“Huggy Bear? I like that!”
“Don’t even think about it!”
“What about H.B.?”
“No.”
“When I’m cumming?”
He looked at her and smiled. “At that moment, you can call me anything you want.”
“Even if you’re nowhere around?” She jumped up and ran from the room before he could answer or move to catch her. He heard her laughing as she ran to her room.
Later as he tried on the clothes, the thought of her having an orgasm without him started working on his mind. He knew she was just kidding with him, but that didn’t stop the green-eyed monster. The thought that she could achieve that kind of pleasure from anybody else, even her own hand, infuriated him. He took a deep breath and tried to still himself. That was when he had decided to put on the clothes to take his mind off of foolishness.
He thought the clothes looked ridiculous, but they were a perfect fit. “Rico, Rico, Rico,” he said to himself. “How do you do the things you do?” Before he could answer his own question, his telephone rang.
“This is Ian.”
“What’s up, boss, do you need me for something?” Rico asked.
“I was just thinking about you.”
“You got the clothes?”
“I did, thank you. Who told you it was a costume party?”
“Dot did, months ago.”
“You know Dot and Kingsley, but not Nesta?”
“Not since she’s been an adult.”
“That makes no sense. You’re only a few years older than her.”
“Did you need something, boss?”
“Did you send Sean a wedding gift?”
“I did, you were very generous.”
“Thanks. I can’t think of anything else.”
“You know where to find me.”
They said their goodbyes.
Ian thought about everything he knew about Rico. The Hunter was much too good at what he did to miss that Rico hadn’t responded to his question about only being a few years older than Nesta. He wondered whom he could ask, certainly not Fox—a being who probably invented the
on-a-need-to-know school of thought. Ian figured Kingsley would keep any secret important to
Fox, and Dot would keep Kingsley’s.
He heard her tiptoeing toward his room. Growing up with an ex-Hunter as a father, he
wondered how often she actually got away with sneaking into a room. The thought made him
remember that she had done just that to him, twice. There was the morning she’d left him a note
while he was sleeping, and then the night she’d snuck in on him and Fox as they drank cognac.
In Fox’s cases, obscenely, ridiculously priced cognac.
The only person who’d ever been able to sneak up on him before her was Fox, a being who
may or may not be a lower case god. He wondered what did that meant.
As he pondered the question, a hat sailed into his room and landed at his feet. “Nesta?” he said, just a little louder than conversational. “Why are you throwing hats at me?”
She entered, smiling. “Don’t you know the old joke?”
“I guess not.”
“Whenever my father came home expecting my mother to be a little angry at him, he would throw in a hat first. It would always make her laugh.”
“Why?”
“I guess the joke is if you throw in a hat and the angry person doesn’t shoot at it, it’s safe to
enter.”
Ian laughed harder than he had in years. He couldn’t have explained why it struck him so.
She sat on the bed next to him. “If you liked that one, listen to this. Over the years, music has played a big part in their lives. Most of the time, I had no idea what was happening and why certain songs would be playing on a loop. But one time, when I was about thirteen, my father pulled into the garage and my mother was playing music as she cooked dinner. I noticed that she quickly put on a certain song just before he walked in.”
“What was it?”
“Bobby Womack’s ‘If You Think You’re Lonely Now, Wait Until Tonight.’ My father took one step into the kitchen and froze. He got this sick look on his face.” Nesta stopped and laughed. “He looked at my mother and whined, ‘Wha-a-a-t, Dot? What did I do?’ I was sitting at the island doing my homework. I had no idea all this drama was going on around me, but for the first time I was old enough to figure it out.”
Nesta and Ian rocked with laughter.
“They sound like they were so much fun!”
“That’s one word for it.”
Ife was gone when they got back downstairs. When Kingsley returned from wherever he was, he had a bucket of chicken, three side dishes and biscuits. Ian noticed that Dot had set out paper plates, flatware and napkins—he assumed she’d been expecting her husband to bring dinner.
The mood at dinner was subdued. Ian thought his host family seemed preoccupied or maybe just tired.
After dinner, Dot suggested a game of bid whist.
“Really?” Kingsley asked. “We haven’t played cards in years.”
“It’s about time, don’t you think?” She looked at Ian. “You play, don’t you, Hunter?”
“I know the game, but I’m not nearly as good at it as Hunters who’ve lived here for a while.”
“Good, then you’ll be Kingsley’s partner. Girls against the boys. He cheats, so it’ll all average out.”
“Dot! Why would you say that?”
Ian looked at them; something about just talking about playing had brought the life back to them. They were all grinning.
