Page 30 of The Best Man: Unfinished Business

Chapter Fourteen

Robyn

Robyn awoke with the sun on her face, lying in Kwesi’s bed, still in his embrace.

His arm was warm and solid under her neck, comfortable.

It had been a long time since she last had that kind of pillow when sleeping.

She turned to look at him and then observe their tangled bodies, an intermingling of her bronze and his mahogany limbs.

Her body was still relaxed from climaxing, from the two times they’d made love in the night, plus the one gift he gave her on the sofa.

The memory of it was still… delicious. Robyn smiled at the thought. It was certainly something to baskin.

She kissed him gently on his cheek and then felt a slight pang of guilt when he began to stir. He turned toward her with a slow blinking of his eyes. After focusing on her face, he smiled.

“Good morning, beautiful,” he said softly. Even this early, his words sounded like he was singing a song.

Robyn smiled back at him and traced the contours of muscle along his chest. “It is a good morning.” Everything was perfect—Kwesi was more than she imagined he’d be, and she’d done a lot of imagining.

He was the type of guy who could make you start to envision a future, a long future together.

And Robyn felt ready for that. It was time for this new beginning also, the budding of love and all its possibilities.

She sighed as she reached her arms upward, stretching.

“Did you sleep well?” Kwesi asked.

“Did we sleep much at all?” Robyn teased.

“I’m not sure, but I feel incredible.” He smiled at her again.

“?‘Incredible’…that’s a word.” Robyn pondered how she felt, really. What was the word for it? “I feel… hopeful, ” she said finally.

Kwesi turned to look at her, propping himself up on an elbow. “And what might you be hoping for?” His tone was teasing, but his eyes were sincere. There were so many ways to answer his question, but right now, Robyn just wanted more, more of him, of this, of last night.

“I was just thinking that this feels nice, you know? Everything. Being with you, cooking with you…”

“I feel the same.” Kwesi picked up her hand and brought it to his lips.

“I’m going to London in a few days to tend to family matters, but I would really like to see you again when I return…

like this.” His eyes flickered across her naked body.

Robyn felt turned on instantly, like she could make love to him all over again right now.

She started to reach her hand down toward his belly button, and around the hard cleft of muscle at his hip, and the ripples in his abdomen flexed as he responded to her touch.

As she touched him, Robyn casually continued the conversation. “Your family is in London? Your parents? Do you have siblings?’

“My parents are here, in Accra. As are my brother and sister,” he said.

Robyn continued to trail her fingers along his leg, looking for morning wood. “Ahh, so which of your family is in London? The boys? You have a business there?”

Kwesi reached down for her hand and brought it up between them, holding it while he searched to meet her eyes. “My wife and children are in London,” he said. What? “At our family home.” Robyn was sure she heard wrong.

“Your ex?” Robyn shot up like a firecracker and snatched her hand back, then pulled the sheet up to cover her body. “Did you just say—?” she spat out with a stutter. “Did you just say…‘wife’?”

Strangely, other than a bit of surprise, Kwesi did not change his countenance.

“Yeah,” he replied calmly. “My wife. My ex. We are separated but still married. We live separate lives. Hers is in London, where our children are in school and it’s what they know as home.

I am based here for business. We’re an unconventional family, sure, but there are no secrets between us, if that’s what you’re wondering. And no secrets between you andI.”

“Well, this feels like a secret that I am just hearing about….” Robyn said, running through her mental Rolodex of conversations about Kwesi having older kids and an “ex.” She naturally assumed ex- wife. Not wife.

“Wife?” Robyn found herself repeating. For a moment, it seemed to be the only word she had access to.

She searched the room for the hidden camera, the one that would tell her that this was all just a joke, an unwelcome one, but at least not real.

This can’t be happening, she thought, shaking her head to try to dismiss the unfolding circumstances.

Kwesi reached for her hand again. By instinct, she pulled it farther away. “Robyn, there’s nothing to be worried about. This is not the conventional way that you might be thinking in America. There is nothing wrong.”

“Oh, there’s a whole lot wrong, Kwesi,” Robyn began, trying to control her mounting anger. “This is some bullshit.” She was sitting up in the bed now. “You never said wife before. Was I supposed to interrogate you? Ask you, ‘did you actually get divorced?’ Aren’t we adults?”

“I wasn’t trying to deceive you, Robyn. I don’t think of her that way. She is my ex. But she is also still my wife…on paper. Most people I would say that to would understand.”

“But you could have said it a million times before, just like that. In any of our other conversations. In fact, that should have been the first thing you said. Not after…after we…”

“Made love?” Kwesi offered.

“Oh, is that what happened? Because now I just feel fucked.” Robyn got up to look for her clothes.

“Robyn, last night was magical, beautiful, everything I could have wanted. And I want to have more of that with you. There’s nothing to stop it.”

“Except your wife!” Robyn found her bra and pulled the sides around her back to fasten the clasp.

She wasn’t about to get caught up in this kind of madness.

There was no role for her as the other woman in someone else’s fractured family.

She’d already had enough of that. She started to stuff her breasts in the bra cups.

“Robyn, Robyn, wait, please.” Kwesi stood up with her, not bothering to even attempt to replace any of his clothing.

Even under the circumstances, his body looked amazing.

Robyn was disappointed that she was still moved by it.

With his hands and arms now, he continued, gesturing passionately.

“My wife would love you. She’d love to meet you.

” He smiled his contagious smile. Meet me?

Robyn did not respond, although the corners of her mouth threatened to rise.

“Come on, Robyn. Please, please listen to me. This is not what you’re thinking.

I assure you. You have no reason to be upset. ”

“Oh no? Just because you entered my body doesn’t tell you how I feel, Kwesi!” Robyn shouted at him, without meaningto.

Kwesi approached her and placed his hands on her shoulders.

So close to sliding those bra straps down and starting all over again.

He leaned down to look at her. She didn’t slap his hands away like she wanted to.

“Tell me why. Why are you upset?” he said, craning his neck down.

Robyn scrunched up her face in incredulity. Negro, are you kidding me…?

“Are you serious right now? Because…you’re married. And I feel stupid. And used. Why didn’t you just tell me, Kwesi? So you could have sex with me and just leave…to go back to your wife ?” Robyn felt like she was going crazy. The moment was too overwhelming to fight.

Kwesi wrapped himself around her, pressing her folded arms into her chest between them. He hugged her tightly and as much as she wanted to, she didn’t resist.

“Robyn. That is not what is happening, I promise you. The opposite is happening. I want to spend every day with you. That is what I am feeling.” He stepped back and looked her in her eyes.

“Come to London with me.” He said it as if he’d just had the most wonderful idea.

“Would you like to come?” He held her eyes with his and waited for her response. The invitation was disarming.

“I…I can’t. I have Mia and the restaurant. I…”

“Then I will call you every day when I am gone. I will do whatever will make you comfortable. But in the meantime”—he stepped closer to her, wrapped his arms around her again, and spoke with his lips to her ear—“over these next days before I leave…will you let me show you what you mean to me?”

Robyn could have said no. She felt she should have.

How could I have been so stupid? So trusting?

she wondered. What have I gotten myself into?

But there, in his arms, wrapped in that way, she felt something for him beyond the doubt.

And that was something she wasn’t quite ready to let go of. Not just now.