by Carl Weber
I was too stunned to reply.
“And, by the way, just in case you still don’t believe me, here’s the woman’s name and address. Maybe you need to pay her a visit. I’m sure for some cash she’ll sell out old Jerome in a New York minute.”
He slipped me a piece of paper with the name Tina Lauderdale printed on it. The address was in a seedy part of town off Jefferson Davis Highway.
“And when you talk to Jerome—because I know you will—tell him Peter said hello.”
Snap! The last puzzle piece fell into place. Now I knew who this guy was. I watched as the man Jerome had described as his stalker left the bar. Considering the source of the information, I was still left with plenty of questions. Based on everything I’d been told about this guy, it was possible he was just making this up to hurt Jerome. But armed with these incriminating photos and Tina Lauderdale’s address, I intended to keep searching until I got the answers I was looking for—no matter whose ass I had to kick in the process.
Isis
46
I was lying in my hospital bed, suffering with horrible cramps, when my mother walked in smiling and singing. She was carrying her digital camera, which I had no doubt she’d used to snap a million pictures of the baby—probably in Egypt’s arms, I thought sadly. Unlike my own foul mood, my mother looked like the happiest woman in the world.
I hadn’t seen her since we’d arrived at the hospital. My father, God bless his soul, had been sitting with me all afternoon. Daddy didn’t say much; he just sat there and watched the game on the TV, but it was a comfort to know he was there. I loved him so much.
“Bobby, you better come on in here if you want to see the baby again. We’re getting ready to go back to Egypt and Rashad’s.”
My father nodded to my mother, then turned to me. “Isis, honey, we’ll be back in the morning. You going to be all right?”
“I’ll be okay.” He leaned in to kiss me, and I wrapped my arms around him, holding tight. “I love you, Daddy.”
“Love you too, princess. You did good today.” He glanced over at my mother, then said, “Don’t let anybody ever tell you any different.”
He walked past my mother, but she didn’t follow him. “You coming?” he asked from the doorway.
“You go ahead. I’ll be right there. I wanna say good-bye to Isis.”
After Daddy was gone, my mother sat in the chair next to me. She handed me an envelope. “Your sister wanted you to have this. I think it’s the rest of your money.”
“Thanks.” I placed the envelope on the table next to my bed. I was now officially thirty thousand dollars richer, but it didn’t feel nearly as good as I’d expected it would.
“How you holding up?” she asked. “Are you bleeding much?” Her eyes were wandering around the room, so I doubted she was really interested in my answer. That was fine with me, because I was too tired for a long conversation anyway.
“No, it’s already slowing down, and the nurse gave me some Tylenol for the cramps. I’ll be all right.”
“I know you will. This whole thing is hard on everyone.”
On everyone? The only person this was hard on was me. I was the one who just went through nine months of pregnancy only to have my sister rip my baby out of my arms right after his birth. If it wasn’t for the fact that Rashad and I were going to have our own secret life and family, I’d probably be a basket case. I changed the subject to stop myself from screaming at her.
“I see you got your camera. You take any pictures of the baby?”
“Yes, I took quite a few.”
“Can I see?” I reached for the camera, but she pulled it back.
“No, baby girl, you can’t see the pictures. You need to leave this alone.”
“Leave what alone? All I want to do is see pictures of my baby. It’s not like I’m running up in here with a lawyer trying to have the surrogacy annulled.”
Her eyebrows shot up, and her mouth flew open. “And you won’t, will you?” I didn’t answer, and she repeated herself even more sternly. “Will you, Isis?”
“No, ma’am,” I finally said to appease her.
“Good. I’ll tell you what. I’ll let you see all the pictures when we get on the plane day after tomorrow.”
“Plane? Day after tomorrow? Where are we going?”
“Your father and I are going to take you to Los Angeles to get you settled.”
Where the fuck did this come from?
“I’m not supposed to go to L.A. for a few weeks. I don’t even have a place.”
“You do now. Rashad just wired the apartment complex a check.”
I didn’t say anything. I knew that if I opened my mouth, I would curse her out, so I just shut up.
She changed the subject when she saw I wasn’t going to share what I was feeling. “I love you, Isis. This is a brave thing you’re doing. It’s like the real mother in the Bible who was willing to give her baby up so that he could live.”
Oh, Lord. She wasn’t really going to start preaching to me now, was she?
“I want you to read your Bible.”
Yep, she was going to preach. I lay back and stared at the ceiling as she began her lecture.
“It’s found at 1 Kings, chapter three, verses sixteen through twenty-eight. It’s the story where the two mothers came before King Solomon claiming the same boy child. The real mother wanted the child to live and not be split in half, whereas the mother whose child had died wanted the live baby split in half.”
“What has that got to do with me?”
“As the biological mom, you want what’s best for Little Rashad. You’ve got to be willing to sacrifice your feelings for your baby’s best interest. You don’t want your baby to be split in half between you and Egypt, do you?”
“Mom, what are you talking about?”
“He’s not going to do it, Isis.”
“Who’s not going to do what? What are you talking about?”
She gave me a look that said, You know exactly what I’m talking about. But I didn’t.
