End Zone Love (Connecticut Kings Book 4)

by Love Belvin

  I shook my head, leaving the doorway, not wanting to think about that. There was a short walk to the kitchenette and living room. I checked the locks on the windows. Again. This was a safe neighborhood, I knew, but after having been in the suburbs of Alpine where there were more trees and green acreage than people, I’d apparently developed a phobia. The small living room was littered with furniture, bags of unsorted clothing, and old memorabilia from my place in East Orange that I couldn’t begin going through. I tried getting as much of it organized as I could before I brought Kyree here earlier, from my mother’s.

  After checking the locks on the door, I took to the bathroom to relieve my bladder. I washed my hands and began walking back to the bedroom. Cupping my belly again, I spoke to her.

  “We’re going to try this again. It’ll be three soon and Mommy’s got a lot of work to do. I need sleep, little girl!” my voice was low, playful, but seriously admonishing.

  I was unbelievably tired as I scooted back and wobbled until I found comfort on my side. Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath, hoping sleep would take over. Unbelievably, after a few seconds, my stomach growled. My eyes flew open and just as I shifted to push up and pitch a fit, there were forceful raps at the door.

  BANG! BANG! BANG! BOOM!

  Too quickly, I twisted to leap from the bed to grab my phone, but was able to make it. With a yowling heart, I checked in on Kyree first, who was still lost in sleep. I closed the door and headed for the front door quietly. Hardly anyone knew we were here. Who would be banging at the door at this hour?

  BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

  Police?

  I tiptoed as quietly as I could manage to the peephole. Bodies moving was all I could make out at first because they faced the opposite way with their backs to me. One was looking at the names on the mailboxes.

  BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

  That series had me rearing in the air on my toes, landing flat on my feet.

  “Who is it?” I demanded, now pissed.

  “Open the door, Jade!”

  Relief flooded me at the mention of my name. This wasn’t random. I peered through the peephole again. This time, I saw hair. A beard. Then a pale muscular arm. John? My hands went to the locks, twisting and unhooking until I was able to swing the door open.

  “Oh, my God,” I whispered.

  Tyheem’s head collapsed backward in relief. John’s eyes mimicked his partner’s. But the expression of the big ogre in front was one I was entirely unfamiliar with.

  “Are you serious right now?” His words were expressed too low, too calm. That was until he screamed, “Answer Me!”

  Trent shouldered forward, coming into the apartment dangerously scouring the place as he passed me. He was supposed to be in training camp. What was he doing in Jersey at this hour?

  “Who here with you?” he demanded without looking back for an answer. “Where he at?”

  As John and Tyheem filed in behind him, faces tight, arm muscles flexing, and jaws twinging, I thought to try to stop Trent.

  “Trent, where are you going? Who are you talking about?”

  I watched as he pushed the bathroom door opened, stepped inside and yanked the shower curtain back.

  “Trent!” I tried again. “What are you doing?”

  I followed on his heels, at some point Tyheem and John coming between us in the tiny walkway. He led them to the bedroom at the far end. I grabbed my belly protectively, on alert as I followed them.

  Trent flicked on the light and searched the small room, under the bed and inside the closet.

  “Who are you looking for, Trent?” I asked again.

  When he didn’t see anything, the muscles around his eyes flicked twice.

  “Where’s Ky?” he gritted in movement out of the room.

  “He’s sleeping, I hope!”

  Trent was so violently loud, pushing in doors, dropping his heavy feet to announce his hunt. He smacked the room door open and at some point, found the light. It was hard for me to see him now that his security made their way past me again to be near him.

  I now felt violated. That was Kyree in there. My son!

  “Wait a minute, Trent!” I yanked John’s arm away, shoving him to get closer. “You need to calm the hell down!”

  By the time I’d made it to Tyheem’s big frame, Trent was storming out of the room. The guys followed him out as I paid one last glance to Kyree, who was stirring, but still sleep. Thank God kids his age slept like logs. I quickly flicked off the light and closed his door to head to Trent. I was now pissed.

