Chapter 6
Kennedy was in the best sleep of her life when a hard pinch to her thigh sent her shooting upright in alarm.
She glanced around, squinting from the light before realizing where she was after noting her mother standing above her with a chastising glower.
The last she recalled, they’d been on the couch talking after she got in from meeting up with Sonny, so she must’ve dozed off while Diane was chatting a hole in her head.
She adjusted the top of her halter dress before groaning because her head was spinning from the shots she’d drunk kicking in more than she’d anticipated.
“Sorry, Ma. I swear, I didn’t get makeup on the couch. I’m getting up.”
“Ain’t no point in rushing now. You’ve been there the whole night like you don’t know, I hate y’all stanking tails sleeping on my furniture,” Diane chided as she strolled to the window. Kennedy frowned and sniffed herself before sucking her teeth.
“I don’t stink!”
Her mother hummed while spinning the tilt wand to open the blinds, as if the living room wasn’t brighter than her sensitive eyes could take.
“So, you went to Sarge and Zeke’s lounge last night, I assume? You got to see them?” Diane pried, glancing over her shoulder.
“I did.”
“How was that for you? Seeing Zeke after all this time and whatnot.”
“I guess it was shocking, but it didn’t move me or stir up old feelings, if that’s what you mean. Have you known all this time, too?”
“I did. I was hoping that you’d come to me about it at some point, but you never did. That kind of hurt my little old feelings, but you were always closer with your brother and Butch. A girly tomboy if I’d ever seen one.”
A sigh fell from Kennedy as she stood. “I didn’t want to talk to anyone about it and still don’t, honestly. I’m mad that y’all know in the first place. I prefer to keep my dumb decisions private.”
That pulled a laugh from Diane before she peeked out of her window, causing her amusement to abruptly cease. Her arms crossed as she pivoted to face her daughter, who seemed to attract men problems worse than flies on shit.
“So, this new guy that your father told me about. Is he considered a dumb decision, too?” she checked, garnering a childish pout from Kennedy.
“Why is your husband telling my business?”
“Because that’s what we do. My husband and I don’t keep secrets in this house. Answer the question.”
“Ma, I don’t know. It’s complicated.”
“Well, you need to uncomplicate it fast because if he’s a dumb decision, you have about a minute left of keeping it private. A random man is standing outside of my house, and judging by that fancy car, I think it’s him. I can go and get Butch to check if—”
“No!”
Kennedy dashed to the window in an instant, peeking outside before her stomach flipped at the sight of Relic at her family’s home.
He was leaning onto the same car he’d chauffeured her in on their first business date to meet with Tolliver, while his iridescent eyes lasered at the house as if he were contemplating whether to leave or break inside to drag her ass out by her braids.
She released a dry laugh at the irony of the bullshit and frustrations she’d shut herself off from following her miles away. Relic’s audacity didn’t surprise her.
Kennedy stomped to the couch and pulled her phone out of her purse since she refused to go outside. With her emotions running the show, there was no telling the way she’d react once face to face with him again.
Her brows pinched at the incessant text messages that popped up, but she bypassed them before her head reared back at the unexpected twenty next to Relic’s name when she checked her call log.
A mass explosion of flutters filled her stomach, but she disregarded it and thumbed his icon.
His prosaic voice wafted through the line before she could brace the phone against her ear.
“I’m outside.”
“No shit, Relic, I saw you! How the hell do you even know where I am? Are you stalking me now?”
“I am, but this is what you want, right? You want me fucked up in the head about yo ass, Kennedy. That’s why you’ve been missing in action for days, ignoring my calls, and not checking in, right?
That’s why you told Jah about meeting up with some nigga, knowing I could hear, dwat?
Because you don’t have to beat me physically is what you told him.
You’ve been fucking with my goddamn head for days, and you know that shit.
You don’t want to talk it out because you’d rather bring out the side of me that I tried to keep light with you.
You would rather I show my ass... you got it. ”
The call dropped without forewarning, and her heart followed suit.
Against every fiber of her being telling her to leave his ass outside for the neighbors to call the police, she shot him a text to inform him that she was doing the opposite.
His diatribe warned her that his temperament was unpredictable.
