The Takedown

by Nia Forrester

  Jamal grinned. “I don’t know. Am I?”

  “Probably not. So here goes: salt-and-pepper shrimp to start, and green curry tilapia with jasmine rice and garlic eggplant.”

  “You ordered all that,” he teased. “And put it in a bunch of serving dishes …”

  “No. I did not. Excuse you. I cooked it myself. Smell my hands.” She came toward him and extended her arms so he could sniff her palms. Jamal leaned in. They smelled like spices, like curry and onions.

  “See?” She arched an eyebrow. “I followed the instructions from a YouTube channel I found, and everything looks just like it’s supposed to. Next time …”

  He pulled her closer by the wrists and then kissed the inside of each one. He didn’t even know why he did it. Maybe because she was being cute, and goofy, the way she had been that morning in Puerto Rico when he found her dancing to reggaetón with the housekeeper. Or maybe just because he liked kissing her, and always felt like he wasn’t doing enough of it, especially lately.

  Kayla’s eyes dropped, shyly and she tugged her hands free.

  “Anyway, the reason I asked whether you’d be here is because Candace and my friend Drina from school are coming over. It’s going to be kind of a girls’ thing. There’s going to be wine and chocolate and we’re going to be silly and loud, so …”

  He looked at her. “Oh, so you don’t want me to stay.”

  “Of course you can. Just … stay in here, that’s all. I’ll bring you your food.”

  Her cousin Candace, and the friend from school whom Jamal had never met, showed up around seven-thirty, both dressed for a night out though Kayla was still in her shorts, and had only changed into a t-shirt instead of the old frayed undershirt she had worn while cooking. After introducing him to Drina—who played it cool for about six seconds before beginning to gush—Kayla pointedly excused him from the room and said that she would have his dinner set aside separately but that she and her girls would eat at the table.

  Jamal heard them from the den throughout their meal, talking loudly about the random stuff that women talk about when they gather in groups. They were so loud, he could almost follow along with their entire conversation. When it got quieter, it was only because Kayla was coming in to tell him that his dinner was waiting whenever he wanted to eat it, but that she and Candace and Drina were heading out.

  “If you’re not going anyplace else, I think we’ll have Beckett take us,” she said. “Because, you know …”

  Yeah, he knew. Because he’d heard the pitch and volume of their voices increase in a way that made it obvious that alcohol was being consumed. And lots of it.

  “Nah, I’m not going out,” he said. “Where you goin’?”

  At that, Kayla spluttered into laughter. “I’ll tell you in a minute. I have to change, first.”

  But she didn’t come back. About fifteen minutes later, to the soundtrack of tipsy laughter, Jamal heard Kayla, Candace and Drina leave the apartment.

  He waited up until midnight, and when she still hadn’t come home, he called Beckett, because it wasn’t even a Friday, so where in the hell could she be?

  “A gentlemen’s club, sir,” Beckett said. “And they were all pretty intoxicated, so I dropped the other two young ladies home and I’m on my way back now. Ms. Hughes is asleep in the backseat, but completely safe.”

  Jamal rolled his eyes, and go dressed to wait in the lobby so that Beckett wouldn’t have to drag his inebriated fiancée out of the car, into the elevator and up to the apartment.

  When she pulled up, he went outside, and nodding at Beckett, opened the rear passenger-side door. On the backseat, strapped into her seatbelt but slumped to one side, was Kayla. She was wearing skin-tight jeans and high heels with a flimsy organza tank top. Club-wear. The kind of outfit your average twentysomething year old wore when she was going out on girls’ night with her friends. Her locs were loose and hanging over her face, partly covering it, and she looked younger, asleep.

  At first prepared to be annoyed, now that he saw her, Jamal couldn’t help but smile. But Beckett was waiting, so there was no time to stand around. Unfastening the seatbelt, Jamal put an arm beneath her, and the other at her back, lifting her from the car.

  With a foot, he shut the door and nodded again at Beckett through the open window, before going inside. Just before the elevator arrived, Kayla woke with a start, and a gasp, looking alarmed for a second before she realized where she was.

