Everyone lifted their glass in a toast as they all looked toward Marc with warmth.
“And to my wife. You have proven to me that there is nothing but truth in the statement that behind every successful man there stands a good woman,” Marc said, staring down into her upturned face. “I love and appreciate you for anything and everything you have done to make my life complete.”
Jessa rose to her feet in a strapless red dress and wrapped her arms around Marc’s neck to kiss him passionately. His hands went to her waist before sliding around her completely to hold her body closely to his as they both moaned in pleasure.
“Hey, get a room, you two,” Kingston said jokingly as their kiss lengthened.
“O-kay,” Aria drawled playfully right along with him.
Jessa laughed huskily as she leaned back in her husband’s tight embrace and looked up at him. “We almost put on a show, huh?” she teased Marc.
He winked at her as they took their seats.
“Well, congratulations, Marc. I’m sure I speak for everyone when I tell you how proud of you we are,” Eric said, raising his glass. “Cheers.”
Everyone did the same. “Cheers.”
Two waiters came with trays carrying their dinners.
“I am starving. I skipped lunch today,” Renee said as her steaming bowl of paella was set before her.
Jackson side-eyed her before digging into his own plate of paella. “Okay, Mrs. Corporate America, Rome was not built in one day,” he said to her, a hint of sarcasm evident in his voice.
Renee paused. “Actually, I missed lunch to attend the parent-teacher conference for our child. You know…the one you couldn’t make it to, Mr. Corporate America,” she returned smoothly.
“Okay, you two, down there,” Jaime said, with a nervous smile.
When it came to discussing Renee’s career, the couple could go from happy to hell in no time at all.
“Oh, no, no, no we’re cool,” Renee said before tasting her food. “Just making sure he understands that I do what he does plus more.”
“I guess if you could screw my dick off and let that swing between your legs you’d really be a superwoman,” Jackson returned coldly.
“Jackson, man, I do not need that image, and I’m eating stuffed sausages,” Kingston quipped, trying to lighten the mood.
It worked.
Everyone laughed.
“You’re right,” Jackson said with a nod as he looked to his friend. “My apologies.”
“No worries, Jackson,” Marc said genuinely.
Aria covered her husband’s hand with her own. “I married Kingston for his sense of humor,” she quipped. “Among other things.”
“I thought we agreed not to discuss…things?” Eric asked.
Everyone groaned and laughed, but the mood had definitely switched back to one of a laid-back atmosphere of easygoing conversation.
“I just want to say that nights like these, when the eight of us are together, are the best,” Jessa said in her husky tone as she eyed her friends. “I can only hope that we all have many more good times ahead of us.”
Aria shook herself to free her thoughts of the memory of one of many couples nights they all shared together. Card parties. Cookouts. Just nights sitting on someone’s deck or porch talking or joking. Joint vacations. The whole nine. Their lives—all of their lives—had become intertwined.
She turned and looked up at Jessa’s house. “The secrets that house holds. If those walls could talk,” she said aloud, more to herself than anyone as she shook her head.
She felt Renee and Jaime walk up to stand beside her on the sidewalk.
“Jessa betrayed one of us, and one of our husbands also betrayed Marc. I mean, we all were friends—especially Eric,” Aria said, still thinking out loud.
“What do you mean, especially Eric?” Jaime asked with attitude.
Aria leaned back from the hostility she saw in Jaime’s eyes. “We all got the text, so every last one of our husbands is suspect. Don’t you think?” she snapped back.
“I think the only husband you need to focus on is Kingston,” Jaime countered.
“That’s cool, but don’t you overlook your husband either, Boo.”
Jaime crossed her arms over her chest and eyed Aria up and down. “You know what? Let’s get to the real, Aria. Friend or not, you have a problem with me.”
“I sure do when you’re on your Pollyanna perfection crap.” Aria threw her hands up in the air. “One day reality is going to set in on your ass and you might go crazy.”
