The way she went on and on about him, was like she’d known him before tonight. Like he was a long-lost love or somebody. I listened to her ramble about how accomplished he was, how she couldn’t wait to hang out with him to see if he was everything she thought he was. It was nonstop. I silently predicted that she was on her way to heartbreak. I just hoped that she didn’t come in my office bending my ear about it when it all went to hell.
“Okay, girl. Well, call me tomorrow,” Kandice said, when we pulled up in front of my house.
“Will do. Thanks for the outing. And especially, thanks for driving. I appreciate it.”
“It was my pleasure. Glad we got to hang out. Gotta do this again.”
I reached over and gave her a quick hug. “For sure,” I told her on my way out of the car.
She waited until I opened my door and waved her off, then sped off to her early morning rendezvous.
After I was inside, there was not a single part of me that was ready to go to sleep. I stripped out of everything I had on, removed what was left of my makeup, and hopped into a steamy shower. While in the shower, I kept replaying over in my head that glare in Marco’s eyes. The few times I was able to make eye contact, he was staring dead at me—intently. It was piercing. He was so damn attractive. There was not a damn thing out of place with that man, in the looks department. Those dark features got me. And he looked kind of GQ for the night. And he smelled good. Yes, he did.
When I finished my shower, I thought I would feel at least a little sleepy. But, that didn’t happen. I was more awake than ever. Awake and hungry. I hadn’t eaten anything all night. I was surprised that my stomach wasn’t doing summersaults since I had drank on an empty stomach. Thankfully, luck was on my side.
I debated on making a food run, but then thought about having to throw on something else to wear, grab my purse, drive . . . and then removed those thoughts altogether. Even though I knew there was nothing in my refrigerator worth eating, I still went to see. Opening the box, confirmed what I already knew—I was major fucked. Not even as much as a pack of bologna in there! Eggs. But who wanted that? I didn’t. Bread. But nothing to put in between the slices. Cream cheese. But no bagels. Not that I wanted that shit anyway. I needed meat in my system.
“Argh!” I grunted out loud, shutting the stainless-steel door closed.
Then I had a thought. Potatoes! My go-to food. If all else failed, my potatoes never did. I went to work. Pulled out a skillet from the cabinets and put some Canola oil inside. I took out four medium-sized red potatoes and took them over to the sink, where I washed them and put them in the colander. After they were nicely diced, I turned the stove on to heat my oil then grabbed the only onion and the only red bell pepper out of the refrigerator. Once they were diced I tossed them inside the colander with the potatoes and stood nearby waiting for my oil to heat all the way up.
Twenty minutes later, I was turning off the fire to my smothered potatoes and imagining that I heard a knock on my door. I glanced over at the wall to make sure that my alarm’s light was illuminated red, which it was. And then I deduced that I had to be hearing things.
However, seconds later when I was getting the bread and hot sauce out of the fridge, I heard the noise again. I began panicking as I searched the kitchen for my cell, which I spotted on the other end of my island. I tiptoed to my phone and picked it up, slowly walking toward the front of the house.
I took long, silent strides toward the door and slowly crept up on the peephole. I studied for a few seconds at the figure walking away from the door. It was a slightly blurred visual, but I knew instantly who it was when I saw him step off the curb and head to his car. I quickly punched in the code to the right of me to deactivate my alarm and snatched open the front door just as he was opening his car door.
-61-
MARCO
“Hey,” she called out, upon opening her front door. She had a curious look on her face, confused about why I was there, no doubt. “I thought that I was hearing things at first. That’s . . . uhh . . . why it took me so long. What’s going on?”
“I was on my way to the hou—”
“You wanna come in?” she asked, stepping aside to let me in.
“Sure.”
After I walked in, she and I stood inside at the door for a few seconds before she locked her front door. “Follow me,” she instructed.
