Sweet Dreams (10 page)

“Where are you going?”

She stopped and turned. Preston had sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed. “I thought you were asleep.”

Preston ran a hand over his cropped hair. “I guess I dozed off waiting for you.” He beckoned her, then patted the mattress. “Come and sit down. Come, baby. I’m not going to bite you,” he urged, sensing her hesitation.

Chandra took a tentative step, then another, before racing to the bed and launching herself at him. He caught her midair, flipped her onto her back, straddling her.

His gaze lingered on the hair she’d twisted into a knot atop her head, then moved leisurely down to her scrubbed face. “What took you so long?”

Her lids lowered, a dreamy expression softening her delicate features. “It’s been a while since I’ve had the luxury of lingering in a bathtub.”

“Did you enjoy yourself?”

Chandra smiled. “Immensely.”

Burying his face between her chin and shoulder, Preston breathed a kiss against the column of her scented neck. “That’s good.”

The heat, the comforting crush of Preston’s body and the increasing hardness between his thighs enveloped Chandra as she struggled valiantly not to succumb to the familiar sensations of rising desire. She hadn’t been dreaming, or if she had she hadn’t remembered, since her return. What she felt was beginning to remind her of the dreams she’d recorded in her journals.

“Preston?”

He groaned in her ear. “What, baby?”

Chandra struggled not to move her hips. “We’re supposed to be talking, not making love.”

“We’re not making love, Chandra.”

She closed her eyes when she felt the outline of his erection against her thigh, while the intense heat from his body threatened to swallow her whole. In a motion so quick it caused her to catch her breath, he reversed their positions, she lying between his outstretched legs.

“Preston?”

“What is it, baby?”

“What exactly are we doing?”

Cradling the back of her head in one hand, Preston rested his other one over her rounded bottom. “We’re going to talk about Pascual and Josette.”

Chandra wanted to tell Preston that she loved it when he called her baby. It came out in a sensual growl. “What about them?”

“Stop wiggling, or my hard-on will never go down.”

Chandra’s head popped up, her eyes meeting Preston’s. “I was trying to get into a more comfortable position.”

“And I’m trying not to spend the rest of the night in pain.”

A frown creased her smooth forehead. “Why would you be in pain?”

The seconds ticked as Preston gave her an incredulous look. “Are you a virgin?”

Stunned by his bluntness, her mouth opened, snapped closed, then opened again. “No!”

“No!” he repeated. “If you’re familiar with the male anatomy, then you should know men can’t sustain an erection for an extended time without a release because it hurts like hell.”

“I know that.”

“If you know that, then stop teasing me.”

Chandra tried to sit up; her efforts were thwarted when Preston held her fast. “Let me go, Preston.”

He tightened his hold around her waist. “Now, you know I can’t do that, baby. Do you know how hard it’s been for me to keep my hands off you?”

“No,” she answered truthfully.

“Well, it has. I never imagined how much my life would change when I found your journal in that taxi. My first impulse was to give it to the driver, but I changed my mind.”

“So, you opened it and saw my contact information in my journal.”

“Yes. And I’m glad I did.”

“Do you actually think I believe you were just waiting to meet some anonymous woman?”

Preston glared at Chandra. There were times when
he wanted to shake her. He didn’t know why she was distrustful. “What the hell did your last boyfriend do to you?”

Chandra averted her gaze while chewing her lower lip. Once she’d gathered her family together to inform them she wasn’t marrying Laurence, it was the last time she’d mentioned his name. She’d convinced herself that if she didn’t have to retell the story of what went wrong then she wouldn’t have to reopen a wound that took years to heal.

“I’d rather not talk about it,” she said after a pregnant pause.

“Not talking about it won’t make it any less painful.”

Her gaze shifted back to Preston as her lips thinned in anger. “There’s no pain, Preston, just rage whenever I think about it. The funny thing is that I don’t blame Laurence as much as I do his parents. We dated for a year before he asked me to marry him. I accepted, and then the next step was meeting his mother and father, who were quick to tell me I was so wrong for their precious baby boy.”

