Close Contact (Clarke Brothers Book 3) Read online

  In it, he was completely professional, asking when we could set our meeting before the reopening of Tigress.

  Shit.

  Apparently, it was still on his mind too.

  Only… with everything happening between us, what did he even mean when asking me about a “meeting”?

  Was it code for sex, or was the man really trying to work?

  It was really and truly an uncertain place to be in, especially with a man like Aiden who was so… confusing.

  Before we met – before this collaboration was ever a thing – I’d kinda idolized him. He was talented, he was kind, he was philanthropic, he was very low key, and he was… fine.

  What wasn’t there to like?

  I remembered him coming to eat at Tigress, before my troubles. I was too busy to fangirl or fawn, but he’d insisted on at least shaking my hand, and complimenting my food before he let me get back to work.

  It was a memory I cherished.

  But then, my next interaction with him was in the process of handing over half of Tigress. Any interfacing with him then – and maybe still now – was colored by my negative feelings about the whole thing.

  Our first time being one on one, in private?

  Somehow resulted in his head between my legs.

  And throughout all of it, he’d never shifted away from his persistent… unbotheredness.

  Not only did nothing seem to ruffle him, he seemed so convinced that this… whatever the hell this was… between us, was natural.

  Normal.

  Appropriate.

  He was completely unmoved by how, when I got around him, I was suddenly taking part in some… erotic fiction version of myself who played with my pussy on my kitchen counter, and rode dick in my office.

  A whole other person who didn’t have to consider the consequences of those things, or worry about the cost of her actions.

  Good thing he’s not here right now… I thought to myself as I hit the reply button to type out a response. I told him it would be fine for us to meet in two days, in the kitchen at Tigress.

  There would be other staff there, which would force me to keep my pussy to myself.

  I moved on to other emails, still needing work as a distraction to keep my mind off the storm – and off Aiden. There was only so much I could do in the middle of night though, so after I’d updated my calendar with new appointments, and my to-do list with necessary tasks… I was right back to square one.

  At least until my desperate refresh of my email brought a fresh message to my inbox.

  A reply from Aiden.

  ------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  From: Clarke, Aiden

  To: Nolan, Kima

  Subject: re: About That Meeting…

  Thanks for the quick reply, Ms. Nolan – Friday works for me as well. Forgive my prying though, because I have to ask – do you usually answer work emails at two in the morning?

  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------

  From: Nolan, Kima

  To: Clarke, Aiden

  Subject: re:re:About That Meeting

  Only when the weather seems intent on dragging me to hell and I’d rather be awake for it. What’s your excuse?

  --------------------------------------------------------------------------

  As soon as I hit send on the reply, I mentally kicked myself, because, what is your problem, Kima?

  There was a professional way to respond to his question, and yet I’d matched his energy like we were friends, with a reply that was way too casual.

  Like I just couldn’t help myself.

  I was still feeling disgusted by my choices when, not even a minute later… my cell phone rang. The number wasn’t saved, but I didn’t even have to wonder about it to know… it was Aiden.

  “Hello?” I answered, closing the lid on my laptop as I put the phone to my ear. I couldn’t even force myself to make him wait a few rings before picking it up.

  Pressed.

  “So you’re afraid of thunderstorms, huh?” Aiden’s warm, amused rumble came over the line, hitting me right between the legs.

  I shifted in my seat at the counter, propping my head against my hand as I closed my eyes. “Is this what you called me for?”

  “Good-natured teasing? Absolutely,” he replied, bringing an unwanted smile to my face.

  I quickly stifled it, not wanting it to be apparent in my voice when I claimed, “Okay, I’m hanging up.”

  “Don’t do that.” His tone was so gentle that it could’ve been mistaken as a request, but it was really an imperative – an unnecessary one.

  I had nowhere close to the discipline one might need to hang up on Aiden Clarke.

  “Why shouldn’t I?” I asked anyway, as if ending the call was even an option.

