Madam, May I

by Niobia Bryant

  She gasped.

  He pulled her dress over her head and flung it away before he pressed his face against her cleavage and planted warm kisses there.

  She shivered.

  He shifted his head to the left and licked at her nipple.

  She cried out and arched her back, gripping the soft tendrils of his hair as he pleasured her from one taut brown nipple to the other and back again, stoking a heat inside her that seemed to warm her from her head to the tips of her toes. “Lo,” she sighed.

  “Damn, look at you,” he moaned, sitting back to do just that.

  She raised her hands high above her head as she watched him, enjoying how sexy he made her feel with just his heated gaze. “Look at this,” she said, bending over backward and spreading her legs before him as she pressed her hands to the hardwood floor.

  “Shit,” Lo swore.

  He shifted his body and then bent down to blow a cool stream of air against her intimacy.

  Her thighs shook, and she bit her bottom lip as she winced.

  The first feel of his tongue stroking against her swollen bud buckled her arms. And when he sweetly sucked her clit between his pursed lips, he moaned in pleasure and gripped her soft inner thighs before sliding his hands across her belly and down to massage her breasts.

  Well, damn, Lo . . .

  He was both passionate and methodical with his wicked movements, between sucking and licking at her clit with perfect timing.

  “Cum for me,” he whispered against her.

  She released a shuddering breath as she began to circle her hips, bringing her core up against his tongue.

  Loren wrapped his arms around her upper thighs, locking her in place as he felt her body tremble with her release. His moans echoed her own as he tasted her on his tongue.

  He released her and slapped her buttocks before she rolled over onto her stomach and then moved back between his open legs on her knees. He gripped her face and kissed her deeply as Desdemona jerked the elastic waist of his shorts down to free his hardness. “Oooooh,” he softly roared into her mouth at the feel of her hand stroking him from root to tip. Again and again. Slowly and then quickly. “Shit.”

  With one hand twisted in his hair, she jerked his head back to free her mouth from his so that she could lower her head and take him into her mouth, adjusting herself to fit him to the back of her throat.

  Loren’s legs shot out straight on either side of her, and he fell back against the sofa as he thrust his hips upward with a savage cry that seemed torn from his gut.

  She pleasured him with well-acquired skill as she eyed his face and enjoyed the feel of his hardness against her tongue and lips, drawing shivers and moans and looks of shock and pleasure. She circled the smooth tip with her tongue before taking his top inches into her mouth to suck until her cheeks caved and a little of his release shot from him to coat her tonsils.

  Desdemona sat back with a lick of her lips as she worked his hardness with both her hands.

  “Don’t. Make. Me. Cum. Please,” Loren begged, his eyes wild and fiery as he looked at her.

  She rose up on her stiletto heels. “I needed this, Lo,” she admitted as she straddled his hips and reached between them to hold his heavy hardness upright as she slid down onto him inch by inch.

  His mouth formed a circle.

  “And I want you to remember that this is my dick,” she said, slowly lowering herself up and down on his rigid inches as she bit her bottom lip. “Even when you’re with someone else or even married, it will always be my dick. Right?”

  “Hell, yeah,” he agreed, digging his fingers into her soft hips as he looked down at their union. “And that’s mine. Right?”

  Desdemona sat down on his strong thighs, taking all of him into her with a soft grunt. “Always,” she promised.

  Right along with my heart.

  Her emotions tightened her throat as she leaned in to kiss him. He encircled her with one arm across her back and the other cradling her quivering buttocks as he worked his hips in sync with her.

  Back and forth.

  The base of his hardness slickly pressed against her clit, and before long she was quivering with another aching release. She sucked at his lips as she looked down at his face. “Lo,” she gasped, her climax drawing tears. “Lo.”

  Loren massaged the back of her as his eyes searched hers. “I’m a fool to love you,” he admitted, his voice low and deep.

  “And an even bigger fool to tell you that I do.”

  They stopped the lovemaking and stared at each other. Hearts pounding. Pulse racing.

  She nodded. “I love you, Lo,” she said with every bit of emotion she could pour into her words. “I love you so much.”

  He tilted his chin up to capture her mouth with his own. “But it’s still goodbye, isn’t it?” he asked in between the sweetest kisses.

  A tear raced down her cheek as she pressed a kiss to the corner of his mouth and buried her face against the hollow of his neck as she nodded again.

  He comforted her, massaging her back. “It’s cool. At least I know what love feels like for the first time.”

  She raised her head. “Me too,” she admitted.

  They made love with a fierceness that both frightened and excited them. Slow and steady. Fast and furious. Going still to hold off their climax, neither wanting their connection to end. And then, when they could no longer deny themselves, giving in to their passion they climaxed together, feeling the ultimate high. Riding the waves. Enjoying the splendor as they clutched each other tightly with their mouths locked in passionate kisses.

  Long after the ride was over, they still clung to one another.

  “Stay the night,” he softly demanded, pressing a tender kiss to her shoulder as he rubbed circles on her back.

