“If you weren’t pregnant, I would climb on that table and make love to you all night, Caress,” he told her with conviction.
Her eyes dipped down to his hardness. “You’re big but do you really think you can reach the womb?”
He gave her a half smile. “We wouldn’t have even gotten this far if you didn’t try to call me a down-low brother.”
“I know you’re not gay or bisexual or trisexual.”
“Trisexual?” he asked, pulling his shirt back down.
“Willing to try anything,” she said, both relieved and disappointed that their little rendezvous was over.
Julius moved to lean back on the table beside her. “If nothing else, I guess it’s good you’re moving out or we wouldn’t be able to fight this thing much longer.”
“Is that the only reason it would be good for me to move?” Caress asked as she pushed her hair behind her ears.
“I’m used to you being here now,” he said with a smile.
“Yeah, right,” she drawled.
They fell silent again.
“Thank you for being the voice of reason,” she told him as she let her eyes shift over to him.
“If you can say thank you for that, why can’t you say thank you for the things I’ve done for you and not worry about repaying me?”
Caress wondered if he would ever understand her. “Because that’s different, Julius.”
“You know I could have very easily made love to you down here…especially with you begging me,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest.
She slapped his muscled arm. “I did not beg,” she stressed. “I made an impassioned request.”
Julius snorted. “Fine line, Caress. Very fine line.”
Caress laughed huskily as she dropped her chin to her chest and let her hair cover her warm, blushing face.
“So I guess I kinda did you a favor by not taking advantage of you. So how about you do me a favor?”
Caress flipped her hair back and eyed him suspiciously. “What?” she asked.
“Very simple. Just say, ‘Thank you for the bedroom furniture, Julius’ and accept it as my gift.”
Her shoulders dipped as she released a long breath. “No, Julius.”
“Favor for a favor. Plus, I’ve already said I have to get rid of the furniture because I’m moving my office back upstairs. So that’s two favors for a nice guy who has been a wonderful host and a gentleman for not sexing the hell out of you even though I have never been so turned on and so hard in all my damned life.”
“Julius—”
“Thank you for the bedroom furniture.”
“Julius—”
“Come on. You can say it. I promise it’s not that hard.”
She chuckled as she bit her bottom lip. She reached over and lightly grasped his chin, turning his head to face her. “Thank you for the bedroom furniture,” she said softly as she leveled her eyes with his. “I really appreciate it.”
Julius grinned as he reached over and quickly pressed his lips to hers. “You’re very welcome, Caress Coleman. You are very welcome.”
Caress just dropped her head and enjoyed the lingering taste of his kiss on her mouth.
Chapter Eleven
Two Weeks Later
Julius was feeling déjà vu.
Karina breezed right past him and stepped inside his villa, twirling to open the white cotton wrap she wore, and exposing her naked svelte body to his eyes. “Last time I tried this, we were interrupted,” she said in a husky voice as she ran her hand from the valley of her breasts and down to stroke her shaved kitty.
“Well, looks like your luck has run out again, sweetie.”
Karina whirled and her jaw dropped to find Dwayne sitting in front of the computer at the desk in the corner of the living room. She gasped and jerked the wrap closed as Dwayne pretended to cover his eyes with his hands but then obviously peeked through the break in his slender fingers.
Julius closed the door and then shot his assistant a warning glare—an unspoken warning to be respectful to his clients. Dwayne dutifully focused his eyes back on the digital proofs they had been reviewing on the computer. Julius’s eyes dipped to take in the sight of the tightly held wrap formed to the slender but shapely outline of Karina’s body.
She turned to him and he leisurely shifted his eyes upward. “Julius, can I speak to you… alone ?”
Julius shoved his hands inside the pockets of his linen pants. “Can it wait, Karina? I was just about to e-mail some preliminary shots to your agency. They want them ASAP.”
If there was one thing Karina understood or respected above all it was her business. With her back safely to Dwayne, who was far from interested anyway, she let the wrap hang loosely, leaving a glimpse of a hard brown nipple here and a flash of a thigh there. She stepped close to him and placed her hands on his strong shoulders as she whispered in his ear. “Dinner. Tonight. No excuses, Julius.”
As she lightly licked his earlobe, his body—that primal male instinct—responded to her. Her seduction plot. Her obvious desire for him. The soft scent of her perfume. The heated feel of her body so close to his.
His desires stirred.
It had been months since he’d had sex. He couldn’t deny that his level of sexual frustration was at an all-time high. With Karina steadily pouring it on him, it was hard to deny that if nothing else it would feel good to just make love to a woman. To release his pent-up frustration. To stop feeling like a virgin ready to explode all over himself.
