Miss Independent, Volumes 1 - 4

by Kiki Leach

  He didn’t pick up on them, but she was so done with everything in that moment that she wouldn’t have cared too much if he had.

  “In here, Joe!” the other cop yelled out from the kitchen.

  As soon as Vanessa and Officer Joe ran inside, they found the other cop struggling to break the two men apart. Both had blood spewing out from every part of their faces now and Nathan’s hand, the same one Vanessa had bandaged, was shaking on its own as if he had suddenly developed some kind of nervous tick. Maurice turned and spit more blood into the sink, as well as his second crown, and cricked his neck as if he was ready for another round.

  The first officer grabbed onto Nathan, spinning him away from Maurice, and shoved him down to the counter. He wrestled his arms behind his back while Officer Joe latched onto Maurice and did the same.

  “What the hell is the problem here?” Officer Joe asked, jerking Maurice around and forcing him to stand straight.

  “They’re idiots, that’s the problem,” Vanessa replied. “Like I told you out there, they started going at it upstairs, it spilled over down here and I couldn’t stop it.”

  The other officer yanked Nathan up by his cuffed wrists. “What do you want us to do with them?”

  “I don’t care where they go as long as they get the hell out of my house.”

  “I’m not leaving,” Maurice declared. “My stuff may be gone from that room up there, V, but this is still my house.”

  “One you just damn near destroyed,” she said.

  Nathan flinched, taken aback by Maurice’s news, and locked his eyes on Vanessa. “Your boy moved out?” He leaned his head back and started laughing. “Then you two aren’t together anymore?”

  “No, asshole, we’re not,” Vanessa replied. “All thanks to your continued bullshit.”

  “No, V,” he shot back with a slight smirk gracing his lips. “Thanks to yours.”

  “You son of a bitch,” she murmured. “What happened back then had nothing to do with you! Just like I told you before, it was in the past and should’ve stayed there. You had no place bringing it into the present--”

  “Come on, V,” he droned on. “It was only a matter of time before that truth came out, with or without me bringing Adrian out in the open.” He lowered his head. “It’s just too bad that it led to all of this,” he responded in a scornful tone.

  “You don’t believe that. You’re eating this shit up with a silver spoon and wanting to go in for seconds.”

  “Like you upstairs with him?”

  Maurice tried leaping forward, but Officer Joe held him back from it.

  Nathan turned his focus to him and leaned his head. “If you’re that insecure letting another man from her past get in the middle of your current relationship, or lack thereof now--”

  Vanessa attempted to interject. “Stop it, Nathan--”

  “Then Vanessa probably isn’t the one you should be with. ‘Cause I’m sure as hell not going anywhere this time. And Adrian doesn’t seem like he’s going anywhere anytime soon either. Adding a third to the mix seems to be more than she can handle anyway.”

  Maurice peered and spat out more blood filling up his mouth. And then he smiled, or at least tried to move his face in that direction as much as he could, as red stains covered his teeth. “Adrian had nothing to do with why we’re no longer together.”

  Vanessa glanced up at Maurice and enlarged her eyes. “Mo!”

  “He’s going to learn it sometime soon enough, right?” Maurice responded.

  Nathan chuckled. “Learn what, pretty boy?”

  “That you weren’t the reason Vanessa and I split up. But I’m the reason she dropped you back then.” He bent forward and continued in a low voice. “I’m the reason you’ll never have a chance with her again.”

  Nathan’s entire face filled with unrecognizable rage. His temples flared and his lips tightened. “The fuck is he talkin’ about, V?”

  “Mo, don’t.”

  “After finding you in the shower with Sheila,” Maurice continued, “V came to me in tears. I couldn’t stand to see her in so much pain and thought you needed to have a taste of your own for once. And I knew after all the talks we had over the years about her and your relationship, even as badly as you treated her, that finally losing her for good would do the trick. Going to Page Six was the only way to make that happen.”

