My breathing was ragged. It had been a long flight. I was tired from anticipation and the stress of not knowing how Don would receive me. But I’d never felt so good in my life. I held on to Don, my arms and legs wrapped around him, denying any thought of flight. He hugged me just as tight. His hands smoothed over my body, down my legs, as if he was spreading hot lotion along my limbs. I reveled in the feel of them, hard and soft.
“I can’t tell you how scared I was,” I said when my heartbeat returned to normal.
“Scared? Why?” He kissed my shoulder.
“Scared you’d reject me.”
I was scared, more than I’d been in the tenth grade when I wanted the cutest boy in my geometry class at school to ask me to go to the school dance. This was infinitely more important. This was my life. I was sure of Don and unsure at the same time.
Suppose Jack and Lila were wrong when they convinced me to fly here and tell him how I felt? Suppose I was wrong? Don had come that last night to take me out, but rejected me at my door. Like a jilted bride, I felt bereft knowing he’d scorned me. And now I was putting my heart on the line, hoping that the gamble I was taking now would pay off.
Don stopped kissing my shoulders and stared at me. “Why would I reject you? I love you. You knew that. If anything, I was afraid you’d reject me. After all, I always knew your secret. You didn’t know mine.”
“No more secrets from now on,” I said.
He raised a hand in the Boy Scout salute. “No more secrets.”
“I have a question, though,” I said. He shifted an inch, raising his hand and resting it under his head, waiting for me to go on. “That night, when you came to my house, to take me to the End of the Summer Dance.”
He nodded.
“What happened? Why did you suddenly leave?”
“I didn’t think I could handle it. I had so much confidence when I wrote the note. As the night grew near, I wanted to see you so much I could taste it. But when you opened the door and I saw you standing there, I knew it was hopeless. There was no way I could spend four hours with you and not want to take you to bed. Not tell you how much I loved you and beg you to marry me.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“You hated me.”
“I never hated you. Not from that first moment in front of the house on the Vineyard. I was attracted to you. I think I even wanted you then. But that’s not the real reason, is it?”
“No,” he answered. “I wasn’t sure you wanted me.”
“You couldn’t doubt that.”
He grinned. “No, I didn’t doubt that. It’s the …”
“It’s my idea of marrying a rich man.”
“I thought once you found out who I was, the only reason you’d want to marry me had to do with my bank account.”
“You don’t have a bank account,” I said. I lay next to him, my arm casually hung over his waist, my fingers playing on his back. “It’s your father who has the account. You own a house on Martha’s Vineyard, one in which I stayed, by the way, a few investments that keep you in clothes and cash, but nothing more.”
He stared at me.
“You used to own a race car, but when you lost the last race, you also lost your sponsorship. This was one of the reasons you returned to the U.S. and took over the Vineyard hotel.”
His eyebrows raised. “And how would you know this?”
“Jack,” I paused. “She’s a wiz at finding information.” I smiled and kissed him.
“There’s one thing I know,” Don said. “Money or no money, I’m not letting you go again. We can get married right here, and I don’t care who can attend the ceremony as long as there is one.”
I kissed him again, this time longer and harder. “I can’t wait,” I said.
He frowned suddenly. “How did you get here?”
“On a plane.”
He laughed. I did, too.
“I mean how did you get in my room?”
“I was never in your room.”
“But the key?”
“Apparently Shane Massey has spent a lot of time in hotels and knows all the angles.”
“Shane is here?”
“They all are, Shane, Jack, Lila, and Clay. They were either going to be my moral support or witnesses for the wedding.”
“Witnesses,” he said. “Definitely witnesses.”
Dont miss Zuri Day’s
Lovin’ Blue In stores April 2011
Turn the page for an excerpt from Lovin’ Blue …
The police! Eden Anderson’s heart leaped into her throat as she pulled behind the police cruiser parked in front of her brother’s Baldwin Hills residence in Southern California. “What’s going on, Michael?” she whispered as she fumbled with her seat belt, then the lock button, before scrambling out of her packed Acura SUV and rushing to the front door. Her concern had been growing for the past three days—ever since her phone calls and e-mails to her older brother had gone unreturned.
At first she’d shrugged off her worry. After all her brother, Michael “Big Mike” Anderson, was trying to make a name for himself in the music game. He’d produced a couple B-level acts while working for a major record label. His work often went late into the night, and reaching him wasn’t always easy. But when Eden had left two “call me right now” messages, followed by texts marked with the same urgency, she’d experienced the first two twinges of fear. And now, looking at the black-and-white squad car sitting at the curb of her brother’s front door sent Eden’s anxiety into full throttle.
Eden knocked on the front door. No response. She repeatedly rang the doorbell, but didn’t hear the chimes that usually sounded when the button was pushed. Eden knocked harder, first on the door, then on the window. The living room was dark; she could detect no movement. But lights were on upstairs. Eden’s fear increased.
You’ve got a key. Out of her panic came a voice that reminded Eden that she had a key to her brother’s house. He’d given it to her months ago, when she’d come house-hunting and stayed at his place. She’d meant to give it back, and then mail it back, but hadn’t. Remembering that she’d placed it in the zipper compartment of her large Junior Drake purse, Eden walked purposefully back to her car to retrieve it. Her steps were measured and much slower than before. Eden wasn’t sure she wanted to find out what was happening on the other side of the door.
