“I’m sorry I didn’t sit next to you…” I say, meaning it.
I’ve got to tell her.
“I know this isn’t the best place,” I take a steadying breath and rip the Band-Aid off. “But I wanted to tell you first that I’ve gotten a job in North Carolina. So I’m moving there…ah, next week.”
Amber didn’t use to be so great about showing emotion. She used to be closed off and a little distant. Even with those she loved.
But today, standing beside Rock’s grave with her baby, her mouth drops open and she lets out a woof of air. Like I kicked her. “What? Why are you just now telling me this?”
“I only got the offer three days ago.” Not a lie. But not the exact truth either. It’s true I only got the offer three days ago, but I applied for the job shortly after that doctor’s appointment.
“The fact that they made you the offer means that you must have applied for the job. I’m assuming this offer didn’t come out of the blue.”
Darn, Amber. Of course, she picks up on that omission. I swear she’s like a bloodhound with the real truth and nothing but the truth. Encouraging her to apply to law school has come back to bite me.
I squirm under Amber’s interrogation, all the true answers wanting to come out. But I keep them locked behind my clamped lips. I’m not that naïve girl at the table anymore. I know better now. Telling her the truth won’t solve anything. Only make it worse.
“One of my dad’s sisters lives in Charlotte. All her children are grown and out of the nest, and she’s been begging me to move down there ever since my parents left New York. A special position as an advocate for college-age foster youth just came up. And I think…I think it’ll be a perfect fit.”
Amber’s head jerks back. “So you’re just leaving?”
I waiver, wanting and wishing like I often do that things had turned out differently. That Stone had never shown up at my kitchen table and that Amber and I had raised her baby together as we planned, without his sperm donor ever finding out.
But that’s a stupid, selfish wish, especially now.
Luckily, the priest saves me from having to answer her hurt question. He calls for our attention, and we all turn to face where he’s standing behind Rock’s now closed casket.
More sermonizing, then it’s finally time to lower Rock’s body into a ground. A terrible sound rises from the other side of the audience’s semi-circle as soon as the gleaming black and gold casket starts its descent.
It’s Rock’s mother. Her entire body shakes as she weeps into her hands, and I suspect she would fall to her knees if not for Luca holding her up with a strong arm around her shoulders.
On the other side of her stands Stone and a much older version of the man in the mugshot on the Wikipedia page for Stanley Ferraro. Stone and Rock’s father, on temporary release from his double lifetime sentence for several counts of pretty much everything a mafioso can be sent to prison for. Stanley had originally been slated to become the Ferraro’s Family’s next head, but that Don title ended up going to Luca’s father when his brother caught a lifetime, and then some, prison sentence.
If things had worked out differently, Stone would be the current head of the Ferraro family. But they didn’t and now he’s the one standing by as his father does absolutely nothing to console his grieving wife.
That might be because he’s in handcuffs chained directly to his waist. But I don’t think so. His expression is a total mirror of his granite-faced son’s. He’s a craggier Stone with a full head of grey hair. Hard, emotionless, and apparently incapable of providing even a measure of comfort to the woman barely standing beside them.
Looking at the two expressionless men, I try to find a pang of sympathy somewhere in my soul. Try to forgive. Try not to hate Stone, like I’ve hated him since I found him at my kitchen table. But observing him watch his brother get lowered into the ground with the same cold, uncaring expression he wore when he told me to sit down, I can’t. I just can’t.
I throw my dirt and go. No stopping to give my condolences to Rock’s mother, who I doubt I could look in the eye anyway. No saying good-bye to Amber. I just go and don’t look back.
The air is less cold on the other side of the cemetery’s entrance. And as I order another Lyft, I breathe heavily, feeling like I’ve narrowly escaped something. Joe, a Latino-looking guy in a black Prius is my savior and he’s on his way. All I have to do is meet him at the curb.
But then…
“Hey, Naima.”
I freeze at the sound of Stone’s voice. It sends shivers down my back now just as it did back then. And I no longer have to worry about catching my breath. It disappears as he comes to stand in front of me, somehow looming larger than Rock ever did, even though they are—were—identical twins.
He blocks my access to the road. “I don’t know how they do it at your kind of Catholic funerals, but at ours, you usually say something to the mother of the deceased. Especially when the deceased is your dead boyfriend.”
A thousand defenses come to mind, none of which I dare to say out loud. Not to this man.
“I’ll send a card,” I lie. Then, as long as I’m racking up the sins, I add, “I have some place to be. An important appointment.”
A beat, as his eyes flicker up and down my body. Not the way Rock’s did when we first met, but like a man, who couldn’t be more disgusted. “You’re lying,” he says. “But go, run.”
Again, I could defend myself. Again, I don’t. Instead I happily take the invitation and start to push past him. But then he grabs hold of my arm, his meaty hand a vice around my shoulder. “Hear you’re moving.”
My heart pounds with fear at his words. Is he tracing my emails and calls, like Luca used to do Amber? If so, how much does he know about the real reason I’m moving?
“Amber’s all upset about it,” he says, cutting off my panicked thoughts.
