“When I was one-year-old, on my birthday my mom dropped me off at the orphanage. She told everyone that she was coming back for me. I always thought that was why I never got adopted. They knew my mom was coming back.”
She took another sip and held the mug hoping the heat would give her courage.
“The people who ran the orphanage did four birthday parties a year. This year one of the parties was going to be on my birthday. I was turning thirteen. I was a quiet kid, I stayed to myself, read and dreamed of when my mom would be back to get me. This party made me think that my life was going to get better. I was happy.
“There was a worker who hated me. I don’t know why, to this day I don’t understand why she didn’t like me. I guess I was having too much fun, laughing too loud. We didn’t get presents, but we did get cake and ice cream, and I was determined to enjoy my birthday.”
She could still see the dress the woman was wearing. It was ugly, but she never told her that she needed a style change.
“The woman started to laugh and then ask me what was so funny. Her voice was so loud that everyone turned to look at her. I mean, she said, I wouldn’t laugh if my mom was a whore who died at the hands of one of her johns.”
She stopped, the breath catching in her throat even as her heart was telling her to run with its frantic beat. She waited for the look of disgust on his face. When he sat still and waited, she finally continued.
“All the kids were staring at me now. The older ones started laughing and pointing. They called me names and the younger ones followed suit. When I got older, the boys would say ‘look, the daughter of the whore is too proud to do what her mama did.’ I even got physically abused because I wouldn’t do what they wanted. It wasn’t until I went to college that my life began to change.”
“Did you mourn your mom?”
She shook her head. “Not at first. I was so angry at her. How could walking the streets be more important than me? When I was in my second year of college, a woman saw me and called me Julie. She followed me when I tried to leave.” She caught her by the shoulder and stared at her.
“She stared at me so long that I thought the name calling was about to start again. Finally, she said you can’t be Julie, but you look just like her. I told her who I was, she hugged me and cried. We went to a small cafe, and she told me about my mom.
“My mom was eighteen when she got pregnant with me. Her parents threw her out of the house because they felt she was disgracing them. Then her love a.k.a. my asshole of a father left her. He didn’t want anything to do with her or me. My mom was on the streets pregnant. After she had me she tried to raise me, but we slept outside, and most days she couldn’t feed me anything except breast milk. So, as I kept getting older she finally took me to the orphanage. She did the only thing she could to make money. No one knows what happened. They say she was about to quit to come get me. All we know is that someone killed her.”
She drank the rest of her hot chocolate before putting the mug down.
“I wasn’t sure how to feel. In the end, I decided to be happy that my mom loved me enough to try.” She shrugged. No amount of angst or grief was going to change the past.
She tried to hide her yawn.
“Why don’t we lie down for a while.” He took her hand and helped her stand.
“Not many people know the story of my mom.”
“Thanks for sharing it with me.” They went into his bedroom.
“I swear I’ve never seen a bed as big as this.” She got on it and waited for him to join her. He pulled her close and her eyes closed. This was what it meant to feel safe.
Chapter Twelve
The loud pounding on the outer door woke her up with a start.
“We’re waiting downstairs for you.”
“Go away Phoenix.”
“Come eat, or face Quinn.” He growled before he turned and stomped down the stairs.
“That sounded like an order.”
“Ignore Phoenix, I do it all the time.”
“And Quinn?”
“She’s harder to ignore. Are you hungry?”
“What time is it?”
“Morning. You slept the rest of the day and all night.”
“You should have woken me.”
He leaned over and kissed her. It was slow and drugging. His tongue licked her lips until she opened. He devoured her making her body arch towards his. When the kiss was over, she forgot what she had been saying.
“You needed your rest. I figured you could eat in the morning. How do you feel?”
“Hungry.” She stretched feeling better than yesterday. “I feel like I have more energy.”
“Then we should go get you some breakfast.”
She went to wash her face and then came back to change her clothes before she looked at him ready to go downstairs and face his family.
He took her hand, and they left his rooms and walked down the staircase. She wondered who had the other floor on this side of the house.
“Brandi,” Quinn walked over to her and gave her a hug. “I’m so glad you’re here. Now there are two of us. There are days when I feel outnumbered.”
“Woman power.” She raised her fist, and Quinn bumped it. They laughed.
“Today we did what I call a power breakfast. We have omelets a few are filled with vegetables. Most of them are filled with meat.” She stopped to glare at the guys. “We also have grits. The guys will eat them, but they won’t eat oatmeal, go figure. Then, of course, we have meat as a side. There is toast if you want it. The guys feel it’s worthless food unless it’s part of a sandwich, or it’s on a pizza.”
“It all sounds good I’ll try a little of everything.” She sat at the table where there were two empty seats.
“Do you want toast?” Jabari asked her.
“Only if you share it with me.”
He gave her his dark and dangerous look. The one that made her stomach jump before it melted into a heated stare. That was the one he had given her before his head went back, and the muscles and veins in his neck stood out in stark clarity as she sucked on his cock. His arms had become stiff as his muscles jumped and his roar had rocked the car as he came in her mouth. She licked her lips.
