Ineffable (3 page)

“Go on,” she urged, smiling. “You wanna kill it, I got another bottle chilling.”

Nori killed it. “Get it.”

Margot laughed, and he watched her long legs stroll as she left to get the wine.

He followed slowly, wanting to see more of her home. It was big and airy with white walls and hardwood floors. There were soft, patterned rugs underfoot, comfortable couches and multipurpose furnishings. Somehow he’d expected it to be cluttered – perhaps even hobbity; artists were prone to squirrel things away – but it wasn’t. Her home was as spare and elegant as she was, and as cool, he thought, absorbing little clues to her personality.

“Here.”

He turned to accept the drink she held out. “Nice glasses.”

She smiled slightly and winked at him. “I bought them at Ineffable a few years ago.”

His brows rose. “Thank you.”

She laughed. “So,” she settled back on the couch. “Why are you here?”

“I told Tommy I would come by.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Then, to lighten the mood, he told her about the woman from earlier. He surprised himself and told her about the manager too.

“Why is Candy so set on keeping her?”

Good question. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen her act this forgiving. She’s usually the first one to consider the bottom line.”

“Well,” Margot rose and tipped the last of another glass down her throat as she walked back toward the kitchen. “Sounds like there’s more there than meets the eye. Best you figure out their real relationship before a secret pops out to bite you in the ass.”

Nori followed, hoping she wasn’t about to put him out. He was never sure with Margot. It was exhilarating and nerve wracking and occasionally infuriating.

“Are you hungry?”

“Yes,” he told her bare legs and luscious little butt. The rest of her was hidden in the refrigerator.

“Shit,” he heard her mutter. “I need to buy some food.” She emerged with a large rather limp looking tomato, a bag of shredded Italian cheese and a bottle of red sauce.

She retrieved an onion from a bin in the pantry, found a thing of ground chicken in the freezer and dropped everything on the counter.

He sat at the kitchen table to watch. “What are we having?”

“Nachos.”

Nori hadn’t watched a woman cook since the last time his aunt visited a year ago. He hadn’t really watched then, but now he stared avidly. If he could figure out what about Margot had captured his attention, he’d be that much closer to working her out of his system. But even as he thought about fucking her, perhaps rolling over after his orgasm faded and finding the allure that currently obsessed him was gone, he knew he was kidding himself. If he had Margot in his bed, he wouldn’t be the one who left. She would.

This was not a good idea. It was never a good idea to mix business and pleasure. That dutifully said, Nori knew there wasn’t a chance in everlasting hell he was leaving her home without trying to make love to her. Even feeling that he might come out the loser in a sexual encounter, he couldn’t resist her. For the first time in his privileged life he was prepared to take what he could get.

She filled a glass with cool tap water and drank it. She filled one for him, and it was clearly an afterthought, which bugged him, but he drank the water down, never taking his eyes off her.

Twenty minutes later she told him to wash his hands.

“Bathroom?”

She jerked a thumb toward the hall without looking at him. “First door on the left.”

Nori washed his hands quickly then took a peek into the other rooms he passed. He couldn’t see much. The blinds were drawn everywhere.

She was eating when he returned, and he sat down across from her. There was a folded napkin and another glass of water beside his chair.

“Taco sauce?”

He nodded, watching closely as she dashed on a bit of the sauce.

“Dig in.”

He did. The nachos were perfect. Spicy and flavorful. They ate in silence, and he continued to eat after she stopped and checked on a bottle of wine in the freezer. Apparently it wasn’t cold enough. She prepped two water glasses with ice and poured it anyway.

“You don’t eat much,” he observed. “I suppose that’s why you’re so slender.”

She laughed softly. “Yeah?”

He shrugged. “Are you naturally skinny then?” He was trying to get a rise out of her.

It didn’t work.

“Could be. I’m going for a walk. You coming?”

It occurred to him that she was trying to get him out of the house. Since he didn’t want to go he shook his head no. “Too hot.”

“Answer the phone if it rings, will you? My answering machine’s broke.”

She didn’t mind him answering her phone? She was either the most trusting woman he’d ever met, or she just didn’t care. “Sure,” he rose and took his dishes to the sink.

He lingered in the kitchen, but as soon as she left, he started poking around. He clicked on the light in the first room he came to, a guest room. It appeared untouched with the exception of the bookcase. He moved closer to read the titles and found a little bit of everything. There were books on nutrition and cooking, jewelry making, finance, business, fashion, biographies of famous entertainers: Bette Davis, Josephine Baker, Lena Horne. There was also fiction. Most of it by African-American authors: Toni Morrison, Zora Neale Hurston, Alice Walker. He found several volumes of poetry by Langston Hughes and Maya Angelou. A book lay on the night stand, The Secret History by Donna Tartt. It was huge, and when he flipped through to the back, he found a white woman’s picture above the author bio.

He went to her bedroom bathroom next, all white and very clean. There were no pills in the medicine cabinet, which was strange. Most people had aspirin or vitamins at minimum. There was very little makeup either, a tube of mascara, some blush, a four color palette of cream eye shadow, two tubes of lip gloss, one pink, one dark red. There were lots of skin care products, however. He saw two kinds of serum, three moisturizing creams, two bottles of toner, several exfoliants and cleansers.

He closed the cabinet and opened the closet door. The top two shelves were towels. The third held bar soap, toothpaste, candles and hair products, and wa la, a bottle of over-the-counter painkillers. The bottom held packs of sanitary napkins, including a little round basket with a selection of them inside. He theorized she filled the basket and set it out when the time came, removing it when her need passed.

