Page 57 of Love Delayed

“Nah, my mom is gonna cook and call some of the fam over. You know how we do. You down?”

“Absolutely,” I said, smiling at him.

I loved his family’s get-togethers. There were always more of his mother’s Spanish relatives than his father’s Black kinfolks, but honestly, we all enjoyed ourselves the same. The only difference was that there were a lot of tortillas and jalapeños involved with the meal.

“Okay, I’m going to run out for ice and more beer. Do you need anything?” Marcus asked.

“I’m good, babe. I’m going to head into the kitchen to help your mom out,” I told him.

Wearing a smile, he lowered his head and shook it from side to side.

“What, babe?” I asked with my head tilted, curious about what he was thinking.

“Eli would have never stepped into my mother’s kitchen, not even for a glass of water,” he said and laughed. “What the hell was I thinking?”

“She never helped in the kitchen?” I said, a little surprised. “How did she get away with that?” I asked, thinking back to when his mother nearly demanded I help with the cooking.

“Well, to be honest, my mom said vegans aren’t allowed in her kitchen, and that ruined it,” he said, laughing louder and harder.

I wanted to laugh with him, but I didn’t get it that time, which was odd because I was always humorously connected to Marcus. We never skipped a beat with lines from movies or old sayings from back in the day.

“Why is that so funny?”

“All of it is just so damn comical, Zee. Just thinking back on the entire relationship with Eli is funny as hell. This woman, this person so damn opposite of you, checked all the boxes for what I thought would be the ideal wife for me, and all along she was a fuckin’ fraud,” he said, laughing even harder. “Zack, you’re a fuckin’ idiot,” he said between chuckles.

“Who’s Zack?” I asked, now totally confused.

“He’s a buddy of mine. Zack and his damn boxes,” Marcus replied while continuing to laugh to the point where tears were streaming down his cheeks.

“You know what, none of this is making any damn sense to me. So, I’m going to head to the kitchen and let you work through whatever this is,” I said, waving my hands in a circular motion in front of his face.

Now bent over in laughter, he nodded as I walked away. What that was about, I had no damn clue, but I figured he would enlighten me later.

Chapter Thirty-One

Marcus

I followed my mother to the back of the house to the screened-in porch, where we sat on the wicker chairs at one of the tables. I was hesitant to speak, but I had questions.

“What is it, son? You can ask me anything. I’d never lie to you, so ask me whatever you need to ask,” she said, opening the line of communication.

I lowered my head in an effort to get myself all the way together. The entire situation was emotional, and I hoped my mother wasn’t scheming with a woman whom I thought she didn’t care for much at all.

“Marcus, son, talk to me.”

“Did you know Eliana was cheating on me?” I finally asked.

She paused and then answered, “Yes, I knew.”

“For how long?” I asked between clenched teeth as I lowered my gaze to the ground.

“Not long. Friday night, to be exact––when Angelica, DeSoto’s wife, called me. It was late that evening. She said she had to tell me something DeSoto told her not to, but she stressed that she didn’t misunderstand what she saw.”

“I don’t follow,” I said, finally lifting my head to look at her.

I wanted…no, I needed to hear the truth.

“Well, Angelica said she was with DeSoto at a tattoo shop in the city. She was sitting on the sofa in the waiting room with a huge picture window that overlooked the floor where the artists worked. A woman walked into the shop, and one of the tattooists paused from working on DeSoto’s tattoo to stand and greet her with a kiss. Not thinking anything of it, Angelica turned away, but a few moments later, the woman entered the waiting room and went to a bar that was set up in a corner. She said the woman poured herself a drink and then hung around the doorway, leaning on the frame while watching Rush work. After drinking a couple of cocktails, the woman cranked the volume up on the music and started dancing by herself. That’s when Angelica focused on her face. She said the woman looked familiar, but she couldn’t figure out where she had seen her. Then it hit her, and she called out her name. That’s when things got crazy. Eliana tried to say she was there to get your name tattooed on her, but when Angelica asked her why she was lip-locking with Rush when she first walked in, she had no answer. Angelica tried to go into her bag for her phone to snap a pic of her, but Eliana ran out of the shop.”

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