She led the way and I watched every step she took. She was more carefree than I took her for, wearing nothing but a thin jersey-type shirt that stopped somewhere mid-thigh. It would’ve been at least two to three inches longer had it not been for the small mountain that was her ass, causing it to rise.
“Smells good in here,” I complimented her. “I just know you’re not cooking at damn near three.”
“Uhh, Panera was closed; so, I absolutely am,” she giggled.
I got a giggle out of her. Something that I hadn’t heard her do in any of my interactions with her. “Panera?” I asked.
“Yep. I’m obsessed with that place. Anyway, you want some?”
Do I want some? I could’ve taken that so many places but decided that I wasn’t going to.
“Do you know how to cook?” I teased. “Because you know . . . I just don’t go around eating everybody’s food.”
“Pick a seat and I’ll bring you a plate, then you can be the judge.” She turned around to look at me from the cabinet. “Buuut, I’ll forewarn you. It’s not a whole meal. I mean, it is for me, because I eat it as a meal all the time, but—”
“Then it’s a meal for me too. Let’s see what you’re workin’ with.” Before sitting down, I walked over to her kitchen sink. “Is it okay to wash my hands right here?”
“Sure.” She pointed to a silver rack near where she stood. “Paper towels are over there when you’re done.”
By the time I was done washing my hands, she had ketchup, hot sauce, bread, and a bottle of juice on the table. Seconds later, she came to the table with a plate for her and one for me. Steam was still coming off the potatoes and I could already tell they were going to be good.
I waited until she had sat down before I dug my fork in for a taste. “This is tasty,” I complimented, my mouth full.
“Thank you. I’m glad you like.”
I stuffed my mouth with more of the food, nodding my approval. “I more than like them. You’re gonna have to save me a bowl every time you make some of these.”
“You like them that much, huh? Or is it that you were just hungry?”
“Oh, I was for sure hungry. So, you saved me. But it’s more than being hungry. Man. And I don’t even eat vegetables all like that.”
“Aww,” she smiled. “I took you out of your norm? I like that.”
“I guess we’re even, then.”
I smiled at her waiting to see if she’d be slow to catch on, or if she’d get it right away. She tilted her head at me and then placed her fork on her plate.
“What does that mean? We’re even then? Like you . . . Ohhh!” She picked her fork back up and started back on her food. “I get it.” She smiled without looking up at me, bashful. “You are so wrong for that.”
“Why am I wrong?”
“You know why. Why bring that up?”
“Why not bring it up? I got questions.”
“Questions like what?”
“Like was I the reason you didn’t get married.”
She started to laugh softly, more like a chuckle. A nervous one. “No. Kind of. But not really.”
“Which one is it? Was I, or wasn’t I?”
She was no longer eating. Instead she was playing around with the remaining potatoes on her plate. Shifting them to different spots.
“He found out about what happened between us. And yes, that’s why he wanted out. But, I was getting married for all the wrong reasons. I wouldn’t have been a good wife.”
I put my fork down on the now-empty plate and gave her my full attention.
“So, did you leave home to run away?�
��
“I did. But, not in the way you might think. I was running away from everything I thought about myself. Or rather, I was trying to get away from everything I thought about myself. I was placing pressures on myself that were driving me crazy. I was watching the people around me and basing my life on the ones they were leading. The more I did that, the more I came down on myself, the more I rushed myself into areas I wasn’t ready for—marriage being one of them.”
She grew quiet on me for a few seconds before looking me in my eyes. It wasn’t something she had made a habit of; I liked it because I got to see the beauty in her brown eyes. I was a fan of her face. It was very pretty and the way that her curls fell around the sides of her face was sexy as hell.
“And has Vegas been good to you so far?”
“Yeah,” she responded with a smile. “I’m thirty-five and have never lived away from family. Even when I went to college I stayed home. So, even being five years short of forty, I’m still evolving. Never thought I’d leave my comfort zone.”
“You were with a few girls at your bachelorette weekend. How did they feel about you leaving?”
