Secret listened to Ray go on and on. Once Ray stopped talking Secret said, “Why do I feel like you’re breaking up with me?” She laughed, but inside that’s how she felt. She felt as though Ray was running down why she wouldn’t be able to communicate with Secret the next week or so. Out of sight out of mind. So after not talking for a week, the two would probably drift apart. Secret understood. Ray had just been doing her a favor. She never promised she’d be her best friend or even remain friends with her, and Secret was okay with that. Perhaps Ray had served her purpose in Secret’s life. She hadn’t promised her anything else.
“I’m not breaking up with you.” Ray laughed. “Not that we were ever . . . you know.”
“I know, I know,” Secret said, waving her hand. “I didn’t mean it like that. But anyway, I know you have a lot on your plate. You know where I live and I know your number. Speaking of numbers, I’m going to get my cell phone turned on as soon as I get a chance.” Secret’s cell phone had been given back to her when she was released from jail. It had been on her person when she got arrested. It was dead, of course, and when Ray had brought her to the apartment to check it out and grab a few of her things, she hadn’t gotten the charger. She’d tried calling it to check messages from Ray’s land line, but it wasn’t in service.
“Well, when you get it on, be sure to give me the number.”
“Most definitely,” Secret said.
“No doubt,” Ray replied.
“Yep.” Now the two seemed to be trying to keep small talk going to avoid any awkward silence or to avoid having to say good-bye, one or the other.
Ray looked down at her watch. “Well, I guess I better go. I don’t want to be late for work.”
“No, we can’t have that now can we?” Secret was looking down fiddling with her fingers.
Ray smiled. She looked over at Dina who was wide awake in her car seat on the couch. “I’m going to miss you,” she said walking over to Dina.
“I’m going to miss you too.” Secret looked up with a huge grin on her face, only to see Ray cooing at Dina. Secret’s face flushed with embarrassment realizing Ray’s sentiment hadn’t been directed toward her. “Oh, I’m so sorry.”
Ray had bent over and was rubbing the back of her fingers down Dina’s chubby check while saying to Secret, “It’s okay. I’m going to miss both you and Dina.” She stood up straight and walked over to Secret, taking Secret’s hands into hers. “Stay in touch, and I mean that.”
Secret nodded. Ray released her hands and then went over and opened the door.
“Take care,” Ray said.
“You too,” Secret replied and then closed the door behind Ray. She stood there with her hands on her hips looking over at her baby. “Well, little one, it looks like it’s just me and you.” Secret walked over to the baby’s car seat. She unsnapped the straps holding the baby in and lifted her out. “How’s Mommy’s Li’l Muffin?” A smile cracked on Secret’s face when she realized Ray’s little nickname had rubbed off on her. “Let’s go get all these groceries put away, huh? Does that sound like a plan?” Secret rubbed her nose against her baby’s, making the baby’s eyes flicker open and closed. Secret laughed.
She went to pick up one of the grocery bags just as there was a knock on the door. Was Ray back already? Had she forgotten something?
Secret put the bag down and went to look out of the peephole. She sighed, her shoulders fell, and then she went and opened the door.
“Geesh, you didn’t even give me time to get settled in, huh?” Secret rolled her eyes and then turned her back on her visitor.
“You’ve had three weeks to bond with the baby and all that good stuff,” Detective Davis said, closing the door behind him. “Just think, if it hadn’t been for me, you would have barely gotten three days with your baby.” He reminded Secret of how striking a deal with him was more to her benefit than his.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Secret threw her hand over her shoulder as she went and sat down on the couch. She looked up to see the Detective just standing there. “Have a seat.” She nodded to the chair by the door.
“Thank you.” Detective Davis sat down and then got right down to business. “This weekend Lucky will be at some basketball tournament at a park. I hear he’s got a lot of money on the line, so no doubt he’ll be there. And you’re just going to happen to show up there too.”
Already Secret could feel her heart begin racing. Just the thought of seeing Lucky again gave her anxiety. She remained calm and listened.
“I’m not quite sure whether you should act like a bitch or play the naïve victim role. You’re going to have to feel him out and see which would work best in your favor.”
“How about I just be me?” Secret asked.
Detective Davis thought for a minute. He then shrugged. “Yeah, I guess that does make sense.”
“You think?” Secret rolled her eyes in her head.
“Hmmm, I see jail has made you a little sassy.”
“Pardon my rudeness, Detective, but you don’t know me. How can you tell what a month of jail has done to me?”
“Remember.” He winked. “I was watching you. Anyway, just be you. Try to forget that this is all a charade. Just go with the flow. Get him to trust you; then we’ll go from there.”
There was something about “we’ll go from there” that didn’t sit well with Secret. “What exactly do you mean by that?”
“Now, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I’ll let you know what you need to know and when you need to know it.” He paused for a moment. “So, you ready to do this?”
“It’s not like I have a choice.” Secret shrugged.
“I guess you are right about that.” Detective Davis stood. “Well, that covers just about everything, for now anyway. Let me know if you have any questions. You have my number.” Detective Davis had given Secret his business card the day he picked her up from jail. He turned to let himself out.
