Breathless 4: Loving Montie

by Shani Greene-Dowdell

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Montie

  Party Pooper

  When she closed the door to my room, all I could say was “damn.” I would never forget my first night in Miami thanks to her. Tracye managed to keep my mind off Destiny the entire night. The sexy blond siren had my full attention and I looked forward to spending more time with her.

  I hopped in the shower and got dressed for Montana’s birthday party. I donned a fresh pair of black jeans, a brown Polo shirt, and black tennis shoes. I couldn’t wait to see my little princess.

  When I arrived at Jacob and Destiny’s mansion, the first thing I noticed was Disney characters at the edge of the driveway greeting arriving guests. Larger than life animated characters filled the property. Minnie, Mickey, Donald Duck, Dora the Explorer, Doc McStuffins and more lavished the place. The sight before me was more than Destiny and I discussed. I guessed I should have been elated, but witnessing an overdone birthday extravaganza for Montana unfold over the next two hours agitated me to no end. I didn’t want my kids growing up sheltered, rich, and unable to tell the difference between a blessing and privilege.

  It’s not that I didn’t think Montana deserved the best, but come on man. No three-year-old needed to have this much hoopla going on that they didn’t understand. She was only turning three—not graduating from college. Did Jacob have to get a skyscraper to circle the party writing her name in the sky every ten minutes? The gift table filled with gifts all around it, falling off onto the floor. The setting was a long way from the modest life of a hard worker success story I wanted to display to them. I had a tough job to do with keeping my children grounded as it was. This was pile on. I would keep Junior and Montana humble, if it was the only thing I accomplished in raising them—well, co-raising them.

  I wished I could say the extravagance was the only thing that had my attention. However, Destiny’s mother fawning over Jacob’s father was an equal eye sore. She rubbed his face with a towel when he got cake on it. He pulled her off to the side and they danced to their own music. Destiny was planning a double wedding to include them. Maybe my front row seats at this major event would make it clear to me that I was old news as husband and son in law.

  Shaking my head, I turned away from Ms. Clara. I felt so out of place sitting around these people that I once knew as my family. They had moved on and belonged to the Turner family. So, with all that being said, what the hell was my purpose at the party?

  Jacob had overstepped his boundary as Montana’s stepfather—as if I wasn’t even sitting right there—when it came time to cut the cake. He stood opposite Destiny with his hand on my daughter’s back, encouraging her to blow out the candles. When Destiny realized I wasn’t at the table, she waved her hand, motioning for me to come up and join them. By then, I was sick to my stomach and they had already cut the cake. The glare I shot her way stopped her from beckoning me. It let her know I wouldn’t be participating in the showcase as a side dad.

  “Do you mind if I talk to Montana and Junior for a second?” I said to Jacob who was hovering over them at the table that was atop a makeshift stage.

  “Sure man.” Jacob stepped aside. “They’re all yours.”

  “I know that,” I said for his ears only before saying my goodbyes to Montie and Montana. Jacob was the one acting as if he didn’t know they were mine. Destiny was attending to other guests, so I would talk to her later about what transpired at this bougie party.

  “Daddy, you going?” Montana asked in the sweetest voice that instantly melted the boulder of ice that surrounded my heart.

  “Yes, I’m about to go, sweetheart. I’ll see you guys soon.” I hugged her and she wrapped her arms around my neck and squeezed as tight as her little arms would allow.

  “Are you going back to Atlanta?” Junior asked.

  “No, I’m going back to my room. I’ll let you know when I get ready to go back to Atlanta,” I told him as I rubbed his head.

  “Hey guys, look. It’s the tooth fairy,” Jacob’s annoying voice boomed and caught my children’s undivided attention.

  “Wow! It’s the real tooth fairy,” Junior ran over to a lady whose face was painted sky blue. She wore light blue leotards and had huge white wings. She hung by strings that were attached to a large float at the edge of the back lawn.

