Ava almost choked on the sweet liquid in her cup. Picking up the napkin on her lap, she touched it to her lips. “No, you didn’t say that.”
“Yes, I did.”
“So, it’s all about the sex?”
Kyle stared at Ava as if she had taken leave of her senses. “Is that what you believe? That I’m with you because of sex?”
“You were the one who said you’re sleeping with me and not your friends.”
“Don’t try and twist my words, Ava. I remember telling you that if I want a woman I know where to go to find one. And if I need to relieve myself I’m quite experienced in that department, too. So don’t ever tell me that I’m with you for sex.”
Ava wanted to come back at him but knew it wasn’t the time or the place for a verbal confrontation. He’d been granted a reprieve because it was his birthday and they weren’t alone.
She handed him the cup instead. “Could you please get me something a little stronger?”
“How strong do you want it?”
“Very strong.”
“Are you angry with me, Ava?”
Her eyes narrowed. “No, darling. Right now I’m real pissed at you.”
Smiling, Kyle leaned in and kissed her. “You’re magnificent when you’re pissed off. Your eyes get a little squinty and your chest heaves just enough to draw attention to your breasts.”
She slapped at him with her napkin. “Get outta here, Kyle Chatham.”
He pointed at her. “See. I got you to smile.”
Ava compressed her lips. “I’m not smiling.”
“Yeah, you are.”
This time she did smile. “Please go and get my drink.”
“If I get you a little tipsy will you allow me to take advantage of you? After all, it’s my birthday and I should be entitled to a very special wish.”
“How many wishes do you want? I’ve already given you at least twenty. You keep rubbing this genie and she’s going on strike.”
His forefinger traced the outline of the wishbone hanging around her neck. “I know a place I can rub and get the genie to give me everything I want.”
Rolling her eyes, Ava turned her back on him. When she turned around the chair beside her was empty.
CHAPTER 16
Ava walked into the house on Strivers’ Row, heading for the staircase. She was exhausted and slightly inebriated. Kyle had brought her a martini and she’d nursed it for an hour before putting the glass aside. The food Faith McMillan had prepared for the party was superb. She’d had two helpings of cold fish appetizers and eaten sparingly to sample roast pork, cold and hot salads, steak and salmon tartare, crudités, wraps and rolls.
A cake decorated with replicas of law books and a topper of blind justice was rolled around at eleven. Kyle appeared genuinely moved when everyone sang “Happy Birthday.” Each guest was served cake and given souvenir slices in pale blue boxes. Micah, Duncan and Ivan handed Kyle envelopes with gift checks to his favorite clothier.
Kyle personally thanked everyone for their good wishes as he was another year closer to the big four-oh. He teased Ivan and Duncan, saying he would still be thirty-nine when they turned forty.
It was after midnight when everyone started drifting off to their respective homes. Tessa took Ava aside, promising to invite her and Kyle for a small intimate dinner before the end of summer.
Now she walked through the master bedroom and into the en suite bath. Ava wanted to cleanse the makeup off her face, brush her teeth and shower before she fell asleep standing up. She was standing under the spray of the shower when the door opened and Kyle walked in. The emerging stubble on his jaw served to enhance his masculine sensuality.
“What are you doing?” she asked when Kyle eased the retractable nozzle from her grip.
He moved closer and she could smell mouthwash on his breath. “I’m going to help you wash your back.”
Taking a step, she pressed her wet breasts to his chest. “It’s your birthday, so I should be the one washing your back.”
Kyle slowly shook his head. “It’s after midnight so it’s no longer my birthday.”
Ava backed up until she couldn’t go any farther. “I don’t like the way you’re looking at me.”
“How am I looking at you, baby?”
Water had curled her hair and spiked her lashes. Ava’s wet body glistened like liquid milk chocolate. Never had he seen her look so alluring.
“Like you want to do something to me.”
“Oh, but I do, darling. I’m going to wash your back. Now turn around.”
