CHAPTER 37
In One Safe Place
It was 4 a.m. when Psalms finished sitting down first with Mintfurd, Suzy Q and Velvet, and then with Tylowe and Meeah. So much was going on. Things were starting to mix together where they shouldn’t, but it seemed it couldn’t be helped.
Temporarily, Tylowe and Meeah would move into the condo with the kids. The crazy shakeup of their world needed to be slowed. At first Tylowe and Meeah thought to take them home, but Meeah’s motherly sense made them reconsider. Having just moved them to Seattle, moving again would be too much stress for them. The main thing was to keep their kids from living in fear.
All calls from the condo, both cell and landline, were recorded in the computer system Mintfurd had set up. Other than to pay her bills, the great-aunt had made no calls from either. What to do with her to maintain her safety was still up in the air. For the Russian, Sasha Ivanov, to kill an old lady would be like flicking a bug into a fire. If she pursued her intention to secure the kids’ money, she would circle back repeatedly until she got what she wanted. It was a matter of security. Safety for the kids and the great-aunt had to be maintained, and the condo was the place to be until…
• • •
After handling ten different women in a Jell-O wrestling contest, Suzy Q needed a day’s rest. Some of those women had been men, who had been allowed to fight as women in their bras and panties. She had a shiner that looked more purple than black. She mocked Psalms that she had a wine-stain birthmark under her eye resembling his, so they were now twins. He told her she must have been getting weak because it wasn’t a she-male that had given her the black eye; it had been another woman.
“Yeah, but they carried her out of the Jell-O right, eh?”
“That they did, after you almost choked her out. Damn, Q, it was supposed to be a fun contest, not an MMA cage match. That’s the stuff Zelda does.”
Suzy Q and Psalms had decided to avoid a conversation about Evita and her disappearance until they’d come back from the East Coast. Now Suzy Q would return to tracking Evita down. Before going to Washington, D.C., she’d had no luck. Zelda had found Evita’s car sitting in a parking garage at a high-end lounge for several days before it had been towed. According to a woman Evita worked with, she had last seen her there when they’d met for drinks. When she’d left Evita, she said all seem to be fine. When Evita didn’t come to work the following Monday, she thought it strange. Evita didn’t leave a message, but that had happened before, so the woman let it be. Zelda had said she would go back and talk to that woman again.
Suzy Q turned to Psalms. “Our journeys in life have had wrecks and flats, eh? Sometimes, mate, we run out of gas. Those times are our fault for not paying attention. Other times we trusted the wrong people to give us a ride. That’s our fault, too, for not paying attention. When they crash, it still rearranges one’s life, eh?”
• • •
Mintfurd and Psalms had a conversation about their security projects all around the world. What was going on in Seattle right now was not the center of their business. They had security teams around the world and team leaders to communicate with to stay in front of potential problems. People paid Psalms to keep them safe, but not all of them were straight. Customers sometimes went in the devil’s direction and started using their security business as a cover to do drug dealing, sex slave trading, or oppressing people. Psalms would kill that contract, and perhaps “redistribute” some of the profits to the oppressed.
Along with the help of a select few, Psalms and Mintfurd helped bring justice to an unjust world. It was a small slice of the pie, but some people slept better at night because others tried to make life fairer. The registered name of Psalms’ business on the letterhead said it all:
ONE SAFE PLACE
Security and Protection
• • •
Mintfurd spoke of his engaging conversation with Darcelle. He said they first talked for about two hours, then he’d called back at midnight and they talked until birds started chirping. They would be going out this weekend if all was clear.
Psalms thought about Gabrielle upstairs in his bed, and knew she was waiting. He doubted she was asleep unless the pain-killers took her down, but even then he was aware she didn’t sleep well. Part of what he and Mintfurd had talked about was Suzy Q’s plan to go after the man—possibly men—who set had Gabrielle up for assassination. Gabrielle was a part of a plan to send a message to back off.
