Chapter 4
Chapter Four
TAKIRA
What are the odds?
Whatever they are, they’re against me. Of all people to sit down in my chair at today’s fashion show, an event I wasn’t even originally booked for…Nazareth Armstrong.
I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t thought of him often over the years.
How could I not? Every milestone of his career he celebrated, my brother bemoaned.
Sometimes the amazing turns his life took were the very things that sent Cliff on his worst benders.
When Naz’s team won the championship a few years ago, giving him a ring before the age of thirty, Mama couldn’t find Cliff for days.
I flew home to help search because she was so desperate.
The boy who was once her greatest source of pride has delivered the most sorrow to her door.
“Thank you again for stepping in today,” Catalina says, sipping her drink, the lights from the pool in Lotus’s backyard casting a glow on her face.
“Oh, thanks for asking.” I swirl the pomegranate martini in my glass. “It was fun.”
It had been. Not having done a fashion show in a while, I’d forgotten the rush of adrenaline that comes with the lightning-fast outfit changes and look adjustments. I practically launched a few models down the runway when time was tight.
“Takira!” Lotus calls from a few feet away.
She’s changed and now wears a dress so short it exposes what looks like lace stockings tattooed around the tops of her thighs.
The tiny straps show off the delicate line of her collarbone, and her platinum braids contrast perfectly against the rich brown of her face.
Her round belly should appear incongruous in the sexy outfit with the strappy heels, but she manages to look effortlessly glamorous and comfortable in her own skin.
“I’m so glad you came,” she says, drawing even with Catalina and me. “Thanks for helping out today and for coming tonight.”
“Hey, Hollywood party filled with beautiful people. It didn’t take much convincing,” I joke.
Actually I did have to convince myself to come.
Seeing Naz changed everything. There’s still something magnetic between us, striking sudden and sure the same way it did the night he walked into my mama’s house on the eve of the big game.
Loyalty to my brother, concern for his fragile recovery urged me to make my excuses, hightail it back to my studio apartment, and forget the random encounter with the man Cliff hates more than anyone else.
Yet here I am, planted by the pool and scanning the crowd for a glimpse of the towering man with intense eyes and a fresh haircut.
“I wanted you to meet my cousin Iris,” Lotus says, tugging forward a woman I’ve seen many times with her famous baller husband, August West.
“Thank you for helping out today,” Iris says, her voice low and even.
There’s a tough kind of serenity to her.
Lotus’s strength and power are so much a part of her it seems she was born into them.
Iris, with her very public battle as a survivor, won her strength by walking through hell and coming out the other side whole.
“I loved every minute of it,” I reply to Iris. “I hope Harbor House got everything they needed.”
Excitement brightens Iris’s eyes, and she smiles so wide, it’s easy to see why her husband is notoriously devoted to her. Conviction makes her glow even more.
“We passed our goal, yes,” she says. “Thanks for asking. You live here in LA?”
“I do now,” I say. “Relocated from New York a while back to work on a movie and ended up staying on the West Coast.”
“The Dessi Blue movie,” Lotus pipes up.
“I can’t wait for that one,” Iris says, curiosity reshaping her expression. “So were you born in New York?”
“Oh, no. I was born in Trinidad, but my parents moved us to Houston when I was still a baby.”
“You ever go back?” Catalina asks.
“All dee time, gyal,” I say, slipping on my mother’s accent like a pair of familiar slippers. “My sister Janice and I go to Carnival every chance we get.”
“I’ve been a few times,” Lotus says. “I actually want to name my summer line Carnival, inspired by the vibrant colors and the flamboyant costumes. I’ve already sketched out a few things and talked to my team about maybe shooting the campaign in Trinidad.”
“Are you kidding?” I gasp. “That would be amazing. Maybe you could even connect with the tourist board. They’d love that kind of exposure with a brand as popular as yours.”
“You think?” Lotus asks, eyes wide.
“I’m sure.”
“It’ll have to wait until this little guy pops out,” Lotus says, touching her belly with obvious tenderness.
“It’s a boy?” I ask.