Karina understood him. She knew this would be nothing more than a man and woman finding pleasure in each other’s bed. No promises. No pressures. No strings.
It was just the arrangement he needed right now.
Julius brought his hand up to touch her lower back as he pressed his lips to the warm spot just below her ear. “In your room,” he ordered, enjoying the feel of her body shivering from his words, his touch, and his promise of pure sexual gratification.
He ignored the sounds of Dwayne pretending to gag.
With a soft smile, she gave him a kiss on the lips. Her eyes full of promise, she tied her wrap closed and left the villa.
Julius made sure the door was secured behind her before he made his way back over to the desk. He could tell from the way Dwayne’s lips were going in two different directions that his assistant was going to say something sideways. He reclaimed his seat next to Dwayne and began scrolling through the many photographs they took on the beautiful island locale of Karina in fashions from some of the top swimwear designers.
Suddenly Dwayne stretched his long limbs. “I heard Karina might be the face of a new perfume.”
Julius knew Dwayne too well.
“Her essence might even influence the name,” Dwayne said.
The build up.
“I’m thinking Desperation or Hopeless.”
And the put down.
Dwayne chuckled. He had amused himself.
Julius gave him the kind of hard stare a parent gave a mischievous child.
“I’m sorry, but that woman is a stone cold mess and no Caress, sweetie.” For that little zinger he did his signature four snaps in a semi arc.
Somewhere along the line, Dwayne had joined Tamara, Kendrick, and Jordan on the Caress-is-the-one-for-you bandwagon.
“You don’
t even know her,” Jordan said, using the mouse to select a photo of Karina sitting on the edge of the water in nothing but a sequined bikini bottom as she covered her bare breasts with her hands.
Dwayne waved his hand dismissively. “Yes, but I know you and this whole ‘I slipped one night and had unprotected sex’ is a bunch of bull. Okay, there I said it,” he proclaimed. “Somebody needed to.”
Julius sat back in his chair and turned a bit to face his assistant. “Are you saying I got Caress pregnant on purpose?” he asked, astonished.
Dwayne turned his chair as well and then crossed his legs. “I’m saying that you are Mr. Responsibility to a tee. You are Mr. Condom kept anywhere I might need it—office, car, wallet. You are the epitome of thinking three steps ahead. You are the safe sex poster child. So why did all that fly out the window that night with that woman?”
“I got caught up.”
“Yes, you did. In the connection. In the chemistry. In the destiny of it all. When you are part of a bigger picture and a bigger plan, things are out of your control.”
Julius shirked away the familiarity of Dwayne’s lecture. His words echoed Jordan’s. When did everyone get bit by the damn love bug and this whole divine prophecy crap? “You’re here to assist with this photo shoot…not my love life,” Julius said, turning back to the flat screen monitor of the computer.
“What love life?” Dwayne asked, “There is no love anywhere in the equation of your life. Love surely is not what Ms. Karina is hunting up. Unless that’s what you call your magic stick lately.”
Julius focused on his work and pretended to ignore his assistant who might just be wiser than Julius was willing to admit.
Several hours later, Julius walked up the secluded walk to Karina’s villa and knocked on the door before he could change his mind. Just moments later the door opened slowly and the flickers of a dozen lit candles illuminated in the depths of his eyes. He looked all around the elegantly styled living room as he stepped inside. He paused for just a second to find Karina in nothing but a pair of leopard heels walking toward him with two glasses of champagne in her hand.
“I decided, why waste time with dinner when it’s dessert we’re hungry for,” she said huskily, coming up to stand before him and offer him one of the crystal flutes while she kicked her foot out to nudge the door closed.
Julius accepted the drink and took a sip of the liquid, immediately recognizing it. “Krug Clos Ambonnay?” he asked as Karina sipped her drink with her left hand and used her right to unbutton the black silk shirt he wore.
“Nothing but the best for tonight,” she whispered against his mouth before she kissed him long and deep.
Julius used his free hand to grasp the back of her thigh, running it up to the soft swell of her buttocks to press into her lower back. He brought her body closer to his as their kiss deepened with a moan.
For him, tonight was all that mattered.
Caress was stirred from her position on the sofa as the microwave began to beep annoyingly. Her TV dinner was ready. She eased up off of the sofa as the lights from her nineteen-inch television flickered in her eyes in the dark living room. She was in the midst of a Martin marathon on TVOne and one of her favorite episodes from the nineties hit sitcom was on.
