Page 17 of No Darker Temptation

We’re better suited for the Met Gala than a bachelorette at the Hard Rock.

A few hours ago, we took a limousine ride around the area, took photos on the boardwalk, had dinner at a fancy restaurant I was dying to leave because the drinks sucked, and then came back here. To gamble and get white girl wasted before hitting the night clubs.

It’s nine o’clock.

This evening’s never going to end.

Karina smiles for a photo and Yulissa giggles as Brent comes up from behind her.

“Boo!”

He wraps his arms around her waist and she squeals as he lifts her up.

Stacy is my only ally this evening. We both think Brent needs to take a nap on the highway.

We exchange glances and she pretends to vomit. I snicker behind my cocktail glass.

Brent’s about the same height as me without heels, sandy-haired, with an athletic build from years of playing varsity football. He’d be handsome if he wasn’t so insufferable.

“Don’t forget, we’re leaving at a quarter to ten,” Brent says.

I glance at my phone. “That’s forty-five minutes from now. You’re infringing on girl time.”

Brent smiles, baring all his teeth. “Didn’t you miss me, Dee? This is the first time we’re hanging out since your fancy vacation.”

I give him a saccharine smile. “Absolutely.”

Stacy snatches my cocktail glass before I break the stem in my grasp. An awkward silence befalls the bar, the three of us unsure of how to pursue a conversation, or if it’s worth the attempt at all.

“Are you enjoying yourselves?” It’s the best he can muster.

“I was. About ninety seconds ago.” Stacy lifts her glass in Brent’s direction and takes a long gulp, practically finishing what’s left of her gin and tonic.

With regards to Brent Hopkins, public opinion within the inner circle of Karina Rosario is highly polarized. The girls either love him or hate him with Stacy, Mimi, and I falling on one end of the spectrum and Taylor, Shea, and Yulissa falling on the other. Mimi, Brent, and I all went to college together with Mimi coming in the year right between Brent and me. They have a complicated history stemming from a house party they both attended Mimi’s freshman year whereas Stacy hated him on sight.

Shea is the most passive, always looking for the best in everyone. I don’t fault her for being the peacemaker. On more than one occasion, Brent and I have gone at each other’s throats. As for Taylor, she tends to follow along with whatever her wife Shea says. Then there’s Yulissa.

None are so fervently in Brent’s favor than our dear cousin Yulissa.

Her mother is Chela, our grandaunt through my and Karina’s dads, and has always been the outcast in the family. As a result, Yulissa’s time with us growing up was limited to parties, holidays, special occasions, and summer vacation. In adulthood, she and Karina got closer when they ended up at college together. Now I just think she stays around because she’s in love with Brent.

Like a broken record I remind myself that suspicion isn’t fact and gut instincts aren’t proof. Over the last two years, I’ve witnessed a closeness develop between Brent and Yulissa that is completely inappropriate. For one, they hang out together alone and have a relationship completely separate from Karina. Secondly, he’s oddly hostile toward Omar, Yulissa’s long-time partner and supposed father of her son, Junior. Supposed because Junior is eight months old and his birthdate doesn’t exactly align with when Yulissa and Omar got back together after break-up number five. However, it’s one of those things that families suspect but never voice aloud. Like the fact that Junior looks absolutely nothing like either of his brunette, brown-eyed, brown-skinned parents.

Deep down, I feel like he looks like Brent. But that could be the insanity talking.

Aside from stolen glances, intimate touches, and whispers in dark corners at parties, I can’t say I’ve ever seen anything outwardly inappropriate take place between them. There was one time last summer where I stopped by Brent’s house because I’d left my phone charger there the night before after a barbecue he hosted. When I got there, I caught a glimpse of him and Yulissa through the front door window. She had her arms around him as if she was just pulling away from a hug. She rose to the tips of her toes to kiss his cheek and then both their heads tilted and I panicked. I rang the doorbell like a maniac.

The last time was back in March a few weeks after Junior was born. I showed up to her apartment with a gift for the baby and I heard her arguing with someone inside. All I was able to pick up on was someone saying “father,” “Karina,” and “married.” Then the door swung open and Brent stood in the doorway, equally as furious as he was shaken to see me there. I think for as long as I live, I’ll never forget the look on his face.

Even now, his gaze wanders across the room, lingering on someone in particular. I half expect to see his line of sight follow Yulissa but instead it lands on Karina.

Karina is hopelessly in love with Brent and aside from being overbearing, jealous, and a possible cheater, I know he loves her. God, the thought alone makes me feel sick and pathetic. How are any of those things admirable attributes for a man in love? I think my perspective on what that looks is irreparably warped. Not just because my parents fucked me mentally but I’m also in love with the man who kidnapped me over the summer.

Semantics.

“I was thinking after the club, we should go down by the boardwalk and watch the sunrise.”

“It’s November and it’s cold as fuck outside, Brentworth.” The bartender comes to replace Stacy’s empty glass with a third gin and tonic. “No one’s going down to the boardwalk to watch the sunrise.”