  “Because then we’d both still be unfortunately awake, only with no one to talk to.”

  “What makes you think I don’t have anybody else to talk to?”

  He chuckled. “Because you’d be on the phone with them, instead of me.”

  “That’s a fair point,” I admitted. “So… what are we going to talk about?”

  “Well, we can start with what you think we should cook on Friday? I’m thinking we should do with traditional Bahamian, as a nod to your culture. Cracked conch, peas and rice? Maybe a fish stew? Guava duff?”

  I laughed, shaking my head. “Aiden, you sound like you read an article about Bahamian food. You read a list on the internet, didn’t you?”

  “I… maybe,” he confessed, joining me in my laughter. “But are you telling me you don’t have the ingredients for any of that in your house right now?”

  “I have the ingredients for all of it in my house right now, but that’s not the point.”

  “Yeah, yeah, sounds to me like you’re just giving me a hard time.”

  “Sounds to me like you’re ri—God damn it,” I shrieked, clutching my chest as a particularly loud roll of thunder caught me off guard. It rattled the whole building, making me reflexively slide off my barstool to go… hell, I didn’t know where.

  I just knew the kitchen with all its big windows and hard surfaces didn’t feel particularly encouraging right now.

  “Kima, are you okay?” Aiden asked, reminding me that he was on the other end of the line. Heat rushed to my face as I realized how absurdly fearful I must’ve sounded, reacting to thunder like it was some foreign concept.

  “I’m fine,” I lied, as I crawled back into my bed, into the warm comfort of the linens.

  “You sure?” he asked, in a tone that made me wonder if, as loud as my heart was beating in my own ears, he could somehow hear it too.

  “Yes,” I hissed. Fully recognizing that I sounded very unsure, and completely not fine. “Maybe we should make some johnny-cake too. Some sowse. Just completely round the Bahamian tourist meal out.”

  It took a moment, but Aiden laughed, apparently going along with my attempt to shift the focus away from my juvenile reaction to a little bad weather.

  “I know you’re teasing me, but I’d love to try all of them – I know you have a few of these on the new Tigress menu, so I want to check it all out.”

  I closed my eyes.

  That was another thing the Clarkes had insisted on, even though it wasn’t exactly what Tigress was known for. Our Caribbean flair – inspired by all the islands – was certainly popular in Blackwood, but it was mostly presented with a Black American fusion – like what I’d grown up with.

  Like who I was.

  A mixture of two flavors into something beautiful.

  All three brothers agreed though – there should be dishes with no American influence at all, bringing the traditional flavors along for people with a palate that craved it.

  Honestly… I agreed, too.

  The new menu we were moving forward with wasn’t actually “new” at all. I’d created it two years ago, and had even taught my line chefs the dishes
it included.

  And then… I got scared, and it never launched.

  But now it would.

  “We can do it. Make it,” I corrected myself, to avoid innuendo. “The conch fritters, the peas and rice, and a green salad, with citrus dressing. And the guava duff.”

  “I’m looking forward to it.”

  That declaration was barely off his lips before a fresh round of unreasonably harsh rain started drumming against my windows, followed by another sonorous boom of lightning.

  My reaction this time was much less dramatic than before, but still audible. I hoped my “shit” was hissed low enough to go unnoticed, but then Aiden asked, “You really aren’t a fan of storms, are you?”

  The lights flickered, and I pushed out a heavy sigh as I admitted. “No. Not even a little.”

  “Bad experience?”

  “Traumatic one,” I explained. “We were in our house, when a hurricane ripped through, out of nowhere. No one thought it was going to be as bad as it was, it just ramped up really fast. We all lived, but… my mother brought us to her family, here in Blackwood. And then my father came along later, after he rebuilt our house, but we never officially moved back. I had nightmares about that night for a really long time.”

  “Oh, damn. I’m sorry for teasing you about it earlier.”

  “You don’t have to apologize. I know you didn’t mean any harm.”

