"Music happens to be an art form that transcends language."

—Herbie Hancock

"Where did you learn to play flamenco like that?" I asked, with my hand wrapped tightly in his as we made our way into the hotel.

A modern style grandfather clock was in the center of the lobby, engulfed by a circular, dark turquoise couch. The white marble floor, with black accented tiles, was spotless. I tried to appear unfazed when we stepped onto one of the gold plated elevators toward the upscale balcony suite.

"Mr. Miles." The concierge nodded at Julian to greet him before the elevator doors closed, leaving us alone again. Julian tilted his chin and focused back on me.

"What? You think I only know how to play rock?" One corner of Julian's mouth turned up. "I taught myself, with much help from books and internet videos. One of the first musicians I found that spoke to me was a flamenco player. Paco de Lucía. He was an inspiration to me."

I smiled to myself at the way Julian pronounced the flamenco player's name.

"I just find it a bit amusing and ironic that you couldn't even hold a conversation with one of your favorite players if you wanted to," I noted.

"Music is the universal language," Julian said, matter-of-factly.

"I can see that. But the same song can represent fifty different things to fifty different people. Nobody's pain is exactly the same as another's, and nobody's happiness is exactly the same, either," I argued. "Actual language is the only way to be certain that your meaning is coming across as you intended it."

"But the general feeling taken away from the instrumentation is the same. Words can be misconstrued." Julian smiled, clearly enjoying our banter. "It happens often. Too often."

"Maybe, but language is still more direct, precise, and less easy to confuse. I think, anyway," I countered.

"Words are the carrier of meaning. Music is expression of feeling. Perhaps some feelings can't be justly put to words." Julian glanced at me from the corner of his eye as we walked down the hotel hallway.

"Actually, I think you are right about that." My thoughts spun circles around the fact that my life as a writer was spent trying to achieve just that. Maybe Julian was right, and some things simply could not be adequately explained in simple words.

"But the two together, word and song, make the most beautiful combination. Don't you agree?" he asked.

"I do." I nodded at him.

"That's us," Julian said, pulling the hotel key card from a slot in his wallet.

"What's us?" I asked.

"You're the words, the lyrics. I'm the music. We complement each other and make for a beautiful song." Julian smiled at his metaphorical epiphany. The more thought I gave it, the truer it appeared.

I was ready to say the words, any words, he wanted to hear from me, but Julian preferred to show me in other ways what he was thinking. We truly were word and song, decent enough to stand alone, but so much stronger together.

"How long have you been keeping that one in your back pocket?" I asked with flushed cheeks as he chuckled and led the way into the suite.

Immaculate glass tables with plush, red chairs and couches sat atop the fern-patterned, cream colored carpet. Julian sat my small suitcase in a corner, as I flicked the bathroom light on to see what was quite possibly the biggest mirror in existence, over a cherry wood, double vanity sink. The marble bath and separate, step-in glass shower were decorated with piles of thick, white, folded towels.

This was definitely better than my stuffy childhood bedroom at my mom's house nearby.

I stepped toward the mirror and swiped a finger under my eyes to clear the smudged black eyeliner from my skin. The mouthwash samples beckoned me and I gargled some while using my fingers as a makeshift comb.

From further inside the suite, I could hear soft music playing, drawing me out to find its source. I passed through the living room, complete with fancy stools by a huge wet bar that, I noticed, was empty... except for water. The bedroom door was open, playing music from the radio, but Julian wasn't on the large, white bed.

I felt a warm breeze on the back of my arms, and went back out into the common area, where I noticed that the balcony doors were open. Julian's back was toward me and his elbows were propped against the white cement railing. Before I stepped out to join him, Julian turned around and held his hand out for mine.

"Come and watch this," he said excitedly.

"Okay, what are we watching?" I looked off into the dark sky with him.

"Be patient, woman," he joked, and put an arm around my waist. His touch set every last one of my nerve endings on fire.

"I love your hair like this." Julian tucked a section of stray strands behind my ear. "You're beautiful any way, but this suits you."

I blushed and pressed my cheek on his arm, attempting to hide my dorky smile but failing terribly. He made me feel like a giddy schoolgirl.