“Call Uncle Ogo,” Nesta suggested. “He loves bid whist.”
Ian thought about how good she smelled to keep the negative thought about Fox out of his mind.
“You just did,” her father told her.
“I just did what?”
“You just called Fox.”
“And you just spoiled my great entrance.”
They all looked up. Fox was standing near the back door holding a glass of cognac, dressed in a long African robe and looking as angelic as he could muster. Ian wondered what he had planned as an entrance.
“You’re the only one who thinks your entrances are great,” Kingsley said.
“Let’s make it rise and fly. I’ll go get a partner,” Fox suggested.
“No, that’s not necessary. Why don’t you play with Kingsley? It’ll give me a chance to observe and relearn the game,” Ian said.
Fox looked around the dining table, and everybody nodded.
“Honey, will you go get the cards while I clean off the table?” Dot asked Nesta.
Nesta jumped up.
“I’ll take kitchen duty,” Ian said.
Kingsley and Fox deliberately froze. “A Hunter doing manual labor? I need to see this,” Fox teased.
Ian ignored them as he reached for the chicken bucket and the stack of used paper plates.
Dot helped by stacking the sides and bunching the napkins. “I’ll have you know my husband is very handy around the house.” she told Fox.
“Does he have a choice?”
“I’ve heard you say more than once that we always have a choice, Ogo.”
Ian looked up in time to see Fox give Dot a warning look. He had no idea what game the two were playing.
“You two play nice,” Kingsley said.
“I found a deck,” Nesta announced when she returned. She handed the box to her father.
With the table empty, Ian tried to sweep the remaining crumbs up with his hand.
“You really don’t know much about cards, do you?” Fox asked him.
“No, I don’t. Why?”
Fox pulled off the tablecloth. “Because if you did, you would know we don’t play on table cloths.” He handed the bundled cloth to Ian.
Ian shook the cloth over the sink and folded it. When he returned to the table, Kingsley was dealing the cards.
Ian pulled up a bar stoo
l behind Nesta.
“Three special,” Nesta said.
“If you’re old enough to wear that ring, then you’re old enough to know that those threes of yours will no longer walk around this table,” Fox told her.
“Dad-dy!”
“Your uncle’s right; now bid your hand.”
“Four no,” Nesta said, grinning.
Ian had no idea what they were talking about. He fought the urge to run his hands through her hair, but he did lean in to smell her lavender.
“Five,” Fox said.
“How bad do you want it, Ogo?” Dot asked him.
“You bid your hand, let me worry about mine.”
“I should take you out, on GP,” Dot said. “But it’s going to give me great pleasure to set your tired ass.”
Ian leaned down and whispered in Nesta’s ear, “What’s on GP?”
“General principal,” Nesta said, not whispering.
“Pass,” Dot said.
“I hate to do this, but I pass too,” Kingsley said.
Nesta grabbed the kitty and fanned it out for Ian to see. He didn’t know what it meant. She pointed to the Joker with her thumb in a way that the others couldn’t see. Ian smiled, not because he understood, but because he thought he should.
“Hearts,” Fox announced.
“You’ve got two,” she said. She put the Queen of Hearts and the Joker in front of Fox and the rest of the kitty to one side.
Ian had played the game five or six times, each occasion, except the last two, over about a fifty- year period. Each of the earlier times he played, it was while visiting in the southern part of the United States. Since relocating to Sacramento, he’d found that once a month some of the Hunters met, usually at a retired husband and wife’s home, where they played most of the day. He enjoyed the comradeship if not the game itself.
“Ian, I hope you’ve been paying attention, because you’re going to need to take my hand in ten minutes,” Fox announced.
“Not fair—he’s seen Nesta’s hand.”
“He’s been back there smelling her hair. I doubt if he’s seen anything that’s not down her blouse,” Fox countered Dot’s objection.
Everybody laughed.
“Do you need us?” Kingsley asked.
“No, I’m just going to Dubai to pull him out. I’ll be right back. I swear some Hunters don’t have the sense God gave them.” He looked at Ian “Don’t mess up my hand!”
Dot stuck a card on her forehead. “This will be waiting for you when you get back.”
“I don’t believe you,” he said to her, but then he looked at Kingsley questioningly. Kingsley deliberately looked away. “If you’ll recall, I passed.”
Fox put his hand down. “Okay, it’s getting close. I’ll be right back.”
Ian stood, and all eyes turned to him. When they looked back at the table, Fox was gone.
“I don’t know how I missed that before,” Nesta said.
Ian sat in Fox’s chair.
“He never did it in front of you after you got old enough to understand,” Dot explained.
