Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen
TAKIRA
“That was delicious.” I pat my full belly and reach for my third Bellini. “I could get used to this.”
“I am used to this now,” Yari says, swirling the last of her angel hair pasta around a fork. “I need a raise, Lo, so I can afford an Italian chef.”
“Done!” Lotus toasts with her wine glass filled with water. “If this new line sells like I hope it does, we’ll all get raises.”
“It’ll be fantastic, like everything you do,” Kenan says. He frowns at her plate with its remnants of pasta and bread. “You barely ate. You feeling okay?”
“This was my second plate.” Lotus cups his face in one small hand. “I’m fine. The baby’s fine. We’re in a gorgeous Italian villa.”
The villa, nestled into the Amalfi Coast, overlooks the Tyrrhenian Sea, has nine bedrooms, two private terraces, a swimming pool with outdoor showers, ancient fireplaces, antiques intermixed with the most modern accoutrements, and a gourmet kitchen our temporary Italian chef made impeccable use of.
“Yeah, nice hook-up, Jared,” August says. “This place is fantastic.”
“He’s been offering it to us for…” He looks to Banner. “How long?”
“Like two years, but we aren’t exactly the best about taking vacations,” she says wryly. “If I’d known how beautiful it was, we would have come sooner.”
“We’ll come back.” Jared leans over to kiss her hair. “And next time, we’ll bring the girls.”
She serves a grin to everyone at the table. “Jared’s convinced we’ll have all girls.”
“All?” Yari asks, brows lifted. “How many kids y’all trying to have?”
“Three,” Jared says.
“Four,” Banner says at the same time, laughing and leaning her head on her husband’s shoulder. “We’re negotiating.”
“I think we’re done,” Iris says. “I thought I wanted more, but I’m hitting a stride in my career. Getting my own accounts and making an impact. Firing on all cylinders. Sarai and Michael feel like enough.”
“What do you think, August?” Yari asks, grinning.
August holds his hands up and laughs. “I don’t have a uterus. I don’t produce milk. My job has me on the road away from my wife and kids half the year, so I say…yes, dear. Whatever you want, dear. I’m satisfied.” He kisses Iris’s hand. “But I’d be satisfied if all I had was you, baby.”
“Okay, number thirty-three,” Iris says, rolling her eyes, even as they brim with affection. “You’re getting some tonight. No need to lay it on that thick.”
August winks. “Insurance.”
We all laugh and push away from the table, agreeing to take advantage of the villa’s amenities.
“Swim?” Jade asks Kenya.
“Oh, yeah.” Kenya stretches. “I been slacking on my regimen. I need to get some laps in.”
Jade takes her hand and leads her much taller wife to the stairs. “Let’s get our suits.”
“Or we could swim without them,” Kenya teases.
“Not if I’m out there.” Yari laughs. “I don’t need to see all that.”
“There’s a theater in the basement,” Banner says, yawning. “We were gonna go watch a movie.”
“I have a feeling that movie will be watching you, Ban.” Jared pulls her into his side. “You’re tired.”
“Making a baby has that effect on me.” She widens her eyes meaningfully. “Something I didn’t have to hide this trip thanks to your big mouth.”
“Movies, you said?” He opens the door leading to the basement, lips pressed against a grin.
Iris, August, Lotus, and Kenan decide to play spades out on the terrace.
“We set them twice last time,” Iris tells me, rubbing her hands together. “It stings their pride that these two girls whoop their asses. Wanna come watch?”
“I think we’ll take a walk,” Naz interrupts, looping an arm around my waist. “There’s olive and lemon trees in the grove. If you want, Kira?”
I glance up, mesmerized by the look in his eyes. It’s not just passion or desire, but adoration. I don’t know how it’s possible for that look to be real in less than two weeks, but I trust it. I feel it, too.
“A walk sounds good,” I say, my breath shallow.
“Okay.” Kenan gives us a knowing look. “Enjoy your walk.” He puts walk in air quotes, making us laugh, but neither of us deny that we could get up to something out there.
We set off for the garden, walking in silence for a few minutes with our fingers entwined, the only sounds splashes and squeals from the pool, shouts and good-natured bickering from the card game on the terrace, and the click of our footsteps on flagstones leading us deeper into a copse of trees.
The scent of lemons wafts thick in the air, their yellow skins gleaming on sturdy branches in the moonlight.
The water shimmers in the distance, moonbeams shading it midnight instead of the bright sapphire blue of day.
Embedded into the cliff, the lights of Positano’s shops and restaurants sparkle like crown jewels overlooking a sea of glass.
“It’s breathtaking.” I stop to absorb one of the most captivating views of our trip. Of my life. “It’s hard to believe it’s real and I’m here.”
“We are definitely here.” Naz takes my hand, leading me deeper into the grove to a wooden bench situated between two olive trees. “Let’s sit.”
When I kick off my sandals, Naz scoots to the end so I can rest my head in his lap and swing my legs over the bench arm.
“This feels very Notting Hill.” I tip my head back to catch the faintest of night breezes. “You know that closing scene?”