Beyond the large pond and landscape in front of us, white and purple sparks lit the sky, startling me slightly. They were followed by bursts of blue, green, and red.

"Isn't this view incredible? This is what I've been doing the last two nights." Julian pulled me completely in front of his body and loosely wrapped his arms around my stomach. "Besides wishing Friday night would hurry the hell up and get here."

"You've been watching the Disney fireworks shows from your room?" I looked up at him with a grin.

"Yes. Don't laugh at me. I've never been to Disney," he said.

"Never?" I asked.

"Never. Have you?" Julian rested his chin atop my head.

"Only ten times a year for most of my life." I laughed.

"Lucky." Julian kissed my hair. It took everything in me to keep from melting into a puddle beneath us.

"We're here. Why don't we go tomorrow?" I suggested.

"Really? You'd want to do that?" Julian tried to shield his enthusiasm and childlike wonder.

"Yes. I know the parks like the back of my hand. We could get there early in the morning, before the big crowds arrive, and be out with plenty of time for you to get to the venue tomorrow night," I offered the plan.

"Let's do it!" Julian agreed exuberantly.

I turned my body to face him.

"Only one thing," I began. His eyes zeroed in on mine. "I'm terrified of heights. No roller coasters. It's bad enough to look down from this balcony."

"Oh, come on! At least one coaster?" he begged.

"You can go on as many as you please." I smirked at him, and tried to memorize the way his lips moved as he spoke, as if he were kissing shapes around each syllable.

"You can always hide your face in my shoulder." He brushed a thumb across my cheek, leaving a heated streak of skin in his wake.

So softly, Julian started singing in my ear while taking my hand in his. He led us in a slow dance on the dimmed balcony, with just the crackling of fireworks behind us. "Tell me, princess, now when did you last let your heart decide? I can open your eyes, take you wonder by wonder..."

Too soon, his velvet voice trailed off and Julian placed his forehead on mine. Though he tried to control it, I could hear his breath accelerating with mine. Unthinkingly, I slowly brought my lips to his. He met me with controlled passion—his lips wanting to crush mine in zealous desperation, but instead moving firmly and unhurriedly.

His tongue slid across my bottom lip and into my waiting mouth, dancing with my own tongue, as his hand held the bottom of my spine. Julian pulled me closer to his body while I sighed into his open mouth. His skin was burning, and although we couldn't have been tethered any closer, it was still not close enough.

One of my hands gripped his rugged shoulder, while the other stroked through his shaggy, gold-tinted brown hair, pulling gently at the roots.

He moaned.

Carefully, I swiped my fingertips across Julian's damp forehead, brushing the hair away from his eyes, and tried using my thumb to iron the crease between his thick brows. His mouth was hot and I was relieved to have remembered to use the mouthwash upon arriving in the room.

He smelled like spice and cedar and leather as I breathed him in. The air on the balcony was suddenly thick and humid, helping his scent to permeate every part of me. I broke away from the kiss just long enough to move to his neck. My tongue traced small shapes into the stubble, as my lips sucked the skin of his neck into my mouth. Julian let his head fall back, and hushed whimpers escaped his lips while the fireworks show continued behind us.

When he couldn't take anymore, his lips found mine again with tangible urgency. Julian walked backwards into the room, bringing me with him, and slammed the balcony doors shut.

Thick, rough fingers fumbled with the tiny buttons on my red, sleeveless blouse and I tore the final three off, sending small pieces flying across the carpet. I kicked my small boots off—first the right, then the left—as Julian broke the kiss for mere seconds, to send his white shirt sailing across the room. With my heart pounding out of rhythm, I reached behind me to unclasp my white, strapless bra, while he tore the belt from his black jeans, kicking the fabric from his legs and feet.

I shimmied out of my tight, gray, pencil skirt and was left in just white panties to contrast his black boxer briefs. Julian's coarse hands found their way down my sides, to my hips, and he gripped onto me tightly while nuzzling my neck.

