“Now Renee, let’s be honest. You weren’t in love with either of those men. You barely acknowledge their existence most of the time. So it’s not like you can sue anybody for alienation of affection. When you have several escorts it’s to be expected that you’ll lose interest and move on, or they will. Why are you wasting your energy on this? They were your dates, not your boyfriends,” Bennie said fairly.
Renee scowled like a five-year-old and tried to get Bennie to see that she had been treated badly by the scoundrels in question. Bennie wouldn’t back down, though. “Renee, what I don’t understand is why you settle for these kinds of relationships. There are some very nice men out there, men with whom you could have a wonderful, meaningful relationship. But you never want more than a steady escort. Why is that?” Bennie pressed.
This was certainly not the first time that they had had this conversation, and Renee feared it would not be the last. She always dreaded this point because there was no simple answer. She tried turning the tables on her friend.
“Well, Bennie, why do you want more? Why are you so interested in this Clay Deveraux person all of a sudden?” Bennie’s face immediately turned soft and dreamy, as did her voice.
“Clay is exciting, Renee. He’s smart and handsome and ambitious and accomplished and adorable. He’s also very, very sexy. Very. And yes, I want more. I want a lot; marriage, children, family, house, dog, the whole enchilada. I loved being married. If Gilbert had lived, we would’ve four children by now, at least. I still miss him, you know. I miss his friendship, his company, his laughter; I miss everything about him. I miss being married to him. I’m not going to kid you, I loved that closeness and I want it again.” Bennie took Renee’s empty flute and rinsed it along with hers in the bathroom sink.
“And you know what, Renee? I think you want it, too. But you just won’t admit it,” Bennie said. She flopped across the bed on her stomach and rolled over on one side to survey Renee’s face.
Renee tried to put on her usual mask of indifference, but it wasn’t possible with Bennie. Bennie knew almost everything there was to know about her friend and it was no good trying to pretend. Renee sighed deeply and pretended to look at her fingernails. Bennie tried again to get Renee to talk. “C’mon, you can’t tell me that all you want out of life is a series of dates with handsome men who’re terrified of you,” Bennie teased.
Renee smiled wanly and tried to go along with the joke. “And what’s wrong with that? Sounds like a perfect life to me,” she said with a laugh that sounded phony even to her. She sighed again and then admitted something the she never thought she would own up to.
“I’m not as heartless as I seem, Bennie. I think sometimes, sure, yeah, why not get married. Then I go home and see my sisters and those idiots they’re hitched to and I get the nervous trembles. Then I look at my mother and think about what Daddy did and I think, no way in hell am I going out like that.” Renee rose from the foot of the bed and started fiddling with various objects on Bennie’s dressing table. Revealing her innermost thoughts always made her fidgety.
Bennie looked at her friend with sympathy. “Ne-ne, I know that you don’t have the best impression of marriage, but just remember two things. Number one, that’s somebody else’s reality. That’s their life and it doesn’t have to be yours. It won’t be yours because you are a totally different person with totally different expectations and ideals. And number two,” Bennie sat up to make sure Renee was listening “Nobody says you have to get married, for heaven’s sake. But you owe it you yourself to fall in love.” Renee spun around from the dressing table and looked at her friend as though she’d suggested parasailing nude on the Detroit River. Bennie held her ground, though. “Yes, indeedy, that’s just what you need; a hot, steamy, messy love affair that’s filled with passion. It’ll make a new woman out of you, I guarantee it,” avowed Bennie.
Renee continued to look at her friend as if she had lost her mind, then a sly smile spread over her face. “So, is that what you’re doing with this Clay Deveraux?” she asked archly. To her surprise Bennie didn’t deny it, but smiled a very private and lovely smile.
“Damned skippy,” was all she said in reply.
Renee couldn’t deny the truth of what Bennie was saying, although she wanted to argue her down. She couldn’t, not without revealing her true feelings. So she changed the subject and led the conversation to other matters, including Andrew’s recent behavior. Bennie had a suggestion for that, too.