Still laughing as a commercial came on, she moved through the small living room back into the kitchen to grab her dinner and pour herself a glass of milk. She really wasn’t hungry but knew she had to eat for the baby’s sake. Thankfully the “all day” sickness had subsided and she was less tired than at the start of her pregnancy. Besides some lower back pain and learning to sleep on her side, everything with the pregnancy was going fine.
In fact, she loved her little apartment and had even worked hard to decorate it once she paid off her hefty storage bill and saved her furnishings from being auctioned off. Her life had settled back into a pattern. Everything was back to normal. She was officially back on her feet.
God was good.
Caress grimaced as her son kicked. “Hey you, settle down and stop using my uterus as your football,” she said, giving in as always to her urge to talk to her baby.
“I love you so much,” she said, her head down as she directed her voice toward her round belly. “You are everything I never knew I wanted.”
The baby kicked again and Caress’s eyes filled with tears as she thought of her own mother for the first time in years. Did she feel this same protective urge, this urgency to love, this fierceness to fight for her child?
It hurt that her baby would never have grandparents, but Caress was determined to give her son all the love she had in her plus some more. She just prayed that Julius lived up to the father she thought he could be because she never would want her child to feel the same disconnection as she did from her family and her past.
Instinctively, she felt Julius was the same way. They shared something through their troubled pasts, and only common sense and common decency would make them ensure their child had far more than they ever had. Not just the material, but the important things: the emotional support, the stability, the comfort of knowing his parents loved him and would never leave him.
As always, when her mind drifted to Julius, Caress felt that familiar ache. She missed him. She missed that comfortable vibe that in time had developed between them. She even missed their flirtation. That little walk they often took across the line between admitting their desires and giving in to them.
Caress smiled and then laughed a little at the kiss and the heated moments they had shared in his darkroom. In the days following they would tease each other about their “red-light special.”
Raising her T-shirt above her stomach, Caress massaged the mound and tried to pretend she didn’t wish they were Julius’s hands on her belly instead. She couldn’t lie and say she didn’t want him more involved in the pregnancy. He called to check on her at least once or twice a week. He had yet to cash the cheeks she faithfully sent him. The very day she moved in he hired a moving company to bring the bedroom furniture.
He was a man of his word.
He was a man of style and grace.
He was a talented photographer.
He was a good friend.
Well-liked.
Caring.
Loyal.
Intelligent.
Articulate.
Handsome.
Funny.
Sexy.
Caress closed her eyes and let herself get lost in the memory of the many moments they shared over the last several months.
The laid-back fun of their first date.
The heat and passion of their first night.
The shock of her moving into his home.
The stiffness of those first few weeks living together.
The undeniable buzz of awareness between them.
The revealing kiss in the kitchen.
The urgency of that “red-light special” in the darkroom.
Moment after moment after moment played in her head.
Brrrnnnggg .
Caress jumped out of her reverie and turned from the counter to pick up the cordless phone on her small kitchen table. “Hey, Tam-Tam,” she said, having checked the caller ID.
“Whatcha doing?”
“About to eat a TV dinner,” Caress said, turning to slide the dinner back in the microwave for a quick rewarming.
“I’m bo
red,” Tam-Tam sighed dramatically. “Kendrick has a men’s meeting at church.”
Caress removed the Salisbury and mashed potato dinner from the microwave and made her way back to the living room to reclaim her seat. “You should have come over here. We could have been bored together.”
“High as gas is? This local call is free, baby.”
Caress laughed as she turned down the volume of the television.
“Heard from Mr. Lover-Lover?” Tamara asked while chewing noisily on something.
“We spoke last week,” Caress said, wishing she didn’t care that they didn’t speak more often.
“He should be back from Jamaica tomorrow.”
Caress froze, a spoonful of potatoes paused at her open mouth as her heart slammed like a door against her chest. Karina’s words came back to her in a rush:
“Julius, this is Karina. I am so excited about Jamaica. We are going to have the best time. Believe that. Anyway call me when you get this message.”
“Jamaica huh?” Caress said, shaking her head to free it of explicit images of Julius and Karina. “Karina must be in heaven.”
“Huh?”
Caress sat on the edge of the chair and leaned forward to alleviate the strain she felt in her lower back. “Julius’s first night home from Africa, this woman shows up at his door with nothing on but a massive sable—”
“Girl…shut up!”
“Humph.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Caress could imagine Tamara sitting on the edge of her own seat. The woman loved juice, “One word: EM-BARAS-SING.”
“Girl, you should’ve slammed the door in her face.”
Caress shrugged. “Not my house. Not my man.”
“Still.”
“Still that’s who he’s in Jamaica with.” Caress grabbed a pillow and shoved it behind her back.
Make You Mine Page 13