His mother walked back to his side after having spent a few moments talking to the First Lady. Lauren, like all the other elegantly gowned women in the room, looked gorgeous in her black dress and jewels. Adam and the men were wearing tuxedos.
“Isn’t this fabulous?” she asked, her eyes sparkling with excitement.
“Yes, it is. Have you seen Pops yet?”
“Nope. Not yet.”
Two Marines wearing dress blues were announcing the guests as they entered, and when Adam heard one of them call out, “Introducing Ms. Michele and Ms. JT Blake of Texas and New York,” his head whirled to the entrance. Two tall, elegantly dressed women who bore a striking resemblance to Max entered the room.
Then the Marine announced, “Ms. Max Blake, accompanied by Ossie and Ruby Blake.”
Adam’s heart started pounding. There she stood, gorgeous in a flowing off-the-shoulder red dress and a silk wrap. Ossie had on a formal bow tie and Ruby a red bow. As she strolled into the room with that walk of hers, holding the fancy after-five leashes of the very elegant and poised rottweilers, she looked like Josephine Baker striding in with leased leopards, and people openly stared in amazement.
His mother was one of them. “Is that her, Adam?”
“Yes, it is.” He couldn’t take his eyes off of her. She had a walk as fluid as a river and as seductive as a moonlit sea. Watching her presence electrify the room made every moment he’d spent with her flood back; from the first day she’d crashed like a meteor into his life, wearing shades and green cowboy boots, to the times they’d spent tossing Frisbees to the dogs, to the cab that rode him away from Portia’s farmhouse and out of her life. And yes, he remembered their lovemaking. He could still taste her; recall the softness of her skin and the sweet wild pressure of her legs clapped around his waist. From all of the attention she was drawing from the men in the room, he sensed they were wishing for memories, too.
He watched her make her way through the crowd, stopping to smile and chat here and there then moving on to greet others in the room whom she seemed to know.
His mother said, “She’s gorgeous, Adam.”
Adam could only agree. The diamond-edged rubies strung around her neck and hanging in columns from her ears were as fiery as her dress. He fantasized on what might be under all that silk, but took another sip of his cognac and decided to leave that alone.
As if she could feel his thoughts, she looked across the large stateroom and met his eyes. Time seemed to stand still. Adam saluted her with his glass.
Max acknowledged the greeting with a short nod of her head, and she swore her suddenly tight nipples did too. She willed her heart to slow down but it didn’t seem to be paying much attention. She ran her eyes over him almost hungrily. He looked real good in his formal black and white attire. In her opinion he was the finest thing in the room. And was that a small gold hoop in his ear? When had he pierced his ear? Apparently something was up with the staid conservative Mr. Wizard, and excusing herself from her family, she and the dogs walked in his direction so she could check him out. The dogs were going to spend the evening outside, behind the scene, until it was time for their medals, but she wouldn’t deny them a visit with Dr. Adam.
Seeing her walking his way, Adam wondered how he was going to get through this evening without snatching her into a closet and showing her how much he’d missed her and, yes, loved her, because he did love her. His mother was right. On the plane ride this morning he’d come to the conclusion that he didn’t care what she did to make a living. His desire to have her no matter what far outweighed his concerns about her safety. If she wanted to stock the house with enough guns to storm Normandy, he didn’t care, as long as he could wake up with her beside him every sunrise.
The dogs saw Adam and began straining at the bit to get to him, and Max totally understood.
Adam greeted her with a strong hug, and Max’s eyes slid closed from the sharp sensations. Lord he felt good. Ever mindful of their surroundings, they kept it short, but that first contact had been electric.
“Max, this is my mother, Lauren. Mama, Max Blake.” Adam felt drunk, not from the cognac but from Max’s scents and warmth.
“Pleased to meet you,” Lauren said, looking up at Max in wonder.
“Nice meeting you as well,” Max replied, and wondered if anyone could tell that she could still feel the heat of Adam’s body through her thin red silk dress.
Adam dropped down to acknowledge the dogs, and the sight of him greeting the large rottweilers with such affection, and the affectionate way they responded, left Lauren speechless.
Max saw the look and said to her, “He’s their buddy. They’ve missed him.” Then she added, while holding Adam’s eyes, “I’ve missed him, too.”
“And I’ve missed you,” Adam said.
The current arcing between them was so intense it was almost visible. “Come,” she said to him. “Let’s take the dogs outside, then, I want you all to meet my mom and sister.”
So Adam and Lauren followed Max and the dogs outside, and then they crossed the room. Adam and Max tried not to show how hungry they were for each other, but with each glance embers came to life like stoked coals.
The introductions were made, and while Lauren, Michele, and JT chatted, Adam and Max stood next to each other. He leaned over and whispered in her ear, “Think we’ll get in trouble if we cut out?”
Max whispered back, “Our mamas will kill us.”
True dat.
So the two held hands instead and tried to tell themselves it was enough for now, but they were lying.
Michele Blake looked over at her daughter holding hands with the handsome Dr. Adam and asked with humor-laced suspicion, “What are you two plotting?”
