Chapter 25 Hendrix
CHAPTER 25
HENDRIX
I ’m not inviting Maverick up. He’s not coming into my apartment. We’re saying goodnight right here in the car, and that’s it.
“Nightcap?” he asks.
“Sure,” I say unhesitatingly, shocking and kicking my own self in the ass. Before I can withdraw the offer, Maverick gets out on his side and quickly crosses around to open the door for me. I stare at his proffered hand like it’s a hissing snake instead of a polite way to assist a lady.
“I changed my mind,” I blurt. “Maybe we shouldn’t—”
“One drink,” Maverick says, grasping my hand and tugging until I get out of the car. When I step down, he doesn’t step back, and there’s little to no space separating us. The heat coming off our bodies is not just physiological, not generated from mere metabolism or circulation or the mechanics of keeping us alive. The air is alive between us. It breathes. It seethes. It has a pulse that pounds loud in my ears every second we stand too close.
“Uh, okay.” I’m still holding his hand and drop it like a live grenade. “One drink.”
I step around him and away from the Bentley SUV.
Which, by the way, is the most baller vehicle I’ve ever been in. I know it’s rented while he’s in Atlanta and doesn’t actually belong to Maverick, but this is indicative of how this man lives. As if the private box at the NBA playoffs, chartered plane, and Miami mansion didn’t already give it away. I’ve dated rich men before, but Maverick is a whole new level. But his bottom line is not even close to being the most attractive thing about him. I’ve never felt this connected, this drawn to a man before.
Can’t have him. Can’t have him. Can’t have him.
The reminder singsongs in my head as we take the elevator up to my apartment. The ride is quiet, the air charged but slick, dripping with desire, longing. Hell, I don’t know what to call it, but every molecule of my body is tuned to his. Magnetized. This has been building, not just all night, but since the moment we met at his party. I keep my eyes trained on the climbing numbers taking us to my place, even as I feel his stare boring into my profile. Fixed on me.
The ding of the elevator arriving at my floor and the doors opening jolt me into action.
“You know,” I say, turning to press my back against the door to my apartment, “it’s been a long night. I’m stuffed from all that food. Aren’t you stuffed? I’m thinking we skip the drink. Thanks for walking me up, but—”
“Hen.” He takes a step closer, sandwiching me between his body and the door. “Let me in. Ten minutes. Please.”
The air in my lungs gathers and hovers like a storm cloud, and I nearly choke on how bad I want to close those last few inches between us. To feel him go hard against me.
“Ten minutes,” I finally breathe out, resigned and knowing I’ll regret this. “One drink.”
As soon as we’re on the other side of the door, he takes my wrist and guides me to the couch. We sit side by side, and he holds my hand loosely in his.
I glance from our joined hands to the bar. “What about your drink?”
“I’m not wasting my ten minutes on liquor.” He leans forward a little, tilting his head to catch my eyes. “Let’s talk, Hen. Like really talk.”
“What do we need to talk about?”
“I have a dilemma, and I was hoping you could help me.”
My brows bunch, and I’m surprised by the direction of the conversation. “What’s the dilemma?”
“How do I get you to give me a chance? Knowing that the situation with Zere is potentially messy and awkward… How do I get you to give me a chance anyway?”
“You don’t,” I answer without missing a beat, eyes never leaving his to make sure he knows I mean this. “I’m not choosing you over my show.”
“I’m not asking you to choose me over the show. I want you to consider us and what that could look like, if it might be worth at least trying.”
“I barely know you.” As soon as the words hit the air they sound like a lie. There is a knowing between us that I try to ignore and disregard. “Yet you want me to give up a dream of mine for years?”
“I’m absolutely not asking you to give up anything for me.” He frowns, gently tightening his fingers around mine when I try to pull away. “I wouldn’t do that. I’m just asking if we could find a solution to this dilemma.”
“ Your dilemma.” I snatch my hand from his. “Not mine.”
“So you’re not attracted to me.” His brows lift. His words matter-of-fact.
“It’s irrelevant.”
I stand, and he does, too, bringing our bodies close again. He has a couple of inches on me, but I barely have to look up for our eyes and our lips to align. He grips my waist with one hand and threads his fingers with mine using the other. The look in his eyes intoxicates me. It’s a cocktail of affection and desire and impatience.
“Hen,” he says, leaning forward so his breath mists my lips. “You’re telling me something that fees like this is irrelevant?”
