Her nipple started to tighten almost immediately until it became almost painfully erect. That’s when his mouth began to circle the nipple, warming it as he suckled and sending waves of pleasure from her breast to her sex. She moaned in pleasure and didn’t even notice that he had grabbed another piece of ice and had started working her other nipple until she felt the same chilly tightening she’d felt previously. Once he was satisfied that she had endured enough, he began to suck and nibble the other nipple until she was again squirming and purring.
The ice that touched her sex almost made her jump out of the bed.
“Shhhh.” He kissed her inner thigh as he circled the ice cube around her clit and across her slick folds.
Her eyes rolled to the back of her head and her teeth clenched when he followed the ice with his warm, ever-so-pleasing mouth. The orgasm that ripped through her felt like it had taken a piece of her soul with it. She felt like she was drifting to the ceiling.
All it took was his first thrust into her to bring her crashing back down.
He began his thrusts slowly at first, giving her time to adjust to him and set the pace.
She was so hungry for him, she didn’t want it slow.
She wanted him hard and fast.
She thrust her hips upward and held on to him tightly. She let her arms glide up and down his strong back and pulled him to her. He picked up on her need and picked up the pace. His moved his hips with a speed that would have stunned her if she weren’t as determined to try out her own speed.
“Roll over. Let me ride,” she demanded.
He grinned and flipped over, not breaking his stride. They remained connected and all she had to do was start her up-and-down spirals as she took control of their pleasure. She rocked and bounced and rolled her hips to a melody she swore only she could hear. But if that were the case he wouldn’t have been moving with her, caressing her and swaying with her to the same sweet beat.
His upward strokes met her downward thrusts, and it was only a matter of time before she felt herself coming undone. The tingling in her thighs followed by the amazing shock wave coursing through her body soon gave way to a release so all-encompassing it made her body shake as if she were going through convulsions. He waited for her to calm down before he flipped her onto her back and took over again.
This time, his thrusts were fast and aimed at one purpose, making her come and finally giving in to his own release.
It didn’t take long before they were both crying out. And the kiss that Troy planted on her lips let her know that they were far from done.
Chapter 8
“Just the way players play, all day every day…”
—Notorious B.I.G.
Monday morning’s staff meeting brought the reality back into Troy and Jazz’s situation. The loving playfulness they had experienced that weekend had to find a way to survive given the fact that they were competing for the same job. And the uneasy collegial relationship they were slowly developing as cohosts of Detroit Live had to find a way to coexist with the burgeoning emotional and passionate feelings they were having as man and wife.
Troy hated meetings, any meetings. He just wanted to be in the thick of things, doing his show and interacting with the viewers. He supposed meetings served some purpose, he just didn’t think they were a productive use of his time.
He stopped thumbing through a magazine and thumping out a beat on the table with his thumb when his father cleared his throat. Troy glanced up to find Jordan Singleton, the production team for Detroit Live and Jasmine all staring at him.
He closed the magazine and stared back.
“Well?” Jordan seemed like he was waiting for some kind of response from Troy.
But for the life of him, Troy couldn’t figure out what. So he just owned it. “Well, what?”
Jordan let out an exasperated sigh and threw up his hands.
The show’s head producer, Carmen, took that as her cue to chime in. “What do you think about us sending Jazz to Trinidad for Carnival in a couple of weeks so that she can get some footage to air when we air your footage from the Barbados Jazz festival? We think it’ll be great. The Carnival climaxes on Monday, February fifteenth and Tuesday the sixteenth, and we think it will be a real treat for our viewers. We can have an island-themed show sometime in late February where we get some up-and-coming reggae artists to come and perform and show the clips and maybe even get the proprietor of that hot new Caribbean restaurant to come and do a cooking demo with you guys—”
“Carnival could be cool. How long will we get to stay?” Troy asked. He had to cut Carmen off because if given half a chance she would have gone on and on and on.
“You’re not going. Jazz is. We already have your footage from Barbados. We need something similar for Jazz. Especially if the viewers are going to be asked to pick the best of the two of you,” Jordan offered in his hard-as-nails brook-no-argument tone.
Troy looked over at Jasmine. He thought about the last time he’d celebrated Carnival season in Trinidad. An overwhelming sense of possessiveness swept over him unlike anything he’d ever experienced in his life and before he knew it he had uttered the word no.
“No?” Jordan questioned as he squinted his eyes incredulously.
No was a word his father seldom heard, and Troy seemed to be the only person willing to say it to him on a regular basis.
“No!” Jasmine’s neck swiveled so quickly as she turned toward Troy, she could have probably given Linda Blair’s performance in The Exorcist a run for its money.
“No,” Carmen whined, clearly upset about the fact that all of her grand plans for a Caribbean-themed show might not come to fruition.
“No,” Troy repeated. “I’m not going to have my wife out there with all those wild and crazy guys looking for women to prey on. It’s a meat market.”
