Queen Move

by Kennedy Ryan

  “No, honey. It’s like I said before. Nothing’s as it seems. That’s not the truth.”

  I frown, resting my elbows on the desk and touching my head, trying to piece her words into something that makes sense. “I don’t understand. Start from the beginning.”

  “It began, like most affairs do, with loneliness. I was so lonely.” A breath catches in her throat. “We both were.”

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Kimba

  “We’ll be in touch.”

  The next day on Serena Washington’s porch, I turn to face the woman who has caused all this trouble. She looked so much like her aunt that when she answered the door, I couldn’t stop staring. I wanted to snap a picture and text it to Ezra so he could marvel, too. The woman who was always on her front porch sweeping, stealthily snooping on our entire neighborhood, has a doppelgänger niece, and she’s as worrisome as her aunt.

  “You really think you can get me a book tour?” she asks as I’m leaving after hours of hashing out terms and getting things settled.

  “I can, but of course we have some editing to do before the book can be released. Fortunately, the publisher hadn’t sent many early copies out yet, and we’re contacting those readers to let them know about the misinformation in the draft they read.”

  “Misinformation?” Skepticism marks Serena’s expression. “Aunt Roselle had her finger on the pulse of everything. She was rarely wrong, but if you say so.”

  “Well, she was wrong about my father,” I say with a confidence that can’t be real until I know more about the charm we found. “Whatever she thought she heard my parents arguing about that night, she didn’t. And writing something like that based on unconfirmed speculation is both reckless and potentially slanderous.” I offer an indulgent smile since we have come to terms that meet my satisfaction. “But lesson learned, right?”

  Serena lifts her chin. “Lesson learned.”

  “I want to be clear. I’ve already spoken to the publisher. The only way this book gets published is if these changes are made, and once I approve it.”

  “I’m surprised you’re allowing it at all.”

  “You’re a good writer and a smart journalist. That’s clear. With the exception of the erroneous information about my father being unfaithful,” I say, pausing, as if giving her the chance to contradict me, but looking at her like she better not, “we loved the book.”

  “I appreciate that.”

  “Adding personal accounts from my family will elevate your book from being an unauthorized biography, something we publicly condemned and tore apart, to one that has our full support. Also, delaying publication makes sense so we can dovetail the release with the dedication of the new Joseph Allen Atlanta History Museum. I’m assuring you a New York Times bestseller.”

  I give her a Queen Bee smile, sweet as honeycomb, but with a little sting. “This is the part where you thank me, by the way.”

  “Thank you,” Serena says wryly. “You’ve got it all figured out, huh?”

  I’m not sure if it’s resentment or admiration in her voice. She’s free to feel either. I don’t care what she feels. I care what she does. And now I’ve got her in check.

  Checkmate.

  I’ll never hear that word without thinking of Ezra, without seeing two kids in his living room with a big board and heavy pieces, ebony and ivory, between us.

  “I need to go.” I smile and start down the steps. “But we’ll be in touch.”

  Once in Mama’s Benz, I call Ezra through the car’s elaborate dashboard.

  “Tru?”

  The hope in his voice breaks my heart because I know I’m probably going to break his, too. Unless… I’ve only allowed myself to consider the possibility that it’s not Ezra’s child a few times. All the maneuvers I’ve had to make over the last day—the conversations with Governor Rafferty, threatening the publisher, persuading and putting Serena in her place under my thumb—every move I made was carefully calculated, a bet I couldn’t afford to lose. This game required my complete focus. I couldn’t let myself consider what was happening with Ezra, but hearing his voice, it all falls on my heart at once, a stratum of hope and hurt and dread and fear.

  And love.

  “Yeah, hey.” I heave a tired sigh. “I have good news.”

  “You do?”

  “Serena is removing the lies about our parents from her book.”

  His silence surprises me. I expected instant jubilation, triumph. Not this waiting silence, like he’s not sure what to celebrate.

  “This is good news, Ezra,” I tell him unnecessarily.

