Page 7 of Mafia Kings & Wedding Rings
I never wanted anybody to be able to throw anything in my face, so I made sure to work for my shit. He loved that about me, and me working didn’t stop him from dropping stacks in my purse when he didn’t think I was looking. Most of the cash I’d been able to stack was because of him. I wasn’t broke and busted like that, but with the way this world was setup, I could be at any given moment. My daddy was living in a long-term care facility and that shit wasn’t cheap.
Since it had been raining off and on, Sayer’s block was empty and quiet. You could see a drizzle against the streetlights shining down on the glistening pavement. Bringing my key to the lock, I let myself into his pad and was instantly hit with the aroma of vanilla and low music. His mama loved that damn scent, and since she decorated his house and came over and cooked and did laundry for him on a regular, she made sure it smelled like her. We didn’t exactly get along, so I made myself scarce around here on weekends when I knew she would do her pop-ups. Sayer mainly spent time at my place since his hours in the street were unpredictable.
Quietly padding through his front hallway, I paused in the doorway to his living room, and my stomach instantly flipped. It felt like someone had slapped me in the face. A very
pretty and pregnant mocha-complected woman stood at the coffee table, folding baby clothes; the same table I picked out for him. Sayer’s tan, tatted arms were around her, stroking her growing belly and kissing along her neck. He was so far up her ass he hadn’t even noticed I stepped inside. She did. Immediately, an ashen expression washed over her face.
“What’s wrong?” Sayer asked, backing up and finally taking note of me in the doorway.
The very relaxed smile he wore only seconds ago immediately wilted.
“Shit, Brie—” He stumbled away from the girl like he was about to stroke the fuck out.
“I thought you said it was over with her.” His bitch tossed the onesie she was folding on the table in a fit.
“Is that what you told her?” I demanded, tilting my head at who was supposed to be my man and looking his stupid ass up and down.
“Look, Brie?—”
“Answer the fucking question, Sayer! Did you tell her we broke up?” I snapped.
“Yeah. I mean, shit been off with us for a minute now. You know that.”
“Yet you still been texting and pulling up on me on breaks because you know I’ve been working! Are you fucking for real right now? Clearly this didn’t just happen. You gon’ tell me that baby ain’t yours?” I aimed a finger at his little prissy bitch standing there like she was about to fall apart.
“You better answer correct, Sayer,” she warned, stroking her stomach in circles.
“Kendra, shut the fuck up!” he barked at her but kept his eyes on me.
“Don’t yell at me!”
“Yeah, aight. That’s my baby!” he confessed. “But this ain’t what you think, Brie.”
“If you tell me you not fucking with her like that when I walked in here to you hugged up like I didn’t help you furnish this muthafucka, I will kill you, Sayer.”
“So what the fuck am I supposed to do with that?” he asked, trying to retain some of his cockiness because he knew I was through. “What you gon’ do, Brie? What you got without me now that you ain’t even got a job? I’m fucking with Kendra because she knows how to treat a nigga and drop what she doing to cater to her man. Only reason I was checking on you was so you wouldn’t crash out. I know how you can be.”
No the fuck he didn’t!He was there when I didn’t give a fuck about the world or anyone in it. He’d watched me crash and burn plenty of times and was always there to help me pick up the pieces. If anything, that’s what was breaking my heart the most. Once the finest nigga in the room to me, he had fallen so far off that pedestal I knew there was no coming back. Medium ugly me, please. These pretty niggas were too feminine for me.I didn’t want to engage in some drawn-out ass argument with him because we had been there before. That was giving him too much. I didn’t want to give him an inkling that there was ever any spinning the block. I’d forgiven a lot, but this was crossing the line.
Drawing my knee up, I connected with his balls, channeling every drop of rage he put there as he crumbled like a bitch. Sending a right hook across his jaw, I sent him to the floor in a sorry ass heap.
“Don’t worry about it, baby. We’re even.”
“Sayer!” Kendra rushed to kneel at his side to check on him.
With his hands between his legs, trying to catch his breath, he groaned in agony and rocked from side to side. I left him and his bitch right where I found them and stomped outside to my car. My townhouse with Plum was about fifteen minutes in the other direction, but I needed a minute before I started driving. My hands shook while gripping the steering wheel.How the fuck had I not seen this? Was I so wrapped up in my own shit that I ignored the fact that this nigga got a whole baby on the way? My God!
I’d met Sayer in one of the darkest, lowest times of my life. Most people thought because I had an education and worked in the field that I do it meant that a bitch came from money. That couldn’t be further from the truth. Everything I had, I worked twice as hard for. God loved throwing curveballs at ya girl. My parents were blue collar. Daddy drove for the city, and my mama was a dietitian over school services. I went to school on a partial scholarship for track, but when I fucked my knee up jumping hurdles, I ended up injured and was advised not to run again by my doctor.
It was then that I was approached by this agent and got into modeling. With my thick curves and slim waist, I was a photographer’s dream. Sayer happened to be friends with thedude too, which is how we crossed paths at one of his parties. I walked into the situation thinking it was going to be for catalogs and stuff like that, but it turned out to be adult magazines. I wasn’t naked in the photos, but they were revealing nonetheless. When my daddy found out, he had a fit, and my mama stopped talking to me for a period. Sayer was all I had, and somehow, I grew dependent on that nigga. Graduating from college and working with other kids who were athletes with injuries made my parents proud. I swear the two of them thought I was going to turn into a porn star or some shit.
The familiar vibration of my cell phone let me know I had a call coming through. Sniffling and quickly wiping my tears, I dug the device from my pocket, seeingOak Bluffs Medical Lodgeflash across the screen.
“Hello.” I swiped to pick up and put the phone to my ear. “Yes, this is her. I’m sorry, what? I’ll be right there.” I huffed, quickly locating the keys in my hoodie pouch, and started my car.
This was becoming a day from hell. I buckled up and swerved my car onto the street in the opposite direction of home. My father needed me, so my own shit would have to wait. Swerving from lane to lane, I knew I was going well over the speed limit to quickly arrive where the facility was. I was lucky enough to find parking near the entrance and immediately got out and sprinted to the doors.
The call had rattled me. All I could think about the entire way was how much of an anchor my daddy had been for me. Our relationship was far from perfect, but that man always showed up when it mattered. Before he got sick, we had dinner every week. He said a daddy/daughter date was necessary so we could keep up with each other. I was working and in school, so it was hard, but he made sure to keep me grounded. Thinking of losing him left my mind traveling to the worst scenario.
