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Shit, this was too much and twenty or not,shewas too much too.
She flipped over, brows knitted as she gazed up at me. “Is something wrong?”
I shook my head, my thoughts muddled with the idea that this was actually too right, frighteningly right. But I couldn’t say the words. So instead, I kissed her for long moments, still trying to calm the beast raging inside me. When that didn’t work, I said fuck it and slammed back inside her, making both of us scream.
We fucked again and again that night, and the next day after I’d taken her back to campus, I got the hell out of Romey, Tennessee.
CHAPTER11
BROOKLYN
NOW…
Sitting in Britta’s formal living room, my mind raced with thoughts, memories. Memories of that junior year homecoming week and of a younger Vann London. I was younger too. Younger, dumber, and damn turned out. Those two nights were…too much and not enough at the same time. Passion, recklessness, and decadence. It took weeks for me to get myself together, to stop craving something that would never happen again. He’d left without as much as a real goodbye. He’d left without telling me he was leaving, but it wasn’t as if he didn’t warn me. He didn’t want me like that. He didn’t want a real connection, but I could’ve sworn I’d felt one. I would’ve bet my last dollar that he’d felt it too.
And I would’ve lost that bet.
That whole situation grew me up real quick, or at least I thought it did. I thought I got it. Theitbeing the truth that sex didn’t mean shit to a man even if it meant everything to a woman. It was a reality I filed at the front of my mind. It became my way of viewing menperiod, and it allowed me to get what I wanted while locking my heart up in a fire safe box.
Whistling and applause tore me from my thoughts and allowed me to focus on the matter at hand—my baby standing on the small stage grinning from ear to ear in her miniature formal gown and headpiece, having finished her performance ofI Have Nothing. Yes, Britta had an actual stage in her living room because, well, she was Britta Fontaine, a world renown burlesque dancer. Whywouldn’tshe have a stage in her living room? I joined her and Vell in applauding Bailey. Their live-in maid, Shep, was also there, standing in the room’s doorway smiling broadly as he too applauded Bailey.
“That was perfection, darling!” Britta proclaimed, leaving her throne—yes, it was an actual throne chair—to hug and kiss Bailey. “I think that deserves a bonus! I mean, the wardrobe, the vocals, the emotion. Brava, sweet girl! Brava!”
Bailey looked as if she would burst with self-pride. Turning her bright-eyed gaze to me, she asked, “Did you like it, Mama?”
“No, Ilovedit! You are truly a star, baby! You make me so proud!” I replied. I’d missed most of her performance due to being up in my damn head, thanks to Vann London, but I knew my child. She was a consummate performer. She’d been born with the gift to entertain, just like Britta and me. I just gave up on all that, content to be a wife and mother, until—
“Bailey, why don’t you go raid my costume closet as an extra reward for that stellar performance! You can take any of my headpieces or jewelry you want.”
Bailey’s mouth dropped open. “Can I have a boa, too?”
“Of course! Vell can help you reach the things that are up too high for you.”
They left, and Shep had disappeared from the doorway when Britta turned to me with narrowed eyes and her heavily adorned hands on her hips. “Where were you, because you damn sure weren’t in this room with us when that baby was performing her heart out.”
I opened my mouth to protest and quickly decided against it. Of all the people in the world, Aunt Britta would see through a lie coming from me. So, I said, “I saw Vann London.”
As she settled back into the soft seat of her throne, her face read confusion. Then almost instantly, recognition blossomed on her face because yeah, she knew who I was taking about. “You did? When? Where? I thought he lived everywhere but this country.”
I shook my head, my eyes fixed on the floor. “No, he’s been in the states for a while, staying with his mother.”
“You went to Mississippi? When?”
Lifting my eyes to meet hers, I said, “He’s staying with Sharla. He’s been sick. Cancer. She invited me over and I accepted, knowing he’d be there. I guess I thought…I don’t know.”
“You thought because years have passed and you’ve lived a whole lifetime since the thing with him, you could handle seeing him?”
“It wasn’t just seeing him. He talked to me, got all up in my space and I smelled him, felt his body heat. Shit, I’m too damn old to be feeling this way.”
“Feeling what way? Horny? It’s been a minute, hasn’t it? Didn’t you tell me you haven’t had any dealings since your divorce? That’s been what, three, four years? I’m sure your lady parts were on fire for him.”
“Why you have to put it like that?” I groaned.
“Because! Look, sweetie, I can hook you up with some willing studs since you refuse to date right now.”
“I’m not refusing to date; I just don’t feel like it and…it wasn’t just sexual. I mean, yes, I’m still attracted to him because he is still the most beautiful man I’ve ever laid eyes on. I just…”
Bailey bounced back into the room, her tiny chocolate frame draped in a boa, a tiara on her head, and too-long silken white gloves covering her hands and trailing up her arms. “Aunt Britta, what should I perform next.”