  “Of course it is. I was just thrown off because I didn’t expect it to be this easy.”

  “Easy it was not.”

  “I can imagine,” he says. “Can we talk? I mean about us? Not all of this?”

  He’d said Aiko was trying to get a doctor’s appointment. Does he know yet?

  “Ez, what—”

  “Face-to-face,” he says, his voice as level as screed concrete and giving less away.

  It can’t be good. If it wasn’t his baby, wouldn’t he just tell me now? Or maybe she didn’t have the appointment yet. Or maybe they found out it was a false alarm. Anything good he’d tell me right away, but he wants to see me—wants to convince me, persuade me. Love me into doing something stupid. I’m so weak for this man, but that I will not let him do. I draw the lines clearly for myself. If the baby is his, I won’t stay. My heart will break every step away from him, but it would be an act of self-preservation. If the baby is not his…

  It hurts to hope this much. Hope is a bird that can soar or be shot down mid-flight.

  I pull into my mother’s driveway. “I’m at home. We could meet here.”

  He pauses, and when he speaks again, his voice has deepened, has heated. “I’ve missed you, Tru.”

  I’ve missed you, too rides the tip of my tongue, but I bite it, let the silence after his words stretch out.

  “We’ve had some developments here, too,” he says when it’s obvious I’m not going to respond in kind.

  “You spoke to your mom?”

  Another silence. Me making sure what was written in that biography never makes it to the shelves is different than confirming that it wasn’t true.

  “How did she explain her charm being at the lake house if your family had never been there?”

  “My family hadn’t, but she had with your mom, I believe.”

  “Oh.” Relief courses through me, bursting out in a laugh. “That’s right. Mama would take her friends there sometimes for girlfriend weekends. I didn’t think she had started before your mom left, but I guess she had. Probably their mah-jongg group.”

  “You’ll have to ask your mom.”

  “Okay.” I suppress the nervousness that rises every time I think of Aiko’s pregnancy, of knowing the answer. “Then I’ll see you in a little bit.”

  He draws a deep breath. “I love you, Tru.”

  I can’t say it back again. I won’t yet. Not until I know my heart is safe and my hope is not in vain.

  “I’ll see you soon, Ezra. Bye.”

  It’s hard to hang up, to break even the smallest connection to him, but I do. How the hell will I let him go if Aiko is having his baby? God, the bitter irony of it. I can’t even get my period to come back, and she got pregnant twice by the man I love without even trying.

  In the kitchen, Mama’s cooking. Raw meat and fresh vegetables crowd the counter. I set my purse on the island in the center of the room and walk over, give her a squeeze, which she returns.

  “You’re cooking already?” I turn to lean against the counter so I can see her face.

  “I wanted to make something good.” Mama glances at me, her eyes dark and sober under the vibrant head scarf hiding her hair. “You’ll be home for dinner?”

  I assess the food. Pork chops, string beans, corn on the cob, sweet potatoes.

  “All this for just us?” I ask.

  “Just us.” She blows o
ut a breathy chuckle, blinks, licks her lips when they tremble. “Some days it gets bad, missing your father. I know it sounds silly, but it helps when I cook his…his favorite things.”

  That feeling I usually try to hide from seizes my unsuspecting heart. Grief. Desolation that Daddy will never walk through that door. Never call me baby girl again. Tears sting my eyes.

  “I miss him, too,” I whisper. “All the time. I keep wondering when it stops hurting.”

  “For me, it won’t.” Mama scrubs dirt from the sweet potatoes, not looking at me. “I lost the love of my life, and it blasted a hole in the world. It doesn’t so much stop hurting as you just get used to the pain, remember how to wake up in the bed alone. Oh, you have to learn everything all over again like a baby learning to walk because I forgot how to live without that man.”

  There are a million things I want to say, want to ask, but she’s never spoken this openly about her grief and I’m afraid anything I say would make her stop.

  “Sometimes,” she continues, “I go into his office and pull out those stinky cigars he used to hide.”

