“You talk big fucking shit, Dretti!” Exon shouted back at him and chuckled. “But I ain’t afraid of big shit talkers, nigga!”
“Bitch, I don’t talk big shit. I talk cash shit! Some shit you can take to the muthafuckin’ bank! So what the fuck you tryna do!”
“Dretti, chill the fuck out!” Keyon yelled at him and started to struggle to keep his hold around his neck. “That nigga ain’t worth it right now! We gon’ get at his muthafuckin’ head later, nigga. Right now is not the time!”
“Let me the fuck go!” Andretti insisted, and I couldn’t watch the exchange without trying to intervene any longer.
I stepped in front of him and his eyes softened enough to let me know he wouldn’t hurt me, even though he looked as if he wanted to kill the entire world. I grabbed Andretti’s chin in my hand and stared back and forth between his eyes, silently pleading with him to calm down. He relaxed a little at the feel of my hand on his jawline, but his ready to fuck the world up stance didn’t change.
“I need you to move, baby.”
“No, Dretti!” Andretti tried to move his head to the side so he couldn’t look me in my eyes anymore, but I tightened my grip on his chin.
He was going to go to prison for murder tonight if he didn’t calm down, and I wasn’t going to stand around and let that happen. As mad as I still was at him, the thought of losing him hurt more than him not coming clean about his past with Emani. Way fucking more.
“You need to calm down. Whatever it is, you need to let it go.”
Exon chuckling at our interaction interrupted what I was saying, and I didn’t even turn around to look at him because I just knew he was about to say something stupid.
“If it isn’t Miss Nim fucking Cole.” Exon chuckled again and I could hear the smile in his voice. “I thought that was you, baby. It’s been a long fucking time.”
“You know this bum ass nigga?” Andretti asked, and the softness he had in his eyes when he first looked at me was now gone. “Don’t tell me you fucking know this nigga, Nim. Please don’t tell me that shit.”
“She actually used to fuck this nigga!” Exon taunted Andretti, and I think my entire soul left my body after he did. My God! Tonight couldn’t have gotten any worse! “How does knowing that shit make you feel, you pussy bitch!”
Everything after Exon said that happened so fast. One minute, I still had Andretti’s chin in my hand, and the next I was on the floor with Bria trying to pull me up. When I stood up Andretti was on top of Exon, and his fist repeatedly came down hard on Exon’s face. Keyon and a few other men were trying to pull Andretti off of him but he wasn’t letting up. It took six of them to finally get him to stop beating Exon up, and Andretti was still trying to go after him as he was pulled out of the crowd.
“Dretti!” I screamed at him and he finally stopped trying to push away the people holding him back, but he didn’t look my way.
“Y’all gotta get out of here, ma,” Keyon said softly and sighed. “Ima have him call you later. I promise.”
I didn’t want to listen to him but I knew I had no choice. There was no reasoning with Andretti at the moment, and I feared for our future as Bria slowly pulled me away from the area.
20
Andretti
Exon’s snake ass was on my immediate murder list. I had already been pissed the fuck off that he put his hands on my baby sister… but when he said that disrespectful shit about Nim I completely lost it. He was out of line times two, and there was no way I could’ve walked away without whooping his dumb ass.
“Dretti,” my sister cried as we sat in my driveway, and I couldn’t even turn to look at her. I was too disappointed in her. “I said I was sorry! I know I shouldn’t have…”
“Don’t ever in your life apologize for what the fuck he did to you!” I yelled at her, and she cried even harder. “What the fuck, Aniya? I don’t understand what’s wrong with your goddamn brain! All the bad shit going on in your life is happening because of that nigga! Can you really not see that shit!”
“I know!” Aniya yelled and sniffled. “I fucking know, Dretti, but I can’t help that I love him!”
I cut the engine and got out of the car without saying another word. My father was right when he said there was nothing we could do to make Aniya see how silly-minded she was being in the name of love.
“Dretti!” Aniya called my name again and hopped out of the passenger seat. “I shouldn’t have confronted him about his cheating ways at the party! I should’ve just walked away!”
