Loren nodded. He was a gentleman. Mike may be the biggest man whore she had ever met, but he was also the most respectful man when it came to how he treated a woman and took great care with her safety. When they reached Mike’s truck, Loren noticed his hesitation before reaching for the handle to get out.
“Thanks again for a nice evening Mike. I’m not only talking about the business part either. I really enjoyed your company.”
Mike turned so that he was completely facing Loren when he replied.
“I enjoyed your company too. I also want to say one more time tonight that you look beautiful.”
“Thank you,” she said blushing.
After exiting her car, he leaned back in before shutting the door.
“I’m going to follow you to your condo and when you’re inside with the door locked, send me a text so I’ll know everything is okay.”
“Mike you don’t have to do that. My condo has paid security and they always make it a point to be sure the women are safely escorted to their doors.”
“Just do it for me please?” he asked
“Okay, I will.”
Before he shut the door, Loren thanked him again and then he was gone.
True to his word, he followed her to her building and when she was safely locked inside her unit, she sent him a text letting him know she was in. From her living room window on the fifth floor, she could see him drive off. She was finally able to exhale and ask herself, what had happened tonight?
Loren didn’t get much sleep following her evening out with Mike. He had such confidence about himself and Loren knew he would be an assertive and very thorough lover as well. At first she couldn’t get to sleep because she had a few websites she wanted to check out for some ideas for his house. She had been up well into the middle of the night doing that and she still couldn’t get to sleep as her body would not let her forget about the close contact she had with Mike on the dance floor. Her thoughts had drifted so far off to the night before that she almost missed hearing her phone ringing. Seeing it was Taija, one of her friends, she answered.
“Hey Taija.”
“Hey Loren. I hope it’s not too early to call you.”
“No not at all. I’ve been up for a while. I was going to give you a call later today anyway to see how you were. Also, so many people have been contacting me since the auction saying that they had a great time and the ladies who won bachelors have been raving about the great dinner dates they’ve had. We never did get a chance to talk about how yours went with my brother. I’ve been so busy with work since then that I haven’t had a chance to touch base with you.”
“That’s why I was calling you too. It was incredible and your brother is a great guy. We’ve been hanging out a little since then and I really like him. I hope you don’t mind or find that awkward or anything.”
Loren laughed at Taija’s comment. Why would she mind?
“Of course not. Do you girl. My brother is a great guy and I’m happy things turned out good. I could tell he was really into you the night of the bachelor auction. Have fun Taija.”
“Whew, I’m glad you said that because I wasn’t sure if you would be okay with us continuing to see each other or not. I just wanted you to know. Just to mention again, I had a wonderful time with Duron. Well I won’t keep you long. Thanks again for helping me with the unpacking and decorating I’ve already done. The place looks great. I’ll give you a call soon.”
After they hung up, Loren patted herself on the back. The bachelor auction this year was a major success. Between her sorority work, her charity work, her business and family stuff, Loren’s free time was pretty much non-existent. Real personal time was all but non-existent for her. Thinking about personal time had her thinking once again about her last failed relationship. She hated when she couldn’t seem to stop revisiting that awful time in her life. She had not had a relationship since her involvement with Sam Wilson.
He had been the love of her life at one time. They had met her junior year in undergraduate school at Spellman and had been together off and on until her graduation from graduate school when they finally parted ways. It was a tough breakup for Loren. Sam had shown her his true colors when she discovered he was seeing other women while in a relationship with her. They weren’t just dating, but were in what she thought, was a one on one, serious relationship. He obviously had other ideas of what that meant. Not only did the relationship end horribly, but she then discovered that he’d started seeing a woman she considered a very good friend.
Her brother Duron mentioned, when first met Sam, that there was something about him that he didn’t like. Duron never trusted him. He said Sam was too slick and always seemed to be hiding something. They didn’t know much about his background and he had no family to speak of; no connection to anyone. That automatically set off warning bells with her brother, but Loren was already in love with the man he showed to her every day. At the time that was enough for her. Now that she was older, more mature and a lot wiser, she expected more and she paid attention more.