  “Fairy, fairy…” Montana said as she toddled over to Jacob and the woman.

  “Bye kids,” I said and waved behind them. I strode from the backyard to the front where my car was parked, looking up flights leaving the city heading to Atlanta with no stops. “There’s no way I can sit through two more events like this. To hell with the rehearsal dinner and wedding. I’ll send a gift,” I grumbled as I located a flight. I was about to click the button to purchase the ticket when Destiny’s name flashed across the front of my screen. “Yeah,” my voice roared loud and curt.

  “Montie, why did you leave so soon? We were about to do the daddy-daughter dance.”

  “Didn’t look like you guys needed me for anything. Jacob has all the daddy-daughter activities on lock.”

  “Really Montie? Are you going to handle it like that?”

  “Yeah, really. If this is what it’s going to be like, I’m not here for it. You’re not going to have me sitting around watching while you let my children think that he’s taking my place. No, especially not when I’m sitting right there. I thought we talked about this already. You guaranteed me that this would not happen.”

  “I expected you to come to the stage when I announced we were about to cut the cake. Instead, you just sat there drinking your beer like you don’t know what your place is. Jacob stepped in like he should when the father isn’t present, mind or body. For this to work, you’re going to have to meet us halfway, Montie.”

  I considered that maybe; just maybe, I was being half jealous and half an asshole when I sat off to the side and watched Jacob step up for me. So, I gave her that point. I could have easily taken my rightful place by Montana’s side. I never had a problem with it before. But my attitude had been a range between understanding to jacked up when it came to the new stepfather role in my family.

  “Well, I left because I didn’t want to cause a scene. Even if I give you the point that I should have gotten up, you know I’m here, Destiny. You know the summertime is my time with the kids, so coming to Miami early only happened because I approved of it. For you to act like I’m not there has me feeling some type of way that I don’t care to explain right now.”

  “Montie, you feel some type of way because you can’t stand to see Jacob in a good mood and trying to do his best by our kids. You want to be the only one they want or need around, but you have to get out of your feelings and step up to the plate.”

  “I’m not in my feelings.” I flat out lied. I felt more for Destiny than I’d ever felt for another woman, and my two kids were my beginning and end.

  “Remember, I know you better than most,” Destiny cut into my thoughts. “I know exactly how you feel right now.”

  “You should know me. We promised to love each other forever. You were my wife.”

  “Yes, that’s why I know today you feel like an outcast.” There was a long pause where the line was silent as we sat there listening to each other breathe. “That’s why I’m calling, Montie. I want you to always know that we’re the original four—me, you, Montie Jr. and Montana. When it comes to taking care of our children, we always need to be good, okay?”

  “This is not the way I want us to be good. I thought I could deal with it, but no, not like this. I want my family back,” I poured the contents from my soul. “Every single day I hope I’ll wake up and the past few years will be a nightmare that I finally shook.”

  “Montie, we can’t go backwards. This is the way it has to be,” she said.

  “Then why did you call me, Destiny?” I asked, not understanding why she continued to taunt me with a truth I had yet accepted.

  “Because I care about your feelings, and I just—”

&nb
sp; “If you cared about my feelings, I mean, really cared, you would have waited on me.”

  “I can’t believe you are going there again, Montie. After all we have been through, you still lead me back to our past. What did you think I was supposed to do, sit around and wait on you to decide that you wanted to be a husband? You know what, I don’t even know why I’m entertaining this. I have to go,” she said in a low, winded tone.

  “You’re entertaining it because it’s not our past. It hasn’t been that long since I made love to you. If I sit still long enough, I can still feel you all over me.”

  Destiny gasped. “Oh Montie, let it go. Just be there for our children.”

  “Destiny, if you can let us go so easily, I think it’s time for me to ask if you ever loved me in the first place.”

  “Montie, I didn’t call to discuss our past. I’ll talk to Jacob about stepping back some when you’re here, because it’s only right.”

