Best She Ever Had (9781617733963) (20 page)

“But if you were an asshole, I never would have fallen in love with you. A bitch and an asshole are a bad match. We balanced each other out.”

He nodded. “That we did.”

They gazed into each other's eyes. The air around them seemed charged again, like an arc of electricity could shoot between them at any second.

Cynthia hesitated. She didn't know if her ego could take him rejecting her a
third
time, but she took a chance. She leaned forward and kissed Korey lightly on the lips. Despite his protests earlier that he didn't want her, he didn't back away. She leaned forward and kissed him again, deeper this time, savoring the texture and taste of her former lover's mouth.

This time, not only did he not back away, but he also kissed her back. She felt his lips move against her own. His tongue slid inside her mouth. He wrapped a hand around the base of her neck and tilted back her head. She opened her mouth wider and met his tongue with her own. He looped his arm around her waist and pulled her tighter against him. She murmured with delight against his lips as they continued to kiss. He growled back hungrily from the base of his throat.

The sound of the television seemed to dim. All Cynthia could hear was the thud of her heart, the steady
whoosh
of blood in her ears, and their breathing. She wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him even closer, drowning in him. His hand shifted from her back to her bottom, cupping the cheeks, pressing his pelvis against her own. She felt the hardness of arousal there, nudging urgently against the terrycloth of his robe and her groin. She answered it with her own arousal. A budding wetness formed between her thighs, and her nipples hardened. Those little round nubs pushed against the fabric of her dress and his chest.

The fervor of their kisses only intensified, and the next thing Cynthia knew, they were panting as they fell back against the bed and began stripping off each other's clothes. Korey didn't have far to go to get undressed. In five seconds flat, he removed his bathrobe and stood before her, stark naked.

She sat back on her shins and gazed down at him in all his naked glory. His body was still slightly damp from his shower, so it glistened in the dim light of the night table lamp and the glow of the television. Thick cords of muscle showed in his arms and along his shoulders. He still had washboard abs. Her eyes drifted lower. A smile crossed Cynthia's kiss-chapped lips. Something else hadn't changed. “Big Korey” was just as long and thick as she remembered, all eight inches of sexual delight.

“
Damn,
I missed you,” she whispered, referring more to the appendage than its owner. She leaned down and greedily kissed Korey again.

Unfortunately, getting Cynthia undressed took much longer, and Korey didn't seem to have the patience for the whole process, torn as he was between removing her clothes and devouring her body. He'd try to untie the knot on her wrap dress, only to pause to pull aside the fabric and lick and nip her neck and shoulders, making her tremble with pleasure. He'd start to remove her bra, only to get distracted by her breasts and start fondling them, giving her goose bumps and making her whimper.

Don't get her wrong—Cynthia wasn't complaining! Her body loved the attention he gave it! She was getting wetter by the second. But at this rate, getting undressed was going to take forever, and he was practically taunting her with all those kisses and nips, fondling and caressing. She finally undressed herself, tossing her clothes and underwear onto the hotel floor. She climbed on top of him and let herself explore him just as eagerly as he had explored her.

God, he's a beautiful man,
she marveled as she trailed her hands over the length of him. She remembered a few tricks that had made him moan back in the day: licking his nipples and navel, pressing her breasts against his thighs while she teased him by running her lips and tongue over Big Korey.

He remembered a few tricks of his own, cupping her breasts in each hand, making the skin tingle. He ran his thumb over the brown nipples, flicking them back and forth and then in a circular movement. When he finally lowered his mouth to one, she breathed in audibly. She closed her eyes. When he tugged the nipple between his teeth, she moaned.

He cupped her bottom and showed equal attention to each breast, suckling them and licking them until she arched her back, dug her nails into his shoulders, and bit down hard on her bottom lip to stifle her moans.

When she felt his fingers tickle the slick wetness between her thighs, she cried out. Her hips started to meet the tantalizing stroke of his fingers. The tingle that had started along her skin now sank deeper, all the way to the bone, and it coasted like undulating waves over her body.