For now, she was happy casually dating and taking the time to grow her business. Casual dating for her didn’t mean sex, it simply meant having a man to do fun things with and hang out with. She hadn’t ventured into anything serious since her relationship with Sam and she wasn’t ready to do so yet.
When she decided to go into business for herself, she knew that it would take a high level of commitment on her part and she was dedicated to seeing her business flourish. If she found a man that she could truly be into, she was willing to invest the time into him, but until then, she would settle for work, work and more work to occupy her time. Being so focused on work, it had actually taken her mind off of the fact that she was not intimately involved with anyone, that is until her evening with Mike the night before. He had stirred up desires she had kept under control. Even now, she knew a cold shower was in her near future if she had plans to lessen the effects of the night before when dreams of Mike and what he would look like naked and aroused had her remembering what it felt like being intimate. He made her miss it.
Not being able to stand the heated thoughts any longer that were also turning her body into a furnace, she got up and headed for the shower. As she stripped, she knew that this would be a very, very cold shower.
~~~
Mike woke up early Saturday morning with thoughts of Loren on his mind. He had come home the night before and his usual would have been to call a female friend for a nightcap, his word for uncomplicated sex. It’s how he often chose to unwind from his week. He didn’t do a lot of kicking it with women during the week because lots of time was spent building up the business. When the weekend came, he would call one of his beauties and before he could get the invitation out of his mouth, they would ask him what time should they be ready.
Mike enjoyed having a very active sex life and he loved indulging as much as possible. Even if he wanted to slow things down, he wasn’t sure he could after having his libido stroked so often for so long,. He didn’t know what it meant to turn it off. Last night, however, was different. Last night was the first Friday in a long time that he didn’t pick up his phone to either visit one of his sex buddies or pick one up to join him at his condo. His cell phone had rung a few times from female friends who left messages wanting to know if they would get to see him. He surprised himself when he didn’t return the phone messages which were clearly invitations for sex. Instead, he ended up back at his condo alone and thinking about Loren all evening.
Mike let his mind play tricks on him with many wonders of what would have happened if he had kissed Loren in the car, which is what they both wanted. He could tell by the look in her eyes that she wanted him to kiss her and he struggled with that decision. He wanted to badly, but he couldn’t get past the fact that Loren was Duron’s sister and he didn’t feel it would be right to give in to his body’s want for Loren when he knew what dangers would lay ahead for him down the road. Instead, he took what he considered the high road and walked away. He tried not to search Loren’s face for any disappointment when they spoke before he closed the door. All he knew was that he had done the right thing. At least he thought so at that moment. In the light of day now, he wished he had kissed her. That way the not kissing her would not have haunted him all night. He had been with enough women where he knew the look of a woman who desired him. He desired her as well, but he knew that desire was making them both forget the consequences of proceeding down that path.
For the first time in his life, his past sexual escapades and his reputation with women had come back to bite him in the ass. If he knew nothing else, he knew that Loren knew of his playboy ways when it came to women.
Being Duron’s sister, she knew first-hand the plethora of women he was known to have bedded over the years. He was also known for dating several women at one time. He knew that Loren was not the type of woman that he would categorize like that. He wouldn’t set her up to be hurt by him because he knew she deserved better than to be one of many women he was seeing. His body wanted her yes, but it was more than that. He had feelings that were growing for her and had been for some time.
On a regular basis he tossed back and forth between the idea of telling her how he felt and staying quiet and the turmoil was wreaking havoc on his life. There were days when he didn’t know if he was coming or going when it came to Loren and the more he saw her and thought about her, the stronger his desire for her became. He knew he had to do something soon, but he wasn’t sure what that something was. He also knew until he figured it out, he would continue to be plagued by the dilemma every day.
Frustration was not settling in and he knew only one thing could distract him and that was the gym. He got up, grabbed his gear and headed for the door.
~~~
A week had gone by since Loren’s business dinner with Mike and he was still heavy on her mind. In the midst of that, she was excited that some art she had purchased had finally come in.