“That’s a whole other story. I’ve only spoken to one of them. And that just happened not too long ago. They uhhh . . . kinda turned on me a little bit. The one that I still talk to is the one that left with your friend Wolverine. In fact, it was that situation that set everything in motion.”
“How?”
“Apparently, her husband was having her watched. Their marriage was on the rocks and he was trying to preserve as much of his money as he could in the divorce. When he got his little intel from his P.I., he felt the need to share pictures of you and me sitting together.”
“That was all?”
“Yeah, the guy was tailing her not me. So, yeah. Jamie, my ex just kinda pieced things together.”
“Well, if this person didn’t actually have footage of us, you could’ve easily denied anything happened.”
“I know. But . . . I didn’t even feel like living with the lie. It all happened the way it was supposed to. I don’t have any regrets and I’m just trying to start anew. None of the past has a place in my present.”
I nodded. “Have you talked to him since—”
“Nope. There’s no need. Done is done.”
“Okay.”
“Do you want any more?” she asked, looking at my empty plate. “Because there’s still some left.”
“I’m good. But thank you.” I sat back in my seat, full and satisfied. “I came to say sorry about how I was toward you earlier. And you end up feeding me. You’re nicer than I thought.”
She laughed out loud, while she rose to take our plates from the table, and to the sink.
“Oh my God! A compliment that ain’t food-related! He’s evolving before my very eyes!”
“I got more where that came from . . . if you want ‘em.”
While her back was to me and she rinsed the plates, I snuck up behind her. It was the place I had wanted to be since she opened the door and had me follow her.
“More what?” she said, spinning around to hear my response.
However, when she discovered me standing right there, her mouth flew open in surprise. I reached around her and cut the running water. She was pinned against the sink and couldn’t move. I mean, if she wanted to, she could’ve. But she didn’t. I watched the rise and fall of her chest. I even got to bear witness to her nipples coming alive as they poked at her shirt from the inside.
I waited for her to object, to say something . . . anything. There was nothing.
Her silence said everything.
-62-
KASSIDI
Shit. When he said, “. . . if you want ‘em,” my mind went all the way to the depths of the inner-city gutter. Down low, and down dirty. I was prepared to keep my response simple, cute, but when I turned around and he was right there, close, in my face, I was ready to get buck-damn naked. True story.
I was trapped against my sink; my words were willing captives—with no desire to state, nor plead my case. And while my voice was trapped, my nipples refused to jump on board. They were determined to be seen and poked firmly against the front of my shirt, begging to be seen, touched.
The inevitable was happening. When his eyes bore into me the way that they did, I knew one thing—it was about to sizzle in here. I was in trouble. It wasn’t a bad kind of trouble, though. It was the kind of trouble where I might have to take him as a sometimes-lover. Often. We would definitely see by the time it was all said and done. Because what we were doing right there in that kitchen, was going somewhere.
With our one-night stand, we were both engaged in the moment, but detached at the same time. Right now, was very different. Our guards were lowered. We took our time. For Marco, I sensed early on that his world was one where women didn’t fit in any permanent place. Because of that, I knew that whatever happened between us, would be strictly platonic. Platonic was all I had to offer anyway, so it worked.
My breast was in his hand, my nipple massaged and teased with his thumb. My heartrate increased by decibels. A heartfelt gasp escaped from between my lips. My eyes opened, then closed, then opened again.
“You want me to stop?” he asked, his mouth so close I could feel his breath brush against my lips.
“No . . .” I sighed. “Don’t stop.”
Both hands were on my breasts now, and I closed my eyes to savor the feeling of what was happening. I wanted to snatch my shirt off so that he would have all the access he needed without restrictions, but I made a conscious effort to just let the moment be born. It was almost as though he read my mind, because moments later, he peeled my shirt from me. I stood in nothing but sheer bikini panties and furry slippers.
“You still okay?”
I sighed softly. “I’m still okay.” My libido was in overdrive.
