Dinner with the Blakemores (The Blakemore Files Book 5) (9 page)

Why am I here?

What am I doing?

I shouldn’t be here
.

These words danced about Ryanne’s head as she stepped off the elevator onto the fourth floor of the Carriage Suites.  She sent a text message to Eddie.

I am here
.

Her stride was slow as she walked down the corridor, her coat buttoned up to the collar.  The footfalls on the thick carpet could barely be heard as she read the room numbers.  The courage she had getting out of the car had all but left her when her phone pinged.

The door is open.

Just like that.  She was about to cross over a threshold of no return. Out of habit and good parenting, she tapped lightly at the door of room 427, before pushing it open to let herself inside.  Uncertain of what to expect, he was standing by the window, drinking a glass of ice water. Eddie wore no shoes, a pair of black jeans, and a red shirt held together with one button at the center.  His jet black hair was damp and slicked back on his head.

The smile he gave her made her feel at ease. “Good evening,” he said to her. “Please lock the door.”

Ryanne turned the bolt to secure the door.  A deep inhalation was taken as she turned back around to find him still standing at the window.  His movements to her were slow. “Let me take your coat,” he said.

She unbuttoned her favorite coat to hand it to him, and he stood for a moment to snap a mental photo of her.  The pretty blue dress she wore was flattering to her figure. It was classy, like the lady.  Eddie’s hands went to her hair and pulled out the pins she used to wear it up off her shoulders.  It fell loosely about her neck in thick coils. Ryanne’s breathing was uneasy.

“That is a lovely frock,” he said to her, his hand slipping into hers as he walked her over to the couch.  It was not a big suite, but large enough. Once she was seated, he made her a glass of ice water, more ice than water, giving it to her as he grabbed his guitar before sitting on the bed.

“I’m not thirsty,” she told him.

“It is for later,” he said with a grin.

Eddie leaned against the pillows as he strummed a soft tune on the guitar.  A beautiful tenor voice came from lips barely moving.  It was a sultry song, of a lover who was misunderstood.  The more he sang, the deeper she was drawn in the words.  Into him. Into this world he was creating for just the two of them to exist.  He sang the last line, strummed the last chord as his eyes came up to meet hers.

Ryanne, suddenly dry mouthed, turned up the glass of water and downed it.  “Was that supposed to seduce me?” she wanted to know.

“I don’t know.  Did it?” he asked.

“Yes.  Yes it did,” she said.  She sat the glass on the table and moved towards him on the bed.

Eddie leaned the guitar against the side of the nightstand as he rose to meet her.  Instead of embracing the body which was calling to him, he turned her around and unzipped her dress.  Steady fingers pushed away the fabric and he was surprised to see she wore a slip underneath.
A good girl
.
Ryanne is a good girl
. He said it twice as a reminder of what type of woman he was taking to his bed.

The dress removed, he pulled the slip over her head to find a matching set of tidy white underwear.  “I was wrong, Ryanne.  You make these look so sexy,” he said to her.

She didn’t need any flashy red undies or a thong that ran a piece of floss up her butt crack. In plain white cotton undies, Eduardo was more turned on than he had been by any woman in a very long time. There was something so pure about her, even in giving herself to him, he knew she was doing it out of pain and grief.  Grief that he had caused her.  He could not make it right, but he could make this night for her something special.

“Eddie, I don’t know why I am here really.  I know I shouldn’t be …” she said to him, her hands on his chest.

“You know why you are here, Ryanne, and so do I.  Even if it is just for a night, a week, a month, this is about you, about us,” Eddie told her, his thumb caressing her cheek.

“Undress me, Ryanne,” he commanded.

Shaky hands undid the button that was holding the shirt closed.  Fingers that were also shaking slid the fabric from his shoulders as the serpent head on his chest stared at her. The red eyes almost glowed like rubies in the moonlight. She reached for his belt buckle, his arousal jutting right. 
He is left handed
. She shook her head to knock away the other arbitrary thoughts that kept popping into her mind as his pants fell down around his ankles. 
He is not wearing underwear
.  Eddie stood before her bare, open and vulnerable.

“Look at me, Ryanne.  See me as I truly am.  I need for you to see me,” Eduardo said.  There was some other meaning in his words, which reached out to her heart.