  Nathan gulped as a small lump formed between his eyebrows and remembered back when he first saw the pictures of him, Vanessa and Sheila splashed across the front cover of the paper in what was referred to back then as a Triangle DeJour.

  His jaw tightened and he grumbled. “That was you?”

  Despite his pain, Maurice stretched his face into an even wider smile and nodded. “Yeah. That was me.”

  Incensed, Nathan kicked up his feet in an attempt to slug Maurice in the stomach. “Son of a BITCH!” he bellowed. Maurice dodged backward into Officer Joe as red spittle flew out from either side of Nathan’s mouth.

  “THAT’S IT!” Maurice hollered out. “Now we’re making progress here!” He tried scrambling out of Officer Joe’s clutches as Nathan tried doing the same.

  Mortified at what continued to unfold before her eyes and feeling helpless at how to solve the problem without more assistance, Vanessa leaned back on her foot and folded her arms over her chest. “You know what,” she said, “on second thought, maybe sitting in jail for a night would actually be good for the soul.” Her eyes diverted to Maurice. “Both of them.”

  Maurice immediately snapped his head in her direction and stood still. “What?”

  “I’m sorry,” she told him. “But you both started this shit with the constant dick wagging ever since he came back, and won’t stop going at each other like idiots until someone else ends it, so that’s what I’m doing.”

  “You’re ending it by having me locked up with this asshole for a night?”

  “What the hell else am I supposed to do, Mo?” She dropped her hands to her sides, feeling both vulnerable and defeated. “Let you two leave here and roam the streets just so that you can kill each other in a dark alley someplace? I may want to smash Nathan’s face into the ground every now and then myself, but I cared about him for a long time, and you…” She stopped and lowered her head, unable to finish. “You need to cool the hell off. You both do, and there’s no way in hell I’m letting either one of you do it here after damn near turning my house into an underground boxing pit! So jail it is.” Vanessa looked over at Officer Joe and gave him a quick nod.

  He nodded to his partner who did the same with acknowledgement.

  “Let’s go,” he snarled, dragging Nathan from the kitchen.

  Officer Joe dragged Maurice, who shook his head in disbelief. “This is bullshit, V. Complete bullshit, and you know it.”

  “What’s bullshit is everything you both have done to each other tonight, and to me.”

  He glanced back at her, but couldn’t bring himself to stare into the eyes of the woman he loved with his entire heart for too long without feeling an insurmountable volume of hatred building up inside his chest, hatred that would no doubt encase his judgement and lead to more bad decisions just like this if it remained inside his heart for too long.

  As they exited her house, Vanessa followed outside and watched as the officers walked both men to either side of the car.

  Maurice kept his eyes focused on the ground as he was shoved inside the back, but Nathan turned back to her and gave a quick wink with the one eye that wasn’t swollen just as his head was pushed beneath the roof.

  Vanessa may not have known much anymore where Nathan was concerned, but was convinced with just that simple gesture that there would be more trouble and maybe even a little extra hell to pay for all of them once he was free.

  Part Fifteen

  Later that night, Vanessa found herself sitting at the kitchen table, staring at her now empty wine glass. Reclining in the chair and running her fingers through her hair, she looked all around at the glass a
nd blood still covering her floor and started to wonder if forcing Nathan and Maurice to mutually sit inside a place in which having access to weapons at the base of their fingertips was actually the smartest thing to do.

  Not to mention, after having some time to really think about the surreal moment of them being shoved into the back of the police car like legitimate criminals, she was convinced that more than Nathan’s payback, someone within the walls of the NYPD would leak their information and arrests to someone else on the outside, which would in turn lead to all three of them being splashed across every paper in New York City by the morning. She could just see it all right before her very eyes, her picture shoved between those of Nathan and Maurice, and beneath the headline Torn Between Two Lovers.

  Only she wasn’t – not by any stretch of the imagination had she been torn between the two men.