“The one where Julia Roberts is pregnant?”
“Not that part. Not for a long time.” I shake my head. “I got too much to do.”
He lifts one of the long braids left loose from my chest, toying with the end. “What do you want? In the future, I mean?”
“To have an A-list clientele. So few of the Black stylists and makeup artists in Hollywood work consistently with A-list clients. My work deserves to be seen on any red carpet and at every premiere.”
“I love your confidence,” he says softly, bending to kiss my temple. “What about your personal life? Obviously you said no kids yet.”
“Not yet, but I do want them. My parents have been married over forty years. They had trouble getting pregnant at first, and Janice came a few years into their marriage.”
I giggle, tipping my head back to catch his eyes. “Mama said once her womb got the hang of it, she couldn’t stop.” I sober. “She lost two between Janice and Cliff, but then she got pregnant with me almost as soon as Cliff was born.”
“And you two have always been close.” He says it as fact, not question.
I nod, a touch of sadness invading the garden, disturbing my peace. Soon I may have to hurt one of the men in my life who mean so much to me.
“Is there a place for me?” Naz asks, the timbre of his voice deepening, caressing. “In your future?”
I sit up and turn to face him, tucking one leg beneath me. “Do you want one?”
He gives me a wry look. “I made a fool of myself to get you on this trip, Kira. What do you think?”
“You didn’t make a fool of yourself. You just acted out of character. I’m glad you did. It’s been the best trip of my life, and I’ve made new friends.”
I cup his jaw, rubbing the shadow of bristles coating the strong line. “I’ve had you, Naz, and I’ve never felt more, never wanted anyone the way I want you.”
“And next week?” He grasps my wrist, trapping my hand against his face. “When we get back to LA, do you honestly expect me to let you go?”
I swallow, glancing down at the aged wood of the bench between us. “No. I just…I have to figure out what we say to Cliff. The best time to tell him.”
“I got an email tonight.”
I frown and shoot him a huh? look.
“Okay,” I say. “And?”
“It was from Myron.”
“Myron from St. Cat’s?” I ask, stiffening. “What’d he want?”
“Coach Lipton is retiring, and they’re asking all of us from his one championship team to come for the ceremony.”
I close my eyes and turn to press my back against the bench, letting both feet hit the ground with a thud. “Cliff is just getting over that damn documentary, and now they want to memorialize the night that ruined his life.”
“No, now they want to honor a man who devoted his entire life to teaching young men a sport he loves. They want some of the men whose lives he impacted to come celebrate a stellar career as one of Texas’s winningest high school coaches in history.”
“I know. It’s an amazing achievement.”
“If Coach Lipton hadn’t recruited me to St. Cat’s senior year, my life wouldn’t be what it is now.”
“I know.”
“Do you? Because it seems like you think other people’s lives should revolve around Cliff’s, including your own.”
“That’s not fair.”
“I want to be with you.”
I suck in a shuddering breath, stand, and put a few feet between me and him on the bench, but I’m unable to look away from the intent in his dark eyes. “Also not fair.”
“Why? Because you’ll have to do something about this? When this trip is over, we’re not over, and I’m not pretending we are for Cliff.”
“Naz.”
“No, listen to me.” He stands and reaches me in one long step, tugging me to him by my wrist. “This, what’s happened to us, it’s fast. I know that. As cautious as I am, do you think I don’t know that? But is it two weeks? Or is it twelve years in the making?”
I swallow and don’t try to pull away but press into his chest, breathing in his clean, masculine scent.
His hands, big and gentle, drift around to cradle my back. “I’ve watched you for years.”
At his quiet words, I look up. His eyes are set on me, his sensual lips parted on a laugh at himself.
“I saw you announce on social media when you were leaving Houston, moving to the A.”
“You did?”
“And then leaving Atlanta, moving to New York.” He grins down at me, tracing the shell of my ear and sending shivers down my spine.
“When you posted you were leaving New York and coming to LA for Dessi Blue, somewhere in my heart, even subconsciously, I said to myself…now I have her. This close, I’ll have her, but I didn’t know how.
All my life, opportunities have found me. Have fallen into my lap.”
He hugs me tight and, arms folded under my butt, lifts me off my feet so our faces are level.
“Naz!” I squeal, legs dangling.
“And what happened?” He sets his eyes on mine, humor sifting out of his expression, leaving an intensity that winnows steam through my blood. “You literally fell into my arms at that fashion show. I didn’t know how it would happen for us…but I think I knew it would.”
I wrap my legs around his waist and link my arms behind his neck, leaning in to capture his lips between mine.
He opens instantly, and that’s how it’s always been with us.
Him, a man notoriously private and reserved and content with himself, opened up for me, craving me.
He breaks the kiss, and I draw in his breath and the scent of lemons as he presses our foreheads together.
“I’m going to that retirement ceremony,” he says, waiting for me to catch his eyes in the moonlight. “I assume Cliff will be there, too. And this thing with him will be resolved.”