Chapter 14
Chapter Fourteen
Luna
Why was everything so complicated? Shit, why did every situation have to be so damn complicated?
Oh… I know. Maybe because humans were flawed as fuck and no matter what we did nothing was ever right.
When I said nothing I literally meant nothing.
I hated that I thought I had gotten my life together and attained the comfort necessary to live in peace and then just that fucking fast it was gone.
Just that fucking fast I was thrust back into the life of holding more than one.
Pushed back into the very space that had me looking over my shoulder at every move.
My child didn’t deserve this life and I had done everything necessary to shield her from it until it wasn’t enough.
Now look at me, back where I started standing in the very place I said I’d never be in.
I was here. I didn’t tell Knoxx that I was leaving because it wasn’t necessary.
I bought too many complications to his life and he had enough on his plate.
“Mom, pace.” My baby caught my attention.
When I looked down at her she was pointing to the massive house before us. Not much had changed, shit the code was the same.
“Cassle.”
“No, not castle. House, Mommy.” I leaned down and picked her up.
My baby laughed while I carried her toward the front door. He asked me to come here and I needed to protect my daughter. That was the only reason I was here. The familial ties that I left here were nothing to me at this point, but her safety was everything. She was everything.
Before I could reach the first set of stairs the door was opening.
I was almost afraid to look up and see who stepped from behind it.
I know it was her, because what else did she have to do besides say here like the old guard while her children ran the streets like savages with and for her husband?
She, being my mother and her husband being my father.
“Luna. You’re home. ” The voice I heard was not my mothers, but my sister’s.
I locked eyes with Rue, before nodding my head. I didn’t have many words for them. None of them. “Where is he?”
“In his office waiting for you. He knew you’d come. I missed you.”
I didn’t return the gesture. Instead, I continued up the stairs and into the house. Nothing about this place had changed. If anything, it was probably left the same to haunt my dreams like I knew it would tonight.
“Though I know you didn’t want to come here I knew you’d be here. I knew you’d come home.”
My brother’s voice trespassed into my eardrums making me stop in my tracks. I turned around and looked at him. He hasn’t aged at all, somehow all of these people that I used to know still looked the same.
“This isn’t my home. I’m only here because your father blew up my life.”
“Luna can we plea—“
“Nothing has changed. I am still no longer welcome here, remember?” I reiterated his words to him. I felt just as raw saying them now as I did when he said them to me.
He looked ashamed, and that did nothing for me.
He was about to speak again, but my father’s words encapsulated his.
“I am so happy that you have come home. Our family is now full again.”
By now I was shaking my head. This was that shit I hated. They wanted to brush over everything and act like it didn’t happen. When in fact it all happened. How dare they? I had to laugh to keep from losing my shit in here.
“And my beautiful granddaughter.” His eyes left me and went to my daughter. “You both must be tired, let Anthony take your bags. Take them to her quarters.”
As soon as he said that the henchman to my left was lifting both of my duffle bags from my shoulder.
I allowed him to while using the extra freedom to grip my now sleeping daughter. This child fell asleep almost as fast as she blinked.
“Come, you can lay her down while we discuss.” My father ushered us into his office. Of course, my kiss ass brother followed. He was papa’s lap dog. I didn’t see that then, but it was clearer now.
Once in the office I put my baby on the sofa and looked toward my father before I spoke. “When this is over, I’ll be gone. Nothing chang—"
“Lunarius, you are my daughter. Nothing with us will ever just be business. You being here moves something in me that hasn’t moved in years. Everything changes, and just like you need me I need you. This family is not whole without you. Give us a chance to show you how much we are all connected.”
I closed my mouth forcing myself to silence. I wasn’t getting back into this. This wasn’t my home and nothing in me was staying here. I meant what I was trying to say before he so rudely interrupted me.
“Yes, connected. Though we have all made mistakes and had lapses in judgments we are all family.”
I scoffed. Family my ass. Where was my family when it felt like my life was falling apart?
Oh, the right family is the people who helped my family fall apart.
Instead of arguing or going back and forth I thought about my purpose for being here.
It was much greater than my rift. This was about me making sure my daughter didn’t have to suffer behind this damn family.
“So, who came after you?”
“I didn’t get that far. He came at me to draw in my place of business, so I had to neutralize him. Maybe I should’ve stayed back in Chicago to see who came looking for him.”
“Still trigger happy, I see.” There her voice was. The woman I used to want to be like, but now I despised the apparent weakness in her loins.
Before I could look in her direction she was in my face and pulling me into a hug. As much as I didn’t want to hug her, I still melted into her hug.
When we finally pulled back, she stepped to the side and saw exactly when she spotted my baby. She almost squealed, before kneeling down next to her. “She looks so much like you did at this age.”
I nodded but kept my attention on my father.
I truly had nothing to say to my mother no matter how much I still loved her.
It was possible that you could love a person from a distance.
I loved her, but our whole dynamic was different, and I was okay with that.
Of course, at first, I wasn’t because out of everyone I didn’t expect that from her.
I didn’t expect to be shunned by my mother, but the fact that she did taught me a lot.
I listened to my father talk for a while before I was shown to my room where my child and I would be staying for the duration of our stay.
I thought it would be my old bedroom, but instead It was the left quarter of the house.
It used to belong to my grandmother, but she died, and it had been vacant ever since.
I mean it has been a while since I was here, so maybe some things have changed.
None of that mattered to me though because I meant exactly what I said. I wouldn’t be here long at all.
Once I laid my baby down, I went out onto the balcony staring out at the trees and nature for a while.
At one point that used to be my favorite thing about this house’s location.
It gave this beyond the gates feel. I used to wonder what I was there, but now knew and a small part missed not knowing what awaited.
Then another part of me felt like it was necessary for me to put the pieces of my own life together.
The vibration of my phone in my pocket broke my thought process.
I knew who it was before I even pulled the phone out.
It was Knoxx; the man I couldn’t stop leading on nor could I let go.
I downplayed sex and time with him to myself out of defense.
I had to protect myself from the pain that I went through last time.
I mean I know Knoxx was no agent or any shit like that, but my heart had PTSD and it nor I were ready to give somebody access to us again.
When I said us, I literally meant my heart and my head.
“Knoxx,” I finally answered the phone because at this point it was obvious, he wasn’t going to hang up.
“Don’t say my fucking name like that. Where the fuck are you?”
“Home. Well maybe not my real home but a home. I have som—”
“Hell nah you aren’t. I just left there.” He sounded so freaking sexy over the phone I could just imagine the expression on his face.
“Not that home. I’m at my parents’ house. I’ll be here for a minute to figure out this bullshit.”
“And you couldn’t tell me that? You couldn’t pick up your phone and let a nigga know that you hopped a flight, a bus a plane a trai—”
“I get it. My bad.” I was already apologizing, because though I owed him nothing, he was entitled to feel a way about my sudden unavailability.
“Nah, you don’t get it and I’m lowkey tired of trying to explain it to you. Safe travels and handle yo’ shit I’ll be around.” Before I could even ask him what he meant my phone indicated that he’d hung up on me.
Knoxx was different from any man I had ever dealt with, because he didn’t hide his emotions or lack communication skills.
If anything, he communicated better than me, and I didn’t know how to take that.
I mean I appreciated it, but I didn’t know what to do with it.
I started to call him back, but I quickly decided against it.
My pride wouldn’t let me call and apologize to him the right way.
My pride wouldn’t even allow me to explain to him why I was so guarded and fucked up.
It was my pride that kept landing me in this fucked up place with him.
Knoxx