“I couldn’t sleep. Thought I’d catch you before you headed out on the jogging trail.”
“Good move.”
“You’re up?”
“I’m up.” Brent opened his front door and basked in the cool morning air as he walked across his porch and sat down on the top step. “I had a dream,” he added.
There was hesitation on Makayla’s end. “Another bad one?”
“More than one. One day I’m going to have a good dream. A dream where you’re out jogging right alongside me.”
“Keep dreaming, hot shot,” Makayla said, and Brent laughed. “If you want a jogging girl you’d better dump me now because I am not the one. I’ve got too much breast and too much ass to be jogging along anybody’s trail.”
Brent was enjoying this. “Oh, but you don’t understand. Guys would pay admission just to see you jog.”
“It would be a sight to see alright. And not in a good way.”
“That’s what you think,” Brent said as he drank some of his concoction. “I’ll pay money to see it.”
“That’s because you love me. Your view is biased.”
Brent laughed again and looked out across his property. He owned ten acres of what looked like pure wilderness surrounded by a beautiful lake. It was secluded. It was peaceful. It was time for her to share it with him. She was moving to Jericho in two weeks anyway. “Still excited about the move?” he asked her.
“Excited and then some. It’s been a long time coming.”
“It’s overdue, that’s for sure,” Brent agreed. Then he decided to tell her. “Listen,” he said, “I’m coming to see you tomorrow night.”
“Tomorrow night? You’re coming Wednesday night? I thought you wouldn’t be able to make it until moving week.”
“That was the plan, true enough.” Then Brent hesitated. It was a major-ass decision for him. His biggest yet. “But we need to talk,” he said.
He could sense varying emotions on Makayla’s end, and any other woman would have asked a lot of questions. But not Mal. She was never anxious about anything, because she always wanted to give him a chance to change his mind. He loved that about her. “Okay,” she said. “I’ll see you tomorrow night then. And happy jogging trails!”
Brent laughed. “I’m going to have your gorgeous ass on a track sooner than you think.”
“I promise you that won’t be happening. I’m perfectly contented with my workout routine. I have no interest in becoming an enthusiast.”
Brent nodded. He loved the fact that she was her own woman too. “Good,” he said. “I don’t want an enthusiast. I want you.”
“Ah. You sure know how to warm a girl’s heart. A girl’s bed too, but that’s another story.”
Brent laughed. They said their goodbyes, and he ended the call. But just as he drank the remainder of his concoction, his cell phone rang again. He looked at the Caller ID. It was the station. They probably wanted to know if they should try to capture the wild boar that was destroying Matt Day’s harvest, like the call he received early yesterday morning, or just kill the darn thing. He wanted to kill himself with the darn thing for answering his cell phone that early in the morning. This morning, however, he left his ringing phone on his porch, along with his empty blender cup, and took off. He was going running. They would have to figure it out on their own. He refused to be stretched thin this early in the morning.
“Wrong choice,” the sales clerk said as Makayla Ross stood in front of the full-length mirror and checked out the biscotti-colored, strapless satin dress she was trying on for size.
They were in the dressing room at Zac Frome’s, a high-end clothing boutique in downtown Augusta, Maine, and the sales clerk was flustered. She had picked out six different dresses that she thought were “perfect” for Makayla, but Makayla had rejected them all. The strapless satin, the dress the clerk loathe, was the one Makayla had chosen herself. “What’s wrong with this one?” she asked the clerk.
“Where do I begin?” The clerk assessed Makayla’s body through the dressing room mirror with a look most disapproving. “I don’t like the color on you, for starters. Brown dress, brown skin? It all blends in together and does nothing for you. And as for the fit?” She shook her head. “No. No. And no. It reveals too much cleavage on top, and on bottom? Oh my. This dress makes your ass look really big.”
Makayla smiled. “My guy likes my big ass.”
The store clerk was not amused. “I seriously doubt that,” she said.
