Opening the drapes, she discovered she couldn’t see through the thick fog obscuring the harbor. It was one of those days she always referred to as “pea soup weather.” The time on her cell phone read 8:17 a.m. She checked her home phone for messages. Stefani still hadn’t called her. It had become apparent that her cousin had changed her mind about leaving the salon.
“I need water,” she murmured under her breath. Not only did she need water but lots of it to offset the effects of the wine she’d drunk and also the slight puffiness under her eyes. If she was going to be photographed the following day, she didn’t want the makeup artist to apply layers of foundation and concealer to correct the imperfections. Adequate sleep and remaining hydrated were the cure to a model’s overall physical well-being. Opening the mini bar, she took out a bottle of water. She finished the bottle, temporarily assuaging her thirst. Not bothering to put on shoes, Seneca went in search of Phillip.
She found him in the living room, lounging on a chaise in a T-shirt and shorts, bare feet crossed at the ankles, reading the newspaper. “Good morning.”
Phillip’s head popped up when he heard the dulcet voice. Sitting up straight, he swung his legs over the chaise with Seneca’s approach, coming to his feet. “Good morning, beautiful. How do you feel?” He extended his arms, and he wasn’t disappointed when Seneca came into his embrace. He sat down again, bringing her down with him.
“Okay.”
“Why just okay? Didn’t you sleep well? Talk to me, baby.”
Straddling his lap, Seneca pressed her cheek to the column of his thick neck. He smelled of soap and clean laundry as she melted into his protective strength. “I have no tolerance for alcohol.”
“Do you have a hangover?”
“No.”
Phillip buried his face in her damp hair. “Perhaps you should limit yourself to one glass.”
Easing back, she stared up at him through her lashes. “Perhaps I should swear off wine completely.”
He smiled. “You’ll be all right as long as you hang out with me. I’ll always be the designated driver, and if or when you fall asleep on me, I’ll put you to bed.”
She returned his smile. “I’m surprised I didn’t wake up in your bed.”
“You sleeping in my bed would’ve really been too much of a temptation, and I probably would’ve broken my promise not to make love to you until you say yes. After all, you did say you wanted me to date you. But now that I think about it, having dinner here was a date,” he said, as if it were an afterthought.
Seneca smiled. Their walking from Battery Park to Herald Square while stopping en route to have lunch was a date. Sharing dinner in his suite last night was again a date. “Is that what you’re waiting for?” Her voice had lowered seductively. “Are you waiting for me to say yes?”
Phillip slid his hands under her shirt and covered her breasts, discovering that Seneca’s slimness was deceiving. She had curves where a real woman should have curves. “The answer to both questions is a resounding yes.”
Seneca inhaled sharply, then bit down on her lip when she felt the growing hardness under her hips. The seconds ticked as they stared at each other. She wanted him to make love to her.
“What do you want?” he asked, reading her mind.
“I want you to make love to me.”
The instant the revelation rolled off her tongue Seneca felt as a weight had been lifted. She’d spent two years denying her femininity, but a single glance from Phillip Kingston had left her breathless and the area between her legs moist and pulsing.
“Are you certain that’s what you want, Seneca?” Phillip chided himself when he’d asked the question. He’d spent a week fantasizing about making love to her. She nodded. “You know what this means?”
Her mouth formed a sexy moue. “What does it mean?”
Cradling her face in his hands, he kissed her soft mouth. “This is about us, not a publicity stunt. It doesn’t matter why you want me to make love to you, but let me warn you that I’m not into playing head games.”
Seneca felt the strong, steady beating of his heart against her breasts and she wondered if he could feel the runaway rhythm of hers. “Why do you want to make love to me?”
“Isn’t it obvious, baby? I like you.”
What he didn’t say was that Seneca Houston fit perfectly into his future plans. She was attractive, intelligent, articulate and, more important, she wasn’t needy. He’d found her to be as self-centered as he was. Their careers were first and a relationship secondary.