“Just wanna make sure,” he said, sliding his hand into the front of my panties and cupping my bare mound in the palm of his hand.
That’s when I lost all sense of self. I moved my hips in slow motion getting into a rhythm. The more my hips moved, the wetter I became, prompting him to send his digits inside of me. He moved them in and out, prodding.
I bit down on my bottom lip, causing a little bit of pain. But I didn’t care.
“Shit . . .” I sighed, weakness overtaking me. It felt like I hadn’t been touched in forever. My bud throbbed, I became hungrier and hungrier for him. I reached around his hands and found my way to his fly, unbuckling his belt, undoing the buttons on his pants. With nothing left to hold them up, around his waist, and down to the floor they went. Anticipation crept over me like a thick, warm blanket. I pulled his boxer briefs from around him . . . his manhood. I captured it inside my palms, admiring, caressing with light strokes.
How and when Marco had made it to his pants to retrieve a condom from his wallet, was a blur. A total blur. But being fucked from behind, against my kitchen sink . . . wasn’t a blur. It was rough at times, then soft, and then rough again. It was intense, it was what I needed. My head against the crook in his shoulder, while he held me steady, stroking my insides relentlessly. It was nothing like the first time, but more of everything. Back then, I engaged, I was in the present with him. But it was more about me reawakening the person I was before I tried forcing marriage upon myself. Now, right here in this space, I got to reawaken what I had tried to bury deep in my psyche—and that was how fuckin’ good this person felt.
I couldn’t help the moans that escaped from me. They were deep and they were long.
“You like that?” he asked.
“Mmm, mmm, I . . . dooo. Yesss, I . . . dooo.”
And I did with my entire being. There was everything to like, nothing to loathe, and for sure nothing to regret. Nobody to answer to, and no feeling like I was as loose as pocket change! The rest of the morning was mine to do with as I pleased. I chose to do, him.
-63-
KASSIDI
When morning hit, I
was thankful for my room-darkening shutters. I wasn’t ready to get out of bed, and I wasn’t ready to be blinded by the sunlight, either. I found myself in the most relaxed state I had been in since I realized I had dodged a major bullet. The day that everything hit the fan with Jamie, I was devastated. But I was devastated for the wrong reasons—worrying about what everybody would think of me. I cried and cried and cried. Wouldn’t eat for a few days and just shut myself off from the world. I felt worthless. But as the days went by and as my soul pieced itself back together, it was refreshing. I felt that a huge weight had been lifted from my shoulders. For the year that I was with Jamie, I did everything I could think of to show him that I was wife material—because I thought I wanted to be a wife so bad. I changed a lot of who I was in order to be who he thought I should be. So, in essence, I survived my relationship with the help of a well-thought out, well-trained representative; not the real me.
Sprawled out on the pillow next to me was my new lover. And what a lover he was. I knew he was working with something when I saw his performance at the club that night. He further confirmed it when I ended up in his bed later. But what we had early morning in my kitchen, my bedroom . . . was all that and then some. We sped it up, we slowed it down, we just gave all the fuck the way in. He went deep, he rode surface, whatever the mood in the moment was, that’s what we went with. There was no oral, but the kisses were a nice companion to accompany the beautiful strokes.
He took a bit to get into the kissing. I knew what that was about. It was something that he didn’t normally do. I wasn’t going to force it. The sex was amazing all by itself. But he did finally give in. And when he did, it was marvelous. The kisses were soft, his lips . . . good.
Thank God for thinking ahead. On a fluke, the last time I went to CVS I picked up some condoms. I was screaming “Hallelujah!” because I would have died five times if we would’ve had to break after using the condom he’d brought with him. I shivered involuntarily, when I thought back to his finger being inside of me. I didn’t know how many digits he plugged into me but it was erotic as hell as he slid them in and out, and painted my labia with kitty’s tears. I damn near couldn’t move my legs. Then came, “Come on. Take me to your room,” after he had me panting like a needy cat against my sink.
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