Makayla looked at the older woman as if she had lost her mind. Why was she being so serious about something that wasn’t serious in the least? “Excuse me?”
“I’m sorry to be blunt, but I know the men of Maine. I have lived here all my life. And I have never known a Maine man to like anything big on any woman. They like their women small and dainty like me. Petite. Fat girls have never been their thing.”
In any other state in the Union, Makayla would not be considered fat by any stretch of the imagination. She was a woman with curves alright, there was nothing skinny about her. From her big breasts and flat stomach that nicely transitioned into perfectly proportioned hips, to what Brent called her tight, juicy ass, she had the kind of sexy body most men would have loved to try on for size. But in some parts of Maine, where flat-butt, flat-chested, rail-thin females were the norm, Makayla was looked upon, especially by those very females, as if she were an amazon. But their depiction never bothered Makayla. She had grown comfortable in her own skin long before their narrowly-constructed definitions of beauty attempted to define her.
“This one will do nicely,” she told the clerk. “I wish to purchase this one.” Then she put back on her own clothing, paid the pinch-face clerk, and left the boutique smiling and satisfied with the dress of her choosing.
She pulled out of the parking lot in her aging Acura TSX and headed back to the state Capitol building where she worked, in the Attorney General’s office, as a supervising attorney. She was on her lunch break, and was already late getting back, but she wanted something special to wear. Brent Sinatra was her longtime beau and that call earlier this morning had excited her. He was coming to Augusta tomorrow night, Wednesday night, because they needed to talk. With any other boyfriend, and in any other relationship, she would have been concerned. But Brent was not the kind of man who would let you down easy. If he had wanted to dump her, he would have done so early on. Not four years in.
But the timing was odd, she thought as she drove. She had just submitted her resignation a day ago and was set to move to Jericho, Maine in two weeks. Because Augusta, Maine was a four-hour drive away and they both had super-busy schedules packed solid, she had assumed that they wouldn’t see each other until the move. But he phoned and said he was coming tomorrow night. And that they needed to talk. She couldn’t be certain, but she had a wonderful feeling that he was coming, not to break up with her, but to ask her to marry him.
It had been a long time coming. Four years ago they stood on Brent’s front porch in Jericho and decided to give their brand new, long distance relationship a real shot. And for the first three-and-a-half years of that relationship, it was truly long distance. Makayla lived and worked in the nation’s capital, in Washington, D.C., and Brent continued to live and work in Jericho. They were able to see each other very infrequently, usually once or twice per month, as Makayla moved up the ladder in the Justice Department and Brent continued to head a very active and overworked police force.
But three-and-a-half years of eight-hour drives or uncomfortable plane rides just to see each other for very brief periods of time, began to take a toll on their relationship. They even stopped seeing each other for a short time, as their jobs and the grind of travel became too much. But after Brent’s Aunt Sprig died six months ago and Makayla attended the funeral, they realized being separated was not going to work. At that same time, a position became available where Makayla could return to her old job in the state of Maine’s Attorney General’s office, and they jumpe
d at the chance. They were still long distance, as Augusta wasn’t exactly around the corner from Jericho, but their travel time had been cut in half.
Then, a week ago, a job even closer became available: Deputy District Attorney for Jericho County. Makayla applied for the position without hesitation and was told on yesterday that she had been selected. She resigned. To Brent’s great delight, not to mention her own, she would soon be heading to what very well might become her permanent home. That was why, when Brent phoned with his we need to talk request, she was far more excited than worried.
She remained excited as she parked her car, hurried into the capital building, and made her way onto the elevator. She felt on top of the world. She felt as if everything was finally going her way and it was a thrilling way to feel. She knew her decision to relocate didn’t come without risks. A job as Deputy D.A. in a small county would be a definite step down and a drastic pay cut from her position in the State AG’s office. She understood that. But it was worth it to her. Being with Brent was worth it.