  Seeing that she was with him, she relaxed again, and looped her arms around his neck. She exhaled, and her eyes fluttered shut again.

  “I miss you,” she said. Her voice was so quiet, he could almost tell himself he’d imagined it, until she said it again. “I miss you so much …”

  “I have a name for you. D’you want it?”

  “I’m starting to dread these calls from you, Madison Avenue,” Jamal said matter-of-factly, leaning back in his chair.

  When Gayle told him who was on the line, he’d hesitated over whether to pick up at all. Nothing good had come of his reconnection with her thus far. And yeah, maybe that was him “shooting the messenger” as she put it, but the way he felt about how that whole Devin thing had gone down, hell someone had to get shot; and Madison was as good a person as any.

  “I can tell. But this one, I thought you might want to know. So, do you?”

  “Depends on what the name is. Another hustler looking to take down Devin Parks? You about to put together a class-action lawsuit or something?”

  Madison gave a short laugh. “Okay, I can tell you’re still upset with me …”

  “Nah,” he said, not bothering to lighten up on the sarcasm.

  “I figured as much, so I had some people do some digging. About that blog that broke the story about Devin? BlackandFabulous?”

  Jamal sat up a little. That blog. The one that had the never-ending treasure trove of Devin-Makayla stories, most of them pure fiction, but all of them feeding the narrative that Jamal Turner was being played.

  “Turns out that—and this will be no surprise to you—that they’re not exactly all about journalistic integrity, so they’re sometimes a little loose about things like protecting their sources. And I hate to tell you, but I was right.”

  “About what?”

  “The source wasn’t from my end, Jamal. It wasn’t Tyree.”

  “Gimme the name,” he said.

  “The thing is,” Madison said. “It’s not even limited to Devin. From what I was told, it’ a longstanding relationship where this person basically feeds the blog information about SE, and your entire …”

  “Madison. The name?” Jamal said.

  She sighed. “Okay, but let me just say this one thing. From what I understand, it wasn’t proprietary information that was shared. Nothing confidential. Just rumors and speculation, with just enough fact to make it look like …”

  “Madison.”

  “DeJuan Stokes,” she said, speaking the name quickly.

  Jamal exhaled a rush of breath, and sank back into his seat.

  “I’m sorry,” Madison said, her voice quiet. “I remember meeting him. I know he’s one of your best people.”

  Jamal sighed. “Thanks for the call, Madison. And for … thanks.”

  He hung up.

  He had recruited DeJuan Stokes. Recruited, trained and groomed him. And though Jamal had always known that DeJuan’s ambition outmatched his scruples, he didn’t believe he was downright grubby.

  True, he’d been obviously a little pissed to be passed over as head of development for someone from outside the company, but never would Jamal have thought he would act against the interests of Scaife. Except … DeJuan hadn’t really done that, had he?

  Devin Parks was not an SE artist. So why go after him? And all these stories about Makayla and Devin … what was he hoping to gain from that?

  Calling Gayle into his office, Jamal asked her to find and send up DeJuan Stokes; and once DeJuan was on his way, to get the IT department to lock
access to all his accounts, cancel his keycard, credit card and remote access passwords for the company server. Then, he told her, she should have human resources cut DeJuan a final check today, including all payouts of vacation.

  “When he leaves my office, he needs to vacate the building immediately,” Jamal told her. “So, if he has personal effects at his desk, even a pack of gum, I want you to make sure it’s downstairs waiting for him at the security desk.”

  “Absolutely.” Gayle betrayed no reaction at all as Jamal described the steps he wanted her to take, and when he was done, simply turned to leave his office, and execute his instructions.

  He sat, perfectly still for the next ten minutes, preparing himself for the conversation to come. The next time he looked up, DeJuan Stokes was standing at the threshold of his office. Dressed in his usual self-consciously hip attire, he looked perfectly at ease, and entirely unsuspecting.

