hurt so goood

Come on baa-byyy, make it huurt so goood

Some-tiimes loove don't feel like it should

You make it. Hurt so goood.

For the final verse, they volleyed the lines back and forth, with Cassidy becoming flirtier and more playful with each delivery. 

I ain't TALK-in' no biig deaaalls

I ain't made no. Plaans My-sellf.

I ain't talk-in' no hiigh heels

Maybe we could walk a-rouuund

All... day... longggg.

Walk a-rouuund

All... day... longgg

One more harmonized chorus and he slapped a hand over the guitar strings to still the final chord.

Hurt so goood

Come on baa-byyy, make it huurt so goood

Some-tiimes loove don't feel like it should

You make it. Hurt so goood.

Cassidy grinned at Jon, positively exhilarated by the opportunity to sing with him and the sexual undertones that had been living in the lyrics.  Whether those undertones were real or imagined, she still experienced the tingling aftereffects, and the way he refused to look away did nothing but intensify it.

“Uh, Jon?”

Her duet partner tipped his chin to acknowledge Obie, but his eyes never strayed from Cassidy’s. 

“You’re gonna need to put a duet on that new album and bring her on tour,” dictated the demanding little man who had done everything in his power to suck the life out of her.

“Sounded good?”  The question was so blandly posed, that Cassidy wasn’t sure Jon even cared about the answer.

“That would be an understatement.”  Obie stood and stretched his arms over his head, leaning first to one side, then the other.  “Lemme go take a leak and we’ll do it once more.”

The door slammed shut, leaving them alone, and Jon continued to scrutinize her with some kind of internal battle waging in his eyes.  She recognized desire simmering there, surely a mirror of what bubbled in her, but his conscience visibly railed against it. 

“Are you attracted to me?” he asked quietly, nudging morality aside, but still keeping himself cautiously in check.

She could only assume the question was offered out of courtesy. A man of his age and splendor must have discerned his power over women long ago, and Cassidy would bet her favorite pair of stilettos that Jon Bon Jovi didn’t have a single damn doubt about his effect on her or any other female. 

“Is there a woman who’s not?”

That chiseled chin ducked toward his chest with a sheepish grin.  “A few, here and there.”

“I find that hard to believe, but just so as there’s no misunderstandin’, yes.  I’m attracted to you.”

That chin came out of his chest and aimed itself determinedly toward her, the fire in those pretty blue eyes escalating his simmer of desire to a full rolling boil. 

“Then spend the night with me.”

If the cliché rock star life had any truth to it at all, this man had spent his existence picking through scores of willing and gorgeous women to select lottery winners who would share his bed for an hour, maybe two.  The realization that he wanted her in his bed - for an entire night - was heady, and Cassidy’s uterus contracted its emphatic endorsement of the offer.

“Keepin’ true to that vein of no misunderstandin’,” she ventured softly.  “You’re married, are you not?”

The rolling boil dialed back to a steady one, but his gaze still didn’t waver when affirming, “I am.”

You were brought up in a strict Southern Baptist household.  You cannot have sex with another woman’s husband. MeMaw would roll over in her grave.

Her grandmother had also had a cat when Cassidy turned up pregnant at age fifteen, but she'd squared her shoulders and loved her granddaughter anyway.  Hell, if she saw Jon Bon Jovi, she’d probably be as tempted to sleep with the man as Cassidy was.

“Is your wife gonna come tearin’ in durin’ the night to snatch me bald headed?”

One corner of his mouth kicked up in amusement.  “No.”

His succinct answers were offered without explanation or apology, and she found it extremely appealing.  He wanted what he wanted and wasn’t compelled to justify it, which was fine, but if he was going to cheat on his wife, Cassidy was interested in his motives. 

 

“Why me?”

Finely muscled arms crossed atop his guitar, causing his biceps to ripple when he shrugged.  “You make me feel good.”

Again, he was direct and to the point.  He wasn’t jerking her around, which she greatly appreciated, so she would extend him the same consideration.  There was only a fleeting hesitation before her chin slowly dipped in acknowledgement.

“I accept your invitation.”

His pupils blew open wide, irises completely scorched away by the inferno that her acquiescence unleashed, and a reciprocating blaze erupted low in Cassidy’s belly.  She’d had orgasms that weren’t this intense and Jon sat three feet away, never having touched her.

Not once.

Not yet.