I didn’t show that side of me to everyone.
“His lips felt like the gun,” I whispered, looking toward my bathroom door, in case he walked in and heard that.
“You kissed?” Blair screamed.
“How about you tell it to the entire world.” I muttered. “And no, he kissed my face… not a big deal.”
“For you, that’s a big deal,” She squealed. “I’m good, Gams… Zoya was being kissed on,” I heard her talking to Gams, who was checking on her because she was screaming.
“Kissing, huh? Gerald?” I could hear Gams ask in the background.
“Gams, I’m not messing with you anymore. Had me high out my mind with those cookies you gave Meer.” I laughed, thinking about how many layers of emotions I had gone through while off her cookies a few weeks ago.
Gams laughed in the background. “You have to go slow… one bite.”
“When I’m done breastfeeding, I’m eating the entire cookie,” Blair sighed, daydreaming of the day she would be able to eat Gam’s cookies again.
“Remember what I told you on the island. That man is a man in love. Let him love you, Cheesecake.”
I smiled. “I hear you, Gams.”
“Hearing and doing is two different things. I know you’re used to being tough and having to safeguard that heart. Let a real man handle it, and baby, you won’t ever regret it. Gerald is a good boy… man,” she corrected herself.
It was easy for Gams to refer to Gerald as a boy. She referred to all the Gods as her boys. In her eyes, they were her babies, even Papa Inferno. She took care of them when they needed, and she would until her last breath.
A tear slid down my cheek, and I quickly wiped it away. “Zoy?”
“I’m here, B.”
“It’s hard to let someone in… scary, huh?”
I quickly closed the bathroom door and leaned my back against it. “I’m so scared, B. Not because I don’t trust him… I don’t trust me.”
They led me to the back near the holding cells, and I followed behind the officer. He motioned for me to stand near the bars, and I looked into the cell that was holding about seven men and tried to pinpoint my client. Capri wasn’t the kind of friend that asked for favors often, so whenever she called and needed one, I made sure that I could deliver for her.
“Gerald Wraithe?”
The man sitting in the back with his head rested on the brick wall opened his eyes. He wasn’t in a rush, and it was as if this was familiar to him. His hopes weren’t high, from the way he remained on the bench toward the back of the cell.
While he was relaxed, the other men were dying to have a conversation with me. A conversation meant their chances were better at getting from behind these bars.
“What up, Ms. Lawyer?” His deep voice caressed my ear drums, slightly knocking me off my game.
His voice was smooth, like a knife slicing through perfectly churned butter. Usually, when I met clients in the holding cells, they were anything but relaxed.
Not Mr. Wraithe.
He sat calmly in the cell, waiting for anybody to say some shit to him. “Fuck him, baby… get me the fuck out of here with yo fine ass.”
Mr. Wraithe finally rose to his feet, his tall frame unfolding as he did a slow, deliberate stretch. It made the men around him nervous, because the man sitting beside him slid over a bit. The fluorescent lights overhead captured his rich dark skin, highlighting his jawline that had been chiseled out perfectly by God.
His waves were so deeply etched into his crown that they gave the ocean competition. The room seemed smaller with him standing, his presence demanding attention without him having to say a single word.
I found myself holding my breath, caught between being in awe and slightly intimidated, as though the earth’s orbit was pulling me closer to him, however, the bars kept us apart.
I shook it off immediately. I had just met this man; there was no way that I felt this magnetic pull with him.
His eyes were on mine, as he reached his arm out and grabbed a fist full of the man’s locks before slamming his head into the bars.
