Too hot to sleep (2 page)

“C
OME ON
, G
EORGIA
,
stop gawking and start squawking!” Toni laughed and dragged Georgia to her feet, then cupped her hands over her mouth and hooted at the gyrating man on stage. The naked bodybuilder wore a headdress and twirled a short stick with fire at both ends, seemingly oblivious of the danger to his lineage. He moved across the stage in little hops to the beat of the calypso music blaring from speakers at deafening decibels. His body was remarkably muscled and proportioned to the point of deformity. Georgia could only stare, and Toni cheered like a woman who’d never before seen a baton.

In fact, the entire room undulated with hundreds of standing women, their hands raised to offer tips, their voices lifted to offer encouragement to the men who performed on the U-shaped runway. Of course, the dancers didn’t require much urging to remove every stitch of clothing and wag the audience into a frenzy. The throbbing music and high-pitched screams reached such a staggering crescendo, Georgia was certain the shaking mirrors that flanked the stage would shatter at any moment.

She suddenly swayed and grabbed the back of the chair in front of her for support. Embarrassment rolled over her in waves. Every square inch of her skin
tingled. Her breasts felt heavy and, since the room was stifling hot, she couldn’t blame their hardened points on the cold. Her stomach swam with dizzying desire.

Georgia held her breath and allowed the atmosphere to consume her. The scent of the performers’ body oils, the taste of perspiration on her upper lip, the press of bodies around her, the flashing spotlights that criss-crossed the room, the pulsing music, all swirled around her like a haze of sexually charged ions. It wasn’t so much the dancers’ naked bodies but the blatant openness that she found so titillating, the fact that the men were proud of their physiques, and that the women weren’t afraid to express their appreciation.

Georgia wet her salty lips. It was enough to drive a decent woman to do things she might not ordinarily do.

She fumbled behind her for her untouched rum drink. Curving her hand around the cool glass, she lifted it to her feverish cheek. Georgia glanced at Toni to see if her friend had noticed she was quietly freaking out, but Toni was laughing and waving dollar bills.

Thinking the alcohol might numb her too-keen senses, Georgia gulped the drink. The fire twirler exited in a blaze of glory, only to be replaced by a construction worker with a swaying tool belt. Within minutes, he had stripped down to his hard hat and was taking bids from the women on the perimeter of the stage. Georgia felt a tingling in her thighs and frustration crowded her chest. She tried to project Rob’s
face onto the body of the dancer, but she couldn’t reconcile the two separate images of stability and sensuality.

“Some hammer, huh?” Toni asked, nudging Georgia out of her reverie.

“Hmm?” Georgia scanned the man’s considerable attributes. “Oh, yeah, I guess.” She drained her glass in another deep swallow.

“Hey, are you okay? I was just teasing about Rob earlier. Did you guys have a fight or something?”

“No.”

Toni’s eyes narrowed and she jerked her head toward the ladies’ room.

Georgia grabbed her purse and followed a bit unsteadily, sensing an inquisition but grateful for the break from the onslaught of erotic cues.

Before the door closed behind them, her friend had lit a menthol cigarette. Georgia frowned, then opened her purse and retrieved a lipstick. “I didn’t know you smoked.”

Toni exhaled and leaned her rail-thin body against a condom vending machine. “Special occasions only. So, are you having a good time?”

She ran a finger around the collar of the sleeveless white button-up shirt she’d worn tucked into loose black jeans. “Sure.”

“Liar. You’ve been in another world all night.”

Her heart pumped the rum through her body, bypassing her empty stomach and sending the alcohol straight to her brain, making her feel floaty and somewhat philosophical. “I have the all-overs.”

Toni squinted. “The all-overs? Funny, I don’t remember that one from school.”

Georgia turned and stared at her flushed reflection in the mirror and talked while she drew an uneven line of mocha lipstick onto her mouth. “I’m restless, fidgety, distracted.”

“Horny?”

Leave it to Toni to cut to the chase. She sighed, puffing out her cheeks, liking the way her laugh lines disappeared. “Toni, do you think I would know if Rob was gay?”

Her friend choked, then coughed out a cloud of smoke. “Probably. Why would you think that?”

She blotted the lipstick with a rough paper towel. “I don’t really. It’s just that I can’t figure out his…likes and dislikes.”

Toni chortled and dismissed Georgia’s concern with a wave. “They all have hang-ups, babe. My old boyfriend liked Aerosmith on the stereo when we made love. Go figure.” She pressed fingers to her temples and closed her eyes. “Let me guess. Rob wants the lights off, and his socks
on.
”

Georgia gave her a wry smile. “I wouldn’t know.”

Her friend’s eyes bulged. “You mean the two of you have never had sex?”

