by Tracy Brown
But now guilt had set in. Malcolm couldn’t face himself. It didn’t help that she had called the office three times that day for assistance—surely desperate for answers—as she faced the music all alone in Mexico. He hadn’t answered any of the calls from the international number, knowing that an angry Sunny was on the other end. Malcolm felt torn. Part of him believed that whatever happened to her would be justified. After all, she had killed a man. She had been buying and using cocaine while he had been oblivious. She had lied to him. She deserved to pay for those things. But, the other part felt horrible for abandoning her. He loved her. And instead of sticking around to help her, he had fled as soon as they said that he was free to leave.
He had turned off his cell phone hours ago, after Sunny’s third call. He glanced at it now, made up his mind that tomorrow he would change the number. He stuck it in the top drawer of his desk, turned off the desktop lamp, and pushed back his chair. He stood up, stretched, and willed himself to think of anything but her. Malcolm grabbed his briefcase, and headed home for the night, telling himself that he had done the only thing he could. He had saved himself.
* * *
Jada lay in bed, not sleeping, but only half awake. She had tried everything from meditating to masturbating, and nothing seemed to bring her enough relief from her thoughts of Born. She thought about calling him, but worried that Sheldon might overhear her. She resented Sheldon for the distance she had been forced to put between her and the man she loved. Each night after dinner, Jada turned off the ringers on all the phones so that the noise wouldn’t disturb Sheldon while he slept. If Born tried calling her late at night after studio sessions with DJ, Jada usually missed the calls as a result. She hated this. Still, she didn’t dare to risk upsetting the calm that had finally settled in her home. Jada wanted her son to be happy, even if it meant sacrificing her own joy.
She tried, for the thousandth time, to think of a way that they could all be a family. She kept coming up empty. The thought of it made her weary. It seemed that no matter how badly she wanted things to work out, there was no way. Through his suicide attempt, Sheldon had presented Jada with an ultimatum—him or Born. She couldn’t have both. Exhausted, she yawned several times, snuggling into the pillow. She glanced at her cell phone to ensure that she hadn’t missed any calls or texts. There was nothing. She set the phone back on the nightstand and settled back into her cozy spot. She wondered where Born was and what he was doing. She yawned again, and this time, shut her eyes and settled into perfect relaxation. As sleep finally overtook Jada, her cell phone screen lit up with an incoming call. Tonight, it wasn’t Born calling.
Sunny muttered under her breath with each ring. “Please, be there, Jada.”
But Jada was already gone, blissfully dreaming of the happily-ever-after that seemed to elude her in her waking hours.
* * *
It was after three in the morning when Born walked Dominique to the parking garage at the end of the block. It was a warm, June evening and the two of them were grateful for the fresh spring breeze on their faces. The party venue had been packed, and both of them had sweated considerably as they danced, mixed, and mingled while celebrating DJ’s success. Dominique’s curls had all fallen, and she self-consciously raked her fingers through her hair in an attempt to make herself more presentable. Born noticed.
“Cut it out,” he said, smiling and showcasing his irresistible dimples. “You look beautiful.”
Dominique blushed, and felt her pulse quicken. Despite the breeze, she fanned herself with her hand, suddenly hotter than ever. “Thanks,” she managed.
The pair walked on in awkward silence for several paces, both of them deluged with thoughts. Born realized just how much he dreaded saying good-bye to Dominique now that the fresh air was helping to clear his mind. He had spent the past couple of hours intoxicated by the scent of Dominique’s perfume and by her disarming smile. Now, as they neared the parking garage, he hated for the night to end.
Dominique was dreading saying good night to Born as well. She stole a glance at him as they walked.
“Where’s Jada?” she found herself asking. “I expected to see her tonight, toasting it up with you and DJ.”
Born shook his head. “I’m not sure where she is.” Noticing Dominique’s confused expression, he elaborated. “We’re not together anymore.” Saying it aloud for the first time; Born felt an incredible sadness wash over him. He had been in denial about it, but there it was. There was no sense avoiding the truth any longer. Things had come to a standstill between him and Jada. Ever since Sheldon had regained consciousness after his suicide attempt, Jada had refused to see him. They still talked from time to time, but things were not the same. Three months had passed without any real contact with her. In Born’s opinion, Jada had let Sheldon win. And, truth be told, he was hurt by it.
Dominique was surprised by the revelation. The couple had seemed unbreakable. “I’m sorry to hear that,” she said.
Born shrugged. “Shit happens,” he said. He pushed the pain of his failed relationship deep down inside of him, and forced a weak smile.
They reached the parking garage, and Dominique gave the ticket to the attendant, who then left to retrieve her car.
“How about you?” Born asked. “You still in love with ole boy?” Born had met Archie on a number of occasions when he had accompanied Dominique to events. He had always felt that the guy was lucky to be with her, and had never really warmed up to him as a result.
Dominique shook her head and sighed. “Nope. He got himself in some legal trouble, and I decided that I didn’t need those kinds of complications in my life. Been there, done that, you know?”
Born nodded. He understood completely. Having grown beyond his hustling days, he appreciated that Dominique had outgrown her attraction to that lifestyle as well.