Every spark, every ignition of passion I felt before, paled in comparison to the need I felt for Julian, right there and then. His fingers played with the elastic band of my underwear and I whined impatiently.

"Say it." Julian's voice was hoarse and thick with need.

"Anything," I agreed breathlessly.

"Say you want me," he demanded softly.

"I want you. I want you so much." I lightly dragged my blue painted nails down the muscles of his back. Julian lifted me in the air and brought me to the couch just feet away.

"Say you need me." He pulled my panties down with force and threw them behind him.

"I need you, Julian," I promised. In more ways than one.

He stood at the edge of the couch and admired me before pulling his boxers down, letting them pool at his feet. Julian stepped out from the black fabric and rubbed my thighs. He stared into my wide eyes with an intensity I would have refused to believe existed until I witnessed it for myself.

"Now say you love me," he said, while kneeling between my knees.

What? I felt the heat gathering in my neck, in my face.

"I'm just joking." He laughed deeply, brushing the stubble of his chin along my collarbone before leaning in for our thousandth kiss. I would need thousands more before the night was over. Somehow, though, I didn't think he was completely kidding.

"Do you trust me?" Julian asked, while pushing the bangs away from my eyes.

"Yes. More than anyone," I said, meaning it.

"Close your eyes, Brooke," Julian whispered in my ear with his breathy, throaty, accented voice that sent chills up my spine.

I did exactly as he asked, and allowed myself the luxury of savoring him, all of him, without anxiety for my appearance.

Hours passed, or maybe it was just long minutes. I could not be sure, since the world outside ceased to be when Julian's eyes thirsted for me, drinking in every angle of my skin. With my hand resting just above his collarbone, I could feel the vein in Julian's neck pulsing in frenzied yearning.

The electricity between us was undeniable, only growing in intensity, and I could not believe my luck to have found him somehow in this vast world that had never been kind to me before this. I was sure that nobody would ever be able to catch fire to my body like Julian did. I never wanted to test the theory to find out. I just wanted him. All of him.

And every touch, every kiss, every swipe of his mouth, every motion of Julian's body was a reciprocated promise of his desire for me.

Greedily, I stole his breath through endless kisses. I vowed to always remember the way his strong arms held straight, gripping the couch around us, while his tight chest heaved for air. I watched every perceptible movement of his skin, especially as Julian allowed his head to finally fall back, giving way to our rapture. His guttural groans soaked straight into my ears, exactly where I'd always wanted them to be. He encased me, until my whole world was him.

We moved together in rhythms and in ways that, I was sure, no other two people had ever done before. Heat, passing from his skin to mine. Warm, plump beads of sweat dripped from his temples to my navel, as Julian grunted through clenched teeth. There was a ferocious beating in my heart that could not be tamed.

Primal, lustful, burning moans kept filling every corner of the suite, bouncing from wall to wall, until both of us were seeing stars.

...

"Water?" Julian handed me a chilled bottle and another clean towel from the bathroom. We moved to the bedroom after we collected ourselves, and the pillows were decidedly the most comfortable things that either of us had ever felt.

"Thanks." I smiled up at him and took it. Within seconds, I had gulped down the entire thing.

"Not thirsty then?" Julian teased and handed me his own water bottle, before getting up to grab another from the wet bar area. He turned the temperature in the room down a few more degrees.

"Not that it's my business, but I noticed the wet bar is void of alcohol. Was it like that when you got here?" I called into the other room, as I twisted the cap off the second bottle of water and let the cool fluid soothe my scorched throat.

"No, it was fully stocked when I got here," Julian replied when he reentered the bedroom. "I asked them to take it away. Neither of us drink, so there was no need."

I smiled at him, listening to the intent behind his words. He didn't want the temptation around me. My heart suddenly swelled, flooding my body with warmth.

"So, where's Nick?" I asked nonchalantly. Julian slid into the bed with me and pulled the white comforter over our still naked bodies.

"I let him have the night off. Or rather, made him take the night off." Julian grinned my favorite grin and scooted closer to me.

"I noticed he wasn't by the door to hold my phone." I laughed.