Oh…Amber. A pang of guilt hits me along with another useless wish that things had turned out differently.
“Dick move, Almonte,” Stone says, as if giving voice to my thoughts. “Better ways to deal with your bullshit crush.”
“I’m not leaving because of Amber,” I say, my lips tightening.
Now that’s the truth, but Stone shakes his head at me like he’s caught me telling another bold-faced lie.
I’m once again gripped by the same anger that made me knee him in the crotch the last time we talked. I hate this, hate the way he makes me feel like someone I’m not. Someone spiteful and fighty. Someone so infuriated, she has to resort to knee punches instead of words.
“Just let me by, okay?” I say. “I don’t…I don’t want to do this. Not today.”
Stone’s hand tightens on my shoulder, the direct opposite of what I asked. I’m considering another knee to his crotch, like the last time we talked to each other. But then I see the look on his face and stop.
Mainly because there actually is a look on his face. Not a cold and neutral expression, but a furrowed brow above eyes that are…well, not soft, but not as hard as they were when they lowered his brother into the ground.
And just like that, my baseline compassion boots back up.
“Stone,” I say softly. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry about your brother. I can’t even fathom how hard this must be for you.”
“Yeah,” he says, the word falling like a pebble between us.
He looks at me. And I look at him. One thin line of human connection tentatively forming between us.
Then his lips come crashing down on top of mine.
I’m shocked. At least I should be, but I’m not given a chance. His kiss is immediately relentless and all-consuming. There’s no chance for my mind to process or wander as it sometimes did when I was making out with Rock. From the moment our mouths touch, Stone plunges and plunders, demanding and then taking every ounce of my attention.
But I can’t blame the surprise of the kiss for what happened next. How instead of pushing Stone away, I threw my arms around his
neck, pulling myself into his savage kiss even deeper. How instead of feeling repulsed by this unexpected assault, my body thrilled with a hum unlike anything I’ve ever felt before. Not caring where I was, who this was. Just wanting more and more.
Until suddenly Stone pulls away, as abruptly as he attacked me.
I stumble back a little, not understanding. Not comprehending. How he could so suddenly stop doing something that had felt so good?
But he does. And even worse, his face has gone expressionless again.
“I don’t get it,” he says, his words at soft as bullets shooting out a silenced gun. “I still don’t fucking get what Rock ever saw in you.”
The words slice my heart open, just as the phone I’m still holding vibrates in my hand. I look down at it to see that Joe, my Lyft driver, is here.
And by the time I look back up, Stone is gone.
Like he was never even there.
Okay, then…
Sometimes you ask God for a sign that you’ve made the right decision. Sometimes he just gives you one whether you asked for it or not.
This is my freaking sign, I decide right there and then.
I, Naima Almonte, am a freaking mess. I need to get the heck out of New York City. And this…what happened with Stone…how I responded to his kiss…confirms it.
Bye, New York.
Hello, Charlotte.
Chapter One
“I just don’t understand why you would move down here if you’re not going to let me move in with you.”
I bite back my frustration and take a steadying breath. “Tia…”
“Okay, okay, at least let me set you up. Come to church with me tomorrow, mija, there’s a man I want you to meet. He is a little skinny but other than that, perfect for you. His name is Luis!”
Eight months later, I’m still certain my decision to move to Charlotte was a good one. But I am regretting answering my aunt Mari’s call while rushing around the best I can to get ready for work.
“Thank you, but no thank you,” I say in Spanish to her latest invitation to join her for church this Sunday.
“Oh, come on, mija, Luis will not bite. And he needs a nice, responsible girl like you to keep him off these streets. Plus, his baby’s mother is blonde, and he hates her, so I do not think he will mind your dark skin.”
Wow.
I still don’t quite know how to respond to the blatant colorism often spewed by the older relatives on the Dominican side of my family tree. On one hand, respect your elders. My father would flip out if he heard I talked back to his older sister for any reason.
On the other hand, if I had to take one more phone call from Aunt Mari about some potential candidate she’d dredged up along with her equally colorist church members, I will scream loud enough for the way less color struck Dominicans in New York to hear it. And don’t even get me started on how I have to constantly remind her that I don’t just consider myself a dark Latina, but black. You know, thanks to the Haitian mother, she and some of my other older relatives still can’t believe my father lowered himself to marry.
“Sorry, Tia Mari,” I say instead. Then I switch back to English to tell her, “Hard pass.”
“You’re right maybe we should wait until you lose all that weight,” Aunt Mari says cheerily.
I glare at the phone. “Okay, I’ve got to go, Titi.”
“Wait, we still haven’t talked about me moving in with you!”
“So sorry, Titi, I’m going to be late for work. Not hanging up on you,” I promise. Then I do just that.
Only to get hit with another pang of guilt. No matter what kind of new leaf I’ve decided to turn over here, the old Too Nice Naima, who tries her best to like everyone and wants everyone to like her back is still lurking around.
Too Nice Naima would have gone with her aunt to church to dutifully meet Luis. Then, depending on the level of his sad background story, Too Nice Naima would not only date him, but also spend the majority of her outside work time and energy trying to fix him, all the way up until he left her for somebody better.