She slowly rode his fingers until the tremors started. When he picked up the pace, so did she. She tossed back her head and bucked her hips, grinding against him. The whimpers turned into moans and back again. Finally, when she was about to shout out his name, he abruptly stopped, pulling his hand away. The explosion that had been building up inside her swiftly dissipated.

She opened her eyes. “Why'd . . . why'd you stop?”

“Would you rather have caviar or fast-food sex?” he asked.

She pushed her hair out of her face. “Huh? What the hell are you talking about?”

She had been so close!
So close!

“It's been twenty years since we've done this. We've got all night, Cindy,” he said, running his tongue over her breasts again, making her quiver. “We don't have to rush. Savor it,” he urged, before closing his mouth over her nipple.

He wasn't lying about not rushing it. He toyed with her body, paying attention to every part of her with painstaking detail, dragging her to edge and then stopping just before she came. After he did that the third time, she almost punched him.

“Remember when I said you weren't good at being mean?” she asked breathlessly while lying spread-eagled on the bedroom floor.

They had taken a tumble off the bed and onto the carpet a while ago. Neither of them had wanted to stop their foreplay to make their way back onto a mattress.

He nodded as he climbed on top of her. “I remember.”

“Well, I lied!” She shifted from underneath him and tried to crawl to her knees.

“Hey, where do you think you're going?” he asked, pinning her down.

“To the bathroom! I'm going to use the massage setting on that showerhead in there to finish what you refuse to!”

He grinned. “I thought you women liked a man who took his time.”

“Korey, do you realize how damn long it's been since I had an orgasm? There was a Republican in the Oval Office! Okay? That's how long it's been!”

His grin disappeared. “That long, huh?” He leaned down and kissed her. “I guess we better take care of that then.” He reached for the night table drawer.

A few seconds later, Korey had a condom on, and she squirmed eagerly with anticipation. She was going to have an orgasm tonight if it killed her!

He kissed her languidly, and she looped her arms around his neck, kissing him back. She felt the hotel room carpet dig into her shoulder blades as he pressed against her. She felt Big Korey nudge against the inside of her thighs. It looked like she wasn't the only one getting impatient.

Korey raised her hips, centered himself between her legs, and eased forward. Their bodies joined with one thrust and this time she did cry out—in pain.

What's happening,
she thought frantically.
What's happening?

This certainly wasn't what she expected. It was a tight fit—a lot tighter than she remembered.

Damn, had Big Korey always felt like this? Maybe Big Korey was
too
big.

Korey squinted down at her with concern. “You all right?”

She nodded and winced, taking short, quick breaths to ease her way through the discomfort. “Just . . . just don't move yet. Okay? Give me . . . give me a sec.”

She spread her legs wider, giving him more room.

“Cindy?”

Inhale, exhale. Inhale, exhale.
She lay there, letting her body reacquaint itself with someone it had once known very well.

“Cindy?”

After a minute, she felt the pain ease to a dull throb, then disappear almost completely.

He sighed. “Maybe we should stop.”

“No! No, I'm . . . I'm all right now.”

She didn't wait twenty years for this opportunity to come around and then wimp out this soon. If she had conquered Big Korey before—then damn it, she could do it again!

“You sure?”

“I'm all right—really.” She did a tantalizing swivel of the hips to demonstrate. “Come on. Don't stop now.”

She felt him ease himself farther inside her, and she felt a twinge again, but it was nothing like before. She gazed into his dark eyes as she and Korey slowly rocked and ground. She raised her mouth to his, and they hungrily kissed again. He held her breast and trailed his hand along her thigh as they made love on the hotel floor with their bodies tangled in the bed sheets. Their moans and whispers broke the silence. It was like the rest of the world outside of the room had disappeared.

Cynthia's heart pounded like the pistons of a steam engine. The tingle she had felt earlier was now a raging fire that sent her nerve endings into overdrive so that his every touch sent her purring. She could tell from the pressure that was building up inside her that her body would get its release soon, and when it did, she knew she wouldn't be able to hold back her shouts.

The deliciously slow rocking suddenly picked up in tempo. Korey's hands shifted back to her hips and bottom, as he thrust harder between her thighs. He bit down hard on his bottom lip—so hard that the pink skin now was virtually white. He closed his eyes.

