by Kim Karr
But come on, we’re talking Elvis here—the King of Rock and Roll. Who wore suits.
My thing. Her thing.
After getting in the car under Mitch’s watchful eye, talking about the past or the mind-blowing sex we’d just had didn’t seem top of my list. Nothing good was going to come out of that conversation; I could tell by the way she tensed when I suggested we talk. I will leave that open for her to address on her own terms. So instead I’d turned the radio on, and as soon as I did, Maggie immediately changed the station.
Just as I went to turn it back—I mean the Talking Heads were playing—“Jailhouse Rock” filled the inside of my Porsche.
And because it was Elvis, I didn’t change it. She started to sing along to the lyrics and so did I, and when I glanced over at her, and she said, “What?” the conversation gates opened to all things Elvis.
Who would have thought we’d both be dog lovers and Elvis fans?
Shit, I sound like a fucking girl.
“Have you ever gone to Graceland, Keen?” Maggie asks, putting her window down.
The evening is cool, but nothing like February in New York, so instead of putting her window up, I follow suit and put mine down too. “No, I haven’t, but I think it would be cool. Who knows? Maybe someday when I find the time, I’ll go.”
The breeze blows the wisps of her hair that have fallen down from her quick pin-up. “I haven’t been there either, but I heard there is one whole room dedicated to just his suits. Can’t you just imagine seeing the suit he wore in Jailhouse Rock or the jumpsuit from the seventies with the wide legs? . . .”
Like the sex appeal Maggie carries, she also has an enthusiasm about her that makes it hard not to get sucked into the whirlwind, even for a no-nonsense kind of guy like me. And yes, although I’d never have believed it, I somehow find myself discussing Elvis’s clothing choices.
Shit, now I really feel like a thirteen-year-old girl.
When I pull the Porsche onto the street that Cam and Makayla, and Maggie and Brooklyn, live on, I park under the shadows of a palm tree in front of the large house where some mystery writer lives.
This is the part I’ve been dreading—the good-night talk.
“Why are you parking all the way over here?” Maggie asks.
Switching the ignition off, I turn to face her. “I think we should talk, and I didn’t want Makayla or Brooklyn wondering what we were doing, or coming out to check on us.”
Maggie’s body tenses immediately and I can tell her wall is back up. “Right, we should probably have the ‘that shouldn’t happen ever again’ talk. There, now it’s done.” Her voice gets low and trails off, but her eyes don’t cut away.
Instinctively, I reach over and take her chin in my hand. “Maggie—” I can’t get the words to come out. For the first time ever, I’m not certain about what to do. My entire life has been about action. Make a decision, execute the plan, and don’t stop until it’s complete. Everything has been so cut and dry. Even with women. And now I’m stumbling on my words, uncertain of what to say. How to express my feelings.
The car door opens and she hops out so fast, I can’t even grab her.
Wrenching open my door and hitting a dead run, I’m able to take hold of her arm before she passes the hood of the Porsche. “Maggie, that isn’t what I was going to say.”
She shoots me a warning look. “Keen, leave it be, will you?”
Dropping my hold on her, what comes out of my mouth is not what I expect. “No, you got it all wrong.”
Eyes blazing, she glares at me.
Crossing my arms, I lean back against my car and wait for whatever it is she has to say.
Mind you, patience has never been my thing.
She takes a step toward me. “Sorry, was that the wrong talk? Should it be, ‘I don’t want to do this to you again, but—’”
I shake my head no, and she stops. I know those words hurt more than any other. What she doesn’t get is they hurt me too.
“Okay, did you want to go with the ‘That was a mistake, we crossed the line, and we can’t do it again’ talk instead?” She makes a check mark with her finger. “Because that one is done too.”
My eyes greedily take her in. She really is a lot to handle, and for some reason, I find that to be such an incredible turn-on. “No, not that one either,” I say with a smirk.
Apparently Maggie’s sense of humor has gone by the wayside, because she narrows her eyes at me and then points her finger. “Keen Masters, you really are an asshole.”
Just as she pivots on the heels of her fuck-me pumps, I grab her arm again and yank her between my legs. “You can call me that a million times. I don’t care, but if you’d let a guy talk, you would know I was going to say, ‘I want to put my cock in that hot little pussy of yours again.’”
A pink shade seems to coat her face.
“Are you blushing?” I ask.
She tries to shove out of my hold.
I yank her even closer. We are eye-to-eye and I take her face in my hands. “Are you?”
Her lips part, and I swear I can feel her heart beating out of her chest. “No, I don’t blush. It’s just warm out here.”
Laughter spills out of me and I take her mouth for another one of those drugging kisses of hers. Licking around her lips, I murmur, “You’re cute when you blush.”
She bites down on my lip so hard, I rear my head back and bring my fingers to my mouth, and once I look at them, I give her a smile. “I’ll give you that one.”
She raises a brow. “Give me?”
“Yeah, I’ll give you that one, and even refrain from calling you cute ever again, although most women would take that as a compliment.”
Those hands of hers that I want on me go to her hips. “I’m not most women.”