  “Okay,” she agreed, closing her eyes and inhaling deeply of his scent as if to capture it within her.

  “So goodbyes in the morning?” he quipped.

  They shared a laugh.

  But the night was not for sleeping. Twice they made love, once in the shower and then again in his bed just as the sun was beginning to rise above the city. He rested on his elbows looking down at her face as he slowly stroked them to another climax.

  “We can do this, you know,” Loren said, his eyes imploring hers, revealing his heart’s desire.

  She kissed his mouth and held his face with her hands. “There is so much you don’t know; please believe if I thought we could find forever in this I would never say goodbye to the man—the only man I have ever loved,” she stressed. “You have to trust me on this.”

  “Trust you while you break my heart . . . again.”

  Desdemona rose from the bed and pulled her dress over her nakedness and stepped into her heels. The torn panties she left behind on the floor.

  “Ali—”

  She rushed over to kiss him again, ending him saying that name that was not truly hers. “Tell me you love me one last time and say goodbye,” she pleaded with him, her eyes soft.

  “Please, Lo.”

  “No,” he said, even as she saw the emotion brimming in his beautiful slanted eyes.

  “I love you, Loren Palmer,” she said, placing a kiss on each corner of his mouth. “Goodbye.”

  She rose from the bed again and picked up her keys from where they had fallen on the floor before making her way to the front door. Her steps were hurried but only because she was afraid she would never leave him.

  His hand on her shoulder surprised her.

  She turned and looked up at him as he pulled her close and kissed her. “I love you,” he spoke against her mouth. There was a long pause before he finished. “Goodbye.”

  Desdemona smiled, reaching to stroke his chiseled cheek one last time before she turned and did the hardest thing ever in her life by leaving.

  Epilogue

  August 2020

  “Okay, this is me.”

  Desdemona shifted her leather sack on her shoulder as she opened the door to
the classroom and entered. The size and setup of the room surprised her, with the seats and desks aligned in semicircles in descending levels before a large whiteboard. People passed her by with more confidence, claiming seats that weren’t already occupied.

  I can do this. I just traveled the world alone for a year. College won’t be the end of me.

  Taking a breath, she moved down the steps and eased past people seated at their desks to claim one in the middle of the row. She opened her messenger bag and removed a notebook, pen, her book, and the case holding her reading glasses as she crossed her ankles.

  There wasn’t much chatter in the large theater-like room as she looked around and smoothed her topknot. There were easily a hundred students in the class and less than a few who were older—or at least looked to be older.

  She picked up her pen and doodled on the lines of the blank page of her notebook. Remembering she had dinner plans with Melissa, she withdrew her one and only phone to text her.

  DESI: Dinner @ 8?

  When Desdemona got back from her last trip of the past year—a two-week cruise to the British Isles, Iceland, and Northern Europe—they had slipped right back into their friendship . . . and Desdemona had even admitted that her real name was Desdemona Dean. She explained her previous desire for anonymity in the big city and was glad when laid-back Melissa accepted the explanation. It had not been easy pulling back the façade but necessary. For her, there was no coming back from being addressed as Desdemona or Ms. Dean during her travels over the last year.

  No more Alisha Smith. That hoe finally dead.

  MELISSA: Perfect. Locanda Verde?

  The thought of the restaurant’s excellent Italian cuisine made her empty stomach grumble.

  DESI: Yesssss!

  She set the phone down.

  Bzzzzzz.

  Desdemona picked up the phone again.

  MELISSA: Not too late, though. Benji is staying over.

  She smiled at the eggplant emojis at the end of the text.

  DESI: Jealous. Days of celibacy: 455.

  Melissa texted her the praying hands emoji.

  The door on the left side of the room opened, and Desi sat up straighter as she looked down at the professor entering the room. She gasped.

  Loren.

  Her entire body went on high alert as she eyed him. More than a year later. Still handsome. More confident.

  Still deeply planted in her heart.

  Damn.

  Four hundred and fifty-four days since she’d seen him last, and nothing had changed. He was still in her heart, still imprinted on her soul, and still her life’s biggest regret.

  “Good morning, class,” Loren said, looking handsome in a lightweight linen suit with his hair pulled back and wire-framed spectacles in place. “I’ll be stepping in for Professor Warren this semester. He has a health matter that warrants his attention at this time but no fears or worries. You will leave this—my class—more proficient in English and even in storytelling.”

  Should I leave? Would he want me to? Do I want to?

  She stayed. Hunkered down. Took notes. Tried her best not to remember just why she had denied herself happiness with him. They had fallen in love.

  And I still love him. Easily. So very easily.

  And when the class was over and they were given their reading assignments before their next class two days later, Desdemona took her time gathering her things into her satchel until she was the last student in the class. “Great class, Dr. Palmer,” she said, rising from her seat and coming down the steps toward where he cleaned the whiteboard.

  He froze.

  She smiled as he looked over his shoulder and over the rim of his glasses at her walking up to his desk. He was just as surprised at her as she was at seeing him. He clutched the eraser tightly in his grip before setting it down and turning to face her.

