“Yeah, thanks.” A flash of surprise crosses her face as she notices the plates on the counter, slices of crispy bacon and buttered toast on each. “That looks delicious. I’m actually starvin’.”
She gives me a sunshine smile before she takes a seat at the table, humming under her breath as she scribbles more. “Since we did it, I can’t stop thinking about this melody…”
“Aw shucks! Don’t tell me plain old Rust is your muse,” I joke.
“Your dick is so good it makes me wanna sing. Bet your little swimmers are music notes.”
“Well, I never heard that compliment before. Thank you kindly.” I tip my non-existent hat at her.
Tally closes the notebook, sliding the pen into the spiral binding. Her brows flicker.
I flip the eggs. “Did I say something wrong?”
“Not at all.” She sighs heavily. “Don’t laugh, but I haven’t been able to write a new song in over a year.”
“Why would I laugh? I know how important music is to you. Writing and playing are like air to you.”
“Exactly! And all this time, it felt like I couldn’t breathe. I tried every trick, but whenever I sat down to write—poof! Head empty, no thoughts. It was as if I’d forgotten how to be a musician. Until you and I, well…” Pink scrawls across her cheeks.
Nerves knot my gut. “Do you regret what we did? Cause I sure as hell don’t.”
“God, no. The sex was way too good to regret it.”
My ego inflates at her praise.
She props her head on her hand, shrugging. “It’s another thing I have to thank you for. First gettin’ rid of the corpse, then fuckin’ the music back into me. I got an idea for a whole album. I want it to be old school country music that tells a story. Bonnie and Clyde from the holler.”
“That sounds like my kinda music.” I smile encouragingly. “And for the record, that between us wasn’t a charity romp. You don’t have to thank me. The music was always inside you, I just fucked it loose.” I grimace. “That’s horrible phrasing, sorry. Sounds painful.”
Tally bites her lip. “Felt pretty damn incredible, though.”
My cock thickens. All I want is to throw her on the table and bury myself inside her, but we could both use a meal first.
I serve the food with two fresh cups of coffee. Raising my mug in a toast, I sit down opposite her. “To the best, most inspiring sex we’ve ever had!”
Tally giggles, clinking her cup against mine. “So far.”
We eat in comfortable silence. When our plates are empty, I catch her gaze.
“Just so we’re clear, if the body gets found, you had nothing to do with it. You know nothing about it.Ikilled that man. Understood?” I say, putting iron in my voice.
She straightens. “But?—”
“No arguing.”
She blushes deeply. “Thank you.”
“It’s my duty as your husband to keep you from harm. But I gotta ask: how did you know I wouldn’t turn you in when you pulled up with a body?”
Her lips curl into a smirk that could put a grown man on his knees. “The evening before my twelfthbirthday.”
“You mean the night you tried to steal Dad’s favorite horse. What a way to introduce yourself to the new kid in town!”
Her laughter chimes like bells. “When you didn’t snitch on me then, I knew I could trust you—come hell or high water.”
My heart swells. “You were right.”
“Lord knows what I was thinkin’ when I tried to run away. I was convinced a kid like me could ride all the way to Nashville with only a guitar on her back and ten bucks in her pocket and they’d make me a star.”