  She admittedly didn’t care so much about Nathan anymore, at least not in the way he still wanted, nor did she give a damn that he could possibly be publicly humiliated again. In fact, she thought it would serve him right for the shit he had pulled since returning to the city.

  But the last thing she wanted was for any negative press to come Maurice’s way, especially press that could affect his job and livelihood. She was still pissed and in her mind rightfully so at what he had done, but it didn’t mean she cared any less about his well-being. In fact, she started to wonder if she cared a little more than she should.

  For a few seconds she closed her eyes and shook her head, fearful that if word managed to spread around the city, what her mother would say about all of it when she found out for herself, much like she always managed to find out everything else Vanessa wished she hadn’t.

  Well, almost everything.

  She prepared herself for the worst in a few hours and felt that guarding herself by being semi-intoxicated when she waltzed into her office, thus able to remain numb, might be a good start. She latched onto the neck of her wine bottle and popped the cork, tossing it in the trash across the room and poured until the red liquid hit the rim. Just as it was about to spill over, she pulled the bottle back and sat it back down on the table.

  After guzzling down a few glasses and on the verge of becoming lightheaded thanks to the lack of food in her system, she suddenly remembered and groaned about the photoshoot she had yet to compile notes for, as well as her deadlines for articles she had yet to complete.

  She guzzled back more wine in the hopes of further dulling her overactive brain, convinced that if life could have gotten any ‘sweeter’ for her in that moment, she would’ve been holding that wine glass while teetering over the edge of a cliff.

  Just as she was about to take another sip, her doorbell rang, startling her.

  “Shit.”

  She wiped the spilled wine from her mouth and looked down at herself when she realized some had landed in small droplets on Maurice’s shirt. Rubbing the stain into the fabric with the edge of her fingers instead of attempting to rub it out with club soda, she thought back on the last time she had seen him actually wearing it, on their first official date out alone together, and smiled. He looked so good that night that she could hardly speak when he first appeared in front of her. The only man truly able to take her breath away, he had a fresh haircut, but was allowing the hair on his face to grow out, which left a light five o’clock shadow that was noticeable in both the sun and moonlight. She was so happy to be with him that night, not caring what the hell lay ahead as long as they were together. She wanted to feel that way again, but deep down no longer knew if it would ever possible, with him or anyone else for that matter. And that made her more angry than sad.

  When the doorbell rang again, followed up by a thunderous round of knocking, she snapped out of her daze and sat the glass down on the table. She continued wiping down the tiny stains as she pushed through the kitchen door and stumbled into the foyer.

  “Who the hell could it possibly be now?” she asked.

  “It’s Sheila, V. I’m sorry it’s so late and I wouldn’t bother you unless it was something that I really thought you needed to hear – from me, especially from me before anyone else.”

  Vanessa threw her arms up and allowed them to drop down; her hands made a hard slapping sound against her legs that seemed to vibrate throughout the entire room. “What the fuck is this night? Damn it.” She tilted her head back and wrinkled her nose. “Be real with me.” She pointed between herself and the ceiling. “Was I so shitty in a past life that these people are now my punishment in this one?! Because otherwise, I don’t understand what I did to deserve this kind of treatment, I really don’t!”

  By now, it was nearing 2am and she had yet to even close her eyes to blink. Heading over to the door and stepping over blood and splinters of wood, she sighed, aggravated that her night didn’t look to be getting any better as time passed.

  The knocking picked up again.

  “Sheila, what the hell do you want?”

  “I need to talk to you, Vanessa. It’s important.”

  “I’ve heard that enough times tonight to know it won’t end well,” she grumbled. “Is what you have to tell me so gotdamn important that it can’t wait a few hours from now?”

  “It can’t!” She stepped closer to the door and rested her forehead against the wood. “I’m sorry, but I need to let you know about this now before I lose my nerve and you hate me more than you already do.”

  Vanessa wasn’t exactly sure if that notion was truly possible.

