Que rubbed himself across my lips before easing in. He felt rock solid, surprisingly cool. His arms wrapped around my body so he could tease and play with my nipples. Confusion swept across my face as he eased back and began slurping and sucking his way down from the base of my spine. I was trying hard to process how he could be inside me and simultaneously nibbling my left butt cheek.
He paused. “You’d better not drop my candy bar, Eva; it needed a little more sugar.”
His voice broke through the sex haze over my head. I caught a glimpse of a Milky Way wrapper before his hands spread my cheeks apart and his mouth went back to setting my skin on fire.
Oh he isn’t about to lick my . . . I need to stop him before that tongue hits the deodorant I put in my butt crack. Embarrassed I reached back and he swatted my hand. I know putting deodorant in your booty crack sounds weird but it was a habit I’d picked up ever since I hit puberty and my booty decided it wanted to sweat like an armpit. Momma Rose used to have a fit about buying me both Dove and Secret but I was too ashamed to tell her the real secret behind the extra Secret deodorant. One swipe every morning and I stayed dry and cucumber-melon fresh all day.
My eyes widened and my mouth froze into the shape of Pluto. Invisible fingers tap danced down my spine, involuntarily arching my back. Something along the lines of a whimper and a gasp managed to slip through my lips. Que made head-spinning laps with his tongue around parts of me that’d never seen the light of day let alone another person. I was buck-naked in the back of a man’s car in the middle of the day with a Milky Way in my lady bits. It made me feel like the dirtiest woman in the world and secretly I loved it.
My fingers were cramping from clutching at the seats. “Que . . . Daddy, please.”
He barely slowed down. “Please what? Say it.”
He slid his candy bar deeper before easing it out torturously slow. I squirmed backward whining at the empty achiness. The soft shushing sound of skin sliding against danced up to my ears and I visualized his hand sliding up and down the length of his rigid shaft. He was just waiting on me to tell him what I wanted. The shushing stopped and my mind stopped as his thick, warm fingers danced in the slick puddle between my legs. He dragged a calloused finger across my throbbing pearl, stiffened his tongue and went in trying to get all the sugary goodness out of my cookie.
I pushed desperately against his face and fingers. “Take it, daddy, make me cum please.” I broke down begging, talking dirty like he wanted.
Thin, breathless moans eased from my lips mixing with the storm outside and Trey Songz’s “In the Middle.”
Veins of white-hot lightning spread across the sky shooting through the clouds. I glanced back. He licked my juices off the candy bar easing himself deep into my center hitting my G-spot on the way in and then again out.
I could feel a different kind of lightning firing up inside me and I closed my eyes.
Que groaned. “My good girl, like that good dick down. You ready to cum for me, baby?”
I could barely nod. I was beyond ready. His fingers dug into my hips as he slammed into me over and over like a man possessed. I was feeling the sweetest torture, stuck somewhere between heaven and not wanting to go to hell. Fat moonshine-clear tears of feel good, ran down my face. Liquid heat coated my insides.
The words “I love you” climbed their way up my body pulsing, winding, and finally tightening into a solid convulsion that launched them into the air as I gave in to the power of my own release.
The second scream that tore its way up my throat was from the hooded figure that’d manifested from the mist of the rain stinging the ground. Azrael, the death angel, stood with the open-mouthed barrel of a gun pointed directly at us.
Chapter 5
Words Are Weapons
Glass shattered, flying like sparks; I dropped down drawing my knees into my chest pressing my naked back against the cold leather of the back seat in terror.
“Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit,” Que chanted. “She done lost her fuckin’ mind.” He scrambled into the driver’s seat.
“What’s the matter, Quinn? I know you ain’t think you could run around without somebody lettin’ me know. You can’t hide from home, nigga, you . . .”
I stuck my nose over the back seat, trying to catch a quick glimpse of this murder mood wrecker without getting my head blown off. The wind had lifted the hood off her head but that didn’t do anything to cool her temper as she got closer to the car. I hit the floor. Another bullet took the side mirror off Que’s car. Her words were drowned out by the sound of the squealing tires and the wind howling over the car as we sped away.