Cynthia started to tremble. She gripped his broad back to steady herself, but it was of little use. She was quaking all over, feeling her legs and her arms rapidly turn into putty. When the shock wave finally crested over her, she closed her eyes and shouted his name. Her back arched. The muscles in her legs and arms clenched. She bucked her hips with each spasm, still shouting.

Korey came soon after. She felt him swell inside her, then he cried out. He tightened his hold around her hips. He dropped his head against her shoulder and gulped for air. He shuddered, and his body shook with each tremor. Cynthia cradled him in her arms until the shudders subsided.

He raised his head a minute later and gazed down at her.

“So did we end your losing streak?” he asked, grinning.

“What do you think?” she whispered groggily.

“I think we should make up for lost time and see if we can get you there again.”

“I'm game.” She tiredly thumped his shoulder. “Just let me catch my breath first.”

“Well, do it quick.” He licked his lips. “We're far from finished.”

She certainly hoped so.

Cynthia woke to the sound of a knocking. She opened her eyes and winced at the bright morning light that came through the cracked bedroom blinds.

“Korey?” she croaked, smacking her lips. She lifted her head and looked to her left. Korey's side of the bed was empty. Only the indentation of his head was still on the down pillow. She wondered if he had gone to get the door.

The knocking was insistent now, even though they had put the “Do Not Disturb” sign on the outside door handle hours ago.

Cynthia pushed herself to her elbows and looked over her shoulder. Couldn't they read the damn sign? She hoped nothing was wrong. It wasn't hotel management, was it? She frowned. She and Korey hadn't been
that
loud, had they?

Their lovemaking had dragged on until dawn and had gotten a bit rowdy as the night progressed. Okay, maybe
she
was the one who had gotten rowdy, but it was hard to keep quiet when she was having that much fun. A long line of bad lovers had left her without an orgasm in
years,
but last night Korey had made up for that. Her orgasm dry spell was officially over.

She heard the sound of a deadbolt being unlocked and a door opening.

“Good morning,” someone said in a thick Spanish accent. “Your breakfast order, sir.”

Breakfast? Good!
Cynthia was hungry enough to eat the complimentary magazine in the night table.

Korey appeared a few minutes later while she was trying frantically to fix herself so that she was a bit more presentable. It was a Gibbons family rule that a woman should look as gorgeous in the morning when she woke up beside a man as she had been when she fell asleep beside him. Cynthia glanced at herself in the dresser mirror one final time. She wasn't wearing makeup, and her hair was slightly disheveled, but at least she didn't have drool on her face. By the time Korey nudged the bedroom door open with his shoulder, carrying a tray of silver platters, Cynthia was as close to flawless as one could get under the circumstances.

“Stay where you are,” he said as she started to toss back the covers and walk toward the little desk in the corner where she thought he was about to place the tray. “No need to get up. I can serve you there.”

She smiled. He was bringing her breakfast in bed? How sweet! In the old days, Korey had been full of romantic gestures like these, leaving freshly picked flowers at her locker, drunkenly serenading her from underneath her bedroom window on her birthday. She remembered shouting at him to quiet down before her mother heard him, even as her heart warmed at the fact that he had done something so reckless, ridiculous, and charming. And now he was doing it all over again, making her heart flutter a little.

“Don't start,” the blunt voice in her head warned. “You guys just spent the night together. So he's bringing you breakfast! Big deal! This isn't a love thing, girl!”

She watched as he removed the metal lids, revealing a plate of toast, scrambled eggs, and bacon, and another plate of fat sausage links and Belgian waffles sprinkled with powdered sugar. A bowl sat beside it. It was filled with fresh fruit and covered with Saran Wrap.

“Thanks for the food, Korey, but why didn't you wake me?” She would have liked to pick her own order.

“I tried!” He walked toward her and sat the tray on the edge of the bed. “You shoved me away and told me, ‘Go away! I'm sleeping.' ”

She laughed. That sounded like something she would say.

Cynthia sat up in bed, piling pillows behind her, and reached for a slice of toast. Korey removed the lid from a small glass jar and began to pour syrup on his waffles.

