by Eden O'Neill
I went to sleep within his heat and his soft hip hop beats.
Chapter Nineteen
Bri
Ramses and I didn’t go back to the charity event. We went to my hotel room, where we didn’t leave.
We’d done the civil thing, of course. He’d texted his date, and I’d called mine. Meredith, as he’d said, hadn’t expected to go home with him so her quick response of “Catch ya later” hadn’t been surprising on his end. He hadn’t told me the excuse he’d given her for leaving, but they seemed amicable about how both their nights ended. She’d probably, like he’d also said, gone home with someone else, and though Guy hadn’t expected him and me to leave together either, he had been surprised by the call.
Initially, I’d given him some lame excuse for leaving. I had to stop at my hotel room to get something. He hadn’t protested, but when I called to say I wouldn’t be returning, his concern rang through the line. I gave yet another lame excuse, this time feigning illness, and I felt a little guilty about that. I didn’t like lying to people, and I had been clear things weren’t going anywhere between the pair of us.
Ramses had me doing things I didn’t normally do, this man, this… young man making me live and breathe life in a different way. When I was with him, I didn’t think. I didn’t want to think so it was easy for me to give in to a night of passion.
And passion we had, basically everywhere. There wasn’t a surface in that hotel suite where he didn’t taste me, make me come. By the end, we’d collapsed in a tumble of spread limbs and moist flesh on the chaise lounge in the suite’s sitting area. We’d both fallen asleep there, but when I woke up, I was in a bed by myself.
That didn’t mean Ramses wasn’t around me, on my flesh or in the sheets. We’d made love here too, several times.
Love. Was that what this was? It was infatuation, definitely, and obsession, most assuredly. I was obsessed with Ramses, had been for a while. He was like a forbidden candy I couldn’t help but taste, the urge to be naughty and sample his flavor ridiculous. We didn’t hold back sexually, and we’d only spent a couple of nights together. Something told me more wild days were sure to come, but I wasn’t sure I was prepared for them.
I want you to be my girl.
But what did that mean to him? Did he understand what that meant? Did I understand what that meant? Sex was one thing. Perhaps, the easiest thing. It was society and pressures to be a certain something that was the problem. We did have a decent age gap, and we’d also have to stare his mom in the face and tell her the truth.
After I’d already lied to her.
I lay with so many thoughts in that bed I basically drowned in them and Ramses had been gone for so long, I turned to find him. I grabbed my phone first, a text message on the screen.
Ramses: Come get breakfast when you’re ready. I’m getting it ready for you.
Oh my God, he made me breakfast.
Like a legitimate boyfriend, he doted on me, but then again, I’d done the same for him that first night.
Mostly, because I was a control freak.
The game from last night was over without the sex-induced haze, and the urge to grip hold of that control tugged me out of bed.
I showered quickly, the bedroom connected to the bathroom. It hadn’t been until after I toweled dry and threw some clothes on that I smelled, well, food. It wafted in like he’d started to ready it after I woke up. He might have even been listening for me to wake up so he could start.
I wouldn’t put it past him, shaking my head when I cracked the door open and a myriad of smells hit me. I was talking eggs, baked goods, bacon.
I’d even smelled steak.
I got a suite with a kitchen, but he’d have to have gone out to get food. Or called a delivery service. I padded down the hall with my bare feet in a pair of jeans and a tank top. My hair still wet, I towel-dried it on my search to find Ramses and that food. I found them both in the sitting area.
And he’d completely outdone himself.
He hadn’t cooked, silver domes indicating room service lining the counter between the kitchen and the sitting room. But it appeared he’d ordered everything on the menu.
Platters with stacks of danishes, three-tiered stands arranged with muffins and scones. He’d order pancakes, as well, and he did have steak and eggs. It all sat arranged on their various plates near the bacon, a feast with at least two types of cold beverages and coffee. Ramses was coming out of the kitchen with silverware for it all. Two place settings had been arranged next to each other. The table sat at least twelve, but he only put silverware in front of the two chairs. It reminded me of the sweetheart table at his friend’s wedding.
And God, was he delicious too.
He hadn’t spotted me at first, in only his lounge pants, gray sweats that cuffed at his ankles. He must have planned to stay overnight in the city as well, a complete and ab-lickable god with his shaven head and magnificent body. The sweats helped his Men’s Health Magazine aesthetic, the outline of his package on full display. Whoever invented gray sweatpants needed to be knighted for their service to womenkind.
I cleared my throat, and Ramses jerked that buzz cut in my direction, his grin wide. Eyeing me, he placed a hand toward a chair, and I took it.
“What’s all this?” I asked, letting him push me in, and he joined me.
“This is a do over.” He snapped out a napkin, placing it on my lap before draping an arm across my chair. He folded a hand behind my neck. “And you’re sexy as hell.”
I didn’t understand the whole do over thing, but I definitely computed his mouth on mine.
He captured my lips in his hungry kiss, smelling all fresh like he’d showered. He must have snuck one in while I’d been sleeping. The fact only made me want to get in his lap and bury my face in his neck, but I resisted.
