by Love Belvin
He glanced in the direction she was looking with a raised brow. “Who and where?”
Immediately, I scratched my chin, and lowered my head at his growl. Divine must’ve caught it, too, because he elbowed me and mouthed, ‘Pussy Protection’, with stretched brows. I tried to hide my amusement.
Zo caught it, too. Her face wrinkled a bit. “Oh, dear,” she murmured dryly. “Are you concerned that because in just a matter of months, you’ll be an old retired man while I’m still in my baby making prime, I’ll lose interest and go with a younger, more zestful sugar daddy, StentRo?”
My eyes ballooned. Zoey didn’t even crack a smile to soften the blow of that jab.
“Would you cut that shit, Niña,” he whined under his breath with slanted eyes.
Yo! This was some shit I’d never seen: StentRo tucking his tail between his legs. I remember seeing him on the news back when I was in high school. He got arrested for bar fights and swinging on paparazzo when they photographed him, drunk and turned the hell up. Or the time he was caught on tape, breaking off two model chicks. He was the tatted rock boy of the mid-2000s. Extremely talented, no one knew if his career would survive his zero-to-sixty temper and lifestyle. Now, he was letting a soft, beautiful—and apparently witty—femme pimp him in public.
The hell?
My eyes blinked on their own to clear my vision.
“I’ll be back, Stent,” Zoey’s voice turned less hostile.
She even stroked his mouth with her index finger to sooth the burn of her pimping before taking off. StentRo stared after her for a few seconds after Zoey left. The moment he turned back to us, I flipped my eyes in the opposite direction.
“The fuck y’all staring at?” he growled again.
“Yo, didn’t you just tell me last week, over dinner, you gave your life to Christ?” Divine asked, his forehead creased. “Why the fuck’re you basing at us like that?”
“Yeah,” I added with my own scowl. “I was just about to say… Ezra would be real proud of how you handled getting your dick snipped by your old lady in public.”
“Bitch, didn’t you make a spiritual and religious switch yourself? A total damn conversion?” StentRo countered to Divine. “And you?” His hard eyes were on me. “Don’t fuckin’ judge me.”
I didn’t feel threatened. It was a man thing. His wings had just been clipped by his lady in front of his boys. He was trying to rebound. He was also right. We all exchanged glances for a minute before busting the hell out laughing. Stenton didn’t join in, but did smile to indicate he was in the moment with us.
“Shit, y’all think she’s the innocent girl next door. I put a dead on that years ago.” He rolled his eyes, I could tell by his dry grin, that revelation didn’t come easily. “Y’all just don’t know how hard it was for me to okay that painting.” His face hardened. “My girl’s bare in it. I’m proud of her because the painting is dope—”
“And your presence is in it,” Divine interjected, confirming to me that was Zoey in the oversized painting down in the lobby.
“Oh, definitely that,” StentRo scoffed. “Without it, that shit would’ve never left my office.” He cut his eyes, revealing his inner struggle. His eyes skirted over to Divine. “And don’t forget, just two weeks. Ship that shit right back to the crib.”
Damn! StentRo was really messed up over this. I didn’t know why: I’d spent lots of time at their place to know their union was solid. Trust me.
“Indeed,” Azmir nodded soberly. “I can dig it, duke.”
“Nah, Divine, I don’t think you do. I have to stay on top of that ass or she will trip. You know.” StentRo flipped his chin in the air. “I’m still looking for your boy, Moreau.”
That was a threat. Couldn’t perceive it any other way. I could tell there was something behind this exchange, and didn’t want to know. I wanted no parts of drama between a man and his lady.
Divine lifted his palms in the air. “Indeed. I’m telling you, I feel you, man. Check this,” He shifted closer in our cypher for more privacy. “My wife returned to work last November after taking off a year to be with the babies. It’s been rough because I didn’t want her struggling with a job unnecessarily, but she’s a determined one and I had to let her figure it out on her own. She’s since cut back from fulltime to part-time, but it took a month for that to happen.”
