“Well, she’s doing more than babysitting Pie for him,” Mingus said. He reached for his cell phone and scrolled through his pictures. “I had to get an old friend of mine to open the records department this morning down at the county clerk’s office to follow up on a lead Neema had. It seems that Ginger got married recently. Give you three guesses who the groom was—and the first two don’t count.” He passed his phone and an image of the marriage license to his sister-in-law.
Danni cringed. “Please tell me it’s not so.”
“Sorry,” Mingus said with a shrug of his shoulders. “But your friend Ginger married her boss. Ginger Novak Balducci is our new auntie.”
There was a collective gasp as they each let that information settle.
Parker leaned across the table, his voice dropping to a loud whisper. “Let’s keep that little tidbit between us for the time being, please. No one outside of this room needs to know. At least not until we can figure out how she and Balducci both play into all of this.”
Davis listened with half an ear as the family revisited the details they did know. Plans were made to question Ginger. He suddenly thought about the last time he had seen her.
“She carries a gun,” he said. “Ginger does.”
“And you know this how?” Ellington questioned.
“She had a gun on her when she and Balducci showed up at the hospital to see me. I saw it holstered under her jacket.” As he thought about that moment, he couldn’t help but remember Neema’s visit and their first kiss, and his heart suddenly felt like it was going to stop beating from the hurt of it all.
* * *
As the family began to say their goodbyes and head to their respective homes, Mingus pulled Davis aside. “I try to stay out of other people’s business,” he said.
“I know, but you should have told me. I feel like Neema’s made a fool out of me.”
“I didn’t tell you about Neema because it wasn’t my place to tell you. It was hers, and she swore to me that she would before the week was out. If she hadn’t, then I would have told you. That was our agreement. And I think she had every intention of telling you if Simone hadn’t beaten her to the punch.”
“We were supposed to talk after dinner. She said she had something important to share with me.”
“So now you need to decide what you plan to do about it.”
“I don’t plan to do anything. It’s over,” Davis said emphatically.
“You’re just pissed that it was Simone who called her out. Had anyone else told you, you would have been more than ready to talk to Neema and make things right between you. Don’t let Simone steal your joy. She would never have let any one of us come between her and Paul. So don’t you sabotage what you and Neema could have with each other. You know you want that woman.”
“Right now,” Davis said, “all I want is to be left alone.”
Mingus chuckled. “Good luck with that!”
They seemed to line up, everyone in the family wanting to leave him with a word or two of advice. Telling him not to make any rash decisions seemed to be the ligne de jour.
Simone threw her arms around his neck and hugged him tightly, contrition battling with her strong will. “I should have handled that differently,” she muttered.
“You think?”
“I was just so mad! How dare she lead you on and try to take advantage of you!”
“Simone, I love you, but it’s time you let go and stop trying to rule my life.”
“That’s not what I was trying to do.”
“It’s exactly what you were trying to do. I appreciate you wanting to protect me, but you need to turn all that energy toward your husband and my future nephew.”
“I am not that bad.”
“Yes, you are. Our mother isn’t as overbearing as you are, Simone. You need to take some pointers.”
Simone sighed. “Okay, so maybe I have moments.”
Davis shook his head. “I know you were just looking out for me. But damn, Simone! Did you have to be so rough? You were like a pit bull the way you went after Neema.”
Simone blew a soft sigh. “Truth?”
“Always.”
“I may have been a little jealous. I may be having a hard time thinking of you loving someone more than you love me. Next to Mom, I was your favorite girl. I don’t want you to have another favorite.”
Davis laughed. “You may need professional help for that.”
Simone hugged her brother a second time. “What are you going to do now?”
“I don’t know. I just need to step away for a while to think.”
“Well, don’t think too hard. You might give her a second chance and that’s not a woman you can trust.”
“You don’t know her, Simone.”
“And I don’t want to. Not yet, anyway.”
“You really need to spend more time with Mom practicing patience and forgiveness and all those other traits you seem to be lacking. Preferably before the baby is born.”
“Now who’s being mean?”
Davis kissed her cheek. “I love you, Simone.”
“I love you more, baby brother,” she said as she hugged him one last time, then followed her husband to the car.
Minutes later his parents stood together as Davis readied himself to go home. He hugged one and then the other.
“Are you going to be okay, son?” his father asked.
Davis nodded. “I’ll be fine. I just need some time.”
“Take a minute,” his mother said, “then call Neema and talk to her. She owes you an explanation and you owe her the courtesy of listening. Nothing may come of it, but if you care about her the way I think you do, I believe you two can work it out.”
“I need to make sure she isn’t planning to write anything about what you both shared with us this evening. There’ll be no working anything out if she does.”
“I’m not worried about that,” Judith said. “I don’t think anything that was said here will be repeated. Her initial intentions may not have been above board, but I think once she fell in love with you, she was firmly committed to protecting your interests.”
