ROMANCING MO RYAN (15 page)

She touched his hand as it touched her face and he hesitated, staring into her eyes as if he could see through them, but then he leaned down and kissed her.
 

She closed her eyes and felt the tender quiver of his lips against hers, and then she opened her mouth to allow his tongue in.
 
She held onto him as he moved down closer to her, her body trembling underneath the covers, as it craved this man’s touch.
 
He pulled up slightly, but just long enough to untie his robe and remove it, revealing his tanned, naked body.

He laid down beside her, pulling the covers around his waist, as he wrapped her in his arms and resumed kissing her.
 
His hand moved down, inside her panties, as he fingered her and massaged her clit, as he continued to kiss her.
 
He moved his mouth from her lips to her cheeks and back to her lips, rubbing his against hers, loving the taste of her, the smell of her, everything about her.
 

The idea that she could have thought his intentions were to turn something into nothing, to turn that powerful connection they had two nights ago into nothingness, left him reeling.
 
He wanted to be with this woman above any woman he’d ever wanted.
 
Yesterday and today, while he went through meetings after meetings in Tallahassee, he couldn’t stop thinking about this woman.
 
Yes, a part of him was still apprehensive.
 
Fully committing to anybody after what he’d gone through with his deceased wife was still a daunting proposition for him.
 
But he thought he’d made it clear two nights ago, when he took her virginity, that he was all-in with her.
 
Didn’t she realize he wasn’t the kind of man who would take her innocence, and then dump her?
 

But Nikki was innocent, whether she would ever admit it or not.
 
And he therefore knew, as his mouth moved down, lifted her shirt completely off, and took her nipples into his mouth, that he had to make himself clearer.

That was why, when it came time, he guided his dick inside of her in such a way that made her immediately shiver.
 
That was what he wanted, he thought as he stared at her reaction.
 
He wanted her to crave him the way he craved her.
 
And as he lay down and began gyrating her, moving in and out in a wondrously slow rhythm, he allowed his dickhead to slide slightly under, and then to pop off.
 
That electrifying feeling Nikki felt when his penis slid under and then slid back up, caused her body to lift up into his to ease the intensity.
 
This man knew what he was doing.
 
He knew exactly where her spot was, and he knew exactly how to hit the spot repeatedly.
 

For the longest time they made love.
 
Mo couldn’t get enough of her, as his gyrations became a sensual dance.
 

“Like it?” he asked her as he fucked her.

“Yes,” she said.
 
“It feels wonderful, Mo.”

“You feel wonderful, baby,” he said as his gyrations slowly began to increase.
 
“You make me feel so alive, Nikki.
 
So vibrant.
 
I’ve never had anybody like you.
 
You make me. . .
Oh, baby
,” he said as his penis engorged to a breaking point, forcing him down as far as he could go inside of her, and then releasing.
 

Nikki lifted up against him as he released deep into her.
 
And his release became the valve that turned on her own climax.
 
And she couldn’t hold back either.
 

“
Mo-oh!
” she moaned, as she held onto him and allowed her body the pulsating pleasure as her folds collapsing around his rod.
 

And it was a sweet release, the kind that made both of them just lay in the other’s arms, for the longest time.

When she woke up the next morning, Mo was already dressed in another one of his stylish suits, and was bending down kissing her.
 

“I’d better get up too,” she told him, moving to lift up.

“Not yet,” he said softly, his lips pressing against her hand.
 
“It’s Saturday.
 
Sleep in.”

“Where are you going?”

“I have a couple of meetings this morning.
 
Then I’ll be back.”

She smiled.
 
“So it’s settled then?”

He knew exactly what she meant.
 
“Yes, my darling, it’s settled.
 
You, Nicole Tarver, are now officially my girl.”

“Your girl, or your woman?”

He smiled.
 
“Both,” he said, and kissed her on the lips.
 
Nikki wrapped her arms around his neck in her youthful exuberance.
 
She was young and inexperienced and idealistic to a fault, and Mo knew those three facts alone were going to pose major challenges in their relationship, but it couldn’t be helped.
 
Of all the women he could have, and have had, Nikki was the one he wanted, despite her youth, and inexperience, and unrealistic idealism.
 
Because none of the others could match her honesty, and her integrity, and none of them made his heart quiver whenever she walked into a room.

When they stopped kissing, she placed his tie in her hand.
 
“In that case,” she said, “you, Judge Montgomery Ryan, are officially my boy.”

Mo smiled.
 
“Your boy, or your man?” he asked her.

“My boy,” she said, and Mo laughed.
 
Then he reached beneath the covers, slapped her on her naked romp, gave her another long kiss while his hand massaged that romp, and then left her where she lay.
 

Nikki felt as if she was floating when he left.
 
She felt as if she had discovered a treasure so precious that even she couldn’t understand the depth of its’ value.
 
And all of that anxiety and worry was gone completely.
 
She was always told, by her mother, by her siblings, that she expected too much from these men out here and she needed to just settle down with whoever was willing to settle down with her.
 
A man is a man, one of her sisters used to always say.
 

But she was glad she didn’t follow their advice.
 
She was glad she didn’t jump onto every bandwagon that came along, every smooth Joe who whispered in her ear.
 
She didn’t know it at the time, but she was saving herself for Mo.
 
A real man.
 
And in bed, the way he sexed her, a real pro.

Sometime in the night he had put one of his dress shirts on her, and she got out of bed and pranced around his beautiful home in that long shirt as if she was the mistress of the house.
 
She sailed in and out of rooms, in and out of closets, amazed at how tidy he was, looking and smiling and walking on air.

She even went downstairs and checked out his record collection.
 
