CHAPTER 17
For two days, I posted back up at the Hyatt Regency after the altercation between me and Germaine. I still couldn’t believe that he’d punched and choked me until I passed out. When I regained consciousness, he was gone. It didn’t take long for me to decide that I wasn’t going to be there when he got back, so I left. He blew my phone up with apologies after apologies, but I wasn’t trying to hear any of them. Meagan was blowing my phone up as well. As much as I didn’t want to talk to her, I had no other choice. I was very blunt and standoffish when I told her that I’d be away for a few days and when she questioned what was wrong, I gladly told her none of her fucking business.
After learning that I’d be gone, she reminded me of calls that I had to make and messages that I needed to respond to. I nearly blew an internal head gasket when she asked if I wanted her to handle any of them. She was probably handling more than that with Kingston. With as much anger and disgust I could conjure up, I told her no and hung up in her face. That anger was due to all the images that had popped up in my head of her wallowing around with my man. Even all the calls that Jalisa made to me were answered by my voicemail. I damn sure didn’t want to talk to her.
On my third day in the hotel, I called and told my mother to bring the boys so they could spend the night with me. Of course she wanted to know what was going on, but I didn’t tell her anything. It was none of her business as well. I didn’t need to give her any more ammunition to use against me and throw up in my face whenever she felt the need to. It was a different story when she made it to the hotel.
“So, do you plan on living like this for the rest of your life?” she asked then peeped through my luggage. I ignored her as I snatched Nathan out of her arms and playfully tossed him in the air. Johnathan had grabbed hold of my leg and the three of us fell back onto the bed after I lost my balance. “I know you hear me talking to you, Nikki.”
I took a deep breath before replying, “Mama, you can leave now. Thank you for dropping the boys off.” I gave her a stern look to let her know that I was serious about her leaving.
“I talked to your sister yesterday,” she egged on as if I hadn’t spoken a word.
“And?”
“She’s flying down next month. It would be nice if the boys saw their…”
“She’s not their damn sister. How many times must I tell you that?” My mother knew that she was pissing me off. Part of me wondered if that was her intention.
“Cierra came from you. She’s your daughter. How in the hell can you not see that when you carried her for nine months?”
I ignored that question. “Can you leave now so that I can have some time alone with my boys?”
“Time alone?” She turned toward the television. “Looks to me like you’re already geared up to have the TV take care of them.” She was referring to the children’s show line up that was scrolling up the screen. “Time alone is you actually tending to them and not the damn TV.”
I laid Nathan on the bed next to Johnathan who had his face buried in the soft, down comforter. I stood up and got in my mother’s face. “Just because you didn’t raise me right doesn’t mean that I’m gonna be the same way toward my boys.”
“What do you mean by not raising you right?” she asked as if I’d insulted her. “You didn’t give me a chance to.”
It was time for me to tell her why I hated her so much. “You still don’t know why I left after I graduated high school, do you?”
“I figured you left because of the continued backlash you got from fucking around with that teacher and getting him fired,” she sassed.
“Believe me, that had nothing to do with it.” That smug look on her face slowly disappeared. “I was always pissed at you for kicking my father out of the house.”
“There were some things you wouldn’t have understood,” she countered.
“What about now? Would I understand them now?”
“It really doesn’t matter now, Nikki.”
“Well, let me finish. Besides being pissed at you for getting rid of my father, I had other reasons. I read your diary when I was sixteen.”
“What does my diary have to do with any of this, Nikki?” she asked trying to force down that lump that had formed in her throat.
“On page twenty-three, you prayed to God that I never had any kids because I was a selfish and devilish bitch.”
“Well, you are and you know it.”
It was time to let her have it. I knew why she felt that way about me. “You’re still pissed that your boyfriends wanted me and not you.” I expected a few harsh words after my statement, but I didn’t expect the slap.
“I could never keep a man because of your whorish ass!” she yelled.
I held onto my face. “You had a man, but you kicked him out!”
“You’re an evil lil’ bitch. Is there anyone on this earth that you give a damn about?”
I glanced down at my boys. “I give a damn about them.”
“You don’t give a damn about these boys. You don’t deserve them.”
I laughed. “Please enlighten me as to how I don’t give a damn.”
“You’re never around. Germane is their mom and dad.”
“Yeah. Yeah, Whatever.”
“I was happy when you left my house,” she continued.
“Why because you knew the threat was gone,” I replied. “Don’t be pissed at me because you didn’t know how to please a man. Besides, you let it go on for as long as you did. You kept bringing those men around me and I kept giving them what they wanted, to get what I wanted.”
She was flabbergasted and her face told that story. “You’re crazy,” my mother said in a frightened voice. “All of this for a damn man? Nikki, you can’t make men love you! You can’t blackmail men into loving you!” she yelled as if her heightened voice would rattle some sense into me.
“I guess you realized that after your numerous failed attempts, huh?”
She tried to slap me again, but this time I caught her hand before it landed. “I’m no longer that teenager who sat back and took these slaps from you.” There was a ten second stare
down before I released her arm. “Get out of my fucking room,” I growled at her.
