A Forever Kind of Love (Kimani Romance) (12 page)

The climax that had started building within her blood erupted with a ferocity that had her screaming toward the sky.

Corey captured her by the waist before she could collapse and laid her onto the soaked bed of soft grass. With a satisfied smile on those incredibly talented lips, he grabbed the condom she’d dropped and ripped it open. After covering himself with the latex, he spread her legs apart and entered her with one long, deep, decadent stroke.

Mya’s world exploded. Everything ceased to exist, except for this one man who had stolen her heart so many years ago. As he moved with deliberate slowness, driving his hard flesh deeper into her with every thrust, she closed her eyes and melted into the moment. She didn’t need anything else. Only Corey, loving her body the way no other man ever could.

Mya wrapped her legs around his back and locked him on top of her, her hands gripping his rain-slicked shoulders. She sank her fingers into his flesh as he started to pump faster.

He emitted a clipped, low grunt with each thrust, rocking into her body, setting her entire world on fire. Mya clung to him, savoring every delicious slide of his hard flesh inside of her.

The sensation that started as a small kernel in her belly sprouted into the most intense, magnificent orgasm her body had ever experienced. Corey continued to plunge into her, quickening his thrusts, wrenching another skin-tingling climax from her just moments after the first.

Mya collapsed onto the grass, her body humming with the kind of satisfaction she had not felt in fifteen years.

“Oh, God,” she sighed. She stared up at Corey, a slow smile pulling at her lips. “That was better than I remembered.”

* * *

Corey burrowed his head into the pillow, wanting nothing more than to stay tangled in these sheets with Mya for the rest of the morning. He reached his hand out in search of her warm skin, but came up with nothing but cool, silk sheets.

What the...?

He sprang up from the bed, tossing the pillows and sheets onto the floor. He looked around the room, a sense of foreboding washing over him as he searched the bathroom, then ventured downstairs.

Empty. The entire house was empty. Mya had actually left him in bed.

The elegant string of curses that tore forth from him was reminiscent of his ballplaying days, but the ire stirring in his gut right now was ten times worse than anything he’d felt after a bad call by an umpire. How in the hell could she leave him? After everything that had passed between them last night?

Corey went to the laundry room and snatched clothes from the dryer. He violently jammed his arms into a clean T-shirt and pulled on a pair of worn jeans. He shoved his feet into his tennis shoes, then grabbed his keys from where he’d tossed them on the kitchen counter.

As he backed out of the driveway, he eyed the massive magnolia tree in his backyard and his stomach clenched in remembrance of all they had done underneath those branches. If he could, he would have the damn thing bronzed.

He turned out of his driveway and headed for the Dubois house.

Ten minutes later, Corey pulled up to the wooden fence surrounding Eloise Dubois’s yard. His chest tightened at the sight of Mya. She was hanging sheets on the clothesline that stretched across the side yard, just beyond the vegetable garden.

She jumped when he closed his car door, and spun around. Standing with a flowered sheet folded over her arm, guilt was written all over her face as he approached.

“Hi,” she said.

“That’s it?” Corey asked.

“Corey, let’s not do this.”

“After what we did last night you had better believe we’re doing this. Mya, if you think I’m going to let you stand there and tell me last night meant nothing, you’re crazy.”

“I didn’t say that it meant nothing, but don’t make it out to mean any more than it did, either. We had sex. Fine. It’s not as if we haven’t done that before. But now that we’ve gotten it out of our systems, we need to just go back to working on the celebration.”

“I haven’t gotten you out of my system, and I don’t plan to,” he said.

“Corey, please.” She let out a tired sigh and kneaded the bridge of her nose. He captured her arm, forcing her to drop the sheet. “Goodness! What!” she shouted, jerking her arm away.

“Why is it so hard for you to say it, Mya?”

“What, Corey? What do you want me to say?”

“That you still have feelings for me. And not the kind of feelings one night of sex will take care of. It’s more than that. I can feel it. I felt it last night.”

Her eyes closed again. Corey tried not to be offended by the anguish that was evident on her face, but it wasn’t easy. Why in the hell was this so difficult for her to accept? They were good together. They always had been. If not for his one indiscretion all those years ago, who knows where he and Mya would be today?

One thing he did know, he was not letting her slip away so easily this time. He’d made that mistake once, and it had cost him fifteen years of living without the woman he loved. He didn’t want to lose another second.

Corey captured both her wrists and pulled her close, pressing a light kiss on the back of her hand.

“I’ve loved you more than half my life, Mya. I know you think that’s crazy since it seems like a lifetime since we’ve seen each other, but it doesn’t change the way I’ve felt about you all these years. No one has ever measured up to you. Not even close.”

