Naughty (2 page)

“Have you started reading
Auld Lang Syne
yet?” Naomi asked, referring to their current book club selection.

Kennedy hadn’t even cracked the spine of the book. She leaned over, picked up the novel from the nightstand, and dusted the cover with the sleeve of her robe. The jacket looked interesting enough; an attractive couple dressed in black tie was locked in an intense embrace. The title was scrolled in gold foil. In smaller script the words “
SHALL OLD ACQUAINTANCES NEVER BE FORGOTTEN
” was written across their bodies. “I haven’t had a chance yet. I’ve been flying so much that when I do have extra time, all I want to do is sleep.”

“Speaking of flying, was Mr. Cutie Patootie on your flight tonight?”

Kennedy had completely put the Mystery Man out of her mind. The first time she had seen him was a month ago when he boarded a flight from New York to Johannesburg. He had sat in first class, which was her station. With the pastel pink pages of
the
Financial Times
covering the lower half of his body, she barely caught a glimpse of his face as she asked his beverage preference before they took flight. Once the plane reached a cruising attitude of thirty thousand feet, she returned to ask whether he wanted veal with rosemary and chive risotto or salmon on a bed of field greens. When he looked up from the newspaper to answer, what greeted her was a pair of sexy, smokey hazel eyes on reddish-brown cinnamon skin and a goatee framing a pair of lips that were even more succulent than her last lover’s. “Salmon, please,” he answered in a deep voice. Her knees almost buckled. She knew it wasn’t the air pocket they had just passed through but the sexy sound of his baritone voice. Giving no indication of attraction, she remained professional and returned with his meal. The rest of the flight was uneventful as he read one newspaper after the other and she serviced the other passengers. Kennedy had seen him once thereafter but he never even looked twice in her direction. Today’s flight should have been his usual bimonthly trip, but he hadn’t been on board.

“No,” she answered with disappointment dripping off the one and only syllable.

“Did he ever say anything to you?”

“You mean besides, ‘Excuse me, miss, may I have another pillow?’ ”

Naomi cracked up laughing. “You know what I mean,” she said, after recovering from her laugh attack. “Did he ask for your number?”

“He probably thinks I’m a fixture of the plane. Most first-class passengers have that sense of entitlement.”

“You’re right, they are an elitist bunch,” Naomi agreed. “But I’m sure he’s checked out how you rock that uniform,” she countered.

“Girl, I’m not thinking about that man,” Kennedy said, picking up the
Boiler Room
DVD. The movie was old, but she didn’t care. “I’ve got to go because I have a date with Mr. Diesel.”

“Who’s that? Did you meet him at work? Was he on your flight tonight?” Naomi quizzed, anxious to know who this new man was.

Kennedy chuckled, and then said, “Diesel as in Vin, the actor.” She absolutely loved looking at the man.

“Oh. It’s going to be another Blockbuster night, huh?” Naomi asked, finally catching on.

“Yep,” she replied, sliding the disc into the player. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow,” Kennedy said before hanging up.

“Okay, enjoy your movie.” After Naomi hung up, she looked at the clock on the nightstand, wondering where her husband might be.

IT WAS
after ten o’clock and Jacob should have been home by now. Naomi started to call his cell number, but didn’t. He had scolded her too many times about blowing up his phone. He told her that when he was out entertaining clients, it was embarrassing to have to keep answering calls from his wife, as if he were a little boy. Naomi knew Jacob was a workaholic when they first met. He was a man on a mission to succeed, and it was his tenacity and drive that had turned her on, but now his late nights were getting old. She missed having sex on a regular basis, like in the beginning of their relationship. She still desired her husband and remembered the day they met as if it were yesterday.

She had been a carefree flight attendant at the time. Jacob Reed usually sat in row two, seat C, the aisle seat. He was six feet four inches tall, so the extra leg room along the aisle was an added benefit. Naomi was attracted to him the moment she laid eyes on him. He had a sweet, schoolboy quality. His mahogany skin was always shaved to perfection with no hint of razor
bumps. He wore rectangle, tortoiseshell glasses that rested across the keen bridge of his nose. He kept his hair closely cropped, showing only a whisper of a natural wave pattern. The stark white shirts he wore underneath his navy suits were usually monogrammed at the cuffs with the letters J. R. It was easy to surmise that he was some type of executive.