“You’re so goddamn brainwashed it’s ridiculous!” I turned around and walked up on her. “Do you honestly think this shit is your fault? He shouldn’t have put his fucking hands on you no matter what, Aniya!”
“But…”
Bright headlights pulling into my driveway stopped Aniya mid-sentence, and we both looked to see who it was driving up.
“I know you didn’t call daddy!” Aniya screamed at me, and it took all of me not to cuss her silly ass out.
“You’re the only one who is going to explain what that dumb ass nigga did to you, Aniya, and I hope Bebe and our father can get through to you when you do because I’m done trying.” I pointed toward the front door and shook my head at her. “Go in the house. I’ll take you home tomorrow so you can explain the shit that happened tonight to our parents."
Aniya walked away with her head hung low and was halfway to the door when Nim got out of her car and slowly walked over to me. I leaned against the side of my car and exhaled a heavy breath. After everything that went down at Steeze’s party, I didn’t want to see her again tonight. Not while I was still in a fucked up state of mind.
“Dretti,” Nim called my name in a soft and worried tone. “Oh my God, look at your hands…” She grabbed one of my hands in hers and slowly caressed the top of it. “Dretti…”
“Stop talking, baby.” I pulled her into me and wrapped her tight in my embrace. I needed to feel her. Feeling Nim could immediately make anything wrong in my life better. “I don’t wanna talk about the shit that happened.”
“I’m sorry…”
“For what?” I pulled my head back from the crook of her neck and stared at her intensely. “What are you apologizing for, Nim?”
“For how you found out about…”
“I don’t give a fuck about whatever you used to have with that nigga.” I gripped her face in my hand and kissed her lips. My fucking lips. “That shit you had with him is dead for life, and I’d never let anyone come between what you and I have together. Not that bitch ass nigga. Not your ho ass cousin. No-fucking-body. You hear me?”
“Yes,” Nim moaned sweetly in my ear when I bit down on her neck, and I picked her up and wrapped her legs around me.
Placing Nim's back against the car, I tongued her down as rough and passionately as possible. She was mine, and there was nothing anyone could do to change that shit. Ever.
Nim grabbed a fistful of my shirt in her hands and rain began to pour down on top of us as we kissed for what seemed like hours. When she finally pulled her lips away from mine, her red lipstick along with black mascara was smeared all over her cheeks. I couldn’t tell if she’d been crying or if it was the rain that had her mascara running, but I didn’t even mind either way. She looked like the most beautiful disaster I’d ever seen in my life.
“I love you so much, Dretti. And I don’t care about anything that happened tonight. All I care about is that you’re safe.” Nim trailed her finger across my rosary tattoo and kissed my lips before she said, “And that you’re mine. I meant it when I said I never wanted to be without you, Dretti. I meant that shit with my entire soul.”
“And I meant it when I said I’d always be there for you, Nim. I don’t ever go back on my word, mami. I’d never go back on my word when it comes to you and…”
Nim placed a finger against my lips and smiled.
“Let’s have another first, Dretti.”
I smiled back at her beautiful ass and licked my
lips.
“Oh, yeah? And what should that be, baby?”
Nim began unbuttoning the plaid shirt I had on while she seductively stared into my eyes.
“Let’s make love outside, Dretti.” Nim smiled her pretty white smile again and bit down on her bottom lip. “Let’s make love in the rain.”
Epilogue
Andretti
Six Months Later…
“You’re a mushy ass nigga now, Dretti,” Keyon said over the loud music we were spinning and grinned at me. “Damn! Can you take your eyes off of little baby for one second? Shit!”
“Mind yo’ own woman, Key!” I smirked and kept my eyes on my baby.
Nim was dancing with Bria in the middle of the dance floor at Rhythmz Lounge, and I couldn’t make my eyes look away from her if I really wanted to. They stayed glued on her beautiful ass whenever she was in the room.
“That’s a low fucking blow, Dretti.” Keyon shook his head at me and yelled, “You know damn well I ain’t got no fucking woman to mind!”
“Oh shit.” I chuckled and patted the top of his shoulder. “I forgot your ass is still heartbroken. My bad, brah!”
“Fuck you, Dretti!” Keyon chuckled too.
