with a man who had just learned her name, but probably remembered all the sexual positions she whispered in his ear for the past week.
“Brandon, I want you to know that I’ve never done anything like this before,” Cydney blurted out, although she wasn’t sure why she cared since she didn’t plan to ever see him again.
He grazed her cheek with the back of his hand. “I know. Believe it or not, I know what type of woman you are.”
The gesture was sweet, but Cydney didn’t believe him. What woman would believe a man in her position? She knew what he wanted, and it was fine with her because she wanted the same thing. She’d never had a one-night stand, but she didn’t think she could stop herself now, even if she tried. The man was definitely in shape and had the build of a basketball player. His skin was the color of cinnamon and she’d never seen eyes like his. They weren’t hazel or blue but more so a combination of the two. Sea-blue, she thought as she peered a little closer. He was hot....
“So what do you say, Jessica?” he said, breaking into her thoughts. “Will you come inside the beach house and spend the night with me?”
Cydney looked him up and down, her eyes lingering on his six-pack. How can I say no to a man this fine? She didn’t live with regrets and after one more glance over his body, she knew she’d regret not taking him up on his offer.
“I accept,” Cydney said, relishing in the desire reflected in his eyes. “But only on one condition.”
“What’s that?” Brandon said, his voice even sexier than before.
Cydney tilted her head to the side as she observed Brandon a little more closely. She was one day shy of twenty-seven and definitely not a stranger to the bedroom. But there were still certain things that she’d always wanted to try yet never entertained with other men. If only for tonight, she wanted to live out one of her fantasies. She glanced at the beach, and then back at Brandon.
“I want to have sex in the ocean,” Cydney finally replied.
Brandon smiled at her and nodded his head in agreement. “That seems simple enough.”
“But not just that,” Cydney continued. “I want us to continue our naughty conversations by talking dirty while we explain every single thing we want to do to each other...while having sex in the ocean. No inhibitions....”
Cydney watched the fire build up in his eyes right before he stepped closer to her. His hands gently grazed her face again, only this time they didn’t stop there. He took one finger and dragged it in between her cleavage before dropping his head to the side of her neck. There, he placed soft kisses along her neckline, paying close attention to the parts right above her breasts. Cydney dropped her head back and enjoyed the way his lips felt on her skin. She couldn’t help the moans that escaped her mouth with every seductive kiss he placed on her upper body.
When he neared her mouth, she stopped him before their lips could touch. Outlining his jawline with her finger, she used her free hand to gently push him away from her. She took that moment to provocatively lift her dress over her head, revealing her spicy two-piece bathing suit.
Her eyes were pinned to his lips as he licked them in anticipation and slowly unzipped his pants before pushing them completely off. Cydney gasped at the sight that was before her. Brandon hadn’t worn anything underneath, displaying his enlarged sex. Her mouth watered as she took in the complete sight of his sexy nakedness. His arms and abs were so muscular that it made her want to lick every crevice of his body like it was a chocolate-ice-cream sundae.
He walked toward her, one mission clearly evident in his mind. Instead of getting nervous, Cydney flirtatiously smiled and met him halfway.
“I see you brought the swimsuit you were looking at in the store,” Brandon said as he played with the string on the side of her bikini.
“I always keep my promises,” Cydney replied, her voice catching as his eyes grew even deeper with desire.
“Come with me,” he told her seductively while grabbing her hand and leading her to the ocean. Her inner voice warned her that a man this sexy could be dangerous for a woman’s psyche. Men this fine were hard to forget and even harder to duplicate. But that inner voice was no longer present the minute their bodies hit the water. The only thought on Cydney’s mind was making sure she remembered every moment she spent with her sexy island lover.
Chapter 1
Eight months later...
“Cydney Rayne.”
She glanced up at the man who had whispered her name and prayed her eyes were deceiving her. They’d been formally introduced an hour before her sister Imani’s wedding, and her body temperature still hadn’t returned to normal. It had taken all her strength to stand up as maid of honor and not steal glances at the sexy man whose eyes had been glued to her the entire ceremony.
Imani and Daman Barker’s backyard wedding reception was in full swing, and she didn’t dare regard the man while being surrounded by her family and friends.
“Please follow me,” she said quickly before leaving the reception and retreating to a nearby walk-in closet inside her grandfather’s large house. As soon as she shut the closet door, she wondered why she hadn’t found a less confined hiding spot.
As they stood there observing one another, she wondered who would be the first to speak. Goodness, the man looked devastatingly sexy. He looked even better than she remembered. His black suit looked tailor-made and now the foremost thought in her mind was how good he’d look out of it.
He licked his lips as his eyes practically burned a hole through her lavender maid-of-honor dress. He was obviously having the same thoughts she was. She wanted to kiss him badly, and seeing the fire in his eyes, she knew that he wanted to kiss her, too. But Cydney refused to start something with a man like him—the kind of man who oozed sex appeal and looked like he just walked off the cover of GQ magazine. She could lose her damn mind with a man like him, and losing her sanity over a man, no matter how good he looked, was not an option.
A month ago, when she’d gone to help her new brother-in-law move out of his Detroit condo, she had seen a picture of Daman with a man she couldn’t quite make out. She could only see his profile in the picture, but she instantly knew that she had met the man previously. Refusing to believe her eyes, she put the photo out of her mind, hoping it was just a weird coincidence that he resembled that man she’d tried to forget about. Now, staring back into a pair of amused sea-blue eyes, she reminded herself that she never did believe in coincidences.
“So, Cydney Rayne, would you like me to call you Jessica, Cydney or do you prefer Cyd, the name everyone else has been calling you all day?”
She wished she could wipe that smirk off his handsome face. She wasn’t the only one who’d made up a fake name. “Well, that depends. Do you want me to call you Shawn Miles or would you rather I call you Brandon?”
His eyes squinted together. “Although I loved the way you screamed my name that night in the ocean, I’d wished you were screaming Shawn rather than Brandon. Now that you know my real name, maybe we can make that happen.”
Throwing her head back in an exaggerated laugh, she refused to let his arrogance get to her. “I’m sure your ears were playing tricks on you, but if that’s the name your mother gave you, then Shawn it is. You can call me Cyd or Cydney, but if you think for one
