Chapter 3
V Saint
“I don’t interrupt. I insert myself when it matters.”
Itook my dates to places that made women sit up straighter.
Expensive rooms revealed things that cheap ones couldn’t.
The right restaurant would tell me how a woman carried herself, how much she drank when she thought she was being cute, how fast she started performing once the attention settled on her.
Tonight, I chose Duo Bistro in Calabasas.
Most of the men in the room were dressed like they had something to prove. Jackets. Cufflinks. Tight smiles. I came in wearing all black. Fitted Tom Ford tee. Lightweight Gucci bomber. Black pants. Black loafers to match my jacket. No heavy jewelry tonight, only my gold Rolex.
I wasn’t there for the woman sitting across from me.
She just didn’t know that.
But I made sure she had my attention so she wouldn’t think I was an asshole.
Her name was Camille. Pretty enough. Brown skin. Thick all over. Short. Older but pretended like she was younger. I liked women my age; young girls couldn’t keep up with me. However, this one didn’t know I knew she was lying about her age by three years. Crazy, she didn’t even have to lie.
She had spent the first twenty minutes pretending she wasn’t impressed by being there, then ordered the most expensive tequila on the menu and started leaning into her vowels every time a server walked by.
I had already seen enough, but kept entertaining.
“You always this quiet?” she asked, lifting her glass.
“When I’m listening.”
She laughed. “That sounds sarcastic.”
“It usually is.”
She smiled at that one. Women liked short answers. It gave them room to project whatever fantasy they needed. I let her have it.
She crossed one leg over the other and leaned forward. “So, what made you pick me?”
I picked up my water and looked at her over the rim. “You answered your messages on time for once.”
“So punctuality got me in the door?”
“It got you a seat in a nice restaurant.”
She took another drink. Her third. Maybe fourth. I had stopped counting once I realized she was trying to keep pace with whatever version of me she had made up before she got here.
“You know,” she said, lowering her voice, “I almost didn’t come. Everybody online is talking about these wife auditions like you really out here interviewing women.”
I looked at her. “Oh, you saw that?”
“Yeah, I saw it. So you were joking, right?”
I let a few seconds pass before I answered. “About which part?”
I watched her face as she tried to find the safest response. It was one of my favorite parts of talking to women. Not humiliating them. Just letting silence do what it always did. Pull the truth out by the ankle.
She laughed again, softer this time. “I mean, the auditions part.”
“Applications are already rolling in.”
“Oh, my God.” She covered her mouth. “You are not serious.”
“I’m grown, miss lady. I own too much to keep playing in women’s faces and letting them play in mine. Sounds serious to me.”
She touched her hair. “So what are you looking for then?”
I reached for my glass and looked past her shoulder.
That was when I saw Sade.
I had known she was here before I ever sat down. Her reservation hit the board an hour earlier. Bennett. Two guests. Booth seating. I always knew when she was on that damn dating site. My cousin owned it. I paid her to break the rules.
She was seated three sections over, facing the room. Long brown hair curled. Posture straight. Black dress, simple, lying on her curvy body, expensive diamonds. She wasn’t trying to be seen. That was part of what made men keep seeing her anyway.
The man across from her was talking too much. I even caught her secretly yawn, trying to act like the nigga wasn’t boring.
I looked back at Camille.
“What I’m looking for,” I said, “usually minds her business.”
She laughed too loudly. “So not me?”
I gave her a dry look. “You said it.”
She hit my arm lightly, playing cute, and I let my eyes drift back toward Sade for half a second.
Same calm face.
Same measured way of listening.
Same untouched energy she used to walk around with when she was younger, moving through Los Angeles as if none of it could get on her if she didn’t let it.
Most women changed in the land.
That was the point of the city.
It sold reinvention to people too weak to stay who they were.
Sade had never seemed interested.
Camille was still talking. I caught the end of a sentence about Cabo and some designer I did not care about.
I gave her just enough attention to keep the night moving.
“What do you do again?” I asked out of the blue.
She straightened. “I do luxury brand consulting.”
“For who?”
“A few people.”
“Name one.”
She smiled and looked down at her drink. “You interview everybody this hard?”
“Remember, I’m taking applications.”
She took another sip and bought herself time. “I just mean, you know, I work around a lot of people. Different clients.”
“That ain’t what I asked.”