Quinn was staring at her with a knowing smile on her face. Brandi felt flush and picked up her apple juice to hide her embarrassment.
“I’m working on a project downtown. The new smart building, so I’ll have to leave soon.”
“I can’t wait to get a look inside.” She stopped talking and stared at her plate. “I’m sure it will be great since you’re working on it.”
She reached out, and Jabari was reaching for her. She held his hand tight until she could smile again.
“What about the backyard?”
“We’re doing that on the weekend. The crew is grateful for the extra money. I say we have about six more Saturdays and a few Sundays, and the job will be done.”
“I can’t wait to see it.” She started eating letting the conversation flow around her. When they were done, she pitched in and helped with cleaning the kitchen.
“Brandi, would you mind if I examined you and Fie?”
She gave Mekhi a smile. “I would appreciate it.”
Maybe he would find something the other doctors hadn’t. She cautioned herself not to get her hopes up. It was too hard to recover when you realized your diagnosis hadn’t changed.
“I’m going to see Quinn off first.”
She had to smile. Quinn was so small, and he looked like a huge shadow behind her making sure nothing happened to her.
“We’ll be in the basement,” Jabari told him. He went to the freezer and took out a large bag filled with freezer bags. He handed it to Slade before he left the room and came back with Fie.
“Mekhi has space downstairs where he treats us.” He took her hand and led her down, followed by his brothers. They walked over to a large room that was bright. As far as offices went it was nice.
She sat on a cha
ir and watched as Slade placed the freezer bag on a long table.
“What do you have?” Mekhi asked as he walked in.
“Someone entered Brandi’s condo when we were out. They left this in the corner under her rug.”
“How did you find it?” Slade asked.
“Fie showed me where it was.”
“Thanks, Fie. I love you so much.” She gave him rubs and then kissed him as he squirmed in her arms until he found his way to her shoulder.
“We forgot to feed him last night.”
“I fed him, and Fie knows you were tired and needed your sleep.”
She hugged her cat close. Jabari took the freezer bags off one layer at a time until she could see a cocoon with hairy black legs coming out of it.
“These are Romulan beetles.”
“Why would someone leave a beetle at my place?”
His brothers turned to look at her.
“These beetles aren’t from earth.”
“Oh. That makes even less sense.”
Jabari went to sit next to her before he swept her up and placed her on his lap.
“Something's in the world kill. These kill painfully. They burrow deep inside your body and eat your organs.”
Her body was shivering even as her head was shaking. What was happening? She was already dying who could want her dead faster?
Mekhi pulled out a burner and lit it. She was tense as the fire jumped up like it was greedy for something to burn. He opened the bag and poured the beetles into the flame. The screeching as they burned hurt her ears. The smell was something she would always remember. Then he melted the plastic bag until it was nothing but a clump.
“If even one of them got loose, the earth would be in danger. They multiply by splitting in half. And they would eat through every warm bodied creature on this planet.”
“Why does someone want me dead so badly that they would risk the world to kill me?”
“I wish I knew.”
“Can I examine Fie?”
She nodded and let Mekhi take him. She had still been holding him. He sat on the table like a good boy, and she grinned at him.
“Can you neuter him, or should I take him to a vet?” There were six indrawn breaths.
“Don’t get sensitive. I’m not doing it to be mean.”
“You can’t neuter him.” Mekhi told her.
“Is he going to die?” That’s what the vet told her, but he was looking so much better now. She wanted him to live even if she couldn’t.
“No, he will live.”
“Brandi, Fie is a special cat. I know this planet neuters them, and I agree. Fie, on the other hand, is a cat you don’t want to neuter.” Jabari said.
“But why?”
“Do you trust me?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t have him neutered.”
“All right, but you have to take care of him.”
“I will.”
She couldn’t stand the thought of her cat being hurt any more than he had been. Maybe she should have pushed, but this was one fight she didn’t want to win.
There was a loud roar before a tiger strode into the room. She screamed and tried to get out of Jabari’s arms.
“It’s just Tee.”
“I know Tee, and that’s not her.”
“We seem to attract special cats.”
Tee hissed at Fie and faked a pounce.
“My baby!”
Fie went up on his back legs and hissed. The sound was deadly. Tee switched forms and jumped up on the table. They walked around each other before Tee butted him with her head. Fie rubbed against her. She jumped down, and he followed.
“What just happened?”
“Long story, I’ll tell you all about it later.”
“She turned into a tiger right and then a cat? I didn’t imagine that?”
“No, she does that. Unless you’re the enemy, she’s friendly.”
“I don’t think she likes me.”
“She does, believe me. Now it’s your turn to get up on the table.” Mekhi wiped it down.
“Maybe you can save me like you saved Fie.” She joked.
Mekhi took her vitals before having her lay back. He placed a clear material over her that acted like a scanner.
