Heard It All Before Read online

  “You realize what this means, now, don’t you?” No, I didn’t and wasn’t sure I was ready to hear it.

  “Do I?” He absolutely hated it when I answered a question with a question.

  He took my chin in his hands. “You’re mine now, Ms. Nightingale.”

  Whatever I’d been expecting him to say, this wasn’t it! “Yours?” I knew I sounded as confused as I was. Lord, it had been years since I allowed myself to be this scattered over someone. Okay, so I never allowed myself to be this scattered over anyone.

  He dropped a light kiss on my lips. “Mine, all mine.”

  His to do what with? His for how long? And did that mean he was mine in return? Shit, I had to get my ass up off this floor and outta here so I could rethink everything. I had really done it now. Just jumped overboard without a life raft or nautical map. Whatcha wanna bet there are sharks in the water?

  “What are you thinking about?” Gregory asked me. I wasn’t about to tell him. I hopped up and put the straps of the teddy back on my shoulders. My damn legs were shaking; my thighs almost groaned. Then I tried to nonchalantly redo the snaps on the teddy. How did one calmly fiddle around with their crotch? “Need some help with that?”

  I shot him a glance as I managed to get one out of three snaps done ... good enough. “Got it; thanks, though.”

  He got up and started pulling on his poor clothes. They were hopelessly wrinkled from our tussle on the ground. That didn’t stop him from looking real good in them, especially now that I knew what was under there. My mouth went dry, then started to water. I had to escape before I turned into one of those pathetic dick-whipped girlies I’m always dogging at the office. They go on and on about how great their latest was and how much they put up with from him because he knew how to do them right. I mean, these girls gave up their money, their families, their jobs, sometimes even their religion for some man who turned them inside out in bed and might not give a damn about them. Hell, until today, I had never been with anybody worth acting that much of a fool over. Don’t get me wrong—I had had good sex before, even great sex, but this thing we just did? I couldn’t even begin to categorize it. Let’s just say that if I allowed myself, I could act a plumb idiot over this boy and still keep a smile on my face. It was only with God’s grace and my willpower that I turned away and picked up my coat. Or maybe God had nothing to do with it all; this really wasn’t his arena. Shit, I didn’t even know what to think.

  “Renee, I wish I knew what you were thinking.” He was affectionate, he was tender, he was worried, and I was totally freaked out.

  Hell, I wish I knew what I was thinking too! But until I did, I had to bounce. Still, the boy did just turn my whole world upside down, changed the entire way I looked at sex and the committed relationship. And he didn’t look like he was sprinting in the other direction. I guess I could say something nice. “Greg, you literally knocked the thoughts right out of my head. I’m totally overwhelmed and I’m leaving.” There, honest flattery if he cared to read into it.

  He didn’t. “Is that good or bad?”

  Time for more confessions. “It’s the best I’ve ever had, and I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not.” I tied the belt on the coat, picked up my purse, and put my hand on the doorknob and fiddled with the lock. I waited for him to say something, but when I looked back, he was just standing there looking at me like he didn’t know what to make of me.

  “Later,” I muttered, and yanked the door open.

  “Wait!” He came forward and slammed the door shut. “Are we okay?”

  Whatever the hell that meant. What is okay? “Uh-huh.” I kept my eye on the doorknob. I was really afraid I was about to start crying—I never cry! And what the hell would I be crying about? I had to go.

  “Babe, you look spooked as hell. We should talk, huh?”

  I opened the door again. “Later, all right?”

  “Yeah, later,” he said as I pulled the door closed behind me.

  Gregory—Monday, June 1, 3:40 p.m.

  Now what the hell was that, I wonder? God as my witness, I’ll never understand women.

  First, she put me off. So I thought, okay, we’ll do this her way, to my liking. I was taking it slow and easy, giving up just enough to let her think about what she’s missing.

  I was laying it on her with the entire Samson Romance Kit—the picnics, the theater, even church! Working that see-how-much-I-like-you, see-how-much-fun-we-have-together strategy. Then, at the end of the night, the kiss that said BOOM! “See how much fun we could be having, baby?”

