Chapter 17 Clever, Kind, and Beautiful #2
“Wes was already on my mind, because he called me yesterday. So, this morning I’m visiting my eco-friendly psychopharmacologist up the street, when I see his location. He was only three minutes away! I had to pull up.”
As Imani talked, Sasha could practically see Wes’s soul leave his body.
“I’m glad you brought up that call,” he jumped in. “Sasha, the reason I called Imani concerns you, too . . .”
“You have his location?” Sasha asked Imani with a tight smile.
“Oh, I never check it. It’s leftover from when we were lovers.”
It was like the whole world blinked at once. Sasha cut her eyes at Wes. Wes shifted in his seat, looking puckish. He let out an awkward, forced chuckle. “It was years ago.”
“Wes was at a low point. Depressed, sleeping for days. I was worried, so I made him share it.”
“I wasn’t depressed, I had Covid. Let’s not make a bad thing worse.” Wes flagged down their waitress and preemptively ordered Sasha a white wine.
“It wasn’t Covid, it was melancholia. You’d just gotten fired from the agency.
You were a shut-in. Every time I saw you, you had melting ice in your palms. So odd.
Anyway, I forgot I had your location.” She wagged her finger at him like a schoolmarm.
“You think I want to know where you are at all times? You’re so bad. ”
Wes rolled his eyes at Imani—then, she dissolved into husky laughter, resting her hand on his arm. A nauseating wave of jealousy rolled through Sasha’s stomach.
She tried to look unbothered. “Were you two boyfriend and girlfriend?”
“She’s so cute,” said Imani, looking at Wes with amusement. “Imagine me believing in girlfriends and boyfriends?”
“We dated briefly,” explained Wes. “Extremely briefly. An extremely long time ago.”
“I don’t believe in labels,” said Imani. “I’m solo-polyamorous.”
“Isn’t that a label?” asked Sasha lightly.
Imani floated past this question. “In poly relationships, you’re in one primary couple, and all other sexual partners are secondary.
Same with solo-poly, except that the primary couple is you with yourself.
I have lovers, but they’re all secondary.
You see?” She winked. “I’m all about freedom and hedonism and safe words. ”
“In summation, solo-polyamory is a pseudo-intellectual label for fuckboy,” explained Wes, eager to wrap up this portion of the program. “Anyway, the reason I called Imani . . .”
“Chill, Wes.” Imani shot Sasha a mischievous look. “Speaking of safe words, what’s yours? You can’t truly know someone until you’ve learned their safe word.”
“Will I need one for this conversation?” Sasha laughed nervously.
“She doesn’t have a safe word,” interrupted Wes. “Imani, enough with your little tests. You always do this.”
Always? How many times had they been in a similar situation—sharing coffee in their cozy, intimate bubble, when a random girl shows up, blowing the equation?
Sasha felt like an interloper. She felt like walls were closing in on her, even though she was outside.
She and Wes were so intimate just ten hours before, and now she was seated across a bohemian bombshell who seemed to know Wes in a way that she never would.
And then, Competitive Sasha arose from the depths of her personality. She wasn’t going to let this textbook cool girl throw her off her game.
“Wes, why do you think I don’t have a safe word?” asked Sasha coolly.
“No reason,” started Wes. “You just don’t strike me as a safe-word girl.”
“Oh really? And what kind of girl is that?”
“One with risky kinks,” he answered.
Offended, she huffed out a short laugh. “I think you know I’m not a prude.”
“Then, tell us your word!” prodded Imani. “Come onnn, it’s a safe space.”
Sasha swallowed, racking her brain for a word.
“Filibuster.”
Imani clapped her hands together with delight.
“Filibuster is bananas,” grumbled Wes, trying to hide the amusement tugging at his lips.
“She’s so clever, Wes!”
“I know,” he said shortly. “She’s clever, kind, and beautiful. But can I please get to why we’re all here. Sasha, I didn’t, uh, get a chance to tell you last night. But I have an update. I know where Teo lives.”
Sasha was stuck on “clever, kind, and beautiful.” Did he really just describe her that way, so casually? Her stomach fluttered, and she prayed she didn’t look as giddy as she felt.
Imani tapped on the table in front of Sasha. “Wes found your dude’s address.”
“Wait, what?” Sasha sucked in a sharp gulp of air. She missed this piece of information, entirely. Whether it was losing her attention span, her decorum, or her panties, she always got lost in his presence. “You found him? When? How?”
It felt so anticlimactic, Wes dropping such important information at Brown Butter. In front of an audience. Why wouldn’t Imani go away?
“Hold on, I need to prepare for this.” She whipped a lip gloss out of her purse, applying it with no mirror. “Now I’m ready.”