He didn’t.
He mouthed his way down to my rapid pulse, hooking my waist and actually tugging me on top of him. A heavy hand kept my ass on firm thighs, his thick cock probing me right through his sweats.
He groaned, tasting the other side of my neck, and if we kept this up, we wouldn’t be eating. I smiled. “Ramses?”
“Yep?”
“Do over?” I fisted his biceps, physically easing him away from me. This was no easy feat.
He was definitely hungry.
Though I had a feeling that hunger ebbed more towards me. Even still, he picked up a fork and speared a piece of melon for me.
He summoned me to open my mouth, which I did, the taste explosion absolute heaven and even better since he fed me.
He allowed me to enjoy myself, sampling what he’d clearly had brought up for me. Everything in front of me was cooked to perfection. He’d even ordered poached eggs for me, which I loved.
His arms ensnared my hips while I ate, what I deciphered as pleasure across his face as he watched me feed myself. I offered him a bit, but he refused. He just liked watching me.
“The do over seems to be going well,” he said, and I noticed he hadn’t answered me the first time. I’d been too busy eating and enjoying his presence to poke him about it. He rested a chin on my shoulder. “Are you happy?”
I faced him, actual worry knitting his brow, and he smoothed a hand over his shaven head.
He sat back. “The last time we did this, you left. Though, obviously not physically. You had me do that part.”
I had, guilt and something else sagging heavy like a sopping blanket on top of me.
He wanted me happy?
At least, he was worried that I wasn’t. That I’d leave. I placed down my fork. “Ramses…”
“No.”
I faced him again, his expression serious. He cuffed his wrist on the other side of my hips, his lips pinched tight in thought. Or maybe hesitance. I’d given him more than one reason to do the latter.
I had run.
I planned to possibly do more of that today, but I said nothing at the present.
He lifted a hand. “Before you say
anything, give me a list of reasons why this won’t work…”
Wow. He knew me so well, didn’t he? At least, thought he did.
I adjusted in his lap, my jaw shifting. He may have thought I was uncomfortable, so he returned me to my chair.
He hung an arm on the back. “Tell me I’m too young for you again or how much it bothers you that I’m your friend’s son…”
He was both those things, our reality. I wasn’t very comfortable with the age gap, but I may be able to get over it, had we not had the other issue.
I’d lied to his mom. I’d lied to my friend, and though he had as well, he was her son. Kids lied to their parents. But friends?
I followed the hard curve of his bicep with my hand, solid and unyielding beneath my flesh. I wished it was different. I wished we were different, our circumstances, and I’d said that before.
Ramses wouldn’t allow me to say it again, cuffing the back of my neck. Bracing me, he caused our foreheads to touch and breathed me in.
I sighed.
“Just,” he started, my skin warming beneath his hand. He squeezed. “Tell me what I need to say. Tell me what I need to do for you to give this a chance.”
He brought my head up, scanning my eyes.
“To be my girl,” he said, basically my entire insides fluttering. “To be with me, as mine and not just for sex. To be out of the dark with all this. To be a real thing.”
My throat thickened, my mouth dry. “Can I speak now?”
“Depends on what you have to say.” He sat back. He lifted a hand. “Do I even have a chance? A chance with you?”
I hated that he felt that way, that I gave him such a run around, that that was the relationship we had.
I fucked with this guy’s heart something crazy, and I hated that.
I cuffed his other arm, so powerful beneath me. He was mighty Ramses, all-powerful pharaoh of the world. At least, mine. “It’s not so simple.”
“What’s not so simple about it?”
“People who are different ages, our kind of age difference is fine on paper. But with that difference comes life experiences. Different life experiences, and relationships are already difficult enough.”
“Well, I’m willing to try.” A frustrated hand came over his head again. “And it’s not that different. Our ages?”
“It is enough of one, yeah, and then there is your mom.”
“Yeah, and she’d be cool with it.”
“You don’t know that.”
“You don’t either, but you’re quick to say it. Shut this down.”
This all seemed moot, the back and forth. We were arguing about things that hadn’t happened. “I’ve barely been divorced for a year.”
“And I’m not asking to get married.” He shook his head. “I just want to give this a chance. Are you saying there isn’t one?”
“No.”
This surprised him, clearly. His eyes flashing. He leaned forward. “Okay.”
Oh my God, what are you doing?
I was being selfish. Willing to entertain this was completely selfish. Because what other words defined this?
He was a young man and had many more experiences that awaited him. Many young women like Meredith last night, ones who hadn’t been married and didn’t have all this baggage.
And I had a lot.
They went beyond my ex and how cruel he’d ended up treating me. They were buried, deeply rooted.
I needed them to stay there.
Placing them there was all I could do to function every day, and in all my thoughts, Ramses made me look at him once more.
“You’re doing it again.”
“What?”
He tilted my chin. “Using too much of this,” he said, touching my temple. “You’re so in your head right now when you don’t have to be. It doesn’t have to be so hard. In fact, it’s so simple.”
