We lived in a little rental in Bywater way before the neighborhood was cool, before a baby made spontaneous afternoon sex impossible. I was doing my master’s in journalism, singing part-time in ratty bars, and coming home to Jules’s warm, sleeping body at night. He was trying to transition out of DJing and into band management, but he wasn’t signing enough acts. We wanted to be different from our parents, and different from our friends who were rushing to the altar and buying bungalows in Uptown and Carrollton. In fact, when we finally did get married, we did it on a lunch break at City Hall, much to my mother’s consternation and my dad’s relief. I didn’t want him going into debt to pay for a wedding like it was his patriarchal duty, or some reflection on my “value” as a woman. As a couple we were artistic, progressive, expansive, bold, and that included, I thought, loosening our hold on each other so we could explore our sexual limits together. I was reading a lot of new-age relationship stuff at the time; threesomes were no big thing.
Julius was having none of it.
“So, let me get this straight. You would have no problem kissing my mouth right after I go down on another woman, making her scream right in front of you. You’d be cool with that?”
“The trick is to have no emotional attachment to the third party,” I said, quoting those books.
“Oh. I see. So I’m not supposed to give a shit about one of the two women I am with—emotionally or personally. I’m supposed to reserve feelings only for you, and my cock for her. And that makes it okay,” he said, laughing.
“Who says it’s gotta be another woman? What about if it’s me and two men?”
He laughed. Then he laughed some more.
“You have a problem with that?” I asked.
“Yeah I got a problem with that. And it’s not the problem you think. I just don’t like the idea of boiling sex down to a whole lotta limbs and lips and cocks and pussies. Why would I bother digging through a pile of flesh just to get to what I already got, here, now, all to myself?”
I lightly beat his damp chest, my sticky fingers trailing up and down his stomach, turning his laughter into shuddering as soon as my hand found him hard again.
“You talk fancy, Solange,” he said, moving his hips to my hand’s rhythm, “but you’re crazy in love with me. I know you. It would kill you to share.”
“You’re telling me you never think about another woman when you’re fucking me?”
This made his dick go harder.
“I’ll tell you what, maybe I have. Maybe I haven’t. But right now, in this moment, I’m thinking only about fucking you,” he said, pulling me in closer.
This man was mine, his dick under my command. Mine. It was fierce and sudden, that feeling of mine. His cock eased into me, while I clasped my hands behind his neck. I loved how his torso went ropy from exertion. I loved how he fucked me. I could feel that surrender, that holy thing that sex can bring to you when it’s done right, when it causes the big “yes” at the center of the flesh; the yielding that comes from feeling safe, right, wanted. It was like that with us for a long time.
And then it wasn’t.
A threesome had remained on my secret list of things to try even before Matilda provided the opportunity. The day I filled out my fantasy form, the tip of my pencil hovered over that box for a long, long time. Then I checked it. This morning, I had found myself racing around my bedroom while a limo idled in my driveway to take me to the Mansion. Six times I changed outfits! And six times I had to remind myself clothes didn’t matter; I’d be naked the whole time, right?
Wrong.
I barely took off my robe.
I wrapped my hand around the knob and froze. I couldn’t even open the door. My curiosity had just … dissolved.
When I got home, I called Matilda and we met the next day for lunch at Tracey’s.
For some reason I felt like I had to apologize.
“Nonsense. Nothing to apologize for,” she said. “Was it a matter of attraction? What do you think we got wrong about your scenario?”
I didn’t have the heart to tell her I didn’t even open the door.
“Truth is, I just … It seemed attractive in theory, but when it became real, I realized it wasn’t something I actually wanted. It just felt like too much. God, does this make me a coward?”
“Coward? Solange, for you that fantasy had nothing to do with bravery and everything to with curiosity. The curiosity just wasn’t there.”
True, but the bigger truth was that Julius’s words had begun to resonate. And in that moment I started to crave something more with my sex, something deeper, maybe more … emotional.