“Well … a beautiful woman like you won’t be single long.”
Dominique smiled. The sexual tension between the two of them was palpable. Born felt emboldened by the Hennessy coursing through his system. He brushed his hand across her cheek, then caressed her pouty lips with the pad of his thumb. Dominique swooned, completely swept up in the moment. Before she could formulate a thought, Born leaned in and kissed her passionately, drawing her close to him by her small waist. Her hands instinctively cupped his face, their tongues moving together erotically. They both lost themselves in the kiss, until the sound of the attendant pulling up in Dominique’s car snapped them out of their trance.
Pulling away from Born, Dominique cursed under her breath. “Shit!” She shook her head, silently berating herself. “This is not cool. I’m DJ’s rep at the label. I can’t do this with … you’re his manager…”
Born stepped back, the spell broken.
The attendant approached, and Dominique fished around in her clutch bag for some cash to pay him. Born placed his hand over hers, stopping her.
“I got it,” he said. “Don’t worry about it. He handed the attendant a crisp fifty and looked at Dominique, apologetically. “Sorry about that,” he said. “You’re right. I crossed the line.”
Dominique felt bad. She had wanted that kiss as much as he had. But she had worked hard to climb to where she was in her career. The last thing she wanted was to allow her horniness to screw it all up.
“It’s not your fault,” she said. “I kissed you too. I held on to you so tight that you couldn’t escape.”
Born laughed at that, and she did, too. The tension dissolved.
“Let’s chalk this up to too much alcohol and pretend it didn’t happen.” Born held out his hand.
Dominique took it, and shook it firmly. She chuckled. “Deal.”
Born held open her car door while she climbed inside. “Drive safe,” he said. “We’ll talk tomorrow.”
Dominique winked at him, fastened her seat belt, and sped off before she threw caution to the wind and invited Born home with her.
Born headed off in the direction of his own car. Checking hi
s watch, he saw that it was much later than he thought. He considered calling Jada, but decided against it. She seldom answered his calls anymore, and he was sick of the rejection. He reached his truck, climbed inside, and instinctively headed straight to Anisa’s house instead.
He turned up the music in his truck, the bass pounding throughout the vehicle. He thought about Anisa as he headed to her house. For years now, their relationship had been restricted to co-parenting Ethan. But Born was noticing that Ethan liked having him around on a daily basis. Truth be told, Born liked being in the family atmosphere with his son and with Anisa. It felt good. Especially with Jada giving him the cold shoulder the way that she was. He was beginning to wonder if he had played his cards right all those years ago when he ended things with Anisa in order to give his heart to Jada once again.
Lately, Born had been spending more time than ever at the home he provided for Anisa and Ethan. Though he had a place of his own, he was comfortable falling asleep in Ethan’s room, or in the home’s spare bedroom. He even held meetings with DJ and his management team there. Those meetings used to take place at Jada’s home, but Jada had abandoned Born in favor of her son.
Born had also taken notice of Anisa’s new outlook on life. She had once been very superficial, and it was for that very reason that his mother still didn’t like her, even after all these years. Ingrid thought Anisa was stuck up, self-absorbed, and a gold digger. After all, she had abandoned Born when he was locked up. Wisely, she had secured her position in Born’s life forever by having his son almost immediately after his release.
But this new and improved Anisa seemed changed somehow. She still enjoyed the finer things in life. However, motherhood had settled her in ways that Born found endearing. Anisa was a great mother. Attentive and caring. The more he was around her, the more he realized that she had grown a great deal over the years. He found himself actually listening when she talked to him about the things that piqued her interest. There had been a time when he instinctively tuned her out. Both of them had matured in the years since their split, and at the very least Anisa and Born had developed a close friendship in the time since Jada had gone MIA.
He arrived, parked his car in the driveway, and saw a light burning dimly in the living room. He opened the door with his key and saw Anisa sitting on the chaise, a pair of glasses perched on the tip of her nose as she read a book. She seemed surprised to see him.
“Hey,” she said, smiling at him.
“Hey,” he replied. “Ethan’s asleep?” As soon as the words left his mouth, he realized what a silly question it was.
“Yeah,” Anisa said. “It’s late.”
He nodded. “Yeah. You’re still up.”
She nodded.
“I just left DJ’s party. I was … I know it’s late.” He realized that he was practically stuttering. He cleared his throat. “I was thinking about you, so I thought I’d stop by … see if you were still awake.”
Anisa’s heart skipped. Her pulse started to pound so hard that she could feel it in her temples.
He was here to see her! She had been on his mind. All the time he’d been spending there over the past several weeks had seemed to be for Ethan’s benefit. But here he was. Ethan was fast asleep, and Born had come over anyway. She took off her glasses, set them and the book down on the table beside her, and slowly stood to her feet. She wondered what this was all about, what he had to say to her.
“You want to talk?” she asked.