Duron had asked her to purchase some wall art for his condo like she did for the house he purchased that she had also decorated. The art she purchased for him had finally come in and she needed to meet the delivery man from the gallery at Duron’s condo so that they could get it hung up. She knew that her brother was out at his house in Buckhead so she wouldn’t have to worry about disturbing him at the condo while she got the art in its place. This distraction would also allow her some time to get her mind off of Mike. She wasn’t trying to fight the connection she was beginning to feel with him. She just didn’t want to make a fool of herself fawning all over him when she knew he wasn’t the one woman type that she was looking for.
She even questioned herself all week about his interest in her. She second guessed whether he was interested especially after he failed to take advantage of the invitation she was mentally giving him to kiss her the night they’d had dinner, while they sat in her car. She felt the charge in the air and she knew he did as well. She assumed it was possible he still saw her as the little sister of his best friend and not as the woman she had become over the years.
She cleared her mind and focused. The hour was getting late and she had lots to do before heading to the condo to meet the art delivery.
~~~
Mike had been at the office for a few hours. It didn’t matter how much work he tried to delve into, he could not get his thoughts off of Loren and how sexy she looked the last time he’d seen her.
She had not stopped in at the office to see her brother and other than a few email exchanges back and forth about his house in California, they had no other contact. He wanted to call her, but he fought that want. He didn’t know what he would say. They had left things at a point that he would call her when the time came for her to go out to Los Angeles and do a walk-through of his house to take photos of each room. Until then, he really didn’t have a reason to just call.
Since it appeared concentration was the furthest thing from his mind, he decided to pack things up and head back up to his condo to get a little remaining work done there before meeting up with some friends later in the evening for drinks and some pool.
After gathering up all the paperwork he would need, he headed to the elevator that would take him up to the penthouse of the office park where he, Tyrone and Duron each had penthouse condos. He loved living at the top of the office park and since traffic in Atlanta could be a beast on most good days, he was glad he didn’t have to go far to go home, especially after a late night of working.
While he waited for the elevator, he wondered if Loren had thought about him after the time they had spent over dinner. She had to know that something was happening between the two of them just as he could feel it, but he assumed like him, she had to be thinking of the impact of them getting together on any level. He figured they were both thinking the same thing, that the not knowing, and not acting upon things was best not only for them, but for those closest to them as well.
Mike noticed the elevator was taking longer than usual. Since this elevator only went up to the penthouse level with a special key, it normally came right away, especially on the weekend when he knew Duron was not in the building and Tyrone had gone fishing with friends earlier in the day. A few minutes later the elevator arrived and when the door opened and inside was Loren looking like a goddess, he almost forgot to take his next breath. He was surprised to see her considering he was just thinking about her.
“Hey Loren. What are you doing here?”
“Hey Mike. I’m here for a delivery from an art gallery of some pieces I ordered for Duron’s walls. The delivery guy is supposed to meet me here in another hour, but I wanted to come a little early to wait on him. What are you doing on the business floor today? I thought the office was closed?”
Mike entered the elevator and inserted his key into the special lock that would continue to send the elevator to the penthouse level. A key was required every time the express elevator that went to the penthouse was activated and every time it stopped on any floor. The doors would not close and go up without the key. Once the doors were closing again, he turned to face Loren taking in her gorgeous attire. She never disappointed him with how she maintained her pristine look.
Today, on a Saturday, she was dressed in very high heeled green stilettos with jeans and a green and white loose fitting top over a white tank top. Her light make-up was always flawless and the big flashy jewelry she liked to wear was not gaudy, but very fashionable and sexy. Mike’s mind and body focused on how sexy she looked, especially in jeans that seemed to hug her body like a glove. They weren’t too tight by any means, but fit her just right.
After looking his fill, he finally found the words to respond.
“I came down to get some work done in the office. After having very little success, I decided to head back up to finish before going out later to meet some friends. You look beautiful as always, Loren.”
Mike didn’t miss the blush he saw cross Loren’s face.
“Thanks Mike. You look relaxed.”
Checking out his attire in basketball shorts, a t-shirt and tennis shoes, Loren wasn’t used to seeing Mike like this. Most of the time when she saw him it was either at the office where he was always dressed in a suit or at some other function where he would again be dressed in either a suit or other dressy attire. Even over the years, she knew that he would often play pickup basketball with her brothers, but she never ran into them until after they had already re-dressed.