Her bottom lip trembled, and she pulled it between her teeth. When she spoke, her voice cracked with emotion. “Corey, what do you want from me?”

“I want you to give this a chance, Mya. Give
us
a chance. I don’t want just one night with you.”

“I’m not sure I can give you more than that,” she answered.

Corey’s shoulders sank. Why was she so hardheaded?

“I need to finish this,” she said, stooping low to pick up another sheet. “And I promised Aunt Mo I would help her sew the skirting for the main stage, so I won’t be able to come with you to New Orleans to listen to that band tonight.”

“Is this how it’s going to be?” he asked.

She didn’t say anything else, just resumed clipping the sheet on the line with the old-fashioned wooden clothespins.

Corey stood there for a moment with his hands on his hips, astounded that one woman could possess such stubbornness. He knew better than to press her. She would only close herself off even more.

He bit back a curse as he turned and headed back to his SUV. He sat behind the wheel for several long moments, just staring at her, knowing it made her uncomfortable.

Good. He wanted her rattled—more than she already was.

He could think of only one reason for her to have sneaked out of his bed the way she had this morning: she had been just as blown away at what they’d shared as he had been. The bond between him and Mya had always been powerful, but last night had been...otherworldly. It was too potent to deny. But she was trying, and Corey knew her well enough to know she would only try harder.

The clock was ticking. Gauthier’s anniversary celebration was only two weeks away and he could sense that she was planning to head back to New York as soon as it was over. Corey didn’t know how he would do it, but he was going to get through to Mya before it was too late.

Chapter 10

“O
ne strawberry daiquiri with an extra shot of rum,” Phylicia said as she placed a bowl-shaped wineglass in front of Mya. She poured the remaining slushy mixture into another wineglass, hitting the side of the blender until every drop came tumbling out.

“I think you’ve got it all.” Mya chuckled.

Phil peered into the empty pitcher. “Just making sure. After the week I’ve had I can use whatever form of relaxation I can get.”

“Why? What’s going on?”

“Nothing I’m going to bore you with, especially when I know we’ve got much more interesting things to talk about.”

“You mean the plans for the anniversary celebration?” Mya asked with a sarcastic grunt. She knew exactly what Phil wanted to talk about, but Mya wasn’t up for it. She’d spent much of the day trying to push Corey Anderson and his amazing sexual skills out of her mind.

Phylicia gave her the evil eye, something she was notoriously good at. “Start talking.”

“You picked me up from his house this morning, Phil. There’s not much else to say.”

“Mya Eloise Dubois, if you don’t start talking right now, I am marching straight to your grandmother’s and telling her what you and Corey used to do in her house when she and your grandpa would drive to town.”

She cut her eyes at Phil. “You so do not play fair.”

“I never claimed to. Now spill,” Phylicia said, scooting onto the bar stool in the modern kitchen/living/dining area that Mya would never have imagined her best friend living in. For someone whose entire life revolved around restoring historic homes, Phylicia’s modest cookie-cutter house was a downright contradiction. The first time Mya had walked through the door, her jaw had literally dropped open.

Mya glanced over at the one person she’d shared almost every secret and dream with and knew she wouldn’t be able to hold anything back. Problem was she didn’t know where to start.

Actually, knowing Phil, she
did
know where to start.

“The sex was great,” she opened with. “Seriously,
seriously
great.”

“I’ll bet.” Phil smiled as she took a sip of her frozen daiquiri. “I won’t make you go into detail because we’re grown-ups now. Unless, of course, you want to.”

Mya rolled her eyes.

“Okay, okay.” Phil held up her hands. “So, now that we’ve established that the sex was great, why exactly did you call me at the butt crack of dawn to come and pick you up from his house?”

“Because, Phil.” Mya shoved an agitated hand through her springy curls and massaged her scalp. The persistent throb that had been hounding her since she’d crept out of Corey’s bed like some thief in the night continued to pound.

“I can’t go there again with Corey,” she continued. “What we had ended a long time ago. I’m a completely different person. So is he.”

“So, how do
those
two people feel about each other?”

“What?” Mya asked.

“You just said that you’re both two completely different people than you were back in high school. So, as two single adults, how—other than being sexually attracted to each other—do you two feel about each other?”

Mya’s eyelids slid shut. She tried to deny the admission she was about to make, but she knew she couldn’t. Not after last night.

“I think I’m falling in love with him all over again,” she said. She waited for Phil’s response, but all she heard was the sound of the stool scraping on the ceramic floor. She opened her eyes to find Phil reaching inside a kitchen cabinet. “What are you doing?”

“Getting the shot glasses,” Phylicia called over her shoulder. “This calls for some serious reinforcements. You want to stick with the rum or should I pull out the bourbon?”

