You're Mine ~ A Sweet & Steamy Romance

by Stella Eromonsere-Ajanaku

  “Are you ready?”

  “No!” she denied, willing her body to ignore his heated fingers and heart-melting words.

  And Banjo lodged his head on her back, sliding his hands beneath her breasts. “At least you’re honest. There’s no rush. I’ll wait for as long as you want.”

  “A man after my own heart.”

  “Go inside and change into something more carefree before I forget my promise to wait for sex till you’re ready.”

  Holding the towel over her shoulders, she hastened inside the house, her pulse accelerating like a kangaroo in heat.

  Twelve

  It took another missed call on Banjo’s phone to remind him he had not returned Bolu’s call. Sitting cross-legged in the gazebo overlooking the ocean, he scrolled through his contacts.

  “Hey Bolu! What’s going on?” he quipped once the line clicked.

  “I hear you’re cooling off on the French Riviera, kissing every bird in sight.”

  “Not every bird,” Banjo laughed. “Only one. But that’s not why you’re calling.”

  “Before I get to why I called, is she gifted at the top and bottom?”

  Chuckling despite his slight irritation, Banjo sneered. “Get to the point. I don’t have time for your idle chat, mate.”

  “Be careful with the women on that island.” A note of serious warning tailed Bolu’s comment.

  “Have you been frolicking with the birds in Monaco? I wasn’t aware your sex drive extended to Fontvieille. That reminds me, there’s a petite bird, named Desiree who wants to meet you. I’ll text you her number right after this call.”

  “Only if she has curves in the right places and a flat belly. I don’t want an unusual surprise.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I bumped across a woman once in Fontvieille shopping mall. I discovered something new.”

  Changing his mind about listening to his mate’s chitchat, Banjo butted in. “Spare me the details. When do you get back to work? We have three yachts ready to be fitted with sports courts.”

  As the design engineer on Banjo’s project, Bolu had to give clearance for work to begin. “My end is well taken care of. I’ll send you the clearance sheets by the end of the week. I also know we have all the materials in the warehouse. Zipline, squash, tennis, and basketball courts have been delivered to the foredeck of Project Bluebird.”

  “That’s great news. We’ll get started in a week. I’ll contact the crew. Thanks for letting me know. Get in touch with Desiree. I made a pact with her on your behalf.”

  Bolu howled. “Back to what I was saying. I walked out of a shop in Fontvieille about five months ago and knocked down a woman who looked pregnant.”

  Mirth quenched in Banjo’s gut. “What do you mean, looked pregnant?”

  “Exactly what I just said. She fell and I panicked. I was sweating from my backside. I thought Lord, she’s going to lose the baby.”

  “Then what happened?”

  “When I insisted on taking her to the hospital, she told me she wasn’t pregnant. I was dazed.”

  Waving his hand, Banjo snarled. “I don’t understand. She looked pregnant, but she said she wasn’t pregnant.”

  “She told me she would be okay and insisted there was no need to take her to the hospital.”

  “Describe this woman.” For some reason, Banjo had cold sweat creeping down his spine.

  “Curvy, dark brown-skin, dark eyes, very attractive. She had on a tight-fitting dress.”

  “No names? Come on, Bolu.”

  “Rachael. The name kind of stuck with me. If I’m not wrong she sounded a bit American.”

  Goosebumps floated on Banjo’s skin. “Are you sure?”

  “Oh yes. But I doubt you would run into her.”

  “I did, Bolu. And I fell for her. See you soon, mate. Keep your head above water.”

  “What?” his friend howled.

  Severing the call, Banjo charged out of the gazebo.

  Moments later, standing at the bottom of the stairs in the main living room, he yelled. “Rachael!”

  Tinu appeared at the top of the stairs, her brows creased as she stared down at her son. “What’s the matter, Banjo? You sound upset.”

  “I need to see, Rachael. Is she in her bedroom?”

  Peering at him with suspicion, Tinu lifted one hand. “Let me check.”

  Seething with indignation, Banjo hit his fist against his banister, snarling under his breath.

  “Rachael’s not in her bedroom. Why are you so furious?” his mum asked, panic clear in her tone.

