by Kennedy Ryan
He chuckles, his eyes roaming over my face and body with undisguised admiration. He’d fuck me if he could, but that won’t ever happen. I turned him down when he was drunk enough to actually ask, which only makes him more determined to beat me.
“Maybe,” he whispers back. “Maybe I know it, but Mateo doesn’t, and he’s this close to hiring me to run his campaign. You could always come work for me, Kimba. I’d take real good care of you.” Innuendo sours his voice.
“Tony, you wouldn’t know how to ‘take care of me’ with step-by-step instructions, but I’ll consider…no guarantees now…hiring you to work for me on Mateo’s campaign. I’m sure I could find something for you to do. If I remember correctly, you make a great cup of coffee.”
“We’ll see about that,” he says as I turn and head for the exit. I’m not sure what it will take to persuade Congressman Ruiz, but this wasn’t it. I’ll know my move when it’s time to make it, and it will have Congressman Ruiz coming to me.
I pull my phone out to call for an Uber and see a text message from Mona.
Mona: Wanna get faded? I have wine and edibles. Gummies, to be exact.
These men who think I should bow and scrape to them have me feeling tight and close to my feelings. I could use some loosening.
I hit send on my message back to Mona.
Me: Girl, on my way.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Kimba
At least I’m not as drunk as Mona.
This occurs to me, though, whilst my legs are straight up in the air, the hem of my dress is scrunched at my waist, and my head hangs off the arm of the couch. I may not be drunk exactly, but maybe a little looser than I planned? And I only had half a gummy.
“I’m deadass serious when I ask this question,” Mona says, her words only slurring the slightest bit.
“What’s the question?”
“Are you ready for the question?”
“I just said…dammit, I’m ready. What’s your question, Mo?”
“Where are all the brothers who eat booty like groceries?”
It’s completely silent for several seconds and then we both start giggling uncontrollably. My head, hanging upside down, bobs against the back of the couch. Mona, stretched out on the floor, staring up at the ceiling fan, cackles and grips her midsection.
“Is this keeping you up at night?” I ask. “Not is the overall temperature of our planet rising at an unsustainable rate? Not how will we address the problem of mass incarceration? Or equal pay for women? But your existential question centers around men who eat ass?”
“I need a man who’s not afraid to put in that work. I mean, girls can do it for ourselves, but we can’t do that. And I get sick of getting myself off. I wanna share the burden.”
I snort. “Ain’t that the truth.”
“My BOB gets the job done, yeah, but it’s not…intimate. Ya know what I mean?” The amusement fades from Mona’s expression. “There’s nothing like being touched.”
Like the urgent squeeze of Ezra’s hands on me, the caress of his breath. The gentle touch of something as simple as being helped down to the ground. The desperate need in how tightly he clutched me. It had been affirming.
Mona’s right. There’s nothing like the touch of someone who wants you as much as you want them.
“I miss being fucked,” Mona says. She sits up and reaches for her wine, shunning the glass and taking the bottle straight to her lips. “Feeling a man inside me, hitting that spot over and over, that makes me lose my mind. Clawing and scratching because the shit is so good. I miss being kissed and held.”
She lies back down. “Hell, I miss waking up with somebody beside me. That morning wood poking you from behind.” Her laugh is bittersweet. “My ex liked to fuck first thing. Said there was nothing better to start off his day than…” She shakes her head, leaving the thought incomplete.
“You miss him?” I ask softly.
“He cheated on me.” She bites her bottom lip and takes another swig of wine. “Yeah, I miss his trifling ass.”
“I’m sorry, Mo. How’d you find out?”
“Oh, he was decent enough to tell me himself because he wanted out. Sat me down and said he’d met someone at work. She was younger, skinnier and lighter than me, but, of course, none of those things mattered to him. Their minds had met on an intellectual plane.”
She shoots me an icily ironic look. “Bitch did graduate from Penn. Made me sick. Miss I Got Everything And Your Man. He better not be eating her ass. He never ate booty or did any freaky, adventurous shit with me.”
