Games Divas Play (A Diva Mystery Novel)

by Angela Burt-Murray

  Since the news broke that Glam Network was shooting my reality show, Whatever Laila Wants, the press and blogs had been going crazy, so the premiere date had been pushed up to capitalize on all the excitement and to coincide with the NBA All-Star weekend. The producer assigned to my show, Tanya Peoples, had set up this afternoon’s scene as an outing for me to purchase some new goodies for an upcoming rendezvous. As I walked through the shop that was decorated like a French boudoir, I discussed my desires with the skinny blond salesgirl, Stacey, who was eager to be on camera.

  “Welcome to Suga’ n’ Spice. What can I help you with today?” Stacey drawled as she pretended to greet me for the first time. It was the third time we had shot this setup because this dumb salesgirl couldn’t even get those two simple lines right.

  “I’m looking for something sexy in red to surprise my boyfriend,” I said as I sipped the champagne Stacey had poured for me upon my arrival. Unlike Stacey, I could remember my lines perfectly.

  “What sort of style do you prefer?” Stacey asked as she led me over to a wall of expensive red corsets, teddies, and bra and panty sets.

  “Well, we haven’t seen each other in a while. He’s been on the road, so I want to really blow his mind. What would you recommend?” The Glam Network legal team was nervous about my actually using Marcus’s name in the show, so Miki told me to push as close to the line as possible without actually opening the network up to a lawsuit.

  “Oh, that sounds fun,” Stacey purred. “What kind of business is your boyfriend in?”

  “Let’s just say he’s in professional sports and likes to go one-on-one with me.”

  We both laughed as I winked at Stacey and took another sip of champagne. Stacey pulled down some of the items and spread them out on top of a table so that we could select the best ones to try on. I selected three: a bra and crotchless panty set; a leather and lace corset; and a sheer teddy, and headed for the dressing room in the back of the store.

  “And, cut,” I heard Tanya yell to the cameraman, who had practically been running to the dressing room, hoping he was going to film me changing into this lovely lingerie. Sorry, Charlie. You’ll just have to jerk off to your imagination later.

  “OK, Laila, for this next scene we need you to try on the lingerie and come out to look at yourself in the mirror to see if you like the looks,” Tanya said to me. “You’ll ask Stacey for her opinion. And don’t worry about any of the peek-a-boo parts on the lingerie; we’ll blur those out on TV. Miki also suggested that you pull some things for tomorrow’s photo shoot for your Times Square billboard promoting the show.”

  “Gotcha, Tanya,” I said over my shoulder as I walked back into the dressing room. Once inside and well out of earshot of the camera, I set my champagne flute down on the small white table in the corner of the dressing room and then reached into my black quilted Dior bag for my cell phone. I hadn’t been able to reach Marcus for nearly two days. Most of my text messages, e-mails, and calls went unanswered. All I had received was a short text saying he’d get back to me soon. This was not like Marcus.

  Of course I had read about his wife’s attack on Bossip, and it had been running on what seemed like a nonstop loop all over the TV news, but that was no reason to ignore my calls. When the news broke about the attack on Vanessa, Miki called right away, concerned that this would impact the story line in the show about my relationship with Marcus. I assured her that Marcus was fine. It wasn’t like his wife was dead or anything.

  But if everything was fine, why wasn’t he returning my calls? Had something changed like Miki feared?

  There was only one thing left to do. I had fought, clawed, and fucked my way to this point, and nothing was going to get in my way.

  “Everything OK in there?” Stacey said, interrupting my thoughts with her perky voice.

  “Yes, Stacey. I’ll be out in a minute. Why don’t you go grab me some more champagne?” I needed to send her away from the door so that I could make the call.

  I turned off the microphone pack strapped to my waist, removed the strips of black tape securing the tiny microphone to the inside of my blouse, and set them both on the table next to my handbag. No way was I making the rookie mistake of letting the Glam Network sound engineer listen in on my conversation. I picked up my cell phone and dialed a number. The phone rang a few times and then went to voice mail.

