“And I wouldn’t want to!”
“Well that’s a relief,” his father said.
“You know what? I’m tired of people actin’ like I don’ know what it means to be a Black man just because I’m rich.”
“But you’re not rich. You have nothing. I’m rich.”
Deuce sucked his teeth. “Whatever, man.”
His father laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. “Okay. You know what? I’ma give it to you like this: that Range Rover is your muthafuckin’ ride. Drive it. Don’t let anyone intimidate you into being other than who you are. So you’re young, rich and Black. They don’t like it? Fuck ‘em.”
Deuce tried, but couldn’t prevent the smile from breaking free. His father hardly ever cussed when he spoke to him, but when he did, it was only when one or two things was true: one; Robyn wasn’t around to hear it, and two; he was giving things to him straight.
“I mean it. Drive your car. Don’t be stupid, don’t be arrogant. But don’t let them break you down either.”
Deuce said nothing.
“You hear me?”
He felt his father’s large hand on the back of his neck.
“Yeah,” he said. “I hear you.”
“So, what’s up with you and this new chick you brought around? What’s her name again?”
“Zora,” Deuce said. He didn’t know why, but just saying her name made him want to cheese.
“Zora. Nice. So …”
“Just a friend.”
“Uh huh.” His father sounded unconvinced.
“Yeah. I mean, she’s just … different.”
“Different, huh?”
Deuce glanced at his father out of the corner of his eye and noted the smirk on his face, but pretended not to, instead refocusing only on the road ahead.
“Wait. Didn’t I just see you last night?”
Phone up against his ear, Deuce watched from the other side of the barbershop as his father got the finishing touches on his shave. His own haircut had been done for a little while, and when he got tired of the shit-talking and sports predictions, he called Zora. Just to see what was up with her since they hadn’t talked after he dropped her off the evening before.
“Yeah. Damn. Just checking to see if you’re a’ight. Is that a problem?”
“Why wouldn’t I be alright? From what I remember, you saw me walk up my front path, unlock the door and step right into my house, didn’t you? I know, because I waved at you from the open front door.”
He smiled. He kind of liked it when she teased him.
“I’m a gentleman. I was taught to wait until the lady was safe before pulling off. And there’s been a few home invasion robberies in Jersey so you never know.”
Zora laughed her husky yet melodious laugh. “Well, no one’s invaded my home. So I’m totally fine. But thanks for checking.”
“You’re welcome.”
For a few moments, there was silence between them. Across the room, the barber was wiping his father’s face clean. Soon he would take out his powder and brush and Deuce would no longer have the privacy he needed to seal this deal.
“What’re you doin’ later?”
“Nothing. The usual for when it’s cold as hell outside. Netflix. Chill.”
Deuce grinned. “Come do that with me.”
“Why, when I could do it right here? And not even have to change out of my PJs.”
“You haven’t changed out of your PJs?”
“Nope.” Zora made a popping noise with her lips when she pronounced the word.
“That’s nasty.”
She laughed. “I showered before bed.”
“Yeah. Sure you did.”
“I did.”
“Deuce!”
He looked up. His father was done, and beckoning for him as he doled out tips to the barber and his assistant.
“If you don’t want to come over, let me come over there then.”
“I probably should leave the house,” Zora said, almost as though talking to herself. “Whenever I try to veg out all day, it seems like a good idea, and then around seven-thirty I start feeling a little stir-crazy.”
“So … you comin’ over or …?”
“Ahm …”
Deuce stood, deliberately slow-walking toward the exit of the barbershop where his father was waiting for him. Ducking his head, and lowering his voice, he spoke deliberately softly into the phone.
“C’mon, Zee. I want to see you.”
The nickname, and the way he’d laid it all out there seemed to have startled her into silence. It kind of startled him as well.
Deuce removed the phone from his ear and looked at it to make sure the connection hadn’t been broken. “You there?”
“Yeah. I’m here.” Her voice sounded more sober, and much less playful.
“Can I see you?” he repeated.
“Okay.”
“I’ll be there in an hour and a half. Pack a swimsuit and a change of clothes.”
“A swim …”
“Yeah. A swimsuit. And something to wear after. See you in ninety minutes.”
“But Deuce, it’s forty degr…”
“Yeah, I know. ‘Bye.”
Holding her phone between her shoulder and the side of her head, Zora stuffed her black one-piece swimsuit and a brown viscose skirt into her hobo along with an orange scarf and a long-sleeved beige t-shirt.
“You talk to Rashad since you’ve been home?” the voice on the other end of the line asked.
“Nope. He hit me up a couple of times, but I didn’t pick up. All we have right now to talk about at the moment is business, and I’m on Break, so …”
“Yeah, but you guys barely even broke up. After two years being together, that’s kind of cold to cut a brother off like that. And I can’t believe you’re going to hang out with Deuce Scaife again.”