Mona’s funny as hell even when she’s hurting, so an involuntary smile quirks my lips. One she ruefully returns.
She sits up again, cross-legged, and flings her long dreadlocks over one shoulder. “I could have cheated. Think I didn’t have offers? Opportunities? I did, but I would never do that to another person.”
I sit up, leaving my legs in the air resting against the back of the couch, but propping my elbows on the edge. “I kissed Ezra.”
As soon as the confession hits the air, I want to take it back. Damn wine, loosening my lips and lowering my guard.
“Kimba,” Mona groans, dropping her head to her hands. “You said you had this under control. That you were just friends. Just gonna talk.”
“Yeah, but that was before he told me—”
“I don’t care what he told you.” Mona stands a little unsteadily, the fog clearing from her eyes. “That’s somebody else’s man. A good woman. A friend of mine. The mother of his child.”
“But Mo—”
“Don’t but Mo me. They’ve been together almost ten years. You can’t just waltz into their lives from on high for a month and tear that family apart.”
“I’m not tearing anything apart. I—”
“How could you, Kimba?”
“She’s fucking someone else,” I blurt. Were I completely sober, I doubt I would have said that.
“She’s what?” Mona’s eyes widen and her mouth hangs open. “Aiko?”
“I shouldn’t have said anything.” I groan, not drunk enough for a hangover, but just drunk enough to make a fool of myself and put everyone’s business in the streets.
“But ya did, so go on. Explain.”
“You and Ezra are friends. He’ll tell you when the time is right.”
“The time is right now, honey. You opened this can of worms. Don’t try to go shoving them back in now.”
I sigh and pluck at the frothy, shimmery layers of my skirt. “She asked for an open relationship. Ezra didn’t want it, said things weren’t getting better, and they’ve decided to break it off.”
“Aiko asked for an open relationship?” Mona’s face is skeptical. “Homegirl gets jealous, green as a butter bean over Ezra. I can’t imagine her being okay with him…are you sure?”
“Well, that’s what he told me. He says he wanted to make a clean break because they’ve been having trouble for a while.”
I sit up enough to glance at her over my shoulder. “Is that true?”
“I mean, I know they were seeing a counselor, but I assumed it was just them being smart, proactive. Keeping the lines of communication open.”
“Oh, they’re open all right,” I say dryly. “According to him, they’re over.”
“So Ezra told you this and you two kissed?”
I clear my throat. “Twice.”
“And did you do more than kiss?”
I love Mona, but I’m not getting into the details of Ezra’s fingers inside me, his mouth hot and suckling at my breast. In my mind’s eye, there’s an aerial shot of Ezra and me on that trampoline, breathing hard, turned into each other, unable to look away in the moonlight, intimacy curling deliciously between our bodies.
“Just kissed, but he wants more.” I meet her eyes across the room. “So do I.”
“Look, I’m not that chick who tells a grown-ass woman where to get the dick or how to run her life,” she says, “but I wouldn’t be your friend
if I didn’t say this. They are a family. Aiko is not just some girl he found on Tinder and then decided it’s quits. He hasn’t been with anyone but her for ten years, and they have a son together. Things happened fast and things just happened. It ain’t over ’til it’s over, and if anyone gets hurt when things go south, it’ll be you.”
And I cannot afford to be hurt, not with everything already on my plate.
The kitchen door opens and heavy footsteps approach the living room. I’m on high alert, but Mona looks pretty calm about it.
“Well, here we go,” she says resignedly.
“It’s just me,” Ezra yells from the doorway.
The sight of him standing at the entrance to Mona’s living room sends shock spearing through me. He looks goooooood. His broad shoulders fill the doorway, and the dark jeans and YLA T-shirt show off the lean muscles in his arms and legs. His hair has grown just a little, long enough to curl the slightest bit, and my fingers pulse with the need to scrape across his scalp and burrow into the soft pelt of it. A little scruff shadows his sharply drawn jawline. He’s sun-bronzed, contrasting with the white flash of his smile.