StentRo nodded too hard at that bit of information. It was like there was a fraternity of alpha aggression happening before me.
“So, anyway,” Divine continued, “she had this intern working at her practice right after she returned. He would shadow her and had direct contact, and was apparently crushin’ on her.” When it was clear he was sharing a story and not just encouragement, StentRo pivoted and stepped closer. “He had her personal cell and work email address. One morning, I come out of the shower and see she left her phone on the coffee table in the sitting room. It went off with a text from a Jared asking her if she checked her work email because it’s the only one he had of hers. I’m like, ‘Who the fuck is this Jared?’ because I’d never heard of him. So, I go into the walk-in closet for her iPad because I know that’s the only device she has her work emails going to and—”
I sucked in air. “Don’t tell me you checked ol’ girl’s emails, my G.” I couldn’t believe these two “pimps” in front of me.
“The fuck I didn’t.” Divine spit with an expression of disgust. “My muthafuckin’ pussy, my muthafuckin’ phone,” he made clear. Stenton snorted, serving me the same flexing expression, agreeing with Divine. What was I missing? “Anyway, I check her email, and there were lots she hadn’t seen, but I’ll be damn if there weren’t like three from this Jared kid.”
Divine and StentRo broke out in similar huffs and bravado chuckles as they dapped it up. It seemed as though StentRo knew exactly what D was feeling and where he was going with the story.
“This bitch ass telling my bone how he respects her hustle and knowledge when he shadowed her the first week of his fieldwork, and shit. The next one was telling her he was happy to have the opportunity to work with her and noticed how earlier that particular day my bone seemed stressed. He wanted to check up on her and to know if there was anything he could do to help. He said he knew how difficult it was on new moms to balance work after being out on maternity leave, and shit.”
StentRo laughed, covering his mouth with his closed fist.
“Duke!” Divine called out, souped as hell. “This bitch is like twenty-two—twenty-three years old. He couldn’t even carry my balls to my wife for me to fuck her properly!” They clapped hands in some strange agreement.
I mean… Being a man, I get talking shit on your dick, but these two shared a strange comradery over this topic and story.
“Fuck outta here!” StentRo threatened. “If you were lucky enough to even smell my wife’s pussy, you wouldn’t know the first thing to do to make that shit drip. Trust me, I was the first on it, and put in work to make sure them walls only explode for me!”
I watched his nose flare. He and Divine dapped it up again.
“You know what I’m saying, chief!” Divine was just as spirited, but managed to keep his voice down as he cupped his sack.
Yeah. We were talking pussy ownership as Divine mentioned earlier. This was a different side of both these cats—and petty as shit—than I’d ever seen.
“So, in the last email,” Divine went on with his story, “he said he’d heard her mention her recent weight-gain from the babies to her receptionist, Sharon. He said he thought she looked great even if her man didn’t.” StentRo’s mouth dropped. I could swear he’d shoot this Jared kid on sight if he ran across him. What the hell is up tonight? I had to question the Mauve I’d had two glasses of by this point. “Mind you, she’s working part time at this point. Again, I’d already been flexin’ about her doing too much and unnecessarily. My lady ain’t gotta work another day in her life, but she’s independent as fuck.”
“So what did you do?” StentRo asked
with obvious interest.
“Please tell me you ain’t run up on lil’ man!” I found myself bracing for it.
I’d heard of rumors where A.D. got busy physically with dudes coming for his chin.
“Oh, nah.” Divine assured, doing some funny shit with stretching his jaw by pushing his tongue into his back teeth. He looked sinister with it. “I had the head of my investigative team, Washington, look into him then invited lil’ Jared to dinner.”
“Dinner?” StentRo pushed out, disbelieving.
“Yeah, with the head of his department, who happens to be an Alpha…a Greek brother to one of my closest friends. And oh, you know my research was thorough before I sat with his ass. Apparently, he’d been sleeping with a married professor at his school and the last lead physical therapist he arranged his fieldwork with, but switched practices and ended up with my wife.”
“Wrong one to fuck with!” StentRo tossed his hand in the air for Divine to catch and he did, both dudes cupping their balls at this point.
