Red Hot

by Niobia Bryant

  “Just let me know how much you need to throw her a really nice party,” he said as the light cast shadows against his chest.

  “Sure,” she told him, and then hurried to leave the shed and close the door behind her.

  She allowed herself a moment to lean back against the door. When she stopped Quint, she had foolishly thought they could spend a little time together and get to know each other first. But he just admitted that sex was all it would have been for him.

  She felt even better for not letting things go too far, but it was never an easy pill to swallow when any man saw you as the jump-off/one-night/no-strings-attached chick. That wasn’t Kaitlyn at all.

  Not even a week of spending time in romantic Paris had made her give up the panties. There was no way she was handing over her goodies that easily to any man.

  Not even Quint Wells—the man with the body that seemed to be chiseled in stone.

  Was his dick just as hard as the rest of his body?

  Kaitlyn allowed herself a deep shiver at that thought as she finally made her way over, to climb the rear staircase.

  Quint’s dick was hard.

  He was a man of honor and would never press himself on any woman, but he couldn’t lie and say he wasn’t disappointed as hell when Kaitlyn put the brakes on. Suddenly pulling away all of her goodies had made his heart pound just as heavily as the excitement of knowing she tasted and felt just as good as he knew she would.

  Soft breasts. Tasty, dark chocolate nipples and large areolas.

  The memory of them kept him hard, and Quint busied himself cleaning his tools. However, as he stroked the long tool inside the towel, he couldn’t help but take the seemingly innocent move and replace it with his tool stroking deeply inside Kaitlyn, with her legs wrapped around his waist.

  Quint’s dick strained against his boxers, and he tossed the tool and cloth across the worktable.

  Her sexy brassiere. Her even sexier open and uninhibited reactions. The moans. The cries.

  “Oh, my God. Yes!”

  Quint placed his hands on his waist and looked down at his erection. His dog was definitely on the hunt for a cat. Kaitlyn’s cat.

  Would he have sexed her right here in his shed and put in work too? Yes. But he would have regretted it if she regretted it later, because she was looking for more than sex.

  And that’s all Quint had to offer her.

  In hindsight he couldn’t let his desire for her cloud his judgment.

  Their chemistry could get addictive. And now that he knew that he had been wrong to assume she was the rich party girl down for one-night fun—he really couldn’t go there. Kaitlyn Strong was off-limits.

  Quint grabbed his cell phone and shot a quick text off to Joni: U Busy?

  Bzzzzzz . . .

  He opened the incoming text from her: NO. U COMING THRU?

  And it was simple and easy with her. They hadn’t hooked up in weeks and barely called or texted each other in the interim. Joni knew the rules and played by them. Hell, she helped set them.

  Quint left his shed and locked it. The fall winds whipped around his bare chest. He glanced up at Kaitlyn’s kitchen window. The light was out. What’s she doing? he wondered before continuing around the front of the building to enter his apartment.

  Lei was lying on the couch, reading a book. She looked up and then did a double take at his bare chest.

  Quint shook his head. “Don’t ask,” he told her over his shoulder, on the way to his bedroom to grab another shirt.

  Coming back into the living room, he pulled the shirt on over his head. “Lei, ask Mrs. Harper if you could sit with her for a couple of hours.”

  “She can stay with me.”

  Kaitlyn?

  Quint finished jerking his shirt over his head and found Kaitlyn sitting next to Lei on his sofa. His heartbeat picked up the pace double time.

  “I was just telling Lei about her birthday pajama party,” Kaitlyn said, avoiding his eyes. “I thought you were still out back.”

  Lei bounced off the chair and came rushing at Quint to throw her arms around his waist. “Thank you, Daddy,” she said sweetly.

  And that made his heart tug. He loved his daughter, and he had to admit he appreciated Kaitlyn stepping in to make her feel better about her mother not coming.

  “Thank you,” he mouthed over Lei’s head.