A smile that evaporates when he sees me.
“Tru, I didn’t know you were here.” He clears his throat. “Sorry to barge in, Mo.”
“Like you don’t bust up in here every damn day unannounced,” she says. “One day, you gonna get an eyeful.”
She walks over and gives him a hug. He watches me over her shoulder, his eyes running along my bare legs, still flung over the couch. My instinct is to sit up, cover myself, preserve some modesty.
But I don’t.
My other instinct is to make him want me the way I want him. The heat of his stare is addictive. His eyes caress my bare shoulders and legs, and despite the warm summer night, my body is covered in goose bumps.
“You’re back early.” My voice comes out husky, breathless.
“Uh, yeah.” He makes no move to come farther into the room. “I wanted to get back.”
When he looks at me, I missed you is in his eyes.
I’ll wait is in the hands he shoves into his pockets.
Without saying a word, his body tells me with eloquence how he feels, what he wants. I want it, too, but Mona’s warnings ring in my ears.
If anyone gets hurt when things go south, it’ll be you.
“I got edibles and wine,” Mona tells him, walking back to her bottle on the floor. “Join us.”
“You know I don’t do weed,” he says wryly. “I can’t spare that many brain cells.”
He focuses on her while he talks, but his gaze keeps drifting back to my legs. I bend my knee and run my fingers along my thigh.
Just to see what happens.
He lowers his head. His Adam’s apple bobs with a deep swallow. The muscle in his jaw flexes.
“Noah got to camp okay?” Mona asks, flicking a look between the two of us.
Ezra nods. “He walked in like he owned the place, of course.”
“He probably will by the time it’s over.” Mona laughs. “You’ve gotta play Monopoly with this kid, Kimba. Ruthless kingpin.”
Her comment falls into the vat of silence accumulating between Ezra and me. We watch each other warily, furtively.
“So, no gummies,” Mona says, grabbing an unopened bottle of wine from the coffee table. “Wine? Join the party.”
“I think I’ll go actually,” he says, his voice deep and graveled. “I just wanted to let you know I was home early in case you needed anything.”
“Like a good neighbor,” Mona says. “Oooooh, what if I lived next door to the State Farm guy? He’s so fine on those commercials. I’d be borrowing sugar every day.”
“Yeah, well,” he says, his words clipped, controlled. “I’m gonna go.”
When he leaves, Mona looks at me and shakes her head. “Be careful, girl. If I were you, I wouldn’t.”
But she’s not me, and looking at the empty place where Ezra just stood, I already know I probably will.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Ezra
“Damn sprinklers.”
I crush the dried leaves of Noah’s tomatoes in my fist. The system has been unreliable for weeks. The timer’s been temperamental. It looks like the garden wasn’t watered at all while I was in New York.
“I need to get someone out here to check it,” I mutter, walking to the collard greens in the rear of the garden.
I do realize midnight is an odd time to perform such a thorough inspection of our vegetables, but it seems like as good a way as any to distract from the fact that Kimba is next door in Mona’s living room.
Her legs were flung carelessly over the side of the couch. Long and toned and the color of burnt honey. The bodice of her strapless dress barely contained her breasts. She probably didn’t realize the top of one nipple, like a drop of chocolate, was barely visible from just the right angle.
I stood at just the right angle.
Hell.
I drop to my haunches and check the soil the sprinklers would only reach when they oscillate. Looks like it hasn’t seen a drop of water.
A noise brings me to my feet. Kimba stands at the fence dividing my yard from Mona’s. She aims a tentative smile over a row of corn stalks. “Can I come in?”