Jaime didn’t say anything at first as she maintained her calm and simply smoothed her hand over her hair as she eyed Aria. “You don’t know anything about my marriage,” she said in a cool voice.
Aria stomped her feet and pointed her finger accusingly at Jaime. “Oh, my God, you just did it. You just took a sec to put on that Calm, Cool, Collected bullshit when you know damn well your ass is mad as hell on the inside, you nut.”
“You really need to get more of that hood out of you.” Jaime sighed dismissively.
Aria made a fist and stepped forward.
“No, Aria!” Renee screamed, stepping between them. “I let this go on long enough. Why are you two turning on each other?”
“I don’t need this bullshit.” Aria turned to walk away.
“No, what you need is etiquette training,” Jaime called out over Renee’s shoulder.
Aria froze. Paused. Turned. Locked eyes with Jaime. “So you think Eric is better than Kingston? There’s no chance in hell it’s your husband. There’s no way in hell it’s your marriage being destroyed. You think you’re above being cheated. Does your pussy shoot sparks or some shit? What the fuck make you so special, Polly-fucking-Anna?”
Renee turned to face Aria. “Aria, don’t,” she warned with a stern eye.
Jaime cocked her head to the side and eyed Aria up and down. “If it makes me Pollyanna because I’m not immediately taking the word of someone else above my husband’s, then so be it.”
“You are so full of shit, Jaime,” Aria said, walking up.
“Don’t take your anger out on me because you think your best friend stole your husband.”
Whap!
Aria’s hand stung from reaching beyond Renee and slapping the hell out of Jaime. She didn’t plan it. She didn’t mean to. She didn’t even realize what she was going to do until her hand landed across Jaime’s face. “Jaime, I’m sor—”
Whap!
Aria gasped and her mouth fell open after Jaime soundly slapped her back.
Renee pushed her hands into both of their chests. “Are you two kidding me right now?” she roared. “Calm your asses down.”
Aria wanted so badly to crawl right over Renee and beat Jaime’s ass like she stole something precious.
“This is all Jessa’s doing, so why in the hell are you two turning on each other like this?” Renee asked, looking between the two of them. “If anything, we need each other more than ever. Come on, ladies, put on your big-girl panties. Come on, pull ’em up.”
That old Aria from the Bricks wanted to wear Jaime’s ass out, but the Aria she was today was mindful of the scene they were making on the streets of the upper-middle-class subdivision. “I shouldn’t have hit you first and for that, I apologize, Jaime.”
Jaime nodded even as she continued to rub her reddening cheek. “And I apologize for that slick comment…but not for slapping you back.”
Aria actually smiled. “I didn’t know you had it in you, Bougie,” she joked.
Jaime smiled. “I didn’t either,” she admitted.
“Now that you two done found some sense,” Renee began as she turned back to face Jessa’s house, “do you think Jessa told one of our neighbors where she moved to? I mean someone has to know, right?”
Aria shook her head. “I doubt it. She would’ve been scared someone was going to tell us,” she said, bending down to pick up the purse she dropped when she was about to spot Jaime’s eye. In truth, she
still thought Jaime was full of shit, but more than giving her a big dose of reality, right now she knew their focus had to be on bigger and worse things.
But God, it felt good to slap the hell out of her, she thought, even if Jaime did get some get-back.
“I was just thinking about when we went to the Fiesta the night Marc got promoted,” Aria told them.
“You’re right about what you said, though,” Renee said. “We all were friends. I mean, what would Marc say right now? How could they do something so low-down?”
“Because they are low-down,” Jaime added. “Creeping with the widow of your friend? There are some lines you just don’t cross.”
“Maybe they really love each other,” Aria said, pain at the thought of that radiating across her chest.
Both Jaime and Renee turned their heads to look at her.
“What?” Aria asked. “If Jessa is being straight up, not only did one of the men cheat with her, he is leaving to be with her.”