“Renee, you know Andrew likes you. All my family adores you; they think of you like one of the family. Just give him back as good as he gives you. I’ve been telling you that for years. If he thinks he can get to you, he will. And he sees right through that air of sophistication of yours. You have to get down and dirty with him and he’ll back off,” was Bennie’s advice.
“Oh, so I should have licked him back today?” said Renee with amusement.
Bennie laughed. “Well, it would have given him something to think about that’s for sure.”
Renee was too weary to laugh, but she did give Bennie a weak smile before going off to her own rooms. She wasn’t thinking about giving Andrew something to think about; Renee had plenty to think about on her own.
***
For the next few weeks Renee managed to maintain an outward semblance of normalcy. Her day-to-day appearance and demeanor didn’t portray the unsettled feelings that were roiling about inside. The defection of two of her minor beaus was yesterday’s news; she was quite over that. As Bennie had pointed out, it wasn’t as though she was enamored of them in any real way. Bennie had given her a lot to think about, especially the thing about falling in love. Normally Renee would’ve ignored her, but the idea wasn’t nearly as repellent as it had been in the past. It was probably Bennie’s influence because she was certainly taking her own advice.
Renee had only seen a picture of Clay Deveraux, the man who Bennie was so enamored of and it had frankly frightened her. She’d seen a grainy reproduction of an old newspaper picture featuring a skinny man with braids and a virtual scimitar of a nose. When Bennie met him in person, she insisted that he was quite good-looking, something that Renee had seen for herself when she went with Bennie to Chicago. Bennie had attended some kind of media conference where she renewed her acquaintance with Clay and Renee met him in person at last. Bennie was totally right; Clay Deveraux was absolutely gorgeous and furthermore he was totally smitten with Bennie. So much so that he was visiting her in Detroit for Memorial Day weekend.
Renee had a chance to observe them closely before the huge cookout that Benny Cochran threw every Memorial Day. They were sweet and tender with one another and obviously thrilled to be together. Any fool could see that they were well on their way to true love. Maybe it was the fact that her best friend was poised on the precipice of Something Big that made Renee so interested in passion all of a sudden. Bennie was, after all, one of the most levelheaded people that Renee had ever known and she was floating along in a rosy haze of bliss. Even when Bennie was dating her first husband, Gilbert, she didn’t have a glow quite like the one surrounding her now. That fact, more than anything else, made an impression on Renee because she knew how deeply Bennie had loved Gilbert and how devastated she had been when he died.
And maybe her sudden interest in the concept of love had something to do with the fact that her current beau was boring her to tears and her mind was wandering. Marshall Thomas was tall, well-built, handsome and intelligent. He was retired from the Army, a four-star general, at that. In addition he was courteous and gentlemanly. He owned several bed-and-breakfast inns including two in the northern part of Michigan. He played a good game of tennis, was an avid horseman and enjoyed traveling; all of which scored very high on Renee’s lists of things to look for in a companion. He simply had no sense of humor that Renee could discern. That hadn’t been a problem in the past, but lately it was more and more annoying to Renee. The man never seemed to laugh at anything. It was like dating a wax replica from
Madame Tussaud’s; he was nice to look at but any resemblance to a real human was purely coincidental.
Today, as they entered the huge, beautifully landscaped backyard of the Palmer Park home of Bennie’s father, his lack of humor was all the more apparent. Bennie’s nieces and nephews caught sight of Renee and immediately made a beeline for her, calling her by her customary name within their ranks. “Uncle Renee! Uncle Renee!” Bennie’s youngest nephew had started calling Renee that when he was first able to talk and no one could shake him of the habit. Even now, at age four, little Drew insisted that Renee was his “Uncle Renee”, even though he understood what an aunt was, and how aunts differed from uncles.
