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  Chapter 3

  Their train rushes along, past buildings, warehouses, and backyards. Trees fly by as Michael glances out the window. Kennedy sits across from him, Amtrak-issued blue blanket draped over her lap, no one beside either of them. The ride is comforting, the train rocking slightly back and forth as it hurtles north toward Wilmington, Philly, Newark, and their destination, New York City.

  The car is not at all crowded. Michael thought every seat would’ve been taken, seeing how today is Friday afternoon. But the travel gods are watching over them. Kennedy sits with her legs crossed, foot tapping to a beat on her iPod that only she can hear. In her hand is her trusted BlackBerry Pearl, which she is never far from. Head down, her fingers peck incessantly over the tiny keyboard—type, pause, type, repeat.

  Michael has brought several magazines to read. They lie untouched on the seat beside him. The motion of the train is therapeutic, making him groggy. He’s got the rest of the trip and weekend to flip through the pages, so he lays his head back on the cushion and closes his eyes. He drifts off only to be awakened by a vibration on his hip from his cell phone. Opening his eyes, he observes the expanse of water as the train passes over a low bridge. The effect is that they are gliding over the water, traveling via hovercraft or low-flying helicopter. Michael reaches for his own BlackBerry as he stares at the scene before him for a moment more. It is peaceful and serene.

  Back to the vibrating BlackBerry . . .

  He owns a silver Curve.

  His wife, a black Pearl.

  Michael checks the oversized screen. An IM message. He open it and has to smile. It’s from a woman.

  The woman sitting across from him.

  HEY HANDSOME

  He glances up. Kennedy’s head is down, but she raises it momentarily. Their eyes meet; she smiles seductively, then lowers her head, fingers never leaving the keyboard. He responds.

  HEY MS. SEXY THANG. WHATS ON UR MIND?

  This time Kennedy doesn’t look up. She’s busy replying, foot continuing to tap as her iPod whirls away.

  YOU

  Michael makes eye contact with Kennedy. He raises his eyebrow as if to say, “Yeah? Go on. . . .”

  Head drops back down, and she types and sends.

  THINKING ABOUT U MAKING LOVE TO ME

  Michael grins. His fingers go to the keys, composing a response.

  REALLY? DO TELL

  When Kennedy is concentrating on something, she inadvertently taps her tongue against her teeth. Michael observes her doing this now, and he finds it incredibly sexy.

  IM WET

  Michael looks up into the eyes of his wife. She’s staring at him, eyes unblinking, her smile driving him wild. Michael cocks his head to the side and opens his mouth to speak.

  “Right now?” he asks, his voice low.

  Kennedy slowly removes the earbuds and shuts off the iPod. She leans forward.

  “Find out.”

  Michael leans back and sighs. “Damn,” he whispers. He fingers the Curve, typing a response.

  UR MAKING ME HARD

  Their stares lock once again.

  Kennedy uncrosses her legs and stands, moving Michael’s pile of magazines in order to sit beside him. She re-drapes the blanket over both of them. She nuzzles close to him, her hand slowly gliding up his thigh. Her head is facing him and the window, lips dangerously close to his ear.

  She whispers, “Will you fuck me later?”

  Michael’s breathing spikes. His eyes scan over the other passengers, but they are lost in their own reveries.

  “Yes, baby.”

  Her hand creeps upward, dropping to his inner thigh. Fingers splayed, feeling the rise as he hardens.

  “And eat me?” The words are puffs of air against his ear.

  “You know I will. Love tasting you . . .”

  Her fingers are on him, finding the outline of his manhood and massaging it. She squeezes his dick, feeling it grow between her fingers. Michael licks his lips and leans back farther as Kennedy unzips his jeans. She catches his stare and smiles—that seductive smile that drives him insane.

  A moment later Kennedy’s hand is massaging his cock through his boxer shorts. He’s fully hard now, and Kennedy clutches him in her hand, the fabric and her fingers constraining him. She slips her fingers beneath the boxer shorts and is rewarded with the fullness of him. Fully engorged. Her fingers wrap around his girth and squeeze as she nibbles on his neck. Her lips graze his earlobe, tugging on it playfully.