  “It’s nothing to do with you, Mum,” he dismissed with a casual wave, coating his words with forced sweetness.

  Cross at himself for his recklessness, Banjo trooped to his bedroom. Squeezing his eyes shut to control the hurt building up in his chest, he pulled the closet door open. This time, one of the hinges snapped and the wooden door hung by a thread. Casting the cracked hinge an evil eye, Banjo yanked out his bag and packed all his clothes, leaving behind the dark suit and white shirt he bought for the Volunteers Party.

  Just as he laced his shoes, Rachael rushed inside his room.

  “Banjo! Your mum told me you wanted to speak with me.”

  “I think it’s a little too late for that,” he ground out, deciding he had nothing to say to her after all. What was the point in talking to a brick wall?

  “What do you mean by that? Where are you going with your bag?”

  Raging like a bull, he turned to face her. “Really? Do you think you have any right to ask me personal questions?”

  Putting up both hands, Rachael sat beside him on the bed and reached for his arm. He stiffened, trying to control the urge to shake off her fingers. After everything they had shared in the past weeks, he wanted to yell at her until she snapped out of her secret world.

  “Take your hands off me!” he ordered in a restrained voice.

  Eyes huge with worry, she backed away. “I’ve not seen you this angry. Why are you so mad at me, Banjo? What have I done?”

  “Ask yourself the same question when I’m gone. I just found out I’ve been wasting my time courting a woman I can’t trust to tell me the truth. There, you have it!” He snatched his bag from the floor and headed for the door.

  Rachael raced in front of him and shut the door, leaning against it. In his heart, tears fell like a storm. “I don’t want to hurt you, Rachael. Open the damn door! Keep whatever it is you’re hiding to yourself. I really don’t want to know about your little baby or no baby secret.”

  Tears slipped out of her eyes. And his heart tore to pieces, so he turned his back on her. Clenching his fists at his sides, he struggled not to cuddle her. “Don’t cry on me, dammit!”

  “I’m so sorry, Banjo. Believe me, I wanted to tell you so many times. I was scared you’ll turn your back on me. I was scared you’ll leave.”

  Spinning around, he lifted his hands. “I asked you a dozen times about your baby and the baby’s dad. You kept your mouth shut.”

  “Because I’m not pregnant!” she wailed, swiping away blocks of tears from her cheeks with one hand. “I’m not pregnant.”

  “Then you made a fool of me for over three weeks, falsely leading me to believe you were pregnant. Right now, I feel like a mug. And I hate feeling this way. For that reason, whatever we thought was steaming between us is over. I’m leaving. Good luck with everything.”

  Crying harder, Racheal begged. “Please, listen to me just this once, Banjo. I beg of you.” She fell to her knees.

  Hardening his heart against the woman who had made him so happy, took all the control he never knew he had. For the sake of the short-lived affair they shared, Banjo lifted Rachael up to her feet, swiped away her tears with his tongue and smashed his lips against hers in a punishing kiss. Before he got sucked in by her charm however, he snatched away his lips, opened the door and fled.

  Too stunned by the deep kiss, Rachael shut her eyes. Before she could savour the sweetness of Banjo�
��s lips, he was gone. She pinched her wrist to be sure she was not dreaming. Hurled by fear, Rachael rushed out of Banjo’s bedroom screaming, “Banjo! Banjo!”

  Staggering a little, Rachael ran through the living room into the front room. There was no trace of him or his bag. She dashed via the hallway to the porch. He was not there. When she got outside, she came to a halt. Tinu stood on the paved pathway, her eyes filled with tears.

  “He’s gone,” her auntie said, struggling not to give into the misery on her face.

  “No!” Rachael screeched, dashing forward as Tinu opened her arms wide to receive her sobbing frame.

  Both women cried their hearts out, each one grieving for a different reason. After a long while, Tinu led Rachael inside the house.

  “Give him time to come to terms with the reality,” her auntie consoled, pouring two glasses of white wine.

  “There’s nothing to celebrate, Auntie Tinu. My heart is split in two. I’m so sorry. I should have listened to you. I should have told him.”