“Mia,” Zora sighed. “It’s no big deal. I’m just …”
“Trying to get a little of that good-good,” her friend cackled on the other end of the line. “I don’t blame you, girl. Nothing like it to get you over the post-relationship hump. No pun intended. And if what I hear about him is true …”
Oh, it was definitely true. But Mia didn’t need to know all that.
“Mia, I’ll call you back when I get home later. And please stop bringing up Rashad. He is definitely past tense.”
“If you say so. But dudes like Rashad don’t come a dime-a-dozen. You should …”
Zora held the phone away from her ear.
She had heard this sermon one time too many for her taste—about how Rashad was a “woke brother”, how he was on some “Barack Obama-type shit” and most of all how rare he was. That was the kind of talk that helped lead Zora into such an intense relationship with him so quickly in the first place; and it was probably also responsible for her staying in said relationship for at least one year too long.
It was just that the optics of her and Rashad were too powerful to ignore. People loved the idea of them. Together, they looked like the prototype of the ideal Black power couple—her with the dark skin and big natural, and Rashad, with his militant bearing and unrelenting scowl, staring down anyone who dared to look at him even halfway funny. And that they were co-chairs and co-founders of a Black Lives Matter chapter? That just made it even more of a modern Black American storybook romance.
When she was honest with herself, Zora admitted that it wasn’t just other people who loved the idea of her and Rashad. She had too. Until just a few months ago, she was as bought into the story as anyone else. Breaking it off had actually given her a few anxiety attacks. What if he was The One? What if she was being foolish by letting him go?
There was no question Rashad was going to be making some big moves in the next few years. He was the guy who would miss his five-year college reunion, but only because he was running for State Senate, or was a nationally-respected activist too busy to attend since he was on a speaking tour. But being in love with Rashad’s passion a
nd drive; being enamored of his politics, and in sync with his worldview wasn’t the same as being in love, enamored with or in sync with Rashad himself. It had taken Zora a long time to acknowledge that, and now she was determined not to backslide by having anyone persuade her otherwise. She had been avoiding his calls mostly because of all the people who might attempt that persuasion, Rashad was the most persuasive of all.
Deuce Scaife was a convenient, albeit very pleasurable, antidote to that. No one could be more different from Rashad than he was. When they met up that night, completely by accident after his traffic stop, she had taken her shot, partly to see what would happen if she did; and partly because he had—much to her surprise—been just as magnetic as all the rumors suggested.
Glancing at the face of her phone, she checked the time. He would be pulling up at any minute. And since she preferred to head him off at the front door, or better yet at the curb, she needed to get downstairs fast. The last thing she wanted was for her brother, Ousmane, to spot the car outside and suggest that she invite her guest in. His, and her father’s more traditional sensibilities would be offended if she snuck out with some anonymous guy without at least introducing him for their inspection.
“Mia, let me catch up with you later,” she said, cutting her friend off mid-sentence. “I need to get out of here before Ousmane starts getting on my nerves.”
“Okay. But answer the brother’s call, Zora. Even if you’re not planning to get back with him, y’all can still do some good work together.”
In that, Mia had a point. BLM was facing a lot of negative media backlash, and along with about a dozen other college chapters, there had been talk about having a stakeholder call over the holidays to strategize on how to counter all that. The problem with decentralized movements like BLM was that a few knuckleheads; or as was the case in New York, a lone gunman with misguided motives and a history of mental illness, could blow the whole thing up in one news cycle. Just because nationally, the movement lacked the resources to coordinate a rapid-response strategy.
They had lost a lot of ground over the past few months and were in danger of losing control of the media narrative altogether. But luckily, Rashad was a master strategist. If they had a stakeholder call, Zora was confident he would have more than a few good ideas for how they might recapture their hard-earned public support.
On the handful of occasions when he had been in the media locally, Rashad had owned the interview, coming across as articulate, thoughtful and commanding of the facts. His credibility had no doubt given credibility to the movement itself. Zora still remembered the hundreds of emails and text messages he had gotten from chapters and individual supporters around the country. The buzz online about him after one particular radio interview that past spring had enabled them to raise over ten thousand dollars for their chapter in less than a week.
In a word, Rashad Dixon was impressive.
“Admiration is not love, Zora,” she whispered to herself.
It had become her own little secret mantra. Whenever she found herself faltering on her resolution to let her relationship with Rashad go, she repeated it. She could respect him, they could be friends and compatriots; but he was not, could not, and would not be more than that, ever again.
Taking a deep breath, she slung her bag over her shoulder and headed downstairs. Her timing turned out to be perfect. Just as she glanced out the window in the front room, Deuce’s white Range Rover slowed and then stopped just in front of the house. Grappling for her phone, she shot off a quick text message to let him know she was on her way. And checking to make sure the coast was clear of her intrusive male family members, Zora slipped out of the house.
As she slid into the SUV, Zora turned to smile at Deuce, and he grinned back at her. Her stomach did a little flip of pure sexual excitement, even as her brain told her she was an idiot. It had been saying the same thing ever since she slid into that booth next to him at Beef & Billiards, but the rest of her body wasn’t listening.
