“Yes, but I’ve made so many mistakes with my life and I just hope it’s not too late to correct some things.”
“Like with Delmar?”
“I don’t know. I might as well face the fact that I wasn’t a good mother. He may never forgive me for that, and that’s okay. He’s too much like his father to be forgiving. I did come back into Delmar’s life because I thought it was a way to make some quick money, but I think seeing the way you raised your son and how much he loves you…well, it just made me rethink my plans.”
“Maybelline, I’m not perfect when it comes to raising Brady. I have made some huge mistakes.” I thought about how I had tried to give Brady so much but had kept so much from him, like his father and grandparents. That was wrong.
“I appreciate you trying to help me and taking me under your wing. No lady like yourself has done that for me.”
“I don’t think I did enough,” I said softly.
“Do you have a favorite charity?” Maybelline asked.
“Yes. Why do you ask?”
“Because I’m going to write you a check as a way of showing you how much I appreciate you.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
“I won’t take no for an answer. What’s the name of the charity?”
I thought for a minute, and then suddenly Shelby’s face popped into my head and I said, “Make it out to Brandon’s Room.” Maybe the couple of hundred dollars that Maybelline was going to give me would help some new mother.
Maybelline pulled a checkbook from her purse, went over to the counter where I kept the hair-care products, and wrote out a check.
“Here you go,” she said, and handed me the check. I looked at it and gasped. “Five thousand dollars. Can you afford this?”
“Let’s just say I can’t afford not to do this,” Maybelline said as she winked with an easy smile.
CHAPTER
40
Reality Bites Brady
Lowell’s words chilled me, and I shook my head in disbelief. The woman I had given myself to and fallen in love with was a fraud. I wanted to believe it was a bunch of lies, but I knew Lowell would never joke about something like this.
“How could this be true?” I asked.
Lowell looked at me sadly and said, “I know this is tough to understand now, but you will get over this, Brady. People do crazy things for money and power.”
“I mean, I’ve heard of schools doing this when they’re recruiting a player, but it’s usually just some college girl who is easy,” I said. My mind was spinning with confusion and frustration. Could Barrett really have played me just to get me to sign with an agent? An agent my mother had already dismissed. I thought about the guy at the restaurant and how he seemed so certain he knew Barrett. Why hadn’t I paid closer attention to what he was saying?
“Are you going to be okay? Why don’t you call your mother.”
“So she can tell me ‘I told you so’? Naw, I don’t want to do that. I guess I can thank Barrett for bringing out the truth about my mother,” I said.
“Brady, get over yourself! That’s nothing to thank her for. Look at the wedge it put between you and your mother,” Lowell said.
“I might never have found out that my father might really be alive. I may never meet him, but I don’t feel so alone in the world.”
“How can you ever say you felt alone? Your mother gave up her life for you. That’s very selfish of you, Brady.”
“I know…I know, but do you understand how this feels? The two women I trusted the most betrayed me. How would that make you feel?”
“Your mother loves you,” Lowell said. “Barrett doesn’t count. She’s worthless.”
“I thought Barrett might love me one day,” I said. Tears were forming in my eyes, but I was determined not to cry. And what was I crying for—being the biggest fool in the world? It felt as though my insides were softening like ice cream left out in the sun.
CHAPTER
41
Barrett Picks a Fight
Now!” Barrett told the limo driver from the back seat.
“Ms. Manning, I don’t think we’re supposed to tail another car into this gated community without first calling someone and asking permission to enter,” the driver said, turning to her. After three days, Barrett had got sick of waiting for Nico to return to the hotel and decided to take things into her own hands.
Barrett and the driver sat on the street just outside the gate of The Country Club of the South, a posh, upper-crust settlement of mansions in Duluth, thirty minutes outside of Atlanta.
The only reason Barrett knew where he lived was that Nico had had balls enough to bring her here once when his wife and children were out of the country.
Nico had driven her into the curved driveway then, as she looked up at the five Corinthian pillars that stretched high into the sky and supported the home. It was beautiful, built on two acres of sprawling green land, with a four-car garage and both a fish pond and an Olympic-size in-ground swimming pool in the back.
Nico took Barrett’s hand then, pulled her out of his yolk-colored Maserati, and led her through the marble-floored house with the high white ceilings.
“This is where you’ll be living someday, baby,” he said, Barrett’s head spinning at all she would soon have.
She found herself upstairs in the master bedroom, being undressed by Nico. As she felt her zipper coming down behind her, her eyes remained wide, her mouth slightly open, as she gaped at the huge flat-panel TV that hung from the ceiling above the elegant king-size four-post bed.
Barrett fell in love with what would be her new home. As her dress fell from her hips and she was pushed over onto the bed with 1,000-thread-count sheets, allowing Nico to enter her from behind, she smiled, knowing that soon the bed, the linen, and the blankets she was getting done on that very moment would soon all be hers.
“Drive through that damn gate now, before it closes,” Barrett ordered the limo driver now as she leaned on the back of the seat, big sunglasses on her face, a silk scarf pulled around her head.