  “You don’t have to tell me how you feel, Destiny. I know. Just make sure what happened today never happens again and I’ll be fine with that part. I can’t see myself getting over losing you, however.”

  “I’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again,” she said without addressing the divulgence of my true feelings for her.

  “Good, because while I can’t officially claim you as mine like I want to, Junior and Montana are mine by blood.”

  “No one is denying that.”

  “Then we won’t have to have this conversation again.”

  “Hopefully not. But you know Jacob cares about them too, which is why I want to make sure you’re at the wedding rehearsal dinner. I need you there to show our kids their parents are in solidarity with me marrying Jacob.”

  “I’m not in solidarity with you marrying him, but I’ll be there since it’s what you want.” I ended the call and the flight itinerary popped back on my screen. Should I leave or should I stay?

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Justine

  Revelations

  “I’m glad you came with me. I didn’t want to go to this shindig alone,” Montie said as we pulled into the parking lot for the reception hall.

  “Of course. I’m glad you called and gave me the details. Even though you said you wanted me to come with you to the rehearsal dinner, I thought after our night at the hotel that would be all she wrote about us.”

  “I told you I would call you,” Montie’s velvety tone filled the car, causing me to smile. In an alternate world, another time-another place, I would take him out of his misery of pining for Destiny and love him back to life. She was cruel to him for dumping him and then asking him to watch her commit to another man. It was as if she wanted him to be complicit in breaking his heart. Let’s not mention that she dragged his precious little ones along to his torture.

  “Men say they’re going to call all the time. I’m just glad you called,” I admitted, hoping we could be allies in getting what we both wanted most…our true loves. The ones meant for us.

  “Well, I’m a man of my word, Justine.” He looked at me, and I smiled at him. “I have plans for you after we leave here tonight,” Montie said, staring at my plum red gloss covered lips.

  The last time we were together, he constantly watched my lips before his eyes traveled down my body and stopped at my most intimate place. Why did men use me, until they used me up, and then move on and put a ring on the next woman?

  “I bet you do have plans, Mr. Montie. You men are all the same,” I said, knowing full well after the disclosures of this night, the last thing he would be thinking about was his “plans” for me.

  “What do you mean by that statement?” he asked with a slight frown on his face. “I’m my own man and not like any other.”

  “Well, if you’re different, you would be the first for me. I know how the guys are that I have been with. They want their cake and someone else’s cake too. Montie hadn’t told me whose dinner we were attending, so I vaguely stated, “The guy in there probably isn’t even true to the woman he’s about to marry.” I pointed to the door.

  “You don’t know me well enough to stereotype me into being every other man in the world. You don’t know the man that’s getting married, either. So, do explain why you think that solely because you dated a few creeps that all men disrespect their women.”

  “Well, I know for a fact that I was able to sleep with my ex not too long ago, and he’s about to get married. As a matter of fact, he’s having his rehearsal dinner tonight somewhere in Miami. He’s probably going to look his fiancée in the eyes and tell her that she’s the one for him, while knowing he made passionate love to me in their home only weeks ago. So, don’t tell me about men, when most of them don’t even respect the fact that they are engaged,” I blustered.

  “Woah, what about your responsibility in the situation? You didn’t have to sleep with an almost married man,” he chuckled. “You could have respected their engagement, too.”

  “Humph! That’s what you say. I love that man because he was mine to begin with. I don’t feel like the other woman when I’m with him,” I stopped short of saying I was and would always be Jacob Turner’s woman. I wanted to make it inside the event, so I needed Montie’s invite to hold. I was on a mission. “Besides, if a man loves a woman, he doesn’t cheat. I didn’t cheat. He did,” I added in a more subdued tone.

  “Well, you have a point there. That’s one thing I never did was cheat on my ex-wife,” Montie admitted. I nearly gagged at the mention of Destiny. “She was the only woman I ever wanted to make love to.” The faraway look in his eyes told me he was envisioning him and her together, making the sweetest love.

