they all had female bosses—then, with the exception of April, who owned her own business, none of this would have happened. They’d all be better off.
“What?” Frankie asked suspiciously. “I know that look. That’s the I’ve-got-an-idea look.” Her eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “What are you thinking?”
Zora didn’t purposely ignore her, but couldn’t focus on anything beyond her current train of thought. If a chick had been in charge, she pondered consideringly, liking the way the phrase sounded, the empowering message it implied. A chick in charge…An in-charge chick…No, Zora thought as inspiration struck.
Chicks-in-charge.
“Zora?” Frankie asked again. “What gives?”
Zora smiled. “You just gave me an idea, one that I think is going to change our lives.”
She spent the next three hours outlining her thoughts, brainstorming with the other three, who quickly recognized the potential, and by the time the bartender heralded the last call of the night, the concept of Chicks-In-Charge—an organized group created by women, for women—which promoted personal and professional happiness garnered through self-awareness, self-confidence and independence, was born. They would join forces, help each other. There was strength in numbers. They could change things, Zora decided. Knew it. The board was formed, the president elected and each member held a key role. They were on the cusp of something great, something monumental. Anew beginning, a better future. Zora could feel it. They all could.
Frankie slid her a look, grinned. “This is so going to kick ass.”
Mentally exhausted but curiously energized, Zora smiled and hoisted her beer for a toast. The clink of bottles bumping finalized the deal. “To Chicks-In-Charge,” she murmured softly and they each echoed the sentiment.
1
One year later…
“I JUST WANT TO GET LAID,” Zora muttered angrily as she made her way back to her hotel room. She stabbed the elevator call button and waited impatiently for a car. Honestly, she thought. It wasn’t too much to ask. It had been more than a year. A year, she silently wailed, since she’d felt the hard, thrilling weight of a man between her thighs.
Disgusted, embarrassed, thwarted, irritated, but most of all unsatisfied, Zora shook her head at her own stupidity. What the hell had she been thinking? Why had she thought it would be a good idea to get involved with a guy who was into abstinence? Had she lost her mind? Clearly she had. Otherwise she wouldn’t be prowling the halls of one of 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,
