“You said you’d Messenger or WhatsApp me when you got in. I gave you a day to get it together, but now you’re just inconsiderate.” Her friend’s accent was sweet as sugar, but when she was pissed, every word could burn like acid.
Adah muttered a curse. “Sorry! My mind’s been...” She didn’t even know what else to say about her state of mind.
“You don’t have to tell me how your brains are more scrambled than a platter of Waffle House hash browns, but what you do have to do is let me know you weren’t killed by some roving maniac on that damn island.”
Chastised, Adah sighed and subsided back into the sheets. “I’m sorry. I’m safe.”
“The first part I’m sure of, but what about the second? I heard your mama took off after you as soon as she found out you left town.” Adah opened her mouth to ask the obvious, but Selene just kept going. “Before you ask foolish questions, I’ll just go ahead and say I was not the one who told her where you went.”
Adah rolled back to the center of the bed and sat up, propping herself up on the overstuffed pillows. “It doesn’t really matter anyway. She’s here—”
“And making trouble?”
“And making things even harder than before. I already wasn’t sure about what I promised, but now she’s just pushing me more and more in that direction. And the more she pushes, the more I want to resist.” Suddenly Adah felt her throat close up, her eyes burning with tears.
“But there’s more, right?” Selene asked. She seemed to know Adah better than she knew herself some days. Their time going to the same schools and living in the same city all their lives only reinforced their bond and sometimes uncanny knowledge of each other.
“I met someone.”
“Are you fu—” Selene stopped. “You’ve been down there for less than two days. How are you gonna meet a man when you’re supposed to be working on your own damn issues?”
“I got lucky?” Adah made sure her tone conveyed the very opposite.
“Let me guess, your mama found out about your island stud and now she thinks you’re deliberately setting out to ruin the company and the family name at the same time.”
“She didn’t do it on purpose, but you know how focused she can be sometimes. It’s not malicious.”
“Damn, girl.”
“I know.”
At times Adah felt like a walking symbol of everything her parents had lost when her sister died. Someone smarter, more vibrant and willing to sacrifice herself for the good of the family. Zoe wouldn’t have hesitated when it came to marrying Bennett. She would’ve seen it as her duty and her privilege. But now the responsibility fell to Adah, who felt conflicted by the desire for a life she shouldn’t want. Her cowardice and lack of commitment to anything other than her wish not to be tied down made her feel weak.
True, she hadn’t taken a lover since committing to the marriage. Instead she’d focused her energies on building the boutique day care service that had become her passion. She’d cultivated her friendships, traveled to more than a dozen countries, enjoyed everything life had to offer that had nothing to do with sex. But all those years of self-denial were catching up with her. Lust for Kingsley had swept her out of her mind and right into his lap. She licked her lips, and although she tasted only sleep, she imagined a hint of him still rested on her tongue.
“Your mama can be scary,” Selene said, bringing her back from the memory of Kingsley in her mouth.
Adah laughed, a rough and unhappy sound. “She isn’t. Not really.”
She could practically hear the shrug on the other end of the line. Selene knew it was fear of disappointing Thandie rather than fear of anything she would do or say that had kept Adah in line for so long. She sighed.
“I just don’t know what to do.” Adah climbed out of bed, wiping a hand across her face. “I’m just stuck in this strange I-don’t-know phase. It’s like I’m in high school all over again.”
A rustling came through the phone line, Selene probably rummaging through her fancy closet for clothes to wear during her ridiculously early workout. “What do you want to do?”
“I want to run away,” Adah whined.
“You already tried that, and your mama and all your worries just followed you down there.”
Now Adah wanted to swear and throw things. “You’re right.” She stumbled to the bathroom to rinse the sleep from her mouth and peer at herself in the mirror. Hair in a bird’s nest, face puffy from sleep, a look of hopelessness pulling down the sides of her mouth.
“What should I do, Selene?”
“Honey, you already know what to do. You just don’t want to do it.”
Adah stuck her tongue out at her reflection in the mirror, pretending it was Selene. “You’re not being helpful.” She started brushing her teeth.
“Oh, please. I’m just not giving you an easy out.” Sounds of more productivity came from the other end of the line. Adah imagined the muffled thump was one of Selene’s expensive pots against her tiled countertop. “Speaking of what to do, I hope you don’t think Bennett has been as faithful to your premarriage as you’ve been.”
“I don’t expect him to be.” Adah said the words around her toothbrush and the white foam from the toothpaste building up in her mouth.
Although Bennett was one of the few reliable and much-loved men in Adah’s life, he and Selene didn’t have much to do with each other. They seemed to orbit Adah’s existence in two separate directions, connecting very rarely.
“You should,” Selene said about Bennett’s apparent infidelity. “He is your soon-to-be fiancé after all.” She made a disapproving noise, sounding just like Thandie in a way she wouldn’t have liked one bit if Adah pointed it out. “Although no one in town would believe it since he’s so very discreet, that man has been petting every peach between here and the Mason-Dixon Line.”
Adah laughed and almost choked on her toothbrush. “How do you even know that?”