Renee found it charming, especially since he was her godchild. She might have found it less charming if she knew that Drew’s Uncle Andrew was the one who kept telling him that Renee was Uncle Renee. In one of his random attempts to rile Renee he had inadvertently created a family joke, one that Marshall did not get and could not abide. When Drew persisted in calling Renee ‘Uncle’ his brothers and cousins all joined in.
Every time Marshall was witness to it irritated him to no end. He brought it up again as he and Renee sat at a long table under the big white tent in the backyard. “Renee, I fail to understand why those children persist in calling you ‘Uncle’. It’s disrespectful and silly,” he said.
Renee gave him a long look from behind her sunglasses. As they were extra dark, she could give him a good assessment without his realizing it. On the surface, Marshall was the perfect escort. But right now, he was wearing an expression that could best be described as peevish, which was too bad. Renee was simply not in the mood to tolerate much in the way of drama today. It was bad enough that Bennie had that hunka-hunka burnin’ love Clay at her side like he was welded there, the ever-merry Andrew had struck again. After greeting Marshall with a warm handshake he had waited until he was alone with Renee. In a whisper that no one else could hear he said “I thought that was your dad for a minute, but Mr. Kemp doesn’t have that much gray hair.”
It was his version of hilarity since he had in fact met her father on many occasions over the years. Renee had endured that with the clenched jaw of the martyr, refusing to allow Andrew to get the best of her. The other irritant was that Andrew for once had a date, albeit a most unsuitable one, in Renee’s opinion. She was short and busty and had the weave of life, something that didn’t escape Renee’s expert eyes. Plus, whoever had put on her sculptured nails should have been shot because they were horrible-looking. They were much too thick and long. Altogether, Renee thought she was a bit on the cheap side, even for Andrew. But why she was even concerned about Andrew’s love life was unexplainable. What did she care what he did with his spare time?
Even when LaKeisha, for that was her name, asked where Renee got her contact lenses she remained calm. She gave her usual answer, “From God, dear,” although she wasn’t sure that LaKeisha was bright enough to understand what she meant. For the most part, Renee was calm and unruffled, but an undercurrent of irritation remained. And Marshall was unknowingly stirring it up with his grumpiness. Renee decided to avoid possible cross words by busying Marshall. He always seemed happier when he was fussing over her. “Marshall dear, could you get me something to drink? I’m terribly thirsty,” she said sweetly. Unfortunately, Drew heard her remark and like the devoted little godson that he was, he dashed off to get Uncle Renee some punch.
“I’ll get it for you,” he called as he sped off. He was back quickly, both grubby hands clutching a large plastic tumbler glass of punch that was a little too full for him to carry. And before anyone could come to his aid, he stumbled in his eagerness and the contents of the glass spilled out all over Marshall’s spiffy white pants. A look of complete horror transformed Marshall’s face, but Renee missed it completely. In seconds she was on her knees scooping up Drew as the tears of mortification gushed out of his big eyes. “Are you all right, honey lamb?” she crooned. She set him on his feet to make sure that he had no scratches or cuts from his tumble.
“I-I-I’m s-s-s-sor-r-ry, Uncle Renee!” he wailed. “I didn’ mean to spill it on that man!” Renee took Drew on her lap and kissed his tears away.
“Oh, honey lamb, Uncle Renee knows that and so does Mr. Marshall,” she said, narrowing her eyes at Marshall and daring him to say otherwise. “Mr. Marshall is just going to go change his pants and come back to pick me up so we can go up North. Unless he would rather go by himself,” she ended with a very fake smile directed right at Marshall.
Marshall was caught between a rock and a hard place, his usual situation with Renee. It was obvious that if he didn’t do as she instructed she would certainly leave him to fend for himself over the holiday. And it was equally obvious that he had to get out of the doomed pants soaked with punch the color of blood. He had no idea that Renee was so fond of children, but that too was plain to see. All of her concern was for that sniveling brat and not a bit for him. So he had no choice but to play the gracious gentleman and agree to pick her up in an hour. Renee didn’t even seem to hear him as he bade her farewell because she was too absorbed with the weepy Drew.