  “I love that you’re so big. . . .”

  Michael turns his head to her.

  “You make it that way, Ken.”

  Kennedy begins a slow stroke, taking her time but maintaining pressure as she jerks him.

  “I want you in me.”

  “Does Amtrak have the equivalent of a mile-high club?” Michael asks playfully.

  “I wish.”

  Kennedy glances around at the other passengers. There is no one occupying the seats directly across the aisle from them. She glances back at her husband momentarily before lowering her head, pushing the blanket down in the process. Michael’s eyes grow wide. Her mouth consumes him in an instant. Kennedy takes him deep and fast into her throat. Several up and down strokes of his hard dick in her hot mouth, her hand providing the friction, before she sits up, covering him quickly with the blanket.

  Michael is speechless.

  Kennedy kisses him on the mouth passionately while giving his cock a final tug. Then she places it back inside the confines of his underwear. The entire deed lasted less than five seconds, but it was exquisite in its approach and execution.

  “Always wanted to do that,” she says with a gleam of longing in her eyes.

  Chapter 4

  The bellman finishes depositing Michael and Kennedy’s bags in their hotel room and gives them a quick tour. King-size bed, room done up in shades of purple and red, eclectic photographs on the wall, an oversized chaise lounge made of comfortable upholstery. In the bathroom, an enclosed-glass shower stall for two and a separate Jacuzzi spa that’s big enough for the both of them. Michael palms the bellman a ten-spot and closes the door. Kennedy rushes to him and wraps her arms around his neck, pulling him close and offering up her tongue, which he readily takes.

  “I LOVE it!”

  “Me, too,” Michael responds.

  “This view ... ,” she says, going to the window. They are on the fifty-first floor, facing west. The Hudson River shimmers in the distance. It is dusk, and lights in the neighboring skyscrapers are beginning to blink on. They linger at the window for a moment admiring the picturesque view as Michael stands behind his wife, holding her waist. They remain that way for a moment before Kennedy turns to Michael and says with a grin, “I’m starving.”

  They find a restaurant within walking distance of their hotel in the Theater District, an Italian spot with plenty of atmosphere that serves generous portions, family style. Their entrees: veal parmigiana and clams in red linguine sauce. They share a very good bottle of Pinot Grigio between them while waiting for the food.

  Michael, much to Kennedy’s contentment, sits not across but beside her in a cozy booth. While sipping their Pi not, Kennedy and Michael recount the ups and downs of their week. Their rule—they are allowed to spend no more than an hour bitching about their respective jobs. The rest of the time is to be spent on positive rhetoric. Not that either of them focuses on the negative. Their jobs are fulfilling, and for the most part they have bosses who are supportive and coworkers who are pleasant to be around. They chat about Zack and his school and friends, their family, and each other.

  Once the veal and clams arrive, Michael has Kennedy laughing about one of his friends/coworkers. Marc is a senior attorney at Michael’s agency. He’s white and a few years shy of retirement. The Sean Connery look-alike is comical—he’s constantly hitting on the young interns and associates. He likes them young, fresh out of college. Anything older than twenty-two or twenty-three won’t do.

  “The g
uy is slick,” Michael exclaims while forking a sliver of veal into Kennedy’s mouth. “He knows the boundaries with respect to his job. So as to not seem like he’s harassing these women, he attempts to hire them as his personal dog walkers for his two German shepherds.”

  “I don’t like him,” Kennedy says.

  “I know you don’t,” Michael replies, laughing. “But you have to give him credit—he is relentless—and it seems like every other week he’s getting one of the nubile young things over to his Georgetown condo under the guise of getting to know his dogs.”

  “Nubile young things? Michael, if I didn’t know any better I would think you actually admire him,” Kennedy says.

  “Ken, I admire his perseverance. The guy doesn’t give up, even though he’s not getting any!”

  Kennedy’s turn.

  She has a coworker, a paralegal named Jacqueline. Jackie, as she’s called, is dating this uptight dentist named Freddy. Michael remembers meeting them at an office function earlier this year. The dentist said all of two words the entire evening.