“Trust me, I know Eric is not leaving me,” Jaime said. “We’ve been through—”
Aria cut her eyes at Renee as Jaime shut her mouth and swallowed back the rest of her words. Been through what, Pollyanna? she wondered, fighting the urge to voice her thoughts. Humph.
She saw the worried look on Renee’s face and knew she was thinking of that conversation Jackson wanted to have. “Hey, regardless of who it is, we have to remember that Jessa might be doing us a favor taking a dog off our hands. Let her fight those fleas. Life is all about a cycle, and people always get it as good as they gave it. Trust and believe that.”
Renee wanted—needed—to talk to her husband and/or Jessa Bell. Period. That was all to it. The combination of the alcohol and her emotions was wearing her down. “Does anyone know the company where they chartered the boat or the harbor they left out of?” she asked.
“Shee-it. I wish, because the way I feel, I would charter another boat and go and get they ass out of the sea, baby. Believe that,” Aria said.
Jaime shook her head. “I never thought to ask for that information.”
Renee felt like she needed another drink, but the effects of the liquor she already had were kicking in. She felt relaxed and mellow and weepy. She felt a surge of tears but blinked them away. “They’re in the sea but I feel like our asses are the ones up a creek without a paddle.”
“Listen, there’s nothing we can do until the men show up. Why are we letting this foolishness stop our lives, especially when we have no clue who should be upset?” Jaime tried to reason.
“So what do you suggest, Jaime, that we all go home and pretend or hope it’s not us?” Aria asked.
Renee felt her head spin and she forced herself to stand still while she got her bearings. “Well, it’s not going to make me that much more happy to find out that Jessa betrayed either one of you and not me. This woman was all of our friends, and as far as I’m concerned, it could have been me just as well as you—and that pisses me off that she would do this to any of us.”
“I didn’t say I didn’t care or that I hope it’s not me,” Jaime stressed. “I’m just saying that this is what Jessa wanted or she wouldn’t have sent the text to all of us. She wanted us all to second-guess our marriages and ourselves.”
“True,” Aria agreed.
Renee walked to sit on Jessa’s front stoop. She dropped her head between her knees. “What made me think I could handle Patrón?” she moaned.
“Sit still. I’m going to make you a cup of coffee,” Jaime offered, turning to walk the short distance to her house.
“You okay, Renee?” Aria asked.
Renee lifted her head and nodded before she wiped her face with her hands. “Just a little tipsy, but with all this shit going on, I wish I was tore up,” she admitted with pure honesty.
“No, they ain’t worth that. The last thing Kieran and Aaron need is a drunk for a mama,” Aria told her, squatting down beside her to rub her back.
Renee turned to look up the street at her own home. “I can’t lose my family, Aria. I won’t. I can’t,” she said in a whisper. “Jackson and I have been together since college. I grew up with this man, you know? I learned how to cook and to fuck and to keep house and all of that with him. What am I without him?” Renee admitted her fears to her friend and herself.
Jaime dropped her keys and purse on the marble counter of her kitchen before she grabbed a bottle of Starbucks mocha Frappuccino from the fridge and poured it into a cup to heat in their steel microwave. The stuff was liquid crack and just what Renee needed to sober up.
She pushed her hair behind her ears, exposing her three-carat diamond studs, as she fought not to let her emotions push her to strike out in anger like Aria or drink like Renee.
Truth was, she had always held out hope that ultimately Eric loved her, because he could have easily divorced her and kicked her out without it costing him a red cent—and truly she still was waiting for that moment to come.
But she still felt like he had to have some love for her because he never left and he never asked her to leave. She swore there had to be some authenticity to the affection and devotion he bestowed upon her in public. Surely he wasn’t faking all of that….
“How do I look, Eric?” Jaime asked him as he strode into their bedroom suite.
He didn’t break his stride to the dresser or even look in her direction. He didn’t say one word as he began to search the drawers for something.
