Trouble

by Ann Christopher

  Brian leaned against the other side of Justus’s pillar and tugged at his bow tie. “Your dad sure can spend some money,” he said, raising his voice over the string quartet ten feet away in an alcove.

  Justus’s jaw tightened. “You have no idea.”

  Little did Brian know that his father had engineered this whole blowout to demonstrate to Cincinnati’s elite—black, white, and otherwise; judges, politicians, and local TV personalities—that he’d arrived and planned to stay for a good long while. The old man should have just handed out copies of his bank statement and been done with it. Then he could have donated the $75K he reportedly spent on the reception to the Boys & Girls Club or something else worthwhile.

  Justus scanned the crowd and saw his beaming brother and his new wife accepting congratulations from an elderly man at a table across the room. V.J. looked happier than he’d ever seen him, and Justus was glad for that. But their father’s corresponding smugness still pissed him off.

  “Anything for V.J.,” Justus muttered, glaring around at the ridiculous display of conspicuous consumption in every direction. “Nothing’s too good for the crown prince.”

  Brian rolled his eyes. “Don’t start. Where’s your girl?”

  “Carla went to the bathroom. No telling when she’ll be back.” Justus focused for the first time on Brian’s blond hair, which stuck up all over his head like a rooster’s comb. “What the hell’s wrong with your hair?”

  Brian grinned and swiped his hand through it. “It’s the style. Carla liked it.”

  “Carla ain’t got no sense.”

  Truer words were never spoken. Carla had her uses—Justus patted his back pocket to make sure he’d remembered his jimmies—but they were pretty much limited to looking good and being eager and available. The bottom line was that Carla was just that—a girl. The person he wanted to find? Now, she was a W-O-M-A-N. He discreetly scanned the room again.

  Brian’s eyes narrowed. “Who do you keep looking...” He trailed off suddenly, his entire body snapping to attention.

  Justus rolled his eyes, knowing that only one person in the room commanded this reaction.

  He turned in time to see his father walk up and extend his hand to Brian.

  “Hello, Brian,” Vincent Robinson said. “Welcome.”

  “Thanks, Mr. Robinson. Great reception.”

  Justus scowled at the way his father’s chest puffed up. Jackass. Oh, sure, the old guy looked perfectly normal at first glance. He was tall and slim, with salt-and-pepper hair trimmed short, dark brown skin, sharp eyes with frameless glasses, a fancy silk tuxedo, and gleaming patent leather shoes. He looked exactly like what he was: a successful civil rights attorney with his own practice.

  The problems started every time he opened his mouth and began spewing his passive-aggressive bullshit.

  “Thanks, Brian. Glad you could come.” Vincent’s perfect white teeth gleamed in a wide smile, at least until he turned to Justus and nodded. “Son.”

  Justus automatically slouched against the pillar and crossed his arms over his chest. Maybe Brian didn’t see the man’s animosity oozing from his pores like sweat, but he sure did.

  “What’s up, Vincent?” Justus asked coolly.

  His father’s temples began to throb, as predictable as the Bengals losing come playoffs. It was childish to get such pleasure from something as easy as calling his father by his name, true, but why pass up these little moments of joy?

  Vincent looked to Justus’s ears. “I see you wore those earrings.”

  While Brian stared fixedly at the cake table and pretended he’d suffered a catastrophic hearing loss, Justus fingered the two-carat round CZ studs he wore. He’d planned to take them out before the ceremony, but forgot in the pre-wedding excitement.

  Now, though? What the hell. He’d play.

  “They’re not too much, are they?” he asked, channeling a newborn’s wide-eyed innocence as best he could.

  Vincent’s lips thinned into virtual invisibility, but then he faced Brian and clapped him on the back. “When do you leave for New Haven?”

  “Ah...” Looking startled, Brian darted a glance at Justus. “A few days before school starts.”

  “Some of the best days of my life were at Yale,” Vincent said thoughtfully, shooting a fond smile in the direction of the newlyweds, who’d moved to the next table down. “Vincent Junior’s, too. It’s where he met his wife, of course.”