  Tinu shook her head and pressed one wineglass into Rachael’s hands. “In life, we make decisions. Some great, some not so great. We learn our lessons and we move on. Banjo will understand, eventually. He needs time.”

  Forced to accept the drink, Rachael sat on the kitchen floor, the tiles cool under her backside.

  “Understand what Auntie? My stupidity? Or my secretive nature? I hate myself right now.”

  Shaking her head, Tinu joined Rachael on the floor and stretched out her legs. “There’s a strong bond between both of you. I don’t see how he can just walk away from you for good.”

  Unconvinced by Tinu’s attempt to comfort her, Rachael’s fingers shivered around the glass. She set it down beside her.

  “You should have seen the way he looked at me.” She huddled beside Tinu. “He hates me.”

  “Did you try to explain to him?”

  “Yes, but he said it was too late to talk. I meant to tell him. I just needed to find the right words.”

  Tinu patted Rachael’s quivering fingers. “Sometimes we have to just take the plunge into the deep end and see what we find. I understand your reluctance to talk about it and I hoped Banjo would have been more patient. It has only been a couple of weeks.”

  Tears bathed Rachael’s cheeks and her lips wobbled. Tinu placed one hand around her shoulders. Rachael sobbed, counting the number of times Banjo had asked her about her useless bump.

  “I wish I had trusted him earlier,” sniffed Rachael, wiping away the tears with her fingers.

  “Do you think you love him?” Tinu asked, her voice as broken as Rachael’s heart.

  Rachael shrugged. “I don’t know. But I’ve thought about him every day since he walked through the front door. Apart from the fact he’s so attractive, he has a ready charm about him that I like a lot. I shouldn’t be telling you.”

  “Don’t be silly, my dear. I see everything. The way both of you clawed at each other’s throat, I knew there was an attraction stewing.”

  Grinning through her tears, Rachael looked up at her god-mother, a woman who had loved her through pain and joy in the past two years and more. “I wasn’t sure you would approve. It was one of the reasons I held out on him for so long.”

  Smiling through her own shock, Tinu shook her head. “I had no reason to disapprove. I want to see both of you happy, together or apart.”

  The mere thought of Banjo with another woman brought intense hurt to Rachael’s chest. Broken by pain, Rachael laid across Tinu’s thighs, crying harder. “Do you think he would go back to Tess?”

  “My dear daughter, you’re breaking my heart. Tears won’t bring Banjo back. If you want him so much, then, you’ll have to go and find him. I have no idea if he wants Tess back, but I doubt it.”

  Rachael scrambled up, staring at Tinu as if she had just given her the key to a treasure chest. “But I don’t know where to find him. Besides, what if he doesn’t want to see me?” She bit her finger nail, but it was not edible.

  “We’ll wait a few days and I’ll find out where he’s working. When you get there, your feminine instinct will kick in, trust me. A woman who wants something precious knows how to get it.”

  Grabbing Tinu’s hands, Rachael smiled. “Thank you for not judging me harshly. And thank you for not disapproving of me.”

  “As long as Banjo’s happy and settled and you are too, my job is done. Isn’t that what all parents want?”

  Wrapping her arms around her bunched knees, Rachael nodded. “I’m sorry I hurt Banjo.”

  “He could have waited to listen to all you had to say. Sometimes, he reminds me so much of his dad. Loving, but very stubborn and impatient.”

  Rachael snapped out of her misery. Tinu Ricci hardly ever spoke about her estranged husband. “How did you meet Banjo’s dad?”

  Leaning her head against the wall, Tinu smiled. “I feel like I’ve known Dante all my life. As kids, we were neighbours. Our parents lived on the same street in Islington, North London. We went to the same school, had the same friends. And he asked me to go on a date during his Prom. He was a year ahead of me in school.”

  Silent as a lamb, Rachael listened with rapt attention.

  “It wasn’t love at first sight for me. He was my best friend and eventually, when we finished our degrees from different universities, things changed. When I returned from the United States, I found out I had missed him greatly. The feeling was mutual.” Tinu’s lips curled into a small smile.