  “Jackie went down south with him for his homecoming last weekend,” Kennedy explains. “While there she happened to check his phone and saw all of these text messages from other women.”

  “She just happened to check his phone?” Michael asked.

  “I didn’t get into all that.”

  “Okay . . .”

  “Anyway, she finds these messages, and they were definitely inappropriate for him to be having with anyone who was not his girlfriend.”

  “Like?”

  “Like ‘I made it safely, baby’ and ‘Missing you and what you did to me last week.’ ”

  “Ouch.” Michael takes a sip of the Pinot and forks some of Kennedy’s clams into his mouth.

  “So, get this. Freddy is sleeping when she’s doing all this. She goes into the hallway and calls these women on his phone. Two answer. She asks who the fuck these bitches are and what they have to do with Freddy.”

  “Oh boy. Shit hits the fan,” Michael says.

  “Sure does. One woman tells her outright, ‘I was dating him, but he tried to fuck me without a condom, and I wasn’t having that!’ ”

  “You’re kidding? He should know better,” Michael exclaims.

  “I know. The other woman says that she is Freddy’s cousin.”

  “What? Just how gullible is your friend?”

  Kennedy laughs. “Jackie confronts Freddy—she wakes his black ass up, and guess what he says?”

  “I can’t even imagine how the good dentist handles this one.”

  “He says, ‘I can’t believe you went through my phone without asking!’ ” Kennedy laughs some more as she pauses to enjoy her food. She has a touch of red sauce on her bottom lip, so Michael takes his napkin and dabs at the spot.

  “Typical male response,” Michael says. “Deflect the conversation away from the real issue.”

  “Exactly. What’s truly sad is that she started to doubt herself.”

  “Hold up. I’m sure she pressed him about what the woman had said regarding not using a condom. I mean, how can he not address that?” Michael asks.

  “Well, Freddy managed to do exactly that. He refused to speak to her, and the next day went to a football game without her.”

  “She’s an idiot,” Michael exclaims. “Freddy treats her like shit because he can. Because she lets him.”

  “True. The whole thing sickened me to hear. It made me realize how lucky I am to have what we have.” Kennedy leans in and kisses Michael on the cheek. “I’m blessed to have you in my life, Michael,” she says.

  Michael glances her way and smiles.

  “Does this mean I’m getting some tonight?”

  Kennedy groans while rolling her eyes.

  “You could fuck up a wet dream, you know that?”

  After coffee, no dessert, they walk back to the hotel hand in hand. When they are inside their room, Michael throws off his running shoes and opens the drapes wide so that the splendor of Manhattan at night invades their window. He climbs onto the bed as Kennedy begins to undress.

  “I guess we should start getting ready,” Kennedy says.

  “Good idea. Ladies first.”

  Kennedy retreats to the bathroom and closes the door. Michael reaches for his BlackBerry Curve and checks e-mails and voice mails. Afterward he presses a few keys, enabling the Chaperone feature on his phone to locate his son.

  A few moments later an address displays on the screen.

  A District of Columbia address.

  Jeremy’s house.

  Technology is a godsend.

  He wonders what Zack is doing right now. Undoubtedly huddled in front of Jeremy’s Xbox 360 playing Test Drive Unlimited, Top Spin 2, Amped 3, or Call of Duty 2 (his favorite).

  Michael lays his head back and naps.

  Kennedy makes a grand entrance close to an hour later. What Michael sees takes his breath away.

  “My goodness . . .”

  She stands before him, her hourglass-shaped body clad in a formfitting little black minidress that stops at the tops of her thighs. A plunging V neckline is open to right above her navel. Less than half of each breast is confined by fabric; the rest of her smooth, lovely flesh is on display. Black, shiny, needle-heeled boots end slightly above her knees. Her hair, flat-ironed straight down her back, is flawless. A pair of diamond-drop earrings in 14K white gold is her only jewelry. Her makeup looks professionally applied. Michael is speechless. He goes to her slowly, marveling at her as if she’s an apparition, reaching out to touch her, inhaling a scent of heavenly perfume.