“Yes.” She rolls her eyes. “Can’t tell Kenan nothing. He has a girl, my stepdaughter, Simone, from his first marriage. He would have been happy no matter what, but getting a boy? Yeah, he’s over the moon.”
“August was the same way,” Iris says, kicking off her shoes and sitting on the edge of the pool.
“How many kids do you have?” I ask her.
“Two.” She lowers her feet into the water.
“But some days it feels like twelve. August is amazing when he’s home, but he’s gone so much during the season.
We have onsite daycare at my job for Michael.
He starts kindergarten next year and Sarai’s already in elementary school, but it’s still a lot solo. ”
“Can’t say I miss Kenan being on the road half the year,” Lotus says.
“I thought August would sink into a depression when Kenan left,” Iris says. “Thank God they brought Naz in.”
“That reminds me.” Lotus turns inquisitive eyes my way. “How did you say you and Nazareth know each other, Takira?”
The sudden silence encompasses our lounging circle, swelling with the three women’s collective curiosity.
“Oh, yeah, well.” I stall, staring into my now-empty glass. “He and my brother played ball together in high school. We haven’t seen each other in years.”
“He seemed mighty glad to ‘see’ you.” Catalina snickers.
I shoot her a sharp look but don’t say anything.
“And he’s never glad to see anyone,” Lotus adds, eyeing me. “I feel like there’s a story there. Come on. You can tell us.”
“There really isn’t,” I rush to correct them. “I literally met Naz once. He only transferred to my brother’s prep school senior year, so they didn’t have much time together before graduation. I’m surprised he even remembered me.”
Now that’s a lie. Even though we only met once, I have no doubt I left an impression on him, as he left one on me. Kindness and intelligence and curiosity. Hell, he was the first man to ever make me come. The way he made me feel, it lingered long after he had left Houston to follow his dreams.
“He’s here somewhere,” Iris says, craning her neck to look out over the crowd.
“Last I saw him,” Lotus says, “he was playing pool with Kenan and August. They’ll be over soon, I’m sure. Kenan can only be separated from this baby for like an hour at a time.”
We laugh, but an urgency to leave assails me.
I can’t deny the attraction when I saw Naz today, but somehow I know, if I actually do see him again, I’ll get drawn into an impossible situation.
One that could become a tug of war between my loyalty to Cliff and the attraction that’s still there between Naz and me.
“Where’s your restroom?” I ask, standing abruptly. “I gotta go.”
“Oh, sure.” Lotus gestures toward the house with one whole side comprised of wide windows open and overlooking the pool and backyard. “Down that hall off the foyer, first door on the right.”
“Thanks.” I split a smile between the three of them. “I’ll be right back.”
I probably won’t be. I do have to use the restroom, but I’ll find a way to slip out after that and call Catalina tomorrow using a headache as an excuse for my disappearance.
Lotus mentioned possibly working together.
We exchanged numbers, and hopefully something will come of it, but I need to get out of here.
I pick my way around the pool with careful steps, feeling slightly lightheaded after a few drinks from the bar.
I do my business and wash my hands, fully prepared to tiptoe my ass right outta here.
Naz makes me do something none of the Groundhog dates ever have.
Feel.
I feel…confused, unsure. Exhilarated. Turned on.
All I’ve wanted the last few years was to feel, and now that I do, it’s with the wrong guy.
A guy who has, through no fault of his own, hurt my brother so badly.
Cliff is finally clean. Finally getting better.
I can’t risk a connection with the very man he blames for his misfortune, even if that blame is completely misplaced.
I dry my hands and head back into the hall, determined to get out of here, only to run, for the second time today, into a wall of muscle and man.
I glance up and up until my eyes collide with Naz’s.
He stares down at me, his hands coming to my elbows, gripping there to steady me.
That mere touch sends my heartbeat into an erratic pattern and quickens my breath.
He runs his thumbs along the backs of my arms in a gentle caress.
“There you are,” he says, his eyes intent, his mouth unsmiling as if he knows exactly what I was about to do. That I was leaving to escape this very moment and this very man. “I’ve been looking for you.”