  “If it’s true that you only had eyes for her, you’re one of the good ones, Montie. Too bad she couldn’t see it when you were together,” I said.

  He nodded, stepped out of the car and came around to open my door for me. “Look, I’ve loved and lost, Tracye. It seems like you’ve done the same thing. Maybe we can just enjoy each other’s company and try to forget our past loves for the next few hours. Deal?” he asked, holding a hand out to me.

  “Deal.” A counterfeit grin splayed across the expanse of my face as I intertwined my arm in his. He fell for it hook, line and sinker. As soon as he figured out my ex was Jacob, he would also realize Jacob was the engaged man that I slept with. He would tell Destiny everything to get her back in his arms. Then Destiny would know Jacob wasn’t beholden to her like she thought he was. Jacob would be shattered when Destiny left him, and I’d be right there waiting to put him back together again. My plan would reposition all the players, and I would get what I desired. Humph…loved and lost? I’m no loser. I’m going to win when Jacob realizes he still loves me and Destiny goes back to Montie. So really, everybody wins.

  I looked at Montie. He returned my gaze with a question in his prominent brown eyes. His kissable dark lips pointed in my direction. He wanted to say something.

  “What?” I asked, having gotten sidetracked by my thoughts.

  “I want you to enjoy yourself and forget about that loser, aight?”

  “Alright,” I said and stopped walking. I squeezed his large hand into mine. “I have to tell you something, Montie. I don’t know how to say this, but earlier in the car, it may have sounded like I was saying you’re not a good man. That’s not what I meant. I was just saying I believe people are who they are.”

  Montie nodded for me to continue.

  “I mean, look at you. You’re a successful, sexy man and we took a spin in the bed on the first night within hours of meeting each other. Who’s to say you’re not engaged to some unsuspecting woman in Atlanta? Or that you don’t have a woman somewhere having daydreams about the things you did to me, just waiting on you to come back and make her whole again?”

  “There is no one to say those things about me. I’m not engaged and I don’t have a woman. You don’t have to believe it, but I’m a one woman’s man. I always have been and always will be.”

  “Ha! My ex, the one who thr
ew me out of his house a few weeks ago after we had sex, said the same thing. He went as far as to pretend I was her as we made love. Rain drops were beating on his million-dollar home and we kissed each other like our lives depended on it as he stroked inside of me. It was more than he says…”

  Montie held his hand up, ceasing my constant ruminating about the last night I got rocked by Jacob. “Hold up. That’s too many details,” he said, looking sickened by the ways that Jacob took me. The same way he planned to use me after we left this party. Whatever.

  After the fiasco I planned to create at the wedding rehearsal, Montie’s last thought would be bedding me. Oh, I couldn’t wait. Destiny would be crushed. Jacob would be upset, but he would definitely come around. A devious grin spread across my face as I imagined the moment this façade of Tracye would come to a head. The game I was playing was going to land perfectly. Destiny was about to find out that I made love to Jacob in the seventeen million-dollar home people were boasting about all over town.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Montie

  Bittersweet

  Don’t get me wrong, being with Tracye took my mind off Destiny. Well, until the woman of my heart, all the woman I could ever need and want stood only feet away from me. If only I knew what she really needed when she was mine. I had tunnel vision, clouded by the drive to succeed. Success came to be something I not only regretted but also loathed because it cost me my family. In my mind, I thought once I turned my company into a six figure a month success, I’d be able to kick back without any financial worries and live larger than life with my family. Like any successful business, my company became a leach, sucking the wind right out of my world. Before I knew anything, I was waking up every morning and getting dressed without even speaking to my wife and kids. I’d get home late at night, don my pajamas and do more work before crashing at my computer. That was it, for years…the years she needed me to be by her side with our new babies. I understood what she meant when she said I left her a long time before she left me. That understanding hurt like hell.