“Ms. Manning, better sense is telling me to stop and punch the code for the residence and request permission first.”
Barrett rifled through her purse, dug out a hundred-dollar bill, and held it out to the man.
“What is better sense telling you to do now?”
The man took the bill from Barrett’s hand. “It’s telling me to drive, ma’am.”
The driver sped the long, black car through the gates just before they closed.
“Take a left there, then straight ahead. It’s the big house with the five pillars.”
Once there, Barrett opened the car door.
“Shall I wait for you, Ms. Manning?” the driver asked.
“No, you can leave and I’ll ride my bike home. Of course you’re to wait, fool,” Barrett snapped, slamming the door after stepping outside the car.
Barrett walked up to the door, wearing her beige, designer tea dress with matching shoes and bag. She wore a scarf around her neck, the tails thrown over her back. She approached the house with the confidence of a woman who would one day own it.
She rang the doorbell and impatiently tapped her foot until the door opened.
A middle-aged Hispanic woman, wearing a house servant’s uniform, opened the door. With a thick accent she asked, “May I help you?”
“Yes. Fetch Nico for me.”
“Mr. Nico not home,” the woman said.
Barrett sighed, frustration evident in her voice.
“Then who is home?”
Before the woman could answer, Barrett heard another voice deep in the house. “Lucy, who is it?”
The Hispanic woman said, “She no say.”
The other woman smiled and said, “That’s okay, Margoly. I’ll take care of it. May I help you?” the woman now said to Barrett.
Barrett did not say a word, simply pulled down the front of her sunglasses with the tip of her finger to get a better look at this wo
man. She assumed this was Nico’s wife, but then again, it couldn’t be. She looked much younger than she was supposed to—her skin less wrinkled, her figure too girlish. Her hair was shoulder length, black, shiny, with perfect auburn highlights. Her eyes were hazel, and a mole dotted the space just above the corner of her mouth. She was cute, Barrett thought, but Barrett wasn’t fooled. She knew the woman standing before her was assembled like a cheap piece of IKEA furniture straight out the box. Plastic surgery, a hair weave, fake contacts, and an eyebrow-pencil mole could make any woman look halfway decent.
“You Nico’s wife?” Barrett huffed.
“Yes.” The woman smiled. “And who are you?”
“I’m your replacement,” Barrett said as she tried to step into her new home. “You should probably start packing.”
“Excuse me.”
“Yes, your days in this house are numbered.”
“You’re a crazy woman,” Nico’s wife said, stepping back and closing the door. But before it closed all the way, Barrett said, “Then I’m the crazy woman your husband has been sleeping with. Nico is in love with me.”
The door stopped, opened again, there was a woman standing there, a blank expression on her face.
“What did you say?”
“Don’t act like you don’t know. It’s been five years that he and I have been making love the way it’s supposed to be made. Don’t act like you don’t know. You’ve been played. He’s leaving you.”
“I don’t believe you. Do you know how many women claim to be sleeping with my husband? You’re just one more, gold-digging, groupie ho who’s trying to get between me and Nico. Find your own man.”
“Groupie ho!” Barrett said, almost hyperventilating. “If I wasn’t sleeping with him, how would I know that you have a four-post bed in your room and a Phillips forty-two-inch plasma glued to the ceiling?”
“He could’ve told you that,” the woman said, seeming uneasy.
“Then how would I have known how to get here?” Barrett said.
“We’re in the book.”
“Okay,” Barrett said as she smiled a devilish grin. “Then how would I have known that the only time you give Nico head is on Christmas and his birthday, and even then you don’t know what the hell you’re doing? That he always tells you to watch your teeth.”
Barrett didn’t see the wild slap coming. It appeared from nowhere, knocking her glasses to the ground and sending Barrett stumbling. As she rose up, she touched the spot on her cheek where she’d been struck, felt it stinging. Barrett turned toward the woman and was about to lunge for her—when she was suddenly grabbed from behind.
Barrett spun her head around to see who was manhandling her. It was Nico.
“What the hell is going on? What are you doing here?” Nico said, obvious anger on his face.
“Looking for you and getting what’s mine!” Barrett said.
“Nico, what is she talking about?” his wife said, tears in her eyes.
“Pressley, go back in the house. This doesn’t concern you,” Nico said as he tried to drag Barrett back to the limo.
“I’m not going anywhere,” Pressley said. “I want know if what this woman says is true.”
As Barrett continued kicking, fighting, trying to free herself, Nico whispered in her ear, “Just go back to the hotel and we’ll talk about this later. You hear me?”
“I ain’t going anywhere!” Barrett shouted, pulling free from Nico.
When he went to grab her again, his wife said, “No! I want to know the truth. Are you just trying to get his money, or are you really sleeping with my husband?” Tears still spilled over her cheeks.
Barrett knew this was the moment of truth. She looked at Nico, and he was doing everything short of shouting to her that she was supposed to lie. Lie and say that none of what she had said was true, and they would work this out. He would make sure Barrett got everything he had ever promised her. His eyes also said that if she told his wife the truth, they would be through. He would never speak to her again, never lay eyes on her.