Her smile stayed in place, but her eyes shifted. “You’re intense.”
“You’re vague.”
“I consult for beauty brands, nightlife brands. Stuff like that.”
“What does consulting mean?”
“It means I help them shape their image.”
“How?”
That was where she started fumbling for real.
“Well, you know, strategy. Marketing. Connections.”
“Whose?”
She sat back. “Why do it matter?”
“It doesn’t,” I said. “I was just seeing if you knew what you did, and you don’t.”
That should have offended her. Instead, it made her grin, because some women mistook precision for flirtation.
Across the room, Sade had picked up her menu again, but she wasn’t reading it. Her attention drifted every now and then, not toward me exactly, but enough.
Enough to know she had noticed me and did not care to show it.
That part was familiar too.
Seven years earlier, she had been drunker than I had ever seen her, sitting inside my homeboy’s birthday section in a downtown club, laughing with her friends.
It was so packed, women were overlapping men, sitting on laps, and she had her thick ass thigh pressed against me.
I had moved in close enough to smell the mint on her breath and tapped her on the shoulder, causing her to glare at me.
I whispered to her. Not disrespectful. Just low. Just enough to make her blink and laugh in my face like I knew she would do.
“I heard you are the girl who is still holding on to her v-card. I’ll marry you.”
She laughed. “Stop it. I don’t even know you.”
“Nah, you stop it. I’ll pay millions for it right now.”
“I’m not a hooker,” she had said, smiling like I was stupid. “And I’m not pressed for money.”
Then she got up with her friends when one of them said, “Let’s go dance,” before I could answer.
She didn’t remember that night.
I knew she didn’t.
But I did.
And every now and then, my mind went back to it and laughed on its own.
Camille reached for her glass again.
I checked the time.
Still early.
Still enough night left to make a bad decision and hate myself for it later.
“You want another?” I asked.
She nodded toward the restroom. “I’m gonna freshen up first.”
“Take your time.”
She stood, smoothing down her dress. “Don’t disappear on me.”
“I can’t … you’ll expose me.”
She laughed as she walked off.
I watched her walk away, then looked back toward Sade.
Her date was mid-sentence, leaning in with both forearms on the table, too eager, too pleased with himself. I could tell just by his face that he thought the night was going well.
I picked up the bouquet I had bought for Camille. White roses. Safe choice. I pulled one from the middle, then slid my business card from the money clip in my pocket.
By the time I reached Sade’s table, she had already looked up.
I stopped beside them, not close enough to crowd her, close enough to interrupt the air around the booth.
“Evening,” I said politely.
The man looked up first. I already knew his name was Marcus. Knew he worked in the same field as me. I didn’t dig too deep. only seen his name and occupation on the dating profile.
“Can I help you?” he asked, sounding annoyed.
I ignored him.
My attention stayed on her.
“I’m working on a development in South Central,” I said, holding the card where she could see it. “Luxury units. I’m looking for an interior designer who understands restraint and doesn’t decorate for applause.”
Her face didn’t change much, but her eyes did. Just a small shift. Enough interest to satisfy me.
But her irritation came in.
“Excuse me. I’m not on business hours.”
I smiled a little. “I know.”
I set the card down by her water glass, then laid the rose across the edge of the table.
I finally turned to him.
“I paid for y'all dinner.”
He frowned. “What?”
I adjusted my watch and looked back at Sade. “Yeah. Enjoy the rest of it.”
He sat up straighter. “Hold on. You paid for our table?”
“I paid for several. Yours just happened to be one of them.”
Sade’s mouth twitched a little at that. Not a smile. Not quite. But it was there.
I caught it.
That was all I came for.
“You should call,” I told her. “If you care about the community you grew up in.”
I walked off before either of them could drag it into something else.
When I sat back down, Camille was returning, heels clicking against the floor, face brighter now, liquor seeping through her polish the way I knew it would. She slid into the booth and reached for her glass.
“Did I miss anything?” she asked.
“Nothing worth repeating.”
She pouted, then smiled.
I looked at Sade once more out of the corner of my eye; they were gathering to leave.
She had picked up the card.
She wasn’t reading it. Just holding it between two fingers, and then she dropped it back down on the table.
By the time dinner was over, Camille had leaned all the way into drunk. Her words were slower. Her hand stayed on my dick under the table too long. I walked her out because I was raised to. Sade was already gone, but when I looked at the table, she had left my card and rose on the table.