“What do you mean by
wrong?
”

“I didn’t have the right
pedigree
.” She spat out the word.

Eyes narrowing, Preston angled his head. Instinctually, he knew it had to go beyond pedigree. The Eatons were one of Philadelphia’s prominent African-American families. “You didn’t have the right pedigree or the right color?”

The breath caught in Chandra’s lungs. “How did you know?”

Preston gave her a look usually reserved for children. “Chandra, please don’t insult my intelligence. It was
their politically correct way of saying they didn’t want their son to marry a black woman. If they had wanted to have you investigated, then the P.I. would’ve told them that you come from a family of doctors, teachers and lawyers, so it had to be something else. And for me, race was the only other obvious variable.”

She shook her head. “I don’t know why I didn’t think of that.”

“It was because you were young and very much in love with someone who didn’t deserve your love. If you give me his address I’ll pay him a visit.”

A frown formed between her eyes. “And do what, Preston?”

“Kick his ass, of course.”

“You wouldn’t?”

“Hell, yeah. I can promise you he wouldn’t look the same after I give him an old-fashion North Philly beat down.”

“Don’t tell me there’s some thug in Philadelphia’s famed dramatist.”

Preston glared at her under lowered brows. “There’s a lot of thug in me. However, I’m able to channel most of it into writing.”

“The only time I got a little feisty is when Laurence’s mother said it was nothing personal, but she had expected her son would marry someone within his social circle. I told her I understood exactly what she was saying because as a Thoroughbred I should’ve never hooked up with a jackass.”

Throwing back his head, Preston howled, Chandra’s laughter joining his as tears ran down their cheeks. She rolled off his body to lie beside him. “I’m glad it turned out the way it did, otherwise I never would’ve met you.”

“Is that a good thing, P.J.?”

He closed his eyes. “It’s a very good thing, C.E.” Turning on his side, he rested an arm over her belly. “The Tuckers’ pedigree can’t begin to match the Eatons’, but I’d like to hope that I at least have a chance to prove to you that I’m not a jackass.”

Chandra shifted, facing Preston, their faces only inches apart. She studied the features of the man who’d managed to scale the wall she’d erected around her in order to protect herself from heartbreak.

She knew he wanted to make love to her, and she wanted to make love with him. Unknowingly, he’d become the nameless, faceless man who’d invaded her sleep and dreams to assuage her sexual frustration.

“You could never be a jackass,” Chandra whispered against his parted lips. She tasted his mouth tentatively as if sampling a frothy confection.

Nothing on Preston moved, not even his eyes as he relished her caress of his mouth. “What do you want, Chandra?”

“I want you,” she said.

“How?”

The kisses stopped, and she stared at him. “I want you to make love with me.”

Preston smiled. She hadn’t asked him to make love to her, but with her. His right eyebrow lifted a fraction before settling back into place. “And I want you to make love with me.” He pressed a kiss over each eye. “Are you using birth control?”

Pinpoints of heat dotted Chandra’s cheeks. In her dreams she hadn’t had to worry about conception; but the man in whose bed she lay wasn’t a specter or figment of her imagination but flesh and blood and capable of getting her pregnant.

“No.”

Preston kissed her again. “I will protect you.” And he would. He would protect her from an unplanned pregnancy and protect her from anything and anyone seeking to harm her. It was in that instant that he realized he was falling in love with Chandra Eaton.

C
handra stared at the flexing muscles in Preston’s abdomen when he sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed. She was certain he could hear the runaway beating of her heart as he opened the drawer in the bedside table. She exhaled a ragged, audible sigh when he placed a condom on the pillow beside her head. It was one thing to sleep with a man she’d known a very short time and another to find herself pregnant with his child.