Mia and Sophie had been making eyes across the room with that friend of his, the track star with the Terrell Owens body and Lance Gross smile. And after a few minutes of that, he came over to invite them to join his table.
Zora knew of Deuce Scaife, of course, because his father was the Chris Scaife of recording industry fame; and his mother was notorious for her own reasons. From the time he was about sixteen, Chris Scaife, Jr. aka “Deuce” was the subject of blogger speculation. So, when word spread on campus freshman year that he had transferred from Notre Dame, everyone was curious, including Zora. But her curiosity had been abstract. She didn’t care to meet him and definitely wasn’t one of the groupies who started stalking his dorm almost from day one.
Besides, she had other distractions. Around that time, was when she met Rashad, one year ahead of her in school, and lightyears ahead in his political development. Whatever it was she saw in Rashad, he saw something with equal pull in her; and within weeks they were a unit. And so they had remained until recently. The Deuce Scaifes of the world may as well have existed on a different planet. But because the Black student body wasn’t that large, word of his exploits sometimes made its way to Zora’s ears.
And of course, she saw him around campus. Always with a different girl, but somehow the same type of girl. She was decidedly not his type of girl. No one could have been more surprised than Zora when, sitting next to him in Beef & Billiards and listening to his surprisingly arresting rumble of a voice, she felt her body angle itself toward him, her skin very sensitive, as though yearning for him to touch her. And that was part of why she went for it that night when he came to her room. He was to have been a curiosity and a diversion, nothing more.
But that only explained that one night. It didn’t account for why she had orchestrated her way into a ride home with him from school, or why she had gone over to his house to watch a movie she’d seen many times before. Nor did it explain why she was here, with him right now.
“So why did I need to bring a swimsuit of all things?” she asked him as they pulled away from the curb in front of her house.
“Why does anyone ever need a swimsuit?”
He was wearing a long-sleeved white shirt that hugged the muscles of his arms and chest, and dark-wash jeans. Zora couldn’t remember what position people said he used to play when he played football, but for sure he still had the body of an athlete. She could personally attest to its impeccable shape, even when relieved of clothes.
Blushing, she glanced out the window, worried that the memories of their night together might be visible on her face.
“We’re going back to my father’s house,” he explained. “To swim.”
“How do you know I can?”
“Can you?”
“Yes.”
Deuce smirked. “You like being difficult, huh?”
“You shouldn’t call people difficult,” she returned, playing with the ends of her braids. “It’s not nice.”
“And if they are? What should I call them?”
“You should call them … challenging.”
“Yeah,” he said slowly. His gaze met hers then he scanned her from head to toe in a way that made Zora feel as though his hands, rather than just his eyes were on her. “You’re definitely that. Challenging.”
Chapter 4
She looked almost completely different.
When Zora had come running out to the car, she was wearing a knit hat, so Deuce didn’t know, or think about what might be under it. He assumed her usual mass of hair. But when they got back to his father’s place and she pulled it off, he saw that she had changed things up and now it was in eight neat cornrows, converging at the nape of her neck and fastened there in a shoulder length ponytail. With her hair no longer the focal point, it was easier to see her face, but now much more difficult not to stare.
She was standing at the edge of the pool, arms extended above her head in a pose that lengthened her already long torso. Zora had full, firm thighs, a small waist an
d an ass that looked to Deuce like it was sitting on a shelf. As for the breasts, he only wished he had taken more time to appreciate them that night back at school when he had a chance. But that night had been … crazy. A frenzy of touching and tasting that left little time to examine, little time to truly savor anything other than the electricity between them. Even in the completely modest black swimsuit, her body seemed to be taunting him.
“This is the coolest thing ever,” she said, lowering her arms again. “Swimming outside in the winter.”
The steam rose off the water of the heated pool so he was viewing her through a partial haze. Standing in the shallow end, Deuce watched her set up and then execute her dive. She swam the length and surfaced, letting her head fall back as she did. The water streamed down her face then stood in silvery droplets on her skin, stark against its darkness. Deuce forced himself to look away.
“What was it like?” Zora asked suddenly. “Growing up with all this.”
“I didn’t really grow up in this house,” he said. “I visited it. And not that often until the last few years.”
“Why not?”
This was one of the things that most disarmed him about her—the way she asked questions, and made statements that most other people would have shied away from, her frank curiosity clear in her eyes. She had probably been the kind of precocious kid that her parents were always scolding: Don’t you know it’s impolite to ask people that?
Moving closer to him, using her hands to part the water, Zora stopped when she was only about six inches away. There was almost a foot in height difference between them, so she had to look up. When she did, her neck was exposed. Deuce remembered how he had kissed and sucked on it when he was inside her, and how she sighed when he did.
“I grew up with my mother. My father … he wasn’t around so much.”
Zora’s eyes were serious. She nodded, absorbing that information. “Was that difficult?”
Deuce cleared his throat, not sure how to answer her question. “It was what it was,” he said finally.
Young, Rich & Black Page 4
