“Not the wisest thing, I know, but I just can’t seem to take my eyes off it.”
It took all of Lang’s self-restraint not to reach out and touch Dante. However, he didn’t have a problem rubbing his hand up and down her arm. Lang knew Merrick was watching them, so she asked Dante to join them on their bed. He declined and turned toward his right instead.
“Langston Rogers, this is my boy, Vince Campbell,” Dante said, introducing her to the tall honey-brown Allen Iverson–Carmelo Anthony combo standing next to him. “I’m sure he’d love to meet Merrick.”
Lang escorted Vince over to Merrick, who smiled immediately. Once they were engaged in a flirtatious banter that excluded her, Lang made her way back over to Dante.
“How come you never told me you were, like, a software developer?”
“How come you never asked?” he replied, taking a small sip of the now very diluted Hennessy he’d been nursing all night.
“I didn’t think I wanted to know.”
“But I bet you made your own assumptions.”
Lang glanced down at the floor sheepishly before shrugging her shoulders.
“Uh-huh, you thought I was a street pharmacist or something.”
She nodded her head.
“I think I should be offended,” he said, placing his snifter back on the bar. “A black man can’t drive an Escalade and own a loft without—”
“I apologize,” Lang said, cutting off his sociopolitical monologue before he got his LV loafers scuffed stepping up on his soapbox. She hadn’t meant any harm. “I guess the real truth is I just didn’t want to get to know you like that.”
“Yet you wanna have sex with me like that?”
Lang nodded.
“You never answered my other question,” Dante reminded Lang.
“What question was that?” Lang asked, playing dumb.
“Are you leaving here with me?”
“I don’t like having my clit teased. It’s been six months—”
“I know how long it’s been, Lang,” Dante interrupted. “You still think you’re too proud to beg?”
“What-the-fuck-ever, Dante. My initials aren’t TLC,” Lang said, walking away.
Dante quickly grabbed her hand and pulled her back. “Come home with me.”
“Why should I, Dante, huh? What’s in it for me?”
“I’ll bet you a case of Cris that you’ll be begging before the night’s over.”
“You know it’s gotta be Veuve for me to even consider it worth my time,” Lang said, smiling mischievously.
“Veuve for you, Cris for me.”
“Bet.”
Thirty-five minutes later Merrick called for two cars—one for her, the other for Lang. Dante stayed behind at the bar with Vince.
“See you on Tuesday,” Merrick said outside the club, reminding Lang of her three-day weekend.
“Enjoy it,” Lang said, hugging her assistant before climbing into the back of the Lincoln Navigator.
“Change of plans,” Lang told the driver. “I’m going to DUMBO, not the Stuy.”
Twenty minutes later Lang listened to her messages as she waited for Dante in the back of the parked Navigator in front of his loft. She’d missed two calls from Sean.
Sean was used to his wife working late at the magazine, particularly during production, so he had no reason to be suspicious. He also knew she usually took Merrick out after closing an issue, so he knew not to expect her home any time soon.
Hey, baby, I know you’re working late and beating yourself up about nailing all the style forecasts and celebrity coupling predictions for the New Year. Um, let me see if I get this right. He laughed. Beyoncé and Jay will stay together but definitely won’t be getting married this year. Wedges are in, and so is the color turquoise. Did I get that right?
He’s such a good listener, Lang thought as she grew tired of waiting for Dante. It’d been twenty-five minutes already.
Sean laughed again.
Anyway, I have a nice surprise for you when you get home. So promise me you’ll call me when you’re on your way home. Okay, baby? I love you. See you soon.
“What am I doing?” Lang asked out loud as she dialed Dante. “I’ve got a good man at home, and I’m chasing behind this boy.”
His phone went straight to voice mail.
“Listen, Dante. This thing we’ve been doin’ has been, um, fun, I guess. But I’ve got too much at stake to risk it all for some half-ass thrills. Once again you’ve got me waiting for you. And for what? A kiss here. A touch there. Please. I get way more than that, better than that, at home. So I’m out. For good.”
