by D. L. Sparks
“So you gon’ answer me or what?”
I nodded as I moved slowly toward him.
I ran my hands up arms uncrossing them and resting my hands on his chest. I stood on my toes as I kissed his neck. His hand slid up my thigh and rested on the small of my back.
When I felt his body relax, I took his hand and led him upstairs to the bedroom.
Linc sat on the edge of the bed, watching, while I allowed my clothes to fall to the floor. The only time he took his eyes off my body was when he pulled his shirt over his head. I licked my lips and bit my bottom lip as I reached behind me and undid my bra, letting it fall to the floor. I moved forward into his embrace, skin against skin. He sucked one of my nipples into his mouth, moistening it before gently blowing on it, causing it to reach out to him. A moan rumbled in my throat as he called the other one to attention.
I looked down and watched him draw circles around my nipples with his tongue as I reached down and undid his pants. Once they were completely off, I laid him back on the bed. I held him in my hand and slowly began stroking him until I felt him begin to swell in my hand, and a groan escaped his lips.
“Put it in your mouth,” he instructed.
“Yes, baby.”
I did what he wanted and sucked him into my mouth.
“Like that, baby?”
“Yeah ... just like that.”
He moaned and I felt his hips move as I licked and sucked the head while I stroked him. His hands made their way to the back of my head as I sucked all of him into my mouth.
I moved slowly at first. Making sure I was able to take him all in without gagging. Then I let him work his hips and use my mouth for his pleasure.
I squeezed the base of his penis with my thumb and forefinger, making sure his pleasure lasted. I massaged the underside of the shaft of his penis, feeling the huge vein throb against my tongue.
“Mmm ... you taste so good.”
He reached for me. “Come here.”
I crawled up his body until my center was directly over his. He sat up and sucked my nipples into his mouth as his hand moved between my legs. I felt his fingers enter me as I reached between us and began stroking him. As I straddled his thighs, I moved my hips against the rhythm of his fingers as we stroked each other.
It wasn’t long before his hands were on my waist and he was lifting me up, guiding me down onto his waiting shaft. I couldn’t stop the moan that rose and escaped from my throat as he opened me up.
He pulled me close and I wrapped my legs around him. He sucked on my neck as we rocked like that for a few minutes before he lay down and let me take over.
I worked my hips in small circles, watching him as he looked up at me, enjoying his show. He reached around and smacked my ass, and my rhythm picked up some speed.
“Yeah, girl, you know how I like it. Work that ass.”
Sweat ran down my body onto his as he grabbed my waist and began thrusting his hips upward, causing me to cry out. I held on to the headboard and rode him faster.
“Uh! You ... gon’ ... make ... me ... cum,” he said, his breathing ragged.
Just then my eyes snapped open and I stared, emotionless, at the wall in front of me.
That’s exactly what I’m trying to do, I thought.
I placed my hands on his chest and moved up and down on him. I was so wet; the sounds of my body filled the room.
I teased him—pulling him out, all the way to the tip, and then taking him all back in. I did that, over and over again, until I felt his hands grip my waist.
“Cum for me, baby,” I whispered.
When I felt his body tense, I hopped off him, slid down his body, and took him in my hand. I worked him up and down. I licked and sucked his tip as he cried out. I felt him throbbing and twitching as he came; his warm seed spilled out onto my hand.
I got up and went into the bathroom for a towel to clean up. I turned the water on in the shower and let it run as I looked at the woman staring back at me in the mirror. Tried to justify the things she’d done in the name of love and family.
When I realized I couldn’t, I climbed under the streaming water.
You do what you have to do, I thought.
I cleaned up and brushed my teeth. After brushing my hair back into a ponytail, I climbed into bed. Linc was already half asleep, but he pulled me close to him as soon as he felt my body next to his.
“You know I was thinking about something,” I started.
He reached up and rubbed my hair. “What’s that?”
“There’s a lot going on and I can’t focus right now, with Grammie being sick and you working on this case.” I took a deep breath. “What if we pushed the date back for the wedding? Just for a little while.”
He got quiet and I held my breath.
Held it so long that my lungs began to burn.
“Nah, date stays the same.” He grabbed his phone and silenced the ringing, officially dismissing me.
“I mean, don’t you think it would make sense—”
“Drop it. The date stays the same,” he said, cutting me off. “Oh and Idalis.”
“Yes.”
“Don’t get Trip fucked up.”
My eyes went to the ceiling, and got lost in the fan’s movement.
Became hypnotized by its smooth rotation.
I lay there, trying to find comfort in the midst of chaos.
Is that even possible? I asked myself.
I guess anything is possible, when you have control over nothing.
Chapter Eight
Trip
I slid the plastic key into the door to my rented home and took a deep breath. The suite at the W definitely wasn’t my house back in New Orleans, but until this case was complete, it was home for now.
I tossed the files I had in my hand onto the glass coffee table before heading toward the bathroom. I was in desperate need of a hot shower. I opened the glass door and turned the knob. The marble-and-glass room quickly started to fill with steam as I pulled off my clothes. The Velcro from my vest cut into the silence of the room as I tossed it to the floor.
