by W. S. Greer
All of the Carters had a few features that made it obvious that they were related. They all had deep, dark brown eyes, and they all looked like they could’ve been linebackers for the Chicago Bears. Mikey looked more like an offensive lineman, at six-foot-three, three hundred pounds. I couldn’t decide who was scarier, Clarence or Mikey. But that was before I saw Kelvin’s father.
Senior walked into the room with a very obvious swagger. He stood at least six-foot-four and had the widest shoulders of all the Carters, including my Kelvin. Just like Ant and Deshaun, Senior was bald, and had a thick mustache, but it was very well kept. His obviously expensive gray suit had white pinstripes, and his gray shoes matched it perfectly. Now I could see where Kelvin got his fashion sense from. His eyes were deep and dark, yet there was something about him that was different than the rest of the Carters. They were all intimidating in their own way, especially Clarence and Mikey, but Senior was different. His face seemed to be stuck in an angry glower. If he was happy, he didn’t want anyone to know it, but I was convinced that he was pissed.
Senior walked over to the table as Mikey switched seats to allow him to sit at the head spot. He pulled out the chair and sat down, staring at Kelvin and me as he moved. I glanced over at Kelvin, and unlike his uncles, he didn’t look intimidated. In fact, he looked the same way he did the night he beat the shit out of Timothy Bulger after he’d broken into my house—fearless.
“So, I see we have a problem,” Senior started. “Somebody seems to have put a hit out on you, but you seem to only be concerned about her.” He said her like he hated the word, and didn’t even look my way when he said it. I couldn’t help but remember that this was my first time ever meeting this man in person. What a start to our relationship. “Maybe you’d like to take this opportunity to tell me why you have your head up your ass,” he said.
My eyes bulged at his bluntness, and I immediately looked over at Kelvin to gauge his reaction. His facial expression hadn’t changed.
“Nice to see you too, Dad,” Kelvin replied. “I don’t think it’s a good idea for us to start this conversation at each other’s throats, but I think it’s important that I remind you that I’m not a fucking child, so don’t talk to me like I’m one. Just because I disagree with you doesn’t mean that I have my head up my ass. Otherwise, I could certainly say that you have your head up your ass. I don’t know what happened tonight, but I’m concerned about both of us. I don’t want anyone in our family getting hurt.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Senior snapped. “Our family? Our family is the Carters! She is not a Carter.”
I wanted to jump into the conversation, but something told me it was a bad idea.
“I don’t give a fuck if she’s not a Carter. She’s a part of me, and I’m in love with her. If you won’t protect her, then don’t waste your time trying to protect me.”
“Don’t be fucking stupid, Kelvin! You think Ivan gives a fuck if she’s not a Carter? He’ll shove a gun in your little princess’s mouth and blow her brains out the back of her head. He doesn’t give a fuck. The only way to protect her is to leave her alone, otherwise, you’re putting her in danger.”
“I’m not even sure why we’re having this conversation. You know that if Ivan can’t get to me, he’ll go after Lilliana to force me to come out. So protecting me, and not protecting her is sentencing her to death, and you know it.”
I felt my heart begin to pound. I didn’t know how I’d somehow fallen into this new and crazy world where my life was suddenly in danger, but the reality of it hit me like a ton of bricks. How did everything change in just a few short hours? I was just having a nice dinner with my friends, now my life was in danger, whether this Ivan guy could get to Kelvin or not? What the fuck?
The two Kelvins had a brief pause in their conversation, and I figured this was my best opportunity to speak my peace. I took a deep breath and went for it.
“Umm, I don’t mean to intrude on your conversation,” I mumbled, “but, could you please explain what the hell is going on here? This is a lot of information to take in at once. Someone is gonna try to kill me?”
Senior looked at me like he was ready to choke me. “I don’t mean any disrespect,” he snipped, “but this is a conversation between me and my son. When I want to talk to you, I’ll address you. Until then, you should keep your mouth shut.”