Barrett stood there, her chest heaving, tears in her own eyes.
“No, I’m not just trying to get his money. I’m in love with Nico and he’s in love with me,” she said.
Nico’s wife started wailing, looking as though she was about to faint. Nico grabbed her in his arms and yelled at Barrett, “Get the hell out of here and don’t bother my family again!”
“But Nico,” Barrett said, rushing toward him.
He shot a cautionary finger at her as he dragged his wife into the house. “Leave us alone, and if you bother my family again, I’m calling the police!”
Nico slammed the door in Barrett’s face just as Barrett reached it. She began banging at it, kicking it, as more tears fell from her eyes.
“Nico, open this goddamn door! Please! I love you. What about your promise?” She begged for ten minutes after that.
He never came.
Now Barrett had no choice but to do what she had vowed to do if things ever came to this.
CHAPTER
42
Carmyn Opens Her Heart
I finished cooking a meal of chicken Marsala, rice pilaf, and asparagus for Sylvester. I wanted to show him how much I appreciated his help finding Woodson, which I still hadn’t quite figured out how he’d accomplished with his limited means.
I put on a Mary J. Blige CD, went into my bathroom, and sat at my vanity to put on my makeup. I had on peach silk pajamas over a black thong with a matching bra. I planned to serve dessert in bed.
The phone rang, so I pressed the speaker button and said hello.
“What are you doing on this wonderful Sunday evening?” Kellis asked.
“I just cooked a little dinner and I’m waiting for Sylvester.”
“Cooking? You must really like him.”
I thought for a moment and said, “I think I do, and I’m very lucky my evil twin didn’t run him away.”
“He is nice-looking, but before you walk down the aisle, I hope I figure out where I know him from. I still can’t get over how many secrets you’ve been keeping from me. I thought I was your girl, and here you are hiding your current man and your old man.”
“I know, and you’re my girl. But a lot of that stuff was so painful, I really wanted to forget it and act like it never happened,” I said.
“Well, from what Woodson told you, some of it didn’t,” Kellis reminded me.
“And isn’t that wonderful,” I said.
“Yes, it is. Have you talked to Brady’s daddy again?”
“We’ve talked a couple of times. He wants to talk to his family before we tell Brady,” I said. “I’m holding out hopes he’ll get to see Brady on Senior Day or in a bowl game.”
“It would sure be nice if he could see Brady play,” Kellis said.
“Yeah, I thought about that, but Brady has so much pressure on him, and with that girl gone I just don’t want to put any more on him.”
“How are you feeling about Woodson?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Do you think there is a chance something could happen between you two? Like maybe reuniting and being a real family,” Kellis said.
“That man is happily married,” I said.
“What if he wasn’t?”
“Kellis darling, we have all moved on. Hold on,” I said. I heard the call waiting beep and a Texas number flashed across the caller ID. I pushed the button on the phone and said hello.
“Carmyn.” It was Woodson.
“Yes.”
“Are you busy?”
“I’m on the other line. What’s going on?”
“I just wanted to see if you’ve talked to Brady and when I might be able to meet him. I’ve talked things over with my wife, and we’d like to invite Brady down to Houston so he can meet his sisters,” Woodson said.
“I don’t know, Woodson. I don’t know if Brady can get away until the season’s over.”
“It’s your call,
but I want to meet him soon. I’m really nervous about this. What if he doesn’t accept me?”
“Don’t worry, he will,” I assured Woodson.
“Do you have all my numbers?”
“I do,” I said.
“So just call me when you’re ready, then. I’ll be on the next plane out.”
“I will. Have a good night.”
“You do the same,” Woodson said softly.
I clicked back over to Kellis. “Sorry ’bout that, girl. That was Woodson. He’s talked to his wife and he wants Brady to come and visit him in Houston. He said he’s nervous and anxious to meet Brady.”
“Can you blame him?”
“You’re right,” I said. I looked at the clock on the counter and told Kellis I had to finish my dinner prep.
“Get some for me, girl.”
“Some what?”
“Some good lovin’,” Kellis said.
“Go out and get some for yourself,” I said, laughing.
After dinner, Sylvester and I retired to my bedroom. He laid his body down the length of my bed and gave me the most beautiful, gentle smile I had ever received from a man.
“What is that look about?” I asked.
“I was just admiring how beautiful you are,” he said. “Why don’t you come over here and let me give you a massage.” I knew that was code for let me undress you, so I decided to turn the tables.
“Why don’t you let me give you a massage,” I said.
“Have I hit the jackpot tonight? I mean, first that wonderful dinner, a movie, and now a massage. What’s going on, Carmyn?”
I moved toward him and pushed his body over slightly so that I could sit next to him. I looked into his tea-brown eyes and said, “You’re always doing things for me. Tonight is my time. Turn over and let me unbutton your shirt.”
Sylvester smiled, and I began to slowly unbutton his light blue cotton shirt. As I reached the bottom of the shirt, I pulled it open, raised his T-shirt, and kissed his navel.
“Hmmm, that feels great,” he said.
I looked up and said, “I never really thanked you for finding Woodson.”
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