“I guess we'd better eat fast if we're going to head to the lobby to see if we can catch the kids there,” she said, breaking her toast in half. “They're teenagers, so I don't expect to see them down there before noon. That'll give me enough time to go to my room to change clothes.”

She also wanted to head back to her room to refocus. The longer she stayed here, the more nostalgic she got. It made her forget the reason she had come to his room last night: for sex only. She had no other expectations. It was best to leave now with a slightly sore vajayjay and a full belly.

Korey stopped chewing. “Cindy, maybe at this point we should focus less on stopping the wedding and more on how to deal with the aftermath.”

She stiffened. “Why do you say that?”

“Because it's probably time to accept that they're already married. Maybe we should—”

She furiously shook her head. “They're not married.”

“—just wait until they come back to Virginia, and push that they get an annulment or something. It can't be—”

“They're not married, Korey! They can't be!” she insisted, making him pause.

“Why can't they be?” He furrowed his brows. “Look, Cindy, why are you so hell-bent on stopping this? I know you're upset about it. So am I! But I've come to accept it. Why not you? You aren't
that
stubborn, are you?” He narrowed his eyes at her. “Why are you fighting this so hard? What aren't you telling me? Do you know something I don't?”

She looked away from him guiltily and stared at the breakfast tray instead. She wanted to tell him the truth. She was so tired of carrying around the burden of her secret, but she knew she couldn't share it with him. They had shared a wonderful night together. She didn't want to ruin the moment with her little bombshell. Not this soon.

“I just don't want her to get married, Korey,” she lied, before eating her toast. “It's as simple as that. Look, let's change the subject. Let's instead focus on the fact that you're eating all the damn bacon!” She jabbed her finger at the slices he had piled on his plate.

“Since when do you like bacon?”

“Since now,” she said, taking a slice away from him and popping it into her mouth.

“You never liked it before!”

She shrugged. “That was twenty years ago. Things change.”

He smirked. “Not everything.”

She grabbed another slice.

“I remember something you really used to like then,” he began slowly, “and I bet you still do.”

“Like what?”

“Do you remember the game we used to play?” Korey asked with a wicked smile as he pushed the breakfast tray to the other side of the bed and stretched beside her.

Cynthia paused mid-chew. She adjusted the bed sheets over her breasts. “A game we used to play?”

Korey nodded and leaned across her legs. He slowly rubbed her thighs, not taking his penetrating gaze off of her. She could feel the heat of his touch even through the sheets. “Yeah, it was a game you liked
a lot,
if that rings any bells.”

The memory of what game Korey was referring to suddenly dawned on her. Cynthia lowered her bacon back to her plate. Her face reddened as she licked the remaining grease from her lips. “I remember.”

“Uh-huh. I bet you do.”

“It was another one of
your
ideas. You had a kinky imagination back then.”

“And I still do.”

She pursed her lips, ignoring his saucy retort. “The game was whether or not you could spell my full name before—”

“You came. Yeah, I got so good at it that I could get you to do it before I finished the ‘a' in Cynthia.”

She snorted. “Only because you cheated! I bet you were spelling some letters twice.”

“
Really?
That sounds like a challenge to me.”

Her eyes widened as he began to tug at the bed sheets. She started to tingle all over as the cotton slid over her breasts, then her stomach and then her thighs before he tossed the sheets aside. She sat naked before him.

“Lie back for me, baby,” he whispered.

Her throat went dry.

“Lie down.” He laid his hands on her shoulders and gently but firmly pressed her back against the pillows behind her.

She stared at the fluffy cloud-and-angel relief painted on the hotel ceiling. Her heart was starting to race a mile a minute. Her nipples hardened. She was getting wet again just thinking about what he was about to do to her.

“Spread your legs.”

Cynthia closed her eyes and slowly did as he ordered.

“A little wider, sweetheart.”

She could remember him whispering those same words twenty years ago. His magic spell was working again. This was all too much, just too much. She had come here for sex—that's all! Not for butterflies in her stomach, not for all these emotions. She was starting not to feel like herself anymore. She wasn't the plainspoken, coldly rational Cynthia who saw men as easy prey and didn't believe in love. She had regressed back to a love-struck eighteen-year-old girl who was full of hope and passion and all that other nonsense that now made her adult self roll her eyes in disgust. She didn't want to be that girl again. That Cynthia was too vulnerable and too easily disappointed.