“Can you really see inside my body using this?”
“I can.”
“What do you see?”
“I see life but a thousand times faster than normal. Your organs are breaking down too fast. Even though they are repairing themselves at faster than normal speeds, the decomposition is beginning to win.”
“That’s what Dr. Herman said. It’s some new disease.”
“No, it isn’t. Whatever is doing this is alien to this planet.”
“How can you be sure? Do you know what it is?”
“I can’t be a hundred percent sure because I don’t know how your species came to inhabit the planet.”
“We have two theories. One is evolution.”
“Which I would believe if I saw it still happening today.”
“The other is a supreme being, God.” She always bought into the belief in a God. It was something she kept to herself, but she believed.
“That’s the problem.”
“Why?”
“It means I can’t be sure this planet is your origin, and I don’t know what organisms were once native to this planet or another you may have come from. If I believe that you were created on this planet, and it’s been as viable as it is now from the time of your creation, then I have to believe that whatever has infiltrated your system is not from this planet.”
“Why can’t you see it?”
Mekhi looked at Jabari, there was sadness in his eyes.
“Some organisms can mask their presence. Unless you know what you’re looking for you won’t find them.”
“Bottom line, I’m dying.”
“Yes.”
Chapter Thirteen
“You’re quiet.”
“I’m getting my affairs in order. I have an order for a gown to be worn on the red carpet by an up-and-coming actress. I would like to finish it before I die. Someone else will have to make it, but at least the design will be finished if she decides to wear it.”
She was sitting on the couch in his living room. There were things she’d like to change, but she wouldn’t be here long enough for that. She got up and went to the room that would be her studio.
“I need the easel and chair from my office.”
“Can we get you new ones? I’d like to have everything in your apartment destroyed to make sure we don’t miss any alien bugs.”
“I want three things from my place. There are pictures of Piper and me on the walls, I want those. In my closet is a purple evening gown.” She held up her phone and showed him a picture of it. “On my dresser is a small gold locket. In it is a picture of my mother and one of me. Do whatever you have to with everything else; I'll be leaving it all behind anyway.”
“Do you want to come?”
She shook her head. The last thing she needed to see was her possessions go up in smoke. “I’ll stay here if it’s not a problem.”
“This is your home now.”
She nodded and walked into the den. Should she go back to him and assure him everything was right in her world? Sure, she should, but she couldn’t. Her life was ending, and it wouldn’t be in a bed surrounded by her family.
Her body would still be young and wanting to live life when the end came for her. So, he’d have to give her some breathing room because she needed to mourn.
“Explore, all I ask is that you stay away from the other wing of the house until you're invited over.”
“I will.”
He left leaving her alone with her thoughts. Sad laughter filled the room. She was alone the very thing she asked for and the last thing she wanted. Fie came in and jumped into her arms snuggling against her neck.
“I’m a mass of contradictions. I don’t know what I want.” She held
him close for a long time before she put him down and stood up. “I’m becoming fond of the old saying; I can rest when I’m dead.”
She went into the bedroom and found a pair of tennis shoes and a sweater with big pockets.
“I need to buy an easel and a chair.” Her cat meowed at her. “I can’t do that Fie stores frown upon it.”
Did she really care? What would they do, send her to jail? Maybe… Did the send the dying to jail?
“Okay, you win.” He jumped up in her arms.
They went to find the steps. Right next to them was a small bend.
“Let’s see what’s in the corner.” Her mouth hung open when she saw the elevator. “I wonder why he didn’t tell me about this?”
She shook her head. He still wasn’t convinced she was dying. Hell, that hurt. Not because he didn’t want her to die but because his pain would be greater when she did.
“He doesn’t want to lose me Fie. I am both humbled and grateful.” She pushed the button getting on when it arrived.
The dials read 3, 2, 1, M, B, C.
“What do you think C means?” He purred at her. “Yeah, I don’t know either.” She pushed the button and laughed. It was funny, but she really thought she could understand her cat.
“I’m going crazy Fie.” He rubbed against her with a deep purr. “No, really I am. I keep thinking you’re talking to me. It has to be a side effect of this alien disease killing me.”
The doors opened, and she found herself pressed against the wall of the elevator. She needed to ground herself to believe what she was seeing.
“Please tell me you see this?” She walked out of the elevators into a garage filled with cars. “There have to be around fifty vehicles here. And that doesn’t count the ones they have sitting outside. How many cars do six brothers and one female need?”
Quinn had a truck. A brand new one, she said her older one got into an accident.
Fie rubbed against her neck. “That’s a bad idea. We should call an Uber. They might be upset if we take a car. True, we could take one of the least expensive ones. Is that an Alfa Romeo?”
It was jet black. She could see herself on the highway, windows open braids blowing in the breeze. Damn, just thinking about it made her horny. It had to be the sickness, right? The thought of driving fast and free then pulling over and devouring Jabari didn’t make sense, did it? Her body was buzzing from the thought.
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