  Dammit, I can’t reach him, either. I don’t hang up the phone; it’s time to leave a message.

  “Kareem, this is Laila,” I hissed in a low voice as I unbuttoned the tight Miss Sixty jeans to unpeel them from my body so that I could slip on the lingerie for this next scene. “You better return my call tonight. I’m not playing with you. We have a plan to follow. So don’t even think about trying to fuck me over or you’ll be very sorry.”

  I disconnected the call and then tossed the phone back into my handbag. I was sure Kareem would call me back soon. After all, he and I both knew he didn’t have a choice.

  CHAPTER 13

  Vanessa

  The tension in the apartment was so thick, we could forget needing a knife to cut it—Marcus and I needed a chain saw.

  We had retreated to separate wings of the apartment. I had allowed him to come home last month since I didn’t want to be alone in the apartment. We only came together to interact with Damon when he demanded we watch TV together or eat dinner. We were civil in his presence, but I’m sure the frosty chill in the air made Nicole want to turn up the thermostat in the apartment.

  This morning, to escape the self-imposed prison our apartment had become, I walked down to the little mani-pedi spot around the corner after dropping Damon off at school. I was happy to see the reporters were gone so that I didn’t have to worry about any prying telephoto lenses. I dipped into the small, empty salon. An attendant introduced herself as Ling and asked me to pick my nail color from the wall’s cabinet. Scanning the bottles of OPI polishes, I quickly located my favorite, Lincoln Park After Dark, for both my hands and feet. Ling led me over to an elevated leather pedicure chair and turned on the massage button and heater. I dipped my feet into the warm scented water and let the jets massage my toes. I closed my eyes, my shoulders dropped, and I began to relax as I reflected on the last few days and formulated a plan.

  When Marcus and I got back to our apartment that first night after I was released from Dr. Harrison’s care, we retreated to separate corners of the penthouse. The next day when Marcus, who had slept in one of the guest rooms, brought a breakfast tray into our bedroom, I glanced over at the clock on the nightstand and saw that Nicole would have just dropped Damon off at school.

  One look at him, my ribs throbbing from the attack, and it was war. I threw the crystal clock from the nightstand at his head. As Marcus ducked, he dropped the contents of the tray on the floor, spilling eggs, bacon, orange juice, and coffee. The clock crashed against the wall, shattering and spreading glass across the carpet.

  “You have to give me some answers!” I screamed.

  “I’m so sorry, V. You know I love you,” he said as he walked over to the bed to hold me. Marcus seemed unsure of what to do, but he kept apologizing in his sorry-ass way, shaking his head as if even he didn’t know how we had gotten here. His words were tired clichés with no meaning at this point. I pushed him away.

  “What about the vows we took? What about the promises we had made to each other when we got married and you went pro? You swore to me that nothing, not a single thing, would ever come between us. Not your career, not Kareem, and not those nasty-ass groupies you can’t seem to keep your hands off. Look at our life! It’s a joke!”

  “Vanessa, I can fix this,” he pleaded. “I know you’re right. I’ve lost sight of what matters, but I don’t want to lose you and I won’t lose my son.” He paced in front of the bed.

  “Ha! Yes, your son. The one who’s counting on us to raise him together and looking to you to show him
how to be a man. Is this how you show him how to be a man, by cheating on his mother with whores?”

  “Look, you don’t understand what life was like for me. Traveling around from city to city with everyone wanting something from you. It’s hard, Vanessa. I’m just a man, and yes, I’ve been weak. But none of that matters now. Haven’t I proved my love by giving you everything you could possibly want? The homes, the cars, the shopping sprees, the private jets, the jewelry. I work hard to provide all those things for you, so maybe this is the life of a professional athlete’s wife, the price of admission.”

  “Everything I’ve ever wanted?” I screamed at him as I slapped his face hard. “I’ve given you everything you’ve ever wanted. A life. A home. A son. What about that? And as for me, the only thing I ever wanted was you, and I’d trade it all in just for that one thing. Now can you say the same?”