“As a matter of fact, Detective, I do have one question.”
He paused and faced Secret.
“My apartment,” Secret said. “It hadn’t even been touched when I came back to it. From what I hear, a person suspected of being this big dope dealer usually gets their house turned upside down. Things considered to have been purchased with drug money are confiscated. None of that happened with me. You mind telling me why, Detective Davis?”
The detective just stood there, not even attempting to search for words. It was useless. Secret was a smart girl. How could she not have figured it out?
“The state never had any intentions of ever charging me, did they?” Secret asked. “That scenario would have never stood up in court. My first offense. You guys had been watching Lucky. You saw him bring that dope out of that house and place it in the trunk of my car. You probably have this evidence room like on television of pictures of him all over the walls. Pictures of him coming out the house with it, putting it . . .” Secret’s words trailed off. She’d been a pawn in the police’s game of chess with Lucky this entire time.
Never denying or confirming verbally, Detective Davis’s silence gave Secret all the answers she needed as he exited her apartment. Secret wasn’t a hateful person, but she couldn’t help but feel anger and hatred toward Detective Davis.
How had she gotten herself into this mess? Although there were plenty of ways she could have gotten herself into it, there was only one way out. And she was determined to get out.
Besides, she couldn’t turn back the hands of time, so how she’d gotten herself into this situation was no longer relevant. She had to figure out how she was going to get herself out of it . . . alive.
Chapter 11
Secret got off the bus about two blocks away from the park where the basketball tournament was taking place. Cars were parked along the streets within a half-mile radius from the park. As Secret strolled Dina along the sidewalk, she passed by cars parked in grass lots, partially blocking the driveway of residential areas and wherever else they could find a sp
ot.
If all of these cars were any sign of how many people were in attendance at this outdoor basketball tournament, Secret couldn’t imagine how she would find Lucky amid all these people. Perhaps she would get lucky and he would find her.
Once on the park grounds, looking around at all the people, Secret felt she’d have a better chance bumping into Lucky again at the free clinic, which was where she’d originally met him. She’d been there confirming her pregnancy and Lucky had claimed to be there with one of his boys. Secret didn’t know whether to believe him. All she knew was that by the time she did have intercourse with him he was clean, because he hadn’t given her anything.
Secret walked around and got as far as she could in an hour, fighting the crowd with Dina’s stroller. The stroller was something Ray had purchased for her as a gift. The hospital had supplied the car seat/carrier through a program for mothers with low or no income.
Secret had fed Dina on the bus and the little one was sound asleep, but she didn’t know how long that would last. Eventually Secret took a break at one of the vending trucks and purchased herself a hotdog. Finding a place to cop a squat was useless. It was way too crowded and weaving that stroller in and out of the crowd was a headache. Everyone was packed on the available bleachers like sardines. They were cheering, ranting, fussing, and cussing at the players. Secret didn’t really want her baby all up in that anyway. Some folks looked to be so hot and bothered with their losing teams that a riot could very well break out. Secret was not about to get caught up in that. So she just stood next to the vending truck eating her hotdog, inhaling the scents of the various foods flowing from the vending trucks.
A fight had broken out on the court between two players. Sure people had bet money on these games, but the way these players were acting, one would have thought an NBA contract worth millions was on the line. All Secret could do was shake her head and ask herself what she was doing in the midst of this mess.
Halfway through her hotdog, Secret almost choked on it when her eyes landed on him. He was rooting, cheering, and pumping his fist while watching the game taking place on the court. The little bit of hotdog Secret had eaten almost came back up. She managed to tighten her throat and force it to stay down. She put her hand over her mouth as if that was reinforcement to keep it down.
Secret began to take in and let out quick deep breaths. She thought she would just about hyperventilate. Seeing him suddenly, like this, right here had caught her off guard. She hadn’t been looking to spot him. She’d been looking to spot Lucky. And nothing could have prepared her for this moment of déjà vu.
Once again the same feeling that had come over her when she’d bumped into him outside of that Chinese restaurant had returned. It was him. It was the man she’d lost her virginity to. The stranger her father had set her up to have sex with for money. The man who had unknowingly fathered her baby. Now that he was right there in her view, she observed all of his features.
Secret unzipped the sun and bug shield attached to Dina’s stroller. She peeked in at the still sleeping baby. She stared at her, then looked back up at him. The him whose name she didn’t even know. She stared at him briefly and then looked back down at Dina. She exhaled. Dina looked nothing like him. She was a spitting image of Secret.
Thank you, Jesus, Secret said to herself before zipping the visor back up. She took a deep breath in and then exhaled. The last time she’d seen the man who had fathered her child it was when she’d gone looking for Lucky. Now that she was looking for Lucky again she’d seen him. Coincidence, or was it that just maybe this guy had some connection with Lucky? Secret got her answer when she looked up to see the guy high-fiving the person next to him. Secret allowed her eyes to wander to the owner of the hand and sure enough it was attached to Lucky. This time there was no forcing the content of Secret’s stomach back down. She couldn’t even make it back over to the trashcan before the vomit came up. She jumped back just in time for it to miss her shoes.
