10
The concert was excellent, and so was Harrison’s company. I was glad I’d taken Nicky shopping with me that morning, because the turquoise dress was her idea, and with the way it fit me, I turned plenty of heads and had Harrison’s rapt attention throughout the night. One almost would’ve thought I was the main attraction rather than the skilled R&B crooner. The evening was so nice, full of good music and good vibes, that I virtually floated from my car to my front door and entered my living room with a little twirl. Nicky’s backwards ass was right. This was fun. This was living. Going out and being appreciated by a man just for being myself. Expecting nothing from him and having no expectations attached to my company. Maybe I would try dating another guy. From what I could tell, this dating game wasn’t half bad after all.
I was in my bedroom, dress pulled down from my upper body and bunched up around my waist as I sat on my bed and kicked my heels off. I smiled at my reflection in the dresser mirror, at the way the black-laced edge of my push-up bra framed my breasts, tilted my head to the side and studied my neck, the flawless brown skin of my chest and face.
I was beautiful. Maybe not the most beautiful woman in the world, but I was beautiful. Putting so much stock in how my exes treated me had erased that truth from my mind. I made a vow to myself at that moment to never forget that, to never deny my own beauty again, and to never ever attach my self-worth to how someone else treated me.
I slipped all the way out of my clothes and hopped in the shower, relishing in the hot water pouring over me as I lathered my skin with my favorite plumeria-scented body wash. About thirty minutes later, I’d pulled on my favorite old night shirt and climbed into bed, was on my way to La La Land when the sound of thumping bass jolted me out of my semi-slumber. More than a little disoriented, I rolled over, trying to figure out what was going on, what I was hearing, and why I was hearing it. Then it occurred to me.
Ryan Boyé.
I closed my eyes and sighed, grabbed my cell phone from the bedside table, and checked the time—1:00 AM. Really? Was this negro really blasting music at this time of night or morning or whatever?
Shit.
And things were going so well.
I sat up and tried to mentally will this fool to turn his music down, because I really did not feel like having to walk over there and beat on his door to get him to do something his grown ass should’ve had sense enough to do anyway.
I waited for five whole minutes. I waited as the music thumped and the picture frame on my dresser vibrated, growing angrier by the second. I could’ve called him, but bump that. Instead, I stood up, released a frustrated groan, and threw a robe on over my night shirt. Barefoot and pissed the hell off, I left my place and stalked to his door, beating on it like I was the chief of police.
No answer.
Oh, hell no!
I kicked the door, and yelled, “Hey!”
The music stopped, and less than a minute later, the front door eased open to reveal a heavy-lidded Ryan Boyé, shirtless in a pair of red briefs, and from the looks of things, I had interrupted something or had awakened him from a very steamy dream, because ole boy was standing at attention. All of the moisture in my mouth traveled to my core. I shifted my weight on my feet and tore my eyes away from his groin, letting them amble over his muscular stomach and chest and finally settle on his eyes.
He raised his eyebrows. “Yes?”
“Uh-um-uh…your-the music…”
His eyes flickered with recognition. “Oh, man. Did it wake you? I was listening to it and fell asleep and must’ve rolled over on the stereo remote.”
“Oh…didn’t it wake you? It was loud for a few minutes there.”
He reached up and rested his hand on the back of his head. “Yeah, I was kinda out of it. Took me a minute or so to find the remote. I didn’t realize it was under me.”
“Oh, okay. Well, um…just try to keep it down. The neighbors don’t mind calling the police.”
“Yeah, yeah…sorry, again.”
“No problem.”
*****
“…so now he says I can stay until I finish this degree. I’m so relieved.”
Nicky’s words were clear to me, but I just couldn’t focus on them. It’d been three days since the whole loud-music-Ryan-in-his-underwear thing, and my mind was still twisted in knots. My body still reacted to the mere thought of seeing him like that—tall, beautiful, aroused. Aroused for who? Was there someone in there reaping the benefits of what The Maker had so generously gifted him with that night? It really didn’t matter if there was. All that mattered was the singular thought that had plagued my mind since that night.