  When I made it out to the small living room that now looked tiny with these three giants standing swollen in it, I saw red.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing? Kyree wouldn’t have been hiding underneath a bed or in a closet from you!” I watched as Trent’s head turned to face me. “Who are you looking for? You didn’t think I’d be in the arms of another man so quickly after exchanging vows again, did you?”

  “Grab Ky, get your shit, and let’s fuckin’ go!” he roared in my face. He stepped forward, back bent to reach me at eye level. “Now!”

  My eyes flew wide. “I’m not going anywhere! How did you even know I was here?”

  It had been two days since Ryshon called about the pictures and video. I hadn’t answered calls or texts from anyone except Lashawn, who was able to get a couple of her friends to help me move my things from one of Trent’s garages, onto the truck, and from the truck in here that night after April left for Camden.

  “My aunt called me crying when she came back to find shit missing!” he yelled. “And you got my baby’s things here?” His eyes shot all around. I managed a few essentials from her nursery, specifically a bassinet and changing table still in their boxes. “You think I was going to have my daughter and Ky living in this shitty shoe box?”

  “Small equates to shitty, Trent? So, now, I can’t select a place suitable for my children?”

  “You ain’t selecting nothing!” His long thick arm reached past my head when he pointed. “Get whatever you need now.”

  “I’m not going anywhere! This is my place!”

  His head snapped back, astounded. “This your place?”

  “Yes!”

  “So, you brought my aunt to your stash spot last week? That’s what y’all was doing in Bloomfield? You got some balls, don’t you? You been plotting for how long, Jade?”

  “It’s not like that! I’ve had this place since last year, from my Section 8. I told you about it then.”

  “So, you are still scamming the government? Are you serious right now?”

  “No! I’ve been paying the rent on my own.”

  “And you check on it with my aunt, too? For what?”

  He wasn’t letting my monumental slip from last week go. I cupped my face with my palms.

  “It’s not like that, Trent!” I repeated myself. “I was giving it to LaShawn. We’ve been talking about it since Christmas. She’d been saving her money so I can relinquish the lease to her. I came last week to tell the landlord we were ready, but he wasn’t here. I’ve spoken to him since then and he’s cool with it.”

  His eyes gestured the room, scattered with my things and my kids’. “And now…?”

  A cry shot from my belly. “Now, it’s time to revisit things. I’m not leaving. I can’t go back to what I thought was security. We’re staying!” Tears fell.

  Through them, I watched as Trent stood straight, taking a deep breath, trying to calm himself. I’d never seen him so out of sorts. He was violently angry, eyes red and the cords of his neck prominent. Then he lowered his face to me again to peer into my eyes.

  “We’re married. We fight. I get it! But let me tell you what you not gone do!” He stepped closer to me, his face directly to mine as I trembled with fear for the first time since meeting Trent. “You don’t get to pack up and leave! This marriage shit is forever! You don’t like it? You should’ve fuckin’ never snuck into my room all those nights until you finally got what
you wanted! I’m more than a good lay. Next time, be careful what you ask for. Move. Now!”

  The sun was coming up.

  Through tremoring shakes and a tear-stained face, I beheld the dawning sky from the balcony off the master suite. I was in a tower, and around me was green acreage of billowy landscape and manicured trees beyond the pool and tennis and basketball courts. The air felt and smelled different here. No noise pollution outside of insects and harmless wildlife amid the modest forest.

  Alpine…

  The place I ran from. The short-lived hiatus from my reality. It was after five in the morning and I was back here. Ky was nestled in his bed, back asleep from the forty-five minute commute. And our things were being off-loaded into one of the three garages, from which they came two—now three—days ago.

  I buried my swollen face in my hands, my elbows on my knees as I sobbed quietly.

  What am I going to do now?

  “Everything’s off the truck,” I heard from behind me. It felt like 2015 déjà vu. “I’m going to have April take it back in the morning. You should call the landlord about handing in your key in the morning, too.”

  He was pushing me. I didn’t have to lift my head to see with my eyes.