She presented him with her back. Bracing her hands against the wall, Ava closed her eyes. Kyle started at the nape of her neck with a bath sponge filled with her favorite shower gel. She moaned softly when he made circular motions along her spine and lower to her buttocks.
A shudder rippled through her when he began with small circles then widened them until he covered every inch of skin from head to toe. Tiny bubbles shimmered on her body like precious gems.
A sigh of ecstasy escaped her when Kyle changed the flow of water on the nozzle to pulsing. The tiny pulse beats heated and sped up her blood. There was a heaviness in her lower belly. He rinsed her feet, legs, thighs.
Then, without warning, Kyle eased down to sit on the floor of the shower stall. Slowly, methodically, he spread her legs and placed the nozzle inches from her vagina, rinsing away the residue of soap clinging to her pubis.
His fingers searched the folds, separating them and directing the pulsing flow to the delicate area with overly sensitive nerve endings. The light in the shower stall gave Kyle an up-close view of the area that gave him so much pleasure. He positioned the nozzle near her inner thigh and knelt forward. Spreading the folds again, he pressed his face against her mound and tasted her. He began tentatively, as if sampling a new dish. He increased the pressure until his face was flush against her vagina and he ate with the relish of a starving man eating after a prolonged fast.
Ava tried escaping his rapacious tongue, but the hand on her belly wouldn’t permit movement. She cried, screamed and begged for him to let her go, but Kyle was relentless. His tongue moved in and out of her body until she was helpless to control the shudders shaking her as if she were experiencing a seizure.
Unable to stop the assault, she surrendered as orgasms overlapped themselves. As she braced herself for another one, Kyle pushed into her and released his own passions. Spent, they lay together, waiting for their hearts to slow down to a normal rate.
He washed between her thighs, then between his own. No words were necessary when they went into the bedroom and climbed into bed together. Ava curled into the hard contours of Kyle’s body and went to sleep.
For Kyle, his thirty-ninth birthday would be one he would remember—forever.
* * *
Wyatt Wainwright had agreed to a meeting. Kyle wanted the real estate mogul to come to Harlem, but he refused, declaring he rarely ventured uptown to do business.
Jordan was angry because he felt they were giving Wyatt the upper hand, but Kyle was quick to remind him that they were in control because Wyatt had come around enough to agree to meet.
Jordan was waiting outside the Wainwright building when Kyle stepped out of a taxi at seven-fifty. It was just like his grandfather to schedule a breakfast meeting. And with the meeting had come a condition: Wyatt refused to meet with the tenants’ committee.
Moving forward, Jordan met Kyle and shook his hand. “Good morning.”
Kyle noticed lines of stress ringing his associate’s mouth and a slight puffiness under his eyes. “Is it a good morning?”
“You noticed?”
“Yes. How much sleep did you get last night?” he asked perceptively.
“I managed to get about two hours.”
“It shows.”
“Thank you for the compliment.”
“You’re welcome, Jordan. Are you sure you’re ready for this?”
“I’m ready.”
Kyle pat
ted Jordan’s back. “Let’s go do battle.”
The two men walked into the revolving door and out into an opulent lobby. The guard standing behind a desk straightened when he recognized his boss’s grandson. “Good morning, Mr. Wainwright.”
“Good morning. I’m going up to see my grandfather. Mr. Chatham is with me.”
“No problem, Mr. Wainwright.”
“I guess it pays to have your name on the building,” Kyle teased Jordan after the doors to a private elevator closed behind them. If he’d come alone he would’ve had to be announced and cleared by building security.
“It doesn’t mean jack. It’s all for show.”
“Don’t knock it, Jordan. Being a Wainwright gave you a prep-school education, entrée to Harvard and their law school. And I doubt after you graduated you were burdened by thousands in student loans. If I hadn’t worked for TCB I still would be paying off my loans.”
“So you think I’m a whiney little rich boy?”
“You said it, Jordan. Not me.”
“Being rich isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be.”
“It’s better than being poor. If those people involved in the rent strike could afford to live elsewhere they would. But right now they’re stuck. At least they know they can afford to pay the rent where they are.”