“Right.”

Toni pursed her lips. “Wow. How far have you gone? Second base? Third?”

Georgia quirked her mouth side to side. “I’ve never been quite sure what constitutes second and third base.”

“You’re stalling.”

“Okay, we’ve kissed.”

“No uncontrolled groping?”

“No.”

“No nipplage?”

“Nada.”

“No oral sex?”

She shook her head.

“Damn, no wonder you think he’s gay. But I have a lot of homosexual friends, and I’d bet money that Rob is not gay.”

Georgia tilted her head and inspected her own reflection. “Which means he doesn’t find me sexually attractive.”

Toni’s face appeared over her shoulder. “Look at you—great hair, great face and great body. I’m telling you, the man is probably intimidated.”

She rolled her eyes. “Oh, yeah, that’s me, Miss Intimidation. I’m not exactly a siren, Toni.”

“Precisely. Most of the time you look like Miss Untouchable.” The cigarette bobbed wildly. With a flick of her wrist, she removed the clip that held Georgia’s dark hair away from her face, then fluffed the long layers. “And here.” Toni removed a cranberry-colored lipstick from her purse. “Toss that brown stuff and try this.”

Georgia applied the new color, then frowned. “It’s bright.”

“Yes, ma’am.” She twisted Georgia sideways, then unbuttoned her white shirt until the little pink bow on her bra was exposed. “Do you have to wear the bra?”

“Yes!” Bare skin under thin white cotton? Oi.

“Okay, okay.” Toni pulled out Georgia’s shirttail
and tied the front ends high enough to expose her navel. “There. You just need to loosen up. I’m sure all Rob needs is a signal.”

She looked back to her reflection and pursed her mouth. “You think?”

Toni dotted the cranberry lipstick onto Georgia’s cheeks, then blended the color with her thumb. Someday her friend would make a wonderfully smothering mother. “Definitely. Do something to shake him up a little. You know, show up at his place wearing nothing but a belt or something like that.”

Georgia chewed on her lip. “And what if he turns me down?”

Toni shrugged. “It’ll be his loss and then you’ll know where you stand. But trust me, he
won’t
turn you down.”

Her friend had a knack for making things seem so black-and-white. And even as her tongue formed more words of protest, Georgia stared at her new wanton image in the mirror and warmed to the possibilities. She’d worked her way through college and three years of post-graduate work. Every day she handled life-threatening situations at the hospital. So why would she be worried about making a pass at a man she’d been dating for several months? Maybe because it was safer to let him go on thinking she was Miss Modesty than to risk unleashing the passion that boiled beneath the surface. She didn’t want to come across as some kind of…well, any of those names her mother had called her father’s string of faceless girlfriends.

“Come on,” Toni said, snuffing out her cigarette.
“Let’s buy Stacey a table dance—I saw her eyeing the pirate. Besides,” she added with a wink, “we have some planning to do.”

Georgia followed her friend, rubbing the headache forming just behind her ear. While most people had a conscience, her
conscience
had a conscience—a something that reined in her urges, and kept her on her best behavior.

She swallowed. At least so far.

G
EORGIA SLIPPED INSIDE
her apartment door and swatted at the light switch. Still buzzing slightly from her last drink, she kicked off her shoes next to the couch and glanced at her new phone contraption, but the message light wasn’t blinking. How flattering. She removed the portable phone from the base and headed for the bedroom, not the slightest bit sleepy. In fact, her pulse kicked higher with every step.

Over the past few hours, she’d thought about Toni’s advice and allowed herself to be carried along on the crest of the erogenous wave rolling through the strip club. She’d decided her friend was right—Rob was waiting for her to make a move. So, during a shared cab ride home, Toni had settled upon the least threatening, yet highly erotic option: phone sex.

Despite that phone sex was a favored fantasy of hers, Georgia felt obligated to protest on behalf of the upstanding girl she was purported to be. Besides, she didn’t know how to do it.

Toni had pshawed. “What’s to know? You talk, you moan, you hang up.”

“But how do I ask him if he wants to?”

“Don’t ask, just
do.
”

And if Rob were totally offended, Georgia reasoned, she could always move to the Midwest and change her name.

Moving slowly in the dark, she slipped out of her shoes. Could she pull it off? The fact that she’d never participated in phone sex before only heightened her anticipation. Her chest rose and fell more rapidly, her breasts tingled, her thighs grew moist.

She turned on a lamp, then dimmed the illumination to bathe her Verdigris iron bed and the mustard-colored comforter. After stepping out of her jeans and folding them over the padded seat of her vanity table, Georgia sat on the edge of the bed and sank her crimson-tipped toes into a green hooked rug she’d made when she was fifteen—a lifetime ago. At that age she had fantasized of romance and physical bliss, never imagining one element without the other. She had thought by now she would’ve met a man who could provide a constant supply of both. Could Rob?