“I know that.” I pat my leg. “Now come back here.”
She shakes her head.
“Please,” I add.
Slowly she steps between my legs. “That was much better.”
“I’m not always an asshole.”
She laughs. “No, just most of the time.”
My hand goes to my heart. “You wound me.”
Licking at the blood on my lip, she whispers, “Not likely, but I am sorry. I didn’t mean to bite that hard.”
I groan. “Do that again.”
“Do what? Bite your lip?”
My fingers creep over her hips to run them under the silk of her top.
She moans, and let me tell you, no woman moans like Maggie does. It’s enough to make a guy come on the spot.
“No, the ‘I’m sorry’ part.”
“Watch it,” she says, hovering her mouth over mine as if it’s a threat.
Fuck, I’m so hard right now and I really don’t want to lose her lips, so I drop it.
Hey, I know when to back down.
My fingers slide around to her back and then down to her ass. In turn, her hands go around my neck, and then we kiss, or a better term for it might be mouth-fuck.
When we stop kissing, we stare at each other.
“So do you forgive me for fucking up what we were just starting?”
“I don’t know.”
“Okay, that’s fair,” I tell her.
She stares at me, as if she’s contemplating telling me to fuck off.
That’s when I decide to hell with it all, I’m just going for it. “Fuck, Maggie, I had you, but I want you right fucking now. I want to taste you. I want to lick your sweet pussy until you scream my name. And then I want to watch your face as I make you come. Repeatedly.”
Her fingernails tear into the flesh at the base of my scalp. “That’s quite a list.”
“That’s not all.”
She tugs on my hair. “Tell me more.”
Okay, so it wasn’t “fuck off”; that is good.
“I’m going to lick, bite, and suck your nipples until you feel everything ache. Your pussy will be throbbing. I’m going to make you scream with pleasure. You’ll be begging
for more.”
She’s not panting, but I can tell she wants to. “Anything else?”
I raise a brow. “Leave your front door unlocked and your shoes on, and you’ll find out.”
She nips at my lip. “Done and done, but right now I want to hear what else.”
Yeah, I’m a sucker and give in. “I’m going to suck your nipples into hard peaks, and you’re going to scream at how good it feels.”
Now she’s practically panting. “What else?”
I grin. “Oh, there’s so much more. You’re going to suck me off.”
“Am I?”
I nod. “And then I’m going to come all over those gorgeous tits of yours.”
Her nails are digging so hard into my skin, I’m pretty certain I’ll be bleeding from the back of my neck too. “It sounds like you’re trying to mark me,” she says.
Just like that, I feel my body tense.
Is that what I’m trying to do?
Because fuck, if it is, I’d better back the hell away . . .
And fast.
Maggie
Brooklyn James is at it again.
This time with the usual tall blonde, hair halfway to her hips and brushing the bare skin exposed by her halter top.
I can’t see her face, but I really don’t have to. I’m sure she’s beautiful in that cold, neutral way Brooklyn prefers.
Perfect features.
Blank expression.
A fame seeker.
One hundred percent fake.
Every week he says he’s done with that kind of woman, and yet he keeps bringing them home.
Through the window beside my front door, I watch as he backs her toward my large, comfy chair until her ass settles against it. His mouth never leaving hers, he moves between her legs.
Crap.
He’d better be taking her upstairs, and soon.
I can’t take the “Oh God, Brooklyn, that’s it. That’s it” that I’ve been hearing for the past six weeks.
The same six weeks I’ve been home in my bed every night, alone.
Without thought, my gaze lands back on the window. In the few seconds I looked away, Brooklyn has turned his blonde so that her hands are flat on the back of the chair.
Control issues like his brother?
Perhaps.
Just as I’m about to put the key in the front door, I start to wonder, what else do they have in common? Is his brother just like him? Or worse, what if he is just like his brother?
A strange feeling washes through me.
One I’m not accustomed to.
I sigh, feeling like my skin is too tight. Like my emotions are swooshing in green slime. Yes, green slime, because for some reason the thought of Keen being like Brooklyn isn’t one I want to even consider.
In fact, the thought of Keen with any other woman burns like fire as it races through my mind.
What the hell?
No I’m not, I can’t possibly be feeling this emotion. It’s crazy. Preposterous. Insane. Yet, as soon as I look again into the living room and see Brooklyn leading his blonde toward the stairs, I know I am feeling this way.
Possessive.
Jealous.
And so unlike me.
Makayla’s words come crashing back to me: “Keen’s the male version of you.”
Oh, God.
I want the anger back; it was so much easier to deal with.
The thought that he is going to do to me what I have done to so many guys isn’t one I can even consider.
Worse, do to me what he already did to me.
The nonchalant “just have fun” attitude and “not label this” frame of mind I have always had is nowhere to be found.
Just like it to up and run when I need it most.
Staring at the key in my shaky hand, I decide I can’t do this. I just can’t. I can’t explain it other than something deep inside me is screaming that messing around with Keen Masters again will only mess with me even more than it already has.
