Never Been to Me Read online

  Never Been to Me

  GiGi Gunn

  www.urbanbooks.net

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Never Been to Me

  Acknowledgments

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  Notes

  Copyright Page

  Never Been to Me

  By

  GiGi Gunn

  Other Novels by GiGi Gunn:

  Cajun Moon

  Rainbow’s End

  Living Inside Your Love

  Acknowledgments

  Besides my usual inner circle—you know who you are—I’d also like to thank, for their continued support, encouragement, time, interest, inspiration, and expertise:

  Vocalist Sandra Y. Johnson, saxophonist Lyle Link, Kevin Dwyer, Brenda Owen, Diane Taber-Markiewicz, Janice Sims, Sabrina S. Scott, Faye Putty, Elaine Gordon, Effi Barry, Arlene Jones, Alexis Baham, Martha Bridgeforth, Lareeta Robinson, Zina McNeil, La Tanya Samuel, Dana Lyons, Laurien Lynn Dunlap, Camille Lucas, Joan Conway, Vanessa Moore, and Sarah Lipscomb; Cover To Cover, M’tinis, Get Your Read On, and Turning Pages Book Clubs’, the Ladies of Miss Conway’s Literary Event, the Ladies of Miss Juanita Jones Reading Guild, Ladies of the Diamond Red Hat Society, and everyone who read and enjoyed Never Been to Me.

  GiGi Gunn invites readers to visit her Web site at:

  www.gigigunn.net and e-mail her at [email protected].

  Dedication

  To D. C.

  Washington, D.C.

  The capital of the free world,

  my hometown.

  If you dance to the music, sooner or later, you’re gonna have to pay the piper.

  —Mama Sinclair

  CHAPTER 1

  Paradise Cove

  Bora-Bora, South Pacific

  Drenched in the tropical sun’s rays, she stood perched at the end of the wooden pier and scanned her tranquil surroundings. The solar heat warmed her body with delicious abandon so unlike the cold, gray winter days she’d left behind in D.C. The ocean, laid out in an aquamarine fantasy as far as the eye could see, lazily tumbled toward her, before slowing to lap, like bathwater, against the weathered post. Gentle trade winds swirled around her bikini-clad curves and carried a constant scent of hibiscus, plumeria, antriums and other exotic, undistinguishable fragrances. No sounds but those emanated and sustained by nature; the unspoiled earth at God’s best; at His purest. The universe as He had intended.

  Persi let her eyes meander over her environment and thought how Paradise Cove personified its name. A string of plush grass huts punctuated a pier that jutted out into the Pacific Ocean, insuring privacy while hiding an interior elegance. On the horizon, four men fished in an open canoe, as their ancestors had done for thousands of years, catching their dinner for the night. As with all vacations, the ten days were going too fast and, no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t convince time to slow down.

  She dove into the welcoming wet, letting her copper-brown body part the water like the Red Sea, knowing she’d miss these early-morning dips once back in frigid, dreary D.C. She touched the pristine white sand of the Pacific’s bottom and looked up though the crystal-clear water where prisms of solar rays rippled on the surface, and beyond that, the cloudless blue sky. Paradise, she thought. Neon fish, brightly painted electric blue with yellow stripes or bright orange dotted with black spots, playfully engulfed, then darted around her. She smiled as she swam in the gigantic aquarium. She floated under the transparent bubble of their hut, which formed the dining room floor where they’d spent many of their nights eating and watching the psychedelic aquatic life frolic below for their amusement; the same view shared from the living room, bathroom, and bedroom. This hedonistic paradise, designed solely for pleasure and decadently catering to every whim, had no kitchen. Native men clad in white dinner jackets balanced trays of sumptuous treats supplying sustenance, day or night, to the mostly newlywed patrons. Paradise Cove lived up to its honeymooner’s haven reputation: no children, no scheduled activities, no pets, no tours or happy hours to destroy the lush peace and serenity.

  Persi came up for air, flipped onto her back and invited the sun’s full blast to kiss her face. She lay there, buoyed by the water, absorbing all the perfection of the past few days.

  She smiled and thought of how she and her man began and ended their twenty-four hours whenever they wanted or not. Staff cast no aspersions on the privacy sign hanging on a hut door for days in a row: KAPU, which translated to Forbidden—please do not disturb. Reclusiveness was encouraged by management who remained unobtrusively around and ready with a solicitous “Anything you wish, Mr. or Mrs. Shelton?”

  Persi began treading water and in the distance saw Brad still on his cell phone; she hated that intrusive contraption. She’d left a capable staff to manage her assignments during her absence, but Brad couldn’t do that with his “girls.” Three daughters he talked with each morning here, before they went to bed there. If the true test of future behavior is past behavior, she expected the same paternal devotion when they had their children, hoping to give him a son. Each morning, she went for a swim to give them their privacy, soothing herself with the thought that she had “Daddy” all to herself the rest of the day, week and total ten day stay.

