Page 93 of Cuffed By Your Love
You good, sis? I got memes and Hennessy if not.
Then Jason:
He better not be touching my sister like that clown. I’m just saying. I like that dude but I got a shovel.
I smiled, tucked my phone away, and looked back at Elias.
He walked over, handed me my mug, and slid down beside me. His arm went around me like second nature. I leaned into it like it was home.
“You still think you dangerous to me?” he asked, voice soft.
“Yes,” I whispered. “But I think I might be worth fighting for.”
“You always have been, Deputy Gorgeous.”
And in that moment—messy, complicated, heart-bruised and healing—I believed him.
I knewsomething was off when Jonay didn’t answer my text that morning. Her replies were clipped, mechanical—just dry-ass “okays” and “we’ll talk laters”, like she was reading from a damn script written in detachment. No voice notes. No little eye-roll emojis she usually sent when I’d say some off-the-wall shit just to hear her laugh. Just cold air through a phone.
That wasn’t my baby. That was a woman trying to make a clean break before she bled on somebody she loved.
I should’ve known.
Jonay had the kind of heart that would feed everybody else’s hunger until she was starving, then apologize for not being full. She had the kind of soul that thought protection meant sacrifice, thinking she was sparing EJ and me by backing away, when allshe was really doing was digging a ditch for herself with a dull-ass spoon.
And me, I loved her for it.
But I wasn’t having that shit.
There was no way I was coming up off her. She had to be crazy as hell. I’d already lost one woman to violence; I’d be damned if I let a selfless, stubborn, sexy-as-hell storm like Jonay walk away from the only peace either one of us had felt in a long-ass time.
Not because she thought she was protecting me. Not because she was scared. And sure as hell not because that Brokeback Mountain bitch-ass nigga Kam still thought he had a say. That man didn’t just smell like desperation. He wore it like cologne.
I sat in that stiff-ass precinct chair, rocking a tension in my chest that hadn’t been right since Jonay tried to pull away from me. IA had just cleared my name, but that didn’t ease the thunderstorm boiling in my blood. They told me I was good, no write-up, no suspension. They said the video evidence backed my role as a bystander during Kam’s restraining order hearing.
But I wasn’t just a bystander. I was her man. Her protector. Her peace. And hearing her call herself a liability to me and EJ?
Yeah… that messed me up.
Nah, messed up wasn’t even the word. That shit cracked something in me open. She really thought I’d let her distance herself out of love, like love was supposed to mean letting go.
Hell no.
That woman was silk and steel in one body, the kind of beauty that would soften your soul and snatch your breath in the same damn sentence. The way she walked into a room made the world shift. She didn’t even try, and that was the problem. She didn’t see the way her light bent to people. She didn’t see how powerful her presence was, because she’d been dimmed too many times by people who couldn’t handle her shine.
She really tried to give me a soft exit, talking about how she didn’t want to bring mess to my door. Talking about how she was a liability. I wanted to scream:Baby, you are my blessing, not a burden.
EJ, my boy, already claimed her. He had his Spider-Man pajamas folded next to her Spider-Man hoodie. He’d been asking where’s his Miss Pretty when she didn’t answer the phone fast enough.
There was no way in hell I was letting her leave us because of her ex-dude who couldn’t let go and move on because he fumbled God’s gift.
My phone buzzed and jarred me from my thoughts. Jonell’s name lit up the screen. Sis was supposed to be on her little trip, feet kicked up somewhere warm, drink in hand, but her voice came through tight, urgent. “Elias, please tell me you’re close to my sister.”
I frowned. “No, I’m at the station right now. What’s up?”
She let out a shaky breath. “It’s Kam. I just got word from a friend. One of his boys has been running his mouth in the group chat. He’s out, he’s drunk, and he’s talking about pulling up on Jonay. I swear to God, Eli, that man is the devil with a key.”
My jaw clenched, my whole chest tightening like somebody cinched a belt around it.