She sighed. Well, soon enough she would know if her fantasies would get him off, or scare him off.

Georgia glanced at the clock. One-thirty, Wednesday morning. Rob would be in deep REM sleep. Although if things went to plan, he’d be wide awake within a few seconds. Before she had time to reconsider, she slipped off her white cotton panties and left them lying on the rug. Her hands shook slightly as she held the phone and pushed the button to retrieve Rob’s preprogrammed number.

When his phone began to ring, warmth flooded her abdomen. After the third ring, she panicked and
started to hang up, but before she could locate the darned Talk button, she heard his sleep-fuzzy voice come over the line.

“Hello?”

Her heart thudded so loudly she could barely hear him. “Hi, Rob, this is Georgia.”

“Hmm?”

“D-don’t talk,” she said, then leaned back against a pile of pillows and lowered her voice to what she hoped was a sexy tone. “Just listen.”

A
FTER SIX YEARS
on the police force, Officer Ken Medlock should have been used to late-night calls, but he still had trouble focusing on the voice at the other end of the line. He reached for the lamp on the nightstand, but remembered a split second after the sound of the hollow click that he’d forgotten to replace the burned-out bulb.

Did the woman say she was “Georgia”? His mind spun as he tried to place the name—a new dispatcher? Blinking seemed to help clear the cobwebs. One-thirty. Damn, the last time he’d looked at the clock had been less than an hour ago. His intermittent insomnia seemed to have grown worse as the temperature climbed—and now this interruption.

“Rob, I know it’s late, but I’ve been thinking about…us…all evening and I was wondering…that is…” The woman with the sultry voice inhaled and Ken opened his mouth to tell her she had the wrong number.

“I’m not wearing panties.”

His mouth snapped shut and his manhood stirred, proving at least one part of his body was processing information.

A small trembling laugh sounded. “I’ve always wondered if you were a boxer man or a brief man.”

What was the mystery woman’s intention? Engage in a little late-night dirty talk to entice this Rob guy to come over? “Boxer,” Ken blurted, then swallowed and leaned back onto his requisite three-pillow stack. Had he lost his mind? Or more appropriately, had he lost his shame?

“Mmm. Do you sleep in them?”

When I sleep.
He couldn’t remember such a welcome interruption though—few of his
dreams
were this good. He might have thought his partner was playing another practical joke on him, but even Klone wouldn’t go this far. And the woman sounded so sincere, she had to be the real thing. His job required him to make life-and-death split-second judgments, but suddenly he was gripped with indecision—’fess up, hang up, or play up.

His body made the decision by sending a flood of desire to swell his deprived loins. What would be the harm in succumbing to one wild impulse? Before he had time to reconsider, he muttered, “Mmm-hmm.” Knowing she might realize her mistake any second, he held the mouthpiece a few inches away from his mouth. On the other hand, if she didn’t know what kind of underwear Robbie Boy wore, maybe she’d just met the man. Or maybe she was a prostitute. Ken had lived in the South for most of his adult life, but had never met a woman named Georgia.

“I thought it was time to let you know how I feel.”

Or maybe her boyfriend simply didn’t know how good he had it. “Okay,” he offered.

“But not if this makes you uncomfortable.”

He found the crack in her confidence endearing.
Did she have any idea how sexy her voice sounded? And the only thing uncomfortable at the moment was his hardening erection. “I’m fine. Um…go on.” When silence followed, he was afraid she was onto him.

“Can you shed those boxers?” she whispered.

In for a penny, in for a pound. Ken reached beneath the warmish pilled sheet and slid off his shorts in three seconds flat, not an easy feat in a waterbed while juggling a phone. The TV remote he’d left on the bed crashed to the wood floor. “They’re gone. Are—” Ken wet his lips, “are you undressed?”

“Not yet,” she said. “I’m wearing a white button-up blouse and a white bra.”

Ken closed his eyes. “Take…take them off,” he urged.

From the rustling sounds, he surmised she was stripping. His mind whirled, wondering what this woman who called herself Georgia looked like. Was she redheaded? A brunette? Blonde? Brown eyes? Blue? Hazel? Long hair? Short? Sections of his fantasy woman clicked into place like the tiles in a vertical slot machine. Long, dark hair, blue eyes, a great smile, curvy. And peeling off her clothes.

“They’re off.”

Ken bit his tongue to keep from asking more questions that might end the phone call. His hand slid beneath the sheet, and he imagined Georgia easing into the bed next to him.