As much as I hated to admit it, my mind was on Idalis. We had history—a history that no one would understand but us. Hell, she was my first kiss. I smiled at the memory of us hiding under the back steps of her grandmother’s house. We were only seven years old. I remember how she tried to act like she wasn’t scared, but from the way she was shaking, I could tell she was just as nervous as I was. It was just a peck, but I remember walking away, feeling like I’d just become a man.
I also remembered how Idalis used to help me hide the bruises from the fights with my father with the makeup she would sneak from her mom’s room.
“He gon’ get his one day, Trip. You just watch,” she would always say as she gently applied the tacky mixture to my bruised skin.
I turned the water on in the fancy sink, bent down, and splashed some water on my face before pulling my locs back in preparation for my shower. I looked up into the mirror. Stared at the man staring back at me. I tried to see past him—didn’t want to see him—but I couldn’t escape him.
It was my father.
I saw him in my hazel eyes, in the hardness of my jaw line. I’d even inherited his long eyelashes. It was his face. I was becoming him.
Everyone always told me that I looked just like him, and I fought hard to reject that my entire life. Always insisting that I looked like my mother. I didn’t want to give that asshole credit for anything. He didn’t deserve shit but the dirt resting on top of him.
I closed my eyes against the memory, but it hit me like a runaway train.
I was ten years old when I was awakened by my mother’s scream. She was cowering in the corner of the bed that rested against the dark wall. My mom, my little sister, and I were all crammed into a twin-sized bed in a small bedroom on the second floor of my grandmother’s house. My little sister was huddled with her in the corner. She was clinging to her nightgown, with eyes wide as saucers. I was at
the foot of the bed.
I felt my mom’s hand on my leg. “It’s okay,” she whispered.
All of a sudden my dad’s voice came booming through the room. He was screaming at my mother, accusing her of sleeping around. I could tell he was drunk. He smelled of liquor and cigarette smoke. He was probably high off some weed or something, but I wouldn’t have known the difference. The screams that escaped my mother’s lips were due to the crutch that he was using to beat her.
“I swear to you, I didn’t,” she cried, barely above a whisper. She pressed her body closer to the wall. Tried to sink into it. Holding my sister, trying to shield her. I Stayed under the covers. Pulled them farther over my head. I didn’t raise my head, only craned my neck enough to see my mother’s face. The light from the hallway was falling across the bed; she had a look of terror in her eyes. It was a look I’d seen many times before.
He swung his weapon of choice again, this time catching her on her leg and clipping my foot. I scrambled to the head of the bed, ready to protect my mother with my tiny body. He looked at me and scowled, ready to challenge me as always, but the crutch broke from that last blow. I could hear the wood crack and the pieces hit the hardwood floor.
He threw what was left of the shattered wood to the floor. The crutch was my uncle’s. He had had a motorcycle accident and had broken his leg a couple months before. The crutches were still around the house. He turned and walked out of the room. He was mumbling and calling my mother every name but what her mother had given her. I heard the change in his pocket jingling along with the keys in his hand as he stumbled out of the room and down the steps.
My mother looked tired, worn, and much older than her license said. The tears ran down her face as she sobbed in the corner. After hearing the front door slam shut downstairs, my mother slid out of the bed, hobbled on her bruised legs, and padded to the bedroom door. She leaned against the door frame for a second; I guess she was making sure he was really gone.
Her thin nightgown clung to her sweaty body. Her breathing was ragged and fast. She slipped out of the room into the hallway and then down the stairs. I heard the locks click and the chain rattle on the front door as she did everything she could to lock out her attacker. To lock out my father. My mother limped back in the room and crawled into bed. She grimaced out of pain and sucked in air. She stretched out next to my sister and me. And we all lay there until the sun rose pretending to be asleep, and praying he didn’t return.
It’s amazing how your mother’s influence molds you. When you are in the womb, your mother’s actions and movements influence your movements and sleep patterns. When you’re born, you are trained that daytime is for waking and nighttime is for sleeping. That, too, is by your mother. As you grow, your parents teach you a lot about manners, rules, and how to act in public. But it’s the unconscious things they teach you that seem to take hold of you like a pissed-off pit bull that refuses to let go.
I believe that you are taught to be the person you eventually grow up to be by watching your parents. Girls learn how to be a woman by watching their mothers; they also learn what to look for in a husband or a boyfriend by what they are exposed to by their father. Boys learn what to look for in a wife or a girlfriend from their mothers, but more importantly they learn from their fathers how to be a man and a father. So, inevitably, if something is wrong with the equation, then a person is involuntarily set up for a life that is way harder than it has to be.
My father taught me an important lesson.
Not just how to be a man, but how to be a better man than him.
The bruises. The black eyes. The trips to my aunt’s that always lasted longer than they were supposed to. Everyone wanted to blame the drinking and the drugs, but I refused to give him a cop-out.
He made a choice, and it was the wrong one.