“The rum is fine,” Mya said.

They brought the half-f daiquiris, along with the bottle of rum and the shot glasses, into the living room and settled on the sofa. Yet both of their shot glasses remained dry as Mya poured her heart out to her best friend.

“I just don’t know what to do, Phil. I mean, really, who does this?”

“Does what?”

“Carry a torch for the same boy for fifteen years.”

“Give yourself a break, Mya. It’s not as if you and Corey had some passing fling in high school. You two loved each other more than half the married couples I know. I was jealous as hell of what you two had back then. And, to be honest, I’m not the least bit surprised that you and Corey have landed right back here. If there are any two people who were meant to be together, it’s you two.”

Mya stared at Phylicia with blanket confusion on her face. “Who are you and what have you done with my best friend?”

Phil flipped her off. “I may not always show it, but I’m still a romantic at heart,” she said. “Seriously, Mya, there has always been something special between you and Corey.”

Mya cradled her forehead in her hand. “I know.” She sighed. “That’s what scares me the most. It feels as if I’m right back where I started.” She shook her head at the ridiculousness of it. “Here I am, thirty-two years old and still pining for Corey.”

“What are you going to do about it?”

“I don’t know,” Mya admitted. “It’s not as if I can drop everything and move back to Gauthier. My life is in New York.” Mya shoved her hand in her hair. “God, why am I even talking about this? It was one night. It’s so typical of me to make things out to be bigger than they really are. I need to be more like you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Phil asked with an affronted frown.

“You know what I mean. You never got all emotional and stuff over guys.”

“That’s because they avoided me like head lice. Are you forgetting the hours you spent in my bedroom while I moped about some loser who wouldn’t give me the time of day?”

Mya reached over and captured Phil’s hand. “You didn’t have the easiest time when it came to dating. But, from what I hear, now the opposite is true. Aunt Mo said you’re the queen of playing hard-to-get.”

A smile curled up the side of Phil’s mouth. “I do get evil pleasure at turning them down. Do you know Roddy Palmer had the nerve to ask me to dinner a few weeks ago, as if he doesn’t remember standing me up for the senior prom? I waited until he made reservations and everything before turning him down.”

“Phylicia Phillips. When did you become such a tease?”

“It’s something I’ve perfected over the years,” Phil said. They both looked at each other and burst out laughing. Phil squeezed her hand. “I’ve missed you, Mya. It’s been too long since we’ve done this.”

A lump of guilt formed in Mya’s throat at the longing she heard in her friend’s voice.

“The phone calls and emails are nice and all, but it doesn’t compare to having my best friend here with me,” Phil continued. “Promise you won’t stay away this long again.”

“I won’t. Promise.”

They spent the next hour catching up. Phil pressed Mya for behind-the-scenes drama on the Broadway productions she had worked on for the past year, but Mya was more interested in learning about some of the houses Phylicia had helped to restore. Her friend’s work was starting to gain national attention in the world of home restoration.

“I can’t believe how much you’ve expanded your dad’s business,” Mya said.

Phil grimaced. “He’s probably turning in his grave,” she said as she reached for the bottle of rum and poured two fingers into her shot glass.

“Why would you say that?”

“Dad was not on board with my expansion ideas. He was content with working on the little fixer-uppers here in Gauthier. We had a huge fight about it just before he died.”

Mya reached over and put a hand on her friend’s shoulder. One of her biggest regrets was not coming back to Gauthier to attend Phil’s father’s funeral.

“I’ve never seen a man who doted on his daughter as much as your dad doted on you. Don’t worry about some silly little fight. I know he’s proud of what you’ve accomplished these past couple of years.”

Phil sent her a strained, sad smile, and Mya’s heart constricted even more. There was a pain in her friend’s eyes that worried her.

“Well,” Phil said, pushing up from the sofa, “now that we’ve officially turned this fun girls’ night into a crying fest, I say we go all the way.” She walked over to a beautiful mahogany cabinet that Mya had no doubts was once a resident of a junkyard before Phil got her hands on it. She opened it to reveal shelves lined with DVDs. She pulled out two slim cases and held them up.

“
Beaches
or
Steel Magnolias?
” Phil asked.

Mya expelled a wistful sigh as she pointed to the DVD in Phil’s left hand. “Let’s start with Bette Midler. I’ll get the tissues.”

“And I’ll get more liquor,” Phil said.

* * *

Mya carried the bushel of green beans up the steps and set it on the folding table she’d set up on the back porch. She dragged the trash can from the kitchen and positioned it at the edge of the table.