“It’s hot over here,” she continued, much to his relief. “And I just couldn’t sleep after leaving the club. All that nudity affected me.”

She was a stripper? That explained the stage name.
His conscience eased somewhat. At least she wasn’t some innocent lady shedding her modesty for the first time. And she must have an incredible body. Her shadow of an accent didn’t belong to a Southern belle, but in his mind, Georgia was as lush and sticky-sweet as her name implied.

“I need to relax,” she said, sighing.

Ken could almost feel her breath warming his neck. His answer was a low groan of encouragement.

“Lately I’ve been hoping we could become more…intimate.”

“I never knew,” he replied in a low tone.
The truth.

“We’ve both been a little shy, but somehow, it’s easier to talk about my fantasies on the phone like this.”

A hot flush traveled over his skin. “Go on.”

“My breasts,” she said, her voice suddenly tentative again.

Round? High? Firm?

“Sensitive.
So
sensitive.”

Not as visual, but he could make it work. “Mmm-hmm.”

She was breathing harder now. “My hair is down and tickling my breasts.”

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

“Can you picture me lying next to you?”

Could he? “Uh-huh.” She was killing him. Moonlight streamed through a window next to his bed, transforming the tangled sheets into a woman’s figure. Her skin was smooth and golden with faint and minuscule tan lines. Beautiful. Their hands tangled as they stroked and caressed each other.

“Touch me lower,” she murmured.

His breath caught in his chest.

“Lower,” she urged, and he moaned, picturing the dip of her navel and the tangle of dark hair in the vee of her thighs.

“There,” she moaned, gratified. “Yes, there.”

Ken tensed, moved by the emotion in her voice. “I can’t wait much longer.”

She was practically panting now. “Yes…now.”

He imagined himself ready over her waiting body. Their moans would mingle at the union. She would close around him as he sank deeper and deeper in her warmth.

Her voice reverberated in his head, a stream of soft moans, punctuated with throaty inflection to capture a rhythm he matched without hesitation. He could never tire of her voice. “Talk to me,” he begged.

“S-so…good…ohhhhhhhhh…harder…faster…”

Ken obliged, his breathing becoming more ragged with every thrust. “When you’re ready,” he whispered, “take me with you.”

“Yes,” she gasped. “Together…now…oh, yes…”

Ken’s eyes rolled back as he joined her powerful release. Their voices culminated in staccato cries, then gentled to quiet moans. Satisfied sighs hummed on the line as they both labored to control their breathing.

“That…was…great,” he managed between great mouthfuls of air. His body spasmed with residual pleasure and he felt utterly drained.

“Mmm-hmm,” she agreed with a silky laugh, then cleared her throat. “I…guess I’d better let you get back to sleep.” She’d retreated into shyness. “Good night,
Rob. Call me tomorrow.” He heard a faint click, then a dial tone.

Ken floundered to sit up and managed to knock the phone and other clutter off the nightstand. He swung his feet to the floor, his heart still recovering from his unexpectedly naughty phone call. He’d seen, done, and heard a lot of things during his years as a beat cop, but this was a first. Unbeknownst to her, the woman had performed a public service.

Today—no, yesterday—had been one of the lousiest days he could remember. No deaths, thank goodness, but he’d answered an excessive number of domestic violence calls, and the criminals seemed to get younger all the time. He became a cop partly because he wanted to pass a safer world on to his nieces and nephews, and partly because he felt law enforcement was the best possible use of his God-given physical strength and mental discipline. He’d simply underestimated the sheer malice with which people treated one another, especially members of their own family.

Every cop experienced times when he simply didn’t want to get up and go to work, and Ken had been entertaining such thoughts when he lay down. And although his body now tingled with muscle fatigue, his spirit sang with new vitality. Ken decided he needed to get his priorities in order and find a good woman, then maybe he wouldn’t dwell on the misery he encountered every day.

And maybe he wouldn’t be tempted to steal an orgasm meant for another man.

His conscience poked at him, but what could he do now? Nothing, he decided hastily, rising and striding
toward the bathroom. Chalk up the misdirected phone call as a once-in-a-lifetime experience and let it be. Tomorrow, Georgia and Rob—whoever they were—would have a big laugh when they realized she’d coaxed a wrong number to climax.

Ken leaned against the sink and ran a hand through his flattened hair, thinking about the sometimes shy voice of his unwitting partner. What if, instead, she felt humiliated and kept her secret? What if she worried about the identity of the person with whom she’d shared such an intimate experience?

Nah.

He splashed his face with handfuls of cool water, then stumbled back to bed, unable to stop a slow grin and a wide yawn as he fell onto his pillow. One thing he did know. His insomnia was cured for tonight.