Lang tapped the headrest of the driver’s seat. “Please take me to Stuyvesant Avenue and…”
The piercing xenon headlights from Dante’s Escalade interrupted her instructions.
The driver turned on his ignition.
“On second thought…”
Dante tapped on the window. Lang rolled it down halfway.
“Listen, I just left you a—”
“Get out the car,” Dante instructed.
“No, D, if you would—”
“I’m not gonna repeat myself,” Dante said, opening the door. “I’m finally gonna give you what you want. Now we can do it right here, or you can bring your sexy ass upstairs.”
An hour and a half later a completely different driver in a black Suburban waited for Langston to wave from the stoop of her brownstone. He nodded his head and pulled off.
Lang unlocked and turned the knob to the front door and then the inside hallway door. She tried to shake from her mind what had just ended less than thirty minutes ago, but it wasn’t dissipating that easily. She stood in front of her glazed mahogany staircase, knowing Sean was anxiously awaiting her. He’d told her so when she’d called to let him know she was finally on her way home.
The musky, erotic scent of sandalwood met her at the foot of the steps and escorted her to the top of the staircase where the renowned Toots Thielemans’s legendary harmonica lured her outside the door of her bathroom. It sounded to Lang like Toots’s “Obi” had just finished, and now his sexy “Felicia and Bianca” was just beginning. Next was “O Cantador.” “Bluesette” was still Lang’s all-time favorite. She’d have to wait until the very end of The Brasil Project to hear it though.
She stood.
On the other side of the door, a steamy, hot bubble bath anticipated her arrival. An eager Sean, donned in loose-fitting boxers, awaited her, too. Carol’s Daughter’s A Jasmine Evening bath salts filled the porcelain antique tub. Small white votives lined the floor, accompanied by sandalwood-scented candles surrounding the tub. An uncorked, chilled bottle of Veuve sat nearby in a silver bucket.
She opened the door carefully.
“Happy New Year, baby,” Sean said, handing his wife a flute and then tongue kissing her softly.
Champagne. Damn. She owed Dante a case of Cristal.
Sean lifted off his wife’s cashmere sweater and unhooked her bra. He kissed her gently on her forehead, her cheek, and then lingered at the crook in her neck. He nuzzled her there.
“Please, Dante, please.”
“Please what, baby?”
Langston shook her head and moaned for Sean’s pleasure, not her own. She was too numb with memories of Dante to feel present.
Sean traced his warm tongue along his wife’s delicate collarbone, softly kissed on her chest, and gently sucked on her right nipple—the more responsive one—and then her left.
“Please take me.”
“Take you where? I’m not understanding you, Lang. If there’s somewhere you want me to take you, you need to be real specific.”
Sean slowly slid his tongue down his wife’s taut stomach. He kissed around her belly button as he easily unzipped her skirt and slid off her panties and each of her sheer thigh-highs. He tongued her belly button as he squeezed her ass.
“Please fuck me, Dante.”
“Say that again.”
“Please fuck
me, Dante.”
Sean burrowed his nose between his wife’s legs, rubbing the hood of her clitoris with the tip of his nose. The strong scent of her sex excited him.
Lang moaned, this time for herself.
Sean slid one finger inside his wife. She was sticky and wet. She instinctively squeezed her muscles, gripping his finger. He slid in another one.
“You sure that’s what you want?”
“Yes, I’m sure, Dante.”
“Get down on your knees and beg me again.”
Lang did as she was told. “Please, Dante, I want you to fuck me. I need you to. Please.” Tears streamed down her face, which was pressed against his knees. “I want you so bad it hurts. I ache to feel you inside me.”
“Um, Sean,” Lang said, choking back tears and bending down slightly to hold his face in her hands. “All this is so sweet. I’m—I’m moved.”
“Hey, baby,” Sean said, standing up. “Why the tears?”
“I—I—I,” she stuttered.