  She looked at his tanned-brown form whittled against the backdrop of the powdery white sand; as magnificent and beautiful to her now as he’d been when she first laid eyes on him. As a ninth grader, she’d been transferred to Roosevelt High School’s science program where Brad Shelton was a senior. As she tried to find her chemistry class, her vision was stolen by six feet, two inches of all man, wrapped in an ROTC uniform as he strutted toward her. The sight of him stopped her heart. More than the dress blues and the scabbard diagonally projecting from his muscular body, he was a visual symphony in copper, his coloring so stunningly odd: light copper skin and blondish-brown hair peeking from under his hat. She fumbled and dropped her books and then glanced up into the most gorgeous, symmetrical face she’d ever seen, with light, piercing honey-sage eyes set below an explosion of thick lashes, balanced on high cheekbones. And his lips—full, wavery, and seductive; at fourteen years of age, she didn’t even know what that meant, but she knew she wanted to kiss them. Touch them to hers. She’d just stared up at him, gap-mouthed and awed, and watched him walk around her without a backward glance. Not only was their age difference and the fact that he was way out of her league problematic, but he was probably bored with girls reacting to him this way.

  Persi chuckled thinking of it now. It was love at first sight for her—as he walked on by, she scrambled to collect her fallen books. He walked on by her his entire senior year. But she noticed him every chance she got.

  She now looked over and saw that he was off the telephone. She began swimming toward him. Always pensive after getting off the phone from home, her job was to cajole him around to the vacation mentality—an assignment she savored.

  “Everything all right?” she asked, emerging from the water like Botticelli’s Venus.

  “Fine,” he said tersely and then smiled. “The little one lost her tooth.”

/>   “Cute,” Persi answered in kind. “So what do you want to do today?” she asked, her body dripping wet as she climbed between his legs.

  “Whatever you like.”

  “You know what I like.” She licked, then nibbled on his lips, tugging them into a half smile, then a full kiss.

  His dry hands slid over her drenched flesh and he found her skin moist and hot to the touch. His body reacted and any thoughts of home evaporated in the seductive, steamy heat. He gathered Persi in his arms and they disappeared into their hut.

  After they made love, Mr. and Mrs. Shelton hired a jeep and toured the botanical garden, where she studied the native, indigenous plants, then bought souvenirs before they dined in town for the first time since they’d arrived. They preferred each other’s company until their ten days was up. As they packed, it was now Persi’s turn to be pensive. She detested that their vacations, which had begun as twice or more times a year, had been scaled down to once a year and always ended too soon. Although they’d been to exotic locales like the Maldives in the Indian Ocean, Barbados, and Curacao, she hated being restricted as to where they could go; no quick weekend getaways to closer and more accessible Bahamas, Jamaica or St. Thomas.

  Brad noticed her usual expected, quiet, sullen behavior the night before they went home. He always thought that they should make the most of their last night together, but she’d always turned morose.

  “How’s my girl?” he asked, stroking the side of her cheek, wanting to feel her nude body, exquisitely tanned to a deeper copper brown, beneath him on their last night.

  “Hmm.”

  “You’re still my girl? My number-one lady?” He offered his boyish smile and looked playfully into her eyes. His eyebrows arched and a smile split his striking face.

  She ignored his charms and handsomeness and fanned away his searching hands. She unapologetically leveled her eyes at him and said, “Until we touchdown in D.C. and you go home to your wife and kiddies.”

  CHAPTER 2

  The drone of the plane hummed in Persi’s ears despite the expensive headsets Brad gave her as a gift one year. Firmly ensconced in the front cabin, as far away from each other as possible and still in first class, this was the arrangement agreed upon early in the relationship. They’d landed after their vacation from the Maldives and, once lighting from the plane and heading down the ramp, he’d glimpsed his little girls with signs and balloons emblazoned with Welcome Home Daddy! Instinctively, Persi’d hung back as he proceeded out into the open arms of his wife and girls. There she was... the wife. The wife who didn’t understand him. The wife he no longer slept with. The wife he was staying with for the sake of the kids or at least “until the girls reach high school age.”

  “Tsk,” Persi now scoffed. She’d believed him. On that particular day, she’d walked off the plane ignoring the happy family—all strangers to her. Later, Brad appeased her with a piece of jewelry—either the necklace or the earrings. The price of her pride should be higher.

  Still awake and restless, Persi glanced over at his reclined, sleeping form. She rotated the small, personalized movie screen back into its place and saw him stir. He had it all: an excellent position, a sterling reputation in the community, a loving wife, three children, and a mistress of five years who was crazy about him. She hated him. She hated herself. Persi fooled herself during their rendezvous at her place or in posh hotels or quickies after hours in his office; it felt good during the tryst... damn good—but she always despised herself afterward. She was disappointed in the situation—in herself, but was hard-pressed to change it.

  Like any relationship, it’d begun with an innocent hello. She’d officially met him at a Black Caucus event while still full-time at the National Institute of Health. After more than ten years, on that night, she’d seen him at a distance and couldn’t believe how unbelievably handsome he still was. When her friend Doxie came over with a “guess who I saw?” Persi already knew. “Brad Shelton,” Persi’d answered. Doxie looked disgusted and asked, “Don’t tell me you still have the hots for him?”

  “Is he still fine?”

  “I’m sure his wife thinks so.”