The truth was, long before he’d met Seneca he’d tired of dating different women, whether it was by mutual consent or if it was a prearranged publicity stunt. Some of them he’d slept with and some he hadn’t.
He was only twenty-six yet felt years older. Playing professional ball was physical enough, but Booth Gordon’s carefully orchestrated plan to turn him into a sex symbol had become emotionally challenging. Each and every time he slept with a woman he’d run the risk of scandal, which could jeopardize his lucrative contracts—on and off the court. It was a risk he wanted to do away with. His having a relationship with Seneca “Butterfly” Houston would serve as a feeding frenzy for the paparazzi and fodder for the tabloids while turning them into international celebrities.
Seneca’s smile was as tender as a kiss. “I like you, too,” she whispered, curving her arms under his shoulders.
She liked him because she knew she could trust him. He’d admitted he wasn’t one to kiss and tell, and that he couldn’t afford to do anything that would put his basketball career, his endorsements and his future plans to become a physician at risk. Whether Phillip realized it or not, she was the one who could make him sorry he’d ever come on to her if he ever did or said anything to jeopardize her career.
“I’m not using protection,” she said when he swung her up in his arms and headed in the direction of his bedroom. Seneca couldn’t afford an unplanned pregnancy, and being faced with the decision of terminating a pregnancy was not an option. Her rationale was if she was woman enough to lie with a man, then she was woman enough to deal with the consequences.
“Don’t worry about it, baby. I have condoms.” She didn’t want a baby and he couldn’t afford to father a child—not at this time in his life.
Phillip placed her on his unmade bed; she closed her eyes for several seconds, but when she’d opened them she saw that he’d drawn the drapes. Everything seemed to move in slow motion. He sat down on the side of the bed, opening the drawer in the bedside table. With wide eyes, Seneca stared at the small square packet on the pillow next to her head. Her gaze shifted to the muscles rippling in Phillip’s back as he leaned over to remove his shirt and shorts. He turned and loomed over her. A small gasp escaped her when his penis, swaying heavily between his legs, brushed across her belly.
Phillip followed the direction of her gaze. “It’s okay, baby. I’ll try not to hurt you.” He knew he had to make certain Seneca was fully aroused before he penetrated her. “If I do something you don’t like, please let me know.”
Seneca nodded. If she hadn’t been attracted to Phillip, or sexually deprived, she never would’ve asked him to make love to her. Masturbating while viewing a porn flick had become her guilty pleasure. Heat, then chills, swept over her body, bringing with them a rush of wetness in her vagina as she struggled not to move her hips. She was literally gawking at Phillip’s dick as he opened the packet and rolled the latex down his erection.
Inhaling through her nose and breathing out through her mouth, she slowed her breathing until she was back in control. His fingers grazed the hem of her shirt, and he eased it up and over her chest. Her lounging pants and panties quickly followed, as if he’d performed the task countless times.
Supporting his weight on his elbows, Phillip rained feathery kisses down the column of Seneca’s neck, lingering at the rapidly beating pulse in her throat. He caught her hands, threading their fingers together when she reached out to touch him. Her touch was
like pouring gasoline on a fire. It would excite him to the point where he wouldn’t be able to control himself, and he would take her without a pretense of foreplay.
His mouth covered her breasts, tongue and teeth, making the nipples hard as tiny pebbles. Sliding down the length of her smooth, silken body, Phillip inhaled the musky scent wafting from the apex of her thighs. Tentatively, he flicked his tongue over her mound, the tip tracing the small patch of soft hair, ignoring the gasp from Seneca. He didn’t know whether a man had gone down on her; if not, then he wanted to be her first.
“Are you okay with this?” Phillip asked.
His query penetrated the sensual fog pulling Seneca into an abyss she hadn’t known existed. Phillip’s lovemaking was so different from what she’d had with her first lover. Vincent had always kissed her hard, then squeezed her breasts a few times before pushing inside like a battering ram. He pumped like a jackrabbit, came and then collapsed on her, all the while whispering how good she was. It took a while, but she finally told him that he had to slow down so she, too, could climax. He’d stomped off angry, telling her no girl had ever complained about his “fuckin’,” to which she replied that he should go back to those girls.