“Explain it to me then.” I worked my hair around. “Make it as simple for me as it is for you.”
Dampening his lips, he faced away. His fingers dragged across his mouth before he returned. “How about we put a deadline on it.”
“What?”
He nodded. “One of your biggest issues is my mom, right?”
“Yes.”
“And the fact I’m only a few years younger than you. Which I can’t help, by the way.”
“I know.”
Smirking, he hugged his arms around my entire waist. He’d actually been able to grip his biceps this time. “We figured out the whole me being your student thing. I’m not anymore, but maybe you’d feel better if we officially came out with everything if I wasn’t a student anymore.”
“Meaning…”
“Graduation hits, and we are a couple,” he stated, smiling. “We acknowledge it. We tell my mom. We skip over a few details. Say we started talking shortly before but didn’t actually start dating until after graduation. We still will be dating before graduation, but this way, in the eyes of my mother, it looks a little more innocent.”
“I don’t see what difference that would make.” It was still lying. I shook my head. “And what? We sneak around? Behind her back?”
We obviously couldn’t go anywhere together.
His big shoulders lifted. “I don’t want to, but I’m willing to do that for you. It also puts a hard deadline on the secrecy, and who knows…” His brows waggled. “You may be tired of my ass before then and we won’t have to worry about telling her at all.”
I’d be hard-pressed to imagine that. He drove me crazy, yes.
But I liked his crazy.
I liked our crazy, and I wanted to scream about how ludicrous this entire thing was.
This won’t work. This won’t work. This won’t work.
“This will work.”
Crap. I’d said that out loud.
He took my hands, grinning. Using our fingers, he tugged some of my hair out of my face. “Or maybe it won’t. But at least, we’re giving it a chance. I told you. No regrets.”
I released a heavy breath, and I knew what I was going to say before I even said it. There was just something about this guy. He always got his way with me.
I wrapped my arms around his neck, and he covered the back of my head.
Bending my head forward, he warmed the top of my crown.
“Ball’s in your court, professor,” he said, the smile in his voice evident. He pulled his big arms around me. “My Jersey girl.”
I closed my eyes in wild wonder that his friend could ever not love him back. Ramses was so easy to love.
God.
I hugged him tighter, nearly wishing she had. It’d be a lot easier for him. It wouldn’t be easy with me.
I was too damaged for it to be.
Chapter Twenty
Ramses
I almost regretted the commitment I’d made with Brielle, the urge to keep what we had a secret.
But then I had her.
I had her every day in my DMs, messages between lectures and board meetings. She’d given me her personal email too, so at least I wasn’t hitting her up at school when I did that.
She’d been concerned about that too, if one could imagine.
Like my mother was literally monitoring her emails, her need for secrecy apparent. I didn’t like it. Not at all, but that made her comfortable. She also didn’t run, so I didn’t argue.
I had her.
I didn’t have to chase her anymore, which I liked. I seemed to always have my running shoes on with this woman, but over the next few weeks, I didn’t have to do that with her.
I couldn’t take her out or anything, and between her schedule and mine being tight, that did make a relationship difficult. That’d happen even without the whole keeping us a secret thing, but we made it work. When we could arrange it, she did come over to my place, stay the night. We recommenced our runs after school and work often, so that made getting together easy. Her staying at my place on occasion also made it easier for her to go to work in the morning.
And hell, if I didn’t take full advantage.
I liked waking up to her, kissing her awake until she let me inside her. The best shit was the shower sex. I couldn’t fucking get enough, and it was lucky if either of us made it on time to classes the next day.
We always did, though, and she made sure of that. My responsible ex-history professor. She stayed at my condo a few nights a week, and when she didn’t, we were texting the shit out of each other. I didn’t push for anything more outside of that since I did get to see or hear from her most days.
I was also busy, so pushing for more wasn’t really an option at the present. I was still bound by obligations with school and work, and her life was the same. Our current arrangement made it easy.
But I was still looking at the calendar.
I’d even circled the event on the date: graduation. Like her getting my ass out of the shower for class after morning sex, I planned to hold her to that date. I refused to let us lie to my mother forever.
Me: So, once I’m considered an educated adult by the prestigious standards of Pembroke University (i.e. have graduated), you know I’m going to take you out, right? Treat you?
I damn well planned on showing her off and sent her many text messages just as this. She needed a reminder. We had a deadline and all this secrecy shit would be over eventually.
She texted me back while I waited for a client, a surprise on my roster today. In fact, I’d been a little confused by the name, but more curious than anything. I had a few minutes before it yet, so took full advantage of texting my girlfriend.
My girlfriend.
We didn’t use such words, girlfriend and boyfriend. Not because I didn’t want to use them, of course. I’d shout it from the rafters that I was seeing her.
Brielle Whitman-Quintero proved to be a special case. AKA skittish as fuck. It didn’t take much for her to run. So, no, I didn’t use labels.
Bri: You’re so silly.
Me: Rude and completely disrespectful to your fellow educated adult.
Bri: You haven’t graduated yet.
Me: Burn.