Page 49 of The Love Audit
I pulled her into my arms and pressed our lips together. She was surprised at first, but she softened in my embrace with a sweet moan and wrapped one of her legs around my waist, and we deepened our kiss. I rolled my body on top of hers and began plantingkisses on her cheek, then chin. I pressed my lips into the curve of her neck before leaning up to look into her eyes.
“Are you ready for this, Jasmine?” Her eyes were heavy-lidded and soft. Her supple lips were slightly swollen with a rosy hue. Her hair was a halo of tangled curls. She tucked her bottom lip between her teeth but didn’t respond to my question. “Once we cross this line, there’s no going back.”
“I’d never want to go back,” she whispered and painted my lips with a featherlight kiss. “So, to answer your question, yes, Derek Carter, I’m ready.” Her sentence was punctuated by a paw scratching at the bedroom door and a muffled whine. “But I don’t think Tora is ready.” She giggled.
“He’s ready for his morning walk.” I sighed and rolled off her.
“We could be quick,” she offered with a raised eyebrow.
“Not an option, kitten.” I kissed her nose before I climbed out of bed. “When Tora wants something, he won’t stop until he gets it.”
“Reminds me of someone I know.” She chuckled and climbed out of bed. I’d forgotten that she was still naked from the waist down. The sight of the lower curves of her ass peeking out from the bottom of her T-shirt was nearly enough to make me forget about Tora’s walk and yank her back into that bed. “You’re right, though.” She sighed. “We better not keep the boss waiting.” She felt around the floor for her panties before stepping into them.
“And besides”—I pulled her into me and curved my palms around her cheeks, grabbing two handfuls and squeezing, making her squeal—“the first time I make love to you, I’m gonna take my time.”
I’d been looking forward to spending time with David all week, but of course that was before things with Jasmine and me took a turn for the better. After walking Tora, we had breakfast in bed, where Jasmine ultimately became breakfast in bed. Then I took an extra-long cold shower in order to prepare to tear myself away from the living embodiment of a dream come true.
She pushed me away after our fifth kiss goodbye, warning me not to keep David waiting, and I left her on the couch, her laptop open on her lap and Tora curled up next to her, snoring. It was an image I’d give anything to freeze in time and keep forever.
After spending three hours in David’s backyard, I was fully convinced that he’d forgotten more about grilling and smoking meat than I could ever learn in two lifetimes. His passionate pursuit of the perfect combination of flavor and tenderness intermingled with the application of his many degrees in physics and engineering and his knowledge of chemistry made for one of my most interesting afternoons in recent memory. It succeeded in making me forget the real reason I was in this town and almost made me forget that Jasmine and Tora were waiting for me back at the apartment… almost.
“I know that look.” David laughed as he handed me a beer from his customized beer cooler, another one of his innovations. “When Eleanor and I first got together, I could barely put one foot in front of the other most days. And when we got married? Whoo, buddy! If that woman hadn’t shoved me out of the front door every morning, we would have starved to death.” He’d obviously caught me during a Jasmine-induced flashback, and I couldn’t even defend myself.
“In the beginning”—I snapped the cap off my beer and clinked bottles with David—“with Eleanor, how did you know she was the one, that it was going to last?”
“You having buyer’s remorse, Chief?” He gave me a skeptical look and took a swig of his beer.
“No,” I answered quickly. “Not at all. Jasmine makes me happier than I ever thought was possible. Falling in love is something I wasn’t looking for. I never expected it.”
“Yeah, that’s usually the way it happens,” he conceded.
“I was raised by two people who I thought were happy and in love. Then, in what felt like an instant, they hated each other.” I drifted off, afraid to reveal too much personal information and shocked that I’d confided in someone besides my brother about my parents’ divorce. “Did you ever worry about your feelings changing in the future?”
“Hmm.” David leaned back in his chair, and he seemed to be measuring his words carefully. “Love doesn’t always last, and when you’ve been around as long as I have, you’ve seen relationships stand the test of time and you’ve seen relationships fall apart.”
I nodded and took a sip of my beer.
“To be honest with you, I never really focused on my future with Eleanor.” He chuckled when I furrowed my brow. “Yes, we made plans and had babies, but what I mean is, I focused on the present, what was in front of me. All I ever wanted, all I still want, is to spend as much time with that woman as God sees fit to grant me. I can’t even imagine wasting a second thinking about what might happen to us in the future when I have her in front of me right now. I sure as hell don’t compare my relationship to anyone else’s. Theyaren’t us. We aren’t them. Shit, even now. Every morning, I wake up and see her lying next to me, and I let the rest of the day happen.” He chuckled.
“I don’t know if that’s the answer you were looking for. I’m not much for giving relationship advice. All I know is that I found the woman I want to spend the rest of my life with, and I’m lucky enough that I get to do that.” He sipped again. “And I don’t take a second of that life for granted. It’s one of the lessons my great-grandfather instilled in all of his children, and they passed it down through the generations. Never, never take one second of your life for granted, because it’s not promised.”
He got quiet and reached into the cooler for another beer. I quickly finish my bottle before accepting the one he offered to me, and we sat in silence for a few long moments, sipping our drinks, deep in thought.
My mind was whirring, trying to internalize David’s words about living in the present, but David seemed somewhere else, somewhere far away.
“Do you know the story of how the town was founded?” he asked me in a low voice, taking a deeper draft of his beer.
“John William Pike used his modest fortune from inventing to start a—” I had begun to rattle off information from my many hours of internet research when I was interrupted.
“No.” David cut me off. “Not the Google search, Wikipedia nonsense. I’m talking about the real story of how this town was founded and why.”
“No,” I said in a low voice. “I guess I don’t.”
“I’m sure you’ve heard of the Greenwood District in Tulsa,Oklahoma.” He leaned forward in his chair. I nodded but was afraid to speak, wondering how Miller’s Cove could possibly be connected to one of the worst tragedies in American history.
“They called it Black Wall Street. It was founded in the early 1900s by wealthy Black business owners looking to build communities exclusively for Black people, where they could flourish free from the racism they encountered damn near everywhere else in this country.”
His expression became stony, but he continued to speak.