"I never asked him to do that to you," Julian began. "He took it upon himself. I trusted you, but not everyone is like you, Brooke. People have terrible intentions sometimes. It's just management's protocol for that type of thing."

That type of thing. As if Julian could read my mind, he explained in more detail.

"I didn't mean it like that, I'm sorry. The other guys, well... they bring girls back sometimes. This isn't what I do. I don't make it a habit. You're the first woman I've ever brought back to my room in this way," he promised me.

"Ever?" I needed to hear him confirm it again.

"Ever," he assured me.

"Why me?" I asked. "I mean, if you had never done this before, if it wasn't your thing, what changed your mind?"

Julian was thoughtful for a long moment before he spoke up again.

"Have you ever heard of the bow and arrow theory?" he asked.

I shook my head.

"Okay." Julian scratched his chin while contemplating his words. "Say that everyone has an emotional bow and arrow. The arrow carries our thoughts, our feelings. That could be fear, anger, compassion..."

I nodded, encouraging him to continue.

"The bow represents our intentions and openness. It determines just how powerfully we draw back the arrow, to send those thoughts into the world. With it, we decide if we want to be known and understood. If there isn't enough power, enough fire, behind your emotions, the arrow can't fly. People can't know you. But if there is a great fire in that person, the arrow will fly powerfully. It will fly until it hits the target—whether you know who that target will be yet or not."

"So, you become acquainted with a stranger through your assumption of their intentions, before really getting to know them," I presumed, partially teasing him.

"You can view it that way," he said with a smirk. "But you were never a stranger to me. You communicated with me before we ever spoke, and that's why I've always been so comfortable with you."

"What do you mean?" I asked, pleased with his answer so far.

"You disclosed a lot of what I needed to know through your eyes. Your stance. Your laugh. How your voice resonated. Your nervous little gestures. The way you hide your teeth when you smile, except for when you can't help yourself." Julian's eyes were burning into me. "I was watching you when you pulled up in your car. And when you were stood outside, having a chat with Laina and Mason. You could say you were firing arrows at me and didn't even know it yet."

"And what did those arrows say?" My mouth felt dry and hot under his focus.

"That you have pain." Julian's throat moved down and up, as he swallowed hard.

"But beyond that, you have hope. You have genuineness and selflessness. You have strength and empathy. You have a lot of love." Julian paused. "You forgive too easily. You're too patient. You don't know how beautiful you really are. Am I getting close?"

Julian brushed the hair from my eyes.

"How could you possibly know those things just by looking at me?" I asked suspiciously.

"I highly suspected. And with each word between us, you've affirmed it all. Now, I'm just trying to know you better every minute of every day. I want to know everything about you." Julian propped himself up on his side by his elbow. "I could carry on talking to you forever."

"We don't have time for that." I nudged his shoulder with my own. Fear, or something close to it, spread across his features before I continued. "We have to get some sleep so I can show you around Disney tomorrow."

I reached for my phone to set an alarm, only to find it was dead. I trotted over to grab my charger from the suitcase in the living area.

"Where are you going?" Julian called after me.

"I have to plug in my phone. Will you set your alarm?" I asked him.

"Sure." He was fidgeting with his cell phone screen when I got back to the bedroom.

"Do you believe in coincidences?" I blurted out as I sat back on the soft bed, fluffing the pillow behind me.

"No. There's no such thing." He interlaced his fingers with mine. "Why?"

"Just something a little ironic." I laughed once, softly.

"What is it?" he pressed.

"I don't have you saved as 'Julian' for the contact name in my phone," I said.

"Yeah? What is it then?" He smiled while turning off the lamp by his side of the bed. I already missed his piercing eyes.

"Arrows."

I felt a low rumble of laughter emitting from Julian's chest. As it dissipated, turning to deep, slow breaths on my skin, I was lulled to sleep in his arms.

1. "A Whole New World" (guitar cover) by Kanaho

2. "Kiss Me Slowly" by Parachute

3. "Give Your Heart a Break" (cover) by Anthem Lights

4. Taylor Swift Mashup by Anthem Lights

5. "Río Ancho" by Paco de Lucía

6. "The Moment" by William Ackerman