The elevator stopped and the doors opened to an area with a massive table with miniature models of buildings owned, designed or purchased by Wainwright Developers Group.
Very nice, Kyle mused as he followed Jordan down a hallway with walls of glass. The view from fifty-five stories above the Manhattan streets was breathtaking. Their footsteps were muffled in priceless Persian carpet as they stepped through double doors leading into Wyatt Wainwright’s private office.
“Good morning, Rebecca.”
A young woman with long auburn hair spun around in her chair at Jordan’s greeting. A bright smile reached her sea-green eyes. “Jordan. What a wonderful surprise.”
Jordan barely glanced at his grandfather’s latest sex toy. “Is Wyatt in?”
“Yes. He’s expecting you and…” Her professionally waxed eyebrows lifted slightly when she focused her full attention on Kyle. She ran the tip of her tongue over her glossy lips. “It is Mr. Chatham?”
Kyle’s expression was as immobile as dried concrete. He’d gotten up at five and flagged down a taxi to take him downtown for an eight o’clock meeting to conduct business and, he hoped, settle a score, not flirt.
“Yes, it is,” he drawled sarcastically.
Rebecca had the wherewithal to blush. “Please go in, gentlemen.”
Jordan and Kyle walked into Wyatt’s private office. The tall, slender man with a silver mane stood at a table with china, silver, crystal and cellophane-covered trays of sliced fruit, mini pastries and jars of yogurt. Pitchers of orange, apple and grapefruit juice, along with carafes of coffee and hot water for tea, rested on another table.
Wyatt flashed a cold smile. “Please come in. Jordan, I must say you’re looking rather well.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Taking a step forward, Wyatt offered his hand to Kyle. “Mr. Chatham.”
Kyle shook his callused palm. “Mr. Wainwright.”
“May I call you Kyle?”
“Yes, you may, Wyatt.”
Wyatt’s eyes narrowed as he studied the man who’d enthralled his grandson. He’d had Kyle Chatham investigated and had to admit to being impressed by his curriculum vitae and illustrious tenure at Trilling, Carlyle and Browne.
Chatham was the total package from the top of his close-cropped hair to his imported-soled feet. His suit was a perfect fit, the hem of his trousers falling into a precise break at his shoes. What he couldn’t understand was why Chatham would leave a firm paying him seven figures to hustle like an itinerant peddler for nickels.
Wyatt inclined his leonine head when he gestured to the table. “Please serve yourselves. We’ll talk after we’ve eaten.”
“I’d rather we talk while we eat,” Jordan said.
Kyle rested an arm over Jordan’s shoulder. “It’s all right, Jordan. We have all morning. We’ll eat first, and then we’ll talk.”
He unbuttoned his suit jacket and sat, waiting for Jordan to follow suit. He wanted to thump the younger man for his impertinence. Kyle had instructed Jordan that he would chair the meeting.
When Wyatt took a chair across from Kyle the slight resemblance between grandfather and grandson was obvious: height, lean face and stubborn chin. Jordan was probably more like his grandfather than he cared to admit.
Wyatt’s brilliant blue eyes lingered on his first grandchild before he picked up a fragile cup, filling it with steaming, fragrant coffee. “We expected you to come down to the summer house last weekend.”
Jordan reached for a napkin, unfolded it and placed it across his lap. “I had prior plans.”
“I hope those plans included a woman. You know how spastic your mother has become because you’re still single. In fact, I think she would calm down even if you were seeing someone on a steady basis.”
“Sorry, Grandfather. I don’t live my life for Mother. Perhaps she will have more luck with Noah.”
Wyatt scowled. “Noah doesn’t even like women.”
Jordan smiled for the first time that morning. “Oh, that’s where you’re wrong, Grandfather. My brother likes women, just not the ones you parade in front of him or try to hook him up with.”
Wyatt’s frown deepened. “He could’ve said something rather than act like a fruit.”
“The politically correct term is gay,” Jordan insisted.