Blood trickled down the side of Que’s neck. I’d never seen anyone get shot except on TV, so unless she had a really powerful dart gun it was probably from the broken glass.
“Who the hell was that, Que?” My voice trembled. The icy, vengeful gleam in her eyes replayed in my head. She looked like she was on some kind of hit woman for hire mess. I shimmied my panties up, straining to reach over the center console for my pants on the floor in the front.
Que slammed his fist into the steering wheel blasting air out of his scuba-wide flared nostrils.
“It’s not what you think, Eva. That was Cameron, my wife . . . soon to be ex-wife now. I can’t believe she just tried to shoot me.”
I stopped mid-shimmy and stared at him in slack-jawed disbelief. The rain soaked my hair through the rear window but I was oblivious to it. The churning in my stomach mixed with the feeling of gritty hostility rising up the back of my throat had me fighting to swallow. I cracked my knuckles. The ugly “worried about his wife trying to kill him” face he was making pissed me off more by the second. He didn’t wear a ring, never said anything about a wife; he even answered his phone no matter what time of day or night I called or texted. Blood rushed up to my neck and face. The reality of being played hit my ass like a blazing injection of jealousy. It started at my toes creeping its way up my body.
Something was howling in my ears. It was louder than the wind through the windows and sharper than any of Mariah Carey’s highest notes. It was my own voice. Tears slashed their way across my cheeks blinding me. Screaming, I clawed my way across the back seat jerking the steering wheel in his hands. Que must have thought I was having a typical hysterical female moment until the second my fingers wrapped the steering wheel.
“Eva! What the fuck?”
Metal grated against concrete. Sparks shot from underneath the car. Que managed to pry my fingers off the steering wheel. I then wrapped them around his neck as best I could. We bounced across the median into the oncoming traffic on the other side. High beams flashed and horns blared. We zigzagged and weaved but I was not letting his ass go. Sweat rolled down his face making his neck slick and hot.
It was different when I was eight. I couldn’t do anything about the ball of bitterness in my chest when they brought Leslie home. This wasn’t even the same as when Psi put his fat, nasty-ass hands on me.
“I gave myself to you and you lied to me,” I screamed against his face. “I want you to hurt. I want you to die.”
Que turned to look at me over his shoulder and I noticed we’d stopped on the side of the road. I wasn’t expecting the hurt and resentment that I saw in his eyes. I almost killed us, but hearing it bothered him more than me doing it.
I took my hands off of him and forced myself to breathe until we got back. Ava had said, “Don’t get played, don’t be a fool,” and I’d done just that.
I grabbed my shoes feeling perfectly fine with sitting in the back seat until we got to my car. There was nothing in me that wanted to be close to him without killing him.
Cameron, Que’s wife, was supermodel tall. Even with her hair slicked down in a matted black mess and her mascara running down her cheeks she was still beautiful. I wasn’t runway size or sample petite; on a good day my ass was at least a size ten.
We pulled to a stop beside my car. Que turned to me with sad eyes. “Eva, I’m sorry you had to be
a part of that. This doesn’t mean anything changes. My marriage was over long before I met you. I’m gonna see you again right?”
The reckless me from moments before was gone and now I felt shy, almost embarrassed. Unable to look him directly in the eye I shrugged. “I’m not sure and I’ve got classes, work, and—”
“Here.” He pressed his money clip toward me packed with hundreds. “I can be all the work you need and then some.”
Shaking my head at him, I started reaching for the door handle. It was beyond tempting, but I had my pride. On second thought if his wife puts me on blast I might have to haul ass in the middle of the night. I’ll make sure to tithe extra out of it on Sunday. I grabbed the money clip stuffing it into the back pocket of my jeans.
Making the rest of my classes was the furthest thing from my mind. I just wanted to get home, shower, and go to bed.
