Can't Help the Way That I Feel Read online

  My nipples erect and my head full of erotic possibilities, I was overcome by a rush of steamy desire that had nothing to do with sitting in a bathtub full of hot water. I closed my eyes and slipped effortlessly into my fantasy. I was back at Naomi Maddox’s house, but this time I was inside the room and sitting in the tall, yellow leather chair. He was naked and sitting across from me on the footstool. The man my mind created was fine, friendly and vaguely familiar. He had Terrence Howard’s bedroom eyes, Denzel’s charismatic smile, and the Rock’s hard, chiseled body: a DNA bonanza of Hollywood features. All imagined. All good. And for all intents and purposes, all mine.

  “You want to touch them, don’t you,” I teased, looking him straight in his hazel eyes.

  “Yes, they’re beautiful. May I? Please,” he begged.

  “No. Not yet. I want you to watch me. Would you like that, baby? Would you like to see me fuck me?” I emphasized my query by parting my lips and placing my finger in my mouth. My digit became his penis and I erotically treated it as such. My tongue wrapped the tip in circles of bliss before my lips clamped down and, with a seductive rhythm of varied speed and pressure, sucked. I could feel the erotic pull both in my fingers and clit and I could tell that the visual, in combination with my increasingly obvious arousal, was getting to him.

  “Yes.” His voice was but a deep whisper as he fought to maintain his cool. But the sight of my naked breasts, released from their satin confinement and showcased by a half-unbuttoned blouse was rendering his efforts ineffective.

  “Okay. I promise to let you watch me but only if you abide by my rule—no touching yourself or me until I give you permission. Agreed?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good boy,” I said before treating him to the sight of me lifting my breast to meet my bended head and taking my nipple into my mouth. I circled my areola before lapping my nipple with a wide firm tongue. “You like that, huh? Me too,” I told him, seduced by my own bawdy behavior.

  He said nothing, just sat licking his lips and trying to keep his hand away from his rising dick.

  My vagina was wet and juicy and crying out for attention. Slowly, I did a full body stretch, shifting my weight to my feet, arching my torso away from the cool, smooth leather, and raised my skirt until it was high in my lap. Then, in a classic Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct move, I slowly separated my legs, revealing my hidden treasures, which were conveniently unfettered by fabric.

  “Come closer,” I commanded and watched as he obediently leaned his face into my hot crotch. I gently spread the lips of my pussy, revealing Quincy’s lovely pink underside and stiffening clitoris. “Blow on it.”

  A steady stream of warm breath hit my wet nib tantalizing me with a fire and ice sensation and taking my desire up a notch. “Hmmm,” I moaned. “Isn’t she pretty? Wouldn’t you like to give Quincy a kiss?”

  He did, and moved to respond but I wasn’t quite ready yet.

  “No, keep blowing,” I called out.

  Back in position, he continued to blow while moving his hands, which had been clutching the sides of the ottoman, to stroke his engorged member.

  “Ah-ah-ah. No touching,” I decreed, painfully enforcing my own rule. Every nerve ending in my body wanted, needed, demanded that he touch me, but delayed gratification was still proving to be a powerful aphrodisiac.

  “That feels nice, baby. Now taste it,” I commanded, gently pulling the folds of my vagina open wider.

  He dropped to his knees, and with his face directly in my pleasure zone, lapped up my creamy middle with his tongue. Wanting to make the best of this opportunity, he began to tickle my clit, first at the tip and then with the broad whole of his tongue. I felt weak with want and grabbed his head, pushing him deeper between my legs. Without instruction (ya gotta love a man who thinks quickly on his knees), he began to suck my clitoris like a pacifier, pulling the blood from the rest of my limbs and causing it to pool at the very tip of my sexual universe.

  My hands, answering the call from a jealous chest hungry for more attention, kneaded my breasts before concentrating their attention on rolling my nipples until they were as stiff and engorged as my clit.