Tori, Keyon’s once girlfriend, left him for her baby daddy a few months back, and he’d sworn relationships off completely since.
“You better get on with Bria while she’s still single, Key. I know you think she’s bad as fuck, as you would say, nigga. Stop playing around and make something shake!”
“That’s a word. Ma is fine as hell. I might have to push up on that!” Keyon said and dapped me up. “Go see about your lady, Dretti. You’ve stared a hole in the side of her face so hard that you’ve finally caught her attention. I’m sure her cheeks are burning and shit.”
Nim finally caught onto my gaze, and I took the headphones I was wearing off and made my way down to where she and Bria were dancing. They both smiled when they saw me approaching, and Bria whispered in Nim’s ear and walked off before I got to her. I pulled Nim into my chest and she wrapped her arms tight around my neck and smiled again.
“It’s about time you came down to see me.” She kissed my lips softly and I let mine linger against hers for a few seconds. I couldn’t get enough of doing mushy shit like that to her. “I’d say this party I put on is going a lot better than the last one I threw for Steeze. What do you think?”
We both laughed, and I nestled my face in the crook of her neck.
“I’d say it’s going a hell of a lot better than the last one. You owed him a good time tonight, baby, and it’s a good thing Exon and Emani are still in jail. They can’t go around fucking shit up this time around.”
As crazy as it sounds, Exon and Emani had apparently still been messing around, and she was the woman my sister, Aniya, confronted him about at Steeze’s mansion party. It wasn’t too surprising, though, because they were both cut from the same grimy cloth, and karma never missed her chance to bite a snake back. Exon was on some reckless shit after he and I got into it that night, and he tried to rob the wrong people while Emani was with him. He ended up getting a robbery charge and she went down as his accessory, and shit, hopefully, prison would turn both of them around. That reckless and wild behavior they stayed on could only last for so long before it messed both of them up for good.
Exon getting arrested was a blessing in disguise for my baby sister too. It was the wake-up call and out she needed to leave his reckless ass alone because it could’ve been her who got knocked up with him that night. After he went down, she decided to get her life back in order and was even enrolling in nursing school next fall. To say I was proud of her turnaround was an understatement. I was happy to finally have my normal little sister back.
“I tried to warn her that karma didn’t play,” Nim said referring to her last conversation with Emani and shook her head. “It’s crazy how fast it can come back around too.”
“Yeah, it is. Enough about all of that, though, baby. I wanna talk about you.” I smiled at Nim’s pretty smile. “I love you, Nim.”
“I love you too, Dretti.”
“Enough to marry a nigga?”
Nim pulled her head back and eyed me skeptically before she smirked.
“Stop playing with me, Dretti. You aren’t ready for that with me yet.”
“Who says I’m not?”
“Dretti…” Nim’s voice trailed off as she watched me get down on one knee, and I grabbed her soft hand in mine.
“Nim Cole, mami, I love you more than I love my damn self, and it’s crazy how fast it all happened, but I wouldn’t trade my feelings for you for anything else in this world. I crave every single thing about your beautiful ass, and I’d be dumb to go another day without knowing you’d be mine forever for real…” Pulling the velvet box from my jean pocket, I took out the huge diamond ring I’d bought for her two months prior and placed it onto her finger. “So what’s good, Nim? You tryna be stuck with my handsome ass for life or what?”
Nim giggled, cried, and nodded her head all at once.
“Of course I’ll marry your handsome ass… Dretti!” Nim squealed when I scooped her up bridal style and kissed her all over her face and sexy soft lips. “I love you so damn much, Andretti Matthews! Thank you for always adding to our firsts, baby."
The End!
Afterword
Thank you so, so much for reading! I’d love for you to tell me what you thought about Andretti and Nim by leaving a review on Amazon or Goodreads. Although this is the end for them, there are so many more characters to come! Make sure you stay on the lookout for book two of “The One He” title series!
If you haven’t read about Keanu, the bad boy who inspired me to write about Andretti, check him out today in my short “Love is All We Need” that was published in the B. Love Publications Anthology “Love is All We Have”.
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With Love,
A. Marie Johnson
Up next from B. Love Publications…
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