Misbehaving(10)
“If you want to,” she said and smiled. That smile hit him right where it counted.
“You don’t think we should talk first?”
“Talk about what?” she asked. “This is just for work, you know.”
“Oh.” Ben nodded. “Work.”
“Think about it,” she said, letting him in the room. The Hotel Essex was one of the more luxurious hotels he’d ever stayed in. Scarlet walls, black polished floors, elegant white rugs—it was an art deco dream come true. And in the middle of every room a huge king-size bed heaped in plush white linens beckoned. The headboards looked like thrones. The walls were decorated with real art, not hotel “art.” And with the black-and-red-striped curtains pulled back and the moonlight shining, one could see the rolling hills blanketed with deep soft grass and lush leafy trees for miles. It was a far cry from a cramped dorm room.
“So how have you been?” she asked.
“Good. Great. I love my job. I guess you really love your job.”
“Both jobs,” she said as she sat on the bed and tapped a few keys on her laptop. He saw her save and close a document. He must have interrupted her at work. Surreptitiously he glanced around for any sex toys. Maybe she’d put them away before opening the door. “The blog work is the most fun, though. I guess Claudia told you what I’m doing?”
“Yeah, sex education blogger? Something like that?” He tried to sound nonchalant.
“Exactly like that. My boss is in a bind. He needs a thousand words by Sunday night. I thought I was reviewing a coffee table book. Wrong.” She held up the book. It said THE MANUAL on the front in big gold letters.
“Sexy font,” he said.
“Sexy book.”
“Look…Bea,” Ben said and sat on the end of her bed. “I wanted to tell you I was sorry. You know, about not having sex with you in college.”
“That’s what you’re sorry about?”
“For starters,” he said. “Henry asked me not to go for you because he was worried I’d dump you and Claudia would kill him over it.”
“I like that my personal life was decided by you and Henry instead of me.”
Ben winced. “Yeah…add that to the list of things I’m apologizing for.”
“Well, I did sort of give you hell over it, right?” Beatriz asked, a wicked gleam in her eyes.
“I think your last words to me were ‘You fail as a man,’” Ben said. He remembered those words as if she’d spoken them yesterday. They’d burned themselves into his brain and he swore there and then he’d never fail as a man again.
Now it was Beatriz’s turn to wince.
“I said that?”
“You said that.”
“Well, I was naked, offering you every square inch of my body inside and out, and you turned me down.”
“I prefer to think of it as a supremely heroic act of self-sacrifice on my part, because my best friend had never had a real girlfriend before Claudia and worried constantly he’d screw it up with this woman that he declared as his ‘soul mate’ the day he met her.”
“Soul mate?”
“He’s more romantic than you’d expect for a guy who used to wear his underwear outside his pants.”
“Smarter, too, if he loved Claudia that much from the beginning.”
“Yeah, he’s a good guy. The best guy. Hard to tell the guy who’s been your best friend throughout your entire college career ‘no’ to a simple request not to fuck his girlfriend’s baby sister.”
“I get it. I do. It’s for the best. You probably would have fucked me and forgotten me like Henry thought.” Beatriz grinned at him, a smile that said, “I’m just giving you a hard time.”
“But I didn’t fuck you, and I’ve never forgotten you.”
Beatriz’s smile wavered a moment before returning in full force. The combination of her bright white smile and her dark copper skin nearly blinded him. He wanted to see that smile a billion more times before the day he died. At least a billion.
“So…what are we doing here?” Ben asked. Beatriz closed her laptop and moved it to the bedside table.
“Getting reacquainted,” she said. “And having sex if you’re game. I’m sort of on deadlines here.”
“You’re serious?”
Beatriz nodded. “As a heart attack. It’s no-strings-attached sex. I won’t even make you buy me flowers after. Think about it while I’m in the bathroom.”
She left him sitting alone on the end of her bed while she went to the bathroom.
Ben took a deep breath and released it slowly. Think about it, she’d said. What was there to think about? Sex with the most beautiful woman in the world? Yes, please. Then again…this was work, she’d said. Just work. Nothing more than work. Did he want to be work? Cock for hire? He’d sworn off women for an entire year, hadn’t he? Then again, he’d sworn off them because he knew he needed to get over Beatriz before dating anyone else. How was he supposed to get over Beatriz if Beatriz was under him?