Page 4 of Cooly

I just stared out the window and nodded. Because for once, she wasn't lying.

Chapter 2

I glared at Diamond out of the corner of my eye. We were in the back of a friend's private lounge. I'd been here a hundred times before; if I knew this was where she was bringing me, I would have stayed home.

"Why you still moping and drunk as fuck?" she asked.

"I ain't moping."

"You been moping for months." She paused. "You cut your dreads, Cooly. You had those things for years. She got you having Waiting to Exhale moments."

I gritted my teeth. "What's the fucking surprise, Diamond?"

Before she could answer, her phone lit up on the table. She glanced at it, her expression shifting into something unreadable, and picked up. "Hold that thought."

She stood, smoothing down her dress, and walked toward the back of the lounge. She disappeared through a velvet curtain without looking back.

I reached for my glass. The whiskey was warm now, the ice long melted. I drank it anyway.

I didn't know how long I sat there alone. Minutes. Maybe more. I thought about Indigo—the way she was treating me like I was a stranger, like the years we'd spent together meant nothing.

The door to the private lounge opened.

I looked up.

For half a second, my heart stopped.

Dark skin. Natural hair pulled back in a low puff. Same height as Indigo. Same soft build. She was wearing a simple black dress that stopped midthigh, gold hoops catching the low light, her face half in shadow.

For that half a second, my brain short-circuited. Every thought I'd been having about Indigo vanished, replaced by a name I hadn't let myself think in years.

Ayomide. There was an irony to her name—it meant bringer of joy. She used to make me feel like I wasn't just my father's son.

She was standing in the doorway watching me like she'd just walked out of my past and into the present. I heard she’d moved to LA after graduation and went to law school out there. She had fucked up my feelings so badly I didn’t want to know anything else about her.

Her eyes found mine across the room, and for a moment, neither of us moved.

Then she smiled. She had a beautiful smile.

She covered the distance between us, stopping a respectable five feet away, then looked like she was debating on whether she should come closer. "Long time no see, Chinedu."

Her voice always made my dick hard. She used to whisper secrets in my ear and I’d damn near cum on myself. Now it just thumped a little.

“7 years.” I said as I stood up slowly, my legs feeling unsteady beneath me. I didn’t know if the liquor or her presence caused it.

She smiled small. " Diamond ran into me earlier. Said you needed a friend."

I laughed. "You friends with Diamond now, enough to be talking about me?"

She shrugged. "I didn’t hate her before. I just didn’t like knowing my boyfriend knew what her pussy tasted like and she was always around him."

I chuckled. She had never been a fan of Diamond, and Diamond didn’t like her—she knew it.

“You could've said no to her.”

“I almost did.”

“So it was almost fuck me, huh?”