Page 98 of Love me Like XO

Within seconds I heard two shots, and loud thuds to the ground. Life was short for some, shit especially for the ones who came for me and mine. Givens wasn’t safe by long shot, because there was only so long he could hide out at the station if that was where he was. Then if he wasn’t at the station he could only hide for so long anywhere. Nowhere was safe when you had a nigga like me on your heels.

REE

When I finished my client this evening the last thing I expected was for Malik to be standing outside the shop leaned against his truck with a lone rose. As busy as he had been with whatever lately, the last thing I expected was for him to be on his romantic stuff, but I was surprised. Thoroughly surprised when he extended his hand with the rose and uttered the wordsdate night.

“You’re tired aren’t you, baby?” I asked as he now held the passenger side door open for me.

“I’m straight. You should be too.” He waited for me to get into the car, before closing the door and going to the other side.

When he was finally in the car, he leaned over and pecked my lips, before taking the car out of park. He pulled off secondslater, without even giving me a hint. In true Malik fashion if a hint wasn’t given, that meant it was a surprise that he’d hold behind his lips until it was time to speak on it.

He turned the music down about fifteen minutes into the ride, before glancing in my direction.

“How was yo’ day, baby?”

“Long, but worth it. I did a few new clients and bodied that shit.” Her happiness flowed from her lips and the way her cheekbones sat parallel from one another close as fuck beneath her eyes.

“Good.”

“And yours?” I asked, eyes resting on the peek-a-boo ass tattoos on his neck.

“Straight to the point. Err’ thing will be good. I’m ready to cash in on something, though.”

I cackled. “And what is that?”

Seconds later we pulled up to an empty storefront. Well maybe it wasn’t empty, it was possibly the privacy screen I noticed on the doors and windows. Moments later I glanced in his direction, waiting for an answer because he was quiet.

He wore that smirk, the one that always had me shedding my panties when it was just he and I. The one that sent a jolt down my spine every time we locked eyes.

“What is this place Malik?”

“It ain’t about what it is now, but what it’s gonna be.” He winked. Then before I could speak again he was out of the car. I had a feeling about what he was about to cash in on, but lord knows I wasn’t ready, or was I? At this point Malik was with all the shit I wasn’t ready for. Back then I blamed Hadees for always being at a standstill, for us being stagnant. The now look at me now, with somebody who is the opposite of stagnant. He was uplifting, pushy and completely ready to take steps that I didn’t know if I was ready for. Well maybe not ready isn’t the correctterm, because when it came to Malik I was ready and willing for a lot of stuff that I wasn’t normally.

Within seconds the door on my side was open and he was standing there. “The fuck you over here looking like you constipated for.”

“How you know I ain’t?” I accepted his hand and exited the car.

“Trust me if you was, I’d know. You tell me all that shit.”

I giggled. “No, I don’t, you’re just so obsessed with me ‘til you be knowing everything.”

“So when you be like, baby I’m constipated. Baby I got cramps. Baby my stom—” he was mimicking me in every way until I punched his ass in the chest.

“I bet I don’t tell you anything else.”

He chuckled, before we reached the door. “Fuck outta here.” He opened it for me to enter, then stepped in behind me.

The distinct sound of the buzzing of an ink gun told me exactly where we were if nothing else. Then if nothing else, the various pieces of art things on the wall let me know. This nigga was serious when he said he wanted his name on me.

“Don’t get quiet now. I told you what I wanted, baby.” He used his hard body to nudge me further into the store.

I laughed nervously. I wasn’t scared, but tattoos weren’t the me. They were Empress’s thing. The little one on my arm was a dare from Irish, but that was it.

“You about to chicken out on me?”

The way he asked that, and the feel of his hand on my side made me look up at him, we locked eyes briefly then I shook my head. “No.”

His name was there.Shit his name was there. Resting freshly into my collarbone, while mine rested on his neck. Had it not been red like the fucking sea it would’ve easily been able to become lost in the other tattoos he already had, but it was there. Scraped in freshly bruised, but there forever. Forever like how long he’d promised me. I believed him. Believed that to him forever meant just that and not what all these fake ass niggas screamed in the media. Forever meant fucking forever. For however long both of us had breath in our bodies. For fucking ever.

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