Indiscretion

A week later, there was a knock at my door at 9 PM.

I opened to find Naomi standing there. While it was a welcome surprise, she should’ve been home with the kids, so a wave of panic hit me. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

She waved her hands. “Oh no. I’m sorry to scare you. Nothing is wrong. Everything is fine.”

“Your sister is doing okay?”

“She’s great.”

I let out a long, deep breath. It had been nine intense days since Frannie discovered the rash. Luckily, no other symptoms had cropped up, and her blood count was still holding. “What are you doing here?”

“Standing in the hall, apparently. Aren’t you going to invite me in?”

I smirked and grabbed her hand, tugging her inside my apartment and against me.

She giggled, and it immediately felt like all was right in the world. I kissed her lips. “Who’s watching the kids?”

“Frannie’s sister-in-law had a business dinner in the City. She stopped over to visit afterward, and I asked if she would mind if I ran out to do an errand for an hour.”

“Am I the errand you needed to do?”

Naomi bit down on her bottom lip. “You are indeed.”

Then I noticed what she was wearing—one color, head to toe, even her lips were painted to match. “You’re wearing a lot of red.”

“I’m feeling a lot of passion.”

“Is that so?”

She nodded. “I hope you don’t mind me stopping by unannounced?”

“You can come by whenever you want.”

She wrapped her arms around my neck and pushed her tits up against me. “I can come whenever I want, huh? What about you? Can you come whenever I want?”

“Oh, trust me, I can come anytime I’m near you.” I buried my face in her hair and took a deep breath before licking from the hollow of her throat up to her ear. “You just need to tell me where you want me to come.”

It had been way too long. Way, way too long.

Naomi pulled back, batting her lashes seductively. “How about I show you, instead?”

We were barely inside my apartment when she dropped to her knees.

Oh fuck. My head fell back as she unzipped my jeans and reached into my boxer briefs, pulling out my cock. This woman kneeling before me was pretty much the most spectacular thing I’d ever seen, and that was before I realized her hair was in a ponytail. I briefly wondered if she would mind if I took a photo of her like that. But that thought and all other thoughts disappeared from my head as Naomi looked up at me and circled the full width of my crown with her tongue.

This.

Is.

Heaven.

Her bright red lips opened and wrapped around my shaft, sliding down the length of my cock in one long, painstakingly slow motion. I felt a little woozy, and I wasn’t sure if it was from all of my blood rushing south or the feelings I got when I was around this woman. Maybe it was both.

Her head began gliding up and down, and I was torn between holding back and wanting to come down her beautiful throat as fast as I could so I could be inside her in every other way. I wanted to fill every hole, make her feel me everywhere—so she would know exactly how she made me feel. This woman consumed me.

When she opened her velvety throat and took me even deeper, my eyes rolled back in my head. “Fuck, baby.” I groaned and wrapped her ponytail around my palm. “Keep sucking, just like that…”

Then a cell phone started to ring. I had no idea if it was hers or mine, but there was no way in hell either of us was answering it. I fisted her hair tighter, to make damn sure of that, and started thrusting into her mouth. Eventually it stopped, or else I was so far gone I couldn’t hear it anymore. But a few seconds later, the ringing started again, and I realized it wasn’t my ringtone. I wanted to ignore it in the worst way, but a horrible feeling washed over me.

“Babe, what if it’s the kids?”

Naomi slipped my cock from her mouth and blinked a few times. “Oh God.” She fumbled around the floor to find her purse, unzipping in a panic, and swiped to answer on the third ring.

“Hello?”

The room was so quiet, I could hear the person on the other end of the phone.

“Is this Miss Heart?”

“Yes.”

“This is the nurse at St. Matthews. I’m calling regarding your sister, Francesca.”

“What’s the matter? What happened?”

“She sprang a high fever a few hours ago, very suddenly. And just now she had a seizure.”

“Oh my God.” Naomi’s hand clutched her chest. “Is she okay?”

“She’s asleep. We’ve given her medication to reduce the fever, but it’s still very high. We thought you should know. I tried to reach her primary medical delegate, but I wasn’t able to, so I’m calling you as the alternate.”

“What? I thought I was her primary medical delegate?”

“Not according to the system. But I can double check the paperwork, if you’d like.”

Naomi shook her head. “No, it’s fine. It doesn’t matter. Can I come see Frannie now, even though it’s not visiting hours?”

“Yes. Visitors are permitted past regular hours in emergency situations.”

“I’ll be right there.”

***

One minute I’m answering my door and feeling like king of the world, and the next I’m driving Naomi back home after twenty hours at the hospital. Frannie hadn’t woken up after her seizure. She’d slipped into a coma, and the doctors weren’t optimistic about the outcome.

Naomi stared out the window the entire drive to Frannie’s apartment. When I parked and turned off the engine, she looked around and blinked, appearing almost startled. “Oh my God. I don’t even know how we got here. Did I fall asleep during the drive?”

“Your eyes were open, but you were definitely somewhere else.”

She looked straight ahead for a long time. “I have to tell the kids. Do I let them see her like that?”

I raked a hand through my hair. “I don’t know.”

Tears streamed down her face. “It’s going to scare them so badly, but I feel like I need to give them some warning. When they saw her last week, she was doing so well.”

I tasted salt in my throat and shut my eyes. “Fuck. I’m so sorry.”

“I wish she’d never done the transplant. She could’ve gone into remission without it, like she did last time. I wish I’d never encouraged her to do this.”

This was all my fault. All my fucking fault. I needed to tell Naomi what I’d done, that without my stupid need to make things right, her sister wouldn’t be in this predicament. But now was not the time. Telling her wouldn’t help anyone but me. I might get it off my chest, but it would only complicate things for her by adding a new layer of emotional stress. “It’s not your fault. All you ever did was support your sister’s decisions.”

Naomi had held it together the whole time at the hospital, but suddenly she broke. Her shoulders shook, and then the noise came. I unbuckled her seatbelt and pulled her over the center console, holding her in my arms as she cried.

“I can’t lose her. The kids can’t lose their mother.”

Silent tears streamed down my face. I couldn’t even console her by saying everything would be alright. It most likely wouldn’t be. Because of me. Instead, I stroked her hair and held her tight. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

After a long time, she wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand and sniffled. “I have to go in and talk to the kids before it gets too late.”

“Do you want me to go with you?”

Naomi smiled sadly. “No. But thank you. Frannie’s sister-in-law is still here. We’re going to talk to them together.”

I nodded. I had the strongest urge to tell her I loved her as I watched her walk from the car to the door. But it wasn’t because I thought she needed to hear it. It was because I had a sinking feeling I might never get the chance to tell her.