Believe in Me (Strickland Sisters Book 2)

by Alexandria House

  She slid the book over to me. “Four kids. Three different mothers. He didn’t have a relationship with Luke’s or Kerry’s mom from what he tells me. They just sort of happened. He was fifteen when his first child was born, eighteen when he finally had sense enough to stop spreading his seed all over Chicago.”

  I stared down at the pictures, then looked up at her. “He’s sure they’re all his?” I had my suspicions about the girl. She didn’t resemble Lorenzo at all.

  She shook her head. “No, but he supported them all financially anyway. Look, honey, what you’ve got to understand is the Zo you know and love didn’t exist back then. He was young and foolish, just about worried me to death running the streets, selling drugs, sleeping with all those girls, some his age and others were grown-ass women. And I’m pretty sure he got into some deeper illegal mess that I don’t even want to think about.

  “He didn’t help raise those kids, didn’t even have the desire to until he finally stopped selling drugs and decided to move back here. It was like leaving that mess behind helped open his eyes to what’s important in this life. That was eight years ago, and everything you see now? The suits he wears, the business man he is? That’s his way of shaking off his past. He tried to get to know those kids, but they weren’t having it. Jovani and Darwin still won’t give him the time of day unless they want money from him, and he just keeps giving it to them out of guilt. Luke is locked up right now, but he still won’t have anything to do with Zo. Kerry’s the only one who’ll even talk to him on the phone. But that’s only when he can catch her. He pays for her to go to grad school, I think it is. But none of them will really let him be a father now.

  “But…”

  “But nothing. He showed you Darwin’s Facebook page, right?”

  I nodded.

  “Do you know he had to make a fake account for that boy to accept his friend request? Those children are angry at him, because he was never there and I can’t blame them, but our Zo is not that man anymore. He wants to do better. He would if he could. Look, I didn’t tell you about these kids before, because I felt it wasn’t up to me to do it. But I’ve got to intervene now, because my boy needs you. He loves you.”

  I closed my eyes and sighed. “I know. I’m going home to him tonight.”

  “Good.”

  35

  It was around six in the evening when I saw her pull into the driveway. Peeping through the window in my office, I saw her wave at Rell then walk toward the house.

  I didn’t hear her come into the house, because I was listening to my old-school hip hop iTunes playlist on my computer. I turned it off in time to hear her knock at my office door.

  “Zo, you in there?”

  “Yeah.”

  She eased the door open and stepped inside in clothes I’d never seen her wear before. She looked tired. As pretty as ever, but tired. “Hey,” she said softly.

  “Hey,” I replied.

  She slid into a chair in front of my desk and sighed. “I’m sorry, Zo. I should’ve listened to you. I was—your mother told me everything about your kids. I understand that you’re trying to build relationships with them. I know…I know they’re still angry at who you were in the past.”

  I adjusted in my seat and dropped my eyes to the top of my desk. “So you talked to my mama…”

  “Yes, yes, and I get it now. I’m sorry for not listening to you, Zo.”

  I raised my eyes. “But you listened to my mother. You gave her that respect, huh?”

  She frowned a little and nodded. “Yes…”

  “But the man you love, the one who loves you with everything in him, you couldn’t listen to him, right?”

  She sat up straight. “Zo—”

  “And then, you went against your word and left me. You left me again, Doc, after you promised you wouldn’t. You fucking left me. And you didn’t answer your phone. And where the hell did those clothes come from?”

  She looked down at herself and back up at me. “Walmart. Zo, I just needed time—”

  “No, Renee, what you needed to do was to sit in that kitchen and hear me out! But you didn’t. It took my mama to make you understand. But you ain’t been screwing my mama all these months!”

  She stood up. “Zo! I’m sorry!”

  “You kept some shit from me, too, Renee. Some serious shit, but I didn’t run for the fucking hills, did I? I sat there and listened to you and accepted that shit, because that was all I could do. Because I love your ass!”

  “Zo…” Her voice quivered.

  I had leaned forward and could feel my temple pulsating. “I love you. Never loved anyone the way I love you, but I can’t do this shit anymore.”

  “What are you talking about? You can’t do what?”

  “Us. I can’t do us. I can’t keep loving you and watching you leave me over and over again. I can’t take that shit anymore! I told you it hurts. It hurts like a motherfucker, and I don’t like pain. Not that kind of pain. You gotta take that shit somewhere else.”

  She stood there for a long time, just staring at me, and I stared back at her for a while but had to look away when she started crying.

  “Zo, I made a mistake. I’m sorry. Don’t do this to us. Please don’t.”

  “You did it, Renee. Running away, ignoring my calls and texts like I’m a nuisance or something. You know how fucked up that is? You wearing my ring and disrespecting me like that? Yeah, I should have told you. I wanted to tell you, but I don’t even like thinking about how I fucked things up with my kids. They hate me and I can’t even get mad because I know I deserve it, but I don’t wanna think about it.”

  “I understand that now.”

  “Now?” I scoffed. “Renee, you know me. You know my heart. You should’ve sat your ass down and heard me out. The first thought in your head shouldn’t have been that I was just another nigga who wasn’t shit when it came to their kids, because you know me better than that. You told me to kiss your ass! And you know what, I bet you never treated your ex like that.”

