Chapter 11 Relic #5
“Don’t waste your time. I deleted it,” Treasure replied with a curt smile. “And trust me, Tima is not the only one who forgets to turn it off. As a matter of fact, someone at this table got drunk with Aura in the studio, and she gave them head.”
“Tekken!” Toot spat out fast as hell and then glared at him, waiting for him to take a shot. Seconds passed before he stuck out his tongue and mushed her head.
“I ain’t that fucking trifling, Toot. Give a nigga some credit, damn.”
“And you only get one guess on who it is.” Kennedy appended the rules, making them chorus their complaints. “It’ll be too easy to figure it out if it’s more than one guess, so y’all better consort with each other. If someone blurts it, then it is what it is. Who’s next?”
“Someone at this table,” Relic started, deciding to join in on the drama. His stare coasted to each potential victim before choosing one. “Got his ex knocked up when he first started dating the person he’s with now but convinced her to get an abortion.”
“Oh, hell to the nah. We need to ban this muthafucka from playing. He went straight for the jugular,” Calm said while tossing his head.
“Fuck that. I want to know who this was,” Tima said, squinting around the table. “I have someone in mind, but I don’t want to be wrong.”
Relic sat back with a smirk, watching the women put on their detective hats to do what they did best, while his folks shifted in their seats, sweating like pigs in heat under the ladies’ scrutiny.
He stole a quick peek at Kennedy and chuckled at the pucker of her lips while she slit her eyes at him.
“Hey, I’m playing the game you started, Larenn,” he whispered. His hand clasped at the nape of her neck as he added, “If they can’t take the pressure, tell them fold and pack that shit up.”
“Okay, we have a name,” Treasure said, taking a deep breath. “We picked this one because it was the least likely person we thought, which means it may be true since Relic always has the darkest secrets on people. We say Titan.”
Michi immediately whipped her head in his direction.
His eyes dipped to the table before he picked up his glass to toss back his shot while the girls gasped.
Relic squeezed the back of Kennedy’s neck and studied the women for a sign of who’d chosen the last person he expected them to. It was the reason he’d tossed it out.
“Whoop,” Shabu answered, making eye contact with his brother, knowing what the nigga was thinking. “She picked him.”
“Why, though?” Michi asked, peering down the table at her cousin. Savvy shrugged.
“Like you said, Titan is about perfect, but nobody is that perfect. Plus, knowing Relic, he wanted to prove that point to you after what you said.”
“And threw me under the damn bus to do it, but it’s all good,” Titan uttered, sulking. Pierre sputtered a laugh, and Titan grilled him. “Fuck is you laughing at, nigga?”
“Yo sappy ass! It ain’t, funny but it is. The only reason you’re looking like that is because you know Michi is gon’ dig in yo ass. Plus, you ain’t used to yo brother doing you dirty. Join the Relic don’t give a fuck what he says out his mouth club with the rest of us, nigga. It builds character.”
“Leave him alone,” Kennedy defended, tossing back her shot before pouring another. A drawling smile spread on her face as she said, “I’ll go next. Someone at this table let a ghost bitch, and another bitch who fucked his cousin, convince him that he’s so cold his poor heart could never love again.”
Titan banged the table and hollered, “Get in his ass, Kennedy! We all know who that is.”
“Relic!” they shouted in unison as he leaned back in his seat, grazing his teeth with his tongue before glaring at Kennedy. She picked up his glass.
“You can drink now.”
If looks could kill, Kennedy’s body would rest inside a cemetery plot, next to the ghost bitch she claimed ruined Relic, with how malicious his glower was as he snatched the shot to toss back with a hiss.
When he spun forward in his seat, Shabu’s amused stare was on him, and he flicked the nigga off before diverting his gaze elsewhere.
Relic sat silent and waited until he was certain the attention was off him before he gripped the back post of Kennedy’s chair to jerk her closer to him.
“You know, I’m gon’ show your ass something when we get to the room, right?” he threatened through gritted teeth, and her head cocked.
“As long as the only thing you’re planning to beat up is this pussy, I’m here for it. Your threat is my good time.”