The volume of my gasp was so loud that it echoed off the walls. I thought to defend myself, but the look on Senior’s face scared all of my confidence away. However, it didn’t scare Kelvin.
“Hey! Who the fuck do you think you’re talking to like that?” Kelvin blared. It’d been six months since we’d met, and I’d never heard him sound so pissed. “Don’t you ever fucking talk to her like that again!”
“Hey, chill with that shit, Junior,” Mikey chimed in. Senior put his hand up and Mikey stopped talking.
“Nah, fuck that, Mikey. Let him talk. He thinks he’s a big boy now. Trying to be tough in front of his girl. I get it,” Senior said. “You better recognize who you’re talking to, boy. I run shit around here. Don’t ever forget that. We might have the same name, but you’re not me.”
“That’s the best fucking compliment anyone could give me. I’m not you. I don’t want to be anything like you, either. Regardless, I won’t have you disrespecting my girl.”
“So you’d choose her over The Family? You have her back before you have ours? Where’s your fucking loyalty?” Senior jabbed.
“This isn’t about loyalty. Lilliana is the only good thing I have in my life. She’s the only good thing I’ve had since Fab died, and I won’t let you scare her off. So I suggest you get used to her being around, because she isn’t going anywhere.”
There was a break in the argument as the father and son stared at each other. Kelvin was fuming, but the look on Senior’s face was one of arrogance. He had a little smirk that made me feel uneasy.
“You really think you’re the shit, don’t you?” Senior said, still holding on to his smirk. “She isn’t going anywhere, huh? Son, I’m the only person who decides whether or not anybody stays or goes.” Suddenly, Senior looked over at a man who was standing in front of the entrance to the room. I’d been so busy watching Senior waltz in that I hadn’t noticed the bodyguard who walked in after him. Senior nodded at the man, and the bodyguard started walking towards the table. “Take her downstairs,” Senior said, still grinning.
I turned around just as the man grabbed me by my arm and lifted me out of my chair. When I tried to pull my arm free, he yanked it harder and I let out a small scream. I didn’t know if it was out of pain or out of fear.
I didn’t see Kelvin get up. I only heard the sound of his chair being knocked over from how fast he stood. I turned around just in time to see him draw back and punch the bodyguard square in the face. The sound of his fist hitting the man’s nose echoed and sounded like a book being slammed on top of a desk, and I saw blood splatter across the fancy table as the bodyguard fell backwards onto the floor.
“Holy shit!” Mikey yelled as he stood and ran over to Kelvin, trying to keep him from doing anything else to the bodyguard, who was now on the floor holding his nose that was gushing blood.
“Are you out of your fucking mind?” Senior blared, rising from his seat.
Kelvin turned around and faced his father. “Are you out of your fucking mind? Trying to get this motherfucker to take her downstairs. I told you, I’m not playing when it comes to Lilliana. So, you can save your goddamn power trip for somebody who’s afraid of you, because I’m not the one, Dad. I know we have our issues, especially since what happened to Fab, but trying to prove your power to me isn’t the way to fix anything.”
Kelvin Senior seemed to think about that for a minute as the two of them glared at each other menacingly. Saying these two had “family drama” would be a huge understatement. I didn’t have all the details about what was going on between the two of them, but it was obviously something very serious. It w
as a question I’d be sure to ask Kelvin later.
As Mikey helped the bodyguard off the floor and out of the room, Senior looked over at the man who’d been in the room the entire time, but hadn’t said a word. Thomas Black was sitting in his chair, completely unfazed by the drama of the night. The old man was obviously the eldest one in the room with short gray hair, and gray stubble on his face. He had little black spots on his face that resembled freckles, and the two gold hoop earrings he wore were very old school. I didn’t know who he was or what he was there for, but Senior looked at him like he held him in a higher regard than he held his own brothers.
“What do you think about all of this, Tommy,” Senior inquired.
“I think we have enough drama out there,” Tommy said, pointing to the huge window that looked out into the city lights. “We don’t need more in here. Junior needs us, and we need to be there for him. He’s the last son you’ve got left, Senior.”