He heard the key in the door and quickly nipped into the small bath again where he peed, washed his hands, and emerged to find her kicking off her shoes with an armload of mail.

“You went to the mail box in those shorts?”

Shit. He hadn’t meant to say that. But she laughed at him.

“Didn’t you see me when I left?”

He had but he hadn’t been thinking. He’d been wishing. He wouldn’t make that mistake again.

“Where did you go?” It was a ridiculous question, but she answered it.

“PO Box. I haven’t been this week.”

“Working?”

She nodded.

“How’s the collection coming?”

“Fine. I’ll have designs for you to see by the end of next week as agreed.”

He nodded slowly, following her from the room. Wait. She was taking off her clothes!

“What are you doing?”

She smirked at him over her shoulder as she walked into her bedroom and clicked on the light. “What do you think? I thought you wanted some pussy.”

“What?” he asked, attentive as she removed one earring and then the other.

“Pu-ssy,” she enunciated. “Isn’t that why you’re here?” She walked toward him, tugging rings from her long fingers. “Come on, now,” she coaxed softly, retrieving a hair band from her wrist to ball her long hair on top of her head. “I know you didn’t come to eat my cheap ass lunch.”

Nori stared. Was she for real? “Lunch was good,” he said, walking toward her. “But I suspect you’ll taste quite a bit better.”

He yanked her into his arms. Part of him was pissed she’d given him what he wanted with no effort. The other part was cock poundingly happy he now had her within his grasp. She smelled good, like woman and outdoors and something slightly metallic. He would learn later it was dust from the materials she worked with, residue from shaping stones and beads and grinding metal.

But right then all he knew was that she was delicious. He ran his lips down the side of her throat. He nipped lightly when he reached her collar bone, his cock jumping with pleasure when she squeezed him hard.

“Do you often work when you’re drunk?”

“Why?” Her hands went to his shirt buttons. She had it off his shoulders before he finished kicking his pants loose. “You worried about me chopping off a finger?”

“Ummmm.” Just the feel of her stroking his body threatened to end this before it began. She was licking his nipples; he shuddered. “That’s not funny,” he rasped, wanting to glare at her, but his bloody eyes wouldn’t open.

“No,” she whispered, sucking hard on the side of his neck as she palmed his cock. “It wouldn’t be cute trying to sell jewelry from a maimed designer.”

My God, her mouth, her hands. He groaned as he yanked her out of her clothes. Two pulls and her shirt was gone. Her strapless bra was black and lacy and beautiful, and he told her to “take it off right now or I’ll shred it.”

She did, shimmying free and tossing it aside.

“If I touch you I may completely lose my shit,” he confessed, swallowing as he looked at her gently swaying breasts, her slender frame momentarily balanced on one foot as she finished undressing.

The hair over her pussy was very short, like a shadow. He licked his lips as she walked into his arms, groaning as he squeezed her to him hard. Soon, soon, he told his cock.

He buried his face in her neck, his hands roaming lavishly over her back and bottom as he walked her toward the bed. He landed on top of her with a soft whump, and immediately ground himself against her.

“I want to fuck the shit out of you. I’ve gotta calm down,” he leaned away, moved as though to break their bodies apart.

She stopped moving, and he instantly took advantage by pressing her flat into the bed.

“You feel so good,” he whispered. “Perfect.”

He rolled them to their sides and kissed her, moaning at her taste. It felt like forever not days since he’d had her tongue. Her flavor was complex, and he stroked deep and slow as he tried to figure it out.

“Take your hair down,” he whispered, already longing for the long strands to tease his heated skin.

He wanted to pull it, rub it, have it wrapped around his hands and tangled around their bodies as they tore up the bed. He pulled back to watch, his hands clenching and unclenching around her waist. She made a seductive meal out of taking down her bun, slender arms framing her lovely face. He thrust both hands in immediately. Silky curls wound themselves around his fingers the way he wanted her to wind around him.

They slid together easily, like they had history. A soft sexy one full of lush, sweat soaked memories. She fit herself easily into the planes of his body. Legs around his hips, arms around his neck, cheek rubbing against his, breath rasping at his ear as her small, capable hands filled with his flesh and squeezed.

He shuddered, grunting as his breath left his body in a rush. One hand grabbed the back of her neck; she looked ready. Slow-eyed, full lips parted and damp, she looked so unbearably sexy he worried when he got inside her he wouldn’t last.

“Shit,” he whispered, anxious as he rubbed their noses.

She laughed, and something in his belly lightened, but his ardor did not cool.

“I don’t have anything with me.”

She broke away, and he let her go reluctantly, watching as she crawled across the bed to the nightstand. He couldn’t resist tracing the long line from waist to ass to thigh to knee – Jesus, those legs were something – as she moved away. She pulled a condom from a box, then stopped to check the label. He grinned when she muttered a date three months in the future; she was checking the expiration date.

“Get two.”

She grinned over her shoulder and obligingly went back for another. She tossed them in front of him on the bed. Then, knees sprawled wide, she leaned against the headboard and waited.

It took him perhaps a third of a second to reach her, and she squealed with laughter when he yanked her to him by the ankle. She was still chuckling when he settled between her thighs and bound her wrists in one hand above her head.

She smiled up at him, eyes sparkling as he looked her over. Tumbled black hair, lips plump and damp from his kisses, dewy brown skin everywhere, she was stunning. He was going to fuck her until one of them passed out, and he was praying it was him.

He made quick work of one condom and nudged her. She was hot and damp. He used his free hand to reach down and investigate.

“I’m ready.”

And she was, liquid and raining happily all over his fingers. He released her hands, needing her touch, and Margot, God bless her mysterious little heart, gave him what he wanted.