The intensity of emotion in his gaze blazes through my rationale and my reasons. I want to look away and hold on to the excuses I’ve been rehearsing of why this can never happen. The heat rising between our bodies melts everything except the centripetal force, impelling us to meet, to clash.
The kiss starts so quickly I’m not sure who initiates it. Maybe neither of us did consciously, but it explodes before I have time to prepare. Our mouths are open and desperate and searching. I wish I could say I’m not a willing participant, but that’s impossible since I’m sucking on his bottom lip and gripping his neck to pull him in deeper. He groans against my mouth, his hand roaming down my back, squeezing my waist. The plunging lash of his tongue over and over and over is a hungry rhythm I match lick for lick.
Without breaking the kiss, he guides us back and down to the couch, pulling me to straddle his lap. I follow without hesitation, whimpering at the feel of him, a hard column between my legs. Panting breaths mingle between our lips as I press down and he pushes up, a glorious grinding I have dreamed of more than one lonely night in my empty bed. Big hands slide from my waist down to squeeze my ass, then drag over my bare legs in long strokes. Layers of our clothing—the silk of panties, the roughness of denim—incinerate with the pace of our bodies twisting to find more friction. It shouldn’t feel this good, just the repetition of my hips moving over him, but wetness pools in my underwear and my muscles tighten. I hump him harder, faster, chasing that nirvana that only comes when—
“Shit.” I break our kiss to rest my forehead against his. “Mav, I’m gonna…”
My words are swallowed by a wave of pleasure swelling from the center of my body, and every thought is drowned. Every reason this isn’t a good idea, capsized in the torrent of this thing I can’t deny. I lower my head to his neck, hiding my face as my body quakes with release.
He grabs and lifts my chin, trapping my gaze with his.
“Show me,” he says, his voice harsh, edged with his own desperation. “Look me in my eyes when you come for me.”
And I do. I don’t look away as the pleasure crests and crashes over me, wresting a moan from my throat and tremors from my body. Never removing one article of clothing, looking into his eyes this way, I’m completely exposed, my desire undeniable and on full display. But I’m not alone. An almost-pained grimace twists his even features as he struggles for control. Harsh breaths push past his lips. He doesn’t avert his stare. He shows me everything—the desire and the restraint required not to take me. It makes me want him more.
He clasps my neck and brings my head down so our lips crash. I know I should pull away, but my arms slip over his shoulders and I cup his head in my trembling hands, deep diving into the kiss. I meet him stroke for stroke, my tongue seeking his and exploring the lining of his mouth for any spot I might have missed.
I don’t know how long the kiss would have lasted if he didn’t slide his hands down so his thumbs frame my neck, pressing against the frantic pulse before he tears his lips away with obvious reluctance. The rough pad of his thumb caresses my bottom lip. With his finger he nudges my chin up so our eyes meet, his somehow already possessive even though I haven’t given him anything yet. He tugs one of the braids resting on my shoulder and runs the back of his hand over my cheek.
“Now about my dilemma,” he says, his voice controlled even over his ragged breaths.
I could easily assume with that comment he’s making light of the situation since I obviously caved and orgasmed all over his lap, but his expression remains unsmiling. I scoot back and off him to stand. Composure shaken, I stride over to the bar and reach for a bottle of tequila.
Yeah, it’s like that.
“You want something?” I toss the words over my shoulder as I pour myself a shot, the best I can do on such short notice.
“You know what I want.”
I still, the shot glass trembling in my unsteady hands. I set the glass and the bottle down and close my eyes.
“I’m not doing this,” I grit out, refusing to look at him lest I mount him again and go grinding for round two. “I’ve seen women make this mistake too many times. Choose good dick right now over what’s best for them in the long run.”
“You haven’t even tried it yet,” he says, some degree of levity finally threading through his voice. “How do you know it’s good?”
“Don’t.” I turn to face him and shove my hands in my pockets. “Don’t play with me right now.”
“The way I want you,” he says, the tiny trace of humor disintegrating. “What I want with you—that shit’s serious. I’m not playing, Hen.”
“Do you think Zere will work with me on this show if we start…” I gesture toward the sectional, the scene of our hunching crime. “Doing that? It’s not just me to consider. Chapel deserves this chance.”
“And do you think Zere is the only way you can get a TV show made?” He stands and walks over to me, his gait confident and powerful.