I nod, but don’t otherwise move. I stand still because I’m afraid if I get much closer, I’ll grab her and won’t be able to let go. She’s obviously been out based on her attire. I’ve seen her on television dressed like this. Awards shows. Events. Political functions. Polished and pulled together in a way that probably requires a third party. A stylist. That confection of a dress forms a shimmering bell from her waist to her knees. Her shoes look like they cost about as much as monthly tuition at YLA. Her hair, which I’d gotten used to seeing in its natural texture, falls pressed, straight and shiny around her bare shoulders.
“You look pretty,” I say unnecessarily. I’m sure several men, any number of them with eyes in their heads, told her that tonight.
“Thanks.” She carefully makes her way toward me through the string beans.
“Date?” I keep my voice casual, neutral, the exact opposite of how the thought of her on a date with someone else actually makes me feel.
“What?” She frowns and tilts her head.
“Were you on a date?” I ask with excruciating pronunciation.
“Oh, no.” She smiles, slants a knowing glance up at me. “Would you care if I was?”
I don’t reply, but just stare at her, unblinking, letting her feel my answer instead of wasting words.
“I wasn’t on a date. It was a charity event.” She grimaces. “A work thing. I wasn’t expecting you back from New York for a few days.”
I pluck idly at a dead leaf on a tomato vine. “Yeah. I wanted to get back.”
To see you.
I wanted her answer. I know I have a lot of baggage. Having a kid is one thing. Living with his mom for the last decade? Being in the midst of negotiating what is practically a divorce—it’s complicated. I’m not exactly a safe bet. I get it, but I can’t not ask Kimba to take this risk with me. As irrational as it may seem, since we were only thirteen when I left, this feels like our second chance, and I’ll do just about anything to have it. She picks her way down the row of vegetables, her stilettos sinking into the soil. Her ankle turns, bringing a grimace to her lips.
Her pretty, painted lips.
I like your lips the way they always are.
Thirteen-year-old Ezra was on to something. As beautiful as Kimba looks with the artistry of her makeup, I still prefer her lips bare.
I haven’t moved, and she keeps walking toward me. My hands twitch with the compulsion to hold her, so I stuff them in my pockets, an old tell she can still probably easily read. I make a deal with myself. Until she says yes, until she says she’s willing to give us a chance, I won’t touch her.
The chemistry between us is electricity over an open flame. It destroys reason, and I want her as clear-eyed and lev
el-headed as possible if and when she agrees to try with me. As clear-eyed and level-headed as you can be after a bottle of Mona’s wine and an undisclosed number of edibles.
Kimba looks steady and sober enough when she stops in front of me on the row of collards.
“So, Noah was good?” she asks.
“Yeah.” For once, I don’t want to talk about my son.
“And your mother? She was okay?”
I for damn sure don’t want to discuss my mother when I’m sporting a semi in front of the literal girl of my dreams. “She’s good,” I reply tersely. “Did you need something, Kimba?”
Like me? Do you need me? Because I need you, and if you keep standing here in my garden looking like this, smelling like summer and seduction, I’ll take you, so get on with it.
“Oh.” She glances down at her expensive shoes, covered in dirt. She clutches her clutch, pressing the little purse to her waist. “Yeah, well…I’ve been thinking about what you said.”
“What I said?” Endangering my good intentions, my legs carry me a step closer to her. “What I said about what?”
She huffs an exasperated breath and slides a glance to the side, over to the squash. “About us…giving this a try. Since I’m here in the city and you’re…” She glances up at me and then quickly back down. The fairy lights we strung around the garden streak shadows with her eyelashes on the tops of her cheeks. “…available.”
“Available?” I risk a step closer, not wanting to hope, but liking where this is going. “Yeah, I’m available.”
I pause, holding my breath and balling my fists in the pockets of my jeans.
“Well, since you’re available and so am I…” She gives me a level look and draws in a bust-lifting breath. “I’m saying yes.”
That magic word sets me into immediate motion. I reach for her, scooping her close and wrapping my arms around her waist. I bend my knees so I can bury my nose in the silky sweep of skin from her shoulder, up her neck and behind her ear. Her fingers in my hair are the most delicious kind of torture.