  “I need to speak with Lashawn first.”

  “If she saved for this spot, she can take care of business by herself.” There was finality in that, a hidden edict.

  I finally picked up my heavy head and found his imposing figure half out on the deck and half in the master suite lit with a calming glow.

  “I’m not going back to living as though none of this happened.”

  “I’m not asking you to.”

  “So, you see why separation is necessary?”

  Trent let out a breath, nostrils swelled. “I’m leaving now. I’ll stay in Connecticut until we can talk all of this through. I don’t think it’s what you’re blowing it up to be, but I’ll wait till you’re ready to talk.”

  “You can’t hide there forever. We won’t last long like this,” I warned.

  “I pray we don’t.” His face stern with conviction. “I just don’t need you jumping the gun and disappearing behind my back. You’re pushing me away because we’re getting so close to that sacred place of partnership and you’re scared to let it all go to be there with me. You, me…we deserve this, J. We need each other. Nobody’s gonna ride for me like you do. I’m man enough to admit it. Man enough to beg you if I have to.” His head shook softly as he went lost inside his words. “You’re my everything. Ain’t no other woman out there that comes close. I don’t know how many times or ways I can say it before you believe me.”

  Trent turned to leave, his thick shoulders hunched, face to the floor.

  “I started off wanting a lover in you.” I shrugged with my head. “You blew my mind with that part. Then I wanted to be your best friend. Turns out, you’re sucky at it. Great sex is great. But being in a trusting, secure friendship would make me great.”

  Trent gazed at me with revealing eyes. I knew he was in pain. Understood his limitations right now. He shouldn’t have been here. He was risking his job by leaving training camp.

  The radio stations were jumping. John was tapping away, looking for something he could ride out to in the pitch blackness of the night as we cruised the highway on the way to Jersey. I heard a snippet of The Isley Brothers’ “Living for the Love of You.”

  “Hold!” I yelled from the back seat. “Run that back.”

  He turned the station back and I sat back in my seat, holding my phone. My thumbs scrolled her profile on IG. This had been my treat over the past two weeks; stalking my wife. Jade’s pretty belly was in full bloom. She took lots of pictures of herself nowadays. They weren’t her old “Maybelline queen” style either. Her natural hair was even longer and thicker than before, eliminating the need of a weave. Her makeup was lighter, no dark heavy made up eyes or extra thick lashes. The selected tones were soft on her glowing skin.

  And she was hella-sexy. She wore heels and shirts that exposed the bottom of her brown round belly. She had somebody take a flick of her walking away from the camera as she rocked baggy jeans, high-heeled sandals and a blouse that was fully open in the back with a tie at the shoulders. Her whole back was exposed, showing she wore no bra. She held her arm in the air, raising the peace sign with her two fingers as her thick wavy hair fell down her shoulders.

  Then there was one of her by rose bushes I recognized from the back yard. She had on a fitted sexy dress that exposed her lower thighs. It showed every curve, telling my little one was all belly. Her tits were bigger, nipples uncontrollably hard in it. She wore high heels as she posed with one propped in the air as she rested on her toes, the other flat on the ground. Her one hand grabbing a rose by the thorny stem while she stared sexily into the camera with her mouth open.

  Damn…

  Jade made this pregnancy look so sexy. That pic reminded me of the one she took next to the pool, laid out flat on her back with an arch between her spine and the concrete lip. Her tits spilled from the triangle cups and her arms over her head. That one had me beating my stick in the bathroom. No way I could tell anybody.

  Her IG was public now, for some reason. I didn’t know how to feel about that with these sexy pictures she’d been sharing of my mark on her: her beautiful belly. We’d always been connected, but the upsurge of hearts she got on posts caught my attention one day. Before the Brielle incident, she averaged thirty to sixty hearts and less than ten comments. Now, she got tens of thousands hearts and disabled the comment feature. I guess she didn’t want people to talk: only see her.

  My head shot up from the phone. That’s when it hit me. Jade wanted to be seen by people. People she was sending a message to. Brielle…and me. This was her way of telling Brielle she was carrying my baby. She was telling me she was happy without me.