  Kaitlyn smiled weakly and rose to her feet. “So, anyway, we can go upstairs and plan while your dad . . . makes a run,” she said, with an arch of her brow, before she continued to the door. “Just come up when you’re ready, Lei.”

  “I’m coming now. Bye, Daddy,” she said.

  Quint followed them out the door and made his way to his Ford truck. Behind the wheel he looked up to see Kaitlyn glancing over her shoulder at him before she entered her apartment behind his daughter.

  Starting the car, he headed out of the parking lot and drove the short distance to Joni’s. He pulled into the driveway in front of the small brick home she rented from the Jamison twins, two of the most successful privately owned home-building contractors in the state. In the last few years, the brothers had gotten into acquiring homes, repairing them, and then renting them out or flipping them for profit.

  Before he could climb out of his vehicle, the door of the house opened and Joni filled the doorway in nothing but a short tee and boy shorts. She smiled at him as he came up the walkway and the small front steps.

  “Hey, stranger,” she said, wrapping her arms around his neck to press her mouth against his—and her thick curvy body too.

  Quint had to admit that Joni had one of the best bodies ever. She worked out five days a week; and not only was she thick, but she was solid and well toned—and she knew it. She was soft where she needed to be soft, and firm where she needed to be firm.

  “I was just thinking about you,” Joni whispered against the corner of his mouth as he closed the door behind them.

  “You was?” Quint asked as he gripped her hips and pulled her closer to him as she suckled his neck . . . in the same spot Kaitlyn had just hotly licked him less than thirty minutes ago.

  “I can’t do this,” he said, raising his hand to undo her arms from around his neck as he stepped back from her.

  He couldn’t get riled up by Kaitlyn and then come use Joni’s body to get it off. Even though he knew Joni wouldn’t care, that wasn’t the kind of man he wanted to be. Especially with Kaitlyn now babysitting his daughter.

  For him that felt like a low-life move. Something for an immature man or a man in his early twenties. Not him. Not a grown-ass man more than happy to be over thirty, and full grown physically and mentally.

  “Something . . . wrong?” she asked, with a swift glance down at his zipper.

  “No. Noooooooo. Nah, I’m straight,” Quint said. “I just changed my mind.”

  Joni shrugged and dropped down on her sofa to pick up her TV remote. “No problem,” she said nonchalantly.

  Quint eyed her. He was used to Joni being real-laid back in their dealings, but this complete uncaring was odd at best. Like psychopath odd. Or she-had-another-dude-lined-up-to-replace-you odd.

  Giving her one last glance over his shoulder, he left her house and made his way back to his vehicle. As he started his truck and reversed out of her yard, he felt completely unsettled.

  He was on the edge of being in trouble.

  As Joni had pressed her body to his, kissed his mouth and then his neck, all he could think was he had never felt as much electric chemistry with any woman like he had with Kaitlyn. He had compared Joni and Kaitlyn—one woman he bedded quite often in the past to one woman he had never slept with—and Joni had lost. He had turned down good sex because his thoughts were on the woman who had turned him down and frustrated him at every turn.

  All of that spelled nothing but trouble for him, and trouble was Kaitlyn Strong.

  Kaitlyn tossed and turned in her bed. She kicked the sheets off her body for a few moments and then reached out in the darkne
ss to pull them back up over her. She sat up in bed to snatch off the silk scarf holding the short curls in place. Then she thought about not having the money in her budget for the month to hit the hairdresser’s, so she climbed out of bed to find the scarf on the floor and retie her head.

  She was completely frustrated and out of sorts.

  A man like Quinton Wells was nothing at all like what she usually favored. He was brash and outspoken and brutally honest. He was rough around the edges. He cared nothing about designer clothing and the latest fashion for men. She couldn’t see him strolling through Paris or jetting off to some foreign land.

  Quint reminded her of her brothers. Hardworking, simple men who could be found in their boots and jeans putting in sixty hours a week or better to take care of their family—except Kaeden, who favored suits and indoor activities, but he still lived an uncomplicated life with Jade.