“You sure? Should we ask them to dim the lights?” Wes was going for light sarcasm but landed closer to “pouty.”
“Tell me.”
“He lives at 565 Broome. In SoHo.”
Sasha felt a jolt. Teo had a name and an address. He was an actual person. She’d been waiting for signs from the universe that he wasn’t a figment of her imagination—and these things made him real. Identifiable. And after waiting for weeks, hearing these details was surreal.
And, after last night, hearing Wes deliver them was downright disorienting.
“Teo D. Scera.” Sasha said it again, stretching out the vowels. Then, she repeated it, this time with an Italian accent. “Teo D. Scera, who lives on Broome. Wow. This is real. He’s real. I’m so relieved.”
“I’ve already tracked him down,” said Wes. “It’s why I called Imani. She lives on the same block and knows the doorman.”
Sasha let out an “ohhh,” finally understanding why Imani was there.
“It’s risky to discuss these things on the phone,” explained Wes. “So, I wanted to meet her in person. But later today, obviously. After you and I talked.”
“Wait. Wait, wait, wait,” said Sasha, trying to wrap her brain around this new revelation. Teo. Teo. She had to practice saying it. She drew her wrist up to her nose—the scent of cypress lingered. She was brought back to the flight. Their connection.
One step closer, she thought. I’m probably just stunned. Processing so much information.
“Have you ever seen him, Imani?” She turned to face her. “Probably just under six feet tall? Piercing, irresistible green eyes?”
Wes grabbed a piece of French bread from the basket, and bit into it like he wanted to fight someone.
“Oh him? I know who he is. He stays in the gym. He’s strict with it.
I know jujitsu, so I can tell when people have impeccable movement patterns.
” She smiled mysteriously. “Jujitsu practice taught me to access my divine feminine in a unique way. Authentic womanhood is falling in love with the way you move, don’t you think? ”
“Sure,” said Sasha, downing her white wine.
“I met Wes in jujitsu class. He thought he was a skirmishing expert because he used to box.” She tsk’ed at him. “It was cute beating you that one time.”
“Beat me? You tricked me.”
“My bra was loose. Who knew a rogue nipple could topple a man’s equilibrium?”
Can I use my safe word now? wondered Sasha. She felt small and inconsequential in the face of their spicy shared history.
“Anyway, Sasha, your plane guy’s extremely into core work and squat thrusts.” Imani winked. “Bodes well for you.”
“Let’s stick to details that pertain to the case,” interrupted Wes.
“But you allowed the rogue nipple anecdote?” Sasha scoffed.
“He carries himself like a worldly, wealthy man. I’ve only seen him in gym clothes, but it looks like nothing wrinkled or synthetic has ever touched his skin. And he’s got a fascinating face. He’s like if Adam Driver, Rami Malek, John Turturro, and young Al Pacino had a baby.”
“That’s a whole lotta nose,” muttered Wes. “Long shot, but any idea when he’s in town?”
“No, but the last time I saw him was two weeks ago. We even chopped it up a bit.”
Sasha sat up straight, as if yanked upward by a celestial string. “You spoke to him!”
“I did. I’d just returned from a work trip to Accra. We were talking about how low-budget American flights are. He mentioned taking a flight with terrible service, but the upside was he met a woman. Was that you?”
Sasha gasped. This was real. He was real. “He was talking about me!”
Wes, all business, focused his attention on Imani. “Do me a favor, hang out in the gym more often. And call me immediately the next time you see him.”
“Say less,” Imani responded. “I owe you, after you leaked the USFlight Airlines story.”
Sasha wondered what they were talking about.
It was like a secret tie that bound them, a connection she couldn’t reach.
And then, she felt her chest start to tighten with anxiety.
She felt territorial. And she knew it was a childish, unearned emotion.
But just the night before, they were ravenous for each other. Emotionally, she was still there.
“Oh shit, gotta run,” said Imani, checking her phone. “Wes, you know that piece I told you about on the phone?”
He glanced, quickly, at Sasha. “No, what piece?”
“It was late, you were probably half-asleep. Anyway, I need to go to Luxembourg—just got a tip that one of the church robbers was last seen there. Ugh, Europe in June is the ghetto. But I can visit my mom’s artist flat in London, after.”
Wes sipped his water. “She’s still doing Muppets portraiture using her fingerprints?”
“Toe prints.” Imani stared at her phone, lost in thought. “Hmm. The target churches are always in small European villages, with no resources to launch an investigation. Where in Luxembourg would he be?”
Sasha was reeling. Imani and Wes had late-night conversations, too? Wes knew Imani’s mom? Worried that her distress would show on her face, she blurted out the first thing that sprang to mind.