  She debated with herself on whether or not opening the door was the right thing to do and reluctantly reached for the knob when she realized that absolutely nothing she could say or do was going to get this woman to get the hell off of her doorstep any faster.

  When she opened the door, she leaned aside and noticed that Sheila had been crying. Her eyes were somewhat swollen and the skin just beneath them was puffy. Her hands were shaky and her hair looked as if she had been rolling around in a haystack for a good few hours.

  Vanessa eyed her from head to toe and made a sour face. “What the hell happened to you tonight? Why do you look like you’ve just been mugged on your way over here?”

  “I wasn’t.” Sheila wiped her face and stepped forward. “I just had a night that I’m sure I won’t ever be able to relive again. Even as much as I might want to. Can I come in?”

  Vanessa eyed her again, then nodded her head. “Sure.” She moved aside and waved her hand between them. “Whatever.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Mm-hm.”

  As Sheila stepped inside, her mouth dropped open at the mess around her feet. Her head whipped from one side of the room to the other as she saw the blood stains covering various parts of the floor and noticed that the railing attached to Vanessa’s stairs was now split straight down the middle.

  She spun around to her and cried out, “What the hell happened in here?”

  Vanessa looked over the mess again and lifted her shoulders. “A fight broke out between…” She paused to think. The last thing she needed was to try and explain Nathan away, so she only gave partial truths. “It doesn’t matter who was involved, it’s over now and I’m really not in the mood for discussing it any further than that. So, what do you want?”

  Sheila stared at Vanessa for a long time before moving throughout the foyer like a scared child who was about to get beaten by her mother for cheating on a chemistry test.

  She whirled on the tips of her toes when she noticed that Vanessa hadn’t moved from place and gestured toward the kitchen. “You mind if I have a drink first?”

  “That depends. Did you drive over here?” she asked. “Because if you even have a sip of something and wreck your car once you leave here, I’ll be damned if I see my face on the cover of anything and labeled your enabler.”

  “I didn’t drive over here, V,” Sheila snapped. “I took a cab from where I was before, and then walked around the city so that I could have some time alone to think.”

  “Alright, fine
. I’ve got an open bottle in the kitchen already. As you can guess by the mess and the fact that I’m still awake enough to even answer the door, it’s been one helluva long night. Come on.”

  She trailed back into the kitchen and went over to the cabinet to grab another glass.

  Sheila immediately came up behind and saw even more wreckage all over the floor and countertops, but decided to remain silent about it this time.

  As she moved over to the table, she saw the wine sitting in the middle and checked out the year it was made, turning her nose up at the recent date. “You don’t have anything else a little older?” She removed her sweater and sat down her purse while taking a seat. “I think we both might need something stronger once I tell you the reason I came over here.”

  Vanessa arched her brow as she turned back to her and quickly studied the look on her face. It read as one of guilt, which meant that Sheila was there to seek forgiveness for something else she had done.

  “Shit.” She immediately clinched her jaw and slammed the cabinet door shut. “No, I don’t have anything else older,” she replied in a tone so sharp it could’ve cut right through glass. “This is it.”

  Sheila suddenly felt a chill in the room and reached for her sweater again, draping it around her arms and rubbing her hands together to warm them. She knew what that look meant from Vanessa; she knew what her tone and actions meant and that it more than likely wouldn’t end so well for her, because it never had in the past.

  She started to chew on the inside of her lip and nervously tapped her foot against the floor.

  Maybe coming over wasn’t such a good idea after all.

  Vanessa slammed the glass down in front of Sheila, forcing her to jump up from her chair, and narrowed her eyes while reaching for the bottle. Once the wine had filled her glass, Sheila tossed her hand forward to grab for it, but was startled when Vanessa snatched it back. Drops of wine spilled out on the table, but Vanessa was so focused on her nemesis that she couldn’t give even half of a damn about the stains it could leave behind on the wood.