New Orleans’s most esteemed hotels—at her first ever Chicks-In-Charge conference, no less, a personal coup—in the middle of the night bemoaning her miserable sex life and her failed attempt at seduction.
That part stung.
On the rare occasions Zora had truly applied herself at seduction, she’d always been successful. In truth, she’d never really had to apply herself. She’d smile an intimate smile, put a little extra swing in her hips, crook her finger and that would be it.
Victory.
But not tonight—and not with Dex.
Annoyingly, Dex not only had principles, but adhered to them. Initially, the idea of being in an “uncluttered” relationship, avoiding the emotional snarls that never ceased to come up between sexual partners, had appealed to her. She’d just come out a bad relationship—one of the worst, in fact—and had needed the perspective.
She’d thought it would be a good thing.
Ha!
She’d thought wrong.
As the days slid into weeks and the weeks crawled into months, sexual tension had eroded her patience and her ever-weakening resolve to abstain. This extended weekend—this conference, in particular—had seemed like the perfect time to celebrate, and she couldn’t think of a better way than a few hours of hot, frantic, sweaty sex. She’d wanted a few melting, toe-curling orgasms and room service.
To that end, she’d booked connecting rooms for her and Dex, spent an ungodly amount of money on a see-through scrap of fabric that any right-thinking male should want to tear off of her and had waxed, exfoliated and perfumed all pertinent parts of her body.
For nothing.
Zora growled low in her throat, stepped into the elevator and jabbed the button for her floor. Dex had firmly—oh-so-embarrassingly—resisted her efforts and, to avoid shrieking at him—Zora didn’t shriek, scream, wail or whine because doing so meant she’d lost control of her person, which was completely intolerable—she’d decided to take a walk to cool off. To shut down, de-stress and refocus.
Unfortunately, the lengthy walk had only given her more time to think and the more she’d thought about it, the madder she’d become. She hadn’t cooled off at all. To the contrary, she was more pissed now than she had been when she left the room. Because, while she hadn’t had any form of sexual relief during their relationship, Dex had. She’d taken care of him, and he’d never once—though he had made a few halfhearted attempts—reciprocated the gesture.
In other words, she’d made him come and he’d made her crazy.
This was supposed to have been a fantastic long weekend. Just as she’d suspected when the idea of Chicks-In-Charge had first come to her, the organization had been a smashing success, even more so than what she’d originally anticipated. The idea had struck a chord with women all across America—women who needed advice and guidance wanted to join and become members, and women who had something to offer wanted to participate and share their expertise. The group offered support to women from all walks of life, had banded them together with the sort of single-minded tenacity that had quickly thrust them into the national scene.
They’d started with a local chapter and a Web site—designed by April, of course—and an e-zine that Zora herself had headed up. The e-zine, aptly entitled CHiC, had been phenomenally successful and plans were already in the works for a glossy format. As the magazine’s resident sex-pert—the Carnal Contessa—Frankie would play a significant role in that endeavor.
As word of the Chicks-In-Charge movement spread, local chapters had swiftly moved across America, and had garnered so much attention that several board members had landed guest spots on late-night TV and early morning shows as well. Zora was currently entertaining several book-deal offers. She’d been interested, of course—she’d be insane not to be—but hadn’t moved on anything because, frankly, she didn’t know when she’d have the time to write. Between the magazine and her Chicks-In-Charge duties, she didn’t have so much as a spare minute, much less the time required to undertake writing a book.
But something had happened recently that had made her come to the conclusion that she’d simply have to make the time. Some medieval-thinking yahoo with a too-handsome face and a witty turn of phrase—a fellow New Orleans resident, of all things—had recently written the most unflattering, provoking, ill-informed tome on the “bizarre workings of the female mind.” The book, entitled What Women Really Want, Reading Between the Sighs, had to be one of the most moronic pieces of so-called literature Zora had ever read.
To add insult to injury, ignorant men, believing they were now going to know how to properly “manage” their women, had abandoned their armchairs, lawn mowers, sporting events and bars and had speedily raced to the bookstores to purchase the damned thing, which had promptly catapulted it onto the bestseller list.
It was precisely this sort of prejudice—this testosterone mentality—that Chicks-In-Charge was fighting, and to have it originate here, in her own backyard, felt like a slap in the face. Zora couldn’t recall how many times she’d had Tate Hatcher’s little pearls of shit—not wisdom because there was nothing wise about his idiotic take on the fairer sex—quoted to her, or how many times she’d had to respond to one of his ignorant ideas. In light of Chicks-In-Charge’s success and Tate’s equally successful book, the media had paired them up as unwitting adversaries. It was provoking, to say the least.
Zora had read the damned book, several times in fact, because one needed to know one’s enemy, and she could see where some people might find it entertaining. The author—dubbed “the last true bachelor”—was unquestionably witty, wrote with a wry sort of humor that under ordinary circumstances would appeal to her. A lot, if truth be told. Unfortunately, being insulted didn’t appeal to her, which negated any positive thought she could form about the book, or even the author for that matter.
The first time she’d read it, she’d kept flipping the book over and staring at his picture on the back of the dust jacket. Marveling at his stupidity, she’d told herself. She’d marveled a lot since then—couldn’t seem to help herself. Despite the fact that she vehemently disagreed with every idiotic point made in his book, there was something in that picture—about him, specifically—that drew her.
Naturally, she’d rather be roasted alive than admit it.
But she saw humor and intelligence, a little too much confidence in his heavy-lidded aged-whiskey eyes, and there was something equally obstinate and sheepish about the angle of his jaw, the somewhat full curve of his sexy mouth. Zora paused, remembering, then jerked out of her stupor as the elevator doors slid open once more.
Good grief, she mentally chided. She had enough man trouble without romanticizing the literal author of recent misery. To retaliate, she’d personally written an article for Chicks-In-Charge to debunk each and every point of his ignorant, outdated opinions and had even used his book to showcase the continued stupidity of his own sex. In fact, she planned to deliver that very workshop at this conference.
A pity that such idiocy was packaged in such a handsome body though, Zora thought, unable to completely banish his gorgeous image from her mind. A true injustice.
Which reminded her of another injustice—her unsatisfied sex life. She wouldn’t be able to rectify that this weekend as she’d hoped, but she knew how to start.
By getting rid of Dex.
She’d essentially told him it was time to fish or cut bait. He hadn’t fished, so she’d cut bait. Though she was heartily annoyed, she couldn’t very well blame him. He’d maintained from the beginning of this ill-gotten relationship that he had no intention of spoiling it with sex. That he wanted a “true” relationship devoid of the drama of copulation. She was the one who’d changed her mind, not him, so if anyone was at fault, technically it was her.
Frankie, who’d thought Zora had lost her mind when she’d shared the parameters of her newest relationship, had correctly predicted this end. She should have listened to her, Zora thought now. Dex