I made up in my mind I was never gonna treat a woman that way. The way I was prepared to protect my mother that night—as a man—I would always be prepared to protect. I guess that’s what drove me to the force, and for whatever reason held me on the force.
I was compelled to protect those who couldn’t protect themselves.
After my shower I dried off and stretched across the rented bed and tried to will myself to sleep, but my mind wouldn’t stop. I checked the clock, and the restaurant downstairs, Savu, was already closed. I got up and got the files off the coffee table and sat down on the couch. I spread the evidence and files out in front of me like puzzle pieces.
I picked up the picture from the latest crime scene. The only thing more disturbing than the scenes themselves was how clean they were. No prints, no trace, nothing. The girl’s twisted body lay peacefully. Outside of her throat being slashed, it appeared she was sleeping. I stared at her face, peaceful and beautiful. Guilt washed over me for a moment.
I couldn’t protect her.
I placed the picture back inside the folder and dialed my sister.
I could tell I’d woken her up, but I didn’t care. “Get up. I can’t sleep.”
She yawned. “Ooh! I hate you.” I heard her moving around. “What’s up with you?”
“Sitting here, going through these case files.”
“Man, that shit’ll give you nightmares,” she said.
She had no idea how true that was. “So how’s work?” I asked, trying to change the subject.
“It’s work. Dealing with the public ain’t easy.”
I chuckled. “Who you telling?”
“We miss having you around. Especially Mama.”
“I know, Trin. But I needed a change.”
“So what made you come to that conclusion? You’re all the way over there with no family, and you can’t hold down a relationship longer than six months.”
I kept telling myself that she meant well, which was the only thing that was saving her from getting cussed out.
“Just let it go, Trinity.”
“I will, when you answer me this. Was it Pops or Idalis?”
Hearing both of those insinuations was a blow that I wasn’t ready for. “It was time for me to move on. That’s all.”
“Come on, Trip, this is me. I was there, remember? And I know how you felt when Idalis got engaged too.”
I reached up and pulled the tie out of my locs and leaned back on the couch. She was right. Through it all, Trinity had been there for me. She had been there through all the fights that I had with my dad—both the verbal and physical sparring, all in the name of protecting her and my mother.
Even when I went to college, and swore I’d never come back to that house as long as he was there, she made sure to come by the dorm and keep me updated on what was going on in the house. The older Dad got, the less violent he became physically, but that hadn’t stopped the verbal abuse, which he still inflicted on them. The fact that my mother had refused to leave him left a bitter taste in my mouth, and it wasn’t something that I could let go of, just like that.
“You know there was nothing you could’ve done, right? That’s how their generation is Trip. They stand true to that ‘death do us part’.”
“I know.”
“So why are you punishing yourself and for that matter everyone around you?”
I sighed. “I’m not, Trin. Damn, would you stop trying to fix me.”
“Trip, Pops checked out of our lives long before he died, and you’ve been plugging that hole with the wrong things. You gotta let go of your anger. Because at the end of the day—in spite of him—we both made it. You made it. It’s like you’re still trying to prove something to him.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Then move back. Mama needs you. I miss you.”
I rubbed my temple. “Can we talk about this after I close this case?”
She let out a hard sigh. “Whatever. Bye.”
Just like that, she hung up on me.
I shook my head and thought about calling her back, then decided against it. My phone lit up again, and this time it was Phil.
“What’s
up?”
“They just sent some agents over to Perry Homes, off Odessa Street.”
“Do we need to ride out?”
“No, Lenny called. He said they found two more dealers taken out, execution style.”
I leaned back on the couch and stared at the ceiling. “Wow.”
“Shit, I know. Said the place was tossed and their stash was taken.”
I let out a sigh. “A’ight, I’m about to jump into the shower. I’ll get at you in the morning.”
I disconnected the call and tossed my phone onto the couch next to me.
We finally had the chance to catch up on some sleep.
But I had a feeling I wasn’t going to get much of it tonight.
Chapter Nine
Idalis
Sunday afternoon I made my way to my mother’s with Cameron. I was meeting India and Dionne at a bridal shop, off Howell Mill Road, for our fitting. My mother had agreed to watch him for me.
Once I made it to my mom’s, I gave her a quick hug and kiss, then made my way upstairs to talk to Grammie. Mama told me she was doing much better and had even been getting out of bed and moving around. When I got to her room, she was sitting and knitting.
“Hey, Grammie.”
“Hi, baby.”
I hugged her. Part of me—the scared little girl—didn’t want to let go. I wanted to crawl into her lap and let her convince me that everything would be okay. Instead, I just sank down onto her bed.
“Mama told me you were feeling much better,” I said.
She smiled and nodded. “Yes, I am,” she answered. “How about you?”
I took a deep breath. “I’m doing okay. Things are changing so fast. It’s overwhelming; sometimes I don’t think I can handle it.”
“Yes, you can, baby.”
I took in a deep breath and let it out. “Grammie I’m thinking about pushing back the wedding for a little while.”
She asked, “Do you think that’s best?”
All I could do was nod. I didn’t dare tell her that Linc pretty much told me that date was staying the same no matter what I said.