“Rashad.”
“What about him?”
“He told me everything.”
For a second, I felt panic, but then I realized she was probably just on a fishing expedition. I refused to believe he’d said anything to my mother, especially since he hadn’t even told Egypt.
“What exactly did he tell you?” I wasn’t about to admit a damn thing until I was sure what she knew.
“Let’s just say he told me enough that I canceled the lease on your apartment in Petersburg.”
Oh, damn. She did know everything. “You can’t do that. I’m a grown woman.”
“I already have. And the landlord was very interested to know about your mental history.”
“You fucking bitch,” I spit out before I could stop myself.
I felt a stinging pain I hadn’t felt in twenty years, the heavy-handed smack of my mother. She was standing over me, her eyes daring me to fight back, the same way she did when I was a teenager. “Don’t get slapped again,” she warned. “You may be grown, but I’m still your mother.”
Tears dropped from my eyes. At that moment, I think I hated her even more than my sister.
“Now, that man is not going to have another baby with you, so I want you to get that out your head. He’s in love with your sister, and the two of them are going to raise this baby whether you like it or not.”
I was too numb to explain what I felt anyway. Not only was I hurt physically by my mother’s slap, but also emotionally I was devastated. I’d been betrayed again by the one man I never thought would betray me after I’d given him the gift of a son. How the hell was Rashad going to live with himself? Well, I knew one thing: After all the pain I’d gone through to deliver, there was no way I was giving up my baby. I didn’t care what kind of papers they had. They could all kiss my ass.
Loraine
47
“You wanna tell me what I did?” Michael asked as he pulled in front of my house
.
He was trying to hide his irritation, but after riding with him in silence for two hours, his true feelings were finally beginning to show. Hell, I couldn’t blame him if he was pissed off after the way I acted this weekend.
We’d just returned early from what was supposed to be a romantic weekend in the Roanoke Mountains, the key words there being supposed to be. Although the hot tub was hot and the champagne was chilled, I was as cold as ice, and no matter what Michael did to try to warm me up, it just seemed to make matters worse. I went on the trip thinking it would take my mind off the pictures Peter had shown me. My plan was to try to forget about the photos, at least until Jerome came back from vacation and I could get some answers, but it consumed my thoughts to the point that I ignored virtually every romantic gesture Michael made.
He’d finally given up this morning when he asked me flat out, “Do you want me to take you home?”
I nodded my head. Fifteen minutes later, he’d packed our bags and we were on our way home. Neither of us said a word during the entire two-hour trip.
“Who said you did anything wrong?” I asked him as I unbuckled my seat belt.
Michael slammed his fist against the dashboard. “Dammit, Loraine! Why are you playing games? It’s pretty damn obvious I did something. We just left a fifteen-hundred-dollar-a-night chalet in the mountains because you were ready to go home. Somehow, I doubt it was the four-hundred-dollar-a-bottle Cristal or the chocolate-covered Godiva strawberries that brought you to that decision.”
I’d never seen him this upset, and I did owe him some type of explanation. I placed my hand on his leg and turned to face him.
“You didn’t do anything wrong. I just have a lot on my mind. I really didn’t mean to take it out on you, but you’re the one who’s here.”
“Well, tell me what’s going on.”
“I will, I promise, as soon as I figure everything out myself.”
“Tell me what you know. Maybe I can help.” He was so sweet. Here I was giving him only the vaguest of explanations, and instead of kicking my ass out of his car, he seemed genuinely interested in helping me. Still, I wasn’t ready to tell him the whole story.
“I wish you could help, but this is something I have to deal with on my own before I can move on with you. It’s very complicated.” I tried to give a reassuring look. “Do you understand?”
“Oh, I understand completely.” He leaned back in his chair, no longer looking so patient and understanding. “And it’s not very complicated at all. In other words, it’s got something to do with your husband, right?”
“Yes, it’s got everything to do with Leon, but it’s something I have to work out on my own.”
He nodded. “Okay, you do what you gotta do, but don’t let this guy mess us up. I love you, and I’m not going anywhere.” His words made me feel good. The only problem was that I couldn’t make the same promise to him. If it turned out to be true that Jerome had staged the whole thing with LaKeisha, then I didn’t know what I was going to do. Would I apologize to Leon and try to make my marriage work again? Things with Michael had been going so well, and in a lot of ways, he was better for me than Leon, but I couldn’t say for sure that I would choose him over the man I had vowed to God I would love for better or for worse. This whole thing was getting more complicated by the second.
I leaned over and kissed Michael’s cheek, then got out of his car. I waved good-bye as he pulled off. There was a knot in the pit of my stomach, and I wondered if this was the last time I would ever see him.
When Michael’s car disappeared down the block, I closed the front door and went straight upstairs to my bedroom. I found the manila envelope Peter had given me and the pictures of Jerome and LaKeisha—or Tina Lauderdale, if that’s what her real name was—spread out all over my bed, just as I had left them. I sat on the bed and flipped through each picture as I contemplated the whole bizarre situation. I still didn’t know what the truth was.