“What do you want?” he asks, stopping in front of me, cupping my face and holding my eyes. “I’ll get it for you.”
I jerk away, his words like a bucket of cold water on my overheated body.
“Why do I need you to get something for me I’m already doing for myself?” I snap. “What? I bet everything on you ? Fuck you for a few months till you’re bored and off to the next supermodel, meanwhile I’ve ruined something I actually worked for and earned on my own?”
“I didn’t mean it like that.” He rubs a hand over the back of his neck and blows his frustration out on an extended breath. “I shouldn’t have made it sound like… I respect your work and your choices, Hendrix.”
“I like Zere. When a lot of people would have written Chapel off for her differences, she saw her light the way I do. We both believe in her and think this show could do something really special, that women out there who haven’t been affirmed will see themselves on-screen as beautiful and worthy when they see Chapel. Zere and I share a vision for that. I want to do this show with her .”
“Zere’s amazing. I never said she wasn’t, and I think she’d be the perfect partner, but she shouldn’t be able to dictate your private life.”
“Not even when my ‘private life’ is with the man she’s still in love with?”
“She’s not,” he scoffs. “We broke up a full month before that party in Miami.”
“What?” I do math in my head, retabulating everything I thought I knew about their history. I suspected they’d broken up before the press release, of course, but a full month?
“Yeah, and things had been falling apart for a long time before that,” Maverick presses on. “Because we fundamentally wanted different things and came to a fork in the road. We couldn’t escape that reality anymore.”
“Just because she chose having a family over having you doesn’t mean she’s over you or that she’d be okay with us seeing each other.”
“How will you know if we don’t even ask?” He caresses my cheek, his touch firm and gentle on my skin.
I jerk back, afraid that if I allow even that simple touch, it won’t stop there.
“As soon as I ask, everything changes, Mav.” I shake my head. “No, it breaks girl code.”
“You’re a grown-ass woman, Hendrix, not a girl. And isn’t girl code for friends? I’ve known Zere for years, and I’d never heard your name before that party. You are, at best, business associates beginning a friendship.”
“You think those technicalities will make a difference when it comes down to it?”
“She was out with some other dude just days ago. She’s moved on. I’m ready to move on,” he says. “Look, I didn’t think I’d want this again, a relationship yet, but I met you. That changed everything.”
Hearing that makes me want to melt, but I steel myself against his arguments and the emotions. There was a tiny part of me that dared to hope when I saw Zere dating again, but I’m not convinced it will make a difference. And I don’t think I could blame her if she objected to me starting with her ex. I’d probably feel the same way in her position.
“I really didn’t mean to sound like some sugar daddy who thinks he can buy your way into television.” There is self-deprecation in the twist of his lips and his sigh. “I know you’d never look for that. I respect what you’re doing. Hell, why do you think I want you? Besides being gorgeous, you’re brilliant and generous and principled and industrious.”
This man could talk me into my own bed if I let him. It would probably be the best sex of my life. He would probably be the best at many things, only making it harder to walk away when I need to. And walking away from a man, putting my needs first, has never been a problem for me. I won’t start now.
I walk briskly to the door and open it wide.
“There are plenty of other women who are all those things,” I say, nodding toward the empty hall. “I’m sure one of them will be more than happy to fuck you and let you buy them a career in television ’cause it won’t be me.”
“Hendrix, don’t—”
“Do you not see this door standing wide-open?” I firm my mouth, still swollen from his kisses. “Your ten minutes have been up.”
He walks over, stopping directly in front of me, frustration and something like longing in his stare. “If you don’t give us a chance, then how can you—”
“I don’t think we should talk anymore. Skipper and Bolt can handle correspondence for Aspire, if you ever did actually want to invest.” I narrow my eyes, one hand going to my hip. “Or was that just another way you thought you could ‘help’ meet my goals on the road to fucking me?”
He flinches, but smooths his features out, molds them into the mask he shows the world. “That’s really not fair and I think you know it.”
He leans toward me, and I stiffen but don’t push him away. He dips until his lips brush my ear with a whisper, sending shivers skittering down my spine.
“You know it’s real, Hendrix, and if you think anything you’ve said has changed my mind about us, I’m sorry to disappoint you.”
He drops a quick kiss on my mouth and draws back, resting a finger on my lips before I can voice any protest. He surprises me with a genuine smile, something like anticipation in his eyes. “Because I’m just getting started.”