  An hour ago his wife was standing before him. Now this creature has emerged, something else. Something brand new to consider. A vixen. A siren. A dream.

  Michael is inches from her face. His heart is pounding, and he is growing hard. He focuses in on the raisin-and-champagne-blended eye shadow. The red Bordeaux lip gloss. He resists the urge to lick her lips and taste her. Consume her right here and now. He is that hungry.

  “Who are you?” he asks dubiously, in breathless anticipation.

  And she responds, “My name is Celestial, and I’m your deepest, darkest fantasy come true.”

  Chapter 5

  The taxi drops them off on a quiet street on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, East Seventy-fifth Street, to be exact, a block away from Fifth Avenue, which lines Central Park, and a half-dozen blocks from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Michael pays the mahogany-hued driver, who has been staring incessantly at Kennedy through his rearview mirror ever since they got in. She nudges Michael and whispers to give the man a nice tip. Michael rolls his eyes while breaking off a twenty, telling the West African to keep the change.

  The night air has chilled slightly, and Michael puts his arms about Kennedy’s shoulders; a beefy male greeter/doorman is standing in front of a narrow, reddish brown building, five stories tall, with beautiful oval windows. The man is dressed in designer black—yet he’s white, bald, and reminds Kennedy of that guy on Jerry Springer who’s always breaking up fights. Michael, wearing a well-tailored charcoal multistriped three-button suit with a collared button-down blue shirt, walks up and hands him their invitation—a black-on-black card with the word BLISS in large embossed letters. Underneath, the address, date, and time. The greeter beams at Kennedy, and, as an afterthought, at Michael, too, takes the invitation and fingers it, as if checking for its authenticity, before consulting a PDA. Michael gives him their names, the Jerry Springer guy uses a steel stylus to check them off a list, and he goes to the door, holding it open for them.

  Years ago, Michael and Kennedy were vacationing in the Bahamas. There they met a well-traveled, engaging, hip-hop Generation Y philanthropist who became quite fond of them. They spent much time together, getting drunk and high, gambling and partying until the sun came up. RESPECT, as he’s called, is well known in the African-American community for being a poet, a contributor to many start-up Harlem businesses, and, mostly, a partygoer and thrower. Many
actors, musicians, artists, and even politicians have coveted his invitations, for they know that there ain’t no party like a RESPECT party, and a RESPECT party . . . Well, you get the idea.

  They enter on the first level and move toward the back of the building. The home is deep and surprisingly large. There are a fair amount of people milling about. A brushed aluminum bar in the back room overlooks the patio. Dark walls, African art hanging and spotlit from above, smooth jazz emanating around them like fog, a few couches and love seats where folks can chill. Everyone is well dressed. A mix of black and white, some Asians, some Latinos, a few Europeans. Mostly a mid-to-upper-twenties-and-into-their-thirties crowd. Michael spots a well-known rapper on one couch with his entourage of females. They make for the bar, Kennedy’s hand in Michael’s, as all eyes clock them. Michael nods to those who stop in midsentence to check out his wife. Behind the bar is a tall, good-looking brutha who is shirtless and wearing his hair in cornrows. He’s got a bunch of tattoos across his chest and down his arms.

  “What can I get for you two?” the bartender asks. Michael appraises him. His words and demeanor belie his thuggish looks.

  “What do you feel like having?” Michael asks his wife. The bartender flashes a smile at Kennedy. She replies, “I’m not sure yet.”

  “I’ll have a mojito if you’re making them fresh,” Michael says.

  “Of course. I’ve got fresh mint right here,” the bartender says, holding up a few sprigs between dark fingers, “and I use cane sugar.”

  “Sweet.”

  “And for the lady?”

  Kennedy purses her lips with indecision. “Not sure what I’m feeling right now. Can you suggest something or just surprise me?”

  The bartender considers her for a moment and then nods. “Not a problem.” He begins on Michael’s drink, mashing the mint sprigs in a tall glass. Moments later he is presenting Michael with his drink and then proceeds to make Kennedy’s. She watches him as Michael tests his and gives the bartender dap.