Page 96 of Pregnant By A Rich Demon 4

“We’ll do Christmas right here,” I said, pointing toward the wide corner of the salon. “A real Frasier fir from North Carolina, twelve feet tall, smelling like pine and cold mountain air. We’ll put all the silver and gold ornaments on it. You can hang the baby’s first ornament right on the lowest branch so she can touch it.”

I looked back at Truth’s empty plate.

I wasn’t wondering if she would love me.

I wasn’t plotting some desperate bid to win her over with tricks or force. Force was for cowards like Amai who didn’t understand a woman’s soul.

Truth had always loved me. She had loved the way I listened when she talked about her past. She had loved the stability I offered when Phillip stripped her bare. She had loved the man who showed up on her porch with soup and gentleness instead of threats and snipers. Amai had just gotten in the way. Amai had clouded her vision with fear, blood, and chaos until she couldn’t tell the difference between passion and captivity.

All she needed was time.

Two months on this water. Two months of waking up to the river breeze, eating warm meals, holding our daughter, and studying her medical journals without the shadow of a street war hanging over her head.

Two months, and the fog would clear.

She would look across this very table, look into my eyes, and realize that I hadn’t taken her from her life.

I had given it back to her.

“Just a little longer, Truth,” I whispered into the quiet room, raising my glass toward the empty chair. “Just finish your tests, baby. I’m coming to bring you home.”

Chapter 16

TRUTH

Three months in, and motherhood had stripped away whatever delicate ideas I used to have about peace. Peace wasn’t quiet; peace was having everybody you loved under one roof, making too much damn noise while the food simmered on the stove.

Mama’s house smelled like seasoned flour, hot peanut oil, smothered cabbage with smoked sausage, and sweet cornbread. The screen door kept slapping against the frame every time one of Honor’s bad-ass kids darted in or out, chasing a stray one-eyed calico cat across the porch. Frankie Beverly and Maze rolled off the stereo in the living room, low enough to talk over but loud enough to make Mama sway her hips while she dropped fresh-battered catfish fillets into the cast-iron skillet.

“Truth, hand me that brown paper bag off the counter,” Mama barked, not even looking over her shoulder. “And don’t be dragging your feet like you ain’t got no energy. I know studying for that board exam next month been taking you through there, but you’ll be aight.”

“I’m moving, Mama.” I laughed, passing her the paper grocery bag lined with paper towels to drain the fish. “And I’m not dragging. I’ve been up since five, feeding Tru.”

Across the living room, sitting on Mama’s plastic-covered sofa, was the most feared man in Orleans Parish looking completely defeated.

Amai had on a fitted black thermal shirt with the sleeves pushed up past his forearms, dark denim, and pristine black-and-white retro Jordans. On his left knee sat Honor’s six-year-old, Trey, aggressively driving a plastic monster truck directly over Amai’s heavy gold Rolex. On his right shoulder, Honor’s four-year-old daughter, Chloe, was busy trying to braid two inches of Amai’s hair with sticky, fruit-punch-stained fingers.

Amai caught my eye over the kids’ heads. His jaw ticked once, but he didn’t move an inch.

“Tell your sister to collect her damn offspring,” he said, his deep voice carrying clear over the sizzle of the grease. “This little girl just wiped a blue Airhead across my ear.”

“Aww, look at Uncle Amai,” Raven teased from the doorway, leaning against the trim with a plate of potato salad and a cold beer. “The Demon of New Orleans getting bullied by a four-year-old in sparkly light-up sneakers. Where your shooters at now, Amai? Where the artillery?”

“Priest about to pull up,” Amai deadpanned, staring Raven down. “And if you don’t take your little niece off my back, I’m going to buy her even more candy and have her run her sticky fingers through that weave.”

“Don’t play with me,” Raven fired back, grinning. “Priest will pay to get it redone anyway. Keep talking, and I’ll tell the rest of them you got candy in your socks. They’ll be on you like roaches.”

“Don’t you dare,” Amai warned.

“Mr. Amai,” Trey yelled, slamming the monster truck directly into Amai’s collarbone with a loud vroom. “Make the engine noise again! You did it wrong last time. Do it with the spit!”

Amai closed his eyes for two whole seconds, inhaling through his nose like a monk trying not to commit a homicide. Then he looked at the boy. “If I make the noise, you promise you gonna sit your little ass on that rug and watch Paw Patrol?”

“Yes!” Trey beamed.

Amai let out a low, gravelly engine rumble that shook his whole chest, complete with a tire-screech sound that had both kids squealing in delight. He scooped Trey under one arm, set him on the carpet with the toy bin, and gently peeled Chloe’s sticky little fingers off his neck before setting her beside her brother. There had to be some good in Amai, or else kids wouldn’t fuck with him the way they did. I knew that already, but the confirmation gave me a different type of relief.

“Now stay down there,” Amai muttered, rubbing his ear with a napkin. “Savages.”