“Don’t give it another thought. I promise we’ll orchestrate a stellar Step Seven do-over. Think about what else you’re most curious about these days and we’ll set it up,” she said.
“It can be anything?”
“Of course,” Matilda said, wiping her mouth with her napkin and setting it down.
The idea came to me so swiftly I didn’t have a chance to temper it or to really think about what I was asking her to do for me.
“Well, it’s not really a matter of what I’m most curious about, but rather whom.”
Matilda looked around the crowded restaurant. She leaned forward.
“Please don’t ask me—”
“Pierre Castille,” I said. “He turned down my last interview request, but something tells me he wouldn’t turn yours down. If my next Step is truly about curiosity, then perhaps you can make him my Step Seven do-over. Part of my fantasy could include doing a feature-length interview.”
“Solange, Pierre is manipulative, unpredictable, dangerous even. And I cannot vouch for your safety, which is the first and most important prerequisite for any S.E.C.R.E.T. fantasy.”
“Who says I’m going to accept the Step?”
She looked at me gravely. Could she tell that even as I said those words, I doubted them? He might be all those things Matilda said, but he was also undeniably sexy. And this wasn’t about love, after all. What was curiosity anyway if it wasn’t sticking your hand in a lion’s mouth? I had based my entire career on those kinds of dares. I had walked away from a step for lack of curiosity before, so who knows what would happen if I were face-to-face with Castille. Maybe I’d walk away again. All I knew was when I contemplated that opportunity, I felt that familiar adrenaline rush flooding my veins. Once that happened, there was no turning back.
Matilda seemed both impressed and angry about my plan. “He’s a dangerous man, Solange.”
“I’m not afraid of him. In fact, he should be afraid of me.” I laughed, trying to turn the tail end of my comment into a joke, but her silence hung heavy in the air.
It was the kind of silence that journalists and salespeople know to leave alone because the next person who speaks loses.
“I’ll tell you something,” Matilda said, begrudgingly, affectionately, “formidable doesn’t even begin to describe you.”
The next day, sitting in Julius’s car en route to a parent–teacher meeting, I fought a weird urge to tell him about the threesome and that it was because of him I’d backed out. Instead, I took in the familiar scent of his Jeep, marveling that the man was on time, a little early even.
“You look nice,” he said. “You’re wearing your hair different. I love it curly.”
“I just haven’t blown it out.”
“That’s pretty,” he said, touching my bracelet and the skin beneath.
We still had an easy intimacy, the kind where a hand on a knee or a casual caress while adjusting a tie wasn’t out of the ordinary, but it hadn’t happened in a while. I debated taking off my S.E.C.R.E.T. bracelet, but with six charms now gracing the chain, I couldn’t resist wearing it everywhere I went.
“Are you going to compliment my bag now? How about my shoes?” I said, deflecting attention away from the bracelet.
“I’m not throwing out compliments for nothing. I’m serious. I’m liking it all,” he said, eyes on the road now.
<
br /> “Well, thank you. But I didn’t wear this for you. This is my ‘I’m a Good Mother Despite my Demanding Job’ outfit.”
He laughed softly.
After a moment of silence, I changed the subject. “Anyway. So how’s the food truck business?”
“You know … business is really good,” he said, with some hesitation. “We’re ordering up another truck. I take delivery in a few weeks. This one’s going to the Freret Street Market. We’re hoping—”
“Be careful not to expand too fast, Jules. That’s happened before and you went bust.”
I immediately regretted my words. It was his money, his business, his risk. I had no stake in this. And as long as he continued to pay child support on time, without complaint, I had no right to give unsought financial advice. Or any advice.
But instead of defending himself or shutting down, he simply said, “I understand your concern, Solange. I haven’t had the best track record. But I know what I’m doing this time. I’m taking all the right steps. I feel good about this.”
