The Prettiest Outlaw

Chapter 3

After spending a few days in the hospital, my mother had been back home for a week and a half.

“Aye, Ma.” I walked into the kitchen where she was putting something together at the sink. “Aww, you feel good enough to cook?”

It had taken my mom a minute to bounce back from her hospital stay. She’d been exhausted. From the general loudness of the hospital to the nurses and medical assistants poking and prodding her to check her numbers every couple of hours, she hadn’t gotten much rest.

Her back was to me, but I still walked over and kissed her cheek. She was washing lettuce.

“Hey, son. I’m making myself a chicken Caesar salad with a specially prepared dressing that’s supposed to be okay for diabetics.”

“You need any help?”

“Nah. Your brother was by here about an hour ago. He took me to get groceries and stuff. I wish I knew how to get him to at least get some grief counseling.”

“Yeah. I do, too.”

She finished up at the sink. “Come have a seat with me, Nico, baby. I wanna talk to you.”

The two of us made our way to the round dining table that sat in her kitchen nook.

“What’s up?”

She sighed heavily before speaking. “I know neither you or your brother want to talk about such things, but the truth is that I’m not getting any younger.”

“None of us are, Ma.”

Her eyes found mine, and she stared. Her gaze was intense.

“Exactly. While I don’t feel like I’m on my way out of earth’s door or anything, I do know that I won’t be around forever.”

I nodded but remained silent. She had something on her mind, and I wanted her to express it. I felt like the fact that she always kept her emotions inside was one of the reasons she was plagued with all of the health concerns that she had.

“As a girl, I dreamed of getting married, of having a beautiful home that my husband and I would fill with children. Instead, I spent my life chasing behind somebody else’s husband, hoping he would wake up one day and choose me over her?—”

I cut her off. “Ma?—”

She cut me off. “No, Domenico. I need to say this. I’ve carried it around for too long. Now, I’m sorry to dump this on you.” She chuckled softly. “But you are my closest confidant.”

I inhaled deeply then gave her a nod. “Okay. Go ahead.”

“I’m not having a pity party. I’m simply stating the facts. Sometimes, you have to say things out loud…put them into the atmosphere. The Bible says that the power of life and death is in the tongue, and those who love it, will eat of its fruit. These thoughts clamoring around in my head ain’t doing nobody a bit of good, nor are they bringing my hopes and dreams to fruition.

“I wanted to be a wife. I knew in my heart that I wanted to be a wife. But instead of pursuing that, I pursued a man who already had the very thing I was trying to be. Why would Briscoe ever have needed me as a wife when he had a whole wife at home? It was stupid of me, but I called myself in love. Well, what I learned was that you can be your own worst enemy. You can position yourself to miss everything you claim you want out of life.

“I could have let Briscoe go on about his business and married a man who wanted to marry me. I didn’t do that. Instead, I raised the boys he gave me and watched y’all grow older with each passing year that he stayed married. I stayed while he gave me crumbs and gave the sons we created nothing but crumbs. I gave up my dream of being a wife and bought into his dream. I regret doing that. Every day, my prayer is that God will remove the regret from my heart. I don’t want to have any more regrets, so I have to tell you what’s on my mind.”

“I’m listening.”

“Nico, I want to see grandchildren before I leave this earth. I want to see both you and Donovan marry and fill your homes up with babies. I want daughters-in-law to do all the things I dreamed of doing with the daughter that I never had. I want to talk to my friends about what my grands are doing, how fast they’re growing, how much they remind me of my boys when they were little.

“I was so close to having that… two times. You had Emerald, and you loved her so. But we all knew the diagnosis, so I knew there was never any guarantee that you two would make it to the altar. That cancer was aggressive and relentless. But losing Nevaeh was very unexpected… and the way we lost her… tragic.” Her head shook back and forth. “Though I pray that my Dono will open up his heart and love again, I am just as sure that now is not the time. He’s still too mad and too mean. There is no woman who deserves him in this state. But you, Nico. Do you think you’re ready? Do you think you’ll ever be ready?”