Max chuckled. “Nothing, Mama.”
Lauren checked them out, too, then said in patented mama tones, “I do have my belt in my purse, just so you’ll know.”
They all laughed at that, but it was easy to see that both mothers were pleased to see their children so obviously happy.
Dinner began a short time later, and Max knew she had the President to thank for seating Adam directly across from her.
They spent the elaborate coursed meal sharing small talk with each other, and with the guests seated to their right and left, but the silent sensual conversation between Max and Adam continued. At one point Max extended her leg beneath the cloth-covered table and brushed her ankle lightly up against Adam’s calf. He choked on his wine. Shooting her an amused warning glance, he grabbed up his linen napkin and made his apologies. Once the conversation around them began to flow again, he looked into her twinkling eyes and mouthed, Behave.
She just smiled.
As they left the table after dinner, Adam walked with her back to the ballroom and said for her ears only, “You’re awful playful tonight.”
“You ain’t seen nothing yet.”
He stopped short, but she floated away and went to find her mother and sister. Eyes glowing, Adam knew that from that point forward the game was on.
They played their cat and mouse game for the rest of the night through the presentation of the medals and the President’s remarks on how proud he was to have Dr. Adam Gary be the first recipient of the newly established Lewis Latimer award for science; through the round of congratulations that followed for Max, Adam, and the dogs; and through Ray Gary’s fabulous performance.
Ray’s cover of the old Bobby Womack tune, “Just Trying to Hold onto My Woman,” was sung straight into Lauren’s eyes. The lyrics, so poignant yet powerful, were of a man letting the world know how much he cared, and when Ray walked over to his ex, got down on one knee and sang the last refrain with such emotion, there wasn’t a dry eye in the house.
By the time the dancing commenced, there was so much love in the air the partygoers could taste it. Max looked up at Adam as they danced to the slow sweet music of the band. She couldn’t ever remember being happier. “Do you think your parents are going to get back together now?”
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Adam could see Lauren and Ray in the crowd, slow-dancing like 1970s high schoolers. She had her head on his chest and he was holding her tight. “I think so. Pops put on a helluva show.”
“Well, if your mama doesn’t want him, I know my mama does.”
Adam looked down into the green eyes of his dreams and asked, “And what do you want?”
She didn’t stutter. “You.”
Knowing he was the happiest man on the planet, Adam eased her in close and whispered, “I want you, too.”
The President strolled over and tapped Adam on the shoulder. Adam turned with Max in his arms and said, “Yes sir.”
“My wife has asked that the two of you go out into the garden.”
Max asked, “Why?”
He smiled and said softly, “You’re generating a lot of heat, shall we say, and some of the older ladies are—”
“Jealous?” Max asked coolly.
“No. Envious. It’s obvious you two are in love, and they and my wife think you might like some privacy.”
Adam and Max both laughed, and an uncharacteristically embarrassed Max dropped her head on Adam’s chest for a moment.
Adam, still holding her, said with all seriousness, “Sir, if I’ve been disrespectful—”
The President raised his hand. “No no. It’s nothing like that. You two haven’t been carrying on like teenagers by any means, but it’s in your eyes,” he said knowingly. “Makes me want to take the First Lady out on a stroll in the moonlight myself.”
Max shook her head.
Adam looked down at Max and asked in an English-sounding accent, “Would my lady like to see the gardens?”
“I believe she would.”
So, when the musicians finished their tune, Max and Adam and a few other couples took a walk. As Max and Adam passed the First Lady talking with Michele, JT, Ray, and Lauren, the President’s wife came over to Max and whispered for her ears alone, “The Lincoln bedroom is available.”
A shocked Max stared, and then laughed until tears stood in her eyes.
Twenty-two
After the warm ballroom with all its people and conversations, the night air felt good. As they walked through the darkness, Adam, holding Max’s hand, asked, “What did the First Lady say to you?”
Max told him.
“Oh really?” He laughed, then said with amusement, “She might be almost as outrageous as you.”
Max cuddled close as they moved farther out into the dark gardens. “That could be true.”
By now they were alone and hidden from the crowd inside, and the first thing Adam did was ease her in front of him and give her the kiss he’d been wanting to bestow since leaving her in Ohio.
Max moaned like a woman in need, slipped her arms around his waist and let herself enjoy what she’d been craving since that day, too. The feel of him, the warmth, the familiarity of his embrace, made her want more.
Adam reacquainted himself with the smell of her hair, the shape of her ears, the softness of her mouth. Her tongue played with his, and his manhood soared with desire. “Lord, I’ve missed you,” he husked out.
“I’ve missed you, too….”
Adam couldn’t help himself, his hands were roaming over the curves and valleys sheathed in red silk, and Max’s hands were wandering all over him. They were like eager hormone-heightened teenagers in a high school back hall. She moved her palm shamelessly over the placard on the front of his pants because he’d freed one of her nipples from the top of her dress and was feasting scandalously.
“Ahem!”
They stopped and glared. There stood one of the ceremonial Marines with his back turned to them.