Even with the photographic evidence in front of me, I was finding it hard to believe that Jerome could have done this to me. I wished I could call him—hell, I’d have settled for an e-mail—but he’d promised Big Poppa no communication during their romantic trip. Wasn’t that convenient? This guy Peter just happened to give me this evidence right after Jerome left on a weeklong trip where I wouldn’t be able to contact him. The more I thought about it, the more it seemed that Peter was setting Jerome up—and I wouldn’t be surprised if Leon had something to do with it too. He’d never liked Jerome, probably because Jerome was the only one who ever stood up to him. Just the thought of those two evil bastards getting together to set me and my friend up made my blood boil.
I fell asleep with those pictures in my arms, and my dreams were filled with images of my best friend doing me wrong. When I woke up, I still had no idea what to believe. Either Jerome had set me up, or Peter, and possibly Leon, had Photoshopped the pictures to come between me and Jerome. I decided to drive over to Tina Lauderdale’s house to see if I could learn the truth there.
“You have arrived at your destination,” my GPS chimed as I pulled in front of apartment 234A of the Hillside Court Housing Projects. I knew I was in the right place, because the car in front of me was the same car that LaKeisha, aka Tina, had been driving the day she showed up at my house.
I was nervous about confronting this woman. These projects were definitely not my neck of the woods, and I had no way of knowing who else might be in the apartment with her. What if she really was Leon’s mistress and she jumped me when I knocked on her door? I sat in my car and let my imagination get the best of me for quite a while before I finally gathered the nerve to go talk to her. It was the only way I was going to get the answers I needed. “Just get it over with,” I told myself as I got out of the car.
“Who is it?” someone called out after I rang the bell. I was pretty sure it was the same voice I’d heard from the woman who introduced herself as LaKeisha. I took a chance and called her by the name Peter had given me.
“Tina, open the door.” I rang the bell again.
“What? Who is it?” she asked angrily. The door opened up, and there was LaKeisha. My heart started racing now that she was standing in front of me. I willed myself to stay calm; I refused to show any weakness in front of this woman. Whether she had set me up or she was sleeping with my husband, this bitch was my enemy as far as I was concerned.
“Remember me, Tina? Or are you still going by LaKeisha?” I couldn’t help but smile wickedly when I realized that she was the one with fear written all over her face.
“Oh, shit!” She tried to slam the door in my face, but I put my foot out to stop it. I had purposely worn jeans and sneakers just in case things got out of hand.
“Get your foot out my fucking door.” She tried to push the door closed. Obviously she knew nothing about leverage.
“You keep cursing at me like that and I’m not paying you a dime for the information I need.”
This got her attention.
“You gonna pay me?”
“Yeah, if you give me the information I’m looking for.”
“How much?”
“Five hundred. Now, can I come in?”
Tina—or LaKeisha or whatever she was called—stuck her head out the door and took a look around, as if she was afraid I’d brought the police with me. Satisfied when she didn’t see any, she beckoned me into the house.
She offered me a seat in her sparsely furnished living room.
I remained standing and got straight to the point. “Did you set me up?”
She stared at me silently for a moment. “The money first,” she said, gazing down at my purse.
I don’t know why I was surprised. Considering the dump she was living in, this woman clearly wasn’t bringing home a steady paycheck. Taking money up front for services rendered was probably second nature to her. You should have seen her eyes light up when I handed her the money. She stuffed it in her bra—as if I wouldn’t go down there and get it
if I thought she was lying. Truth is, I didn’t want to give her shit other than my foot in her ass, which, I thought, I might end up doing just for GP when I was finished questioning her.
A cat came up and rubbed itself against my leg, and a queasy feeling started to ease into my stomach. “How long have you had the cat?”
“Him? ‘Bout three years. His momma’s around here somewhere. I had her for about seven.” The queasiness got worse.
“Do you even know my husband? Because my husband’s allergic to cats. He couldn’t spend five minutes in this house.”
She lit a cigarette and took a long drag before answering. “The truth is, I never met the man.”
The queasiness now felt like a punch in the stomach. “What the hell do you mean, ‘never met the man’? Why did you tell me you were sleeping with him? Why would you do this to me?”
“Same reason I’m talking to you now. For the money.” She shrugged casually, like wrecking someone’s life was all part of a day’s work. I wanted to reach across the room and slap her ass.
“You ruined my marriage for money?” I stood up, fists clenched. “Do you even know what kind of a person that makes you? Do you care about anybody but yourself?”
“Shoot, for two thousand dollars, I would have ruined my momma’s marriage—if she had ever been married.” She got a little attitude herself, but she didn’t stand up. Lucky for her, because the way I was feeling, I might have knocked her out. “Anyway, don’t be judging me. Look at this place. I’ve seen your house and your car. Your ass is rich. Just go get you another man.” She took another long drag of her cigarette. “You wanna trade lives with me? ‘Cause we can do that shit anytime you want. “
I needed to leave there soon before I killed that woman. “I got just one more question.”
She shrugged again. “Might as well get your money’s worth.”
I pulled out the pictures of her and Jerome. “Do you know the man in this picture?”