By this time his mother, Faye, became aware of what was going on and came to collect her offspring. She apologized to Renee, who brushed it off as unnecessary. “You all forget that I have nieces and nephews, too. This kind of thing is in the job description of a small child. It’s what they do,” she said with a smile.
Faye had to agree. “But you know, Renee, Drew absolutely adores you. If he thought you were angry with him, he would have been heartbroken.”
Renee leaned over to give the sticky sweetie one more kiss so he knew that she was still his best girl. That’s when Faye noticed that there was quite a bit of punch on the leg of Renee’s silk Capri pants. “Renee, I don’t know if that will come out, but you’d better try to spot it a little,” she fretted.
Renee cast a casual glance at the spot and agreed, although she was pretty sure they would be a lost cause. She went into the house with Faye and Drew, who promptly usurped the powder room on the first floor. The caterers in the kitchen looked at her like, “I wish you would try and use this sink”, so she went upstairs to the guest bathroom. She entered the walk through linen closet-cum-dressing area that separated the two guest bedrooms and was about to get a hand towel to begin her ministrations when she was distracted by a noise from one of the bedrooms. The door was ajar so she peeked in and was turned into stone by what she saw.
Standing in the middle of the bedroom was Dr. Andrew Cochran dripping wet from the shower and wearing nothing but drops of moisture. He was as naked as the day he was born.
Chapter Four
For a long moment Renee couldn’t have breathed if her life depended on it. Nor could she tear her eyes away. Renee had certainly seen naked men before, but nothing like the one in the next room. Andrew was…he was…well, beautiful. No other word could do him justice. Renee had always known that he was tall and well made; that much was obvious to anyone observing him with his clothes on. But she’d never paid attention to how muscular and well shaped his legs were, or how firm and muscular his thighs were, and she had certainly seen him in shorts many times. She’d never noticed how broad his shoulders were and how nicely muscled his back was, and surely she had seen him shirtless before, in a basketball game or swimming. And his backside just defied description other than ‘perfect’. Andrew had the best ass she’d ever seen in her life. She couldn’t have dreamed up a butt like that; her imagination didn’t go that far.
Andrew picked his cell phone up off the dresser and began punching in numbers with his back still facing Renee who couldn’t have, wouldn’t have moved if her life depended on it. She was too awash in a sea of sensation for conscious thought. Even when he began speaking into the phone and moving in a way that indicated that he might turn around, Renee didn’t move. And he did turn around and she did look. Great googly-moo! He was magnificent in every way from head to toe. His chest was broad and muscular
and tapered into a hard waist. His hips were narrow and moved fluidly with a grace that reeked of sensuality. He had just enough hair on his chest to look really sexy and it trailed away in a fine line that led down to his most masculine region. And Renee saw it all, every single inch of his powerful manhood as natural as you please. She could feel her chest expanding and her breasts getting tight. Her knees were weakening but she couldn’t look away, not for all the Coach bags in the Somerset Collection.
Suddenly it was dreadfully hot in the dressing area, although the heat seemed to be coming from inside of her and not the other way around. Renee was finding it more and more difficult to breathe; she started clutching at the towel rack frantically, thinking that she might faint. Just then, Andrew stretched, causing his muscles to ripple in a truly spectacular way, which made Renee lose her grip on the towel rack and bump into the wall rather noisily. Andrew turned his head towards the door with his eyebrows raised. “Is someone in there?” he asked. Crossing the room he jerked the door fully opened and found no one. “That’s strange,” he muttered. “I’m hearing things.” He shrugged and was about to start getting dressed when he sniffed the air once, then twice. That’s Renee’s perfume. He would know that scent in his sleep. Getting dressed in record time, Andrew flew downstairs in search of her.
Until the End of Time Page 5