Because—
No, I can’t even think it.
And yet I am.
I’ve never felt like this about any man.
There, I said it.
Happy?
This is lust to the tenth degree. This is what all those movies are about . . . when men and women do more than fornicate for the simple pleasure of orgasm. They do it to satisfy the full-blown desire that exists between them.
I close my eyes, remembering the way he held my gaze as he moved inside me, the way his hands moved on my body like they wanted to own me, the way he licked me and nipped me like he couldn’t get enough.
The chemistry between us is straight up off the charts.
But if Makayla is right, and Keen and I are alike, then like me, he is going to have a hard time being able to accept that this is more than anything but a sexual attraction. And then what?
Flooded with the sensation of being with him all over again, I can feel my body shake. I swear I can still smell him. Taste him. Feel him.
And he’s not even here.
It scares me to death.
Making me uncertain.
Fearful.
More confused than I have ever been, I slip my keys back into my purse.
Leaving the front door locked, I walk around to the back of my house, where I let myself in through my bedroom doors, and then turn around and lock them.
Tight.
Maggie
The sound of a text pinging wakes me up.
Probably Makayla, the early riser that she is, wanting to know how my day went yesterday.
I need to talk to her in person, and come clean, which I will do very soon, just not today. I have enough to deal with today.
Stretching under the soft blankets, I stare over at the empty pillow beside me. The one that had I not caved under the pressure of the unknown—had I not been worried about what the hell this rip-roaring flame is between us—could have had Keen’s gorgeous face on it right now.
More than likely, he’d be smirking at me, and the hot mess I am in the morning. The thought makes my stomach do that damn flippy thing again.
Enough already.
I get it. He’s all sexy and handsome and charming and he makes your knees go weak, but he’s also all kinds of arrogant and cocky, and let’s not forget how he already hurt you once, so you need to stop it.
Little rant completed, I sit up rubbing my eyes, and then look down at myself and have to laugh.
What a wreck.
After showering last night, I sat on the bed completely naked beneath my towel and slipped back into my shoes, thinking if he really wanted to see me, he wouldn’t let a locked door stop him. He’d call, or perhaps outlandishly bust the door open with his brute strength. And then I’d begrudgingly let him in my bed, but let him in nonetheless.
That call never came.
And my door is still intact.
But hey, I was ready for him in case of either.
And doesn’t that just suck.
That I’d locked him out, and he didn’t want me enough to push past the obstacle, is proof I made the right decision.
See, I wasn’t that wrong about him.
Kicking off my damn shoes, I pull the sheet up and reach for my beeping phone.
The sun is just starting to rise, so I know I’m not late.
The text is not from Makayla.
It’s from Keen.
My lower belly flips again in response, and this time a burst of tingles erupts between my legs.
Oh, geez.
I told my body to stop already!
Opening the text, I brace myself for his rant. More than likely he’s going to be madder than a hatter and I will have to suffer his wrath all day.
Yes, he will become Miranda Priestly today and I will be Andrea.
Damn.
Oh, and let’s not forget he’s the male version, so I get to be all hot and bothered at the same time. I really need to work on repelling his super-annoying sex appeal.<
br />
Realizing I’ve been squeezing my eyes, I open them and read the message.
Asshole: I’ll pick you up at 7:30 sharp.
Me: I’ll pick you up at 8.
Asshole: No. I’m driving and I’ll pick you up at 7:30.
Me: The store doesn’t even open until 10!
Well, it’s not what I expected.
No mention of the door being locked.
No mention of all the wicked things he wanted to do to me last night.
It’s like it never happened, and he’s back in yesterday morning’s full arrogant work mode.
Also, I should probably change his name.
Minutes pass and there is no return text, and then ping. Already holding the phone in my hand, I open up the message.
Keen: Please. I’d like to talk to you first.
Me: Fine.
Talk about taking the wind out of your sails.
Sucking in a deep breath, I let it out and set my phone down. Too mentally drained to argue with him, and honestly too exhausted to make the drive to LA.
Letting him drive works out for the best, anyway. Tomorrow we have to fly to New York, so I’ll stay at my mother’s house tonight and take an Uber to the airport in the morning.
Let him pay for long-term parking. I’ll spend the money on upgrading to first class so I can have a drink or two or ten to gain the strength to be beside him for five solid days, and not want to jump his bones every minute of every hour of every day.
After hauling myself out of bed, I decide that since I have time, I’ll take a bath. My feet are still killing me and the soak can only help them get ready for another day. There will be no sky-high heels for me today—that is for certain. If I want to look Keen Masters in the eye, I’ll get a freaking stool and feel proud when I stand on it.
My bathroom retains the original claw-foot tub and black-and-white checked floor from when it was first built. Something I always loved when my grandmother lived here and am glad my mother kept when she renovated the place before I moved back.
Making quick work of undoing my towel, I stand in front of the mirror and look at myself.
I am a woman in control of my own life.
What am I afraid of?
A man.
Why?
My mother and her mother did not let men define them. They went out and conquered their worlds—without being in love.