Chapter 15 - Kennedy #4
She caught herself, shutting her eyes to regain a sliver of the composure she was losing.
Ezekiel was begging for her to deal with his ass—to make him feel her pain in the worst way for setting up her brother.
She had tried to let it marinate and set in because it was the hardest truth she’d had to swallow, but Ezekiel was forcing her fucking hand.
Kennedy hated to do her first love dirtier than she’d done already, but he was leaving her with no choice.
“An opp who let what, Kennedy?” Ezekiel pressed. If she didn’t know better, she would swear she heard pain in his voice. “What did I do? What do you think I did?”
“I think you need to not call my phone again. I mean it, Zeke.”
She ended their call with that, powered off her phone, and then flung open the door. Kennedy slapped a hand on her chest when her heart tried leaping out of it at Jahleel’s ass standing at the door with an empty expression.
“Your other phone was ringing. It was Relic,” he told her as she walked out. Kennedy played it cool.
“Did you answer for him?”
“No, but he called my phone. He said he’s pulling up and to open the door.”
“Well, did you open the door?”
“Oh!”
His eyes shot wide, like he’d forgotten that part, and then he took off as Kennedy laughed while slyly rushing behind him to drop her phone into her purse.
Just as she closed it back, she heard the door open and Relic booming instructions to Jahleel.
Before she could check what they were doing, the door slammed, and Jahleel reentered the kitchen, lugging two handfuls of bags that put a smile on her face she couldn’t contain if she tried.
Relic sauntered in behind him, effusing the pussy arousing fragrance of citrus and rich amber, while his silk shirt he’d rolled up to his elbows exposed his muscles protruding as he carried in more gift bags.
If Jahleel wasn’t in the room, she might’ve dropped to her knees to suck the skin clean off Relic’s dick. Nothing was sexier to Kennedy than a fine, rich nigga who cashed out his woman without making her beg.
“Why you always gotta to outdo me, Relic? You think you better than me or something?” she quipped, propping a hand on her hip as he scoffed.
“My money is longer, so of course, I’m better. I guess we had the same idea in mind. It’s a truce, Larenn?”
“Yep, because I don’t know about you, but I need—” She paused, lifting a hand to shield her lips from Jahleel before she mouthed, “I need some dick, nigga.”
Relic cracked up as he dropped the heavy bags beside the boxes on the island and then swaggered to her, taking in her outfit before he frowned and sent a hard slap to her ass that sat nicely in her jeans. He clasped a hand onto her waist and tugged her against him.
“Where’d you go besides work today?”
“What makes you figure I went somewhere else?” she asked, reaching around him for a bag to open.
“Because you don’t wear heels to work unless you go somewhere before or after. You wear sneakers and those thin ass pant sets that make your ass jiggle too much when you walk.”
She giggled while digging into a white bag with black lining and black ropes for its handle.
Kennedy tugged out the black box with a white Camellia flower and matching logo, pushing it open to grab the dust bag that she rushed to tug apart for the purse inside.
She tried not to gush too hard at the burgundy quilted, jumbo classic flap bag with gold accents.
“You have heels that color you haven’t worn yet. I did a little digging,” he admitted, making her beam.
“Oh, you get bonus fellatio for that. You picked it out yourself and made sure I had stuff to match it. How many more did I get?”
“You’ll see after you make my plate. Chop, chop.” He smacked her ass, and she grilled him but went to the stove to do as he requested like a good little girlfriend.
“You want me to cut your steak, too,” she murmured, rolling her eyes when Relic and Jahleel laughed.
“Nah, I can manage. You still haven’t told me where you went today, though, Larenn.”
“I sat at Jah’s game,” she told him, omitting her exam at the doctor. “He’s getting better each time I see him play. I think we should put him in a league or send him to camp with kids on his level. He can’t grow on that team.”
“You wore that to sit at his game?”
Kennedy added the loaded baked potato she’d made for him on his plate of steak and broccoli, grabbed both his utensils, and then turned to him with a glower.
“I’m talking to you about Jah’s athletic abilities, yet all you heard was, I wore some jeans and a shirt to watch him practice?”
“And heels,” Relic added as she strutted over and sat his plate in front of him.
“You’re worried about the wrong shit.”
“No, he’s not,” Jahleel added his two cents, licking his fingers clean before stopping after Kennedy narrowed her eyes at him for the nasty act. “He don’t want men looking at you like my friends’ dads do. They might try to kiss you like Zee did.”
“Who?!” Relic barked, freezing just as he picked up his knife. His eyes drifted to Kennedy and then hardened at her petrified expression.
