“I only believe what I can see, taste, hear, and touch,” he said.
“And feel,” she added.
“I said touch,” he defended himself.
She shook her head and reached up to press her palm against his heart.
Anson stiffened from her touch just as his heart beat wildly and every hair on his body stood on end. Like it did earlier when she was so close to him in the pool house.
“Feel in here,” she stressed, patting her hand against his chest.
Anson felt his nipple harden. He walked away from her. “In there is a weakness,” he said. “You don’t know me and you know nothing about what I’ve been through. So please leave this whole subject off, Mona. Please.”
“But—”
He grabbed his crutch and jerked it under his arm before taking a step. His eyes widened as he felt himself slip and lose his footing. “Shit,” he swore as he stumbled and then fell backward.
Mona hollered out in alarm.
Anson winced and closed his eyes as pain radiated across his back and buttocks. He felt Mona place one hand to his chest and the other to the side of his face.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
The touch of her hand. The coolness of her breath against his face. The sweetness of her perfume. All of it was a lot to take in, and when he opened his eyes they looked directly up into hers while his heart pounded loudly and quickly. Her beauty struck him. Her lips teased him. What the hell . . . ?
“Anson . . . Anson. Say something. Are you okay? Should I call an ambulance?” she asked, bending in closer to him.
“Kiss me,” he said.
Mona’s look surprised him as her eyes searched his. “Is this you being spontaneous?” she said softly in the small space between their faces.
Anson reached up with his good hand and lightly cupped the back of her head to close the gap between their mouths.
The first touch of their lips was awkward. A little too wet. A lot too hard.
“Oh my,” Mona sighed.
Anson frowned. “That’s a first,” he said, sounding surprised. “The worst first.”
They looked at each other and burst out laughing.
Anson sat up and pressed his back against the wall of the kitchen. “I’m gonna need your help getting up,” he admitted.
Instead of doing that, she moved to straddle his thighs. “Failure is for fools,” Mona said.
“I’m no fool,” he said, bringing his hands up to lightly grip her hips as she leaned in slowly.
Mona lightly touched her lips to his as they stared at each other. With less than an inch between their mouths, Anson tilted his chin up to do the same as his entire body felt alive. “Not bad,” he whispered.
“Not at all,” she admitted with a hot lick of her lips.
Anson traced her bottom lip with his tongue.
Mona captured it in her mouth and sucked it deeply as she pressed her hands against his shoulders and lightly gripped his shirt.
Anson massaged her hips and brought his hand down to lightly jerk her body closer to his until her breasts were pushed against the hardness of his chest. He moaned as their kiss deepened. His pulse raced. His heart pounded and his head got hard . . . down below.
“Shit,” Mona swore as they broke the kiss to deeply breathe in air.
Anson pressed kisses to her jawline.
SLAM.
The sound of the front door being solidly closed echoed.
Mona climbed off his lap and sat on the floor, her fingers lightly pressed to her open mouth as she panted like she was in heat. With her eyes glazed over she looked sexy as hell.
“Guess who, big brother?”
Anson had never been regretful of the appearance of his brother . . . until that moment. “In here, Hunter,” he called out, thankful their kiss hadn’t brought his dick to a full hard-on.
“Your brother?” Mona said, rising to stand by the doorway.
“You must be the curly-haired she-devil.”
Anson winced at his brother’s forthrightness.
“Oh really?” he heard Mona ask. “Is that what he called me?”
“Hunter,” Anson called out as he avoided Mona’s stare.
His brother poked his head in around the doorway, searching the room with his eyes.
“Down here,” Anson said dryly.
Hunter looked down. “Damn, I didn’t even see you, bro,” he said, stepping into the kitchen and extending his hand.
Anson accepted it, and his younger brother, who was twenty pounds lighter and a foot taller, pulled him up to his feet with ease. Mona jumped in with the crutch and Anson felt like all was “upright” with the world.