Jaime walked up to him and lightly touched his shoulder. “Eric, I said how do I look?” she said with insistence.
He turned and stared at her stoically, still saying nothing.
Jaime stepped back from him. “Eric, we’re having a dinner party—”
He brushed past her and left the room, leaving nothing but his cold dismissal to surround her.
Ding-dong.
Jaime blinked away the tears she felt building and double-checked her appearance in the mirror. Although her hair was perfectly glossy and straight as it flowed like Pocahontas’s down her back, her MAC make-up flawlessly applied, and the deep purple satin sheath she wore fitted impeccably, Jaime knew it was all a facade.
Ding-dong.
Taking a deep breath, she left the room and made her way downstairs. Eric was already standing at the door, waiting for her to reach his side so that they could greet their guests together.
He opened the door and they both placed on perfectly lying smiles as their first guests arrived. His parents, Mr. and Mrs. Hall, stepped inside the foyer.
Jaime’s smile became genuine as her mother-in-law removed her coat and double kissed Jaime’s cheek. “Something smells good.”
“Jaime made her homemade lasagna and a Sock it To Me cake, Ma,” Eric said, taking their coats.
“Hello, son, and there’s my beautiful daughter-in-law,” Harrison Hall said, tall and distinguished and every bit the image of a judge.
“Hi, Dad,” Jaime said, accepting a warm hug from him.
Eric slid his arm around her waist and it felt foreign to her.
“I tell her all the time how lucky I am to have her, Dad,” Eric said with warmth before leaning down to kiss the corner of Jaime’s mouth.
Jaime leaned into him and placed her hand on his chest. “I’m the lucky one,” she said, looking up into his eyes.
“Don’t they make a beautiful couple,” his mother sighed. “And their babies are going to be something.”
“Soon, Ma,” Eric said, easing his arm around to massage Jaime’s stomach.
Jaime thought of her body filled with their child, and love exploded in her heart for him.
Ding-dong.
His parents moved on into the living room.
“We would have beautiful children, Eric,” she said, resting her head on his shoulder.
He gently shook her off. “Please. You actually think I would fuck you without a condom?” he said brutally.
Jaime felt pain fill her eyes and she looked away from him, wanting badly to move away from
him. But his arm locked like steel around her waist as he opened the door and greeted more spectators to the show they were putting on….
Beep. Beep. Beep.
The sound of the microwave brought her out of her memories. As she searched for the lid to the cup, Jaime knew that as much as she could hope was that the true facade was Eric pretending to hate her. But no one was that good an actor.
She carried the coffee outside and down the street to where Aria and Renee were still sitting on Jessa’s steps. “Drink this,” she said, handing it to Renee.
“Thanks, Jaime. I need it.”
“I’m gonna head back home,” Jaime told them, really just wanting to be alone with her thoughts.
“I guess we should too,” Aria agreed. “For one, I’m going to play Inspector Gadget and see if I can find some clues on whether I need to whup up on Kingston.”
Renee sipped the coffee and nodded. “I think we all should do that. And please, if one of us finds something, let’s promise to call the other two,” she said, rising to her feet.
Jaime nodded. “I will.”
“For sure, Renee. For sure.”
JESSA
Our new home. Well, almost our new home, truth be told. My Realtor was the shit because we were leasing this house until my home in Richmond Hills was sold. That would free up the capital to purchase our dream home. I loved it and I would love being in it with him even more. As I walked through each room of the three-thousand-square-foot house, I couldn’t wait to start making memories together. A smile of pure pleasure and satisfaction covered my face. Our day was finally here.
I checked my watch. It was just 2:00 P.M. He’d promised they would be back from the fishing trip around seven or eight and he was coming straight home. To me. His one and only love.
I took a deep and satisfying sip of wine. All of the furniture had been brought in and set up by the movers. The boxes were neatly stacked in their appropriate rooms for us to unpack tomorrow…together.
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