  From a respectful distance, like in high school, Persi kept tabs on his movements all evening until suddenly they were face-to-face. Their eyes locked and he offered that old “you look familiar” line.

  “And with that old, tired line, you must be so married,” she’d quipped.

  “Married ain’t dead,” he’d said as his honey-sage eyes swept her body. “Does that mean I can’t speak to a pretty girl when I see one?” He’d flashed that famous Brad Shelton smile and she was back at Roosevelt High School, an awkward ninth grader standing in front of homeroom, and he a senior ROTC officer who, instead of walking by her, had stopped. History rewritten.

  She’d been so restless and giddy that night that she couldn’t sleep. The usually aloof but brilliant chemist Jean-Luc Etienne noticed her the next day at work and asked about her distraction.

  “I saw an old, ah, classmate over the weekend and he’s still beautiful.”

  “Classmate? I think you wanted it to be more, eh?” Jean-Luc asked in his thick French accent. “Some feelings never change. They hibernate until chemically stimulated again. Then you are right back to where you were then. Eh?”

  The fasten your seat belt light dinged and the pilot announced turbulence ahead. Persi glanced over at Brad as he’d turned over and pulled the blanket up and over his shoulders.

  He’s lived a charmed life, she thought with a touch of resentment. As the first son and second child of Dr. Clayton Shelton, Brad never had to work too hard or do too much, but be the oldest son of the renowned Dr. Shelton. His older sister followed their father into medicine and the father’s established practice and Brad felt no compunction to do or be anything exceptional when mediocrity was all that was required. He’d squeaked by on DNA and privilege and his current success in the business world was directly attributed to his father’s and mother’s connections and standing in Washington, D.C. society. He’d taken his time earning his degrees, first at Howard University, majoring in charm and minoring in schmooze, until forced to grow up while earning his MBA at Columbia University. He’d married Patricia “Trish” Davenport, heir to the Davenport Insurance Company of South Carolina; deemed the wedding of the century—a prince marrying a princess. They lived an idyllic life. Persi had only formally met Trish Davenport Shelton a few times, though they shared mutual friends and connections. Persi had been privy to and obligated by the perfunctory, social Washington introduction done about three times and never taking; when unsuccessful at avoiding Mrs. Shelton, someone would say to Trish, “You know Persi Sinclair?” To which Trish would answer, “Why yes. Lovely to see you again,” when she really meant “Who? And how would I know her?” Persi was intimately familiar with these social niceties as she’d been guilty of the same pleasant, anonymous intros.

  That was how Persi and Brad were reintroduced at a Multiple Sclerosis Society fund-raiser at his Potomac, Maryland home. Persi purchased tickets as a favor to Doxie, taking Rucker Jackman, the celebrity football wide receiver who left a sizable donation and a significant impression on the crowd.

  As Brad served hot dogs from the backyard’s built-in grill, he said, “I remember you, from the Black Caucus event. You’re Bruce.”

  “What?” Persi laughed as he laid the hot dog into her bun.

  “Yeah. That real smart girl who got the full scholarship to MIT back in the day. Chemistry, right? You got a Master’s and Ph.D too.”

  Persi’s face erupted into the widest, blushing, little-girl smile that even Doxie had seen from the tennis courts.

  “I read my Alumni News. You’re more than a pretty face.”

  Persi was speechless. Brad Shelton knew her. Not back then, but he knew her now.

  “You got some big-time position at NIH,” he’d continued.

  “Not really—it pays the bills.”

  “Hey, got someone I want you
to meet over here,” Doxie had interrupted as she rounded the pool. “Hey, Brad,” she said as she attempted to drag her friend away.

  “See ya, Bruce,” he’d said with a flirtatious smile.

  “Persi. Persephone. Persephone Sinclair.”

  “Right. Percy. I knew it was a guy’s name. But you’re certainly no guy,” he’d said with a wink. “Anyone else call you Bruce?”

  “No.”

  “Then that’s what I’ll call you.”

  And call he did. The following Tuesday he’d tracked her down at NIH.

  She yanked up the phone and identified herself. “Dr. Sinclair.”

  “Bruce?”

  She almost wet herself as Jean-Luc looked at her suspiciously.

  Persi now remembered it like yesterday. If she’d hung up on Brad, or had a polite conversation and then declined his invitation to lunch the following Saturday, things would be different. But he headed up a science group of Roosevelt students and wanted to meet about her speaking to them on careers in chemistry; especially for the girls to hear from a woman chemist. That was the hook, Persi now thought in retrospect. She should have known when she wouldn’t mention the conversation to Doxie she was careening toward trouble. She rationalized this was a respectable reason for her to accept a lunch invitation from a married man on a Saturday. She’d never dated a married man before; the best part of him already taken, and Persi wasn’t inclined to share or be part of a harem. Yet she heard herself accepting Brad’s invitation as they decided on a quaint café in old town Alexandria. What am I doing? she’d asked. She wasn’t raised to be the “other woman” and her parents would die if they knew. She and Brad met for lunch and, subsequently, she spoke with the students. In three months, Brad got Persi out of her designer clothes and into his bed. That was five years ago.