He’d returned a few days later, apologizing profusely and asking Seneca to give him another chance. She did give him another chance, and Vincent must have heeded her advice, because she’d had her first orgasm. It had also been the last time they’d slept together. The next day Vincent spread the rumor that her best friend gave him better oral sex than she did, and that she’d gone down on a group of guys.
“Yes-s-s,” she stuttered.
It was the last intelligible word she’d uttered when moist heat seared the area between her legs and turned her into a trembling mass of helplessness. The tip of Phillip’s tongue swept over her clitoris in a slow back-and-forth motion, causing her hips to rise off the mattress. The tiny flutters increased in intensity as moisture bathed her labia. Then it happened—the first orgasm seized Seneca, holding her captive as she arched her back, gasping.
Holding his penis while moving up Seneca’s bucking body, Phillip eased his erection into her vagina at the same time as another orgasm gripped her. She was tight, but because she was so wet it aided his attempt to push inside her.
Fastening his mouth to the side of her neck, he opened his mouth to brand her, then remembered she had a photo shoot the next day. It wouldn’t do for her to show up with love bites on her body. He nuzzled her instead as he counted the number of seconds to penetrate her—inch by each deliciously slow inch. It took nine seconds, and when he was fully sheathed inside her hot, wet body, it was his turn to moan. They were a perfect fit.
Damn, she felt good, better than he’d fantasized. She’d breathed out the last of her climax when he began moving. Her eyes opened, and she smiled the smile of a completely satiated woman.
Bracing himself on his hands as if he were doing push-ups, Phillip stared at his dick moving in and out of her pussy, the sight making him harder, longer. He leaned forward, the motion causing friction against her swollen clit. His head came up, his gaze meeting the stunned stare of the woman beneath him. Her hips had begun to move again, rising to meet his strong thrusts. A knowing smile softened his mouth. He was going to make her come again. And she did. This time the contractions were stronger, Seneca bucking like a wild mare, the walls of her vagina squeezing him like a too-tight rubber band.
Phillip saw her eyes glaze over. He lowered his arms, supporting his greater weight on his elbows as he ejaculated into the condom. “Oh fuck! Oh fuck!” he chanted like a litany. “Oh shit!” he finally groaned out, then collapsed heavily on her slight body.
They lay motionless, only the sound of heavy breathing indicating they were still alive.
Seneca recovered first. Phillip was crushing her. “Baby, please get up.”
It took Herculean strength for him to roll off her body. He lay on his back, staring up at the ceiling and waiting for his respiration to return to normal. Reaching for her hand, he laced their fingers together. When he’d asked his father why he’d married his mother and not some other woman, Richard Kingston’s response had been, “When you meet the right woman something deep inside of you will let you know she’s the one.”
Phillip let out an audible sigh. His father was right. He’d met the right woman—the one lying beside him. He felt the blood pooling in his groin again, but instead of discarding the condom and putting on a new one, he left the bed to wash off the semen.
When he returned to the bed, he found Seneca lying on her side, asleep. Smiling, he got into bed. It took a while before he was able to relax enough to sleep, but when he did his mind was filled with images of Seneca as his wife and the mother of their children.
Seneca slipped out of bed, moving slowly not only because she didn’t want to wake Phillip but also because muscles she’d forgotten she had slowed motion. She hadn’t gotten into a routine of working out, because first, she couldn’t afford the membership fees at Manhattan sports clubs and second, she didn’t like to exercise. The closest she got to exercising was walking. Everyone who lived or worked in Manhattan walked. However, her walking regime was relegated to running shoes, not high-heeled sandals.