He was beautiful.  The serpent’s head was only the beginning of the snake.  Each scale that was etched into his skin made the snake appear to move as the tattooed serpent coiled around his body.  An undigested meal sat in the middle of the snake, right above his left butt cheek, as the remainder of the snake’s body wrapped around his right leg. The tail of the snake was on the top of his foot.

“I see you, Eddie,” she said as she pulled the man into her arms.  She held him close, feeling the warmth of his skin against her own. She repeated his words, “Even if it is just for a night, a week, a month, this is about you, about us….” She tiptoed a little so that her lips could reach his.  Eduardo was hungry for companionship as his mouth devoured hers, his tongue flicking in and out of her mouth. His arms wrapped around her body, squeezing her tighter each time she exhaled. Hot lips trailed down her face to her neck as his teeth sank into the delicate skin, giving her just a nip with his teeth. She moaned as she leaned into him.

Ryanne Trodat Dobbins was an amazing woman. A nurturer.  A giver.  A woman with a loving heart.  She was not a one-night stand. Eduardo had made a calculated risk and he was losing.

He could see himself loving Ryanne.  It was something he could not afford, but it was too late.  From the moment he met her, he wanted this time alone with this woman. He made love to her slowly, without hurry, as if he needed his body to remember every second in her love. She cried when she found her pleasure and he understood.  He nearly cried when he found his own. The tenderness of the connection was not lost on him.

Somewhere in the middle of the night, they connected twice more, each time with the same force, the tender finish, and the missing pieces they both desired in their lives. Eduardo knew he was in trouble because Ryanne had weakened him, but there was still somethings he had to get done before he boarded his plane back to Colombia. He held her close as they slept, her legs intertwined in his own.

In her arms he felt needed.

She needed him.

This is something he would never have again unless she was a forgiving sort. He frowned in the darkness thinking about the last guy who had disappointed her.  Him, she shot. In the nuts.
What would she do to me once this is all over
?

He could not afford her forgiveness, nor another night like tonight. He wanted her for himself. Even as he held her, he wanted this for himself every evening when he ended his daily tasks.

He knew it would not work, because at the end of the day, he was still a snake.

Saxton was sprawled out on the bed butt naked counting his fingers. Odessa walked into the room and he gave her a gigantic grin.

“Saxton … have you been drinking?” she asked him.  He made an attempt to sit up but plopped back down on the bed.

“Yessssss,” he slurred.

He made a second attempt to sit up, failing again.  This was disappointing to her because she needed to tell him about the man in the store. The uneasy feeling that had been hounding her was not going away.  Ryanne’s melt down along with her sudden disappearance in Lucy’s Caddy did not help the matter either.  She was about to talk to her father, but he’d had a couple of cups of whatever Saxton had imbibed and was stumbling from the elevator.  Evidently, it was too much to try walking with his bad hip and the cane, so Big Sarge cursed out the cane, threw it on the floor, and began to crawl down the hallway. For the second time in two days, she saw her daddy cry. Each time his elbow made contact with the floor, he wailed like a frustrated toddler unable to have his way.

“Dora … baby … come get me,” he called out like a wounded soldier on the battlefield.  “I don’t think I’m going to make it.” His hand was held out in the air like he was reaching for the last Huey flying out of the rice patties in Nam.

“Get your drunk ass up off that floor, man, I can’t carry you,” Dora told him, her hands on her hips as she stood in the doorway watching him low crawl down the hall.

“You don’t leave a soldier behind woman!”

“No, but I am going to leave your behind on that floor,” she told him.

He rolled over to his back like a dead cockroach, his legs in the air as he held his belly. Big Sarge moaned in the air, “Dora.  I love you.”  He passed gas, dropped his legs, and fell asleep.

Odessa called to her mother, “Mama, you need some help with him?”

Dora’s hands were still on her hips. “You have your own issues to handle on that end of the hall.  I had to make your naked ass husband go into his own room.  He came down here wanting to talk to me … naked!  What the hell did they drink?”

She didn’t know.  What she did know was that her sister was out there somewhere grieving, and Saxton Blakemore was drunker than Cooter Woods on a Saturday night. He was calling her.

