“Gus,” she whispers.
Iris snorts, laughing at the nickname I told her I hate. There’s still time to retrain Sarai, but right now she could call me Attila the Hun and I wouldn’t care.
Iris’s cousin enters the room at a more measured pace.
The first thing I notice about Lotus DuPree is how much she and Iris look alike. There are marked differences. Her skin is a few shades darker but no less smooth. Her hair is coarser but still curly, cut close and died platinum blond. She’s slimmer than Iris, a little shorter, but she looks like a model. Not in her stature, but with an effortless kind of grace. Over a white tank top, she wears a fitted multi-colored silk kimono jacket. Dark jeans mold the lean line of her legs. The tiniest hoop adorns the keen curve of her left nostril.
Beyond her obvious attractiveness, there’s something about her that highjacks your attention. Even with no expression, Lo’s face seems animated. The expressive brows and wide, mobile mouth speak on her behalf without her uttering a word. She’s as hard to look away from as Iris, but for different reasons.
Iris said they come from a long line of voodoo high priestesses. I see it in Lotus. A regalness—a mystery and an aura, like she knows your thoughts before you think them and is fully capable of changing your mind.
Kenan can’t seem to look away. His eyes follow her path from the door to the bedside.
“Nice to meet you, August,” she says, extending her hand.
Where Iris’s voice is sweet and husky, Lotus’s voice emerges low, commanding, and with an inherent sensuality that would have many men under her spell immediately.
Is that what’s happened to Kenan?
He still hasn’t said a word, and, as far as I can tell, he hasn’t looked anywhere else since Lotus walked in the room.
“Glad we finally get to meet,” I tell her, smiling. “Iris has been talking about you since the night we met.”
“Well, we’re even because your name may have come up a time or two today,” she says, smiling and ignoring the glare Iris shoots her way. “Or maybe twelve times. I stopped counting.”
A chuckle rumbles through my chest, and I grab Iris’s hand to squeeze.
“And this is Kenan, the teammate who put me here in the first place.” I gesture toward the giant beside me, who dwarfs both women considerably. Standing on opposite sides of my bed, Lotus and Kenan exchange looks, neither smiling. Lotus narrows her eyes on him as if she’s seeing beyond the sinew and muscle and bone to the parts Kenan hides from everyone, maybe even from himself.
“Nice to meet you,” Kenan says, clearing his throat and breaking the silence between them.
“Yeah.” Lotus slides her glance away from him. She turns to Iris. “She’s getting whiny. I think she’s hungry.”
“Yeah.” Iris glances at her watch and grimaces. “It’s about that time. She hasn’t eaten since lunch.” She steps a little closer to the bed, still holding my hand. “I better get going.”
“Of course.” I agree, even though what I really want to say is not yet.
“When are you getting out of here?” she asks softly.
“Should be tomorrow. I’ll call you when I’m leaving.”
“Do you need a ride or anything?” she asks.
“I got him,” Kenan says. “It’s the least I can do.”
I shoot him a disgusted look. First the cock blocking. Now this?
Iris intercepts my look and chuckles softly. We share a look as intimate as a touch. I know she wants to be careful about how Sarai sees her, what she sees her doing.
“Okay,” Iris says, picking Sarai up and walking toward the door. “Call me.”
With one last furtive glance at Kenan, Lotus says her goodbyes, too.
There’s a thick silence once they leave. Their mingled scents still linger. Their presence was so strong, I can practically see an impression of them left in the air.
I turn my attention to Kenan, prepared to shoot the shit for a few minutes, maybe tease him a little more about hospitalizing me, when I realize he’s still staring at the door Lotus just passed through.
He turns on me and voices the question in his eyes. “Who the hell was that?”
Iris
August: You up?
The text message lights the phone on my pillow, and I shake myself awake. The Waves flew back tonight from an extended road trip. August hasn’t been home in more than a week. I told him to call me whenever he landed, and I’m glad he’s reaching out. They lost three of the four away games, and the media coverage has been brutal, much of it centering around August, his lucrative contract, and if he’ll deliver on the promise of his rookie season. There’s even been speculation that he’s not the same since his injury.
Me: I’m up. You wanna talk?
August: I’m at your front door. Is that okay?
My heart somersaults, aerobic, quickening my breath. The upper-hand corner of my phone shows it’s midnight.
I want to see him. I glance down at my breasts, my nipples piqued under cotton sheets.
MiMi suggested I sleep naked, and she was right. There’s a sensuality to having my bare body caressed by the soft cotton.
I wasn’t sure how I’d feel being intimate with someone the first time since that last awful night with Caleb. For a long time, I felt no desire, but that kiss in the hospital room proved that desire was simply dormant and not gone for good, if it’s the right person.
August is the right person.
Me: Yeah! I’m on my way.
I grab a robe Lo sent me from her designer’s collection. The silk slides over my arms and kisses the sensitive tips of my breasts. August and I have kissed some since that time in the hospital room, but we’ve mostly kept it casual. I guess we’re dating, even though with his schedule so crazy and me not having anyone to watch Sarai, we haven’t actually gone anywhere. It seems strange, but finally right.
I make sure Sarai’s bedroom door is pulled closed and then rush to let August in. The porch light streaks amber through his dark, misbehaving curls. Fatigue draws lines at his mouth and paints shadows under his eyes. I’m thrilled that by all rights, he should want to go straight home, but after a week away and a lengthy flight, he’s come to see me.
“Hey.” My smile up at him is wide and holds nothing back.
“Hi.” He walks past me when I step aside, but instead of continuing to the living room, he turns me to the door, bends to align our lips. He pulls my bottom lip inside his mouth, sucking lightly and then intensifying the pressure until my knees are putty. His hand at my waist tightens, and he slowly straightens to his full height, pulling me with him until only the very tips of my toes brush the floor. I wrap my arms fully around his neck, angling my head and widening my mouth to accommodate the aggressive thrust of his tongue. When his hands drift from my waist to cup my ass, I moan into the kiss.
“August,” I gasp, resting my forehead against his chin. His labored breaths pant into my hair, and he’s hard and huge against my belly. If we don’t slow down, there’ll be no going back.
Would that be so bad?
I think I’m ready. There’s no doubt in my mind I want him, but sometimes my body flashes back and freezes up. I don’t want that to happen—don’t want to explain when there’s already so much he wants to know that I can’t tell him.