Her relationship with Preston differed greatly from the ones her sister and brother had with their respective spouses. Belinda had been maid of honor and Griffin best man at their siblings’ wedding, and Myles had known Zabrina all his life before finally marrying her last month, while she was preparing to sleep with a man she hadn’t met two weeks before.

Preston stood up, untied the cord to his pajama pants,
letting them slide off his waist and hips. His gaze met and fused with Chandra’s when he stepped out of them. Her breath quickened. The blood pooled in his groin when he noticed the outline of her hardened nipples against the white tank top.

He stared at her, wanting to commit to memory the cloud of dark curly hair around her face, breasts that were fuller than he’d expected and the look of indecision in the eyes staring back at him in anxious anticipation.

The mattress dipped slightly when he placed one knee, then the other on the bed. Lying beside Chandra, Preston turned to face her. “How are you?”

A tentative smile trembled over her lips. “I’m good, Preston.”

He ran the back of his hand over her cheek. “Are you ready for this? If not, then we can sleep together without making love.”

Shifting slightly, Chandra draped her leg over his. “I’m ready.”

She was more than ready. Preston hadn’t even touched her intimately, yet she could feel the trickle of desire coursing through her body.

Preston rose slightly to grasp the hem of Chandra’s top, easing it up and over her head. He took his time undressing her, because he had all night in which to make her dreams real. Reading her journal gave him an advantage: he knew what she liked. Ironically, what she liked, he liked, and then some.

He untied her lounging slacks, easing them down her hips. A wide smile split his face when he saw the tiny triangle of black silk covering her mound. Lowering his head, he nibbled at the bows holding up her thong panty. Chandra arched off the bed, and he placed a hand over
her belly, preventing her from escaping his marauding mouth.

She’d teased him about his mouth and his ability to kiss and he’d interpreted it as a challenge. He’d become an overachiever because of his father’s taunts when he’d revealed he wanted to become a writer. When Craig Tucker told his son he would end up a pauper, Preston had set out to prove his father wrong. Unfortunately, Craig hadn’t lived long enough to witness his son’s success.

Chandra covered her face with both hands when Preston’s moist hot breath seared the apex of her thighs much like the heat from a blast furnace. Delicious spasms made the sensitive flesh of her sex quiver. A rush of moisture bathed her core. In the past it had taken prolonged foreplay to arouse her.

She teased Preston about what he could with his mouth, but that mouth was doing unbelievable things to her. He’d alternated kissing and licking her cropped pubic mound. Without warning, tears flooded her eyes and spilled down her face. His tongue found the swollen bud between the folds. He licked it in an up-and-down motion that made her rise off the mattress.

“No more, Preston. Please stop.”

Preston heard her plaintive cry. He would stop, but not before he tasted every inch of her fragrant body. Moving up between her legs, he claimed her mouth in an explosive kiss, his tongue plunging into her mouth.

Everything about Chandra Eaton was intoxicating: her smell, the perfection of her firm breasts, the curvy fullness of her hips, the narrow waist he could span with both hands and the taste of her sex. Her body was a banquet table where he wanted to feast again and again.

With the precision of a cartographer, he charted a course beginning with her mouth, journeying downward to her bared throat, the column of her scented neck and lower to her breasts. He suckled her like a starving infant, and when drinking his fill he worried the erect nipples with his teeth. The keening coming from Chandra made tiny shivers of gooseflesh on the back of his neck.

Chandra was lost in a web of pleasure so sensual, so wholly erotic that she felt as if she were slipping away to nothingness. Preston’s mouth and hands seemed to be everywhere at once.

Preston heard and felt Chandra’s breathing quicken, and he knew she was ready to climax. He released her long enough to slip on the condom, then moved between her legs once again. Reaching for her hand, he placed it on his erection.

He kissed her neck. “Let’s do this together.”

Preston had asked Chandra if she was a virgin, and at that moment she felt like one. In each relationship she’d let her partner take the lead, yet it was different with Preston. They had become equals—in and out of bed.

