Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 82060 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 410(@200wpm)___ 328(@250wpm)___ 274(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 82060 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 410(@200wpm)___ 328(@250wpm)___ 274(@300wpm)
The wariness went out of his features, the blankness setting back in.
But he didn’t answer, not until he walked by me, and I pivoted to watch him move to the door.
He stopped at it and turned back to me.
“You move, last day of the month.”
“I don’t need—”
“I don’t give a fuck what you need. My son needs a safe place to live with a playground close. And that’s what he’s gonna get.”
He opened the door but again turned back.
Then he delivered his final blow.
“And I got good at it ’cause I got an imagination. If I’d let myself have a woman, there’s only one woman I’d let myself have. But she doesn’t need my shit. Her kid doesn’t need my shit. No one needs my shit. So I’m gonna let her have her life and raise our boy and keep them clear of the shit that is me.”
With that, leaving me eviscerated, he was gone.
* * * *
FYI:
A man with a moving truck showed at my door on the morning of the last of the month.
I hadn’t packed.
The man with the truck and his boys packed for me.
I threatened to call the police, but he was undeterred.
I didn’t call the police.
Darius had said there was a playground at this new complex.
And a pool.
We moved.
The next day, there was an envelope on the new, gorgeous, granite counters of my roomy new kitchen.
In it was five thousand dollars.
Chapter Four
This Is Meant to Be
Rock Chick Rewind
Still some time ago, but now even less…
“Okay, does doing crazy, stupid shit run in you all’s family?” Toni asked.
“Shh!” my sister Lena shushed her.
She was looking through a pair of binoculars.
Toni was in the middle of the back seat of my car. I was in the driver’s seat. Lena on the passenger side.
And Lena was spying on her boyfriend, who she was certain was cheating on her.
We were parked across the street from his place, so the binoculars were overkill.
She put them down, turned to me and announced, “I’m going in for a closer look. Cover me.”
I opened my mouth to stop her, but she was out the door before I could.
“Cover her?” Toni asked.
I smiled, trying not to laugh because this wasn’t funny, not really.
And it wasn’t because I was pretty certain my sister was right. Michael was cheating on her. The dude was shifty as all heck.
But still.
We watched as Lena tiptoed across the street, looking every which way, her long braids swinging along her back (causing me to wonder if I should make an appointment at the salon, those braids looked good on her), making it so obvious she was somewhere she shouldn’t be doing something she shouldn’t be doing, in broad daylight no less, I no longer felt like laughing.
Instead, I groaned.
“She’s terrible at this,” I stated the obvious.
“One of us should stop her,” Toni noted.
She was right.
“And that someone isn’t gonna be me,” Toni went on.
Ugh.
I started to open the door to go fetch my sister but stilled when Toni muttered, “Holy crap.”
Holy crap was right.
This was because, out of nowhere, Eddie Chavez and Lee Nightingale were there.
Lee was heading to my car.
Eddie was heading off Lena.
“Oh boy, that man grew up f-i-n-e, fine,” Toni declared, eyes glued through my windshield. “Both of them are fine. But seeing as I’ve already taken in the grown-up fineness of Eddie’s fine, and I’m just now witnessing the same from Lee, I can tell you the two of them together is too much fine. I might not be able to handle this. And I got experience with fine, since Tony is right now at home, waiting to get the call to bail me out of jail. He said I better make this a misdemeanor, since he isn’t pawning our new flat screen for your foolishness.”
Lee rapped on my window with his knuckles, and when I hit the switch to roll it down, he bent over to look in at me.
And, um…yeah.
He was a good-looking kid.
But now he was fine.
“Hey, Lee,” I greeted. “Long time. Are you home on leave?”
“Yeah,” he grunted.
“Hey, Lee. Lookin’ good,” Toni greeted, pushing in between the seats to peer around me at Lee.
“Toni,” he returned, his lips twitching in a ghost of that famous Liam Nightingale smile. Then, with no further ado, he got serious and said, “Eddie’s gonna put Lena in the car and you three are gonna get the fuck out of here.”
I noted his mouth had not cleaned up since back in the day.
And it was still hot.
“Sure, sure, good,” I babbled.
“She thinks her man is cheating on her,” Toni told Lee.
I lost his face when he looked over the roof of my car.
He came back into the window when I heard the door open beside me and the car bobbed when Lena’s bottom hit the passenger seat.
The door closed again.