  “You wanted to see me?”

  “Sneaky-ASS motherfuckers. everywhere,” Damon said, shaking his head, when Jamal finished describing his day.

  “Yeah. Never saw this one coming though.”

  “It’s all a matter of perspective,” Damon said shrugging. “You should’ve talked to Harper.”

  Turning on his bar stool, Jamal looked at his brother. “Harper? What d’you know about …?” He sat up and shook his head. “Nah, man. Please. Don’t tell me …”

  “She’s cute,” Damon shrugged. “I got her number that night when we met at that supper club. Been crackin’ on her since then, and a couple weeks ago, she finally let me take her out.”

  “Damon, she works for me.”

  “Yeah, like you didn’t screw around with people who worked for you? Remember … I don’t know … your fiancée?”

  “Fine. But Harper’s good people, so don’t mess with her head. She’s …”

  “Mess with her head? She’s messin’ with mine. Says she’s tryin’ out celibacy. You believe that shit?”

  Jamal could have done, but decided not to let Damon in on anything to do with Harper’s past. Everyone had a right to try to remake their life. And if this was Harper’s new kick, then more power to her.

  “What was you talkin’ ‘bout though? That I should’ve talked to Harper. Why?”

  “Because to hear her tell it, the only person DeJuan Stokes was gunning for was her.”

  “But none of the shit on the blog was even about her. That doesn’t make …”

  Except it did make sense. Nothing was on the blogs about Harper because it wouldn’t matter to her if it had been. Everything about her messy past had already been said, raked over exhaustively in other places online, local tabloids, and even in a few rap songs. She had been thoroughly and completely marked as a “’ho”, and that was by now, very old news.

  DeJuan couldn’t hurt her with that. But if he knew she was messing around with Devin, what hurt Devin might hurt her. If that was the case, Jamal and Makayla were only collateral damage, as was Devin himself.

  When Jamal grilled him before tossing him out on the street, DeJuan insisted that he didn’t know anything about Devin and Tyree. All he had shared with the blogger was rumors that Devin was “out there” and what she came up with about Tyree and Devin’s sex life were the result of her own digging.

  What was more likely, Jamal thought, was that Tyree had lied to Madison. He had reached out to the blogger after losing this chance at a big payout, and later thought it in his best interests to deny it.

  None of that mattered anymore. DeJuan was a worm in the apple, and had been extracted; and Devin was going to be okay. The public’s appetite for salacious information about him had lasted all of two weeks, and they had moved on to the new story without missing a step, not at all concerned about the inconsistency.

  Even if two weeks ago he was believed to have been cruising dudes in Atlanta, now, Devin Parks was being portrayed as screwing Jamal Turner’s woman. And in this case, there was plenty of photographic “evidence” that seemed to prove it—picture after picture, going way back, of Makayla and Devin, smiling together, leaning against each other, holding hands and standing really close.

  And how ironic was that? Once again, in a completely different, unplanned, and unanticipated way, Makayla had saved Devin’s ass.

  ~31~

  “You’re still up.”

  Makayla nodded, and smiled as Jamal came through the door. Unfolding her legs from beneath her, she stretched.

  “I was reading,” she said. “Thought I might as well read here, and wait for you.”

  Something in his eyes flickered. She hadn’t done this in a long time, is what she knew he was thinking.

  “Want to come cook with me?” he asked, nodding in the direction of the kitchen.

  “Sure.” Following him, Makayla chose one of the stools at the center island and watched as he took ingredients out of the fridge, lining them up neatly in preparation for whatever he was about to make.

  It had been three weeks since he came home with the news that DeJuan Stokes had been the saboteur; and that it wasn’t even that clear who he was trying to sabotage. Apparently, he had lots of axes to grind—for Jamal for passing him over as head of development, for Makayla, because he had never liked her, for Harper because she was surpassing him professionally …

  Together they decided that there was no way to tell why people did the things they did, and that it was better to put all of that to bed. After all, Devin was fine. He had weathered it, and even come out better on the other side.