“Odessa!  Odessa! ‘Dessa … O … ’Dessa.” She stepped back into the room.

“Yes, Saxton,” she responded.

He was still playing with his fingers.  “Hey, baby.  When I hold my hands like this….” He forgot what he was going to say.

“Saxton … are you drunk?” she asked just to make sure he wasn’t high on something else.

“Hell yesssssss, I am.  Daddy had some 120 year old Scotch that was 42 proof,” he said.  “Wait, scratch that … the other way around. The Scotch was 42 years old … and 120 proof,” he told her. He lay there looking at her with pride for getting it right, like he had accomplished an amazing feat.

A deep voice could be heard in the hallway, whispering, “Blakemore … Blakemore, where you at?”

Saxton rolled to his belly on the bed, his finger and thumb aimed like a gun. “Get down, baby!” He tried to roll to sit up again and failed. “Odessa, make this damned bed stop spinning so I can cover you!”

Odessa ignored him as she opened the bedroom door.  She spotted Agent Roget tiptoeing down the hall, whispering into a keyhole, “Blakemore … you in there?”

“Agent Roget, he is over here,” she said loudly.

The big man popped upright, like he had been caught red-handed, but he too was drunk and started to teeter. Odessa reached out her hand to steady him, careful to stand to the side in case he fell.  She didn’t want him to fall on top of her. “Are you looking for Saxton?”

“I am,” he told her, trying to look dignified, but failing.

She pointed at the bed. “He’s in here.”

“Blakemore, we have a problem,” Roget said as he wobbled across the hall.  One look in the room, and the big guy started stumbling backwards. “He is nekkid! Why is he nekkid, Ms. ‘Dessa? Why are you nekkid, Saxton?”

“My clothes were hot!” he yelled at Roget.

“Blakemore, I need your help, man,” Roget said.

Odessa was completely over this nonsense.  “Agent Roget, go to your room!”  She pointed down the hall.

“That’s the problem, Ms. ‘Dessa.  I am lost.  I don’t know where the hell my room is … this is a big ass house,” he told her as he looked over her shoulder at Saxton.  His eyes got wide as he yelled at his friend. “Man, cut that out!”

Odessa turned to find Saxton with little Saxton in his hand.

He picked it up and it flopped.

He picked it up and it flopped again.

He grabbed at it one more time, a scared look covering his face. “Odessa, I think he is drunk, too! He may need mouth to mouth to resuscitate him!” He told her with an uncharacteristic giggle.

“Oh My Ghhherrrrrrrrd!” she exclaimed as she spotted Belva come up the stairs.  Odessa held up her hands to stop his sister from coming into the room. “Saxton is naked and playing with himself.”

Belva only shrugged. “Well, some things never change.”  She looked down the hall to see Big Sarge sleeping on the floor. “I should have known they had gotten into the Scotch when Uncle Dusty came into the baby shower with his boots off, wiggling that deformed big toe at the ladies.”

Roget spoke up. “Yeah, what was up with that?  His toe looked like a deformed penis.”

Belva sighed as she looked at Roget, trying to hold up the wall. She told Odessa, “I got this. Come on with me, big guy.”  She put her arm around the agent and helped him the other side of the hall.  “You are staying in my wing.”

Agent Roget didn’t care. He had been staring at Saxton’s sister since he arrived.  She was a very attractive woman. “You’re pretty,” he told her. “You smell like flowers covered in dew on a fairies nose.”

“That’s nice,” she said.  Belva guided him past the stairs. “So, Marecus … is that an African name?”

“Why do y’all white folks keep asking me that?” he said as she aided him into a room.

Saxton was splayed out on the bed.  At least he didn’t still have his junk in his hands.  He’d somehow managed to roll over twice and show her his bum. “Odessa, is my ass still there?  I can’t feel it….”

This was all too much.  She decided instead of taking a chance with her drunk husband, she would go and sleep in the room Ryanne was in. At least when her sister came back, they could talk. 

Ryanne’s room wasn’t empty.  Instead, she found her brother resting there.  Face down in the bed. Also butt naked.

“Oh My Ghhherrrrrrrrd!” she yelled.

This was insane.  But Thanksgiving was about to get worse.

It was going to get a hell of a lot worse.