Double

Chapter 6

This Gorgeous Man (Who Makes Me Nervous) Is Part of My New Normal

Tinsley

After breakfast, he and I moved from the formal dining room to the family room. He had a game set up on the cocktail table.

“You play Scrabble?”

I smiled. “I love Scrabble.”

“Cool. We need to talk, and I don’t wanna just shoot off questions at you. I thought it would be cool if we talked while we played. Like maybe for every word, we can ask each other a question. Grab some pillows.” He gestured at his overstuffed, comfy sofa.

I grabbed a few pillows, arranging them on the floor for my comfort.

I was hyper-aware of the fact that I wasn’t wearing a bra.

My boobs weren’t the tiny, perky kind that allowed me the option to have braless days.

My DD cups demanded that they be wrangled in at all times, and I usually obliged.

I appreciated the fact that my husband was being a gentleman.

I’d caught his eyes on my breasts a few times, but he hadn’t let them linger.

I reached into the box and pulled out seven letters while he did the same. I had so many questions that I wanted to ask him that I wasted no time arranging my tiles into a word.

“Ladies first,” he told me.

I put down my first word. C-L-I-M-B. “What’s your real name?”

He rubbed the hair at his chin for a second.

“Yeah, that probably seems like an easy question, but it’s multi-layered.

My mom named me Jayson. That’s my father’s name, his given name.

But at one point, my father was in the streets.

The streets gave him the name Jinx. He was always called Jinx.

So, me being named after him, my family called me Jinx, too.

They called me Double Jinx or just Double.

When I got old enough to decide, I decided that the name Jayson didn’t fit me. I legally changed it to Jinx.”

My mouth was on the floor. This man had taken a perfectly good name and traded it in for his father’s street name? A word that was associated with bad luck? “I don’t get it,” I admitted.

He nodded. “If it makes you feel more comfortable not to call me that, don’t. You can call me Double.”

“Can I call you Jayson?”

“That’s not my name, though.” He laughed.

“But do you still answer to it?”

“If my mom says it, and she’s in her bag? Yeah, I answer to it. Generally, though, I don’t. Shit, my dad don’t even answer to it.”

“So, I should call you Jinx or Double? Got it.”

He changed my word to CLIMBER by adding an E-R at the end of it and went ahead of me in points. Since he didn’t make an actual new word, he didn’t ask a question.

I placed the word COBALT. “What’s in this for you? What do you get out of marrying me? Even a nice guy wouldn’t marry somebody just because he was asked. Why’d you agree to marry me?”

“Shit. That’s not an unfair question. I’m saying, you deserve to know how you ended up in this situation.” He cleared his throat then ran his hand over the locs on his head.

Double was such a handsome man. His smooth, flawless skin was fair with just the slightest kiss of melanin.

His eyes were pools of light brown. He had a perfect nose and medium-sized lips that were topped by a mustache.

His expression was currently serious, but I liked his smile best. He was a big guy.

He was at least six foot four, or six foot five, and with his muscular frame, he looked like a linebacker.

But from what he’d shown me so far, he was a gentle giant.

“I had a lady. We were together for about five years. Long story short, we were going in two different directions. I was focused on the future—marriage, having a family. She was more focused on excitement and having experiences before she settled down. She was offered the opportunity to move to Europe. She took it, even though it meant walking away from me—”

“You wouldn’t agree to date her long distance?”

“I wouldn’t agree to date her any longer.

We’d been dating for five years. I was ready to settle down, .

. . beyond ready. You gotta understand. The men I admire most don’t fuck around in the streets until their forties.

They find their woman, marry her, and start to build.

As far as I was concerned, I was already behind the curve.

My grandfather married his first wife, my mom’s mother, at twenty-three. My father married my mother at thirty.

“I was thirty when I met Erica. I gave her five years. I wasn’t open to an indefinite dating situation. I want my wife. I want my family unit. I’m creating all this legacy for . . . nobody.”

“Wow. I didn’t even know American men thought like that.”

“Don’t credit that to me being American. I don’t know what the fuck American men do. According to my single sister and cousins, they play games all damn day. I’m a Hill and a Waters. Hill men and Waters men are built different.”

“Okay. So just any wife will do?”