“Can I help you?” Adam asked in a voice ragged with impatience and desire.
The obviously embarrassed Marine replied, “The First Lady sent this key.”
Adam could feel and hear Max’s uneven breathing behind him as she hastily fixed her dress. When he sensed that she was ready, he walked over and took the key. The Marine stepped quickly back the way he’d come.
Max and Adam looked at each other, laughed, then ran like kids to the Lincoln bedroom.
Once inside the bedroom historians believed Lincoln never actually slept in, Max slowly peeled off her dress in the soft glow of the lone lamp they’d turned on and stood for a moment and let him look.
And look he did. Adam was entranced, spellbound, hot, as he ran his eyes over the Woman with Many Names wearing nothing but a black thong, killer Brazilian heels, and, around her waist, tiny rubies strung together on a delicate gold chain. Smiling like the seductress that she was, Max turned herself slowly so he could get a good look at the open-work laces on the back of the thong, and he growled, “Come here, you….”
So she did.
While she stood before him, he slid a possessive hand over the thin triangle between her thighs and played until she caught fire. Only then did he turn her around and give his attention to the man-hardening lacing over her fine behind. He undid the tie slowly, greeting each newly exposed portion of skin with kisses, caresses, and such scandalous licks that Max groaned and shimmered. Her legs were shaking so much she was having trouble standing, but that issue was erotically resolved when he invited her to lie down on the bed, lazily pulled off the thong and slid to his knees.
Max was so hot that at the first touch of his wanton greeting she came gloriously, twisting, arching, and gasping.
Adam chuckled but didn’t stop until a second coming buckled her. As she lay there riding out the echoes of her completion, eyes closed and her long legs positioned lusciously just for him, he stood and began to undress. His prior celibacy had given him the stamina he’d needed to keep his own desire under control, but it wouldn’t last forever, and neither could he.
The first coupling was fast, hard. Their need to consummate their months-long separation had no time for technique or artistry. The powerful orgasm that resulted made her cry out and left him thrusting and pumping like a man just freed from prison. Afterward they fell back, breathing hard, fingers entwined, and enjoyed the pleasure of finally having each other near.
When their hearts and lungs regained some semblance of normalcy, Adam moved the short distance to her side and propped himself up on an elbow. He looked down into her face and all he felt inside filled his heart. Sliding a tender finger over the curve of her lips, he asked, “Is this the part where I’m supposed to tell you I love you?”
“I think so.”
“Good, because I do. And, you need to know that I don’t care what you do for a living, Max. I seriously don’t. I just want you in my life. If you want to play Jinga forever, I’m down with it and I’ll try not to hassle you as long as at the end of the day you come home to me.”
Filled with emotion, Max reached up and caressed his cheek. She asked softly, “Is this the part where I’m supposed to say I love you, too?”
He grinned. “Think so.”
“I do love you, Adam, very very much, and you’ll be glad to know that the President signed my resignation yesterday.”
His eyes widened. “What?”
She smiled. “Yep, and it was my decision, the way it was supposed to be.”
Adam fell back, then raised himself. “You wouldn’t kid a brother, would you?”
“Not on something like this. I’m all yours now, my brother, so whatcha gonna do with me?”
He dragged her on top of him. Max fit him inside and then melted with the sensations.
“How about this?” he asked slyly.
As he began to move and she began to slowly ride, she said, “I always did like the way that Einstein brain of yours works.”
“Good, because I’ll be thinking of stuff like this for the rest of our lives.”
“Promise?”
“Forever.”
Epilogue
Max threw the Frisbee down the beach, and Ruby and Ossie went tearing after it. Ossie, being stronger and faster, got there first, so Adam threw another and called out, ?
??Here you go, girl!”
Ruby raced after it and brought it down.
Max and Adam had been playing with the dogs for over an hour. “Time for a Kool-Aid break,” she said, picking up the pitcher and the two glasses perched on the sand.
Adam shook his head. “That stuff is going to freeze out here.”
She poured two glasses of the lime Kool-Aid and asked, “Well, when are you going to invent something that makes it warm this time of year. Mr. Wizard?”
He hung his head.
It was early November. It had taken every day since their wedding a week after the White House medal ceremony for the workmen they’d hired to put the lakeside house back together. They’d moved in three days ago. The place was still filled with packing boxes, but they’d be emptied eventually.
Max said to him, “I’m glad we decided to come back here.”
Adam looked up at the house standing like a sentinel on the bluff and agreed, “Me, too.”
The government had handed over the title as a wedding gift, engineered by the President and his First Lady. Max and Adam had to pay for all the repairs, but between them the new Mr. and Mrs. Adam Blake had quite a bit of green, so they spared no cost having the place lovingly restored to their specifications.
The November wind was brisk coming off the lake, and soon snow would come. Max pulled up the collar of her heavy jacket, then drained the last of her lime drink. “It’s cold out here. Time to go in.”
Adam smiled. He called the dogs, and the canines headed up the dune to the patio. Max hooked her arm in his and said to him as they walked down the beach to the stairs, “My doctor called a little while ago.”