  ‘But how ‘bout us?’ Jamal had asked. ‘How’re we doin’?’

  ‘Not so good,’ Makayla said, her voice breaking.

  And she had just barely managed not to cry. Jamal crossed the room and hugged her then, and told her it would be okay, that they would be okay.

  ‘We just need to get to know each other again,’ he said, his face buried in her hair. ‘To know each other … differently.’

  After that, they talked more. Not that night, but in subsequent days. Slowly, gradually, they learned to be friends again. But it was different, because it was the first time in their entire relationship that there was just the two of them in it.

  For a change, not every third conversation was about Devin. Part of the reason for that was because Makayla hadn’t seen him in ages. They talked on the phone a few times a week, and texted often. But somehow, they had silently agreed that a little time, a little space might be in order.

  Now, it was Jamal who saw him, as he had finally signed his deal with SE and was constantly in and out of the offices for various meetings with staff. He had gotten a decent contract, that included all the trappings and promotional perks that he never could have afforded when he was independent. And he had a new collaborator in Prentice Michel, who Jamal said rivaled Devin in his difficult nature, and in his talent.

  Harper, who had been working with Prentice would also soon begin working with Devin. But according to Devin that hadn’t happened yet. Makayla could tell from his voice that he was looking forward to it, and maybe not just for professional reasons.

  “You gon’ eat some of this?” Jamal asked, indicating the food on the counter.

  “What’re you making?”

  “Bleu cheese burgers.”

  Makayla smiled. “Only you could eat that at two in the morning and still look the way you look,” she said.

  “How do I look?” he asked, biting into his lower lip and surveying her from beneath his brows.

  Makayla felt a flush of heat and could not maintain eye contact. It had been like that lately—lots of suggestive looks, lots of flirtation, lots of ‘new relationship energy’ which was interesting, since they were hardly “new” to each other, and definitely not to each other’s bodies.

  But it had been a little while. Almost like they were … dating, even though they lived together.

  “You having one, or not?” he prompted.

  “Yeah. Might as well.”

  They were silent for a few mom
ents, while he chopped onions and peppers, and prepped an egg to bind the ground beef into patties.

  “What was the thing you went to tonight again?”

  “Kendrick Cruise was at Prudential Center in Newark. I stopped through, to check him out. See how he was doing with his wife on tour with him.”

  “And how’s he doing?”

  “Keepin’ on the straight-and-narrow, so far.” Jamal glanced up at her. “He’s ready to change his life for her, I think.”

  “That’s cool,” Makayla said, trying to sound upbeat.

  Willing to change his life for her.

  “Come over here, help me with this bleu cheese,” he said. “Don’t want to get all this …” He indicated his hands, knuckle deep in raw meat.

  Makayla came from behind the counter and fetched the bleu cheese crumbles from the refrigerator.

  “Where do you need them?”

  “Just sprinkle them in here, while I make the patties.”

  She tried to reach over his arm to follow his instruction, but instead, he lifted his arm so she could stand in front of him, between him and the counter. He had her effectively caged in as he fashioned the beef patties, his large arms brushing against her sides, his pelvis brushing against her rear.

  Makayla felt his breaths sweeping the dome of her head, and smelled the light, clean scent of his cologne. Her fingers trembled as she sprinkled the bleu cheese crumbles onto the beef.

  “Good?” she asked, feeling slightly breathless.

  “Yeah … good.”

  Just as she moved to duck beneath his arm, and return to the safety of the other side of the center island, Jamal leaned in. At first, he just brushed the tip of his nose against the length of her neck, then he moved to her shoulder, and planted a featherlight kiss there, moving up again toward her neck and behind her ear.

  “I’m sorry,” he breathed against her skin.

  Makayla’s head fell to one side, and her eyes fluttered shut. “For … for what?”

  His hands were still sticky from the raw meat, and the egg binding mixture. This should not have been an erotically-charged moment, but it was. Maybe because whenever he touched her like this, everything else became irrelevant, and disappeared.