“What? I didn’t understand a word you just said.”
Adah spat out her toothpaste and repeated her question.
“I have eyes, honey, and so does Blake.” Unlike Adah and Selene, their friend Blake was happily married and had a baby on the way. She wasn’t around these days as much as before she got married, but she was still an integral part of their trio. “She saw him at the High Museum with a girl who was hanging all over him. Later that night, she swore up and down that she saw them step into one of the closets for a quickie.”
Adah giggled. “Damn, is she stalking him now?” She wasn’t surprised by her lack of jealousy at hearing the news of Bennett’s very active sex life. Sometimes she wanted to care more about his hypothetical infidelities, but the stories her friends told her about his antics only made her laugh. Yes, she felt vaguely scandalized by those stories but she also wanted to hear more, impressed by the set of brass ones he must have to get away with half the things he did.
“Not stalking. She just cares about you, just like I do,” Selene said.
“I know...” Adah stuck the phone between her cheek and shoulder to smooth argon oil and leave-in conditioner in her hair.
Over the years Bennett had become more of a brother to her than a fiancé. Even a potential fiancé. They talked every now and then, both over the phone and in person during epic three-hour lunches, sometimes about their intended future together but most times not. He was easygoing and utterly confident as only the sole child and privileged son of relatively well-off Southern parents could be.
He loved women and sailing. After college, he’d borrowed a boat from one of his Exeter classmates and sailed around the world on his own, stopping wherever he felt like and staying however long he desired just because he wanted the solitude and the challenge. Sometimes Adah felt jealous of him being able and willing to do anything he wanted without worrying about his parents�
�� disappointment or disapproval. Maybe he would understand what she was going through.
“So are you going to talk to him?” Selene reached into Adah’s mind and plucked the thought right out of it.
“I think I need to.”
“And what are you going to say?”
“Why are you asking me questions I don’t know the answers to?” She turned and left the bathroom.
Selene laughed at her. “Girl...”
“I know.”
After Adah hung up, she felt a lot better. She took her morning shower and went out to the balcony to make the inevitable phone call. Cell phone in hand, she sat on one of the two reclining chairs and looked down on the sand and the stretch of blue water shimmering like diamonds under the sun.
She was second-guessing her decision to call Bennett when the phone rang.
“I hear you’re already getting yourself in trouble down there in Aruba.” Bennett’s voice rumbled through the phone.
She drew in a breath of surprise, and happiness.
Unlike the quiet domesticity of Selene’s surroundings, she could hear the chaos of a bar wherever Bennett was. Thudding dance music and the sound of laughter, high and manic, that came at the height of a night’s debauch. She looked at the phone in amazement.
“Isn’t it eight o’clock in the morning?” she asked.
“It’s five o’clock somewhere,” he said with laughter in his deep voice. “Besides, I’m not in Atlanta. And don’t try to change the subject. What’s up with you?”
The music faded away even more. Adah heard the bang of a door closing, then the quiet murmur of voices. She blew out a breath of air. “What do you know?”
“Selene called me. She said you might need to talk.”
Adah frowned. She didn’t think Selene and Bennett knew each other well enough to have each other’s phone numbers. Thinking back to the conversation she’d had earlier with her best friend, she tried to think of anything Selene had said that would hint at some sort of friendship with Bennett.
Through the phone, he made a tut-tut sound. “Don’t get distracted yourself either. I called you on a mission.”
Adah choked on a laugh. Sometimes she thought he knew her better than he ought to. Unpredictable but unfailingly kind and generous, Bennett was the kind of man most women dreamed of. She wished she could jump in and commit to him like their parents wanted. There were worse men out there.
But she didn’t think those reasons were enough for her to marry him.
“Tell me,” he prodded when she was quiet too long.
Adah took a breath. “I’m not sure this marriage thing is for us.”
“It worked out fine for our parents,” he said. “Don’t be so cynical.” There was humor in his soft drawl, a warm invitation to tell him everything on her mind.
“What if this is a mistake?” She heard the quiver in her voice, but it was too late to take back the whining uncertainty of her declaration.
“This is only a mistake if you allow it to be. Do you want something else?”
Adah shook her head although an image of Kingsley immediately came into her mind. “I want to be sure.”
Bennett didn’t hesitate. “Then take your time to be sure. Our parents can wait. This is our lives, not theirs.”
Adah swallowed. It would have been much easier to break off the agreement if she didn’t like Bennett so much and if he wasn’t such a damn nice guy. A good man who would make a great husband someday. For someone else. The words crept into her consciousness and wouldn’t be silenced.
She dropped her head back and pressed the heel of a hand over her closed eye.
“It’s not that simple,” she said.
“As usual, you’re overthinking, but far be it from me to deprive you of one of your favorite pastimes.” His laugh was soft and warm though it was just a breath from being mocking.
“Just relax on your island, Adah. Go swimming. Make love with a handsome stranger—” she nearly choked “—and when you’re completely liquid and sitting in the seat of who you are, your mind and heart will know what to do. Stop making a bigger deal of it than it is.”