He looked on as his brother turned back to Mona. “I’m Hunter Tyler, and your name?” he asked, smooth as fine brandy.
“Mona Ballinger,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest.
“And I’m Kyra Nollings.”
Anson swiveled his head in surprise as his college sweetheart stepped into the kitchen. She was still thick, still curvy, and still beautiful, with her red hair and shortbread complexion. “Kyra?” he said, surprised to see her again after nearly seven years.
“I thought you would need some help recuperating and I swooped by and picked Kyra up,” Hunter said, moving over to the stove to look inside the pot.
“Surprise,” Kyra said, moving in to press a kiss to Anson’s cheek and give him a hug that was tight enough to blend them into one human form.
“I guess I’ll leave you to your guest.”
Mona rushed over to the island and gathered her items, quickly sliding them into her briefcase.
“No, no, don’t go,” Hunter said, coming to tower over her. “With you here I won’t feel like a third wheel.”
Mona winced. Anson was standing there hugging a woman with the taste of her still on his mouth. That’s enough sharing for me with this crew. “Actually I have to go. And now that the cavalry is here I can head out.”
She breezed past Anson, whose ex was still holding him close and rubbing his back. Well damn, let him breathe....
“Yes, you go on with your business. Kyra’s here now,” the woman said.
“Nice to meet you, Carina . . . I mean Kyra,” Mona said with a fake smile.
“There’s only one Kyra,” the woman said, giving Mona a slow once-over.
Mona did the same. “Yes, I can see you have invested quite a bit into an individual look,” she said, before she left the kitchen without sparing Anson another glance.
“Well, Anson, I see she is quite a little spitfire with about four bundles of fourteen-inch deep wave weave.”
Mona stopped at the woman’s voice carrying from the kitchen. She gave herself a ten count. Weave? Bundles? I should go in there and give her a Porsha Stewart level dragging and see if her tracks can stand it like Kenya Moore’s.
“Meow, Kyra. Put the claws away,” Hunter teased.
Mona waved her hand to dismiss them all and left the house with a solid closing of the door. There was a black Jeep Wrangler parked next to her vehicle, but Mona hardly paid it any mind as she started her car.
She briefly thought about stopping to chat with Reeba on the way, but headed straight home instead. Once she took a hot shower and pulled on a pair of her favorite brightly colored pajamas, Mona lay across her bed on her back with her head dangling over the side.
The last couple weeks of her life had been a roller-coaster ride ending with her in Anson’s lap kissing him until they both were breathless. The first kiss? Not so much. But the second time around? Lawdy.
Regardless, a kiss was all it was. Anson Tyler had no belief or respect for true love and Mona considered that the very core of her being. To love and be loved. To help others love and be loved. She could never consider herself getting involved with someone who felt different.
But that kiss.
And he was fine.
And that kiss.
She raised her hands and touched her plump lips. “Gues
s he’s kissing on Kyra now,” she muttered, lifting both legs high in the air for no reason at all.
Mona turned up her nose as she thought of the curvy cutie with the “see me, notice me” red hair. “He sure likes ’em with meat on the bones,” she said, rolling off the bed and standing before the mirror over her dresser to pull her nightclothes tight against her body. She turned this way and that.
Both Kyra’s and Carina’s lush size-twelve forms made her size-six body look boyish. “I do have some curves,” she said. Just not as much as them.
Screwing up her face, Mona left her bedroom and walked into the kitchen to pour herself a large glass of white wine. “I wonder what they’re doing,” she mumbled into her glass, walking around her living room.
She paused by the sofa table holding all of her favorite family photos. She picked up the one of her aunts, Millicent and Winifred. They were identical twins who had never lived separately. Even now they shared the family home in Baton Rouge.
Clutching the photo of them with identical smiles to her chest, she sipped from her wine and made her way over to the fireplace mantel to pick up her cordless landline phone. “Lord help me,” she mumbled as she used her thumb to hit the buttons.