  “In what way?” Rachael chipped in.

  “Oh, when he touched me, my body just lit up and from then on, we were inseparable. Six months later, we were married.”

  Of course Rachael knew what exactly Tinu was talking about. The first time Banjo kissed her, every part of her skin burnt with desire. She was lured and her emotions sent into disarray.

  “After thirty-one years in a happy marriage, the last thing I expected was to live as a single woman, and with Dante hooking up with a woman half his age.” Although Tinu’s voice wobbled, there was no malice in her tone.

  Instant words of comfort did not jump out of Rachael’s lips. It was hard to know what to say.

  “I don’t want to see you miserable, Rachael. If Banjo makes you tremble and leaves you with a broken heart after a few weeks, then you need to do something to win him back.”

  Smiling at her comforter, Rachael nodded. “Thank you for sharing your story with me, Auntie. I can’t thank you enough for your support.”

  Patting Rachael’s hand, Tinu grinned. “Drink and be merry. If tomorrow comes, then we’ll worry about you and Banjo.”

  Rachael took a sip from her wineglass and shut her eyes. The wine tasted dry and awful on her lips. But she downed the glass anyway.

  Tinu refilled their glasses.

  Above the rim of her glass, Rachael’s teary eyes met Tinu’s. With a sneaky smile on her face, Tinu raised up her glass. “To finding love.”

  With a slow nod, Rachael lifted her glass high. “To finding, Adebanjo Bettino Ricci.”

  Both of them grinned as tears slipped down their cheeks.

  Thirteen

  Bromley, South London

  For two weeks, Banjo moved and acted like a mindless robot. After his fight with Rachael, he flew back to England, visited his daughter for a week in Bromley in South London before he plunged himself back to work on the shores of Split in Croatia.

  Last week, Hugh and the crew at work made concerted efforts to cheer him up. But his mood remained glum. Every free time he had, he fought to restrain memories of his fun time with Rachael. Her smile, her lips shaped into a cute pout and the heated sensations from her peaked nipples taunted him day and night.

  This weekend, he decided to spend more time with his daughter in the hope her presence would rid him of Rachael’s reminiscences.

  “How long is it going to take for you to mourn this woman who has stolen your cheerful life?” Olivia whispered while mounting Lego bricks on the rug in his flat on Bickley P
ark Road, Bromley.

  Narrowing his eyes, he added two Lego bricks where they were not needed. “What are you talking about, Olivia?”

  “Come off it, Dad. I wasn’t born yesterday, you know. You had a fight with Rachael. That’s why you look as if the world is upside down.”

  Shocked at his daughter’s sharp wit, Banjo swallowed, but he carried on adding bricks to create the perfect kitchen Olivia wanted. “If you tell me why you think I had a fight with Rachael, I’ll tell you what’s on my mind.”

  A mischievous smile cut across his Olivia’s face. Adding two bricks on a new layer, Olivia began constructing her bedroom on the second floor. According to her, she wanted a great view of the beach below.

  “Last time we were together, you called me Rachael thrice in one week. Once, I overheard you having a chat with yourself. You sounded angry and I heard you mention Rachael’s name.”

  Banjo breathed out and set down the bricks in his hands. This was unreal. He could not even recall talking to himself. But if Olivia said she overhead him, then it was true.

  “Now your turn. Why are you still angry with her? I was looking forward to meeting her.”

  Involving his daughter in his personal life was not something he wanted to do yet, but he crossed the line when he told Olivia about Rachael when he was in Monaco.

  “Yes?” Olivia insisted, dumping the bricks on the board.

  “Adults argue. I had an argument with her.”

  “Adults make up too,” his daughter responded with a smile. “Are you going to make up with her now? I don’t want to see you unhappy.”

  Several times in the past two weeks, he’d asked himself why he did not wait to listen when Rachael wanted to explain. Maybe because her explanation would not have changed the way he felt about the fact she did not trust him. “To be honest, I don’t know what I want to do.”

  Olivia nodded as if she understood. “If you’re so unhappy because you argued with her, is that not a good reason to make up with her?” It was a logical statement.