She didn’t have to make a big deal out of this. This was already a huge issue, even if he was blasé enough to ignore the ramifications of what she was contemplating. But Adah took a cue from him, drew a breath deep into her lungs and slowly released it.
“Okay.”
He laughed then. She pictured him standing on top of one of his beloved rooftop bars or clubs in some country she’d never been to, the nighttime city spread out below him, aglow with light.
“That’s all you have to say?” he asked. “Just okay?”
“What else is there? You don’t have my parents—at least not yet—so you don’t know how trying to get away from their expectations is like struggling to crawl out from under an avalanche. It’s nearly impossible.”
“I believe in you, baby girl.”
She shook her head finally, unable to deal with his blind optimism. “I’ll talk with you later, Bennett.”
“All right. Let me know how it works out.”
“You’ll be one of the first to know,” she said with a twist of her lips.
“Oh yeah. Right.” He laughed again, careless and carefree, as if whether or not to choose to go ahead with their marriage wouldn’t affect him in the least. “Take it easy, baby girl. We’ll talk soon.”
Adah wandered back into the room, thinking about what Bennett and Selene had told her. And she thought about Kingsley’s face the last time she’d seen him, the flinch in his eyes when her mother told him she was engaged. The beginnings of a headache throbbed above her left eye.
After a shower and properly seeing to her hair, Adah left the hotel, deliberately being quiet so as not to disturb her mother. Although she wouldn’t have called it “sneaking out.” Not really.
She had a decision to make, but before then she urgently had an apology to give.
* * *
Although at the best of times Adah was absentminded, she actually had an excellent sense of direction. The ride from the party had been distracting, to say the least, with Kingsley a temptation to her senses and her apparently loose sense of morality. But between taking peeks at his body unselfconsciously bared by the open buttons of his shirt, she’d also looked at the landmarks they’d passed, taking note of everything around her. She called a taxi to take her to the entrance of the modest community in the hills where she was 90 percent certain Kingsley lived.
It didn’t take her long to find his house, a single-story building with a narrow facade and, as confirmation that she was in the right place, a solitary older-model truck in its front yard. It was early, barely nine o’clock, but she assumed he would be home.
Her feet crunched in the gravel as she approached the house, nibbling on her lip and trying to think of the best way to tell him she was sorry for...everything. Well, maybe not exactly everything. She was about to knock on the door when the sound of a warning yip yanked her gaze to the road just in front of the house. It was the two dogs from the evening before. This time they had two more dogs with them, both bigger. Their tongues hung out in the morning heat as they eyed her with uncertain intent.
Adah shrank back on the veranda, looking around. There was no one else on the street, just her and the dogs, who seemed resolved to walk into Kingsley’s front yard. Her heart started a panicked beat in her chest. She gripped the railing and backed away from the dogs.
Damn!
They came closer, sniffing vaguely at one another, then at the air in front of their noses while watching Adah, like they were making a game of it and stalking her. Adah didn’t think. She jumped over the railing of the veranda and took off toward the nearest escape from the dogs. The gate leading to the backyard. She grabbed the handle and
rattled it, cursing when it refused to open, practically feeling the dogs’ hot breath on her heels. Panting in fear, she gripped the top of the fence and levered herself over, yelping when one of her sandals fell off.
She landed on the other side of the fence with a gasp. Her knees jerked from the landing, and gravel dug into the bottom of her naked foot. But she was safe. She leaned back against the fence with her eyes closed and her palms flat against the warm board of the fence.
“This is unexpected.”
Her eyes flew open at the sound of Kingsley’s voice.
She almost squeezed them shut again. Kingsley was lying by the side of his pool, his gorgeous skin spread out and glistening under the sun, absolutely naked. Adah swallowed hard and pressed her fingernails into the wooden fence at her back.
“I promise you I didn’t do this on purpose.” She tried to look everywhere but at his body, but her eyes drifted down from his face with each passing moment she looked in his direction. Finally Adah settled for staring at the empty space just to the left of his jaw.
“The dogs, right?”
He sounded amused, and although she wasn’t looking—she really wasn’t—she saw him sit up from the chair and put aside a stack of official-looking papers. “They can be a little scary,” he said.
She thought he was going to grab a towel to cover himself, but he only braced his elbows on widespread knees to give her his undivided attention. Adah licked her suddenly dry lips. Since it would be idiotic to tell the man to put on clothes when he was clearly relaxing in his own backyard, where she was trespassing, she settled for standing up straight against the fence and tried to look more at ease, straightening her knees and taking subtle deep breaths, trying not to ogle him. He was making it very, very hard.
Adah cleared her throat. “I came to apologize about last night.”
For a moment he said nothing, made no motion. Then he stood and walked toward the pool. She took a breath of relief when he sank beneath the surface of the water, inch by inch, his legs, feet, calves, the narrow hips and... Adah yanked her eyes up to his face but got distracted by the muscled planes of his chest and the faint marks from her fingernails she saw there. She felt him smile before she saw the curving amusement of his mouth.
The Pleasure of His Company Page 7