I wish it was me.
I watched Nicky’s mouth move, and I nodded my head when I saw her raise her eyebrows. I had no idea what I was agreeing to, but my reaction must’ve been appropriate or at least to her satisfaction, because she gave me a smile in return.
I had finally called my mother, took her request for her and Daddy’s anniversary menu, and Nicky was in my kitchen helping me prepare baked ham, macaroni and cheese, green bean casserole and yeast rolls—all my father’s favorites, because that was just what my mom did. She catered to my father, waited on him hand and foot, never argued or disagreed with him, and in return, he took very good care of her. He owned two huge car lots here in town, with other lots all over Tennessee. Daddy was rich and generous. Me and Renee and Nicky and our mother had never wanted for anything…except his time and attention.
And that was why I was impossibly attracted to the wrong types of men, and Renee was married to the wrong man, and Nicky was a ho’. We had all tried, and were still trying, to fill the void of having a father who basically shared an address with us only on his driver’s license. The man was always gone. Always. And when he was home, we all fell over each other vying for his attention. Looking back on my childhood and upbringing, it was actually full of sadness punctuated by instances of happiness, but those instances never involved Daddy. He missed them, and that hurt.
It hurt, because it wasn’t like he was a doctor out saving lives or a soldier deployed overseas. The man sold cars. Car lots close at a certain time of day. His absence was intentional. We all knew it, though we never said it. And we also knew he had other women, likely other families. And that hurt, too. But Mama accepted it, lived life on his terms, and out of respect for her, so did me and Renee and Nicky.
“Angie!” Nicky shouted, her hands on her tiny, barely-there hips. She gave me an impatient look, as if she’d been trying to get my attention for a while. She probably had, because my mind and focus had been everywhere but there in my kitchen with her.
“Huh?” I asked, shifting my eyes from her to the ham I’d been preparing to put in the oven.
“I said, do you think the rolls are done?”
I blinked once, twice, then finally said, “Let me see.”
I checked the rolls, finding them a nice golden brown, and slid them out of the oven. When I turned around, Nicky was staring at me.
“You okay?” she asked.
I shrugged. “Tired, I guess. Been making a lot of videos, doing a lot of editing. I think I wore myself out.” It wasn’t a lie. I had been working hard. But I’d also found it hard to sleep, because my mind kept filling with thoughts of Ryan Boyé and his penis.
“Everything else is ready for the oven, right? I’ll watch the food. Go lie down,” she suggested.
I didn’t protest.
I managed to fall asleep pretty quickly, and four hours later, woke to my house smelling like a holiday gathering. My sister was gone, having put all the food in the refrigerator. She’d also left a note and my mail on the coffee table in the living room.
I sat down and sifted through the mail, most of which was Ryan’s. I sighed. The mailman was really going to have to get his act together, because the last thing I needed was to have to face that man again.
I sat there for ten minutes before deciding to just put his mail in his mailbox. Peeking out the window, I found his driveway empty and smiled. Good, he wasn’t home, so now was the best time. I slipped on a pair of thong sandals and eased out my front door, damn near threw his mail in his mailbox and almost fell off the porch when his door swung open.
Shit, shit, shit!
I stood there like a deer in headlights as he stepped out of his apartment. At least he had on clothes this time, and he wasn’t aroused as far as I could tell, but he was still…him. He was still beautiful, and I still wanted him.
“Hey,” he softly said.
“Uh…your mail,” was all I managed to say.
He frowned. “What about my mail?”
“Some of it was in my box. I put it in yours.”
“Oh, you were just gonna leave it without saying hello?”
Warmth invaded my cheeks. “Your car…I thought you were gone.”
“There was a car in my driveway when I got home. I parked on the street.”
I turned my head and there it was, right on the street. “Oh, I bet that was my sister’s car. Sorry about that. I guess she thought she’d be gone before you got home.”