The ache between her legs wasn’t as uncomfortable as it was a reminder of how long it’d been since she’d shared her body with a man. A sensual smile softened her eyes when she remembered making love with Phillip. He was more than she’d expected, making certain she climaxed before he came. Her smile faded when she recalled the explosion of profanity he’d spewed when ejaculating. For a brief moment she’d been so frightened by the intensity and ferocity that she’d feared for her well-being. Her limited experience with the opposite sex hadn’t prepared her for Phillip’s reaction, but it was something to bear watching.
When she’d shared the apartment with three other girls, Seneca had been drawn into their conversations about the men they’d slept with. Although she’d had only one prior romantic affair, she’d found herself engrossed in the discussions. And only one of the four hadn’t had a kiss-and-tell experience, while one had admitted to breaking up with a guy who’d cursed and called her bitch during sex. His outbursts had escalated, reaching a point where she’d feared for her life after he was diagnosed with schizophrenia.
Walking into her en suite bathroom, Seneca brushed her teeth, stepped into the shower stall, turned on the water, adjusting the temperature, and then moved under the shower-head. She let the water beat down on her head and face for a full minute before picking up the bath sponge and gel and lathering her body from neck to toes. A gasp escaped her when the door opened and Phillip stepped in and closed the door behind him. Not only did she find breathing difficult, but there didn’t seem to be enough room for her to move without her body brushing against his.
“What are you doing?” she asked, breathlessly.
Resting his hands on her hips, Phillip moved Seneca close, her breasts flattening against his chest. He dipped his head, brushing a kiss over her parted lips. “I came to say good morning.”
Smiling, Seneca inhaled his mint-flavored breath. “I like the way you say good morning.” Going up on tiptoe, she curved her arms under his broad shoulders. “Thank you, and good morning to you, too.” She gasped again—this time when his hand moved over the curve of her hip to between her thighs.
“Are you sore?” he whispered in her ear.
“A little,” Seneca said truthfully. “I want us to wait until—”
“Don’t worry, baby,” Phillip crooned, kissing Seneca and stopping her words. “I won’t touch you until you’re feeling better. But that doesn’t mean you can’t touch me.”
Tilting her head, Seneca stared up at him through spiked lashes. “What are you talking about?”
He went completely still, his eyes searching hers and seeing indecision. She didn’t know. Seneca didn’t know what he wanted her to do. Then realization dawned when he realized her age and limited experience w
ith men.
Reaching for her hand, he guided her fingers to his semierect penis. “Jerk me off, baby.”
A shudder swept over Seneca from the top of her head to the soles of her feet when the flesh in her hand stirred to life, growing harder and longer. Phillip wanted her to jerk him off, and what he didn’t know was that she used to masturbate Vincent whenever she was on her menses.
“How do you want it, Phillip? Fast, slow, hard, easy?”
Resting his back against the tiled wall, Phillip closed his eyes. “You’re in the driver’s seat, beautiful. Do whatever you want.”
It was the first time, other than with the woman who’d taught him everything he knew about pleasuring a woman, that he’d relinquished control. There was something about Seneca Houston that was different, unique, and he intended to find out exactly what it was.
“Aren’t you afraid I’ll do something you don’t want me to do?” Seneca asked.
He opened his eyes, glaring at her. What was she trying to do? Make his hard-on go down? “No, Seneca,” he said between clenched teeth. “Just do it.”
“Sit down, Phillip.”
“What?”
“I said sit down.”
Phillip complied, sliding down to the floor of the stall, Seneca following and straddling his thighs. Grasping his penis with both hands, she pressed it against his belly while moving it up and down, around and around, as if she were churning cream into butter.
The guttural sounds coming from deep within Phillip’s heaving chest competed with the rhythmic tapping of water splashing over their bodies. Excitement—raw, untamed—quickened Seneca’s breathing, her heart pumping wildly against her rib cage. Never had she felt so powerful, so in control as she manipulated the rigid length of blood-engorged flesh.
“Don’t stop! Please don’t stop, baby. It’s so-oo good.”
She didn’t want to believe that Phillip Kingston—touted as the most focused player in the NBA—was sitting on the floor of a shower stall, quivering and blathering like someone possessed while she masturbated him.
Butterfly Page 13