He rested her head on his chest. “Shhhh, you’re just tired. Let me bathe you.”
Lang stepped into the steamy tub. She stood there for a few seconds, acquainting her lukewarm body with the sweltering temperature before sitting down in jasmine-vanilla-infused water.
Sean lathered the seaweed sponge with Carol’s Daughter’s hypnotically sweet Almond Dream body cleansing gel and massaged her neck. He took his time gently washing his wife’s arms, underarms, her breasts and underneath her breasts, her stomach, and her back. He methodically rubbed and rinsed and rubbed and rinsed.
Lang closed her eyes and moaned. She was perspiring.
“You okay, baby?”
“I’m more than okay. The bath is perfect.”
“Should I add some cool water?”
“No, my muscles are a little sore. I need this hot soak. Thank you, baby.”
Sean handed his wife a glass of champagne to quench her thirst. Lang sipped slowly. She’d already drunk more than her share of bubbly.
Sean generously soaped the seaweed sponge and gently washed between his wife’s legs. Lang closed her eyes.
“Unzip my pants,” Dante commanded, looking down at Lang on her knees.
Lang let Dante’s pants drop down to his ankles as she moved her mouth toward his crotch.
“I’ve sampled enough of that already,” he said, pushing her face away. “That’s not what I want.”
He pulled Lang up by her arm and walked her over to his stark-white leather sofa. “Take off your panties and lift up your skirt.”
Dante leaned a bare-bottomed Lang over the back of his couch. Dante left Lang exposed as he walked over to get the Magnums from his walnut coffee-table drawer.
Dante stood behind Lang fully erect.
Sean scrubbed down the fronts and backs of his wife’s thighs, her calves, and the bottoms of her feet. He carefully washed between each of her toes before helping her stand up.
“This is what you wanted, right?” Dante asked, fiercely ramming himself inside Lang.
“Yes!” Lang screamed.
“You begged for it, didn’t you?” he asked, grabbing a handful of her hair.
“Yes!” she screamed again.
“You like it rough, don’t you?” he asked, speeding up his rhythm.
“I love it rough,” she growled.
Dante smacked Lang’s ass.
“Harder!” she yelled.
He smacked her ass so hard his palms stung.
“Hurt me,” she pleaded.
Sean filled and refilled a ceramic pitcher with soothing warm water, carefully rinsing off his wife’s glistening body.
“You’re so gentle with me,” Lang said to Sean appreciatively.
“You’re my queen,” Sean said, tenderly toweling his wife dry. “I wouldn’t know how else to treat you.”
Chapter 13
“Can’t wait to be tasted—see you in a minute.”
Thanksgiving was only two weeks away. Fame’s goal was not to have any musical projects lingering after December fifteenth so his family and the holiday season would have his undivided attention. Whatever jobs weren’t completed by then would just get shelved until the third week of January. Fame always devoted the first two weeks of the year entirely to his family, no exceptions. He believed it brought him good fortune for the year to come.
The S.O.S. Band’s “Just Be Good to Me” blared in the C room of Fame’s recording studio. It was just a little after midnight when Fame pushed the up-and-coming R&B singer’s head down in his lap as he slouched down on the black leather couch with his eyes closed. Fame fingered her weave tracks as he thought about sampling the hook and maybe even chopping up other parts of the song.
Friends tell me I am crazy and am wasting time with you…
“Faaaame,” she whined, lifting up her head and finger combing her hair back into place. “I came over here to sing, not to suck.”
“Look, Daisha, I can’t work until I release some of this stress,” he explained, opening his eyes. “We don’t have all night. Come on, now.”
I don’t care about your other girls. Just be good to me…
Daisha was highly infatuated with Fame. He looked good, smelled good, stacked paper, and had the prettiest, brownest penis she’d ever licked. Her secret fantasy wasn’t sexual though. It was matrimonial. She envisioned Fame running straight into her welcoming embrace after he divorced his dull and boring wife. In the meantime she was more than willing to settle for being his other woman, his official mistress, something more than just one of his jump-offs. She moved her lips toward his.