I said nothing more about the business, and during the parent–teacher meeting I let him do a lot of the talking while I took in his profile, marveling at the way love can change into something else, something different and yet so very familiar. I listened to Julius ask pertinent questions about Gus’s ability to finish his homework. Julius felt he was overloaded with take-home work and asked the teacher to reduce it a little so he’d have more time to relax and just be a kid once school was done for the day.
“His pediatrician doesn’t think he has attention-span issues,” Julius said in the meeting. “A healthy mental bandwidth can just be stretched too thin sometimes.”
“Oh, I concur,” the teacher said. “This is a good plan. We’ll make it work.”
Afterwards, Julius dropped me off at work.
“Thanks. That was good,” I said, patting the back of his hand.
“We did well. Listen, I’d like to pick up Gus tomorrow morning a little earlier. Take him golfing.”
“I didn’t know you golfed,” I said, slotting that with a bunch of other new stuff about Julius I seemed to be discovering.
“I don’t. But I think Gus should try it. It’s harder as you get older to learn new things.”
“Yes, but not impossible.”
“That’s true,” he said, leaning over to kiss me good-bye, his goatee tickling my cheek.
I almost turned my face to meet his lips. I almost changed the peck to something else. What the hell is going on? Is it his smell? Is it all the sex I’m having? Sometimes, too long in close proximity to this man, his smell would mess with my rational mind, making me take leave of my senses.
As his Jeep drove away, I checked my phone messages: there were two from the office and one from Matilda. I listened to hers first.
Solange. Call me. I have news. Pierre—he’s agreed to be … recruited this one time. But there are conditions. Call me.
Holy hell. She came through. Curiosity indeed! I immediately hit “call back.” Matilda picked up on the first ring.
“What are the conditions?” I said, before even uttering “Hello.”
“Well, Solange, he doesn’t want a camera there for the interview portion of the fantasy,” she said, her voice sounding as though this might be a deal-breaker.
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll just sell it as a cover story for New Orleans Magazine. They owe me, after all.”
“The other condition is that the fantasy has to happen in Paris, where he’s been living ever since our event at Latrobe’s.”
My heart skipped a beat. I had never been to Paris!
“That shouldn’t be a problem.”
“How about Gus?”
“He has a terrific father, last I checked, who often takes him for longer stretches when necessary.”
“And what about the news station?”
She really didn’t want me to go.
“I’m owed a vacation.”
Matilda exhaled loudly, clearly sensing there was little she could say to dissuade me.
“Solange, I don’t like this.”
“When I signed up, you said anything I wanted. Any fantasy. I want this one,” I said.
When I became like this, when I sank into that trance-like state of single-mindedness, Julius used to cut me a wide berth and let my obsession run its course. After all, this was the kind of tenacity that won me accolades. But it also got me in trouble. I was hoping for more of the former and none of the latter.
“Fine, Solange, but I have my own condition,” Matilda said. “We’ll make this your eighth Step. I have something else in mind for your Step Seven do-over.”
“Remind me what eight is again?”
“Bravery, Solange,” she said. “Though I’ve never met a woman in S.E.C.R.E.T. who needed less work on that quality than you.”
CASSIE
Jesse and I were in a post-sex tangle, an arm and a leg overlapping lazily, each of us lost in our thoughts. I almost fell asleep, completely forgetting the last-minute Committee meeting Matilda had called that afternoon. I soon snapped out of it, launching off Jesse’s bed with a groan. I was so tired, I could have slept straight through the afternoon into the night.
For the past five months, it had been nonstop work, work, work. But it was already paying off. There were lineups at Cassie’s every night, and there was a palpable buzz on the street about the place. We wouldn’t turn a profit that year, but we’d certainly make money next year, if things continued as they were. And we had scored a featured review in New Orleans Magazine: “Don’t miss this new eatery on Frenchmen called Cassie’s. It has the cozy warmth of your best friend’s house, one where you don’t have to take off your shoes and you always know that whatever’s served will be vivid, surprising, yet somehow deliciously familiar.”