Initially they played that coy game of cat and mouse, but his incessant ringing of the flight attendant buzzer was a dead giveaway that he was interested in more than the customary in-flight service. Naomi would sashay over, swaying her hips through the narrow aisle, and suggestively ask if she could be of service. He would smile shyly, saying that he meant to press the overhead light. This went on for months, until he finally asked for her telephone number. They began to date and she learned that Jacob was a certified public accountant and partner with Kirschner Gross, one of New York’s largest accounting firms. Not only was the brother handsome, he was making serious bank. He lived in a richly appointed duplex loft in Tribeca and drove a sleek Jaguar. She would often meet him in London after he tied up a business meeting. They would shop along Bond Street, and then stroll over to his suite at the Sanderson, one of Ian Schrager’s five-star hotels. They would order champagne and oysters from room service, and then service each other the entire night. Exhausted from a lust-filled night, they would lounge in bed until noon, before repeating the previous evening, kiss for kiss. When Jacob proposed marriage with a four-carat diamond solitaire on a weekend jaunt to Napa Valley, Naomi was ecstatic and as bubbly as the sparkling wines they were sampling. They were truly in love. And not only was Jacob handsome, he was financially secure as well, so Naomi wouldn’t have to worry about money ever again.

Naomi had grown up in a lower-middle-class family, and though they were not dirt poor, they didn’t have frivolous luxuries either. She had always dreamed of making enough money
to indulge herself, which she did from her modest salary. But marrying Jacob would put her in an entirely different income bracket. He wasn’t a millionaire, but made enough money to spoil her with diamond trinkets and designer goods. She envisioned a life of skipping across the pond accompanying Jacob on business trips to London and stopping off in Paris to do some serious shopping. But the dream was just an illusion.

The second she became pregnant after their first year of marriage, Jacob insisted that Naomi quit flying, which she really didn’t have a problem with. He made more than enough money to keep her in first class. Her plan was to resume traveling once the baby was old enough to fly. And when the baby went to preschool, she had planned on starting an interior design business. Naomi had a knack for decorating from studying endless house and garden magazines, and had planned on converting the library in the penthouse into the baby’s room, but Jacob had other plans.

One Sunday, they fueled up the Jag and went on an early-morning drive on the Long Island Expressway. After nearly forty minutes, they exited and drove through an area of Long Island that Naomi had never seen. She couldn’t help but admire the manicured lawns and spiraling driveways that led to majestic mansions, some with Corinthian columns, others inspired by modern architectural designs.

Jacob drove down a tree-lined road and pulled into the circular driveway of a stately-looking home.

“I didn’t know you had friends on the island.”

“I don’t.” He smiled slyly and parked.

Puzzled, she asked, “Then whose house is this?”

Jacob didn’t say a word, just got out, walked over to her side of the car, and opened the door.

“What are you doing?” she asked as Jacob reached for her hand. Since Jacob didn’t know the family who lived in the house, Naomi wasn’t about to stretch her legs in some stranger’s driveway.

“Come on. Don’t you want to see the house?” There was that sly smile again.

“Stop playing, Jacob, I’m not in the mood for trespassing. Would you please tell me whose house this is, before someone calls the cops?”

“It’s ours, Naomi. I closed on it last week. I wanted to surprise you,” he said, nearly pulling her out of the car.

Surprised? She was shocked. The last thing Naomi wanted was a house in the ’burbs. She was a city girl, and the complacency of the suburbs had no appeal to her. “Jacob, why didn’t you discuss this with me before making such a major purchase?”

“Like I said, I wanted to surprise you. What’s the matter? Don’t you like it?” he asked, waving his arms at the monstrosity of a house. “Come on inside. Let me show you around,” he said, taking a set of keys from the breast pocket of his blazer.

As he unlocked the massive door, she stood there feeling as if her world had changed right before her eyes. Once Naomi walked into the marble foyer, she realized it had changed forever. Visions of strolling their baby along Madison Avenue and having high tea at the Peninsula with her girlfriends began to dissipate as they toured the mini-mansion. Though she had always wanted to live in a million-dollar home, she preferred to live in their million-dollar apartment in the city. At least in the city, she’d be in close proximity to her friends, and could easily get out and have dinner with them when Jacob was working late, but now she’d be another suburbanite who only came into Manhattan on special occasions.

