Page 113 of 10,000 Hours With A Rich Menace

“I don’t know, but that is who I am marrying today.”

“How does one go from a vacation to never coming back to work, and now you’re getting married. Stevie, this is me… what is going on?”

I sighed, and ran down everything that went on with Priscilla, and Cindy was so livid that she snapped the comb in her hand. “I told you that bitch was no damn good. I’ve been around my fair share of bitches that don’t mean you no good. Stevie, she could have gotten you raped and killed.” Cindy paced the shop, and Duke reached over and handed her one of the waters that she tried to offer him moments before.

She stood in front of him, facing me, and Duke swallowed her small frame up. If she had been behind him, you wouldn’t have seen her. Cindy snatched the water bottle and opened it, taking a few sips.

“It looks bad, I kno?—”

“Looks? The girl put you in a situation to almost lose your life. Then if that wasn’t enough, she offered you up to the man that kidnapped you in the first place. Thank God Skyler knew him, or you would have been dead. Men like that don’t care if you take a dollar, they want your head… Jesus, I need to sit down.” She plopped down in the chair and fanned herself.

I felt stupid because everyone that I knew had been trying to warn me about Priscilla and I refused to believe it. Being so desperate for a friend, I ignored red flags that someone normal would have noticed.

I’ve always known how serious the situation was, even when I was in that warehouse for a week. No matter how nice Beans was to me, I knew that my life was hanging in the balance, and I could be killed at the end of everything.

“I know.”

“Baby, I need you to use that head more and realize that every chick that is nice, isn’t your friend. That girl may have been nice, but she didn’t give a damn about you… not one bit.”

“Yeah.”

She took a deep breath. “And this Mania character… you are going to marry him because you want to or because he’s forcing you.”

I giggled. “His name is Menace, and I am marrying him because I want to. Cindy, I am in love with him.”

“Baby, how do you know this is love? He kidnapped you, then told you that you were gonna marry him or that bitch and your father would die… how is it love?”

“She could have left the first night she arrived,” Duke answered. “I’ve been with Mens for a while, and when he first laid eyes on you, I knew you were different. He paced the front of the house for an hour before walking in the first night you came to the house. If he wanted to kill you, he would have and Skyler wouldn’t have stopped that.”

I smiled as I looked at Duke. “I know I love him because my heart has never felt that way with anyone. I want to protect him, defend him, and love him all at the same time. I know he can protect himself, and he does very well, I feel like I have to. He actually sees me for the Stevie I am, I don’t have to pretend around him, and you know how much I pretend around guys. Not him, Cindy. He accepts me for who I am, and he encourages it. He made his pool house into a studio for me, and he hates mess. I can see his body tense up with pain from the mess in there, but he likes to be near me, so he sucks it up… that’s love.”

Cindy studied me from the chair and took a deep sigh. “I have had my fair share of crazy stories from when I was younger and hanging my ass out in those streets, so I am not in the position to ever judge you. However, I want to meet this man and see who I am giving my baby girl away to.”

I smiled as she stood up and held her arms out, and I ran into them, hugging her. “You can come to our ceremony… please.”

“Chile, I’m already mentally preparing how I’m going to run across town to change clothes. First, let’s get this hair together because I refuse for you to get married to that man with these split ends.” She ran her hands through my hair, and I laughed.

“I’ve been roughing it out here.”

“I can tell. You can go ahead and sit down, and lock that door… I know you need to protect her, but you standing is bothering me.”

“I got you, Beloved.”

Cindy smirked, as she got right to work, and Duke took a seat. I closed my eyes and put my headphones in to listen to my favorite song.

Stevie

Stevie

No stone was leftunturned when it came to Jeffie. She had everything planned down to what kind of underwear that I would wear with my dress. I told her that I wanted something simple, sexy, and not over the top. This was a courthouse wedding, and I didn’t want to have to pick up a train to walk into city hall.

When people had courthouse weddings, they made promises to have a bigger one down the line. I didn’t want one and didn’t need one. All I needed was this one and knowing that Maverick felt the same as I did meant the world to me.

I’ve always had to pretend to be someone else when it came to dating. Never able to be the real me because that would turn a man off. I don’t know how many dates I’ve been on that I have heard I was different or weird. Men only saw my body, my ass mostly, and decided I wasn’t worth getting to know. They didn’t care what I liked to do, or the fact that I had a brain, too. Every conversation always led back to them wanting to go back to their place or wanting to chill.

Menace noticed things and then he went the extra step to show me that he saw me. Buying me every Lego set because he heard that I liked Legos or going to find my high school ex-boyfriend and beating his ass and making him apologize on camera, those were signs that he saw who I was. When I spoke, he heard me.

“You look so beautiful, Stevie,” Jeffie came into the room where I was getting my makeup done and sat on the stool.

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