  “Stop, stop,” I said pushing him away before he could make me come. Despite the throbbing, telltale signs of an approaching orgasm, I wasn’t ready to come. “Stand up.”

  He complied, rising to his full six feet four inches, which placed his dick squarely in my face. I ran my fingertip against the tender underside of his head, causing his rock-hard shaft to bounce in my hand.

  “What do you want me to do?” I asked.

  “Suck it,” he managed to squeak out.

  “You’d like that wouldn’t you? You want me to take that pretty hard dick in my mouth and suck it until you come?” My voice cracked. It was getting harder and harder to remain composed.

  “Yes, baby. I would. Please. Suck it. Kiss it. Touch or let me touch it. Do anything. I can’t stand it anymore!”

  “Or do you want to fuck me? Would you rather I suck you off or fuck you off?” I was getting bolder and nastier as my arousal escalated.

  “Either. Both.”

  “Kiss me first,” I demanded, giving him permission to touch me.

  Happily he lowered his face down to mine and filled my mouth with a hungry tongue. There was no façade of romance or love. This was a kiss fueled by pure lust. Primal desire. I loved it and it released all sense of control. I grabbed his dick and pulled it toward me. Fucking in that chair was an absolute impossibility and I damn near threw the two of us to the floor in an attempt to get him inside of me as fast as humanly possible.

  “Fuck me,” I demanded.

  I spread my legs in welcome and he grabbed his dick with one hand and pushed it inside me. My body and mind gave a collective sigh as he glided in and out, hitting every nerve ending he could find on both the up- and downstroke. After several moments of glorious poking, he placed his hands on the floor on either side of my head in order to lift his body and adjust the angle. Once again, he began to thrust and grind with mounting intensity, this time with his dick hitting my ready-to-burst bud.

  I couldn’t hold it any longer. My body tensed and I heard myself scream as wave after wave of orgasmic pleasure washed over me. The release was strong and powerful and seemed to last blissfully forever. I lay back, spent and happy, feeling lost and languid in my own afterglow. A few more minutes of lollygagging and then I took a deep breath and lifted myself out of the bathtub. I quickly dried off, grabbed my journal and climbed into the bed and under the sheets.

  Pen in hand, I opened my journal to finish my list, inspired by my rub-a-dub-dub-in-the-tub activity.

  Quincy’s Fuck-It List

  1. Buy and play with toys.

  2. Visit a nude beach and go skinny-dipping.

  3. Have a one-night stand with a stranger.

  4. Get a lap dance from a woman.

  5. Find and fuck my first lover.

  √6. Have sex in a public place.

  7. Make my own porn movie.

  8. Get a happy ending massage.

  9. Have someone watch me make love.

  10. Make love in a yellow chair.

  There I had it, the WWQD fuck-it list. Giving myself a break, I checked off number six. It might have been sex with myself, but it was no doubt in a public place. Number ten was going to be the hardest to pull off, but the scene at Namoi’s place had burned itself into my memory and captured my imagination. Looking it over again, I scratched making love with a woman. Like the chair, I figured adding it had everything to do with that afternoon, but I knew that while it might be the fuel of many fantasies to come, I’d never have the courage to actually do it—Quincy or no Quincy. I changed that fantasy down to a much more doable task: a lap dance.

  “Who are you kidding, Livia Charles?” I challenged myself. “You are no more going to get a lap dance or have a one-night stand than Jennifer Aniston is going to get Brad back.”

  In actuality, the only thing I knew for
sure was going to get accomplished was number one. I was going to find a sex shop, buy a few toys, spend a weekend exploring myself and my vibrator and then report back to the crew and be done with it. And while I was definitely going to do what I needed to do to rev up my sex life, I sincerely doubted that the What Would Quincy Do fuck-it list would be any more than an inventory of exciting fantasies for my bad girl to explore in my head.

  And that’s what Livia would do. All talk no action. With a defeated sigh, I reached over and turned out the light.