“This can be the baby’s room, since it’s near the master suite,” Jacob announced, walking into a room the size of a studio apartment. “It’s large enough to set up a play area once he’s old enough,” Jacob said, pointing to a nook near the back of the room.

“It’s nice,” was all Naomi could say. She wasn’t the baking-cookies-Stepford-Wife type. “Jacob, it’s really a nice house, but . . .”

“Nice,” he interrupted. “It’s well over seven figures of
nice
!”

“Don’t get upset. All I mean is that I never planned on living in the suburbs. I thought we would continue to live in the loft. There’s more than enough room to add a nursery,” she said, trying to plead her case.

“This is not the suburbs, Naomi. It’s Old Westbury. There’s a distinct difference. Anyway, the school system is superb here, and I have no intention of raising a child of mine in the middle of a busy metropolis,” he said in no uncertain terms.

Realizing that this was a done deal, and there wasn’t any sense in arguing the point since he had already bought the house, she walked over and hugged Jacob around the waist. “Thank you, honey.” Naomi could feel the tension in his back as he stood stiffly in her embrace. To clear the air, she reached up and kissed him on the lips.
“Thank you, honey,”
she repeated, this time emphasizing every word.

Jacob looked down at her and said, “You’re welcome.”

She tried to hug him closer. “Honey, don’t be upset.” But her slightly protruding pregnant belly stood between them.

“I’m not upset. Just disappointed that you don’t appreciate what a wonderful house this is. Do you know how many women would jump at the chance to live in this elite community? There was a time that our ancestors could only work in this type of neighborhood, and you’re telling me that you’d rather live in the crowded city,” he said with a tinge of sadness in his voice.

She stepped back and looked up into his sable brown eyes. “I appreciate this house and I appreciate you. This is more than I could have ever dreamed of. I would be honored to live here with you and our baby.” She searched his eyes for any signs of doubt, and then asked, “You believe me, don’t you?”

“Yes. Now let me show you the master suite.” He turned and walked out the door.

The master suite was three times the size of the baby’s room. The vaulted ceilings and ivory marble fireplace gave the room a
romantic feeling. Naomi walked over by the French windows as the sun cast a radiant glow throughout the room. “This is where the bed should go,” she said, becoming more comfortable with her new home.

Jacob looked at the nook by the window that she was pointing to and nodded. “That looks like a good place.”

It must have been a combination of the pregnancy hormones, the room, and the warm sun, because suddenly her body began to heat up with an overwhelming sexual desire. She could feel her nipples harden beneath her turtleneck. She removed her sweater and tossed it on the window seat.

Jacob looked confused. “Why’d you take your top off?”

“Because I’m
hot,
” she whispered in a naughty voice as she slipped out of her slacks. She patted the cushion of the window seat. “Come here.”

Jacob began to walk slowly toward her. “Naomi, what are you doing?” he asked, looking at his wife clad only in her bra and panties.

“Come closer and you’ll find out.”

With Jacob within inches of her open legs, she reached out and began to unbuckle his belt. They always had enjoyed a steamy sex life, but ever since Jacob found out she was pregnant, he’d been treating her like a porcelain doll, afraid to touch her, as if she would shatter into a thousand pieces. It had been three weeks since they had last made love.

“Stop, Naomi.” He pushed her hands away. “You’re pregnant.”

“I’m pregnant, not dead,” she remarked and continued struggling with his belt until it was unbuckled. Pulling his hips forward, she unzipped his pants. “Jacob, I want to make love to you.”

“I do too, but . . .”

Jacob stopped midsentence the moment her hand made contact with his sex. She began to massage him until she felt him grow beneath her touch. His pants dropped to the floor as she unleashed
his member. Naomi lay back on the cushions of the window seat and removed her lace panties, then unhooked her matching bra. Jacob licked his lips at the sight of her luscious, enlarged nipples. He leaned over and began to suck her swollen breast like a newborn feasting at mealtime in the middle of the night. She arched her back as he slipped in between her naked thighs. Naomi let out a slight moan as Jacob slowly and gently entered her.