Staring at me one final time, she kissed the boys before walking toward the door.
“Germaine doesn’t deserve this, Nikki. Maybe the others did, but he doesn’t.”
“All I want from him is to let me out of this marriage with my money and my boys so that I can go be with my man.”
“Those boys deserve and need stability, Nikki. You’re too wrapped up in yourself to give them that.”
After that last statement, she walked out.
***
On day four, I dropped the boys off at daycare, then met with the realtor who helped me with the purchase of my home. It was time to get this plan in motion. I felt that I needed to do a whole lot of convincing to show and prove to Kingston that I was serious.
“Hi, Niquole. It’s nice to see you again,” the chubby, gray haired realtor greeted me with a huge smile and handshake from across his desk.
“Same here, Henry.”
I shook his hairy hand and sat down in one of the padded chairs.
“So, you’re ready to do this?” he smiled hard showing his bright, white veneers. He was set to profit a huge chunk of change from the $575,000 dollar home if he sold it.
“I think so, Henry. I still need to fly out to Sarasota to actually see the house. The virtual tour is great, but it’s nothing like the real thing.”
“You’re right and I don’t blame you, but let me tell you this. There are a few more offers on the house and I don’t think it’s going to wait for you.”
“Now, let me ask you this.” I put my game face on and leaned closer toward his desk. “Does money still talk?”
“It sure does in my world.”
“Well, make it happen,” I said before standing up and sliding my green, Balenciaga bag over my shoulder.
“So, did Germaine like the virtual tour of the house?” Henry asked with dollar signs in his eyes.
My body tensed at the mention of his name. I turned to him and smiled. “It’s a surprise, so don’t mention it.”
“Gotcha,” Henry responded.
As I walked out the door, my phone rang. It was my mother. “What do you want?” I asked after answering.
“Germaine wanted me to call and tell you that he has the boys and you need to call him.”
Before I could respond, she disconnected the call. I hesitated before dialing his number.
“I just dropped them off. Why did you go pick them up?” I immediately chewed him out when he answered.
“The daycare called and told me that Johnathan was sick.”
“Sick?” I questioned. “He wasn’t sick when I dropped him off. Why didn’t they call me?”
“Because they knew which one of us would pick him up,” he answered. “You need to come home.”
When those words slithered through my ear, all I could think about was him being dead. I pressed the end button on my phone to avoid hearing him begging me to come home or his pathetic apologies. I needed to remain pissed at him to focus on how he was gonna end up paying for his actions. He could’ve killed me and didn’t even know it since his bitch ass left me passed out on the garage floor. That was probably what he had wanted anyway. Damn, I wish he would’ve died in that car accident. I wish I knew who fucked with his brakes so they could attempt it again. Whatever the price, I was willing to pay.
Kingston needed to know what he did to me. He didn’t seem too pissed about Germaine spitting in my face so maybe the news of him punching me then choking me nearly to death would make his blood boil. I needed him pissed off like he was when Hummer tried to rape me. In other words, I wanted him to off Germaine. I pressed the number two button on my phone. Kingston answered on the first ring.
“Yeah,” he said as if I had disturbed him.
I forced up a few tears and altered my voice as if I’d been crying. “Baby, Germaine tried to kill me.” There was no need to sugarcoat the situation.
“Can this wait?”
I instantly fumed. “What? No!” I screamed into the phone. I was pissed off at the fact that my words didn’t stir him. “You need to handle him, Kingston like you did Hummer!”
“You need to watch what the fuck you say over these damn phones,” he chastised. “I’ll deal with you later.”
I looked at my phone to see if the call was still active. It wasn’t. He had hung up. What was I doing wrong? What had I done wrong? Why had he changed all of a sudden? Something else had to be going on with him. I needed to find out.
CHAPTER 18
After five unsuccessful attempts to reach Kingston once he hung up on me, he turned off his phone. My last attempt went straight to voicemail. I figured he must’ve been with his wife, but he still needed to talk to me. If we were gonna do this couple thing, we needed to get our shit together and get rid of the excess baggage. We needed to move on with our lives.
As much as I didn’t want to, I decided to go back to the house just in case Johnathan was actually sick. When I arrived, I slowly walked inside and found Germaine sitting on the sofa. He was drinking a beer as usual and smoking a cigarette. I wanted to curse him out for doing so but, I didn’t feel like arguing with him.
“Where’s Johnathan?” I asked after scouring the living room.
When he saw me, he put the cigarette out and finished off his Heineken. “He’s still at daycare,” he answered after standing up.
“What the hell, Germaine? Why did you lie?”
“Because I knew that was the only way to get you here.”
“That’s fucked up. I can’t believe you used your damn son and then you have my mother in on this shit, too.”
“I needed you to come home.”
“I don’t have time for your meaningless apologies.” I turned to walk out the door, but he stopped me by tossing a manila envelope at my feet. I stared at it for a few seconds hoping and praying that it contained divorce papers. I knelt down and picked it up. “What’s this?”