Her fingers closed around his heavy sex, then Preston’s hand covered hers as he positioned his erection at the entrance to her vagina. She gasped slightly as the penetration seemingly took minutes to complete. They shared a smile and a sigh when he was fully sheathed inside her.

Preston did not want to believe the incredible heat that came from Chandra. He wanted to withdraw and pull off the condom just to experience flesh against flesh, heat on heat. Not only was she tight, but she was on fire.

“Oh, baby, I—” Chandra silenced him with a searing kiss that scorched his mouth with its intensity when her teeth sank into his lip. Her hips moved against his, and he was lost.

Her hunger and need was transferred to Preston and he answered. He moved slowly, deliberately. Each time he pulled back it was a little farther, and each time he pushed it was a little harder and deeper.

Chandra’s wrapping her legs around Preston’s waist was his undoing. Sliding his hands under her hips, he lifted her off the mattress, permitting him deeper penetration. Moans and groans escalated, breathing quickened, then the dam broke. Burying his face against her neck, Preston exploded, his deep moans of ecstasy echoing in her ear.

He’s real. What I’m feeling is real
. Chandra had waited more than three years to experience why she’d been born female. The flutters that began with his penetration grew stronger. Her muscles contracted around his rigid flesh, pulling him in, holding him fast; she released him before squeezing him again and again.

The walls of her vagina convulsed as a scorching climax hurtled her to a place where she’d never been. Preston Japheth Tucker was the only man she’d slept with able to bring her to climax their first time together.

“I think I’m going to keep you, P.J.”

Preston chuckled. “You better, because I don’t intend to let you go.” He brushed a kiss over her cheek. “I’m going to have to get up.” She emitted a small cry of protest when he pulled out.

He left the bed and walked to the bathroom, where he discarded the condom and washed away the evidence of their lovemaking. He’d tried imagining what it would
be like to make love to Chandra, but nothing in his imagination could’ve prepared him for the passion she stirred up in him.

Preston returned to the bedroom to find it shrouded in darkness. Chandra had turned off the lamp. He managed to make it to the bed without bumping into anything. Slipping into bed, he pulled her against his chest. “Are you okay?”

“Yes-s-s,” Chandra slurred.

“Do you want to talk about Pascual and Josette?”

“Not now.”

“When?”

“Tomorrow morning.”

Preston wanted to remind Chandra it was already tomorrow. They had tomorrow and hopefully many more tomorrows.

Ribbons of sunlight from the partially closed drapes threaded their way over the bed where Preston lay, his back to Chandra. He opened his eyes, staring at the door connecting the two bedrooms. A smile softened his mouth when he recalled what he’d shared with Chandra Eaton.

He didn’t know why he’d been the one to get into the taxi where she’d left her case, or what had prompted him to read her journal. Whether it was a fluke, serendipity or destiny, he regarded it as a blessing.

He and his younger sister had grown up in a neighborhood where muggings, the sound of gunfire and a heavy police presence were the norm. Some of his boyhood friends never reached adulthood, or if they did then they’d become a statistic in the criminal justice system.

Preston had lost count of the number of times his
mother and father preached to him and Yolanda about making something of their lives. The first and only time Craig Tucker asked his son what he wanted to be when he grew up and was told a writer, it elicited a long tirade about how writers were born not made, and very few, if any, earn enough money to support themselves and their families.

Although Craig had passed away years before he walked into Princeton for his first day of classes, Preston couldn’t shake off his father’s dire warning. Praying his late father was wrong, he majored in English with a minor in mathematics. His rationale was if he couldn’t make it as a writer he could always teach math. But he’d proven Craig wrong on two accounts: he hadn’t become a victim of the streets, and he
hadn’t
failed as a writer.

“Will you share my bath with me?”