  “Meaning and causing are two different things though, so… again, I’m sorry.”

  I bit back another smile. “Fine. Apology accepted. Was there something else you wanted to talk about besides the menu?”

  “Why do I get the feeling you’re trying to get me off the phone?”

  “Because I am.”

  “You have a pressing matter to attend to, or…?”

  “Just… need to get some sleep, probably,” I told him, as if the chances of that happening weren’t incredibly slim.

  “You think you’ll be able to now?”

  “Y-yeah.”

  I stuttered over the lie because the lights flickered again before they shut completely off, bathing me in darkness.

  Shit.

  “Okay. Well, I don’t want to keep you from getting any rest, so I’ll let you go. And I’ll see you Friday.”

  As soon as the call was over, I flipped onto my back to stare at the ceiling, now dimly illuminated in the fading light from my phone.

  Why did I get off the phone?

  It was exactly like he said – now I was just awake with no one to talk to, and I couldn’t even occupy myself with the TV, because the power was out.

  So… here I was.

  Alone.

  It wasn’t like I didn’t have homegirls, or family, or whatever – I had all that, in abundance.

  I just didn’t have anybody to text away the sleeplessness with at three in the damn morning.

  Another loud rumble of thunder shook the apartment again, sending a shiver through me as the light from my phone shut off. The dark itself didn’t scare me, I just wasn’t particularly fond of it paired with the storm.

  Somehow, it just made everything feel more… insidious.

  Definitely not staying in bed now.

  I peeled myself up again, using the flashlight feature on my phone to guide me to the kitchen, where I lit one of no less than a hundred candles I had around here. With some light restored, I checked to see if the kettle was still warm from the tea I’d made myself earlier.

  It really did feel like a blessing to discover it was.

  So, I made myself a fresh cup, with the added treat of a generous pour of bourbon. Right now I didn’t feel tired, but if I didn’t get any sleep, I would pay for it for the next few days. Once it was done, I took my tea to the window I’d been avoiding earlier, staring out at the storm.

  Pretending I wasn’t terrified of it.

  There were lights in the distance, from the next block over, but all the buildings close to mine seemed shrouded, just faint outlines in the dark. There was a brief stretch, about ten minutes, where the clouds seemed to lift, and the moon took a short peek from around the black clouds.

  But then that was over, and the storm started right back up, whipping the trees around like they were those inflatable stick figure things from car lots.

  I checked the radar again, using the information there to ground my mounting anxiety. It helped a lot when the liquor started kicking in. In fact, as I sat there at the window, it started getting harder to drag my eyes back open from every blink – exactly the indication that I needed to get back in bed. This was a narrow window, where my tipsiness could lead me into slumber before the storm got too bad again.

  I did a quick rinse of my cup, blew out the candle, and headed back for my room.

  I was halfway there when a quick succession of loud rumbles sounded.

  “Goddamnit,” I groaned, stopping to lament the fact that my opportunity for sleep was already gone, now that the thunder had arrived.

  But then… the sound happened again, and I realized it wasn’t thunder at all.

  … there was someone at my door.

  I frowned as I headed in that direction, and peeked out the – currently useless – peephole. I couldn’t see a damn thing with everything except the emergency stair lights out, making the hallway mostly dark.

  “Who is it?” I asked, before it occurred to me that I should probably be pretending to be asleep, or not at home. Maybe it made me a bad neighbor, but it was way too late at night – or early in the morning – for anything less than an emergency, and in that case, they should probably be getting in contact with 911.

  “It’s Aiden, Kima. Can you open the door?”

  Aiden?

  I hurriedly unlocked the door, flinging it open to find him soaking wet, wiping away rivulets of rainwater before they dripped from his hair into his eyes.

  “What are doing here?” I asked.

  “I didn’t like the idea of you here alone, scared. There was a break in the storm, so I took the chance. Obviously the break wasn’t quite long enough.”