  “Goodbye, Quincy. Welcome back, Ethel,” I said, before punching up my pillow and flopping over on my back. As my head hit the pillow, I felt a tempting twitch between my legs—a silent but powerful tingle that spoke loud and very clear.

  “I don’t think so, bitch.”

  BUBBLE MUSIC

  Toi James

  The best thing about writing erotica is the residual sex. Letting your imagination branch out into all of these seductive possibilities is very sexy.

  —Toi James

  Gracie, here come your boyfriend.”

  And oh, my goodness, here he comes, switching and sashaying through the diner, heading straight for me.

  I laugh, but he makes me a little nervous, this gay boy named Swan. He comes in here every day to have a large lemonade with extra sugar and a splash of vanilla extract. Truth be told, I have no earthly idea what he’s doing here in the foothills of Georgia. A skinny, mocha-colored boy with arched eyebrows and a switch just isn’t as safe here as he would be in Atlanta. It’s weird, though; he just showed up out of nowhere three weeks ago, and he only likes to talk to me. I think sometimes that W.T.—William Taylor McDonald, my ex-husband—sent him here to spy on me, but I know for a fact that W.T. has been in jail for nearly four years for what he did to me—making me lose the baby and all—and he most certainly would never talk to a queen, much less give one money to watch me work and serve vanilla-flavored lemonade.

  Swan finishes sashaying to the counter and does this dramatic, butt-first hike to sit on the stool. He puts both hands flat on the counter and smiles at me.

  “Good afternoon, Swan,” I say.

  “Hey, girl.” He picks up a menu and starts to read.

  “I don’t know why you even looking at the menu. You only ever order one thing, and it ain’t on the menu.”

  “If I eat this greasy diner food, I’ll get sick or fat—same thing. Lemonade is fat free, darling. Swan needs to keep slim and sexy for the big daddies.

  I smile, a little amazed, and slide his lemonade to him. I have never met anybody like him in my whole life. Everything about him is plain out there for the whole world to see, and he doesn’t care one blessed bit. I’ve spent most of my life locked away, and most of the people I know are the same way.

  “Swan,” I start to dig in, “why do you only talk to me when you come in here?”

  “Darling, ’cuz you’re gorgeous, just like me,” he says, “and you even kind of remind me of me…when I was twelve.”

  “Now, what’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Girl, look at you.” He twirls his finger at me like it’s a magic wand. “You all buttoned up to the neck, hair all snatched up, and that uniform with those shoes. You look like Aunt Esther, and we all know her ugly ass ain’t never got none. Girl, you a walking chastity belt!”

  “Just ’cuz I don’t wear my sex life on my sleeve doesn’t mean—”

  “Oh, please, girl! I can spot a dried-up flower a mile away, and I spotted you right through that window,” he says, pointing at the storefront. “But don’t worry. All hope is not lost. Swan is here.” Then, he gasps and scares the life out of me. “Girl, come go hang out with me!”

  He says it like it’s the most important thing in the world to him. But there is no way on God’s green earth that I, a born-again woman, am going to voluntarily put myself in the company of an insulting little homosexual. That’s like inviting the Devil to dinner.

  “I don’t think so, Swan,” I say, trying not to sound condescending.

  He gives me a curt “Why not?” and shoots me a knowing eye. He knows why not, but he isn’t taking no for an answer. “You can go with me to an art show. A little art show…at a little art gallery…with refined people like yourself,” and he bats his eyelashes at me. He knows good and well why not, all right, and now he just called me out to shame me. He’s a slick little thing. He knows a real lady wouldn’t say no just to save face.

  “When is the show?” I ask, making sure my annoyance is clear.

  “On Saturday night. And don’t tell me you’re busy ’cuz I know you ain’t. It’ll be fun. Art and respectable people. Doctors and lawyers, folk like that.”

  “And you.”