Preston’s smile grew wider. Hearing Chandra’s voice, still heavy with sleep, was the perfect way for him to start his day. He swallowed a groan. She’d pressed her firm breasts against his back.

“What do I get if I say yes?”

“I’ll wash your back and any place or anything else you want.”

This time Preston couldn’t stop the groan escaping his parted lips when his sex hardened with her erotic offer. He curbed the urge to reach between his thighs. He scrambled off the bed and practically ran to the en suite bathroom.

Chandra waited for Preston to return, but when he didn’t she left the bed and walked into her bathroom. She turned on the faucets in the bathtub, adjusting the water temperature before adding a capful of scented
bath crystals under the flowing water. The tub was half-filled by the time she’d washed her face and brushed her teeth.

She let out an audible sigh when sinking into the lukewarm water. The slight ache between her legs was a reminder of what she’d shared with the man who was now a part of her life as she was his.

What had begun with him returning her case and journal was now a full-blown affair. Resting her arms on the sides of the tub, Chandra closed her eyes and smiled. She was having an affair with P. J. Tucker.

How, she mused, had her life changed in a matter of weeks? She’d had her first sexual encounter during her college sophomore year. He was another student in her study group, and she’d slept with him not because she was in love with him. If the truth were told, then she would have to admit that she barely
liked
him. She’d gone to his apartment to study for a statistics exam, and was forced to spend the night when a winter storm dropped a foot of snow on New York City. She slept with him again a week later, then decided they were better off as friends than lovers.

Then there was Laurence, whom she dated for six months before getting into bed with him. Although she’d found sex with him satisfying, it wasn’t exciting. After a while she was resigned to the fact she would marry a man who would provide financial stability for her and their children and do whatever he could to make their marriage a success.

Laurence Breslin may have been what Chandra thought of as benign, but she hadn’t been prepared for his reversal of affection. He’d professed she was the love of his life, yet when confronted by
Mommy
he folded like an accordion and sided with his parents against her.

“Do you intend to keep your promise to wash my back?”

She opened her eyes to find Preston lounging against the door frame, arms crossed over his bare chest. He’d put on the pajama pants he’d discarded the night before. Her gaze moved slowly over the stubble on his lean jaw, down to his magnificent upper body, long legs and bare, arched feet.

Sinking lower in the tub, Chandra winked at Preston. “Yes. I always keep my promises.”

Lowering his arms, Preston approached the tub, at the same time pushing the pajamas down his hips. It had taken months before his mother was able to locate a slipper tub large enough for two adults. He’d used it once, but preferred taking a shower. It was his sister who used it whenever she came for a visit.

“Scoot forward, baby.” Chandra inched toward the opposite end of the tub, and he got in behind her. Scooping up a handful of warm scented water, he poured it over her shoulders. “You know I’m going to smell like a girl,” Preston whispered in her ear.

Resting the back of her head on his shoulder, Chandra smiled up at Preston. “There are worse things you could smell like.”

His eyebrows lifted. “True. It’s a good thing I’m secure about my sexuality or I would be having a few issues.”

“I take it you like being a man?”

“Very much. How about you, Chandra? Do you like being a woman?”

“I love being a woman.”

Preston’s minty breath wafted in her nose. “And what a magnificent woman you are, Chandra Eaton.”

Her lids lowered demurely. “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me. The thanks go to your parents and their superior gene pool.”

“I thought we were going to discuss Josette and Pascual.”

“We did, but that was before you distracted me.”

Chandra’s jaw dropped. “You’re blaming me for what happened last night?”

Preston nodded. “If you hadn’t come into my bedroom wearing that little skimpy top showing the outline of your nipples—”

“Don’t you dare go there, P.J.! You’re as much to blame for what took place. Don’t,” she screamed when his hands cupped her wet breasts, his thumbs sweeping back and forth over her nipples.

“Now, let’s talk about Pascual and Josette.”

“I can’t think with you doing that,” Chandra said in protest.