  V.J. glanced over, saw Vincent and Justus together, and frowned.

  Justus studied his fingernails and waited for his father’s inevitable criticism, which should arrive in four...three...two...

  “I’d hoped both of my boys would go to Yale and join me at the firm,” Vincent continued delicately, “but, well...”

  Justus yawned—hugely and loudly.

  Vincent scowled and opened his mouth.

  But Brian, who was loyal to the soles of his feet, jumped in to defend Justus. “Well, you know,” he said, cheeks glowing red. “Xavier’s a great school, and all.”

  “Don’t bother, man,” Justus said. “Some people would be glad their kid got a full ride at a good school, but not Vince, here.”

  Vincent’s face turned the color of sunburned eggplant, which was wonderfully gratifying to Justus. “I did not pay for all those years of private school so you could play basketball at Xavier University!”

  That was it for poor Brian, who cringed and melted away into the crowd.

  Justus seethed and tried not to think about how much he wanted to lunge for his father’s throat.

  He had no hoop dreams beyond college; he was nowhere near good enough for the NBA, and he knew it. His highest ambition? To become a personal trainer with his own gym after he graduated, which seemed like a perfectly respectable and worthwhile contribution to society, even if he’d never be able to finance a wedding reception that cost seventy-five large for any future daughters he might have. One day he’d tell Vincent the real deal about his career aspirations.

  But not today.

  “Don’t worry, old man.” Shrugging, he grabbed a champagne flute from a passing waiter’s tray, gave his father a mocking little cheer, and sipped appreciatively. “When I move out in August you’ll never have to spend another dime on my ass. And when I’m drafted and get my signing bonus, I’ll write you a check for the hundred large you’ve spent on my education up till now. Deal?”

  And...there it was.

  Check and mate.

  Vincent went rigid. Muscles in his jaw and neck throbbed with what looked like the beginnings of an apoplectic fit.

  Justus watched him, idly wondering whether Vincent would actually slap him right here in front of God and everybody.

  Their mutual animosity might have exploded and mushroomed into World War III if V.J. hadn’t materialized at Vincent’s elbow.

  “Dad?” he asked, shooting Justus a death glare. “Hey, Dad? Judge Meyers just asked for you. He’s at table twelve.”

  One beat passed.

  Two beats.

  Finally Vincent blinked and gave the bottom of his jacket an efficient tug.

  Justus, knowing he’d won this round, grinned and raised the flute to his lips again.

  Vincent lashed out and jerked the glass away. “No seventeen-year-old son of mine drinks alcohol,” he snarled, then spun on his polished heel and stalked off.

  Without missing a beat, Justus took a fresh glass off the tray of another passing server.

  “Why?” V.J. asked tiredly. “Why do you always let him think the worst about you? You don’t even drink.”

  Justus scowled. “Because he’s a dick, that’s why.”

  “He’s our father.”

  “He’s still a dick.”

  “He’s not so bad,” V.J. said.

  “To you.”

  V.J. pressed his lips together and chose not to argue with this unmistakable truth.

  “Come on,” he said instead, nodding toward the dance floor, where several servers were whe
eling the cake table. “It’s time to cut the cake.”

  “Wait, man.” Justus caught his brother’s arm to stop him, because this was the first second they’d had alone since the wedding and the occasion seemed to call for a few words. He cleared away the unexpected lump in his throat. “You did good. Carolyn’s great. I’m happy for you.”

  V.J. beamed. “Thanks. And thanks for being my best man. I love you, man.”

  He pulled Justus into a bear hug so tight Justus expected to hear his ribs split with a loud crack.

  Justus pushed him away, perilously close to tears. “You always have to go too far, don’t you?”

  V.J. laughed again. “Let’s go.”

  With that, he hurried back to his wife’s side with Justus trailing behind. The cake-cutting procedure followed. Big snooze. At least until Carolyn laughed and turned to say something to her smiling sister: Angela, the maid of honor.