As she finger-swept a strand of hair off of her forehead and moved over as a group of fellow employees crowded onto the elevator, she could not suppress her smile. Word had already spread throughout the state capital, and calls of congratulations were coming in from co-workers and friends from Maine to D.C., and even the new arrivals onto the elevator were offering their congrats too. They knew she was leaving, not for career advancement but to be closer to her man, and they were happy for her. One girl even gave her a hug and said she wished it was her. Makayla used to be that girl. It used to always be somebody else who declared victory in the lotteries of life. Now it was Makayla’s time. And if her suspicion was right about Brent’s reason to want to see her tomorrow night, then it was more than her time. It was high time. She wouldn’t give this up for the world.
But when she stepped off of the elevator and entered her small corner office on the sixteenth floor, all of her triumph dissipated. Neal Grassley was sitting behind her desk as if he was still her boss, and was rummaging through her desk drawers as if he was still her lover and knew her like that. When he looked up and saw her, and his eyes immediately trailed down the length of a body he used to know so well, he wasn’t ashamed that he had just been caught red-handed. He wasn’t ashamed at all. He was smiling. Makayla was not.
CHAPTER TWO
“Well, well,” Neal said and stood up from behind the desk. “The spoiled little princess decides to come to work.”
But Makayla wasn’t giving an inch. “I’ve been working all day,” she said.
“Not in this building,” he shot back. “I’ve been waiting for you.” But then he smiled, as if it didn’t matter anyway.
But his smile, it seemed to Makayla, was more about covering up his anger and disappointment, rather than displaying any warmth. Not that she was interested in any well wishes or warmth from him. She wasn’t.
“Don’t you look beautiful today,” he said.
Makayla wasn’t interested in his compliments either. “What are you doing in my office?”
“When I heard the news, I knew it wasn’t possible. I knew a smart, sensible lady like you could not possibly do something this outrageous. Then I thought, wait a minute. What am I talking about? This is Makayla, after all. This is the same smart, sensible sister who gave up the job of a lifetime to return to sorry-ass Maine.”
Makayla began to walk toward her desk. She wasn’t trying to hear him bash her decision. She knew he was angry about it. He expressed that anger six months ago when she first left D.C. Why was he expressing it again?
“It was all settled,” Neal kept talking as he stared at her. “You were working in D.C., doing a great job. You were on your way. But oh no. That was too much like perfection for you. You had to let some man twist you into knots and make you come back here to Maine. And now you’re here. Going nowhere fast. A shooting star that can’t get off the ground. So why should I be surprised by this new move? You went backwards when you came back here. Now you decide to go completely downhill and move to Jericho. But I shouldn’t be surprised. This is typical Makayla. Stupid stuff is typical of the little girl who never ever gets it right.”
Makayla didn’t respond to his nastiness. People had been putting her down for years, and had been questioning her choices even longer than that, but she learned long ago to ignore it. She slept very well at night. She, instead, walked around her desk, sat her briefcase on top of it, and asked him to move.
“Move?” He looked at her as if he couldn’t believe this was the same kid he used to know and control. “Do you realize who you’re talking to?”
“I know exactly who I’m talking to,” Makayla responded with equal force. “Move.”
But Neal didn’t move. He stood there. He was within an inch of her beautiful face again, and that freshly scented curvaceous body again, and those big, juicy breasts he used to suck into submission, and he now knew why he decided to come. He wasn’t ready to lose her too. He was about to lose a lot in life, as the Feds were closing in on him, and he wanted his old life back. Makayla stayed in D.C. for three-and-a-half years and worked with him at the Justice Department in her usual professional way, and she didn’t get tainted by the allure of power and money as he had. That fact alone made him love her even more.
And when she left D.C. and came back to work in Maine, he was disappointed as hell, but he used to be the Attorney General in this state, and in this very building. He still would be able to see her whenever he wanted to. But now that she was moving to Jericho, to be with her police chief boyfriend for good, he was angry. It felt like a betrayal. It was irrational and he knew it, since they had not been an item in nearly five years, but it felt as if she was leaving him all over again.