“Zee. Ms. Kennedy said he kissed her. I don’t know who he is, but I don’t like him.”
“Jah,” Kennedy called, her voice feeble as she stared at him, betrayed. He shrugged and gave her a blank stare that made her heart drop because it had Relic written all over it.
“I had to tell him ‘cause Zee is trying to take you. He kissed you, and he called your other phone, but you told him to stop. Is that who you text ‘cause Relic won’t come home—”
“No!” she blurted, cutting him off before turning her frantic stare to Relic. “I haven’t been talking to Zeke.”
Relic hummed and then focused on his steak, taking him time to cut a slice to eat. He chewed even slower, his eyes floating up to leer at her as he did. Once he was done, he rolled his shoulders and exhaled.
“You got the floor, Kennedy. Let’s hear how you’ll lie your way out of it like you always do.”
“I’m not lying! I’ve used the phone, and I’m sure you know, because you have cameras everywhere. It’s Sonny that I’m talking to.”
“Then, why can’t he call? He ain’t shit but an old best friend, right?”
“Yes, and he can call, but—”
“Which is it, Kennedy?” he interjected, taking another bite of steak. His eyes targeted his son next. “You said she told the person to stop calling, right?”
Jahleel stared between the two as his nerves gradually bled into his once blank stare.
He was worried. When he’d heard Kennedy talking to another guy, he wanted to relay it to Relic to make sure she wasn’t going to leave them like she’d done the last time.
The lour on Relic’s face made him wish he had kept it their secret.
“Jahleel, that is what you said, right?” Relic pressed. Jahleel’s shoulders sank before he nodded.
“He’s telling the truth,” Kennedy spoke up to take the heat off Jahleel.
“He heard some of it, but not everything. Sonny has been calling, but this time it was Zeke but from Sarge’s number, so I assumed it was him.
I told his ass not to call my phone again because I don’t have shit to talk to him about. That was the end of it.”
“It was the end, yet Jah heard you mention a kiss. See how you omit shit.”
“You’re one to talk, Relic.”
“This ain’t about me!” he bellowed, slamming his fist onto the island. Jahleel cowered, and Kennedy caught the move before stepping toward Relic to dagger him with the most noxious look he’d seen to date.
“I tell you one thing, I’ll kidnap your fucking son and leave this bitch if you act out in front of him, and I put that on everything I care about. I put that on your ass. Relax.”
Relic grated his molars as his jaw muscles ticked from her weaponizing his words like she wasn’t the cause of his acting out.
He glanced at his son, and a knot formed in his stomach at the attentive eyes gleaming back at him.
Jahleel wasn’t the same clueless boy that he’d met.
Gone were the days where he could toss his son a tablet and headphones to tune out his outbursts like he used to do while fighting with Jessica.
Jahleel was hyperaware and overly observant of Relic’s every move.
“Stop insulting my goddamn intelligence, and tell me if you kissed that nigga, Kennedy. This is as calmly as I’ll ask you.”
“No.” She held his stare before confessing, “He kissed me the night I saw him at the lounge, but I pushed him off me.”
Jahleel perked up in his seat and nodded to cosign her defense. “I heard that, too!” he exclaimed.
Relic’s stare pinged between the two as he planted his palms on the island, inhaling steadily to subdue the rising anger from hearing about another man putting his fucking lips on Kennedy.
It was worse catching wind of it from his son, who for the first time since he’d introduced them, had chosen him over Kennedy.
Relic wasn’t certain if that was the case anymore, or if Jahleel was lying about hearing the second half because he didn’t want them to argue.
“Nothing will happen to her if you tell the truth, Jah. If you really didn’t hear her say that she pushed him—”
“I did hear her! I wanted to know who she talks to all the time, so I acted like I was still eating and then followed her after she went in the bathroom.”
Jahleel snitched on himself, making Kennedy gawk at his confession, while Relic spit out a dramatic laugh.
“Good fucking job, pitit gason.”
“That’s not a good job, Jah. It’s an invasion of privacy! I can’t believe you did that. So, I have two stalkers instead of one,” Kennedy complained, but Jahleel nodded like he was assured he’d done the right thing.
“I like you, Ms. Kennedy, but I can’t let you cheat on us. My Uncle Shabu said I have to protect Relic ‘cause he’s not used to having a girlfriend.”
“When the hell did he say that?” Relic inquired, and his son smiled.
“When you and Ms. Kennedy was whispering, so we couldn’t hear y’all after you kissed her. We know how to whisper, too.”