The part of the night that gave some levity to his troubled mind was when they arrived at the office. Velvet saw and met EL’vis. Her reaction to seeing a hot-looking man walk through the door was almost comical. Velvet lost her cool and sassy veneer when EL’vis took her hand and spoke to her in French. The two had spoken on the phone before and knew of each other, but never met. Her astute perception could tell he had a different blood in him. She opened a dialogue with EL’vis in French, and switched back and forth between French and Spanish. That conversation lasted for an hour. Psalms took his bags upstairs and went to check on Gabrielle.
Velvet let her imagination roll with the fact that EL’vis worked with Psalms when they were both Secret Service agents. Velvet automatically thought the man who called her “velours de Madam” was Superman, by his looks and work and panache. Her eyes saw EL’vis in a Superman suit with a chest made of steel, arms made of iron, and legs chiseled out of oak. EL’vis’ face had a square jaw, but with soft corners, and Negroid lips that fit as if the best plastic surgeon designed them. His brown eyes seemed to stare away, but he had Velvet’s eyes pinned on him.
One could tell EL’vis was used to women putting the move on him. He stayed kind and charming, but didn’t lead or let Velvet become unprofessional. It caught Psalms off-guard and amused him. When Psalms came back down to the office, Velvet was escorting EL’vis to an apartment in the condo. He laughed at how many times he had asked her to do that with other guests, and she would respond that she was not a bell-hop or check-in clerk.
Psalms needed sleep. He walked into his bedroom and touched Faelynn’s arm. She lifted up from lying next to her injured sister. Faelynn didn’t say a word. She left the room, closing the door behind her and went to her room down the hall.
Psalms had taken a quick shower earlier—eight hours earlier—and felt he needed another one. He was about to lie down next to Gabrielle, and even though she was hurt, it had been too many days since he had touched her. Between them, sparks normally flew like electricity. When they came near each other, they wanted to connect in the most primal way possible.
Anger and illness are often not enough to stop the body from wanting when it wants. Men and women play down what the body wants, as a way of acting pure, yet within minutes, most people know if they want a certain person to touch them or not. If not that person, then someone else of their choosing.
To go without sex is not so simple. High stress and a sexual release is the only way to ease a troubled mind…for a while. If you’re going without, the body still hungers to be touched. It desires to insert or to be penetrated. The body seeks out scents that only the human body can emit. The mind wants to hear certain sounds of flesh, lungs, and mouths, even a bed squeaking from the pleasure of being out of control rather in than in control. The eyes send begging and pleading signals of desire to see another body moving, lying, turning and spreading in its vision. The heart races and sweat glands moisten. The lips and tongue fill with blood, as well as the genital area of male and females, and get excited by often just a thought of sex. In short, the body is horny! The body craves; it thirsts and hates rejection, delays, and complications that impinge on what the body wants.
Psalms wouldn’t think of trying to have sex with his lover, whether he was upset with her or not. A bullet had grazed her; having been shot at, her mental state had to be fragile.
Hot water shot on Psalms’ body from four showerheads pounding on his hard body from each direction. Stress from days of intense situations needed a physical re
lease. For sure, he thought, before he lay down next to Gabrielle, he didn’t want her to feel an instant hard-on. He needed sleep. Little sleep would come with a throbbing hard dick the whole time he was next to her round, ample ass.
He smiled, holding his hard dick as he massaged a little oil on the head. He laughed. “Her breasts are hurt, not her ass.”
In the bathroom, only nightlights in a star pattern on the ceiling emitted enough light to see. The lights brightened a bit as the sensor detected an entrance.
“PB . . .”
Psalms heard a faint voice through the thick shower glass. The glass prevented outside sounds from being clear and in the shower, the waterproof speakers were playing low. “In The Morning” by Ledisi flowed with the steam swirling.
Psalms opened the frosted-glass shower door and saw Gabrielle sitting on the toilet. She was leaning forward on her toes. Her head was down and her long mane of hair appeared to be thrown over the top of her head, covering her face. It all blended with her thick, milk-chocolate body with curves and made his dick jump. Her full breasts had a patch on each one.