  See, you couldn’t just run around plucking fruit from trees. You had to prime an apple. You fed it; nurtured it; gave it sun, moon, sustenance, and pleasant surroundings. Even fed it a little bullshit now and again. It grew ripe for you and began to sway on the tree. Just when you started losing patience, don’t you know that succulent fruit fell right into your hands. So sweetly.

  After all the effort you had put into this, you finally got to savor this fruit, careful not to bruise it; you enjoyed every rounded contour, every juicy bite, right down to the core.

  But what apple, I had got to know, ever jumped up and ran away after this amazingly profound experience?

  A green delicious apple named Renee.

  She shocked the hell out of me with that lace thing and the pumps. Can’t begin to tell you what pumps and lace do to me.

  Anyway, then she shocked the hell out of me when she seemed almost shy for a second there. Almost unsure of herself ... not Renee?

  Then I thought maybe she shocked the hell out of herself. I guess she really didn’t expect to enjoy herself quite so much. Maybe she thought I was only about the boardroom not the bedroom? Come on, now, men in the new millennium simply couldn’t play like that. You had to be about handling business no matter what, no matter when, no matter where. Now, she had to know that rolling up to my office in the middle of day wearing one scrap of material and some do-me-baby pumps was going to set things off!

  Okay, we were both shocked when I told her she belonged to me now. Truly, I couldn’t say which one of us was more stunned to hear those words floating around in the air. That one slipped out before I really thought about it. Usually my game is tighter than that. So much for basking in the afterglow—more like quaking in the aftershock.

  Clearly it was going to be up to me to make sure we make it out of this state of shock and onto some solid ground.

  This could call for a whole new game plan.

  7

  Failure to Communicate

  Roman—Wednesday, June 17, 5:10 p.m.

  I stood in the hot-ass Texas sun basically stewing. Ninety-four degrees in the shade, and the client was tripping and changing job specs for the fourth time. This was off the chains ridiculous.

  My client was LeeCom, a start-up wireless provider that wanted me to build an outdoor break room at its new corporate headquarters. No sweat. Originally, this was supposed to be a quick-n-dirty, pour some gravel, put in some picnic tables, slap up a basketball hoop, and dot some decorative trees and bushes around the place kind of job. Two weeks, tops. That was six weeks ago. Since then, Mr. Lee had bought more land surrounding the building and had added two water features feeding into a koi pond, a walking trail, and a rock-climbing wall.

  So I took a moment at the end of an already too long day to drop by and check on progress. Here was old boy talking about a Zen garden with a meditation area. Uh-huh.

  “Mr. Lee, we can certainly incorporate a Zen garden, but it will have to be along the north perimeter. If you’re thinking of adding Japanese maples, they really need morning sun and afternoon shade. Furthermore, to raze that area and build in the type of feature you’re thinking about will significantly impact your budget and your timeline,” I informed him with as much diplomacy as I could muster. I had two other jobs on hold just waiting for the crew that was trapped on this never-ending job. This would have been okay if Mr. Lee wasn’t funny with the money. He had champagne ideas on a
beer budget.

  It had been years since your boy had been suckered into a just-send-me-the-invoice move. I was strictly cash on delivery or CFO-approved purchase order these days. I had twelve people on my payroll, and I preferred to pay the bills on time.

  “Well now, Roman, let’s talk about that. Can you give me an estimate off the top of your head?”

  Having suspected this was his game, I waved over my foreman, Joe, for a quick conference. As we started the back-and-forth on numbers, I heard my cell phone ringing in the car. Recognizing the ringtone, I motioned that Joe should finish up with Mr. Lee, excused myself, and sprinted for the car.

  Yeah, yeah, business before pleasure, but Miss Jewel and I had been phone tagging for two weeks. E-mail, voice mail, text message, we’d exchanged plenty of those. I wanted to hear her voice, I wanted to see her face, I wanted ... well, lotsa stuff I wanted to do with Miss Jewel.