  There she was!

  Justus stilled, his heart thundering, his stomach tightening the way it did before a big game.

  Angela, man.

  Now that was a woman.

  Even though everyone else today had gushed about the bride (who, let’s face it, looked like the meringue on top of some pie in her fluffy dress), he’d been unable to stop staring at the bride’s sister.

  Like all the other bridesmaids, Angela wore a pale pink dress that reminded him of the dress Marilyn Monroe wore in that old movie where she stood on the subway grate so her skirt could blow up. It had a halter top and some sort of pleated knee-length skirt that left too much—way too much—of Angela’s gorgeous flesh visible.

  Her skin was perfectly smooth, a deep, reddish brown he wanted to touch and taste.

  Yeah, he’d thought about it.

  A lot.

  He wanted to run his hands and lips all over her bare back, shoulders, and arms, to have her wrap her long, shapely legs around his waist, to bury his face between the breasts that filled the front of her dress to overflowing, to squeeze that tight ass, to clamp his hands on those curvy hips and anchor her while they had sex with her on top.

  Yeah, she was older and he was younger, but when he looked at her, honest to God, he couldn’t make their age difference matter.

  Not when he wanted...wanted...wanted.

  The gnawing ache in his gut grew.

  He watched avidly while Angela chatted and laughed with V.J., relaxed with his brother in a way she’d never been with him. He tried to look away a couple times, but his eyeballs were no longer taking direction from his brain.

  What was it about her? His fascination with her, which had grabbed him by the throat when they met yesterday at the rehearsal, made no freaking sense. But when V.J. introduced them at the church and Justus saw her—the heart-shaped face topped by a widow’s peak, the long sable hair, the wide brown eyes tipped up at the outer edges, the straight nose, the lush, bow shaped lips—he felt like he’d been whammed in the ribs with a baseball bat.

  Why couldn’t he escape her gravitational pull? Yeah, so she was beautiful. But so what? He’d screwed lots of beautiful girls in his short life, starting with the sexy little senior (cheerleader; big tits; bigger ass; skilled mouth) that’d popped his cherry when he was fifteen. Angela’s age—twenty-four—and the fact that she already had a political science degree and a year of law school under her belt intrigued him, but he didn’t think that accounted for her appeal, either. The only other thing he could think of was that she was (as far as he could tell, and his instincts about people were usually dead right) uptight. A rule follower but never a rule breaker.

  A good girl.

  This knowledge attracted him as though she’d used a giant shepherd’s hook to catch him around the waist and pull him in. It made him want to ruffle her feathers and make her laugh. To see if he could access the part of her that was a little bit bad. And since his Spidey sense was telling him he had way more sexual experience than she had, he was betting he could.

  Angela.

  Even though, as best man and maid of honor, they’d spent a lot of time together in the last twenty-four hours, he hadn’t really had a chance to talk to her. Worse, when the reception ended, he had no idea when he’d ever see her again.

  Yeah, no.

  He couldn’t let this opportunity pass.

  So when she took a piece of cake and wandered back to her seat at the head table, Justus, plagued by a relentless curiosity, followed her.

  Angela Dennis impulsively pulled her sister in for a hug, carefully balancing her cake plate well away from Carolyn’s pristine white gown.

  “I’m so happy for you,” she whispered, thrilled that they’d navigated the last week without any major blowups. It sounded like a simple feat, but the actual execution was a miracle of Old Testament proportions. She felt as if they’d jointly summited Everest and now stared down into Tibet.

  Carolyn smiled beatifically. “This will be you one day. I’ll be matron of honor at your wedding when you find someone as wonderful as V.J.”

  Angela’s smile froze into something that felt as dry and brittle as plaster, but she managed to keep her snappish comeback on lockdown, and for that, she was grateful. Of course Perfect Carolyn couldn’t imagine any fate more glorious for Angela than to follow along the path Carolyn had blazed. But Angela was sick of being a dumb sheep trying to keep the shepherd in sight. Sick of trying to think of something she could do that Carolyn hadn’t done first and better. It was time she found her own path.

