Note: Again what has been proven is the infinite patience of my readers. Gratitude for your kind thoughts!
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It was late afternoon and Claire was sitting in the front row of the symphony hall, watching Sebastien put the orchestra through its paces with Stravinsky. Her sketchbook was balanced on her knee, but she hadn't drawn so much as one line. She was worried. It wasn't just his demeanor tonight -- he seemed to be in a pretty foul mood and was snapping at his musicians more than usual -- but also the way he had been for the past week or so.
Ever since the night of the costume party, when Claire had felt a separation between them most acutely, she had been noticing it more and more. They spent time together, but it was as if Sebastien was distracted somehow.
Claire had been trying to brush it off, but today watching him berate the string sections until the first cellist was nearly in tears, she decided that enough was enough. He would tell her what was going on, or she wasn't going to leave him alone. She so rarely pressed him on how he was feeling, she thought she should get a free pass just this once.
"Again, again!" he cried. "Let us take it from three after B. Three after B, please, and the cellos need to play out. I cannot hear you over the horns." They began again, but had only gone a few bars before he was shaking his head and waving his arm for silence. Whipping around to face a rather startled Claire, he asked, "How does it sound to you? They still need to play out more, no?"
She bit her lip. Truth be told, she hadn't been listening all that carefully and she suspected Sebastien was nitpicking. She heard the cellos, though it might have been that the balance wasn't exactly perfect. Still, looking up at the first cellist's distraught face, she knew it wasn't the time to encourage his perfectionist tendencies.
"It sounds fine to me, Maestro," she said lightly, trying to tell him with her eyes that he should let it go. He twisted his face up in irritation and she shrugged. "Besides, you've only got them for another fifteen minutes and you should probably run through the last movement." He glared down at her, and she frowned back.
"This is my orchestra and I will keep them here all night if I must in order for them to get it right." She knew she should let it go, but...
"No, you won't. You can't, and you won't, so you should make use of the time you have."
If she'd thought he was glaring before, it was nothing compared to the look he gave her now. She could see he wanted to argue, that he very much did not want to be bested in a contest of wills in front of the orchestra. At the same time she knew he was well aware that she was right, which left him unable to do anything but give in.
They stared at each other for a long moment, and now Claire was getting annoyed. She'd have been willing to look away first, but she could hardly give him a nice, submissive look with the entire symphony watching. And they were, of course watching. Waiting.
Sebastien finally composed his face into his usual non-expression, but his eyes stayed on hers as if he were trying to tell her something. She held his gaze for another moment before shrugging one shoulder and dropping her eyes back to her blank paper. Sebastien turned back around and, to the surprise of the musicians, flipped forward in his score.
"Last movement, please. We will start from the top." When some of the musicians were slow in getting there, their glances still lingering on Claire, he made no more than a token protest. Claire was relieved, but watched him with concern. He had a defeated air about him now, never a good sign. And they both knew what the orchestra was thinking. The lamb had tamed the lion.
Hah. If only they knew.
Even Sebastien's conducting seemed subdued now, as if he were contrite, even regretful of his snappishness. He let a few minor errors go by entirely without comment. When the orchestra got off by a beat, Claire thought he wasn't going to do anything at first. Three bars later he dropped his arms, shook his head briefly, and waited for them to lumber to a halt before raising his arms again resignedly.
"Once more, please, from four after letter F. Four after F." He conducted, but it seemed he was somewhere else, perhaps listening to music none of them could hear. At last feeling he would make no further progress with them that night, he dismissed them early. They shuffled out of the auditorium, looking a little confused, but Claire didn't move until they were all gone.
Sebastien stood alone on stage looking a bit forlorn in the dim stage lights. He wandered off to the side of the stage, straightening a row of chairs absently as Claire mounted the steps. He didn't turn when she touched his arm.
"Maestro, are you feeling all right?"
"Of course."
"It's just that you don't seem quite yourself today."
"Everything is fine."
"I think we both know that's not true. Why won't you talk to me?"
"As I have already said, everything is fine!" he snapped, turning to face her so suddenly that she took a step back in surprise.
"I don't understand why you're so upset."
"Oh, really? Perhaps you recall arguing with me in front of all my musicians tonight," he said, stalking toward her menacingly. She moved back away from him until she suddenly met the wall behind her.
"Th-that's not what I meant, and you know it," she stammered, trying to keep her voice steady.