  Word on the vine was she had been on a date or two with Demetrius. D was all right but ya know a brother wanted a shot of his own. The final ring sounded as I opened the door. “Dammit.” By the time I reached the BlackBerry, the voice mail icon was up.

  “Hey, Roman, it’s Jewellen Capwell returning your returned call. Tag, you’re it. By now you’ve got the numbers. I’m stepping into a meeting but try and catch me. Bye.”

  I hit SAVE and responded with a text message: Trying to catch U girl.

  Joe came over and handed me a clipboard. I looked at the number he’d written down and shook my head. Reaching in the truck, I pulled up our estimate worksheet and started plugging numbers in. “Add labor to this and get him to sign and date.” The phone started vibrating as he walked away.

  Maybe U R using the wrong bait.

  Tell me what U want to nibble on. I’ll put it out there. I paused a minute, wondering if that was too much, too soon? To hell with it; I hit SEND.

  Her answer came back shortly: Partial to chocolate.

  My brows went up. Oh, it was on. U the kinda girl to go straight for dessert?

  Life is short, player.

  Damn straight. I smiled and typed back: Tell me about it. Y U think I’m chasing?

  Careful, what happens when U catch me?

  I’d like to find out.

  Maybe U will.

  Trying to. Got time to see me tonite?

  Not tonight. Gotta date.

  D?

  Wow, grapevine. Yeah.

  What’s up with that?

  Just friends.

  Really.

  Really. He’s not you.

  Glad you noticed.

  Ha! What R U doing right now?

  I looked up to see Mr. Lee shaking his head and Joe headed toward me, neither one looking very happy. Dealing with client drama. U?

  Ditto.

  Talk later?

  Hope so.

  Peace.

  Her reply came quickly: Peace.

  Tucking the phone into my back pocket, I reached for the clipboard again. “Mr. Lee, let me walk you through this.” Exchanging glances with Joe, we walked together to the proposed Zen garden site, explaining costs one more time. Nothing truly worth having came easy, doncha know? That included unrealistic clients and classy women.

  Jewel—Friday, June 19, 8:10 p.m.

  “I don’t get it either, Roni Mae.” I looked at the clock. We’d been on the phone for forty minutes now, thirty-five minutes too long as far as I was concerned. “Yes, she told me.” I’d already gone through the whole drama with Renee, and now here was Roni Mae rehashing it again. Personally, I didn’t see what the big deal was.

  Renee said everything was great between her and Gregory before they decided to break out the freaky-deaky, so if the sex was great as well, doesn’t that just make the relationship more great? Or “mo’ better” as Denzel once said. Great guy, great sex—where was the problem again? That I should suffer such a fate! I know, I know, I tended to oversimplify. It was now becoming clear to me that Renee had never had mind-altering sex before. She had always been too busy planning, scheming, and setting up the perfect seductive aura that she never allowed herself to just be straight seduced. She had never let down the guard enough to just be taken by someone who knew how to take her there, outta control and mindless.

  I shivered a little just thinking about it. But really, this absolutely slayed me. Just between me and you, it cracked me up that here I was, “Little Miss Can’t Be Wrong” as Renee called me, and I already did my turn at the ultimate physical relationship. No strings, no ties, no expectations, just me and this incredibly talented brother getting down and dirty at every opportunity. That had been five years ago, and according to all who knew me, it was totally against my character, whatever the hell that means. Be that as it may, I had a slamming no-holds-barred, all-out, go-for-the-gusto, purely physical fling that lasted for six months. To this day, I still regarded it as the best sex and most honest relationship I ever had.

  Everyone could be manipulated and weakened by sex in certain circumstances. I allowed myself to be a slave to it for a minute until I realized that’s not what motivated me or held my interests for a long time. We had to get up sometime, and then what were we gonna do? Could we hold a conversation, get a common interest, something?