“That night after the album release party, I saw you go outside to the trash.” It felt like my throat was closing because I could hardly breathe. My body tensed up. I knew what he was about to say next. “I got the jacket, Nikki.”
I had to think of something quick. “Your nasty ass dug through the trash for something that…”
“Save it, Nikki,” Germaine cut me off. I was puzzled when he picked up an Omega Psi Phi frat pin from off the table. “This was in your jacket pocket.”
“And?” I wondered how it got there.
“It’s not mine, Nikki. Where did you get it from?”
My throat closed even tighter when it dawned on me that Kingston must’ve slipped the pin inside my pocket. But why? Was he trying to make me take the fall for the murder? I shook that thought quickly. I was supposed to get rid of the jacket so the pin would’ve been gone, too. So, blackmailing me was out of the question.
“Is it Hummer’s pin?” Germaine asked pulling me away from my thoughts.
“What? Why in the hell would I have that asshole’s pin?”
“Nikki…”
“Niquole!” I corrected.
“It really doesn’t matter at this fucking point, Nikki…Niquole. What do you think is in that envelope?”
I stared at the envelope then back at him. “I hope divorce papers.”
He laughed. “You would hope that wouldn’t you?”
I became a little concerned after realizing that I was wrong. “What is it then?”
“I had that blood on your jacket tested. You hold the results of the test in your hand.”
My fingers became putty and the envelope slipped out of my hand. “Why did you do that? Better yet, how in the hell did you do it?”
“Tyrell is a cop and I have a few frat brothers that work in labs so, it wasn’t hard,” Germaine said with a smug look on his face.
I tormented myself for a little over a minute as I tried to picture my body draped in prison attire. What the hell had I gotten myself into? It was my fault that Germaine found everything because I didn’t do what Kingston had told me. Now, because of my brutal mistake, he and I may be going to jail.
“I’m waiting,” Germaine ripped through my thoughts again. I watched him fold his arms across his chest. “Ni---“
“Hummer is a son-of-a-bitch and he deserved to die for what he tried to do to me!” I blasted leaving him speechless and stunned.
His arms fell to his sides in disbelief. His actions were not of a person who already knew the answer to his own question. I glanced down at the envelope on the floor. I picked it up with the quickness and ripped it open. I furiously flipped through the stack looking for answers. None. Blank sheets of paper were all I saw. I turned back to Germaine.
“You played me!” I yelled, then threw the papers in his face.
“You played your-fucking-self,” he replied in a tone and with a look like he didn’t know who the hell I was. “You had something to do with Hummer getting killed?”
I could no longer stand the heat. “I’m outta here,” I said before making a turn toward the door. When I opened it, Germaine immediately slammed it shut. I couldn’t face him.
“Who killed my friend, Nikki, because I know you didn’t do it?” he asked before placing his hand under my chin. He forced me to look at him. “Who did you pay to kill Hummer?”
I watched his skin change colors and those eyebrows connect. He was furious and I needed to get the hell out of dodge. I couldn’t answer him without having to give up Kingston, and I wasn’t prepared to do that. I stood silent.
“So, you’re just gonna stand there and say nothing?”
I couldn’t keep quiet any longer. There was one thing that I needed to know. “Are you gonna turn me in?”
Germaine stepped away from me as if I was diseased. He then gave me one last
pissed off yet disgusted look from head to toe then walked out of the house. I was happy he did because I was seconds away from passing out.
****
I paced my office for nearly two hours wondering what disturbing ideas were brewing inside of Germaine’s head. I couldn’t go to Kingston with the information because I’d told him that the jacket was taken care of. I had to swing the ball back into my court. I knew what I had to do.
Around one a.m., I heard Germaine trip inside the house. I knew he’d be drunk when he returned and I knew he’d be stunned when he saw the house filled with candles. He didn’t see me at the top of the stairs. I pressed the play button on the stereo remote and the first CD in rotation began. R. Kelly sifted from the Bose speakers and throughout the house. I needed the ambiance to be on point.
“Nikki! What in the hell is all of this?” he spoke loudly.
I walked back to his bedroom and slammed the door as hard as I could making sure it was loud enough for him to hear. It worked. Seconds later, he opened the door.
“W…What’s all this?” Germaine stuttered when he saw me lying on his bed in Agent Provocateur lingerie. I could tell that he was really drunk, but I was going to have to look past that.
“Like you told me before, you haven’t touched me in almost a year so, I thought we could spend the night touching each other,” I said seductively.
“Oh really?” he questioned then stumbled over to the bed.
I cringed when I felt his hand start from my foot and trace its way up to my thong. I hated feeling his hands on me, but I had to do what I had to do. Seconds after feeling all over my body, he ripped through the babydoll dress like a hungry animal. He wanted me…bad. That was good, but I needed to regain control before he demolished me. I rose up on my knees and pushed him backward.
I smiled at him.“Me first.” If only he knew how painful it was to make that simple expression.
He anxiously kicked off his Nikes as I unbuckled his belt then his jeans. I seductively removed them as well as his Calvin Klein boxers.
The Available Wife Page 14