  He does a double take at me, “Girl, you don’t know who I am. I am a socialite. How do you think all these people get connected for little shindigs like this? Swan. That’s how. I am a purveyor of classy social relations.”

  It’s Saturday night, and I’m getting the feeling Swan’s invitation is more community service than anything, taking thirty-something divorcées out to art shows with the social elite. He’ll be here any minute, so I open the closet, where all of my “good clothes” are, and immediately remember why I haven’t worn any of them in years. The clothes are expensive and beautiful, but they’re textile memories of my life with W.T., and I’d just as soon burn them all right now than to put any of them on.

  W.T. used to tell me I was pretty all the time. I blushed, and he knew he had me in his pocket. But seven years of being married to W.T. McDonald took a toll on that pretty. I’ve got dents, a jagged, seven-inch scar down the middle of my stomach, permanent bruises from where he hit me over and over—but never the face. You can hide the bruises and scars and smooth the dents with clothes, but you can’t cover your woman’s face in the Bible Belt without calling some serious attention to yourself, your lifestyle and your faith.

  I went to college and studied anthropology for two years before W.T. found me at a Christian singles meeting. He was so smooth and good to me. And he was fine—a chiseled redbone with big, soft eyes. But all of that got old real quick after I said, “I do.”

  I should have known from the start when he convinced me to have sex out of wedlock. We had just gotten engaged and were heavy petting. All of a sudden, he whispers in my ear, “Let me feel how wet your pussy is.” I told him no, that it would be breaking my vow of chastity to God, but he slid his fingers in my panties and whispered back, “Baby, in the eyes of God, we’re already man and wife. Any resistance to me now would be the Devil at work trying to destroy what God has already ordained,” and then he slipped his johnson right in past his fingers and popped my cherry. That was my first time.

  And every time after that was baser than the time before. I’ve been poked in just about every hole I’ve got by whatever W.T.’s imagination could think of. This “man of God” would use all kinds of nasty words to get himself off and work me up, too. It was kind of hot in the beginning, when it was just the two of us and regular old sex. We used to screw our brains out while watching the early-morning televangelists before church on Sundays, or he’d smack me on the rear end telling me I was a “bad bitch” while we did it doggy-style. And he’d always laugh in the end. But then he started to full-on beat me afterward and call me a “fucking whore” for the things he made me do. I was the perfect Christian wife by day, his personal slut and whipping thing by night. To seal it in his head, he used to hire prostitutes and make me have sex with them while he watched and jerked himself off. Then he’d pay her—or them—and when they left, he’d beat me bloody and call me the whore. He said he was beating the Devil out of me. The first time he did it was when I started to regard sex as my enemy. It had betrayed me my whole life. It was the very thing that everyone I loved told me would lead me to sin and damnation. If it wasn’t my parents telling me I’d burn in Hell if I had sex before marriage, it was W.T. calling me a succubus for corrupting his godly mind with my sexual devia
nce. And, of course, there was the Bible—the word of God. Worst part, though, was W.T. and his angry self. Even his penis was angry. When he did it to me, it was like his johnson had monster teeth just trying to mangle me. I hated sex! Not much good ever came of it.

  I do have one good memory of sex, though. Sort of. When I was a senior in high school, Troy Bellows, my very first real boyfriend, showed me Deep Throat. His idea was that he would show it to me as an instructional video so I could give him a knee-buckling, toe-curling blow job. I had considered it for about five minutes until this crazy bubble music started playing in the movie. I was laughing so hard that I couldn’t even think about being sexy, much less do it. But I adored him, so I tried anyway. It wasn’t very good, and the only happiness that ever came out of it was my memory of that bubble music. It got to be that whenever I had to have sex with W.T., I’d just think of the bubble music, because it was the only happy thing I had ever known about sex. That bubble music was my saving grace. It made me smile through seven years of angry, bitter sex—W.T.’s and mine. Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever had sex without bubble music playing in my head.