Through her hair, he heard a plea. “PB, I need to be near you. I need to know something is normal in my life right now. Please. Can I come in the shower with you? My patches are waterproof; the doctor said I can shower with them.
“PB, you have every right to be upset with me, and we can talk about it when you want to. But please, right now, let me touch you, let me please you. I have to feel there is some part of my life that is normal.”
He watched her wipe, stand and flush. He thought about the firmness of her round ass that could almost hold his weight with its density. As she stood at the shower door with her head down, he lifted her head and pulled her hair back. She had a small butterfly Band-Aid high on her temple near the hairline. He looked into her wet eyes. He opened the shower door wider, leaned out toward her thick lips, and he kissed her. He tasted tears; the salt was still sweet. He pulled her into the shower with his hands lightly on her waist.
“Don’t treat me like a baby. Take me. I need that, and I know you may not understand, but I need your body; I need your hard dick in me. I need to make sure I’m alive. I need to know.”
He understood her plea.
“Ah baby, just don’t grab my breasts.” She smiled and kissed his chest. The steam was almost overpowering once he closed the door to the sealed floor-to-ceiling shower.
“What Kind of Man Would I Be” by Mint Condition inspired her. She placed her back against his chest, and he carefully wrapped his arms below her breasts. They slow-danced without moving a foot. She cried, and he let her bleed her pain down the shower drain.
Her tears slowed down as she started to relax and enjoy being close to the man she loved. She was in his protection, and never wanted to escape the air he breathed.
The events of the last days gave her a sobering examination of what she wanted for herself, and what she wanted to be to others. Life was a bullet, inches away from making her a Level Six. She pushed her back firmly into the man who made her think and connect into one-on-one sensitivities, the feelings which she had always wanted. She had almost lost that connection, and hoped he would forgive her for lacking trust. She wanted to forgive herself, too, for not considering the effect her decision would have on him and others.
Right now she needed an injection of the man she loved to feel alive. What Psalms feared had happened: his horniness was in a fiery rage, and that’s what Gabrielle wanted. As her ass was grinding into his hardness, he had to move his dick to lodge in the long crease of her ass. He started to hump her ass, pushing his dick deep between her firm ass cheeks. He was grunting and getting louder than the music.
She was glad the waterproof patches covering her wounds on her breasts had time-released pain-killers, to lessen the discomfort of moving around. She placed her hands on her knees to give him full view of her ass. She gyrated her ass, and it excited Psalms. He became assertive. That’s what she wanted.
He squatted lower and lifted the cheeks of her ass up at the same time and worked his dick into her ready wetness. She wasn’t as wet as she normally was. She was also tighter than usual. It might have been that her mind and soul wanted more than her body. He pressed into her; she groaned. Psalms was always a tight fit at first. She loved the force of his girth going into her and after two long strokes in and out, her wetness came, but she stayed tight.
“You okay?” Psalms asked.
“Yeah, yeah, baby, yeah, come on. Let me feel you cum inside me. Fill me up, don’t hold back.” Her voice was faint, but encouraging, to keep going. He put his hand on her hips and began to stroke her to the rhythm of the song, “If It’s Love” by Kem. Gabrielle’s tightness and his thickness matched the repeated stroking in and out, and the steam-filled shower helped him cum hard and powerfully inside Gabrielle. She felt alive in her one safe place.
CHAPTER 38
Unattended Misrepresentations
A ferry horn blew in the fog, and both Gabrielle and Psalms opened their eyes to each other. She placed her hands to her breasts and a tear rolled off her cheek and onto the pillow. Psalms slid his leg over hers and placed his arm across her, below her breasts. Her hand reached and gripped his forearm. She fought with more tears, dampening her pillow.
Her voice went to the ceiling. “I have scheduled a local counselor from the Betty Ford Clinic to come here today. I hope that is okay?”