Kyle spread a napkin over his knees. He was enjoying the sharp interchange between Jordan and Wyatt. The sarcasm was thick enough to cut with a knife, but at least they were talking.
He selected a small portion of fruit, coffee and yogurt with a topping of wheat germ. Kyle had met more Wyatt Wainwrights than he wanted to. Pompous men filled with their own self-importance. Wealthy men who thought everyone had a price. Sanctimonious men who believed everything they did was right, that they didn’t have to answer to anyone but themselves.
Kyle glanced at his watch. “Wyatt, I’d like to get started.”
“But you’ve hardly eaten.”
“I’ve eaten all I’m going to eat. Now, if you don’t mind I want to begin by saying I’m sorry we have to meet like this. I would’ve much preferred inviting your family to a soirée to celebrate your grandson making partner.”
Wyatt choked, coughing violently when he attempted to swallow while sipping coffee. “You’re making Jordan a partner?” he asked after he’d recovered from his coughing jag.
Kyle nodded. “He’s earned it.”
“He humiliates me and you reward him by making him a partner.”
“You humiliated yourself by hiring incompetents to oversee your holding companies. They dropped the ball. Is your empire so vast that you don’t know what’s going on?”
Thick black eyebrows lowered as Wyatt appeared deep in thought. “I wasn’t aware of the conditions in those buildings until I saw that news footage.”
“Are you saying no one told you about the violations?”
Wyatt combed his fingers through his thick, wiry hair. “No. When I asked about it I was told the building manager didn’t want to bother me with trivial problems.”
Kyle shook his head. “Trivial problems that jumped up to bite you in the ass.”
Lacing his fingers together, Wyatt glared at Kyle. “You must think I don’t care about the people that live in my buildings. Well, let me tell you something. I do care, because I was once one of those very people who stood on that street basking in their fifteen minutes of fame.
“I lived in a stinking tenement with shotgun apartments. I know what it was like to have to heat water to take a bath or wash dishes, what it was to look out the windows and see a backyard filled with so much debris that if someone fell off the roof the garbage would act as a buffer against serious injury.
> “If my grandson had come to me instead of posturing before a television camera I would’ve taken care of everything.”
“It wouldn’t have mattered, Wyatt. Even if Jordan hadn’t come to work for me I still would’ve called you out,” Kyle countered. “This has nothing to do with the manner or approach he utilizes to protect the rights of his clients and everything to do with you not taking care of your business.”
A flush of red crept from Wyatt’s throat to his hairline at the same time a large vein pulsed in his forehead. “Who the hell do you think you are to lecture me on how I should run my business?”
Kyle smiled, knowing he’d rattled the older man. “I’m not lecturing, but I am warning you. I’m the one who will have the ultimate pleasure of ruining your reputation if you don’t correct those violations before the Labor Day weekend. And I don’t give a damn how many people you have to hire to get the job done.”
Wyatt snorted sarcastically. “You ruin me? Surely you jest.”
“I wonder how the members of your country club would react if each received photographs of the squalor in your buildings. Most of the people living in unsanitary and unsafe condition are children. How would it look if one of those children were to die or suffer serious injury because of your neglect? In case you’ve forgotten, your tenants do pay rent every month. Meanwhile, during the Christmas season you dress up like Santa to give away gifts and money to needy families. Have you heard that charity begins at home?” He leaned over the table. “Take care of your home.” Silence descended like a shroud on the room’s three occupants. The hostility was so thick it was palpable.
It was Jordan who finally broke the impasse. “He’s not bluffing, Grandpa.”
Wyatt slumped in his chair. He’d waited more than a year for Jordan to call him Grandpa, and not Sir or the more formal Grandfather. “What do you want?” His query was filled with defeat and resignation. He would do anything and give up everything to reestablish a relationship with his grandson.
Pushing back from the table, Kyle looped one leg over the opposite knee. “I told you what our clients want. They want their apartments brought up to code.”
“Consider it done.”
Man of Fate Page 20