"Oh?" His voice was low and dangerous, and altogether too steady.
"You've been acting strangely all afternoon. I want to know what the matter is."
"There is nothing," he said in a soft, angry voice.
"There is!" she insisted, just as angrily now. "I know you're hiding something from me, and I want to know what it is." Sebastien jerked back in surprise, a flash of something that might have been guilt crossing his face briefly.
"If you keep harassing me about this, I swear I will --"
"Will what?" she challenged, interrupting him.
"I will make you very sorry," he replied, leaning over again and moving his face inches away from hers heatedly. Claire felt twin spikes of terror and arousal tear through her, and her heart sped up. Her chest was heaving with the emotions flooding through her, and it did not escape her notice when Sebastien's eyes strayed downward for a lingering moment before making heated eye contact with her again. Things were getting intense, quickly.
Just then, they heard the scrape of soft-soled shoes on the stage. Turning as one from the humming energy between them, they saw a little slip of a girl -- one of the youngest in the orchestra, a flautist named Shelby.
"Get out," growled Sebastien, and Claire had the curious experience of watching someone else turn red and quiver under his stare.
"Ohhh," sighed the new arrival in obvious embarrassment, "but I, um, I left my, um..." She trailed off before finishing her thought under Sebastien's withering glare.
"Get it, and then get out," he said bitingly. Shelby scurried over to her music stand and grabbed a little case from underneath it. She turned to leave, but before she walked away she cast a glance over her shoulder. Making wide-eyed eye contact with Claire, she inclined her head slightly. Claire could do nothing but swallow nervously and blink back at her. Apparently deciding there was nothing further she could do, Shelby turned frightened eyes back to Sebastien and then fled for the safety of backstage.
When her clattering footsteps had died away, Claire and Sebastien turned back to each other. The tension had not dissipated; if anything, the brief interruption had increased it. Claire's stomach twisted and she could not quite suppress a shudder from the strain of his hot glare. She wasn't sure what Sebastien was going to do.
He reached out to grip her upper arms tightly and press them into the wall behind her. She made a soft pained noise and he crushed her against the wall, digging his fingertips in and kissing her in a fierce, almost painful way. Claire tried in vain to move away from the wall, but he held her firmly, taking what he wanted from her. She whimpered into his mouth and he drew back to bite her lip. Her body was on fire, her blood heating with every passing second.
"God, please!" she gasped.
"What?" he demanded, before stealing her breath with another kiss. She could feel him, hard and hot, against her hip. Somehow, over the blood rushing through their ears, they heard footsteps again. Sebastien stilled immediately, pressing his face into the side of Claire's neck as if he could hide from whatever was about to enter the room.
"They're probably not even here anymore, but you should have seen them. He had her up against the wall and they were just glaring at each other like you wouldn't believe when I came in." Shelby, sounding like she was trying to keep her voice down.
"What do you think they were fighting about?" Holly. Great, thought Claire.
"That's just it. I'm not sure they were fighting. I mean, they both looked pretty mad, but there was just something about it that seemed..." Their footsteps stopped as she considered her words.
"Seemed what?" A third woman, probably Violet, Shelby's friend. She also played flute.
"I don't know, different from when he looked at me. If they hadn't been glaring, I would have said it looked like he was...was, well, about to kiss her."
"Kiss her?" echoed Holly incredulously, apparently forgetting all pretense of being quiet. The women started to laugh, but softly, as though they weren't sure it was really so ridiculous.
"Look, he was either supremely pissed or he was thinking of doing something extremely dirty to her."
Claire let out a kind of choked laugh as Sebastien shook his head grimly beside her. If she hadn't known better, she'd have thought he was actually embarrassed that his thoughts had shown so plainly on his face. Obviously, he had been both supremely pissed and thinking of extremely dirty things to do to her.
"Did you hear that? Maybe they are still in there!" said Violet in a hushed tone. Claire looked meaningfully at Sebastien, who gave her a pained look as he ground his still-hard cock into her firmly. She rolled her eyes, but the footsteps had begun again. He frowned down at her and took a step back, still looking pretty annoyed.
"And that," he said as the musicians entered the room, "is what will happen to you if you cannot refrain from criticizing me in rehearsal. When I want your opinion, I shall ask you for it, and otherwise I expect you to stay out of my job." The thing about it was, he probably meant it. A flood of renewed anger ran through Claire and she stepped away from the wall, annoyed.