“And you claim I’m the twisted one when it’s really you, Kennedy. You love fucking with my head. You want to bring out the worst in me, but I’m not going to let you trick me up.”
“Me?” She feigned clueless, angling to face him as she placed a hand on her chest like she was appalled. “I would never do that, and why would I when they already see the worst in you anyway? I’m trying to bring out the truth in you.”
“The truth?” Relic parroted. That got a chuckle out of him. “What’s this truth you want to bring out, Larenn. I’m intrigued.”
“The truth that you want me, but you let past bitches fuck up your head just like I let Zeke do to me.”
Relic narrowed his eyes, sweeping his tongue over his bottom lip before he hummed and reattached his hand at the nape of her neck.
“Is that so?”
“Sure is. That’s why you’re afraid to tell everyone that this partner shit is a fluke.
You’re scared to let your family know how you’ve let me run the show.
You don’t have the balls to tell them how this pussy be having your ass stuck, and you can’t control me with dick like you did your first love.
I bet you can’t admit to them, I’ve earned my title as the fucking queen.
Tell them how you’ll pay me whatever to stay because if I walked away, it would send you out of your goddamn body—”
Relic firmed his hold on her neck and growled, “Shut the fuck up talking to me, Kennedy.”
His mouth was crashing against hers before her lips could part for a snippy retort.
Kennedy angled her head before palming the back of his to deepen their lip locking with no regard to who was watching.
In her eyes, no one was present in the moment but Relic and her, the way they both preferred it.
Her eyes fluttered closed, and she willingly let him suck her deeper into his world because she fucking loved being there until his switches flipped, and then she didn’t.
Ohhhs and whistles sounded at the table before one of them clapped, setting off a round of applause as Relic and Kennedy pulled away. She sniggered at his dull stare and wiped her lip combo off his mouth with her thumb.
“Uhm, excuse me.”
Kennedy’s eyes shot up and ballooned as a woman in a business suit with a walkie talkie in her hand strolled up to their table. They immediately calmed down.
“I love that everyone is enjoying our restaurant,” the lady started her spiel. “However, there’s been complaints about the noise level being a bit too loud.”
Relic smiled before planting a hand on his chest as he told her, “Our apologies. It’s our engagement dinner, so we went a little overboard.”
“Nigga, yo what?!” Shabu belted as the lady beamed.
“Congratulations! I have to send you over a cake slice to share, our treat. Chocolate, vanilla, or?”
“Red velvet,” they answered in unison. Kennedy gave a cheeky grin, while Relic leaned back in his seat, noting a new fact he’d learned about her.
“Red velvet, it is! I’ll have your waiter bring it over. I hope you all enjoy the rest of your night. Just try to keep it down for me, please.”
“Will do,” Titan told her, giving her a polite smile.
As soon as the woman spun on her heels and moseyed out of earshot, he stated in incredulity, “I know this nigga didn’t just get us in trouble, and lied straight to her face, but still ended up with a free slice of cake.
If that ain’t the story of his damn life! ”
Pierre tossed a grilled meat cube inside his mouth and chewed with a bob of his head. “Facts. The nigga always ends up on top however he gotta do it. I can’t even knock him.”
What goes up must come down.
Relic tuned out of the conversation when those words from Los popped into his head. His eyes drifted around at nothing before he addressed the woman who his folks had been referring to while speaking that quote into existence when they’d taken their kids to the shooting range.
“You blurred the lines.”
His random statement made Kennedy glance at him. “What?”
“You had me meet your folks. You got me explaining shit to your nephew and flying you out like you’re mine.
You got me doing the most in front of my family, and you made my damn son fall in love with you,” Relic grumbled, tugging his chin hairs as he stared ahead.
Seconds passed before he looked at her. “You blurred the lines between us being a partnership or relationship. You opened that door, Kennedy. Don’t act surprised when I walk through it. ”
The slight curl at one corner of her mouth alerted him that she knew as much and didn’t mind it.
She’d craved it from the moment he’d told her that she couldn’t post him because of Aura.
Kennedy was baiting him, and Relic was anxious to accept it and allow her to reel in the biggest fish of her fucking life.
Her doing so would push him one step closer to his end game.