Jazz, jazz, a Frank Sinatra greatest hits album, and another one entitled
Sinatra At The Sands,
and more jazz.
 
From Phil Brubeck to Duke Ellington, Stan Getz to John Coltrane, nothing but jazz.
 
She even pulled out one record, a Louie Armstrong recording, and placed it on the turntable.
 
He actually owned a turntable!
 
She plopped down in his wing chair and listened.
 
Armstrong, in his patented
Satchmo
voice, was singing about a wonderful world where there’s bright skies and beautiful birds and it suddenly wasn’t jive jazz anymore, but music.
 
Sweet music.
 
Mo’s music.
 
So she chilled and relaxed and grooved to the beat.

Her grooving stopped, however, when Mo’s front door was suddenly unlocked and before she could even stand up, a woman walked right on in.
 

Nikki could hardly believe it.
 
She knew she wasn’t a burglar, the fact that she had a key kind of proved that, but she still had no clue who she could be.

The woman, at first, seemed thrown by Nikki’s presence too.
 
Other the fact that she was African-American too, she seemed to be the polar opposite of Nikki.

“Hi,” she said in a friendly tone as she approached Nikki, although there was nothing joyous in her demeanor.
 
She was too busy checking Nikki out, looking her up and down as if she were assessing her, but only in a very different way than Mo often did.
 

“Good morning,” Nikki replied, assessing the woman, too.
 
She was one of those beautiful, busty, dark-skinned sisters with small, cat eyes and big hair, the perfect nose, mouth, ears, and body.
 
A very tall, voluptuous body.
 
The kind, Nikki noted with some degree of concern, that Lance said Mo was known to favor.
 

 
She was much older than Nikki, probably right around Mo’s age, but that was her attraction, too.
 
Because there was an elegance about her, a sophistication, as if she was old enough and experienced enough to know what pleased a man and, equally as important, what didn’t.

“I didn’t think Mo was at home.”

“He’s not at home,” Nikki said.
 
“May I help you?”

“The question is, may I help you?” The woman said this with what was supposed to be a humorous chuckle, although Nikki felt its sting.
 
“One of us is a guest in this house, and it certainly isn’t me.”
 
She extended her hand.
 
“I’m Myra,” she said, and Nikki shook her hand.

“I’m Nikki.”

“Nice to meet you, Nikki.
 
I didn’t know Mo had a . . . houseguest.
 
There was one in here, just last week matter of fact, and she was naked as a jaybird.”
 
She said this as she looked down at the shirt that Nikki wore.

“You’ve said your name but you haven’t said what it is that you wanted.”
 
Nikki felt odd asking this woman such a question, since she obviously belonged there far longer than Nikki had, but it was an odd situation to say the least.
 
She needed to know something.

But the woman behaved as if Nikki hadn’t asked her a thing.
 
“He certainly didn’t mention that there would be someone, especially someone so young, here,” Myra went on.
 
“Are you, by chance, one of his law clerks?
 
No?
 
I only ask it because you look rather young.”

“Who are you?” Nikki asked again.
 
“Are you in a relationship with Mo?” she asked pointblank.

Myra smiled.
 
“Well, we certainly aren’t strangers, if that’s what you mean.
 
“I’m . . . how shall I put this?
 
I’m a very, very close, very personal friend of Judge Ryan’s,” she said.
 
“He usually tells me when someone stays the night in his home, to avoid just this very scene.”
 
Then she looked at Nikki as if Nikki was more a threat to her than the other way around.
 
“But he didn’t tell me a thing about you.”

When Nikki didn’t respond to that, Myra went on.
 
“I do apologize.
 
You look rather stunned.
 
I certainly didn’t mean to startle you.
 
I didn’t mean to just barge in.”
 

Nikki didn’t respond to that, either.
 
What was she going to say?
 
Barge out?
 

“You know what, this is getting super-awkward.
 
I’ll just leave,” Myra said when Nikki’s obvious discomfort became grating.

But Nikki wasn’t about to stay a moment longer herself.
 
“No,” she said quickly.
 
“Let me get my things.
 
I’ll leave.”
 

She said this and hurried up the stairs.
 
Her heart was in her shoe.
 
She didn’t know what to think.
 
This Myra was being coy with her, insinuating that she and Mo had something going on.
 
Or, at least, that he had something going on with some other naked as a jaybird female who had spent the night with him just last week.
 
This Myra could have just been his friend, but she was quick to imply that they were much more than that.
 

Nikki pulled out her cell phone and called Mo’s chambers (she didn’t even have his cell phone number yet, she realized), but they would only dispatch her to his voice mail.
 
So getting it straight from him right at this moment didn’t appear to be a possibility.
 

But whatever this Myra woman was to Mo, Nikki wasn’t about to hang around to find out.
 
She took off his shirt and put on her own clothes.
 
She was devastated that there could be another woman on the horizon, and angry with herself for not realizing it was a possibility. What was she thinking?
 
Mo Ryan, with the snap of a finger, could easily command the companionship of beauty queens and models and sophisticated ladies like Myra galore, and here she was thinking that he wanted her.
 
He wanted her, she believed what he said to her earlier was true.
 
But maybe he wanted her, and the rest of his women, too.
 

She grabbed her hobo bag, slipped it on her shoulder, and headed down the stairs.
 
She wanted to cry but was too angry to cry.
 
This was love?
 
All of these goddamn seesaw emotions were love?
 
And Lance was getting on her case for her refusal to let some bastard take her through this crap day in and day out like some damn weather vane, swinging hot one minute, cold the next, all based on whatever way the wind was blowing?
 
Hell yeah she refused.
 
Who needed this?