  “Zo, please—”

  “No! I’m done. You can get your stuff and go back to wherever you spent last night. Keep the damn ring. I don’t need it.”

  I left her in my office, snatched my keys from the table in the foyer, and waved Rell off once I got outside, hopping in my Escalade and leaving.

  *****

  A week after I last saw Renee, I was doing okay. I mean, I’m not going to lie and say I didn’t miss her, because I did, but I could deal with the door to us being closed permanently better than I could deal with never knowing when she’d decide to leave me.

  That shit was just too much for me.

  I probably would have missed her less if she’d taken her stuff with her when she left, but my closet was still full of her clothes. The counter in my bathroom was still crowded with her hair products and curling irons. Her toothbrush was still in the holder next to mine. My sheets smelled like her, and the mattress smelled like her when I snatched the sheets off of it. Her coffee mug with the words black nurse magic was still sitting on the counter next to my coffee maker. She was gone, but not really. Her presence was everywhere. And I have to admit, that was getting to me more than a little bit, so I grabbed some suitcases and packed her stuff up. What I couldn’t fit in the suitcases, I put in boxes, and when I was done, I texted Rell and asked him to come in the house.

  He stepped into my office with raised eyebrows.

  “Hey, man, come in here with me. I need you to take care of something for me.”

  He followed me into the living room where I’d stacked up the suitcases and boxes.

  “I need you to take this stuff to Renee. I think she’s at her mother’s house. I’ll text you the address.”

  Rell just stood there and looked at me.

  “Did you hear me, Rell?”

  He nodded.

  “Then why are you just standing there looking at me and shit? I need this done ASAP!”

  “Because I’m not doing it,” Re
ll said.

  Silence filled the room. Was I losing my damn mind?

  “I got your back, Zo, and you know it. You’ve always been there for me and my family. Ain’t nothing I won’t do for you, but this? This is wrong, and I’m not doing it.”

  “Uh—”

  “You love her. She loves you, and you need to get over yourself and fix this whole fear of losing people thing you have. You need to get over your abandonment issues. She was upset and she left, and then she came back. But all you can see is the fact that she left. People get mad, people leave, but people also come back! You’re fixated on the leaving part, and you’re only looking at half the picture. So, I’m not doing that. I’m not taking that stuff to her, because someone has to save you from your own damn self!”

  “Nigga…you can talk?” I asked.

  “Yeah, but I don’t usually have to. I know how to get my point across without words. And I don’t really like talking because my brother was always telling me to keep my mouth shut about all the stupid shit he was doing, the same shit that got him killed. But this shit you’re trying to do? The way you’re trying to dismiss Renee, erase her? This requires me to speak. Do you know she’s a mess? Janine said she walks around work all puffy-eyed, doesn’t smile. Is that really what you want for her?”

  “No, man. I love her. I don’t want her to hurt, but—”

  “Then stop this! Unpack her stuff and go make things right! Apologize!” He turned to leave, and then stopped and spun back around. “Oh, and she’s not staying at her mom’s. Janine says she’s staying with her sister, Angie. Let me know when you’re ready to go and I’ll see if I can get her address from Janine.”

  “I didn’t say I was going anywhere.”

  “If your ass has an ounce of sense, you are. You really gonna let her get away? You gonna let her get over you and go find someone else to be with?”

  I sat my miserable ass there for thirty minutes before dragging Renee’s stuff back upstairs and unpacking it, wondering all the while if I’d hallucinated that conversation with Rell. I’d known him since he was literally like twelve years old and I’d never heard him mumble a word, but this dude had just spoken with more wisdom than I had in years. Shit, he kept me from seriously screwing things up with Renee. He was right. I loved her, would lose my complete mind if I ever saw her with another man. And yeah, my ass really did need to get over my anxiety when it came to losing people.

  After I finally put her stuff where it belonged, down to the mug on the kitchen counter, I stepped outside to see Rell leaning on my Maybach. “You get her sister’s address from Janine?”

  He nodded, and as he opened one of the back doors for me, both of us turned toward the sound of a car pulling in front of my house. Renee’s car. I looked at Rell who shrugged. “She knows the gate code,” he said.

  He spoke again. Maybe I wasn’t losing it.

  I watched her step out of her car, and I trotted over to her. “Renee!”

  She kept walking, stopping at the front door and looking back where I stood right behind her. “I’m just here to get my stuff and leave your ring. Won’t take me long. Can you have Rell get those boxes out of my trunk?” She spoke so softly, I could barely hear her.

  I reached in front of her and unlocked the door. She still had a key, but I guess she thought it best not to use it.

  She walked into my house, and I glanced back at Rell who gave me a smile as I closed the door. When I turned back around, Renee was already headed up the stairs.

  “Renee!” I called after her, but she didn’t respond. By the time I made it upstairs, she was already in the bedroom, pulling clothes out of the closet.

  As she placed some stuff on the bed, she looked up at me, and asked, “Where are the boxes?”

  “I don’t want you to take your stuff,” I said.