“I told you that your marriage cannot get in the way of the show. I like Carmen’s idea and Jazz is on board. So you are going to have to just get on board, too.” Jordan spoke with an air of finality. “Now, as you all know, we have a poll going on our website where viewers can vote for their favorite host. So far, son, you are in the lead by three percent of the vote. After a week of you two being cohosts, we’ve seen a lot of traffic to the website and a lot of voting. It’s interesting that you’re only in the lead by such a small margin since you are the host the viewers know and are used to. It looks like it’s going to be a tight race, guys.”
Troy glared at his father and then turned to find Jasmine glaring at him. He wondered if she was glaring because he was in the lead or because he didn’t want her to go to Carnival.
Carmen cleared her throat. “This weekend, you guys are going to be special judges for the big winter step show at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo.”
“Kalamazoo? That’s a real place?” Jasmine asked.
“Yes, it is.” Carmen feigned outrage. “I’m an alum of Western Michigan University and I had some of the best times of my life in Kalamazoo. Anyway, since Detroit Live is popular all over the state and spreading across the Midwest and beyond, judging by the viewings on our website, YouTube and Hulu, we think it’s time to start branching out beyond the Detroit area when we cover local events. We already cover a lot of national and international events. But we have been slow on moving beyond Detroit when it comes to the local. Plus, both of you guys are members of Black Greek organizations and that’s a huge audience demographic. The step show is on Saturday. The two of you can go down Friday after taping and check out some of the happenings in Kalamazoo.”
Troy chuckled. “Are there things happening in Kalamazoo?”
Carmen cut her eyes hard enough to slice him, but other than that, she didn’t even acknowledge that he had said anything. “We’ll be sending two camera guys in case the two of you want to branch out and cover different things…” Carmen’s voice went on and on, and Troy stopped listening after a while.
He thought about Carmen and frowned. She’d been acting a
little weird ever since he and Jazz showed up and announced they were married. Carmen had been his last big mistake three years ago when she first came on as assistant to the former producer of the show. She was cute and perky and had a figure that made a man more than pause. So, even though he had a rule about not dating women that he couldn’t make clean breaks from, a rule that had kept him away from Jasmine for ten years, he had slipped and dated Carmen a few times only to find that the sizzle wasn’t there. So he ended it on the best terms he could. Things had been awkward for a while, but they soon got back on track. Now they seemed to be going back to that awkward space. He just hoped that Jasmine didn’t pick up on it. He decided to place Carmen in the back of his mind where she belonged.
He had more important things to think about, like why was he losing player points because he couldn’t seem to stop tripping over Jasmine going to Trinidad…
It was all Jazz could do to tape the show and remain professional. If it weren’t for the fact that Troy was ahead of her by three percent of the poll, she would’ve swapped her sweet and charming persona for her sista-with-attitude persona a long time ago. Instead her jaw hurt because she had smiled her way through the meeting and had her grin game-tight during the taping of the show.
But now that she was riding home for the day and sitting next to the man who had worked her one last good nerve, her face was on permanent grunt.
She counted to ten a couple of times, because she didn’t want to just rip into him. He had been a good friend to her and was turning out to be such a wonderful lover that she went to bed with a big old satisfied smile on her face just about every night. And for the most part he was even making her rethink her former stance on marriage and husbands. The past few weeks he had been a wonderful husband-lover-friend.
But his behavior at the meeting this morning couldn’t get a pass.
She turned and watched him as he looked straight ahead and navigated his SUV down the highway. She counted to ten again.
“I’m sorry. I was out of line this morning. I don’t know what came over me.” Troy spoke those words and the wind went out of her anger with a squish as if someone had just popped a balloon. “What?” Stunned didn’t even begin to describe how she felt at that moment.
She had nursed her anger all day and she was ready to tell him all about himself and how he was not the boss of her and didn’t have a right to mess around with her career.
And he had just busted her bubble with an apology?
Oh. Hell. No.
The more she thought about it, the more her anger started to build back up. Now her anger wasn’t a balloon full of hot air waiting to be released. Instead she was feeling more like the kid holding the balloon that some jerk just popped for no reason. And she was pissed.
He chanced a glance at her before turning his attention back to the road. “I’m sorry. I’ve had a chance to think about it and I know I was wrong. I hope you can forgive me. I don’t want things to get weird between us. Things were going good, right?”
She turned away from him and started looking out the window. It was dark out already and the only thing she could really see was the lights on the cars passing them and in front of them. She couldn’t really make out the colors or makes, but she needed something else to focus on.
“Yes. Things were going good. And I want things to continue to go good between us. But they won’t if you ever trip like you did today, Troy. You had no right to do that. I’m trying to be professional and make the best of this situation. If you win back the solo host slot on Detroit Live, I’m going to have to get another job. I need to leave this one in strong standing. The taping at Carnival in Trinidad could be a really good thing for me. This is my career we’re talking about. No matter what happens, you’re covered. You’ll either be the solo host or you’ll be on the business end with your father learning the ropes. If I lose, I have to find another gig.”
She glanced at him and saw that he was frowning.
“If you lose, you’ll still have a job, Jasmine. I’ll make my father find something for you with Singleton Communication. Plus, cohosting with you isn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be…” He trailed off and went silent.