Born shook his head no. He walked over to where she stood. Their faces were inches apart, he leaned down and kissed her softly. He saw the shocked expression on her face, and felt an unexpected fury overtake him. In that moment, he hated Jada for rejecting him. He had never been unfaithful to her—not once in all their years together. He was tired of being pushed aside. And he was well aware that Anisa would give anything for even one night in his arms. It made him feel good, knowing that someone still wanted him, even if it wasn’t the woman he truly loved.
He gripped her face in his large and powerful hands and kissed her like he meant it; his other hand fisted a handful of her hair and tugged at it roughly. Anisa didn’t mutter a protest. Instead, she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back with equal fervor. Her prayers had been answered at last.
3
SLEEPLESS NIGHT
Jada woke up in a panic. She had a terrible dream that she was being followed by a man dressed in black, though she hadn’t been able to see his face. The stranger had followed her down a dark and deserted road before trapping her in a blacked-out corner. Just as he drew near, she had awakened with a start. From the way that her heart was pounding, it took her several long and agonizing seconds before she could convince herself that she had been only dreaming. Breathlessly, she sat up in bed, and fumbled for her bedside lamp. She hugged her knees close to her chest and exhaled deeply. She thought of Sheldon, and got out of bed to check on him. Opening her bedroom door, she jumped in terror at the sight of a figure standing there. Her heart skipped a beat, and she nearly fell backward. Already shaken from the nightmare, a sense of fear and dread washed over her. Her pulse calmed only slightly when she saw that it was Sheldon standing there.
She shook her head, confused. “Why are you just standing there?” Her head whipped around and she looked at the clock. “It’s three in the morning. What are you doing up?”
He stared at her, frowning.
“I couldn’t sleep,” he said. “I saw your light on.”
Jada held her hand over her heart, willing herself to calm down. “Why didn’t you knock or say something?”
“I was just about to.” He stepped into the room. “What’s wrong with you?”
She trembled now, and grabbed a blanket off of her bed, and wrapped herself in it. “Nothing,” she said. “You just scared me.”
He stared at her silently for several long moments. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
Jada nodded. “It’s alright. Go back to bed. I’ll see you in the morning.”
Sheldon nodded, then turned and left. Jada stood staring at the closed bedroom door for a long time afterward. She couldn’t shake the eerie feeling that lingered there. She climbed back into bed, but left the light on. She turned on the TV, and sat wrapped in the blanket, lost in her thoughts. She didn’t sleep for the rest of the night.
* * *
Sunny was wide awake, though it was still dark outside the little window above the raggedy cot on which she lay. The sun had not yet risen, and the typically noisy facility where she was housed was oddly quiet at this time of morning. She had barely slept a wink at all, but spent most of the night lying awake thinking about the predicament she found herself in. Throughout the night, Sunny had come to terms with certain truths. First, that she had everything any woman could possibly dream of, and she had managed to fuck it all up. Also, that she was angry and disappointed—not just with bitchass Malcolm, but with herself. And to make the situation even worse, she finally admitted to herself—as she longed throughout the night for one good snort of cocaine—that she had an addiction. She had been in denial about that fact for far too long. But she was torturously fiending for a hit of coke, even as she was locked up for possession. Her cravings showed no signs of subsiding, and all through the night she’d tossed and turned—sleep evading her despite the fact that she was physically, emotionally, and mentally exhausted.
Sunny had cried in the dark as she thought about her life and the predicament she found herself in now. She had a beautiful daughter who was happy and healthy. The home they lived in was opulent and their lifestyle lush. She had money, fame, a career as a model at an age when most women are cast aside in the youth-obsessed beauty industry. She had every material thing that her heart desired. The only thing she didn’t have was Dorian, and the absence of him—the void that was left—had driven her back to the drug that had nearly destroyed her life in the first place. This time, her addiction had gotten her in more trouble than she could manage.
Sunny had dialed Malcolm’s office numerous times the previous day. Each time, his secretary insisted that he was in meetings and couldn’t be disturbed. His cell phone number had been changed. He had left her for dead, and gone back to life as if Sunny never existed.
“I might as well walk away from you now, while I still can.” Malcolm had said those words to her back in New York, before he convinced her to fly to Mexico with him. Sunny wished desperately that she had let him walk away.
He had never been the right man for her, and she had known it all along. She had pretended that their differences were no big deal, had forced herself to fit into his world. Jazz, ice-skating, ballroom dancing, golfing—she had experienced those things for the first time in her life while dating Malcolm. Malcolm was a starched, white-collar guy, who wore flip-flops on vacation. He was a cornball from the suburbs of Maryland. Sunny was a Brooklyn chick through and through. She saw so clearly now that it could never have worked out.
But this? She could never have imagined this. He had abandoned her. And Sunny vowed that she would make him pay for it.
* * *
Anisa woke up in Born’s arms the next morning and was so overcome with emotion that tears of joy pooled in her eyes. With her head resting on his chest, Born’s hand still cupped her ass as he snored softly. Anisa breathed in his scent and smiled. Born was back. Back in her home, in her bed, back in that place in her heart that she had never really allowed him to vacate in the first place. She wondered if the Hennessy she had smelled and tasted on his breath the night before had been the only thing that prompted this blissful reunion. She prayed that it wasn’t.