  She was headed back to the closet, but stopped in her tracks and with her back to me, said, “No, I clearly remember you telling me to get my stuff and go, Lorenzo. It took me a little while, but I’m here and I’m not leaving without my stuff.”

  “I don’t want you to go, either.”

  She didn’t respond or move a muscle, so I stepped up behind her and leaned in close to her ear. “Don’t go.”

  She shook her head. “Zo, you hurt me. I mean, you really hurt me.”

  “I know. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that shit I said. I was—I was upset. Look, baby, I got a lot of things about me that need to be fixed. I ain’t been right since I lost my dad. It hurt for you to leave me like that, and I just…I didn’t handle things right. Please, forgive me.”

  She stood there for a long moment, as if she was thinking about what I said, and then she headed back to the closet. I followed her.

  “You’re not going to forgive me? You’re not going to stay?”

  “No, because how do I know you won’t go off on me the next time I decide to go to the store by myself?”

  “You’re exaggerating.”

  She snatched a dress from a hanger and flung it at me. “No! You exaggerated. I was gone for one day, Zo, one day, and then I came back, because I love you and not coming back was never really an option. I came to you as a woman and apologized. I owned my wrong and you shit all over me, threw me out like trash. Dismissed me like I meant nothing to you. So, no! I’m not staying!”

  She yanked a few more items from hangers and tried to move past me into the bedroom, but I wouldn’t budge.

  “Zo, move!”

  “No. Not until you accept my apology. You’re right. I’m wrong. I’m a piece of shit for treating you like that. I don’t deserve to breathe the same air as you, never did, never will, but I love you and I need you.”

  She shook her head as she dropped the clothes in her hands, picked up a pair of her shoes, and threw them at me. “I don’t care what you need! Move! Move your big ass out of my way!”

  “No.”

  She backed up against a wall in a section of the closet that was bare because of the clothes she’d removed, slid down, and sat on some shoes that she promptly pulled from under her and threw across the closet, hitting the opposite wall. Burying her face in her hands, she groaned, “Just let me goooo!”

  I lowered myself to the floor, sitting directly in front of her. “I can’t.”

  “You hurt me, and I don’t want to be hurt anymore!”

  “You hurt me, too, baby.”

  “But I apologized!”

  “So did I.”

  And then silence, as we sat there staring at each other. I watched a tear trickle down her face and finally spoke again. “I love you, Doc.”

  “I know you do, Zo.”

  I moved right next to her and wiped her wet cheeks. “And I don’t want to be without you.”

  She sniffled. “I know that, too.”

  Placing my hand on her cheek, I turned her head so that her eyes met mine. “Baby, this love we have, it’s got a mind of its own. It’s wild and urgent and fucking beautiful. It’s so strong and consuming and sometimes, I love you so much I feel like I’m gonna lose my mind, but I don’t want it to change. I want to be just as passionate about you in fifty years as I am today, but I have to admit it makes me a little crazy, and the thought of losing you…it’s too much for me. Way too much. That shit makes it hard for me to even breathe.”

  “Zo, couples argue. I might need a time-out sometimes. It was wrong to stay gone overnight. I know that, but baby, I might need space sometimes, a few hours to clear my head, but I’ll always, always come back to you. You’re the love of my life. Don’t you realize that?”

  I searched her eyes for a moment before saying, “Does that mean you’ll stay?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Does it?” I repeated.

  “Zo…”

  “Please?”

  She shook her head.

  I leaned in and kissed her neck. “Doc, please. Please, stay. I don’t know how to be without you.”

  With a deep sigh, she said, “No more secr
ets from either of us, and Zo, you gotta trust that I love you and wanna be with you. You’ve got to. You asked me to believe in you, but you have to believe in me, too.”

  “I do, baby. I do.”

  “I missed you.”

  “I missed you, too.”

  “And I’ll stay.”

  I blew out a breath and rested my head against the closet wall. “Thank you. Thank you.”

  She leaned against me, and I pulled her into my arms, kissing the top of her head, then her forehead, then lifted her chin again so that I could cover her lips with mine. She reached up and rested a hand on the side of my neck as she returned the kiss that swiftly escalated from sweet to sensual as her tongue slipped inside my mouth. I moaned into her mouth when she reached down and rubbed my erection through my pants, dug my hand in her hair and tried to pull her face closer to mine. But that was impossible, so I reached down and palmed her right breast through her t-shirt.

  Then she broke our connection, and said, “No touching, Zo.”

  I stared at her. The closet light was on, but with all the shelving and the clothes that hung around us, there was a shadow cast over her face. That, along with the authority in her voice, had my dick as hard as steel. “Yes, ma’am,” I responded.

  She raised up on her knees and began unbuttoning my shirt, and once my chest was exposed, lowered her head and grazed my nipple with her teeth before covering it with her warm mouth and sucking on it, all while groping and rubbing my groin.

  I clenched my hands beside me to keep from touching her, sucked in a breath when she unfastened my slacks, slid her hand into my underwear, and began massaging my erection as she lifted her t-shirt and bra and pinched her own nipple. I leaned forward and tried to lick her nipple, but she backed out of my reach. “No touching, baby.”