It seemed to ring endlessly. It always seemed to ring endlessly.
“Millie and Winnie.”
Mona was overcome with love and missing them and she allowed herself a quick moment to wallow in that as she closed her eyes and swayed back and forth.
“Mona?”
Her eyes popped open in surprise. Good Lord, were they psychic now too?
“How’d you know it was me?” Mona asked, moving to sit down on the bright pink leather ottoman she used as a coffee table.
“Millie finally got rid of that old phone we was renting from the phone company for the last thirty years, and this one has caller ID,” Winnie said with pride.
To live in a world where caller ID was a major technological advance? God bless their seventy-year-old hearts.
“I actually need to ask both of you something. Is Aunt Millie there?” she asked, looking down at their photo and stroking either Millie or Winnie’s cheek with her thumb.
“Where else my shadow gon’ be?” Aunt Winnie said, her Louisiana accent as thick and southern as their famous gumbo.
Mona smiled as she heard the rustling of another phone in their house being picked up.
“Hey there, Mona,” Aunt Millie said, although there wasn’t an iota of difference in their voice.
“Hey there, Aunt Millie.”
“How’s you matchmaking business going?” one of them asked.
Mona stiffened, preparing herself for the speech. “Real good . . . although Reeba and you both don’t agree,” she said. Might as well get to it.
“Well, we still support you,” Aunt Winnie said.
“And we know it’s a different time,” Aunt Millie added.
Mona could now tell them apart because one of the phones had a little echo. “Tell Reeba that. Please,” she added, to make sure she didn’t come off disrespectful.
“That’s y’all’s fight.”
“Yes, ma’am,” she agreed, looking up to the ceiling.
“Okay so come on with it.”
Mona smiled a little. “I tried to get a read on a man today and nothing happened. I mean nothing at all. Has that ever happened to anyone and what do you think it’s all about?”
“Nothing at all?” they asked in unison.
“Not a thing,” Mona assured them.
“Never happened to me. You, Winnie?”
“Nah. Not me either.”
“But with every generation there’s always something new thrown in the mix.”
“Sure is.”
“He doesn’t believe in any of it. Not our gift. Not true love. Nothing. You think he doesn’t have a soul mate?” Mona asked, rising to sit their photo back in its spot.
“Everyone has one, or everything about what we believe and we’re blessed with is not true, and I rebuke that in the name of sweet Jesus,” Aunt Millie said with fire.
“Bring it, sis,” Aunt Winnie cheered her on.
“I agree,” Mona said softly, moving into the bathroom to stand at the sink.
“What’s his name?”
Mona fought the urge to ask them why it mattered. “Anson. Anson Tyler,” she said, tucking the phone between her shoulder and ear to reach up and loosen her hair from the topknot she’d put it in to shower.
“Anson Tyler?” one repeated.
“White man?” the other asked.
Mona dropped her head and smiled. “No, ma’am.”
“Oh,” they said in unison.
“Well, if you can’t help him, you just can’t help him. Everything is for a reason and he just gon’ have to go it alone.”
But I don’t want him to.
Her eyes widened in the reflection and her heart pounded real fast and real hard. Me and Anson Tyler?
She squinted her eyes and arched a brow. No way. Right?
Mona’s eyes got soft as she remembered the kiss. Her lips opened a little and she tilted her head to the side, letting her eyes drift closed as she remembered the feel of his mouth. She smiled delicately and bit her bottom lip hotly.
“So when you coming home to visit?”
She jerked her eyes open and the memory of the kiss cooled in an instant.
“Maybe when Shara gets in town the three of us will come for one of the holidays . . . if you promise me some gumbo,” she said, turning out the light as she left the bathroom.
“I’ll promise you anything if you girls would come see us while we here to be seen.”
Guilt swamped her. “I promise. We’re coming,” she said with honesty.
“We’ll see,” they said in unison.
Knock-knock.