“Nah, not just any wife. I don’t have to be crazy in love with her, but there has to be the potential there for us to create something good.

I wanna wife I can be friends with, someone I can respect, who respects me.

I want someone motivated and ambitious. But also caring and kind-hearted.

I need to be physically attracted to her.

She needs to be trustworthy and true, and I’ll be loyal and protective. ”

I glanced into his handsome face before putting my eyes back on the Scrabble board. I didn’t understand that chick, Erica. Unless there was some personality flaw I was missing, she walked away from a winner.

The pickings were slim in Iredia for upstanding men, and they seemed to be slim in America, too. I didn’t understand why she just walked away and never looked back. Whatever. Her loss was about to possibly be my gain.

I checked back into the conversation. Double was still speaking.

“Since I’m taking over as the Executive Director of my family’s foundation, I gotta go to all the fundraisers, all the galas, all the benefits, all the auctions, and all the other in-person events you can think of.

It’s boring as hell, but it’s doubly boring when you’re there by yourself. ”

“I can see that.” I nodded my head. “My father was in with the right crowds on Iredia. They went to a lot of events. I can only imagine that the women there flirt with you and stuff.”

“They do.”

“There are probably some nice ones. They already understand the dynamics of your world. I’m sure they’re motivated and ambitious. I’m sure at least one of them would make a good candidate for a wife.”

He shrugged his broad shoulders. “Probably. But I’m not looking to invest the time it would take to vet somebody. Before my grandparents asked me to help you out, I made an appointment with a professional matchmaker. I’m outta the game. I’m ready to get to the finish line.”

“And marriage is the finish line? You make it sound like something you need to cross off a to-do list.”

“Maybe.” He gave a shrug of his shoulders.

“Eww. That’s not very romantic.”

“That’s what you want, Tinsley? Romance?”

I considered his question. “I mean, if a man was truly pursuing me, yes. I would want romance. I would want to feel . . . wanted and desired by him. I would want to feel like he put thought and effort into making me feel like I was his person.”

“Noted.”

We stared at each other in silence until I broke it. “It’s your turn . . .” I hesitated, “Double.”

His light-brown eyes stayed on mine for a few beats before he finally moved his glance down to the Scrabble board. I exhaled quietly. I wasn’t sure why his gaze made me hold my breath; it just did.

He put down his word. EXCITED. Then his eyes were back on me. “I heard that your father was a controlling, bitch-ass bastard.”

If I’d been drinking, I would’ve spat all over him. Instead, I fell over on the rug with laughter. “That must’ve come from my Uncle Moses. They were brothers, but they didn’t like each other much. I’ve never heard my father described that way, but I have to admit that it’s super accurate.”

“Yeah. Your uncle said that you spent your entire life fighting to get out from under your father’s thumb. Then, as soon as he died, your aunt tried to pick up the mantle.”

I nodded.

“How did that manifest in your life? What triggers you? I don’t wanna offend you if it can be avoided.”

I blinked quickly several times. “Oh, so you’re trying to get to know, get to know me.”

“You’re my wife for the foreseeable future, Sweetheart. We need to get to know each other.”

I nodded once then took a deep breath. “Uh, when I was young, like about eleven or twelve, I was on the road to developing an eating disorder. What I put in my mouth and in my body were the only things I could control. I would look at food and use my mind to convince myself that it was disgusting. If the cook served noodles, I would convince my mind that they were worms swimming in blood sauce. If it was chicken, I would mentally conjure feathers on it, even if it was fried chicken or jerk chicken. It got to the point that I could only really eat raw vegetables, fruits, and like, french fries.”

“Damn.”

“Yeah.” I nodded again. “It was very intense and created a war of wills. The more defiant I was about eating, the more he pushed me to eat. He would make me sit for hours at the dinner table, even after I’d thrown up on my plate.

I’d fall asleep there most nights. My mom would wake me in the wee hours of the night and send me to bed.

That went on for months and months. Finally, I told a counselor at school what was going on. ”

“Oh, shit. I’m sure your father ain’t appreciate that.”