“It’s all right. Hey, I feel like I owe you for the whole loud music thing the other night. I ordered a huge pizza. Wanna share it with me?”
I wanted to share more than a pizza. Way more. But I shook my head. “No, thank you.”
He shrugged. “Suit yourself.”
I turned to leave and had barely taken a step when he said, “Thanks for bringing my mail over, Angela.”
I spun around at the sound of my name coming from his mouth. It wasn’t that I minded us being on a first name basis, it was the way he said it, the way it floated on that accent of his. And when I looked at him, his eyes made me feel naked.
I dropped my gaze. “You’re welcome.”
“You sure you don’t want some pizza?”
I wasn’t sure of a damn thing. So I just stood there.
“It’s meat lovers, deep dish.” He tilted his head and grinned. “You know you want some.”
Heat swarmed my core as I stared at those delicious-looking lips. Oh, I wanted some. I really, really wanted some. “Yeah, I’ll join you,” rushed from my mouth, and I wondered where those words had come from and how they’d managed to escape from my mouth without my permission.
I followed him inside the familiar living room, where a pizza box sat on his huge marble-topped coffee table. Dropping into an overstuffed leather easy chair, I let my eyes roam the room while he ducked into the kitchen to grab a couple of plates. Clean, but not obsessively neat. Nice, expensive-looking furniture, an open laptop sitting on the sofa, his cell phone lying face down on the table next to the pizza box. The walls were bare, and it smelled of a combination of the pizza and his cologne. I closed my eyes and tried to will the ever-present image of him in his underwear away. When I opened them, I asked myself what I was doing there. It’d literally been years since I was with a man intimately, and sitting there was dangerous. He was attracted to me. I’d felt his attraction before, and I was definitely attracted to him. I needed to leave before my needy body overcame what little common sense I was managing to hold on to. Just as I stood, he walked back in with the plates and a couple of bottles of water.
“Uh, maybe I should go,” I said.
He stopped in his tracks. “Why? I thought you wanted pizza.”
Unable to find a response, I reclaimed my seat in silence. You keep acting like a nut, you won’t have to worry about him wanting to sleep with you. “Uh…is this your furniture? I mean, did you bring it with you from…”
“Houston.”
“Right. Houston?”
“No, it’s leased, just like my vehicle.”
“Oh…you still have a place back there?”
“Yeah.”
I wrung my hands in my lap and focused my attention on the floor, not noticing that he was trying to hand me a plate.
“You okay?” he asked, setting the plate on the coffee table.
I shook my head and scoffed. “Honestly, not at all. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Just…I don’t know.”
“You look stressed. Been working hard?”
I nodded as I looked up at him. Working hard at trying not to think about you.
He smiled down at me. “Come in the kitchen and let me see if I can help you.”
I frowned but stood and followed him, wondering to myself what he was planning to do. Relax me with food?
He pulled a chair out from the kitchen table. “Have a seat.”
I did, and watched as he moved to the right of the chair I occupied, towering over me. He raised his hands, wiggled his fingers, and said, “I’m good with massages. You mind?”
I shrugged. “Go ahead.”
I closed my eyes, and when his hands rested on my shoulders, warmth penetrating the cloth of my t-shirt, I flinched a little. “Sorry,” I mumbled.
“Man, you’re really tense.” He kneaded my shoulders, his hands strong and gentle at the same time, causing me to seemingly sink into the wooden chair.
“That’s it. See, you’re relaxing already.”
I let my head loll forward. “Yeah…”
He massaged my shoulders another minute before gently pushing against my back, encouraging me to lean forward, and then used his thumbs to rub circles into my back. I sighed softly. His hands did feel good, very good, so when he lifted my shirt and his warm hands met my flesh, I didn’t protest. I just rested my arms on the table and my head on my arms as he continued rubbing circles into my skin. Then I felt his lips on my back.
I sat up straight, stiffening my posture. Standing from the chair, I turned to face him. “What are you doing?”