“I gotta go,” she said, already moving to the door.
“Bye there,” they said in unison.
The sound of the click of one phone and the beep of the other echoed in her ear as she pulled back the curtain to look out. Mona was surprised to see the Jeep in the drive behind her car and Hunter standing on the porch.
Mona was still clutching the phone as she opened the door. “Hello again, Hunter,” she said, standing in the doorway.
He smiled at her and it spread as slow as honey on a hot biscuit. “Is there anything you don’t look beautiful in?” he asked.
Mona kept her eyes wide like a doll baby to keep from blinking or rolling them. “Is that my Tupperware bowl?” she asked, pointing to it in his hands.
“Yeah. When Anson said it was yours I thought I should get it right to you,” Hunter said, his eyes lingering on all points south on her body.
He was as handsome as Anson but far, far too eager. Too complimenting. Too leering. Too everything.
“Thanks,” she said, taking it from his hand. “It’s actually my sister’s, but I’ll get it back to her.”
Hunter reached out and grabbed her hand as she stepped back. “Wait a sec,” he said.
Mona blinked, and in that instant she saw an image of herself in a wedding gown dancing with . . . Hunter in the center of a crowd of people. She gasped dramatically and snatched her hand away as she backed up and reached blindly for her front door. “Thanks, I have to go. Thanks. Bye,” she said, securely closing it.
She turned and slumped back against the solid wood. Hunter was her soul mate? No way in hell. No way.
Mona turned again and opened the door. Hunter was just turning to leave. He turned back and smiled broadly.
She had the utmost respect for her gift—her legacy. Her lips moved but words would not form.
“Are you okay?” he asked, staring at her.
He has Anson’s eyes.
“Yeah. Yeah. I’m . . . I’m fine,” she said, knowing that in that moment of discovering that the man standing before her was her soul mate that she shouldn’t be thinking of his brother. Wishing he was his brother.
Mona released a breath fil
led with her regret and her confusion.
Hunter slid his hands into the pocket of his slacks as he took a step closer to her. “I really brought the bowl back because I wanted to ask you—”
“Hunter,” she said, purposefully interrupting what she knew was a date invite. “I really need to get back to work. Thanks for the bowl. Maybe we can chat tomorrow?” she asked, forcing her voice to sound hopeful.
He nodded. “We can—“
Mona nodded. “Tomorrow. Please. Okay?” she said gently, reaching for his arm to turn him back towards the steps.
“Tomorrow. Definitely tomorrow,” Hunter said with a roguish wink before going down the stairs and over to his Jeep.
Mona waved at him as he started his vehicle and reversed out of the yard. That smile faded as soon as the Jeep pulled off down the road.
She needed time to think and to process. One day would not stop destiny.
What is meant to be will be?
Right?
Chapter 8
One week later
“Miss Ballinger?”
Mona turned away from the storefront window of her office. She had been staring down the street at the man-made waterfall that served as a memorial for war veterans from Colleton County. Her gaze had been so intense that she had clearly missed the young man walk through the door just two feet away from her. Going over to him, she extended her hand. “Yes, I’m Mona Ballinger. How may I help you?” she asked. The short and stout man’s boyish face wouldn’t reveal if he was in his late teens or early thirties. A Pharrell “I’ll never age” Williams kind of face.
Shaking her hand, he smiled and lost another five years. “Actually I’m here to assist you. I’m Malik Freedman, Mr. Tyler’s office manager,” he said. “He sent me over to help you this week in any way that I can—including vetting out a new employee.”
Mona’s gloss-covered plump lips opened in surprise. “Did he?” she asked softly, still taken aback.
Over the last week Mona had made it her business to stay clear of Anson and his houseguest, Kyra. She was more than relieved to find Hunter had already made his way back to Atlanta to resume his residency. That “tomorrow” they discussed on her porch that night never materialized and Mona was okay with that. Mona was not ready to deal with him and the future. Not yet.
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