“Yo, what’s the matter with you?” Fame asked incredulously, wiping his mouth with his hand even though Daisha’s lips had only grazed his right cheek. “You know better than that.”
Daisha was so quick to give him head their very first night in the studio, he didn’t want her lips anywhere near his. There was no telling where her mouth had been or on whom else they’d been.
“What?” Daisha questioned. “My lips are good enough for your dick but not your lips?”
“Not this shit again,” Fame said, clearly annoyed and sitting up straight. “Damn, man, can’t a brother just get some head without all the chitchat?”
Daisha didn’t want to push her luck. Her entire recording career was riding on Fame. She couldn’t believe Aaron “Famous” Anderson was working with her in the first place. She didn’t even have a record deal, yet he’d agreed to work with her. Her manager would kill her if she blew this opportunity. She moved her head back down toward his lap, but this time Fame snatched it right back up.
“Forget it,” he said, standing up, buckling his pants, and walking over to his desk.
“I’m sorry, Fame,” she whined, patting the leather couch, gesturing for him to sit back down.
Fame glanced back at her and then over at the phone on his glass desk. He pushed the speaker button and hit one of the speed-dial buttons. A female with a nasally voice answered the phone on the first ring.
“Where you at?” he asked gruffly.
“Up in Santos with my girls,” she said, clearly happy to hear from Fame. “Q-Tip is spinnin’. You should come through.”
“Nah, I can’t, sweetheart,” he said, looking over at Daisha, who was pouting on the couch. “I’m workin’. I could use a favor though.”
“Oh, really, what kind of a favor?” she asked flirtatiously.
“The mind-blowing kind. How soon can you be here?”
“How soon can you send a car for me?”
“Ten minutes.”
“Can I hang with you in the studio, please?” she asked, pleading more than requesting.
“Nah, not tonight, sweetheart. I got too much work to do. Maybe tomorrow night, though,” he said, sounding more noncommittal than convincing.
“Okay,” she said, obviously disappointed. “Well, you gotta make it quick then. Can you ask the car to wait and make it a round-trip?”
“Not a problem.”
“Can’t wait to taste you, Fame.”
“Can’t wait to be tasted. See you in a minute.”
During that whole conversation, Daisha never took her eyes off Fame. She couldn’t believe he was brazen enough to call the next chick in front of her, and on speakerphone, no less.
“I’m out,” she said, standing up and grabbing her knockoff Fendi purse.
“Leave and don’t come back,” he replied, sliding into the chair behind his desk.
“You can’t be serious, Fame;” Daisha asked in disbelief. “You expect me to just sit here while you get head from some other ho? I don’t think so.”
“Suit yourself,” he said, swiveling in his leather chair. “I can’t work till I get this nut out. I asked you to take care of me, but you didn’t want to, and that’s cool ’cause there’s nothin’ worse than some half-ass head. Shit, that’s worse than no head at all.”
Daisha was livid. First of all, Fame hadn’t asked her anything. Secondly, she was more than upset to know that he had this chick on speed dial. She could deal with him having a wife. She reasoned that because they were high school sweethearts, he couldn’t walk away from that situation so easily. Daisha now wondered exactly how many other girls on the side there were.
In Fame’s mind he didn’t have any girls on the side. He didn’t take care of any other woman besides his wife and didn’t care to invest any time or attention in another woman. What he did have, however, was a couple of Xanaxes. No-hassle stress relievers he could call on in a moment’s notice to alleviate his tension.
“I was supposed to work on your stuff tonight, Day, but it’s not like I don’t have other shit to do,” Fame said, typing on his Mac PowerBook. “If you leave now, don’t bother ever to come back. It’s that simple.”
Daisha loved when Famed called her Day. She took it as a pet name, a term of endearment, but really Fame was just being lazy with his tongue, preferring to address her by one syllable instead of two. Daisha sat back down, rolled her eyes, and pouted.
The Cheating Curve Page 11