Gabrielle lost control and covered her face. At one time she was the most powerful woman in the world. Now she was lying there, with her breasts wounded and her soul bombed out. She had at one time the power to starve a country, but now her own soul was feeling impoverished. She felt no different from a woman squatting outside of a Third World hut. Gabrielle felt poor and mentally destitute. Her drinking was undermining her, destroying her footing, disrupting her life and the things she wanted most: family, love and the strength to be herself, not what the world wanted her to be. It all teetered on the out-of-balance axis of symmetry in her life. Her loss of equilibrium had her falling down.
Psalms moved to hover over her face. His gold eyes connected with her brown ones. “Gabrielle, you’re not weak, you’re wounded, and not just behind those bandages. You’re wounded behind your beautiful eyes. We all handle life our own way, even as you and I love each other; we have our own way of coming to decisions that might affect each other. I live with things I’ve done, and at times I’m conflicted. Those things I’ve done—I ask myself was it for me or was it for the greater good? I struggle sometimes, just as you did when you were a part of world decisions.
“For me, my hurts stem from my mother thing. Her adult misrepresentations of why she handed me a purse full of money, but not her soul, made me turn and face God and ask him for guidance, and learn to forgive myself for the ugliness that comes into mind. Then I have to forgive myself because of those troubling thoughts, and constricted parts of my mind. We can think some cruel things.
“With your help, I think I can meet my Mama Dearest, and be ready for any hurt that might come of it. I’m sorry if I hurt you by not listening to you about something so crucial, but I have a lifetime of hurt.
“We hide our souls from the world because it will chew on us like a dog chews on a bone. Knowing this, sometimes we chew on that same bone, but we must evolve.
“We must keep decisions from being personal when it comes to others close to us. We must keep outside influences such as your drinking from having any part of the decisions we make. So, yes, Gabrielle, have a counselor from the Betty Ford Clinic come here today. If it’s the right place for you, your sister and I will be there for you. Be humbled by God’s light shining on you, not man’s dim view. Don’t worry about what the world will say. You don’t answer to the world.”
• • •
Psalms had Gabrielle go out onto the deck to get some fresh air. He had her lie on a lounge chair with blankets. Outdoor deck heaters warmed the area. He went in and changed her sheets, cleaned
up his bathroom, and got dressed. When he went back on the deck, he saw she was asleep. Psalms admired her sleeping beauty. The sun kissed her while playing hide-and-seek through fast-moving clouds. He had Faelynn go out to the deck to check on Gabrielle as he left.
• • •
EL’vis was across the street on the beach working out as Psalms often did. When Psalms walked into the office, Velvet’s son was doing schoolwork in the quiet room. Velvet was standing at the window watching EL’vis.
“Don’t,” Psalms said.
“Don’t?” Velvet’s voice gave her away; she knew what Psalms meant. Psalms didn’t say anything else, he simply stared at her. He didn’t look at her like he was mad or ordering her.
“PB, I’m not getting any younger. I want a man in my bed that can still bring some joy and some funk to my hot ass. Seeing it in front of my face is something hard to pass up. Don’t worry, I haven’t touched the goods yet, or told him. But, I will if given a chance.”
“Yet given the chance you will drop your bloomers in a heartbeat, right? Just let him be. He’s seen it all, and heard it all. What he has, his worldwide intellect and charm, he uses all of that to do his work. It’s not him I’m trying to protect.”
“Oh, so you’re saying you’re trying to protect me? Well, I’m grown, thank you. Or…maybe you’re trying to tell me I’m not his type and he’s just polite because what…he doesn’t want to hurt my feelings? I’m not his type because I’m a single mother?”
Psalms gave her a blank stare response.
“Is it because I’m not cute enough for a fine-ass man who looks like him? What is it? Is my butt too big? Why can’t you see him with me? What…am I not sexy enough for him? He only wants a woman on his level of hotness? What…I’m not hot? What? What… you don’t think I can swing from a roof, or the back of a boat? Is the thought of me loving him a joke? What, what, what? I can’t hump him in the cold dark water at midnight? What is it?”
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