  The weight of my words caused Marcus to fall back on the chaise lounge at the foot of our bed and drop his head into his hands. I wanted to hate him, but something inside still made me want to go to him. I steeled myself to stay where I was.

  I gasped for air between sobs. Marcus came over to pick me up, but I pushed him away, screaming for him to leave our room and leave me alone. That was three days ago, and we hadn’t spoken since.

  My body was still sore, and I covered the bruising around my neck with turtlenecks when I was around Damon. I wasn’t able to hide the swelling on my face, so we told our son that I got hit during a kickboxing class. Damon, a lover and not a fighter at age four, suggested I not go back if they were going to kick his mommy in the face. My bruised ribs were also starting to heal to the point where I barely winced when getting in and out of bed or standing from a seated position. But the physical part of healing was easy.

  It was the emotional and psychological parts that were killing me. The nights were the worst. I was afraid to fall asleep and relive the attack in the parking garage. Dr. Harrison had prescribed sleeping pills, but they only made the night terrors worse because the pills were so strong, I had difficulty waking myself up out of the deep slumber and was trapped all over again with that man. I could see his ugly, twisted face and feel his hot breath on my neck. The weight of his heavy body on top of mine made me gasp for air. And unlike in real life, in the dream there was no Alex to save me, and the attack played out in an endless loop.

  Most nights I slept with the lights on so that when I woke up from the nightmare, I could instantly see where I was, safe in my own bed. I also kept an extra pair of cotton pajamas on the bed next to me to change into after awaking from the nightmare because I’d be drenched in sweat as if I’d really been fighting off the man in the garage all over again.

  When the detectives working on the case came by the apartment and told us that the man who attacked me was dead, I felt a tremendous sense of relief, but that didn’t make the nightmares go away. They told me he was a low-level member of the Diablo Negro drug gang and that he had likely had his throat cut by a member of his own crew. Before I could ask any more questions, Marcus interrupted and said I needed my rest. He and Kareem would discuss the rest of the matter with the detectives in the library. Even though the monster haunting me in my dreams was dead, I still had a lot of questions. I couldn’t help but wonder why this man had targeted me. Was my attack just a random act of violence in the big city, or had he specifically been looking for me?

  The news of my attack hit the media, and the coverage was nonstop. The only good news that came out of it was that Laila was being portrayed by the media as the home-wrecking whore that she was and Marcus as the callous cheating husband. He didn’t dare go out and get caught being seen with Laila. The press would have crucified him. And as for the Gladiators organization, they were very concerned. Owned by an ultraconservative hedge-fund group, the team’s partners were loath to see their $150 million investment trashed in the press along with their hopes of bringing a championship to New York, so I knew without even asking that the heat had been put on Kareem to fix this nasty little matter. I could tell he was feeling the pressure from all the meetings he was having at the apartment with Marcus. Normally they talked business out in the open, but now the door was closed and the tones were hushed at times and elevated at others. Sometimes Desiree would join the strategy sessions.

  With All-Star weekend approaching in just two short weeks, it was DEFCON 4 for the brand. Naturally, Marcus had been selected again to play in the All-Star game, but I’m sure he wished he hadn’t been, because this year’s game was being held in Phoenix, so all the stories trying to link the dead cheerleader to Marcus would likely resurface in addition to this latest news. I had also heard from Nia that Laila would be in town hosting a star-studded premiere party for her reality show. I had to attend the weekend because we were scheduled to host our annual Marcus and Vanessa King Foundation dinner to raise money for Saint Mary’s Children’s Hospital in Inglewood.

