Message from a Mistress Read Online Free PDF

nodded. “I was just playing.”
    “Aaaaah…” Renee let out a long, drawn-out sigh of pleasure that was more erotic than therapeutic.
    Aria whipped her head over to eye her friend. Her sheet was down around the top of her buttocks as the tall and muscular masseur placed heated towels over her smooth back. “You all right over there?” she asked with a teasing tone.
    The masseur’s face remained stoic even as Renee began to giggle. “Girl, I’m good ,” she stressed with another soft smile.
    Aria closed her eyes and tried to get focused on the goodness of her massage. This spa day, which she knew would cost her close to five hundred dollars, was a long way from her days back in Newark. That was a time when shit like a manicure wasn’t on the radar of things to spend money on. Food, rent, light bills, bus fare were the first, the last, and the only priorities.
    The big-time career as a freelance writer, the big car, and the husband with the big bank account and a big dick were all good, but sometimes she missed the heat and the unique beat of the hood. Sometimes, if she kept it real, Jaime and Renee were too white picket fence for her.
    Aria felt out of place from the ladies’ upper-middle-class upbringing and private-school educations. The same background as Kingston’s. Sometimes, Aria felt like she wasn’t good enough for her husband, his life, or his family and friends. Still, she made it her business not to embarrass him or remind him that she was just a poor kid on full scholarship at Columbia with a caseload of Salvation Army clothes when they met.
    Aria knew that he loved her—or at least he loved what all he knew about her. She bit the gloss from her bottom lip as secrets she tried to keep buried nudged at her.
    Even once the massage drew to an end thirty minutes later and she rose from the table to don her robe, Aria caught a glimpse of her reflection in one of the mirrors on the wall. Her eyes were filled with the secrecy of her past.
    “I am so ready for my coconut and sugar body scrub,” Jaime said as she swung her hair behind her back.
    “Me too,” Renee joined in as she stretched and then pulled her BlackBerry from the pocket of her robe.
    Aria barely heard them as she studied her reflection.
    The thick and smooth texture of her trendy Rihanna asymmetrical cut.
    The slender, almost African beauty of her dark-skinned face with its just-barely-there make-up.
    She thought of the clothes awaiting her in the changing room. The hip and stylish dark Rock & Republic jeans paired with a bright red Biba ruffled shirt of sheer silk—an outfit that retailed for more than one year’s rent in the low-income projects where she was raised.
    She wondered how much of the woman she was today was Aria Livewell the doctor’s wife, living up to her surname, and how much was Aria Johnson, who was just a ghetto girl at heart.
     
    Their spa treatments were over. They had been massaged, exfoliated, and bathed to perfection. The scent of the coconut milk used throughout each treatment still subtly clung to their soft and supple skin. Now it was time for a light lunch at their favorite restaurant, the Terrace Room, to cap off their relaxing morning. Nothing went better with good friends and good food than a damn good conversation. Renee was more than game.
    “I’m worried about my marriage,” she admitted softly into the silence surrounding their table. She checked her BlackBerry for the umpteenthtime. Her job meant being accessible at all times. A day off—even the weekend—was never really a day off for her, it was just a day out of the office. She never knew when a possible promotional contact was going to return a call or initiate a call for a brilliant marketing idea.
    Renee finally pulled her constantly vibrating BlackBerry from its case. “Go ahead, Darren,” she said, absentmindedly fingering her utensils.
    “Found the files.”
    “Yes! Where were they? No, you know what, it doesn’t even matter. Can