“After the dean presented lil’ Jared with email exchanges—dumb ass fucker used his school account to do his dirt—he told him he’d cut a deal with him that would allow him to stay in the program,” Divine answered without the animation from moments ago.
“And?” I asked.
“And that was to adhere to my demands,” Divine replied with nonchalance again.
“Ah, man. What?” StentRo was dying from the suspense, too.
“I had that lil’ nigga write me a twenty-page, single-spaced paper on my empire and why it isn’t a good idea to try to engage the nucleus to my world: my wife. Oh, and in APA format. He also had to resign from his fieldwork for the semester which set him back a year.”
“And he agreed to that shit?” I asked with meeting brows.
“Of course he did.” Divine scoffed.
StentRo followed with, “And the dean was good with it?”
“He didn’t give a fuck. To be real, he couldn’t do much with those emails I gave him; they were obtained illegally, but the kid didn’t know.” He jerked his neck. “So, he went with it.”
“And your lady didn’t wonder what happened to dude?” I had to know.
Stenton scoffed.
“My wife’s been too busy managing motherhood and a demanding ass husband to even have noticed. I told you, she hadn’t tended to those work emails from her iPad, at least. What she does in the office is beyond me, but part time. I’m betting she’ll be retiring completely soon enough.” He supplied a smug grin.
I chuckled quietly at these two, still unable to believe their bravado. These are two successful and accomplished men—billionaires, if combined—who could have any woman they wanted. And here, their common insecurity is their women. Their wives.
“You judging, bruh?” StentRo asked.
“Yeah.” I swiped my nose. “Something like that. You dudes are married, and to women who wouldn’t think about creepin’ on you.” I snorted. “This is senseless paranoia, if you ask me.”
Things went quiet for a minute, both guys’ gazes locked onto me. After a while they glanced at each other, and StentRo tossed a reversed nod of his head in my direction.
“He has no fuckin’ clue.”
“Not a single one,” Divine confirmed.
“We know Brielle ain’t poppin’ off nothing for you,” StentRo commented with the same amount of confidence as his declaration of me not having a clue.
She didn’t, but I didn’t hesitate to ask, “Why do you say that?”
“Because you have no fuckin’ clue, duke!” Divine spoke as if to say, “Duh!” He straightened. “Let’s see if she’s got the juice tonight.” His eyes are elsewhere, behind me.
Again I repeat, but this time to Divine, “Why do you say that?”
“Because she just hit the floor,” Divine tossed back.
I didn’t turn to confirm it. On instinct, my eyes squeezed as though in pain. I don’t have time for this tonight. I didn’t know she’d be there.
“I wanna go rap with a few people over here. I’ll check y’all later.” I walked off to check Ragee, who I was surprised to see tonight.
After chopping it up with him, I came across Tariq Evans, a fellow Connecticut Kings alumnus. It was always love with the big homie. I hadn’t seen him in a minute, and certainly not since my release. He was now a financial advisor, but before switching careers, he was a wide receiver. We chopped it up for a bit before I decided to cut the night short. I got the attention of a staffer in the room and asked about a private exit of the building. Luckily, I was able to slip out the back without being noticed. I made it to my truck just as quietly as I had gone into the gallery. The whole ride home I thanked God for being able to avoid Brielle, who likely knew there was a chance I’d be there tonight to support my old friend, Divine.
When I pulled in my garage, I wondered would exhaustion overtake me and if I’d be able to fall asleep at a reasonable hour. I caught myself yawning a few times since crossing over the GWB into Jersey, so I figured there was a chance. The house was quiet, the kitchen dimly lit and smelling good. My stomach rumbled as I walked around to the front to be sure the lights were down and the front door had been locked. I hit the steps and when I got to the top, I caught a light on from one of the guest bedrooms on the opposite side of the master suite. Finding it strange, I ambled down there.
Jade lay on her stomach over a laptop. Her legs crossed and the pads of her feet faced the ceiling. Those hazel eyes roved up from my shoes to my face. She pulled the wires of her ear buds out.