  And just when I was sure things couldn’t get any worse or any more complicated, Dr. Harrison called to tell me that I was eight weeks pregnant. I couldn’t believe it. Marcus and I had been in such a deep freeze in our relationship for so long that I wondered how that was actually possible. But then I remembered that there was a night, about two months ago, before all the drama broke, when hair be damned, I slipped into the shower with Marcus after he’d come home from practicing with the team. Desperate for some physical contact and affection from a husband who was becoming increasingly distant, I slipped into the large stone shower and wrapped my arms around him, pressing my lips along his back. I took a bar of soap and began to lather his broad chest, working my way down as I pressed my full breasts into his back. Grabbing him in my soapy wet hands, I began to stroke him to arousal. He moaned with pleasure, and the hot water from the showerhead sprayed down over both of us. The steam enveloped us as I pushed him down onto the large stone seat in the corner of the shower and straddled him. Sliding down onto him, I arched my breasts into his mouth and squeezed his shoulders as he licked the water from my breasts and squeezed my hips, pulling me into him deeper. We exploded together and then went limp against the cool shower wall. After we both dried off, I suggested we get dressed and go out to enjoy a nice dinner at the new Italian restaurant that had opened around the corner from our building. Marcus hurriedly slipped into some fresh clothes and said he had to get to a meeting with Kareem about another new potential endorsement. He was out the door before I could even object or ask if we could meet later.

  He didn’t return home until nearly three in the morning.

  After finding out from Dr. Harrison that I was pregnant, I scheduled an appointment with my regular ob-gyn, Dr. Carter, who congratulated me in confirming that I was about eight weeks along and prescribed some prenatal vitamins. As with my first pregnancy, I was having little morning sickness and I wasn’t gaining weight yet, so it was easy to hide my condition. Since Marcus and I slept at opposite ends of the apartment, it wasn’t like he would notice that anything was different. But things were different.

  As Ling finished up my pedicure, I wiggled my glossy toes.

  “Beautiful,” I said to her as I slipped my freshly polished toes into the paper slippers and then climbed down from the chair to head over to the manicure station for my nails. I noticed a teaser from Extra! playing on the flat-screen TV mounted on the wall. The sound was off, but I could understand everything I needed to as the screen cut to a clip of the show’s host, Mario Lopez, standing at the Grove, the outdoor shopping center in West Hollywood where they shot the show. The calm relaxation I had felt earlier evaporated when I saw Laila, dressed in a skintight strapless dress with her long brown hair cascading in curled waves down her back, talking to an animated Mario. Clearly that was the night’s big story.

  “Relax,” the technician said, patting my hands that had balled into fists at the sight of the woman trying to break up my marriage. “Relax now for a good manicure.”

  She wa
s right: I needed to relax. Not just for a good manicure, but so that I could be in control. And seeing Laila being interviewed on Extra! had given me the idea for what I was going to do next.

  This bitch thought she was going to take my man, but she had another thing coming.

  I was having another baby.

  This was going to change everything, whether Marcus and Laila liked it or not.

  CHAPTER 14

  Nia

  As I watched Vanessa make her way through the maze of diners to our table for lunch at DB Bistro, a trendy Midtown eatery, I could tell that something was different. And it wasn’t just the oversize Chanel sunglasses she was wearing on an overcast morning that made me suspicious. Despite going through what anyone would consider two months from hell, she looked great. Dare I say she even glowed? I wasn’t sure she would still have that glow, though, once I told her what Terrence and I had dug up.

  “Girl, what is going on with you?” I said, laughing as she leaned in for a hug.

  “What do you mean?” she said coyly as she laughed and took off her heavy gray shearling coat and tossed it, along with several Henri Bendel shopping bags, into the seat next to us. She looked great in a simple black turtleneck and black wool slacks.

  “Don’t play with me, girl. What’s got you glowing today? Shoot, the last time I saw you with that glow, you were pregnant with Damon . . .” My voice trailed off. “Oh shit . . . Are you pregnant?” I said as I reached for my glass of water and took a large gulp. This was not good news.

  “Yes, as a matter of fact, I am,” Vanessa said with a Cheshire cat smile curved on her glossy brown lips.

  “How? Why? When?” I couldn’t get the questions out fast enough.