  “You knew about those?” I ask, my question, my stunted laugh, teary.

  “He knew I knew.” She chuckles, snapping the ends of the string beans. “We had no secrets, Tru.”

  Her probing stare turns on me. “How did it go with that Washington girl?”

  The reminder of our present drama jerks me from the past.

  “Good.” I turn around to help snap the ends from the beans. “She’s agreed to the conditions I laid out.”

  “So she’s taking it out of the book? The lies about your daddy and Ruth?”

  “Yeah. The publisher won’t release it if she doesn’t. And I have final approval.”

  “You’re something else, girl.” Mama laughs and shakes her head.

  My conversation with Ezra tickles my thoughts. Not the hard parts that he and I have to sort through for our future, but the mysterious parts about our parents’ pasts.

  “Ezra and I went up to the lake house the other night.”

  “So things must be moving right along,” Mama says, her smile teasing.

  “Things were moving right along.” I grimace. “They may be grinding to a halt, but that’s another issue. When we were there, I found that star of David charm Mrs. Stern used to wear.”

  Mama’s hands go still under the water, and her whole body seems to freeze. Slowly her hands start moving again, but she doesn’t speak. So I do.

  “Ezra didn’t remember his family ever going there, so he asked Mrs. Stern about it.”

  She turns her head, stares at me for long seconds. “And what did she say?”

  “Ezra didn’t tell me everything, but she said she was there with you,” I say, rushing my next words, feeling on the edge of a knife I can’t see. “I said you would have girls’ trips sometimes with your friends, and it must have been something like that.”

  I pause, swallow, wait.

  “Was it something like that, Mama?”

  For a second, I think she won’t answer, won’t even acknowledge my question. Then she turns the water off, dries her hands on a dish towel nearby and faces me.

  “No. It was just Ruth and me.” Defiance and dread vie in Mama’s eyes. “The reason I was so sure Joseph never had an affair with Ruth is because I did.”

  “W-w-what?” For once I don’t care that I stuttered. What she’s saying is incomprehensible, but as echoes from that night taunt me with the truth, makes so much sense.

  Damn you, Ruth!

  Let me explain.

  You can’t explain this!

  “It was a hard year,” Mama says, looking down at her hands, caressing the small diamond Daddy gave her when they married. She always refused his offers to upgrade. “Your father was busy, working, gone all the time. So was Al. It’s no excuse. Ruth and I just…we were there for each other. I never would have thought…”

  She shrugs. “It happened. I let it happen. The day Joe died was the hardest of my life. The day he found out about me and Ruth was the second.”

  I’m dumbstruck. Congealing in my shock and clenching a cluster of string beans in my fist.

  “I broke his…” Tears trickle over Mama’s cheeks. “I broke his heart and it took years to mend it. I wasn’t sure I ever could. He didn’t leave. He was somebody by then in his own right here in Atlanta. Maybe he was concerned about appearances, but that wasn’t your father. I like to think he didn’t leave me because he couldn’t stand to live without me. Loved me so much he had to figure out forgiveness.”

  The kitchen, Mama’s confessional, is completely quiet. Even the refrigerator holds its breath while she gathers her thoughts and I gather my scattered wits.

  “We didn’t plan it,” Mama says. “But she was miserable here and missing her family. I was resentful, felt like I was carrying all the load with your father gone so much, and I missed him. Missed being…touched, seen.”

  Mama huffs a short breath.

  “We were careless when we went to the lake house. Stopped to grab something from the corner store up there. Al found the receipt, asked questions…” She gives a sad laugh and shake of her head. “Ruth is a terrible liar.”

  She hasn’t looked at me while she told the story, but now her sad eyes find mine. “Love is not a tidy thing, Kimba. It can’t ever be perfect because none of us are. Someone at some point will make a mess. The test of that love is how you clean it up. Your father stayed and we cleaned it up together.”

  Mama turns back to the counter, snapping string beans again.

  “I’m glad you were able to stop Serena Washington,” Mama says. “That night, the four of us agreed we would never tell. We all had things to lose. This would be a scandal now. But then?”