  She had nothing against her brothers, and she loved them all, but she had always seen their lives as boring and ordinary. She had always thought she was the adventurer. The dream seeker. The one to see the world and live in it. She always had more in her life than Holtsville, South Carolina.

  And so although she loved her brothers, she could never imagine dating a man like them . . . a man like Quinton Wells.

  But she could also admit that of the few boyfriends she had over the years—the ones blessed enough to make love to her—she had never experienced the kind of wild abandon that Quint had created in her. He made her tingle from her toes to the small and fine hairs on the back of her neck.

  Quint made her feel like there was a door inside of her that had never been opened. And behind that door was true passion. A wildness. A lack of inhibition.

  “Them rich boys don’t know how to handle all that.You too much woman for them. But me? I’ll tear that ass up, and you know it, and you want it. Don’t you?”

  Kaitlyn rolled over in bed and pounded her pillow.

  The truth did hurt.

  She wasn’t a virgin to sex, but she was a virgin to passion.

  The feel of Quint’s tongue on her nipples had damn near brought her to an explosion, and she could recall some full-blown sex acts that hadn’t elicited near a response from her.

  But Kaitlyn didn’t do casual sex, and she wasn’t quite sure she was sold on even wanting to date Quint.

  Rock. Hard place.

  And she hated—absolutely hated—that it bugged her all night that he headed out. It was quite clear that it was none of her business, but had he gone to another woman to finish what they had begun, but she had ended?

  She flipped over in bed again before kicking off the covers and making her way to the kitchen to pour herself a glass of wine. She left the kitchen and made her way out the front door, being sure the door was unlocked, before she stood out on the balcony. In her old apartment she would have been able to faintly hear the lake’s movement. She missed the peace it used to give her.

  Her current view couldn’t compete.

  Kaitlyn sighed.

  Moments later she heard: “You can’t sleep either, huh?”

  She looked down to see Quinton now standing on the sidewalk, looking up at her.

  First she felt a thrill of excitement at the very sight of him in his beater tee and pajama bottoms.

  And then she thought of him making love to another woman less than an hour after sucking her titties and she had to fight the urge to pour her wine down on his face.

  Finally she just shook her head and took a sip of wine.

  Quinton looked down at his feet and then back up at her. “Wanna talk?” he asked.

  It tugged at her heart that he sounded so unsure, when he was usually so confident.

  “What’s to talk about?” she asked, even as that familiar excitement he caused coursed over her body.

  He started to say something, but then he closed his mouth before he turned and headed up the stairs. “Stay there!” he called up to her.

  Kaitlyn just sipped her wine and hoped the effects kicked in so that she could finally sleep. Deep sleep. Colored-dreams sleep. Don’t-hear-the-alarm-go-off sleep.

  Quint came to stand by her at the rail. “I apologize for earlier and the other night,” he began.

  Kaitlyn looked down in the center of her wine goblet and swirled it, as if she were a professional wine taster. “Well, the previous time I taunted you and we were playing one-up on each other—so no apologies, and then this time I will accept your apology for assuming I’m a one-nighter,” she said, cutting her eyes over at him. “That is what you thought, right?”

  Quinton reached up and brushed her bangs off her face.

  Kaitlyn trembled.

  “I did assume that,” he admitted, dropping his hand. “But I’m man enough to admit when I’m wrong.”

  “So no worries,” she said.

  Quint was silent.

  So was Kaitlyn.

  “With the way Lei’s mom dropped out of her life . . . I’m not interested in getting into a relationship with anyone,” he said suddenly.

  Kaitlyn nodded and took another sip of her wine. “Just ‘wham bam, thank you, ma’am,’ huh?” she asked into her glass.

  Quint smiled. “Not all rude and whorish like that, but yeah. Kinda,” he admitted.

  Kaitlyn glanced over at him. “And as much as I can admit you turn me on—”

  “Oh yeah?” he asked, looking at her.

  Kaitlyn made the motion to flip her hair over her shoulder, but then she remembered she cut her hair over a year ago. “You know that already. Just like I know—Just. Like. I. Know—that I do it for you, Quinton,” she said with the utmost confidence.