  Anyway, there was Renee, “Ms. Sophisticated Woman of the World” (or so she wanted us all to believe), with this string of men who she had fallen in and out of what she called love with, and not once had she experienced multiple-orgasmic bliss? No wonder the poor girl was in a tizzy. To a complete and total control freak like our Darnella Renee, this kind of situation had to threaten all of her carefully laid out plans. Someone else with any kind of power over her, and it was not career-related? The one I felt for was Gregory. He had to deal with all that intense game playing, dig through all the bullshit to get to the actual relationship. Whatever—too much maintenance for me.

  Personally, I was betting on Gregory. Unless he turned out to be a total undercover dog or something just off-the-hinges drastic happened, I think the two of them might have a shot at it. “It” being that nebulous promise of a happily-ever-after together, if that even truly existed anymore.

  It had been about three weeks since their first little episode, and he was sticking to her like skin on a grape. Smart boy, Gregory. I don’t think I’d seen him leave her side except to go to work. That boy had her on such a merry-go-round, I knew her head was spinning too fast to scheme and plot. I say, why not enjoy the ride?

  I finally noticed that the line had been silent for a while.

  Roni Mae asked, “Did you hear a word I said?”

  I tried to play it off. “I’m on this old cordless, and it keeps going in and out. I heard most of it. What’d you ask me?”

  “I asked how things were going for you in the big love triangle.”

  “What love triangle?”

  “You, Rome, and Demetrius.” She was practically salivating for the details. Always looking for drama where there was none.

  “Please, Demetrius is a nice guy, but he ain’t It. Does absolutely nothing for me. I’ve talked to him a few times, and we had dinner one day last week, but I just don’t feel any sparks, any clicks, any tingles, any anything!” Nothing worse than apathy between a man and a woman from my point of view. When you were hanging out with someone just to have anyone sitting across the table from you ... not a good sign. But I was attempting to “get out and about.” Hanging with Demetrius was better than sitting home alone waiting for Rome’s next voice mail ... but not by much.

  “Oh.” She sounded so disappointed. “What about Rome?”

  Now I sounded disappointed. “Roman and I have a steamy game of phone and e-mail tag going. He started out leaving me rated G messages, and I’d say after three weeks of calling each other at home and work, we’ve worked our way up to that thin line between PG-13 and R.”

  “You haven’t talked directly to him at all?”

  “No, but I tell you, I’m almost intimate with all of his technology now.” I
had to grin, recalling some of the outlandish messages we had been trading back and forth.

  “Well, you know where to find him. Why don’t you just track him down? Show up on his doorstep.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Not my style.”

  Roni Mae clucked her teeth. “And I guess staying at home on a Friday night is.”

  I refused to be bullied. “Apparently so. Don’t you have a date to get ready for?” Hint—go handle your own business and get up outta mine!

  I could practically see her smile through the phone. “Yeah, Aaron and I are going to the movies.”

  “So, how are things with Mr. Paris?” Surprisingly enough, Roni Mae was being very closemouthed about Aaron. Usually you couldn’t get her to shut up about a guy.

  “Okay, I guess.” Her monotone gave nothing away.

  “Well, that sounds lackluster. Where’s the oomph, the hip-hop hooray?”

  “Jewel, I’m doing this thing a date at a time, no more, no less. No lines, no strings, no expectations. By the book, okay?” She sounded defensive.

  My eyebrows shot up. This was a whole new Veronica. I decided not to push. “Okay, cool.” My phone clicked. “Hold on, it’s the other line.” I clicked over without checking the caller ID.

  “Hello?”

  “Is this live, or is it Memorex?” Rome asked with a smile in his voice.

  I sat there grinning like a fool. It was HIM. “I don’t know. Leave your name after the tone and I’ll get back to you. Beep.” I couldn’t remember the last time the sound of someone’s voice made me smile.

  He played along. “Ah, Miss Jewel. It’s me again. If you don’t know my voice by now, shame on ya. It’s Friday night, a beautiful night, and I was really hoping we could get together and do a li’l something.” He sighed dramatically. “But since you’re not there ...”

  I pretended like I just ran in and picked up. “Hello, hello? It’s me; is it you?”

  “Yeah, it’s me and I’m smiling. You’re a difficult woman to catch.”