“Yeah, but you still want your show back all to yourself. And I don’t blame you. I’ve wanted my own show ever since I realized that I wanted to major in broadcast communication when I was in college. I’ve wanted to be the next Oprah for a long time. I may not get Detroit Live, but I’m going to leave Detroit with enough great segments and tapes to get a solo gig.”
He didn’t say anything, but at least he appeared to be thinking about what she’d said as he drove.
He pulled into the driveway and turned to her just as she was opening the door to get out.
“You have every right to be irritated with me, disgusted with me even… However you want to feel is well within your rights. I know I was out of line. And even now as I’m trying to apologize to you, a part of me, for some reason, doesn’t want you going to Trinidad without me. It took me by surprise, because this is the first time I’ve ever felt anything this close to possessive about a woman.
“You make me feel things I’m not used to feeling for women who aren’t blood related. Protective. Possessive. All kinds of things… And because it’s new to me, I might mess up a little—”
She twisted her lips to the side and gave him the look.
“Okay, a lot. I’m going to mess up a lot and I might blow it big-time every now and then. But I hope we can talk about it and get back on the right track when it happens. And I’ll extend you the same courtesy.”
Shocked, she sputtered, “Me? I won’t need it. I won’t trip like you did.”
He chuckled. “Yeah. Let’s hope it stays that way. I’d hate to have to remind you of this moment when you do.” He stuck out his hand. “Truce?”
She shook his hand. “Truce.” She thought about Trinidad and how ridiculous the argument was in the first place. “And you know, there’s nothing stopping you from joining me in Trinidad the weekend before we start taping for Carnival. You can certainly make it back to Detroit in time for Monday’s taping if we leave right after we tape on Friday and spend Friday and Saturday and part of Sunday together in tropical paradise…”
She looked at him, and his gaze held that devilish spark she’d come to associate only with him.
He leaned over and brushed his sweet lips across her forehead in a way that never ceased to give her sexy chills.
“Actually, I’m thinking they can show reruns and I’ll join you for the entire time. When you’re taping, I’ll get lost. When you’re not, we can have some fun in the island sun, together.” She smiled.
He was probably going to find a way to do that anyway, no matter how much he had apologized.
He’d played her well.
She mentally marked this round in his favor.
“So, you know what I’m about to ask, because all the ladies want to know…” Jazz smiled at the hot R&B singer she and Troy were interviewing and the little cutie who went by the stage name Deuce Songz smiled back at her.
They were on the interview section of the set. The set had a huge dark brown sectional and several Afrocentric throw pillows. The entire vibe of Detroit Live’s set was a celebration of black culture from the history and heritage to the music and flair.
“Is there a special lady in your life? Are you dating? Single? Inquiring minds want to know…” Jazz knew she was usually really good at getting people to open up and tell her all their business. There had been rumors of Deuce Songz dating another artist, an up-and-coming female rapper with a pedigree that included a super-producer father and a mother who was a former rapper herself. An up-and-coming female rapper that they were all very close to because her father had dated Alicia before Alicia realized she loved Darren…
If Jazz could get Deuce to admit that he and the nineteen-year-old Kayla Kay were an item it would be a huge scoop. Of course it meant that Kayla’s father, super-prod
ucer Flex Towns, might kill Deuce, but she couldn’t worry about small things like that.
“Is there a special lady in my life?” Deuce pretended to consider her question. He leaned in closer. “There could be. Would you like to help me with that?”
Troy chuckled. “Okay, back up, young blood. She’s taken.” He wrapped his arm around her and gave Deuce a mock-stern look. “And stop trying to pin the man down, Jasmine. He’s twenty-two and way too young to be thinking about settling down.”
Deuce smiled and eyed Jasmine appreciatively. “I don’t know, man. If it’s the right woman—”
“Like I said,” Troy deadpanned, “taken.”
Jazz laughed. Even though she knew she looked good in the burgundy full-body catsuit and the equally fierce thigh-high burgundy leather boots she was wearing, she knew her thirty-year-old self wasn’t really tempting the twenty-something crooner.
She playfully wiggled away from Troy. “Anyway, enough with the I-am-man-making-my-claim caveman routine.” She gave Troy a quick peck on the cheek.
“Now back to you, Deuce. There have been rumors of you and a certain hip-hop heiress heating up the town while she’s in college and starting her own rap career. Care to comment?”
Deuce narrowed his eyes. “Actually, I don’t like to talk about my personal relationships. I don’t like to have people all in my business.”
Troy nodded. “More like you don’t want Flex Towns to get all up in that—”
Jazz nudged Troy with her elbow and cut him off. “So, Deuce, tell us about the new album. Which producers did you work with on this one? Any guest appearances?”
“Yeah, the new album is the hotness! I got all the hottest producers on there. T-Pain, Timberland, Swizz Beatz, Diddy, even the boy Kanye West hooked up a track and got on the track with me. I don’t have a lot of guest appearances this time. Just Kanye on his track and T-Pain got the hook on auto-tune for his track. And Kayla Kay blessed my next single with a tight sixteen bars.”
At First Kiss Page 10