Chapter 15
CHAPTER
FIFTEEN
DUCHESS
We walked for hours and talked about random things. His face lit up as he told me about his family and siblings. It was endearing to watch. He talked about his mom and how she was his best friend. It was probably one of the sweetest things I had ever heard anyone say.
Especially from a man, but I imagined my brothers would be the same when it came to our mother. You could see his affection for his family from a mile away.
His mannerisms.
His gestures.
Even his smiles were like witnessing something exclusive and extraordinary for the first time. It was then that I realized I hadn’t had a real conversation with anyone in such a long time. I couldn’t remember the last time I really talked to someone the way he talked to me. It was like he wanted me to know everything about him, like he wanted to share his life with me, and I didn’t understand why.
Men didn’t usually treat me like that.
I was the DJ.
The girl who brought the party and shit. Sometimes I supplied the drugs.
I was the party girl.
The one-night stand.
I wasn’t this woman I was pretending to be with him. I couldn’t remember being this girl, and it scared me more than anything. At times, I felt like I was the only girl in the world. I loved that feeling.
I watched the way his lips moved.
I watched the way he grinned.
I watched the way he opened every door for me.
I especially watched the way he looked at me, pulling the hair away from my face.
We went to a nice dinner on Bourbon Street and had a few drinks down the strip, enjoying each other’s company. I don’t know how long we rode the carriage ride, but it took us everywhere. Both of us had been to the city before, but it was different this time around, and I knew I wasn’t just speaking for myself.
I took a shower first when we got back to the hotel room, and when I slipped a silk robe over my nightie and walked into the room, he was lying on the bed, wearing a pair of gym shorts with no shirt on.
And just like that… his dick decided to wave hello.
Grinning like a fool, he announced, “What can I say? He has a mind of his own.”
“I see that. Scoot over.”
He did. Before I could question what I was doing, I turned with my back up against his chest, and he didn’t hesitate to pull me closer to his body. I’d be lying if I said I was surprised he didn’t take it any further, and to be completely honest, I don’t know how I would have reacted if he had. I couldn’t ignore the fact that he didn’t try something, and that made me truly respect the hell out of him.
He didn’t expect me to fuck him on the first night, and that hadn’t happened in a very long time. Men didn’t usually treat me that way, and it was a nice change of pace.
We slept like that all night.
It wasn’t until the morning that I realized I had forgotten to take my sleeping pills. I slept through the entire night without a nightmare.
And that hadn’t happened in years.
Except when I woke up, I was alone.
“Luke?” I called out to no avail. I grabbed my cell phone off the nightstand, and it read 9:30. “Where did he go?” I asked aloud just as the door was opening.
“Mornin’,” he welcomed with a smile. He held two bags in one hand and a tray with two coffees in the other. He also had a bag of food under his arm.
“Morning,” I replied.
“I didn’t know how you take your coffee, but there’s cream and sugar in the bag. I hope beignets are all right for breakfast.”
“Oh… thanks.”
He placed the bag of food on the bed and handed me my coffee.
I opened the bag for the cream and Splenda. After I mixed my coffee and took a bite of the beignet, he wiped the powdered sugar off my lips with his thumb.
It made my heart race.
He took a shower, then we made our way back down to Bourbon Street. We spent the day dicking around and looking at several historical sites until we came upon one of those fortune teller places.
“Let’s go inside,” I exclaimed, wrapping my arm around his.
“I don’t like to fuck around with that shit.”
“I’m Cuban; we love this shit.”
He sighed and gestured toward the door. “Lead the way.”
The door chimed when we walked inside, and the place looked like it had been there for hundreds of years. There were rocks, crystals, bottles, and rows and rows of things I couldn’t even describe.
“Welcome,” a female voice said from behind us, making us both turn.
“Hello,” I greeted.
“What brings you in today?”
“Oh… we’re just messing around,” I answered.
“Would you like to have your fortune read?”
“Yes.”
“Follow me.”
She led us to a back room with beads hanging from the trim as a curtain. A table with a red tablecloth had two chairs on one side and one on the other.
“Please have a seat.”
We all did.
“Who’s first?”
“Me,” I expressed.
“Are you guys married?”
I laughed. “No.”
“Lovers?”
“He’s actually my much older boss.”
“There’s a what? Fifteen-year age gap between you two?”
I scoffed out a chuckle because she was right.
“So that would make you twenty-eight?”
I nodded, informing Luke of my age for the first time. He grabbed my thigh from under the table and started rubbing my skin with his callused fingers.
“Can I see your palm?”
I hesitated for a moment before I gave it over.
Never expecting how much she would know and how this would blow up in my face.
LUKE
I had a bad feeling about this.
I didn’t want to be fucking around with shit I didn’t understand. Duchess placed her hand on the table, and the fortune teller traced the lines on her palm with her index finger.
“You’re sad,” she spoke, continuing to trace the lines. “You’ve been sad for a very long time. You come from an extremely privileged life. You know where you come from, but you have no idea where you’re going. You don’t cry. You don’t share any emotion. It makes your heart cold. You don’t love, child. You don’t know how to.”
I looked over at Duchess, and she was taking in every word the fortune teller was revealing.
“You hide. You hide behind everything, including your body.” The fortune teller looked up at her with an intense stare. “You’re scared of the world because it’s done nothing but hurt you. You don’t let anyone in… not because you’re scared they’re going to hurt you; it’s because you’re terrified they’re not going to.”
Duchess roughly yanked her hand away and stood, immediately leaving.
“Fuck…” I breathed out. I pulled out my wallet and placed a twenty on the table. “Thanks.”
“The life you lead is only going to get you killed. I’d consider a new road for you.”
We locked eyes.
She didn’t waver. “You may not be scared of dying, but it’s those you leave behind who will suffer the loss of your life. Especially your father.”
I jerked back, swallowing hard. Feeling like the walls were caving in on me. I never thought about it from that perspective, and it nearly knocked the wind out of me.
“The girl. She brings you peace and tranquility. Which is interesting because she is nothing but chaos. Now, that’s irony. Watch yourself; that girl is nothing but gasoline to the forest fire you live in. You can try to save her… but she may end up saving you.”
I shook my head and left.
Not being able to hear anymore.
I got the hell out of there, shaken to my core.
Now, it wasn’t just my demons on my back…
It was my family too.