I pressed my foot on Jesse’s butt, which was cutely peeking out from the sheets and the only spot on his body not covered in tattoos.
“Jess. You sure you still want to drive me?”
He groaned. It used to require all my effort to keep the emotional intimacy between us at bay. But I was happy with what we had at that moment. I was busy and distracted. So was he. I had great sex when I wanted it. And Jesse remained my stray cat, happy to see me, starved for affection, but ultimately wanting nothing more than to be let out to roam at night, which I was happy to oblige.
I bent to pluck my socks from the floor, but Jesse snatched me back onto his naked lap, where I blithely continued to dress myself. His hands slid between my legs, opening my thighs. I bent to retrieve my bra from the chair. This was our game.
“I’m late.”
“I don’t give a fuck,” he whispered into the crook of my shoulder. He began to grind me on his lap, reawakening his barely asleep erection.
“I have to go,” I said flatly, closing my eyes and reaching up and back to rake my fingers through his messy hair.
“Then you should go,” he whispered, sliding his fingers into the front of my panties, finding me, unsurprisingly, very wet. “You should definitely leave.”
With one swift movement, he spun me onto the bed face down, my limbs splayed. He tugged down my panties, leaving them askew across the backs of my thighs. I could feel him hovering over me, taking in the sight of my ass in the air, his knees knocking my thighs apart. Then, without warning, he entered me fiercely, all thrust and muscle, like he was taking something from me, something I was instantly reluctant to hand over. But my resistance didn’t last. I couldn’t help it. I clutched the sheets and arched my back, giving myself over to him, as he plunged deeper and deeper, his hard fingers bruising my hips, his cock pinioning me onto the bed, my whole body tightening around it. My clitoris was perfectly positioned against the coverlet and he knew it, timing his rhythm and thrusts to make me come. Even if this was all I ever got from him, it was everything I wanted in this moment.
“You like this, don’t you?” he murmured, his fingers entwining my hair and tugging my head back
a bit. The intensity of his thrusts increased.
I nodded, mute with pleasure, the build accelerating.
“I love fucking you, Cassie.”
And with that I exploded around him, my body convulsing as I arched to pull pleasure from his thrusting cock. I could see his veined shaft in my mind’s eyes, easing in and out of me as he spurted across my ass and back. Our bodies were moving together, each taking something from the other until we both began to plummet from the heights, back down onto the rumpled bed.
“Holy shit,” I said, collapsing across the sheets. He rolled onto his back next to me, breathless, laughing lightly. “I’m going to be late.”
“No you’re not,” he said, suddenly rising and clapping like a sergeant. “Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go! Shower, dress, I’ll start the truck.”
I leapt to my feet, seeing stars in my peripheral vision. The fastest shower on earth was followed by frantic dressing, and Jesse was on the porch by the time I threw my wet hair into a low ponytail. We were quietly distracted as he made his way across the city to the Garden District, taking a detour down Frenchmen. It felt weird to just pass by the restaurant, my neck craning to catch sight of people, my people.
The Café was in its mid-Sunday slump. I saw Maureen’s arm sweeping a table clean. Claire had the day off, too, so she’d be at Will’s, maybe watching TV, maybe reading, hopefully not sad and hopefully on the mend. She’d made the difficult decision to skip summer school, preferring instead to split her time between working at the Café Rose and Cassie’s. She loved helping with the prep, Dell regularly commenting that she was naturally gifted in the kitchen. Will was adamant, though. As long as she wanted to live with him, she had to go back in September to some kind of school. I would never tell Will it was actually Jesse who suggested that Claire enroll at the Culinary School of the Arts. He had even offered to write her a letter of recommendation. When I mentioned it to Claire as an option, her face lit up. She squeezed me breathless, and for a brief moment I could see what she must have looked like as a child—happy, unburdened, her future wide open before her.
SECRET Revealed Page 17