My phone rang and I answered without looking. “What is it?” I snapped thinking it was Que.
“Damn, homie. Well, since my bestie-boo didn’t show up for Mr. Jiel’s review I recorded the lecture. What’s the matter?” Storie asked.
Growing up Momma Rose would tell me over and over to pray for discernment so I’d know the difference between friends and friendly folk. She’d say, “Fall and watch what happens. Friendly folk’ll stand back sayin’, ‘I’m prayin’ for you.’ Friends won’t be worried about where you are, what time it is, or getting their knees dirty. A friend will get down, pray, and then pull you up.” Storie was no part of friendly folk; she was a friend. I felt low for not letting her in on what just happened but I didn’t have the strength to put it into words yet.
I put on my best front. “Everything’s fine, girl. Leslie has been blowing up my phone texting about going to the movies or something, I thought it was her. Let me call you when I get in the house. I’m driving.”
Thankfully, she seemed preoccupied enough not to notice my voice cracking. Storie looked stuck-up but she was cool as hell once you got to know her and she had zero filter. Her thoughts hit her brain and then they fell right out her mouth; that’s how it worked. She’d been my ride-or-die guardian angel since ninth grade when she beat Big Keish up for me in the girls’ locker room. These days she spent more time fighting with Bear, her boyfriend, who according to her was only useful in the bedroom.
By the time I got home, the rain had gotten worse and the street was only minutes away from being classified as a murky raging river. Not even fazed by the weather I pulled into the end of the driveway and dragged myself out of the car and squished my way through the front door. My thoughts were pin-balling back and forth between Que and his pop-up wife. Does he touch her the same way he touches me, kiss her the same? Out of all the people to give my virginity to, I picked a married one. The whole thing was making my head hurt.
“Eva, you’re home just in time.” Momma Rose floated toward me. “Where is your jacket and umbrella? You’re drippin’ all over the floor. Let me get you a towel. You trying to catch your death out there, baby?”
A shadow of a smile played across my lips as she fussed to herself. She dashed toward the laundry room drawing my eyes toward Deacon sitting on the couch. I hadn’t even noticed they had company and was glad I could blame the way I looked on the foul weather. Momma Rose always did her best to be a better mother to Leslie and myself than the one we had. Deacon on the other hand was always looking for an arm or a leg to help pull him to a higher level of the barrel.
He nodded at the guy sitting across from him. “Eva, meet Dontay. The church is offering him a home for a couple of weeks.”
My eyes whipped from Deacon to the stranger sitting in our living room. Leslie was only eleven and starting to get boobs and all that good stuff. What if he was a pedophile? Even though Deacon probably wouldn’t have turned him away even if he was. Deacon was disgustingly committed to appearances. I forgot about Que and the hollow hole in my chest for a split second. I assessed this so-called homeless guy that “the church,” or in plain English Deacon, was taking in.
Thank you, sweet little seven pound eight ounce Baby Jesus for bringing chocolate colossus out of the arena and into my living room. Dontay was sitting forward with his elbows propped up on his long legs. He was probably being put to sleep with all of Deacon’s rambling but under the surface of boredom he seemed alert. Good thing my girl Storie wasn’t here because she’d have marched over and rubbed her panties on him to mark her territory. I barely got a half of a smile when he finally decided to acknowledge me. His bright granite-gray eyes met mine briefly and he nodded before turning his attention back to Deacon. It might have been my imagination, but I’d have sworn his expression mirrored how I was feeling inside. He looked like he’d lost or was missing someone too.
Chapter 6
Dontay Gardens Always Attract Wild Thieves and Other Wild Things
Eva had walked in looking like she’d just won a campus wet T-shirt contest. I did my best to look at anything other than her mermaid-like figure with her jean-busting hips. It only took a glance at the sullen expression hidden under all that soaked hair to see something was wrong. She squeaked and squished past us nearly slipping and falling on her face. My lips quivered as I fought back a grin and I forced myself to refocus. I had bigger problems to deal with. Deac was talking about whatever when all a nigga really wanted to know was where I could lay my head.