With a straight face, she gestured to look behind me. “She here?”
“Who?” My face hardened.
“Your jump off from the party tonight. You need privacy? I can take Ky and find somewhere to stay tonight.”
There was a look in her eyes, one I couldn’t grasp to know if she was being straight up or just kidding. From the bitchy conversation I’d witnessed earlier between Stent and D, the last thing I was beat for was to hear about an attached woman. When a slow and sleek grin opened on her face, I knew she’d gotten me.
This girl is trouble…
But I was too tired to do more than acknowledge it. Instead, I changed the subject.
“Studying again?”
She shrugged. “I finished about half an hour ago. Now, I’m just surfing the net for a job and new nail technology.”
“That’s a combination,” I cracked. “Don’t you need dedicated time to apply for the job?”
She sucked in her lips, sheathing her teeth and bit down. “I can tell you haven’t applied for a job in a while. It’s less time-consuming in this day and age. Speaking of which,” she cocked her head, keeping her eyes soft. “How old are you anyways?”
“How old do I look, since you wanna school me about this “day and age” and technology?”
She was cute and ballsy. It was now clear in my mind.
“Hmmmmm…” She squinted with pouted lips. “Like…” she hummed. “Young old… Maybe thirty-two, thirty-three.”
I tossed back my head and chuckled at that one.
“Damn!”
“What?” she gasped sincerely and I caught the flash of rare sincerity in her regard and the brilliance of gold in her eyes.
That sobered me.
“That you consider thirties old and that you’d put me there.” She shrugged with one shoulder. “How old are you?”
“Twenty-five,” she cleared her throat.
Her eyes skirted back to her laptop, obviously uncomfortable all of a sudden.
“See,” I grinned. “I would’ve put you at twenty-two, twenty-three, but you wanna add years to me I ain’t live yet.”
Her eyes lifted to me again. “Yeah, but that would’ve really made me a high-risk teen. I had Ky when I was nineteen.” She giggled shy-like. Her chin jerked in the air. “How old?”
“Only a year older than you.”
“Get out of here!” she cackled at first, exposing her beautifully
straightened teeth. They were aligned and white. When she saw the face I held, she sobered. “No! Really?”
I nodded slowly.
“I just thought because…” With her hazel eyes, she gestured around the room. “This house and the way you carry yourself… so low key and mature—other than when you’re playing with my six year old—that you were older.”
Still holding a blank expression, I leaned against the wall. “I explained the crib. As far as being low key, it comes with reason, but I guess you can say I’m a loner…and good with it.”
“You weren’t a loner tonight, going out on a date, and all.”
And there was that sparkle of mischief in her eyes.
I squinted, tossing my chin in the air. “I thought you said it was a party earlier.” She didn’t respond, but the spread of a grin told me she knew she was busted. “If you wanna know if I have a girl, you should just ask.”
She twisted her lips, while smiling from her eyes like she didn’t trust me. Then she lifted to stand from the floor.
“I’d rather feed you my three herb chicken.” She strained on the way up. “I could hear your stomach growling.
My brow shot up.
I wiped my mouth. “That was good, Jade. Bangin’ for real.” I chewed the last of the chicken breast and fresh string beans.
Thirty minutes later, I was changed and down in the kitchen, cleaning my plate. She really put it down. Jade nodded from across the island with her head in her hand. Her smug grin couldn’t be missed.
“I’m good for something other than losing my apartment and being between real jobs.” Her lashes fluttered, but I now understood that happened when she felt inferior or embarrassed. There was no hint of charm in that act.
“Or cleaning an empty house.”
“A big empty house,” she shot back.
“You don’t get any help with Kyree? If you don’t mind me asking,” I clarified with my hands in the air.
Jade shrugged, mouth twisting against her smile, and her eyes below on the island.
“Not as of late. I’ve been super mom.”
“Does he see his dad?” I wondered about how all of a sudden weeks ago, Kyree started wildin’ out, out of nowhere. I wondered how he managed that before the lights getting cut off.