  Mama bends a meaningful look on me. “Back then? Our lives would have been ruined. I would have told the world what I just told you if it meant clearing your father’s name, though. For Ruth’s sake, I’m glad we won’t have to.”

  I have questions but asking them would feel like defiling an offering Mama made freely. She told me what she thought I should know, and that’s good enough for me.

  “I hated losing her,” Mama says, smiling. “As a friend. We knew what happened between us was a mistake almost before it started, but sometimes when you’re lonely and hurt, you’ll try anything to feel better.”

  “Thank you for telling me.” I swallow my curiosity and shock. “I think… I suspect Mrs. Stern told Ezra, too.”

  Mama grins and transfers the string beans from the sink into a pot. “Ruth and I always thought you two would find your way. I thought we had ruined it, but I guess fate had other ideas.”

  My laugh is bitter, hollow. “Fate has a sick sense of humor.”

  “Explain,” Mama says, frowning.

  “After all these years we finally found our way back to each other at just the right time when he’s free, but his ex is now pregnant and I’m in perimenopause.”

  “Pregnant?” Mama searches my face. “What are you going to do?”

  “He’s on his way here. Aiko was going to the doctor, so he should know now if it’s his or not.” I slump against the counter. “Mama, if it’s his, I can’t do it. I can’t watch her carry his baby while I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to have one. Congressman Ruiz’s campaign is my first truly solo, without Lennix. I want to get this right. I have to. I hope Ruiz would make a difference for people here in Georgia who need help. It’s gonna be the fight of my life.”

  “Do you love him?” Mama asks softly.

  I close my eyes, not wanting to answer that. Not having to. My heart answers for me, pounding Ezra’s name into my chest. “Yes.”

  “This happened before you and Ezra got together?”

  “Yes, but what if…”

  A million what ifs crowd my mind and poison my soul.

  If anyone gets hurt when things go south, it’ll be you.

  Mona was so right. This is about as south as things could go, and if I
lose Ezra, the hurt will be unbearable.

  “It sounds like you don’t want right now,” Mama says. “But you do want forever.”

  “That about sums it up. If there’s any forever left when this is over.”

  “When it comes to love, some messes take longer than others to clean up.” Mama’s smile is wise. “Believe me—I know.”

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Ezra

  It’s just a slip of paper, but my hand trembles holding it.

  “God, I forgot about these,” Aiko says, popping a large pill and chasing it with water. “You’ll have to remind me to take them. Remember with Noah I couldn’t ever remember my pre-natals?”

  “Yeah,” I say, my fingers, my voice numb. “That was a long time ago. They have apps now to remind you.”

  She crosses around the counter to the kitchen table where I sit holding the ultrasound. On the flimsy paper, a little form floats in its own starless galaxy. At the very bottom, tracking its orbit, are the letters and numbers that sink my heart.

  7w2d.

  Seven weeks. Two days.

  The baby’s mine. Any life that is just beginning deserves some celebration, but today, right now, it feels like my life is over.

  At least my life with Kimba.

  “I need to go out.” I stand to leave.

  “Out?” Aiko takes another sip of water.

  I don’t answer but gather my keys from the dish on the counter.

  “I didn’t do this on purpose,” she says. “If that’s what you think.”

  “I know that. Please don’t make this worse.”

  “Worse?” She approaches me cautiously like I might run with her sudden moves. “Why worse? We’re a family. Noah will be so excited about a little brother or sister.”

  “Yeah. He will.” I laugh hoarsely. “Good news for everyone, huh?”

  She glances from the keys to my face. “You’re going to tell her?”

  “Yeah, not that she’ll actually…”

  Give me a chance. Stay.

  Kimba probably won’t do either of those things and I can’t blame her. Gravel lines my throat and I can barely move. It’s the weight of anxiety, but I’m too stubborn, too determined…too damn in love with Kimba to give up yet. The odds are squarely against me, but I have to try.