“Trying to make you feel good. Don’t you wanna feel good, Angela? Don’t you want me to make you feel good?” he asked in a huskier version of that voice that made me melt. His eyes were glued to mine in an intense stare. I saw the desire there, and once again, felt heat and moisture rush between my legs. I was throbbing down there. It had been so long…
“What are you talking about?” I only said that because I honestly couldn’t think of anything else to say, laced my words with anger because I was mad at myself for absolutely wanting him to make me feel good.
He reached down and pushed the chair away, closing the space between us so that my face was only centimeters from his chest. “You don’t know what I’m talking about? You sure?” He lowered his head so that his lips just barely touched mine. A tiny sound escaped my mouth before I clamped it shut.
It’s been so long.
Too long.
Three years…
“I…I…Mr. Boyé, I don’t think—”
“But you are thinking. That’s the problem.” He cupped my face in his hands and locked his eyes on mine. “You need to stop thinking so damn much.”
His mouth covered mine before I could utter another word, his tongue sliding across my lips. I responded by opening my mouth and welcoming it inside. His tongue caressed mine, my face still in his strong hands. Then he moved his hands to my shoulders and my arms before they left my body for a moment and then found my back, where he eased them under my shirt and rubbed them up and down my warm flesh, sending ripples of deep yearning through me, moaning into my mouth and making my mind race almost as wildly as my heart.
His hands slid down to my ass, gripping it as he turned his head and deepened the kiss. A moment later, his lips left mine, and he whispered, “You taste so sweet.”
My answer was to close my eyes, lean in, and kiss him, wrapping my arms around him, expecting him to wrap his around me. Instead, I felt him grasp both sides of my waist and lift me onto the table, our mouths still connected. My eyes popped open, but closed again as he continued to kiss my breath away. Then one of his hands returned to my body, sliding into the front of my jogging pants, into my panties…to my naked core.
I gasped as he began to caress my clit with expert precision. Our tongues were still intermingled as I grabbed his shirt and screamed into his mouth. Two long-term relationships equaling a combined total of eleven years, and I had never, ever felt anything so intense, so terrifyingly, uncontrollably good. With every stroke of his finger, it felt as if he was unraveling a strand of my sanity and I feared when he was finished with me, I’d be completely undone.
But I couldn’t stop him.
I didn’t want to.
I wanted to ride this wave of ecstasy to the end. I wanted the swell of pressure inside of me to be released. But conversely, I wanted the tension to continue building forever, because it felt so unbelievably good.
He slid a finger inside of me. This time I managed to reclaim my mouth and screamed out loud. I looked up at the intensity in his gaze and buried my face in his chest. “Ryan...Ryan...Ryan,” I muttered. Then finally, I exploded, shuddering as I held onto him for dear life. I leaned into him, breathing heaving breaths, heard him say, “I’m sorry.”
I looked up and into his eyes to see that the expression on his face had transformed from one shadowed with lust to one covered in embarrassment, as if he hadn’t meant for things to go this far. Relief flooded me. I wanted him, but knew we were headed somewhere I wasn’t quite ready to go just yet. Not yet. Not with him or anyone else. But the relief didn’t temper the heat and desire that coated every part of my body.
I was sated and satisfied, thanks to him. I didn’t need him, but I damn sure wanted him.
“I-I’m sorry. This isn’t right. I shouldn’t have…I’m sorry,” he said.
I shook my head and began sliding down from the table. As he grabbed my hand to help me, I said, “It’s okay. I’ll…I’ll just go.”
He gave me a look that told me he wanted me to go almost as much as he wanted me to stay. “I really don’t want you to go,” he said, as he reached up and dragged his hand over his face. He looked downright confused, like he wasn’t quite sure what to say or how to feel.
“It’s all right, really. Rain check on the pizza?” I offered him a smile.
He nodded, said, “Okay,” and then walked me to my door. I made my way to my bedroom on weak legs and collapsed into bed, not giving a second thought to the fact that I’d had no dinner.