Believe me, I’m grateful for my aunt after she not only found me my current job and showed up with several cousins to help me move into my new apartment in a nice neighborhood near the college where I do most of my outreach work. But this move, this new job and this upcoming new phase in my life—it’s meant to be a fresh start. It’s a chance to break all my old patterns, and her trying to set me up isn’t part of the plan.
As I make my way down to the bus stop, I decide I need to nip this in the bud. Tell her I’m not just reluctant to date in my current circumstances, but off the idea of love and relationships altogether.
“I’ve had enough hurt and disappointment in my life.,” I could tell her truthfully. “Too much to be prayed away. Sorry.”
Unlike on the New York subway, a man moves out of his seat as soon as I climb on the bus outside my apartment building, which is already stuffed with people headed into downtown Charlotte.
I sigh as soon as I sit down, taking a moment to catch my breath as I often have to these days after any sort of fast movement.
I didn’t have the dream last night.
Again.
That shouldn’t make me anxious, but it does. Obviously, having a recurring dream about the most traumatic experience of your life for nearly a year straight wasn’t fun. But for some reason, its absence feels even more worrying. Mainly because of what had come before that first dreamless night.
A cemetery kiss that hadn’t disgusted or repelled me, but had turned me on, like no other kiss ever had before.
I still don’t fucking get what Rock ever saw in you.
Yeah, me either, Stone, I think, staring out the window at Charlotte’s charming landscapes as the bus ferries me into work.
What is wrong with me that several months and six hundred miles from New York later, I’m still obsessing over that kiss?
Chapter Two
Charlotte’s social work department is understaffed and underfunded, which I don’t like for my clients, but appreciate for myself. My workday passes by just as quickly as every other has since I finished up my training period. It’s filled with urgent paperwork, filings, and a ton of delegation for anything that involves next month when I won’t be here.
Unfortunately, I have a check-in scheduled with one of my most heartbreaking clients tonight. A homeless college student, living in her car, now that she’s been kicked out of the foster care system. I feel tired just thinking about meeting with her.
Not because I don’t want to help her, but because I’m not sure I can.
Nonetheless at exactly 5:45, I step into our meeting/conference room where Cami Marino is already waiting for me. Pacing back and forth in front of the conference table, instead of sitting at it, like most of my clients do.
“Cami, why don’t you sit down,” I say, steeling my heart against the twenty-year old’s huge brown eyes.
She reminds me a little of Amber, because she’s the secret daughter of an Italian father, and also has light brown skin. But other than that, Cami’s nothing like Amber. She’s normal twenty-year-old cute as opposed to arrestingly beautiful. And right now, her eyes are crazed and frightened, as opposed to crackling with determination.
But like Amber, she’s a hard worker who’s overcome enormous obstacles to excel at college. Despite having lost her mother to an overdose and being forced to live out of her car, Cami just made the Chancellor’s list after finishing her junior year at UNC Charlotte. She’s also nearing the same age Amber was when we went from being a social worker and her client to true friends.
I have to remind myself of how well that turned out as I place her case file down on the table. Don’t get too close, the new Not Nice Naima warns me.
“I’m sorry,” she apologizes. “But I can’t sit down. I’ve got to know what’s going on with my sister. Did the other social worker get the proof she needs to get her away from our dad?”
I regard her with a
sympathetic tilt of my head. “Cami, even if the other social worker found something, I couldn’t tell you about it,” I remind her. “That’s not how this works.”
“I just need to know if she’s alright. I need to make sure he’s not doing to her what he did to me,” Cami mumbles into her scuffed tennis shoes. She’s dressed in sweatpants and a thin t-shirt over an ill-fitting bra, and she’s let her hair grow into a wild, super dry fro, in desperate need of a deep conditioning and a long detangling session.
Observing how bad she looks—even for a college student, makes my heart hurt. I’ve read that poor grooming is a classic symptom of sexual abuse. On a subconscious level, victims transform themselves to be less appealing, so as not to suffer the so-called attraction they think they might have invited upon themselves.
Looking at her hunched shoulders, I hate that the system has now pitted me against the girl who came into our office six months ago to report her formerly secret father for sexual abuse, in the hopes of adopting her little sister. Cami feared her sister might be in danger, now that the girl’s mother had died.
Carlos Marino was a prominent member of the community, the executive director of a top accounting firm. And the head of the agency had seemed more concerned with investigating quietly than Cami’s story about having endured a sexual relationship with her father when she was a little girl around Talia’s age.
Now here we were in this meeting room with Cami asking me for answers I wasn’t allowed to give.
“How are you doing at college?” I ask, trying to steer the conversation back to our check-in. “Are you able to keep up with classes, considering everything.”
“I’m fine,” she answers, balling her fist. “All that matters is my sister. Can you just maybe nod if she looks okay.”
“I’ve got a box of supplies for you. Razors, maxi pads, stuff like that,” I say, instead of answering her question. “Right at my desk. It was a little too heavy for me to lift right now, but if you want to come with me—”
STONE: Her Ruthless Enforcer: 50 Loving States, North Carolina Page 2