  “Were you in this class this whole time?” he asked after clearing his throat and removing his glasses.

  She nodded.

  “Your name is not on the register,” he said, looking down at a paper on his desk.

  “It is. You just don’t know my real name,” she admitted before she extended her hand. “Desdemona Dean.”

  Loren took a step back in surprise. “Oh, so when you said there was so much I didn’t know, that was an understatement.”

  She gave him an encouraging smile as she eyed him and accepted that there was no exit when it came to her love for him. “I didn’t know you were teaching this class,” she said, stepping close to him.

  Loren looked down at her, and their eyes locked. That crazy kinetic energy was there. Pulsing. Vibrating. Taking them back to the familiar.

  “Desdemona?” he asked.

  She nodded as she reached up and stroked his chin. “My name sounds so good on your lips.”

  “And do you still think I am not man enough for you?” he asked.

  “Not anymore,” she admitted. “I have never stopped loving you, and this is fate saying stop denying this. Be happy.”

  “With me?”

  “I’d like to try. Flaws and all,” Desdemona said. “I can’t reveal everything to you. A lot of it has to stay in the past for us to make it, and you have to be okay with that.”

  Loren turned his head and kissed the palm she had pressed to his cheek. “My love for you will help make me okay with it,” he said. “I just know this last year has been some real bullshit without you, Desdemona.”

  “I love you,” she whispered up to him as he placed a hand to her back and pulled her close. “I am so tired of fighting this.”

  “Then don’t,” he said in that hotly anticipated moment before he pressed his mouth down on hers.

  They swayed back and forth a bit as they kissed.

  “Madam, may I love you?” Loren asked, teasing at that quip he had tried all those months ago that had gone horribly wrong.

  This time she stroked the soft curls on his nape as she gently nodded. “With all that you have.”

  Don’t miss Niobia Bryant’s sexy, unforgettable novel about love, infidelity, and the importance of keeping your friends close and your enemies closer...

  Message from a Mistress

  Available wherever books are sold

  Jessa’s Intro

  Where do I begin? How do I tell the story? Our story. His and mine.

  He was my lover and her husband. You would think that wasn’t possible—like saying dry rain or cold heat—but it was true. She had the ring and the license . . . but I had him. From that first heated moment in their kitchen when his strong hands reached beneath my skirt to grab my soft, bare ass, I knew I had him.

  I don’t recall the specific moment when our lust turned to love. When our time spent together became about more than just fucking, more than just rushing through electrifying sex that left us both panting, sweaty, and in various stages of undress. We shifted so easily from sharing clandestine and wonderfully sneaky moments—even in their house while she was there—to him sneaking out of their home to be in my arms and in my bed.

  I hated to lie alone at night surrounded by nothing but cool cotton sheets and plush down pillows while she had his hard and warm body to hold close.

  I knew the time would come when I would want more from him than just his dick. I wanted his love, his time, his all . . . for me and only me.

  She was my friend—true, but he was my lover, my love, and in this game there could only be one winner, as far as I was concerned.

  Me.

  Chapter 1

  Jaime Hall enjoyed the feel of the steam pressed against her shoulders and her legs where she sat in the glass shower of their bedroom suite. The thick swirling vapors felt like a lover’s gentle touch against her skin and those intimate parts of a woman’s body. Her breasts. Her nipples. Her thighs. Her lips—both sets.

  She relished it. She needed it.

  Sadness weighed her shoulders down and soon she felt tears fill her oval-shaped eyes and race down her cheeks. Jaime br
ought her shaking hands up to hug herself close. “God, I can’t take much more of my life,” she whispered into the steam as her head dropped so low that her chin nearly touched her chest.

  She heard a sudden noise in her bathroom. Her head jerked up as she immediately swallowed back any more of her tears and frantically wiped any traces of them from her face. The last thing she wanted was for him to see or hear her crying.

  “Eric,” Jaime called out to her husband of the last seven years.

  No answer. Nothing to acknowledge her. Seconds later the bathroom door opened and then closed. Disappointment nudged the door to her heart shut as well. The body’s automatic defense mechanisms were amazing.

  Jaime rose from the bench, turned off the shower, and walked out of the stall. The vapors swirled around her nude curvaceous frame like fog as she stepped down onto the plush white carpeting that felt like mink against her pedicured feet. As she wiped a clear spot in the grand oval mirror over the pedestal sink, she came face-to-face with her unhappiness. She forced a smile and put on her usual mask, but even she could see it didn’t reach her eyes.

  She grabbed a towel and wrapped it around her frame. She raced out of her bathroom suite through their spacious cathedral ceiling master bedroom and out to the hall. As she raced down the curved staircase, her towel slipped and fell behind her on the stairs, but she didn’t break stride.

  Thank God she was home alone, because she wouldn’t want anyone to see her stark naked and racing through the house like she was crazy.

  “Eric!” she called out, striding through the circular foyer to the kitchen.