Jansen McKnight turned off the shower. Did I hear a knock? He waited a beat, and then another, before turning back on the water and finishing the long, hot shower he so enjoyed. Liberally soaping his loofah sponge, he hummed an off-beat Usher tune as he rubbed the rough sponge over his chiseled, six-foot-four-inch body, and then stepped directly under the nozzle so that the water droplets cascaded off his smooth bald head, over his wide bronzed shoulders, and down his hardened pecs, back, and long thick legs. The bubbles pooled around his size fourteen feet before spiraling down the drain.
“Oh, oh, oh, oh, my God,” Jansen sang in the raspy bass voice that often caused panties to fall unbidden. He turned to let the hot water pound against the knots in his shoulders. I need to see Dakkar, he thought dispassionately. Dakkar was the masseur trained in Swedish massage who had rubbed away tension, stress, and frustration from Jansen’s body for years. For now, however, the near-scalding hot water pulsating from his heavy-duty showerhead was serving as a viable alternative. Jansen rested a large palm on either side of the stall, hung his head, and let the water work its magic.
A loud thud interrupted Jansen’s serenity. His just-relaxed muscles tensed, his entire body went rigid in alert. He lessened the water flow, straining to hear beyond the guest bathroom he’d used since agreeing to house-sit for Michael the previous week, and the stereo playing in the bedroom across the hall.
Thump. There it was again, unmistakable this time. Either the sound of footsteps, or something being dragged across the floor, or both. Jansen’s officer instinct went into auto-mode, and for good reason. A recent rash of burglaries in the upscale central Los Angeles
neighborhood was why Michael had asked him to house-sit. Jansen loved the comfort of his home in Gardena, and only agreed to his best friend’s pleas after Michael promised that a home security system would be installed immediately upon his return. Well, brothah, Jansen thought with a resigned sigh, looks like I’m getting ready to earn my keep.
With the stealth of a panther, Jansen turned the shower back to full blast, eased his bulk out of the stall, soundlessly wrapped a towel around his waist, and reached for the 9mm Glock that was never far from his reach. Tonight, he’d unstrapped and rested it on the closed toilet seat before the rest of his navy uniform ended up in a heap on the bathroom floor. Thunk. Jansen eased the gun out of its holster and crept down the short hallway to the top of the stairs. Taking a deep breath, he placed his foot on the top step and prayed the old maple wood wouldn’t creak under his bulk.
Eden walked into the living room and dropped another load unto the hardwood floor. Her first thought had been to leave everything in the car until morning, but a chance glance at a crime watch sign nailed to a post nixed that idea. Even in what she felt was a fairly safe neighborhood, a car packed with clearly visible goods might be too much for a hardened criminal or a bored teen to pass up. So with the last ounces of energy she could summon after driving for ten hours, she walked in with her beloved stereo system—the final load.
Jansen kept his back against the wall as he noted the shadow passing along the living room’s far wall. Whoever this fool is has a lot of nerve. Normally, especially when it was obvious that someone was home, a burglar would do one quick, thorough sweep, get in and out. But Jansen wanted to catch this perpetrator, believing that in doing so he might nab the person or ring of persons behind this neighborhood’s woes. That’s why he’d left the shower running, to give the thief a false sense of security. The criminal had obviously taken the bait and made himself at home. You may be nervy, but you’re not too bright, son. Jansen quietly cocked his weapon. It was about to go down.
Eden gingerly sat her stereo on the coffee table, then reached for the suitcases she’d tossed on the couch. She couldn’t wait to get in the shower. Her head hurt, her hair—stuffed under an Orioles baseball cap—was in desperate need of shampoo, and the secret that was strong enough for a man but made for a woman was about to become public news. Ooh, I’m funky, she thought as she used the sleeve of her long-sleeved Bison Blue T-shirt to wipe her face. As she did so, her earring caught on the sleeve and came out of her ear. She’d planned to replace the clasp on her favorite hoops before leaving DC, but like many other plans she’d made in the past two weeks, these too had changed. Ever since she’d resigned from her job on Capitol Hill, her life had been a series of unexpected interruptions. And she was about to get surprised again.
“Freeze! Don’t move!” Jansen eased off the last step onto the floor, assumed a strong, wide-legged stance and pointed his gun at the back of the scrawny, ball-capped thief who’d been wreaking havoc on the neighborhood. “Get your hands up, and slowly turn around.”
Eden stood frozen, unable to speak or move. What’s going on? Where’s Michael? After hearing the music, and the water running, Eden had assumed it was Michael upstairs. But these strong, authoritative commands had definitely not been uttered by her brother’s lips, and her womanly intuition, along with a rapidly beating heart, told her this was not a joke.
“Do it now!” Jansen took another step toward his suspect.
Eden began to shake as she slowly turned around. She took one look at the huge man whose face was hidden in the darkness, noted the gun that unlike his countenance was clearly visible from his outstretched hands, and did what any normal, law-abiding citizen would do under such dire circumstances. She passed out.
Some Like Them Rich Page 30