The large man put his head down for a second. Probably remembering that his other son had been killed in a shooting already, and that if he lost Kelvin, he’d be out of sons to argue with. When he lifted his head, he looked over at Tommy again.
“Call James. Have him take them back to the Red Chip in his car, but tell him he needs to make sure that he isn’t being tailed. We’ll deal with how we’re going to protect everybody once the weekend is over and Lily has to go back to work. And get in touch with Tony’s family, too. We have to arrange the services. I’ll pay for everything.”
Tommy nodded his head slowly, and pulled out his cell phone to call James. Senior glanced at Kelvin momentarily, just before heading towards the door, and walking out of the room.
The ride back to the Red Chip was a quiet one. Senior’s trusted bodyguard, James Kendricks, had picked us up from the Royal Flush and driven us back to Kelvin’s penthouse suite in his own 2014 Lexus. He seemed to look up at the rearview mirror about every twenty seconds to make sure that we weren’t being followed. If only Tony had done that.
When Kelvin and I got into the elevator, James told Kelvin that he would be in the security room of the hotel, watching the cameras that were pointing at the elevator leading to the penthouse, instead of just letting hotel security do it. James was Senior’s head of security, and he was very good at his job. Kelvin was too mad to realize it, but I knew that it meant something for Senior to put his best bodyguard on the job to protect his son. He sucked at showing it, but he wanted to make sure that Kelvin was safe.
The elevator doors opened and Kelvin and I stepped into the hallway of his luxurious suite, and headed straight for the bedroom. It had been an incredibly long day that started so well, and ended unbelievably shitty. My ears were still ringing from the explosion—and the Carter’s shouting—and I couldn’t have been more exhausted. I’d been sleeping at Kelvin’s place almost every weekend for the past three months, and I even had a drawer with my stuff in it, and a section of his closet designated for me.
I went to the drawer and pulled out my “nightgown”—one of Kelvin’s XXL tank tops that went all the way down to the middle of my thighs—and climbed into bed. Kelvin stripped himself down to nothing but his boxer briefs, and I smiled at his beauty. We were six months in and I was still swooning over him and marveling at his tattoos and sex appeal. The obvious bulge in his boxer briefs caught my attention and I had to force myself to stop looking, because I knew he was stressed out.
“Are you okay, Baby,” I asked, even though I already knew the answer.
Kelvin sat on the edge of the bed with his back to me, giving me a full view of the beautiful Chicago skyline that was tattooed on his back.
“I can’t believe all the shit that went down today. They tried to kill us, Babe. Somebody tried to kill us.”
I couldn’t tell if he was sad or mad. His voice was trembling and he was obviously shaken up.
“I know. It’s crazy. I can’t believe it either,” I replied. “What are we gonna do?”
Just then, Kelvin reached behind his nightstand and pulled out a very shiny nine millimeter pistol. I’d slept in this room countless times and I had no idea that was ever back there. He then reached into the drawer of his nightstand and pulled out the clip that obviously went with the gun. I watched him insert the clip, chamber a round, and then place the gun back into its secret hiding spot behind the nightstand. Then he turned around and climbed into bed next to me.
“I’m gonna make sure they don’t kill us,” he said as I moved over and laid on his chest. “You’re mine, and I’m gonna protect you.”
“Don’t worry about a thing, baby. I got you.”
I opened my eyes and found Kelvin standing in the hallway. There were no lights on, and his naked body was surrounded by darkness as he stood there staring at me. As I marveled at the perfectly proportioned muscles and tattoos that covered his body—not to mention his astonishing package—I was distracted when I noticed he was holding a gun at his side. The look on his face was one of passion, but also one of pain and worry.
I didn’t know what was going on, so I smiled at him, trying to gauge the situation and see if he’d smile back. He did, and it was still the best smile I’d ever seen, even in total darkness. He waved at me, telling me to follow him as he turned around and walked into the living room, but he didn’t turn on any lights.
“Kelvin, wait up,” I said, my voice echoing loudly through the penthouse.