As if they had sensed that she was ready, Aunt Mo’s car pulled into the yard and her aunt and grandmother both exited the car. Grandma’s hair bore the perfectly coiffed evidence of her weekly visit to Claudette’s. Mya started to help her up the steps, but the look Grandma shot her had Mya snatching her hand back.

“I’ll be out to help you with these beans in a minute,” her grandmother said.

Maureen carried a brown grocery bag from the car.

“Is there more?” Mya asked.

“Nope, this is it,” Maureen said as she ascended the back porch steps. Moments later she was walking down the steps, sans bag. “I need to get back to work. I’m already twenty minutes past the end of my lunch break.”

Her grandmother walked out onto the porch carrying two glasses of iced tea. “Did she say that I made her late?” her grandmother asked, gesturing toward Maureen’s car as it backed out of the yard.

“Not specifically,” Mya said.

“Good, because I didn’t make her late. She was the one who couldn’t stop running her mouth in Claudette’s shop. She and Claudette are like oil and water.”

Mya grinned at the mental picture. She sat at the table, and together she and her grandmother started snapping the edges off the beans. They put the stalks in a huge, dented stainless-steel bowl that Mya remembered from her childhood.

“It’s been a long time since I did this,” Mya remarked.

“To tell you the truth, it’s been a while since I did it, too. Once your grandfather retired, he took over all the canning and preserving. I used to call him Martha Stewart the Second.”

“I can’t even fathom it,” Mya laughed.

“Oh, yes, honey. He would tie my apron around his waist and spend all day in front of the stove, heating the mason jars, filling them with brine, soaking them.”

“Sorry I missed seeing that,” Mya said.

“So am I,” her grandmother replied.

The sad smile on her face caused Mya’s heart to twist with guilt. She dropped the beans and reached for her grandmother’s hand.

“I’m so sorry I stayed away for so long.” Her voice broke, riddled with shame and remorse. “I honestly thought it was okay since I would fly you guys up to New York, but now I realize it wasn’t the same.”

“No, it was not,” her grandmother said. “For a long time, I thought we had done something wrong. I know Elizabeth was always ashamed of us.”

“No. Never,” Mya said, shaking her head with such vehemence that the clip holding up her curls sprang free and dropped to the porch floor. “I have never been ashamed. You and Granddad gave me everything I could ever ask for, and I love you both so much for that. I am so sorry that you ever felt that way.

“I didn’t leave Gauthier because of anything either of you did. I just...I wanted more,” she said. “I love my life in New York, but I am sorry for not coming home more often.”

Her grandmother placed a palm against Mya’s cheek. “It’s good to have you home.”

Mya covered her hand and pressed her cheek more firmly against it. She couldn’t staunch the flow of tears that started down her face. When she saw the telltale glistening in her grandmother’s eyes, it just made her tears fall harder.

“Just look at us,” her grandmother said. “Your grandfather is probably having a good laugh at the way we’re carrying on.”

“Knowing Granddad, he’s shaking his head and muttering something about ‘women’ and ‘emotional crap’ under his breath.” Mya sniffed.

“Well, he would be right this time.”

They wiped their faces with a dishcloth and resumed snapping. Before long, the bowl was overflowing with fresh green beans.

“Did Aunt Mo remember to buy the brining salt?” Mya asked.

“I hope she did,” Grandma said. “I’ll check. Why don’t you go in the shed and get the double boiler.”

Mya went into the wooden storage shed behind the house and found the huge pot in the same place it had occupied for as long as she could remember. She grabbed the pot, along with the rack for canning.

“She didn’t forget the salt,” her grandmother announced as Mya mounted the steps.

“Good. I’ll start boiling the water.”

“Looks like we’ve got company,” her grandmother said, motioning toward the road. Mya twisted around. A silver two-door Mercedes coupe pulled into the graveled driveway.

“Who’s that?” she asked. She got her answer a second later when the door opened and Corey alighted from the car. He waved at them.

“Oh, great,” she muttered. Mya pushed past her grandmother and went into the house. She pulled in several deep breaths as she tried to collect herself.

She’d managed to avoid Corey the entire week, preparation for the quickly approaching anniversary celebration providing the perfect excuse. She’d crisscrossed the town and made the hour-long trip to New Orleans twice this week, making sure her errand running didn’t start until just before the high school let out for the day. But today was Friday, and Corey was off for the rest of the weekend. She knew her time had run out.

She shored up her defenses and headed for the back porch. Corey sat in the chair she’d left unoccupied, snapping the ends off of string beans as if he’d been doing so his entire life. Mya stopped just inside the opened kitchen door and leaned against the doorjamb, marveling at the absurdity of her grandmother and Corey Anderson shooting the breeze like a couple of old friends.