  “Oh yeah?” he asked again.

  Kaitlyn turned to face him as she braced her hip against the railing. “Oh no?” she countered.

  Quinton bit his lip to keep from smiling as she continued to eye him like she dared him to deny it.

  “I want you,” he admitted.

  Kaitlyn toasted his honesty before she took another sip. “But you and I would never work, because I respect you putting Lei first, and I hope you respect that I don’t do casual sex. Soooo . . .”

  “Here we are,” Quinton said, his eyes enjoying the feast of her beautiful face lit by the moon.

  She really is pretty, he thought.

  “‘Here we are the two of us together,’” she sang off-key.

  Quint laughed. “What you know about Atlantic Starr?” he asked.

  “‘Secret Lovers’ is classic,” she told him.

  “True, true,” Quint agreed.

  They fell silent again.

  Kaitlyn took another sip of her wine as she cast him a look. “I know you have friends, right? I mean, there’s not too many grown men that are celibate.”

  “I have friends,” Quint admitted. “Willing friends.”

  Kaitlyn nodded. “And was one of those willing friends extra willing tonight, Mr. Wells?” she asked before tilting her head back to finish the last of her wine.

  Quint looked up at the moon and then back over at her. “I didn’t make love to another woman tonight, Kaitlyn,” he said softly but firmly.

  She believed him. “You and I would be so good,” she added as she turned to sashay back into her apartment.

  “Damn good,” he called behind her just before she closed the door.

  CHAPTER 10

  Kaitlyn fell back against her door as soon as she closed it. She closed her eyes and tilted her head back as she waited for normalcy. Everything felt like it was on overload.

  “I want you.”

  She smiled softly as his words seemed to float over her body like the caress of his hands. Quinton Wells made her completely breathless. Completely.

  His beauty was evident.

  His physique was flawless.

  His touch was electric.

  His smile was charismatic.

  The man had her all the way gone.

  And the fact they both admitted it—but accepted that it couldn’t be�
��made her want him all the more. The temptation of it was addictive.

  She pursed her lips and pressed her hand to her neck to feel her pulse rapidly racing against her fingertips.

  It would have been so easy to turn and tell him to come inside her apartment and then inside her.

  So very easy.

  So very, very easy . . .

  Kaitlyn turns and opens the door, surprised to see Quint still standing there outside her door, leaning against the railing, as he looks up at the stars and the moon.

  “Quint,” she calls out softly, enjoying the feel of the night breeze as it drags itself across her naked body.

  He turns. At the sight of her nudity, he stands up straight as his eyes miss not one detail of her body: the soft roundness of her shoulders and the dips of her collarbone; her small breasts plump and full; her hips and strong legs; the perfect pear-shaped beauty, with a body meant to be caressed, tasted, and stroked by a man.

  But not just by any man. Him. Only him.

  Kaitlyn blinks and in a moment he is as naked as she is, and standing before her. She raises her hands above her head with the hint of a smile and thrusts her breasts forward.

  “Suck them,” she directs him.

  And he does.

  Bending to glide his hands up her body to cup her breasts, he guides his mouth to one and teases the other with his fingertips as he backs her into the apartment. Wildly he licks away. The tip of his tongue flickers with speed and agility.

  Kaitlyn feels like she is high. Floating. On a trip.

  “Yes. Yes. Quint . . .” She moans as he kisses a trail to her breasts; she lets the passionate onslaught begin again, until her clit begins to throb and literally aches for release.

  But not yet. Half the fun of a mind-blowing climax is the ride to get there. They are only just beginning.

  She gasps as he pushes her body against the wall and bends his knees slowly as he moves his kisses to just below her breasts . . . and then her stomach . . . her navel . . . both hips . . . the plump and juicy shaved mound of her pussy . . . her thighs . . . the back of her knees. And all the while his hand stays locked on her breasts. Kneading. Teasing. Gently massaging.