  “We’re here, champ,” John alerted me of pulling up to the crib.

  He stopped at the front door, cutting the engine and lights right away. He knew the routine: we’d done this four times already since training camp started. My coaches had been bitching a fit every time I told them I was leaving at night after chow time to ride home, just to make a turnaround trip back to Connecticut. Altogether, coming and going was a four and half hour trip, at most. Taxing, but necessary.

  I stepped out of the truck, pushed the door closed slowly and crept up the front stairs to the house. Using my key, I unlocked it and stepped in. The smell of home hit me right away. A cool breeze from the central air mixed with potpourri scent, fresh flowers, and cooked food that was put away a couple of hours ago before everybody turned down for bed. I went through every room on the main floor, checking for locked windows and doors.

  In the kitchen was a paper bag I knew was left for me. April may have been sleeping, but I told her each time I’d be coming through. I never asked for much, other than to disarm the security system so it wouldn’t go off, waking Jade up. Inside the bag were cookies—homemade. Jade… She must have baked them for dinner tonight. I bit into one, beasting for anything my little one had touched and created.

  Then I took to the back stairs, two at a time, making sure to be soundless as I did. Ky’s door was halfway open as usual. I stepped in and saw him on his stomach, knocked out with his mouth opened. I swiped his head as I smiled. We talked every night since they’d been back. He had no clue of the beef taking place between his mom and me. Didn’t even ask me why I came to get them in the middle of the night from Bloomfield. I’d guessed his mom handled that. I headed out as quiet as I’d come in.

  Next was the master suite. My heart raced on the way there. I hadn’t spoken much to Jade since I left her at the house and basically begged her to stay here without me. I don’t think I’d ever been so scared in my life as I had those few days of not being able to contact her. At first, I thought she was just mad about the pictures and video that were somehow taken in front of the restaurant. Divine flipped and fired the security on duty that day. Me, I w
as still in the dog house.

  The soft recessed lights were on when I walked up to the open double doors. I couldn’t see her from that far away, so I had to go deeper into the room. Her humming stopped me in my tracks. She must have been dreaming. I hoped it was a good one.

  About me. Please, God…

  I took a few more steps closer until I could make out the imprint on her puffy cheek. She must have lay on the other side of her face for a while recently. My dick swelled. Blew up, rock hard just looking at her. That’s how open this girl had me. I was trained to respond to her scent. To react to her presence. Her body… Even though it was buried under the comforter, it owed me something. We were connected, whether I liked it or not. But I couldn’t touch. Couldn’t let her know I’d been making these late-night runs.

  And I needed her. Man, I needed my wife. It had been hard going without her for over three weeks now. Training camp was always hard on players because we were isolated for so many weeks with a bunch of pent up dudes. Well…some of them. JJ was getting some regularly. Cole was easy access. And even though it was frowned upon, he was unapologetic about his late-night creeping. Even our new recruit, Ramsey Bishop, had stepped out a few times. That was crazy. Like my pictures with Brielle, my marriage rumored to be over, the blogs had been tapping away about pictures that went viral of the former talk show co-hosts, Ramsey and Wil Cunningham. The media said it was obvious they were sleeping together. At first, I paid it no mind. Now, that we were in camp together, I knew the real deal.

  A few of the guys did their dirt, but stayed low with it, needing that relief to get them through these rough weeks of camp. Except for me. My only release came from milking my cock to IG pictures she wanted me and Brielle to see. They say revenge is best served when it’s cold. As I stared at my gorgeous sleeping wife, I disagreed. That joint hurt more when it was as hot as she was. I pulled out my phone and snapped a shot of my sleeping beauty, wanting one for the road. Then I backed away for the door.

  Slowly, I made my way down the hall, eating another cookie I wasn’t supposed to have. When I passed April’s door, I knocked quietly then opened it before taking off for the stairs. By the time John and I were pulling out of the gate, and onto the street, she should have been setting the alarm.