“Secret? Is that you? Are you okay?”
Secret couldn’t immediately lift her head up to see who was speaking to her as she was still spitting the last of the vomit out of her mouth.
“Let me get you some water,” she heard the same voice say.
Hunched over Secret could hear the person completing the transaction for the bottled water with the same vendor Secret had purchased the hotdog from, since she was still standing next to it.
“Here you go.”
Secret saw a hand place a cold bottle of water to her lips. Secret took the water into her own hand and drank it. It was refreshing and just what she needed to not only settle her stomach, but to cool her off.
“Thank you,” Secret said, finally able to look up and see who the Good Samaritan was in her life this time. “Katherine.” There was no emotion one way or the other in the way Secret had said her half sister’s name.
Once upon a time the two girls had been like Miss Celie and Nettie. As a little girl Secret would look forward to her father picking her up so that she could spend time with her siblings: Katherine and her two twin brothers. Unfortunately, when her sister and brother’s mother found out their father Rolland was taking her kids to meet up with the child he’d had with another woman while married to her, she put an immediate stop to it. So Secret went years without having a relationship with her half siblings until several months ago when Secret ran into Katherine at a parking lot in a strip mall. It just happened to have been right after Secret had spotted her baby’s biological father outside of the Chinese restaurant.
Reconnecting with her sister had been just what Secret needed at the time. She’d hoped the two could get close again, picking up where they’d left off as children. But the next time Secret would see her sister after that day was when she was driving off with Lucky in the passenger seat the day the police found the drugs in the car.
Secret was waiting in the back seat of the police car, still in disbelief she’d been arrested. Lucky was free to go, but was sitting on the ride he’d called to come pick him up. After about ten minutes both officers were still at the scene and Lucky still sat waiting for his ride. The officer with Secret in tow had called in the incident, requested a tow truck to tow her vehicle away, and had started filling out his report. The other officer was waiting for the tow truck to show up. The officer driving Secret put down the clipboard he’d been writing on the last few minutes and put his running car in drive. He rolled down the passenger-side window and then slowly rolled up beside his partner, who was waiting with his window down.
“The tow truck is about three minutes away. I’m going to go ahead and take her in.” He nodded back toward a weeping Secret. Just then a royal blue Toyota crept up behind them and parked. Lucky shot up from off the curb and headed toward the vehicle.
“He’s really leaving me,” Secret said out loud, although it was just supposed to be a silent thought roaming through her head. Was this real? Was it really happening? Secret turned around as best she could to see where Lucky was going. She didn’t have a full vision, but she saw him open the door of a car that was parked behind her. He got in and closed the door as if he didn’t have a second thought about her. Secret turned back forward and tears just spilled from her eyes. As the car behind them slowly crept by in order to get back into traffic, Secret looked to her left. She’d wanted to lock eyes with Lucky. She wanted to look him dead in his eyes and try to read him. Was he this cold? Secret had no such luck as he was looking straight ahead with a stone face, like he couldn’t bear to even look at Secret. Before the car could safely dip back into traffic though, Secret’s eyes managed to lock on a sight she never expected to see: the driver. Katherine, aka Kat. Her sister. “Oh my God.” Once again the thoughts in Secret’s head had escaped through her mouth. Was this nightmare really happening? Had her man just practically left her for dead and driven off into the sunset with her sister? Was this some bad joke? If so, who was in on it? She needed answers.
With Katherine now stan
ding in front of her, it looked as though Secret could finally get those answers she so desperately sought.
“Sister,” Katherine said. She did have a tone behind her word. It was like she was asking Secret permission to be able to call her sister.
“Sister, huh?” Secret let out a sarcastic chuckle.
“Are you okay?” Katherine, who was usually the epitome of loud, hoodrat ghettoness, was very reserved.
“Am I okay? You drive off with my man, leaving your eight-months-pregnant sister in the back seat of a police car and now darn near two months later you ask am I okay?” Secret held her eyes wide open with her head tilted, waiting for Katherine to respond.
“I didn’t know.”
“You didn’t know what? That Lucky was my man, that I was eight months pregnant, that I was your sister, what? Please tell me, Kat. Exactly what is it you didn’t know?”
“I didn’t know what was going on. I was so caught off guard. I didn’t know the situation between you and Lucky, no more than you knew my situation with Lucky. We had just reconnected. We hadn’t seen each other in years. How was I supposed to know?”
“Don’t even try it, Katherine. You heard the way I talked about Lucky that day we hooked up again at the strip mall and then went to grab something to eat.” Even though Lucky was no longer Secret’s man, that past anger had resurfaced like it was today’s news. Secret was saying all the things she would have said then.
“Yeah, I heard the way you talked about him, but it wasn’t until that day you were arrested that I put two and two together and realized that Lucky had been the guy you were talking about. You never once said the name of the guy you were kicking it with, so how was I supposed to know that the man you claimed to be in love with was the same man who I had vowed to hate for the rest of my life and never say his name again?”
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