“You’re leaving?” Diane asked, watching as Kennedy slid on her boots and grabbed her purse. “You don’t have to go out there if you don’t want to.”
“I know, Momma, but I’d rather get this conversation over with than leave him out there for dad to overreact or the police to show up. It’ll be quick.”
“So, what do you need your purse for? I was born at night, but not last night, girl. Had I known you’d just run off with the boy, I’d have sent Butch instead of telling you first.”
“See, this is why it’s so hard to talk to you. You worry too much and make big deals out of nothing.”
“And why wouldn’t I, when I only have one child left who’s as hardheaded and stubborn as the one I lost?!”
Diane’s beautifully aged face grimaced like confessing her grievances aloud pained her, and Kennedy’s breathing labored from the weight of it landing on her chest. A wave of guilt came afterward.
Not once had she caught on to the reason her mother called and bothered her so often.
Diane missed Koda—her eldest child and only son.
Kennedy had been so self-absorbed, she hadn’t taken time to notice how her brother’s death was still affecting everyone else in her family.
“Ma, I am so sorry you have a selfish ass daughter. I haven’t once asked how you’ve been holding up since me and Tekken moved out.”
Diane sighed. “It’s lonely without y’all, and this quiet house leaves me too much time to think. If I’m not looking through photo albums at pictures of my son, I’m worrying sick about you and Tekken. That damn fire didn’t help.”
“That’s why you were trying to get me to move back home?” she surmised, and her mother nodded.
“I want to keep eyes on you, Kennedy. I know you’re grown, and I can’t protect you forever, but I need to know you’re safe.
Butch told me that your friend is in the streets, and for the life of me, I can’t see why you’d date someone like him, knowing where it landed Koda.
Just because you don’t have a hand in what he does, doesn’t mean that you can’t end up getting harmed in the crossfire.
I can’t bury another child, Kennedy. I don’t have it in me. ”
The strain in her mother’s voice made Kennedy throw both arms around her for a tight hug. Diane had worn her best face and shown nothing but strength for years, and it broke Kennedy’s heart to find out it was a facade. Her dad hadn’t lied when he claimed they were alike.
“If it makes you feel better, I didn’t intend to date him initially.
It was business,” she explained, downplaying the intricacy of their relationship.
“Then he mentioned getting out of the streets when I told him about Koda, so I wanted to help get him there before it was too late. That was all it was.”
“But it became more, and you were comfortable with him to where you told him about Koda?”
Kennedy hunched a shoulder as if it wasn’t a big deal, but her mother knew it was a huge step. Diane smiled.
“Invite him inside. I’m about to cook breakfast before I drag your father to the store. If he drove all this way, I’m sure he’s hungry.”
“Momma, I usually don’t curse around you, but hell to the no! You want him and dad tearing up your house?”
“They ain’t gon’ do jack squat! I can handle my man. Can you keep yours in check?”
Kennedy cackled and tossed her purse back onto the couch. “Is that a challenge?”
“Call it what you want. I’m about to get Butch, so get your friend. I can’t wait to have a conversation with the man bold enough to show up at our home unannounced.”
Diane gave her daughter the most up to no good grin before she waltzed away while Kennedy pondered how in the hell her mother had gone from urging her not to leave with Relic to inviting him inside.
After hearing her mother express her sadness, she didn’t have it in her to turn down the request she was certain would go awry.
She groaned inwardly as she traipsed onto the porch, causing Relic’s head to pop up from his phone as if he felt her presence. Kennedy didn’t miss the creases forming on his forehead before his brows furrowed as he sized her up like he was seeing her for the first time in years.
Relic pocketed his phone and opened the passenger side door, gripping the handle as his muscles tensed to the point of paralysis.
Her appearance put a fury inside of his chest so large; it took every ounce of willpower not to hurt her.
Kennedy tugged at the hem of her dress like she knew where his mind had gone, and he could tell from the front that it barely covered her ass.
He grew irater after noticing he couldn’t inspect her facial scars like he’d usually do to settle his nerves.
She’d concealed her burns like they were a fucking nuisance to her and not the most unique feature that she possessed.
Kennedy stood before him flawless, but his bitch was heavily flawed like him—like his equal. The person she’d turned herself into the last few days out of his sight; Relic didn’t know her.