“Why does everyone keep talking about her being in love with me and me being in love with her?” He tossed up his hands in frustration.
Both his parents laughed heartily. “You still have a lot to learn, son,” Jerome said. “A lot to learn! You and Neema care more for each other than either of you has been willing to admit. Everyone else can see it and you would, too, if you didn’t spend so much time trying to fight it.”
Davis shook his head. If he were honest, he hadn’t been fighting it. He’d been concerned about labeling it and, with everything going on, he hadn’t been able to give it his full and undivided attention.
Judith linked her arm through her son’s. “Let me share something with you. When your father and I met, I didn’t tell him what had happened to me. When we married and I became pregnant with Parker, there were some complications. A doctor inadvertently told your father about my previous pregnancy. Needless to say, he was not happy with me.”
Jerome nodded. “Actually, I was furious. I didn’t think I could ever trust your mother again. I couldn’t understand how she would keep something like that from me.”
“We had to go through it to make it out the other side,” Judith said. “And it was hard work on both our parts. That was an ugly time, and I’m grateful every day that we didn’t give up on each other.”
“If I had to, I’d do it all over again, too,” Jerome said. He kissed his wife’s mouth. “If you’re blessed to find the love of your life, those battles are well worth what they may put you through.”
“Thank you,” Davis said. “I love you both more than I can ever express in words.”
“We love you, too,” Judith said.
“Call tha
t young woman!” Jerome shouted as Davis made it to his car. “We like her!”
* * *
Neema sat in front of Davis’s house for over an hour. For most of that time she cried, that really ugly cry that made her nose run and her eyes itch. She couldn’t begin to express how much she hurt. Mingus had warned her that she might not have the time she thought to tell Davis the truth. Being a coward about it had probably lost her the love of her life.
Because she did love Davis. As he had stood staring at her, confusion, frustration and hurt blended across his face, she realized just how hard she had fallen for him. And now she was fearful she would never be able to tell him. That he would never be interested in hearing those words from her.
She’d thought about calling but knew that if he refused to speak with her, that would probably be the straw that broke her. She’d been able to walk out of his parents’ home with a semblance of her dignity, despite the looks his family had given her.
His mother had been more than generous and even his sister Vaughan had been relatively kind. Davis had warned her about Simone, but even Neema knew there weren’t enough pregnancy hormones in the world to explain away her bad behavior. Simone had been plain mean for no reason and, sadly, Neema had given her more than enough reason to be outright vicious. Neema imagined Simone would be the sister that gave in-laws a bad rap.
After an hour and a half, she was ready to pull her car out of the parking spot and head back across town. Hoping Davis would have been home by now had been wishful thinking on her part. She figured he’d stayed with his family to bemoan her actions. And although she understood it, she was slightly angry that he hadn’t wanted to confront her about it instead.
For a moment, she thought about going to the office to put extra time on the clock, but she had no desire to be out pursuing other people’s bad news. She had her own to deal with. And no idea how she was going to handle the fallout from the full disclosure that had devastated Davis and left her feeling like the most horrible person in the world.
She considered going to the restaurant but that would mean explaining to her parents why she was there and what had gone wrong. That was definitely not the lecture she needed. She opted to head to the house instead and hope her parents hadn’t beaten her there so she could sneak into her room without anyone knowing she was home.
Just as she shifted her car into Drive, the lights in Davis’s house came on, but Davis was nowhere to be seen. For a moment, she thought they might be on a timer, but a shadowy figure moving past the window gave Neema pause. If Davis was still with his family, who was sneaking around in his home? She reached for her phone.
“Nine-one-one. What’s your emergency?”
“I need to report a burglary at the home of Alderman Davis Black. The intruder is currently on sight,” Neema said.
* * *
The police presence in front of his home suddenly had Davis’s heart racing, unable to imagine what had happened now. Then he remembered that he’d forgotten to set the new alarm system his brother had insisted on installing. Seeing Neema kneeling on the sidewalk, her arms around Titus’s neck, sank his heart deep into the pit of his stomach imagining the worse.
Throwing his car into Park, he cut the engine and practically jumped from the vehicle. Mingus walking toward him stopped him from running foolishly forward. “What’s going on?” he questioned as his brother met him in the driveway.
“You had a break-in. Neema was here waiting for you and called it in.”
“Neema?”
“Yeah. And let me school you, little brother,” he said. “When you’re mad at your woman and she calls you—you answer. A woman is not going to call if she knows you’re pissed unless it’s important.”
Davis shook his head. Neema had called him twice and he’d ignored her both times, not ready to talk with her. He had cut his phone off instead. Now he was feeling bad about it and Mingus calling him out didn’t help. “Is she okay?”
“Worried about you.”
A uniformed police officer sauntered up to the two men. “That’s some guard dog you have there, Alderman Black. He wouldn’t let us in, or the perp out, until your wife called him off,” he said, gesturing toward Neema and Titus with his head.