“Remember me asking you if Uncle Ogo used to live with us?”
Kingsley nodded.
“He used to be around a lot when I was too young to question where he came from—am I right?”
“He held you so much I had to put an end to it because you were beginning to think you were supposed to be held all the time.”
Nesta put down her hand. “I was just thinking. If Uncle can go to the United Arab Emirates in a flash, can’t he see what we’re all holding?”
Both of her parents had been smiling, but they got serious with her question. Kingsley answered, “Yes, he can, but he doesn’t cheat at cards and whatever you do, don’t accuse him of it.”
“Please don’t,” Dot added.
“Or for that matter, don’t accuse him of anything negative,” Ian threw in.
“Oh, I wouldn’t. I know he’s honorable.”
“Nesta, know he’s crazy—that’s what you need to know!”
Dot laughed and Kingsley smiled.
“He would never hurt her, but she would hurt him if she accused him,.” Kingsley said.
They didn’t play cards while Fox was gone because Ian indicated he didn’t want to be the one to mess up Fox’s hand. Although he admitted he wasn’t sure what that meant.
Fox reappeared in the kitchen with another man. “Just sit there and wait,” Fox said to him in Arabic.
Dot and Nesta audibly gasped when they looked up. Dot pulled the card off her head. The man smiled. Their reaction was not unfamiliar. He stood and held out his hand as he took a step toward Kingsley, never taking his eyes off of Nesta except to smile at her mother.
“Damn, I just told you to sit there!” Fox said in English. Fox froze the Hunter with his hand and right foot in the air.
Ian and Kingsley stood. “Give my brother a chance to greet us, Fox.”
Fox shrugged, and the man began to move again.
“Close your mouth, Dorothy Jean, he’s not that damn pretty,” Fox said.
“Yes, he is,” Dot argued. She looked at her daughter, and Nesta nodded in agreement.
Fox laughed. Ian and Kingsley had their backs to the table as they greeted the newcomer. “Ian, Nesta is over here agreeing with her mother.”
“Welcome to my home, my brother. I’m Kingsley, and this is Ian.”
“Omar,” he said as he shook first Kingsley’s and then Ian’s hand. “Where am I? I would guess North America?”
“Right, just outside of Chicago,”
“Ah, yes, Chicago, I know it well.”
Kingsley stepped aside, allowing Omar to see the table. “This is my wife, Dot, and our daughter Nesta.”
“Nesta? A Marley fan, yes?”
“Yes,” Kingsley agreed.
“The game,” Fox reminded them, again sitting in his chair.
“Make yourself at home,” Kingsley told him.
Kingsley returned to the table while Ian offered to make Omar a drink.
“Nothing alcoholic,” Omar said. It was an automatic response from a man who spent most of his time around Muslims.
“Non drinker?” Ian asked.
The visitor seemed to give his order a second thought. “Actually, when in Rome,” Omar answered.
“You’re in Illinois right now.”
“That’s true. In that case, I’ll have what Fox is drinking.”
“No, you won’t,” Fox interjected before slamming a card down.
A glass popped in Omar’s hand. He took a sip. “Thanks, Ogo, this will do,” he said, smiling across the room. To Ian he whispered, “Like I would know the difference. I just like to irritate him.”
Fox was in rare form upon his return to the table. He made three of the next five bids.
By the time he made his second bid, his mood had improved enough to let Omar sit closer. Omar had indicated that he wanted to learn the game.
“I’d like to give it a try,” he told Fox after the fourth hand was played. “Most people in Dubai look at me and assume I’m Muslim, so I never get asked to play cards,” he explained to the others.
“Or offered a drink, I’d imagine,” Nesta said. She thought the man looked like he should have been singing doo-wop in a fifties trio, a light skinned black man with straight hair. She wasn’t sure that he wasn’t.
Omar nodded. “So true, pretty lady.”
Ian, standing next to the refrigerator adding ice to his drink, felt his abdominal muscles clench. He took a deep breath. Since Omar was sitting behind Nesta on the stool that Ian had abandoned, Ian pulled another stool to the table. He placed it behind Nesta’s other side.
“You should pull your stool over here, Omar. Fox is the best player,” Dot said, waving her hand in the space that separated her and Fox. “Might as well learn from the best.”
It was fleeting, but Ian saw the women exchange glances. He wondered if Nesta had somehow communicated to her mother something that had
sparked the comment. He wondered if he would ever fully understand women and all their powers.
Nesta turned to Ian. “Move closer, so I can have an armrest.”
Scented Dreams ((A Dogon-Hunters Series Novel)) Page 34