  If Carolyn’s greatest ambition was to be a wife and mother, well, fine.

  Angela would be the career woman in the family.

  Teetering dangerously on the four-inch stiletto sandals Carolyn had picked for her attendants to wear, Angela found her place at the table, sank gratefully into a chair, and looked around. She felt a little awkward sitting by herself, but others would be back soon.

  No sign of Justus, thank goodness.

  Relaxing a little for the first time all day, she was just crossing her legs and arranging her skirt when a movement caught her eye.

  And she knew.

  She looked up, heart already pounding.

  Justus loomed over her like the Empire State Building.

  His slow gaze traveled up her legs and the rest of her body before it settled on her face.

  Their gazes locked with an unsettling intensity that made her breath hitch. Prickly heat crept up her neck and over her cheeks before shivering down her body, causing goose bumps to erupt in its wake.

  What could he want? He wasn’t going to sit here, was he? With her?

  “Hey,” he said, his deep voice easily slicing through the babbling crowd and music.

  “Hi,” she managed.

  And then, without any invitation at all (What? Was he raised by wolves?), he ignored all the other empty spots at the table, pulled out the chair right next to her, and sat, putting his champagne glass on the table in front of him. His NBA-worthy size shrank the table as if he’d cut it in half with a saw, and her pulse thudded along on heightened alert. One of his knees lightly brushed her thigh as he settled himself, and she drew up a little, resisting the urge to pick up her chair and scoot it several feet away.

  Justus.

  He had quite the imposing physical presence. That was for damn sure.

  If she had to guess, she’d say he was at least six-four and two-ten or twenty. She’d thought she’d gotten used to his size by now, because they’d walked, arms linked, together down the aisle today. But she hadn’t adjusted to his height, or the broad shoulders, or the long, long legs, any more than she could adjust if a lion moved into her apartment and claimed the left side of her bed.

  She watched him, everything else forgotten.

  Amusement appeared in his eyes after a lengthy silence. “So...how’s the cake?”

  “Cake?”

  One of his dark brows shot up as he laughed. “Yeah, cake. Or whatever you’re calling that stuff on your plate.”

  Oh! Her cake! Relieved to ha
ve something else to look at besides his wide, dimpled grin, she stared at her plate.

  The problem with Justus, which she’d avoided diagnosing until this very second, was that he was way too attractive, especially for a teenager. His velvety chestnut skin was perfectly smooth, as though teenage acne had decided not to bother with him. He had skull-trimmed black hair with crisp edges, as though he kept a standing weekly appointment with his barber. But his skin and hair, nice as they were, weren’t the problem. It was the eyes and mouth that did it for her. His straight nose she could live with. But the mischief in his eyes, the delight in his gleaming white smile, the energy he exuded like a pheromone, well, those things made it impossible for her to look him in the face for more than half a second at a time.

  Worse, they made her want to squirm in her seat.

  He’s only seventeen, she reminded herself. Only seventeen.

  “I haven’t tried the cake yet.” Feeling sheepish, she took a large and clumsy bite, smearing icing on the outer corner of her lips. Its lemony deliciousness sent a delightful rush of sugar straight to her brain. “Oh. It’s wonderful,” she said, licking her lips.

  “Because...” he began, sounding a little hoarse as his attention strayed to her mouth. He cleared his throat. “I was thinking of the chocolate.”

  “No,” she told him. “Lemon cream. All the way.”

  He sprawled back in his chair and nodded. “So, how’s law school?”

  She wiped her mouth. “I like it. And you! Playing ball at XU in the fall—you must be so excited!”

  He dropped his head, grinning. “Yeah.”

  “You’re still going to get your degree, though, aren’t you? Because if you get injured—”

  “Absolutely.” He nodded firmly. “That’s the point of college, isn’t it?”

  “Absolutely.” Mutual understanding pulsed between them as they smiled at each other. “So what do you want to do when you graduate? Do you think you’ll be drafted?”