“She not my...” Davis started.
“It’s a good thing she called before going into the house. She might have gotten hurt,” the officer continued.
“Did you get the guy?” Davis asked instead.
“Handcuffed in the back of my patrol car. We’re going to take him down to the station and book him. The house is clear, so you can go inside now to see if anything’s missing.”
Davis nodded. “Thank you.”
Mingus gave him a look and he paused as the officer turned and walked away. “Dad’s going to meet us down at the station,” he said, his voice dropping a level.
“Why? What’s up?”
Mingus pointed to the patrol car. Inside, Alexander Balducci’s older grandson sat in the back seat. He was rocking back and forth, clearly agitated.
“Does everything have to be so damn complicated,” Davis said, throwing his hands up in frustration.
“It gets better,” Mingus said. “He was carrying and something tells me that gun is going to come back on those three bodies. From what we’ve been able to figure out, you were supposed to be the fourth.”
“You’re kidding me, right?”
“Little brother, I wish I was.”
* * *
Neema watched the brothers as they stood in conversation. Davis’s gaze kept skating in her direction and she could only begin to imagine what he had to be thinking about her being there.
She and Titus both stood as he walked toward them. Titus’s tail wag evidenced his excitement. Neema was grateful hers didn’t show, not wanting to embarrass herself. But she was excited, and hopeful.
“Hey,” Davis said as he made it to her side. He reached his hand out to pat his dog’s head. “Thank you.”
“I didn’t want anything to happen to Titus.”
“I appreciate that.”
There was an awkward pause as they stood staring at each other pretending to be focused on the dog.
“We need to go to the police station,” Davis finally said.
“I gave them a statement,” Neema responded. “Do they need something else from me?”
“I need you,” he answered.
Nina’s eyes widened and she simply nodded.
“Let me put Titus in the house and lock up. We can ride together in my car.”
“Are you sure? I can follow you, if that will be easier?”
“Nothing about this is easy. And we need to talk. Please.”
Neema watched Davis and Titus head through the front door. Moments later, he exited the home, locked the front door, and gestured for her to meet him at his car. Most of the patrol cars had already taken off, only one stayed behind to watch the home and street. Davis’s brother had also disappeared.
As she slid into the front passenger seat, she wasn’t quite sure what to say or if she should say anything at all. So she said nothing, deciding to let Davis take the lead. There was a moment of hesitation on his part as he sat in the driver’s seat, not starting the car.
Without giving it a thought, Neema reached for his hand, gently caressing the back of his fingers. When he didn’t pull away, she took it as a hopeful sign of what was yet to come.
CHAPTER 17
Davis knew he couldn’t stay angry forever. He also knew his parents had been right about Neema needing to explain herself and him affording her the opportunity to do that. As the palm of her hand gently grazed the back of his, he shot her a look and the faintest of smiles.
He inhaled, drawing oxygen deep into his lungs. “Before we go, we need to talk,” he said finally. “I need to understand why you didn’t trust me.
”
Neema’s dark eyes were wide, confusion washing over her expression. “But I did trust you! Why would you think I didn’t trust you?”
“Because you wouldn’t tell me the truth. If you trusted me, you could tell me anything.”
Neema shook her head, dismay crossing her face. “It wasn’t about trusting you. I regretted what I had done. Hated the choices I had made. I was afraid to confess because I didn’t want you to hate me. And I knew you would hate me! I didn’t want to lose you, but once you knew, I couldn’t blame you if you never wanted to see me again.”
“You should have told me, Neema!”
“I tried. Every time I thought I could get it out, something happened. Your phone rang and you had to take a call. We were distracted, or I simply chickened out! But I had every intention of coming clean because I did trust you. I trusted you because I love you and all I wanted was for you to love me back.”
Davis shot her another look, held her gaze as she stared intently. There was something swimming in her tears that tugged at his heartstrings and made him want to forget every bad thing that had happened with them both in their lives. To bring them joy like never before. Something that made him want to protect her from harm by any means necessary.
“So, tell me now,” he nodded. “Please.”
And Neema did. She was brutally honest about her initial assumptions about him, and what she had accomplished. She detailed where she’d gone looking for information and who she’d talked to. Then she admitted that she had been wrong about everything, and how she had then tried to make it right. She expressed every fear and concern that she had battled, neither embellishing nor omitting anything. She told him every dirty detail and then she apologized one more time.
“I was wrong,” she said softly. “You weren’t the grimy politician I thought you would be. You turned out to be this incredibly sensitive, intuitive spirit, with one of the biggest hearts of anyone I’ve ever known.”
Davis’s smile lifted slightly. “I took it personally. It felt like a major deficiency on my part. That I had failed miserably in all my efforts to show you the man I was. Because if you couldn’t be honest with me or talk to me, then what had we been doing since we met? It hurt.”
Harlequin Romantic Suspense March 2021 Page 92