I knew she did before I even walked past and saw it.
And somehow, that irritated me less than it should have.
Because at least she was still acting like herself.
At least one woman in this city hadn’t changed. I broke the stem and stuck the rose in my coat pocket and followed behind Camille before she fell in her heels.
I took her back to my condo because I was still stuck in cycles I had not fully decided to leave. All I could think about was fucking her from the back, spitting in her mouth, then sending her home in an Uber before the sun came up.
On the elevator ride down, she pressed herself against me and smiled.
But my mind was not on her.
It stayed upstairs where Sade had been.
On the brief flicker in her face that told me I had gotten under her skin just enough.
$$$$$
We made it outside just after midnight.
I walked Camille to my car, unlocked it, and opened her door. She smiled like that meant something. It didn’t. I just had manners.
My Hellcat sat low. It was midnight blue with black rims and tinted out. This wasn’t my business car. This was my “by-night” car. Phantom League Car Club stamped into the back window the way everything else I owned carried a piece of me somewhere.
She slid in, adjusting her dress before pulling out a small mirror and freshening her lip gloss.
I closed her door, walked around, and got in.
The first thing I did was check my gun. Same spot. Same position. I adjusted it once, then leaned back and lit my blunt.
She kept glossing her lips, pressing them together.
In my head, I laughed.
Them thick ass lips gon' be on my dick in thirty minutes.
I shook my head once, low, amused with myself more than anything.
The engine came alive when I started it.
I pulled off smoothly, reached over, and turned the music on. The old school group Portrait came through the speakers, clean. “Here We Go Again” was the song.
I drove with one hand, smoking, letting the city open up in front of me.
I glanced over at her.
She was moving her head slightly, catching the rhythm, trying not to sing.
I smirked.
“I see you,” I said. “Go ahead. Show your real age, Miss Thirty-Eight.”
She burst out laughing.
“Okay, you got me,” she said, shaking her head. “That’s my song.”
“Yeah,” I said, taking another pull. “And I don’t like liars.”
She looked at me, still smiling. “I didn’t lie.”
“You shaved a few years off,” I said. “That counts.”
She leaned back in her seat, more relaxed now. The alcohol had settled into her body. Her voice had dropped a little. Movements slower. More comfortable.
I hopped on the freeway, and my mind moved.
My thirty-sixth birthday was around the corner.
Too much built. Too much established. Too much power in every part of my life that actually mattered.
And still…
I was driving through the city with a woman I didn’t care about, knowing exactly how the night was going to end before it even got there.
I exhaled, watching the smoke disappear into the dark.
My interview with Alana wasn’t supposed to be a joke.
That was the problem.
I meant everything I said.
I just hadn’t moved on it yet.
I made a right, heading into Studio City, California… Near Universal Studios.
By the time we pulled into my building, she was fully leaning into the night. Smiling too easily. Talking softer. Eyes heavier.
I parked, got out, and came around to open her door again.
She stepped out, adjusting herself, looking around like she was taking everything in.
I walked her inside without saying much.
Inside my condo, Camille kicked off her heels and started talking before the door fully closed.
Every sentence coated in liquor and effort.
I poured a drink I didn’t want and set it on the counter.
She walked past me, running her hand along the back of the couch.
“You have a really nice place,” she said.
“Thank you.”
She stepped closer.
“We should shower,” she said. “Together. before we… you know.”
I looked at her for a second.
Then smirked.
“I don’t show my body on the first date.”
She blinked like she didn’t find humor in it.
I nodded toward the hallway.
“Guest bathroom down there,” I said. “Meet me in my room.”
I paused just long enough for it to land.
“Naked.”
I walked off.
In my bathroom, I let the water run until it was hot.
I emptied my pockets before I undressed. The rose had come back upstairs in my pocket, crushed. I set it on the counter and stared at it for a second.
I laughed once under my breath.
All these women around me.
All this access.
And the only one I could think about was the one who had left my card sitting on a table, like I was the one applying.
I brushed her off and stripped.
I hopped in the shower, washed, stepped out, dried off, and moved through the rest of it without rushing.
Lotion.
Teeth routine.
I pulled on a pair of gray sweat shorts. No draws. Shirtless. Clean.
Ready.
But not invested.
I walked toward my room, already knowing how the rest of the night was going to play out.