Chapter 15: Pre Sex
Simon drove us to Hotel Deville on Bourbon Street. The kind of hotel that announces itself the moment you walk through the door. Huge glass chandeliers overhead, shiny hardwood floors, antique pictures on the walls, dark furniture holding up carved wooden figures that filled the grand lobby with a quiet elegance. A bar and small restaurant sat near the elevators like they knew you would need them.
Evan took my hand and pulled me close, wrapping his arm around my waist as we waited for the elevator.
An elderly woman beside us nudged her husband. "James, remember being that young and in love?"
Her husband nodded. Evan smiled at me and held me a little tighter. I did not say anything. Neither did he. Sometimes silence does more work than words.
The elevator arrived. We all stepped in. Evan pressed P1. The penthouse. The elderly man looked at Evan and smiled the way older men smile when they recognize ambition. The couple got off on the third floor and Evan turned to face me immediately.
"I have been waiting to see you for weeks," he said, his head dipping to my neck. "I am so ready to touch you right now I could show you right here in this elevator."
The doors opened before he could make good on that.
The penthouse room looked like it had been pulled directly from a magazine. Sea foam green walls that made the whole space feel like something tranquil and intentional. I sat down and looked at him.
"Do you say that to all the girls?" I asked, touching his cheek lightly. "Because from what I witnessed thirty minutes ago every woman at that party wants you."
He looked puzzled. "What do you mean?"
"Evan. A group of women nearly jumped on me for taking one of their Black men."
"Taking me away?"
"They thought I was white."
He stared at me. Then he laughed. Then he tried to stop laughing and could not.
"I should not be laughing," he said.
I narrowed my eyes at him.
"That had to be Honey and her crew," he said, composing himself. "They show up to every event looking for someone to attach themselves to. Brian told me what happened and I am genuinely sorry."
"Whatever," I said. But I was almost smiling.
"I understand how that feels more than you know," he said, settling in beside me. "I am biracial too. My father is white, my mother is Black and Brazilian. When I went for my first job interview at TruHype Records they thought I was some rich white kid trying to play a part. My name is Evan Thurman McCain. I got teased endlessly until I started rapping about it. Sold my first hit at sixteen. Never looked back. At twenty five I own the number one record company in the country. I answer to no one except my board and my board is my mother, my father, my two sisters and my younger brother."
"That is some life," I said. "I cannot compete with that."
"I know a lot about you Cadence," he said, with a look I could not quite read.
"You think you do," I said, crossing my legs.
He came and sat beside me. "Let us make a deal. For every correct thing I say about you, one piece of clothing comes off. If I lose I tell you who really broke my heart and why I have not had a girlfriend since. Do we have a deal?"
I looked at him. "I am not wearing much. That is not fair."
"Maybe I will get a lot of things wrong."
"Still not fair." I laughed. "Fine. You have three minutes. Clock starts now."
"You did not finish school because something personal happened. Not grades because you are enrolled at Tulane now. Something life interrupted."
I took off a shoe.
"You grew up in the hood."
My eyes went wide. I took off the other shoe.
"Not all Black people live in the hood Mr. McCain."
"No. But there is nothing to be ashamed of. Most of my artists come from exactly where you come from."
"None taken," I said, and rolled down one stocking slowly, unbuckling it from the garter. I watched his eyes follow every movement and watched him lick his lips.
"You took the job with Lilly for something worthwhile. Not for greed. Not for someone to take care of you. You are independent. But you are still finding your footing in the experience department."
I rolled down the other stocking along with the garter and set them both aside.
"One minute left Mr. McCain."
He looked at me for a long moment without speaking. The clock was running and he just looked. Quiet. Still. Like he was reading something written underneath everything I showed the world.
"You are looking for happiness," he said finally. "And you think it might not be something you are allowed to have. Not from your parents necessarily. Just from someone who will accept exactly who you are without needing you to be anything else."
I did not know I was crying until I felt it.
One tear. Slow and quiet down my cheek. I had not seen it coming and neither had my composure.
He reached over and touched my face. I stared into those amber eyes and felt completely seen in a way that should have frightened me and somehow did not.
He kissed me softly on the lips. Then down my neck. Then the back of my neck. His cologne settled around me and I leaned into him without deciding to. Even through the smoke of the party he smelled like nothing but pure uncut masculinity and I wanted to stay inside it.
I wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled him closer.
He stopped and pressed his forehead to mine. "I hope I did not offend you."
"You were right about all of it," I said. "You win."
He picked me up, unzipped my dress and laid it aside, leaving me in my black thong and bra. His eyes moved over me slowly deciding where to begin.
Now. Between his amber eyes burning like open flames and his hands sliding up and down my legs sending shivers through every nerve ending I possessed, I was not entirely sure if this was real or if I had somehow fallen asleep on my own couch and none of this was happening.
I heard a rip. My thong was in two pieces. His mouth covered me before the fabric hit the floor.
I want to pause here and ask a genuine question that crossed my mind in that moment. What exactly do men get out of this? Because I thoroughly enjoy the receiving end, do not misunderstand me, but the dedication these men apply to the task genuinely fascinates me. Evan in particular approached it like a man with a personal mission statement.
He used both hands to open me up and the pleasure hit so immediately that I hooked one leg around his neck and let him take whatever he needed. His tongue moved with complete authority. One finger entered me and I rocked against it. The second followed shortly after. The pressure he applied to exactly the right spot combined with everything else his mouth was doing had me shaking from the inside out. I closed my eyes and came so hard I genuinely lost track of where I was for a moment.
Which, for the record, I did not mind at all.
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