  “Obviously,” I agreed, stepping back from the door. “Come in, I’ll get you some towels.”

  He did that, dutifully following my directives straight to the bathroom, instead of soaking my carpet. Today’s stormy weather had brought a cold front with it, so I actually insisted on him getting into the shower to warm up quicker, since I couldn’t turn any heat on for him.

  I left him with a candle to use whatever residual hot water remained in the heater, then used the last of the water from the kettle to make him a cup of tea.

  All while I battled with myself over how to react to this.

  Really, I was loath to admit it, but… I was kinda glad he was here.

  He shouldn’t be, though.

  He shouldn’t have called me, shouldn’t have been worried about me. And he most definitely shouldn’t have showed up.

  There wasn’t anything I could do about it now.

  I took his tea back to my bedroom, arriving just in time to find him sauntering out of my bathroom in nothing but a towel slung around his hips.

  “I hung your clothes, since I can’t put them in the dryer,” I told him, extending the cup to him as I forced myself to keep my eyes above his neck.

  Not that his face was any less dangerous than the rest of him, but the attempt made me feel like I was at least trying to stay out of trouble.

  “Thank you,” he said, accepting the steaming mug from my hands. “I appreciate that you’re not treating me like the uninvited guest I actually am.”

  “You’re welcome. You think you could… explain what exactly you’re doing here now that you’re not about to end up with pneumonia?” I asked, tucking my hands together behind me. “It’s pretty wild that you came over in here in the middle of a storm.”

  “It is,” he agreed, with a sheepish nod. “And I can’t… I can’t give you an explanation that’s going to sound real, but… I just felt like I had to. The thought that you were
here by yourself, afraid, unable to sleep. It just bothered me.”

  “But when we got off the phone, I told you I was going to bed.”

  “You didn’t though,” he countered.

  I frowned. “How would you know that?”

  “Because I couldn’t either.”

  He told me that with a shrug before lifting the mug to his lips for a careful sip that just… did something to me, all the way down to my soul. Like always, he was so damn… relaxed. Completely comfortable, naked in my house at this time of morning as if we knew other, talking about not being able to sleep because I couldn’t, as if that shit was normal.

  “As soon as your clothes are dry, if the storm has passed… I want you to go.”

  His eyebrows shot up in the candlelight, and he lowered the mug. “Have I made you uncomfortable?”

  A cackle of laughter shot from my throat before I could help it. “Yes,” I told him, nodding as I snatched back my composure. “Everything about whatever the hell this is that has been happening between us… it makes me very uncomfortable.”

  “Can you tell me why?”

  “I… just… because,” I countered, frustrated. He had to know that of course I couldn’t tell him why, because I didn’t even know my damn self. “It’s just… not what I’m used to.”

  “You’re not used to someone worrying about you?”

  “It’s not that. It’s…”

  “You’re not used to your man worrying about you?”

  My eyebrows shot up as I processed what had just so nonchalantly came from his lips. “Really, Aiden? You’ve just decided you’re my man now?”

  “That’s not what I was saying, but… hell, why not?”

  I scoffed. “Right. Exactly what any woman wants to hear from a man who claims to be interested in her. Hell, why not? Thank you. I feel so wanted now.”

  “Seriously, Kima?” Aiden spoke, suddenly missing all traces of amusement in his tone. “I get it – I’ve scared you, and you’re trying to push me away right now. But what you’re not about to do is pretend that I’ve ever, even once, downplayed the fact that I wanted you.”

  “Yeah, you want something,” I replied, with a nod. “And the entire two times we’ve been alone together before this, you got it. I’m human, and I’m a woman with desires, and you’re… a very appealing guy. I’ll own up to that. But what’s not going to happen is you bullshitting me, making this seem like it’s something it isn’t. You telling what you think I want to hear, some kinda soul mate shared conscious mumbo jumbo… it’s cruel, Aiden. I fell for it once – I won’t again.”