Page 26 of Cuffed By Your Love
“She’s cracked. But she’s still solid.”
“Then you be the glue, not the hammer.”
I sat in silence for a minute, feeling the weight of everything I had been carrying. Grief, guilt, and now… hope?
“She texted me back last night,” I said in a low voice.
Mama smiled with warmth and affection. “You saved her number under something ridiculous?”
I laughed. “Deputy Gorgeous. With the little policewoman emoji.”
Mama rolled her eyes and said, “You and those damn emojis.”
After dinner, she walked me to the door, kissing my forehead as if I were still the boy who scraped his knee on the front steps and cried into her lap.
“You ready?” she asked.
I looked up at the sky and then down at my phone, where her name was still sitting at the top of my messages.
“Not all the way, but I’m moving in that direction.”
“That’s all God needs.”
Some women didn’t need saving; they simply needed someone to notice how their spirit twitched before their lips ever trembled.
Jonay moved like a woman who slept with one eye open, even while she prayed. The wind was shifting that day. It was not the kind that whispered peace or carried the laughter of children through the air, not at all. Instead, it moved with the heaviness of tension, like someone wearing Timberlands. Heavy. Direct. Out of place.
I had just left my mom’s house with EJ’s Spider-Man backpack tossed in the back seat, still filled with snacks and second chances. I wasn’t on duty, not technically. But my instincts didn’t clock out.
I saw her first, sitting in her car under that crooked oak tree that leaned as if it had heard secrets it couldn’t carry. The window was down just enough for air, but not for trust. Her eyes flickered like traffic cameras, watching everything, trusting nothing.
She was completely still. Too still. The kind of stillness that came not from peace but from survival.
Then I saw him: Kam’s bitch ass. That damn Charger cruised like a snake on four wheels. It had black-on-black tint and a grille that resembled a smirk. I knew it was him even before I saw the silhouette.
Kam was the kind of man who had never been told no without throwing a tantrum. He wasn’t just driving; he was circling, staking out, hunting what he believed still belonged to him.
I wasn’t one to indulge in gossip, but news traveled quickly in precincts like ours, especially when it was juicy. I had been hearing whispers about a striking, no-nonsense detention deputy who had an identical twin working in the courts. Thistwin had caught her man in a terrible situation and managed to walk away with her dignity intact.
It didn’t take long to connect the dots and realize it was Jonay. Yes, her, my baby, even if she hadn’t recognized it yet. That kind of hurt wasn’t generic. Being treated poorly like that would make any good woman question her faith, without a doubt.
I’d caught glimpses of her, her chin held high as if it were holding up the rest of her. Her skin was smooth, like justice mixed with fire. Her lips seemed to say what they meant, then walked away when they were finished. She was the type who could stride through chaos without flinching, but this was a wound that wouldn’t show beneath uniforms and Kevlar vests.
She wasn’t just beautiful. She had a presence. If the rumors were true, some fool really squandered his chance with God’s favorite.
Then there was Kam.
I remembered him. He was in the academy with me, barely made it through the door before pissing dirty, failing a drug test, and getting kicked out. He thought he was above the rules. He was one of those loudmouths in the lobby but soft on the stand. He boasted about being a man but couldn’t uphold a standard long enough to actually be one. That alone told me what kind of person he was—cheap, synthetic, and flammable.
What I didn’t realize was that he was the one slipping between Jonay’s sheets while still looking other women and men in the eye with lust in his heart. He was the type to beg for loyalty while bartering his own for some backroom thrills. That was weak nigga behavior.
A man who didn’t protect his peace and his woman wasn’t worthy of either. But what really caught my attention was how the streets said he hadn’t moved on. He was still around, stillacting like he owned something he’d already destroyed, still calling what was dead a relationship.
That was the most dangerous type of nigga, the kind who couldn’t handle losing control, who mistook “I’m done” for “I still care,” and who made a woman’s freedom feel more like rebellion than survival.
See, that was the issue with niggas like Kam. They never learned how to lose gracefully. They thought women were extensions of themselves—prizes they won at birth, not individuals who chose them once but could choose themselves now.
I didn’t draw attention to myself. I didn’t pull up behind him or tap the badge hanging in my glovebox. I didn’t need to.