And the thought of it, the thought that he could very well be on the losing end of Makayla’s presence forever, caused that anger that cloaked him to soften. Makayla Ross was not the kind of woman who would allow him to manhandle her. He had to slow down. Be smarter. Work harder. He moved from behind her desk, and gave her back her personal space.
Makayla sat behind her desk and closed the drawers Neal had opened. If he was looking for any personal info on her when he rummaged through them, he was disappointed. She made it her business to keep only business-related info at her office.
When she closed the last drawer and looked up at him, he was standing in front of her desk staring at her. And it was a lustful stare, which angered her. It was over between them. Completely dead. He had since married and had two little girls of his own, and she belonged to Brent. What was his problem?
“Tell me it’s not true, Mal,” he said in a voice that bordered on desperation, as if he still could not believe he let her get away. “Tell me you are not going to accept a job in small-ass Jericho. Tell me you are not going to do something that ass-backwards.”
Makayla saw the bitterness in his eyes, and could sense his desperation, but he had lost his hold on her long ago. What was he thinking? She was twenty-two years old when she first met him. He wanted to be her mentor, he said to her. And as the first black Attorney General for the state of Maine, he impressed her as a brother who was going places and wanted talented young lawyers to take with him. He recruited her hard out of law school and eventually hired her to work in the same Maine Attorney General’s office she was leaving in two weeks. To her own amazement, she did exactly what she swore she’d never do, and fell for the guy. She fell in love with her boss.
But he cheated on her. He cheated on her repeatedly. She allowed it to go on as long as she did because she actually thought she couldn’t live without the rascal. That was how far gone she had allowed herself to become. But she wasn’t that girl anymore. She dumped his cheating ass and got out of the allowance game.
“Tell me it’s not true, Mal,” he said again.
“I can’t tell you it’s not true,” Makayla responded. “Because it is true.”
“But why would you do something this unwise?” Anguis
h was on his face. “You had it made. Even here in Augusta you stand a better chance at advancement than you do anywhere else in this state. But you can’t do it right to save your life, can you? You just had to fall in love with some Jethro from Jericho and couldn’t bear to be away from him. That’s why you came right back to the plantation.”
Makayla gave him a hard look.
But he didn’t skip a beat. “And then, to compound the problem, you decide to move to Jericho so some rich white police chief can take care of you and be the boss of you when you could have bossed yourself. This is the absolute worse move you could ever make, Mal.”
“First of all,” Makayla said with that don’t get it twisted look on her face, “Brent is not going to take care of me. I’ll be taking care of myself. And secondly, the worse move I ever made wasn’t falling in love with Brent Sinatra. The worse move I ever made was falling in love with you.”
Neal’s jaw tightened.
“Moving to Jericho is the best move for me.”
Neal was offended, but Makayla saw more than that. He looked depressed too, as if her decision somehow had something to do with him when it had nothing to do with him. “I’m only trying to look out for your best interest, Mal,” he said in voice that sounded defeated.
But Makayla knew Neal Grassley from way back. She was not moved by his pretense at altruism. “I’m looking out for my own best interest,” she said. “I’m moving to Jericho.”
That word got him going again. “To Jericho,” he said, and shook his head. “You, one of the most promising young attorneys I know, decides to take a nothing job in a nothing county in a nothing state. And you won’t be the D.A. in that nothing town. Oh no. It’s not even that grand, if I can use that word to describe anything related to Jericho. You’re going to be the deputy D.A. Oh, please. Your ass is going backwards and you know it!”
Neal spoke of her decision as if she had agreed to a prison term. But Makayla wasn’t ashamed. For once in her life, her career wasn’t the highlight of her life. Her relationship with Brent was. It was now front and center and she couldn’t wait to indulge it. “Call it whatever you like,” she said. “I’m going to Jericho.”
Brent Sinatra: All of Me Page 2