This church mouse shit wasn’t conducive to getting my Cali green, or daily dose of THC. Even though that’s what got me in this mess in the first place. The white boy I used to buy my shit from hooked me up every time he came back from visiting his people out in Cali. His moms was the trophy wife of this dude who hopped on the Oregon Trail and got rich growing for them medicinal marijuana farms. White Boy hated his stepfather for reasons he never disclosed. But he would get the best shit from out there, roll it into these little cigarillos, seal the box, and walk right through the airport with it. That wasn’t major; the major part was the robbery we were planning. I’d gotten my crazy-ass homeboy who moved to VA from Staten Island, or up top as we called it.
The way I figure it, every dude has to evaluate the face value of another one. If a nigga says he ain’t, can’t, or don’t, he’s lying. I don’t mean we go into detail like analyzing a dude’s eyes and ass. It’s a bare-minimum basic scale that alerts your man senses to the niggas you’d better not leave your woman alone with down to the ones you shouldn’t go toe to toe with. Capo was someone I’d categorize as a triple threat. He looked like he just walked out of somebody’s prison rockin’ them G-Unit tank tops all year round to show that shit off. Even when he wore a button up, all the buttons would be undone. My homeboy Bear would say it was because the dude ain’t know how to fasten buttons. On top of the being prison strong, with paper stacked, Capone was officially board-certified, sealed, and probably never released, crazy as fuck.
Deac was saying something about the backyard and how it got overrun with frogs in summer. It made me think back to the night that got me up in here.
Crickets and frogs chirped in unison around us. The moon spied on us through the trees as if it were God’s eerie silver all-seeing eye. We were on the outskirts of the field and already surrounded by the dank evergreen aroma like ground-up pine needles with a little oomph. Adrenaline was pumping through my system tightening my chest making my ears ring. I adjusted my camouflaged, insulated jacket making sure my piece was ready to go at my hip. My body temperature was already abnormally high but now it was going through the roof. I duct taped sticks and branches to my arms and legs before pulling down my insulated face mask.
Capo walked over looking like Swamp Thing. The corners of his mouth turned down into his traditional scowl. He always looked like he was mid-scratching the back of his throat or about to hack something up.
“Nigga, that must be a harvest moon up there, because we about to rack up out this bitch.” Capo tried to whisper but he had one of those gruff voices that made it damn near impossible.
I
was just as excited as he was but I intended to stay focused until we’d seen the plan through. Adrenaline had me on ten. My blood was rushing to my ears until they went on sonar trying to pick up any non-forest-like sounds. Capo taped shrubs to my back and I returned the favor. We worked quickly and silently layering ice from the bucket we’d dragged up from the truck into the inside of our jackets and pants. It was White Boy’s idea to use those face masks chicks put over their eyes for dark circles. Ain’t even ask how he knew what they were for, or why. I just figured it was a white boy thing. We wore those underneath our skullies.
Cali law only lets niggas grow five plants per person so the growers would band together and form collectives. Most guarded their crops stupid close. I’m talking shotguns, Rottis, or Pits, but not White Boy’s people. There were thermal imaging cameras somewhere above our heads pointed at the field in front of us. This collective monitored their crops from the comfort of their own homes. Big mistake. With our body temperatures lowered we were damn near invisible, and the shrubs taped to our clothes would break up any heat signature making us look less like men and more like deer or dogs. The shit we were about to cake up on was thirty-five people deep and well worth freezing my balls off for. That was a good 175 plants pushing at the max a pound each. And since a pound could go for three to four Gs. Shiiiiit.
White Boy was waiting at the edge of the woods with a produce truck Capo “found.” The plan was simple. We were going to layer the plants one by one onto a tarp we’d hiked in, wrap ’em up and Capo’s prison-strong ass could lug ’em out.
“Tay, I heard somethin’.” Capo crouched down with his hand on his piece.
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