She opened her eyes and started to sit up from the bed.

“Korey, I should—”

“Oh, no, you don't.” He chuckled. “
You
threw down the gauntlet by saying I cheated. Give me a chance to defend my honor, woman.”

She hesitated before she lay back again. She held her breath and felt the mattress dip slightly underneath his weight as he shifted to the bottom of the bed and nestled between her legs. She shivered when she felt him leave a trail of butterfly kisses along her inner thighs.

“I'll say the letters out loud,” he whispered, gently coaxing open her moist womanly folds with his fingers, making her tremble. “That way you'll know I'm not cheating this time.” He gave her one last kiss—this time between her legs. “Are you ready, Cindy?”

Cynthia murmured something in response, though it wasn't any recognizable word, because she immediately felt his mouth and his tongue and all intelligible thought disappeared. She closed her eyes and bit down hard on her bottom lip, loving the sensation and the thrill he was giving her.

“C,” he whispered seconds later.

She felt his warm, wet mouth again, and she balled the bed sheets in her fists. Her legs fell akimbo and she moaned.

“Y.”

Her hips arched to meet his tongue. Her toes curled. If she felt like she was wet for him before, that was nothing compared to now.

“N.”

Each slow, deliberate stroke was better than the last. Her eyes flew open. Her moaning only increased. She was starting to throb now.

“ T.”

The throbbing was spreading. It started from her core and was vibrating down her legs and up her stomach. Her breathing became shallower. She turned her head so that half of her face was buried into her pillow.

“ H. ”

Oh, God!
She bit down hard on the feathers inside the pillowcase. Her legs were starting to tremble. Her hips were squirming so much that Korey had to steady them with his hands.

“I.”

Cynthia closed her eyes again. She could feel it coming over her. There was no fighting it. Damn Korey and his magic mouth! She could feel all her muscles tighten into an intolerable knot, then unwind even faster, sending electric currents up and down her limbs, giving her chills. She twisted and arched her back. She pounded her fists against the mattress and called out his name.

He sat back on his elbows and watched as she trembled and writhed in ecstasy, as the waves of pleasure crashed over her.

A minute later, Cynthia's eyelids fluttered open. She took another deep breath and swept her hair out of her face. Dazedly, she pushed herself to the sitting position and looked down at Korey, who lay on his side now, wiping his mouth and licking his lips. He was smiling from ear to ear.

“And that was ‘a,' ” he said proudly. “So my record still stands.”

“Oh, you . . .” She slowly shook her head. “You are so full of your damn self, you little—”

“Baby, there is
nothing
little about me.” He cocked an eyebrow. “You know that . . . or do I have to demonstrate that to you again too.”

She was struck speechless.
You cocky bastard!

She suddenly grabbed one of the pillows from behind her and hit Korey over the head with it, knocking the arrogant smile off his face. He wrestled the pillow out of her hands, grabbed her arm, and tugged her toward him. She laughed and shrieked when they went crashing back to the mattress. They rolled around naked for a few seconds, and he climbed on top of her, pinning her to the bed. Cynthia giggled and squirmed underneath him. But her laughter died on her lips when she gazed up at him and saw the look in his eyes.

“What? What's wrong?”

He didn't say a word for a long time and just traced a finger along her lips. “I forgot what this feels like . . . how good we used to be together.”

She fell silent.

“I know we fought sometimes. I pissed you off. Hell, you pissed me off too. But I still loved you, Cindy, and I think after being with you these past few days, after all these years”—he paused—“I still love you.”

She turned away from him, choosing to stare at the grotesquely tacky headboard instead. What was with this hotel and its cheesy décor?

He held her chin and turned her around to face him again.

“And if I'm reading you right, I think you still feel the same way about me too. Or is that just my ego talking?”

“We're here for the kids,” she answered softly. Her eyes began to water. “Remember? Remember what you said on the plane?”