I felt my heart starting to beat faster with every step I took. I didn’t want to lose him. I didn’t want to be without him in this darkness, so I started running down the hallway and turned into the black living room.
The only problem was that when I got there, there was no living room, and Kelvin was gone. The only thing in the room was a man. A man whose face I couldn’t see. All I could make out were the tattoos on his hand. The same hand that was pointing the gun at my face.
My eyes bulged, and I tried to scream for Kelvin, but no sound came out of my mouth. Instead, it was another sound I heard—the sound of a trigger being squeezed and the gun going off…
The loud bang of the gun knocked me out of my nightmare and I woke up sweating and out of breath. I was still terrified as I looked over and saw that Kelvin wasn’t in the bed with me. My heart was pounding and the last thing I wanted to do was get out of the bed and find Kelvin standing in the hallway naked, holding a gun. So, I stayed in the bed and looked over at the clock. It was eight in the morning. Waking up in such a panic must’ve kept me from noticing that the sun was up and it wasn’t even dark in the room. I took a deep breath, steadied myself, and threw my legs over the side of the bed so I could sit up.
I ran my hand across my face as the memory of the nightmare played again in my head. Was that some sort of premonition? Was it a sign from up above that I shouldn’t be following Kelvin? Should I really be taking this dream to mean something? I told myself that it was just a dream, but it felt so real.
I sat on the edge of the bed, consumed by thoughts of what I was going to do about everything that had just taken place over the past twenty-four hours. I’d woken up yesterday morning feeling wonderful. Kelvin had fucked me until I came three times the night before, and I actually had fallen asleep by accident—from exhaustion. So, when I woke up, I felt wonderful, even though I was still naked. Kelvin and I had spent the entire day together here in his penthouse, until it was time to head out to Red Lobster. It was the perfect day, and we’d had the perfect dinner with our awesome friends.
Then, the fucking limo exploded, Kelvin Senior acted like he hated me, and I learned that I was now in danger and needed to be protected from a Russian mob boss who wanted to kill my boyfriend, and didn’t care if I died in the process. That was quite the turnaround, and it was just too fucking much for me to handle.
Things had been going so well for us that I’d forgotten that Kelvin was actually in the mob. The fucking mob! His entire family was also involved, and each of them conducted illegal activities in their respective clubs and c
asinos, although I wasn’t aware of exactly what activities they were involved in. Yet, here I was, sitting on the edge of his bed as if he was a regular guy. Was I crazy?
Even without being affiliated with his mob family, Kelvin had never been a regular guy to me. He was strong, passionate, spontaneous, caring, and a fucking bad ass. He was every woman’s dream, and I had him. The way he treated me was nothing short of perfect, and I loved him more than I thought I’d ever love anyone. But, what about the danger? Was I supposed to accept the danger because I was in love with him? I didn’t know what I was supposed to do, and the confusion was so frustrating.
I exhaled, just as Kelvin walked into the room. He was wearing red and white basketball shorts and a white Michael Jordan jersey. He smiled at me when he came in, then he walked over to where I was sitting, lowered himself onto his knees, and laid his head in my lap, wrapping his arms around my waist.
“I love you, Baby,” he said quietly.
See what I mean? Perfect.
I placed my hands on the back of his neck and gently rubbed his smooth skin. How the hell could I even contemplate leaving this behind?
“I love you,” I replied.
Kelvin lifted his head off of my legs and looked up at me. His dark brown eyes connected with mine and made my heart pick up speed. I ran my index finger over his perfectly trimmed beard, tracing the hair around his mouth. When my finger got close to his lip, he took my finger into his mouth and started sucking on it.
“You’re about to start something serious, Baby,” I said with a smile.
“Well,” he replied, removing my finger from his mouth, “that’s what happens when you put any of your sexy ass body parts near my mouth.”
Kelvin unleashed his flawless smile on me as he rose from his knees and sat on the bed next to me. He leaned over and kissed me on the shoulder as he took my hand in his.
“So, how are you feeling this morning?” he asked.