“Nah.” I chuckled. “Especially because she decided to do a home visit. He told her off and got her fired from the school. But he stopped making me sit in front of a plate of vomit. They put me in exposure therapy. I was brought face-to-face with the foods that caused the most violent reactions by a trained professional. She never made me eat the foods, which I think is what my father thought would happen. She just made me look at them. We talked about what I thought about them. What I envisioned when I looked at them. Eventually, I stopped seeing worms and blood sauce in a pot of spaghetti, but I couldn’t eat it.

I could stomach seafood. They fed me seafood.

Now, all I eat is seafood. Pescatarians, stand up! ” I joked.

He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. I could see the compassion there, the concern there.

I looked down at my tiles. TASKED. “Are you close with your mom? You talk a lot about your relationship with your father and your grandfather.”

“That’s the homey. I love that lady. I’d turn the world upside down for that lady, but my dad would beat me to it.”

“What’s she like?” The truth was that I was nervous about meeting her. What would she think of a girl who married her son to get out of marrying somebody else?

“One question per word, Sweetheart.”

“Uh,” I said, before pouting a little bit.

He laughed at me. “You’ll be cool.” He put down his word. PATTERN. “You consider yourself a serial dater, or are you the type to lean toward long-term relationships?”

I knew questions about relationships would come up. I huffed out a sigh. “Neither. I’ve never really dated.”

“Talk to me about that.”

I pulled a face. “One question per word, sir.”

“That’s not a question.”

His expression was serious. He needs to get to know you, I reminded myself.

“Uh, having a father like mine made me . . . suspicious of the intentions of men. By the time I was old enough to date, my father had passed away. I was finally free. The last thing I wanted was to end up under some other man’s control.

At university, I occasionally went out with men.

But if they did anything that even remotely reminded me of something my father would do, I ghosted them.

After a while, I decided that throwing myself into building my business was what was best for me.

I figured love would find me if it was looking for me. ”

“Okay.” His head bobbed up and down slowly. “Lynne told me off the bat that you’ve held on to your virginity.”

I gulped loudly, which probably gave him the impression that what he’d said was news to me.

It wasn’t. “For some reason, news of my virginity seems to be something that everybody thinks they have a right to share. Aunt Gretchen loved to throw that fact around at dinner parties. I didn’t know it was a source of pride for Moses and Lianna as well. ”

“I like you.” He pointed at me while chuckling.

“On the real, though. It wasn’t their pride that made them share that.

It was their concern for you. They wanted to make sure that I understood that they weren’t looking to put you back in the same situation.

They wanted somebody who understood what you mean to them.

And what your dignity . . . your virtue means to you. ”

I scoffed. “Look, I didn’t keep my virginity because of my virtue. I kept my virginity because of their lack of virtue. The dumb asses that tried to date me didn’t deserve my trust. There was no way I would’ve slept with any of those men.”

Before the conversation could continue, the doorbell rang. Although my stomach jumped at the thought of having to meet whoever was behind the door, I was glad for the interruption. Double and I needed to get to know each other, but hell, we didn’t have to expose everything in one afternoon.

I stood from the floor and got ready to make a break for the bedroom that I lived in, but he stopped me with his hand on my wrist. The touch was light, but it still sent a shockwave through me. “Hold up. It’s my cousin, Lyric. She’s here for you.”

“Your cousin?” My feelings of fear and shock must’ve shown on my face because Double gave me a small smirk.

“It’s cool,” he assured me, standing to his feet. “She’s a stylist.”

“As in . . . hair stylist?”

“Personal stylist. She owns a styling business. She dresses most of the who’s who of Chicago.”

I was lost and doing my very best to use context clues to put together what he was telling me. “Why is she here for me?” I followed on his heels as he made his way to the front door.

He stopped walking and turned to me with a softness in his eyes. “Sweetheart, you told me yesterday that you didn’t have any clothes. You’re standing here in front of me, wearing my joggers, my t-shirt, and my drawers. Did you think I wasn’t gonna make moves to get you straight?”

“I . . . I don’t . . . I didn’t think . . .” I stammered.

He grinned his lady-slaying grin. “I got you. Yo, I’m taking you out for dinner tonight. So pick something appropriate for that.”

“What—”

“Just tell Lyric that we’re having dinner at Coastal Harbor Supper Club. She’ll take care of you.”