* * *

My mother’s question stuck with me. From the time I woke up in the morning until the time I laid it down at night, my mother’s question played in my head. It was bouncing around in my head, even as I sat behind my desk at work, preparing for my day. I felt like the main reason the thought kept hanging around was because I didn’t have an answer.I wasn’t sure if I was ready to get serious about a woman again. Maybe. I wasn’t sure.

I had only come out of my office to distribute paychecks to my employees, but when I was at the front counter, I couldn’t help but to chat with Kayla.

“Hey. Here you go.” I slid her both the envelope containing her paycheck and the sign-off sheet that said she received it.

“Thank you.”

“Who do we have picking up today?”

“Uh…” She stroked the keyboard of her computer until the screen she wanted popped up. “Mrs. Washington is picking up the blue Maxima. Ms. Cordova is picking up the white Chevy Tahoe, and Ms. Outlaw is picking up the red Acura MDX.”

No sooner than the words left her mouth did the bell connected to the front door alert us that somebody had opened it.

Dressed in a surprisingly form-fitting leather puffer coat with a furry collar, matching thigh-high black leather boots, and oversized square shades, Julianna Outlaw walked right up to the counter. Once she was close enough, the smell of her perfume invaded my nostrils and the only thought in my mind was damn! She looked and smelled like brand new money.

“Hey.” Kayla gave her a wide smile. “How may I help you today?”

“Hey.” She included both Kayla and me in her greeting. “I’m here to pick up my truck, but I’m hoping we can talk for a minute.”

That statement was directed at me.

I nodded slightly before turning to Kayla. “Can you have Khalil bring the Acura up, please?”

“Sure.”

I stepped out from behind the counter, wondering what Julianna needed to talk to me about. I led her into my office then took the seat behind the desk while she took a seat in front of it.

“Thank you for everything you’ve done with my truck?—”

I cut her off, amusement glinting in my eyes. “You haven’t even seen it yet, lil bit.”

“I know. But I know you do good work, and I’m thinking that you probably did a little extra for me because I’m family.”

“I did.” I nodded my head. “I did a few things. I’ll show them to you when we go through your truck. Langston already settled your payment… as much as I would let him. I didn’t really want to take money for your wheels. I mean, like you said, you’re family.”

“Thank you for that.”

She took a deep breath before clearing her throat, so I figured that she was about to get into why she asked to speak to me.

“Umm, I…I was talking to Bunny. I was telling her that I feel like I need…grounding. So…so umm?—”

I cut her off because all of the hemming and hawing was making me anxious. “Spit it out, lil bit. You got my nerves on edge.”

“Sorry.” She gave me a small smile. “I’m nervous to ask you this, but I’m also kind of distracted by your…chest.” She gestured toward my general location.

I looked down at the white tee I was sporting and had to smirk. If there was one thing about me that I couldn’t deny, it was my love for lifting weights.

I was born big. At birth, I tipped the scales at almost ten pounds and from there it had been up. I was a short, stocky kid who hit a growth spurt during my freshman year of high school, and I morphed into a chubby teen.

Around my sixteenth birthday, the weight started to fall off. As soon as my frame was out from under the chub, I realized that muscle definition was right there. I decided that if I was going to be a “big guy” all of my life, I preferred to be big with muscles as opposed to the opposite.

“There’s not much I can do about that. You’re gonna have to try to ignore it.” I made my pectoral muscles jump one at a time.

We both laughed. Seeing her laugh reminded me that it was the first time I’d seen her do that in a while.

Gianni Outlaw with his Italian stallion, pretty boy, multicultural, Casanova ass had fathered three of the most beautiful women I had ever seen. Jia and Jianna were beautiful women, but neither of them could touch Julianna as far as I was concerned. She was most definitely the prettiest Outlaw.

“What’s up?” I repeated.

“I wanna go to church with you.” She blurted out the sentence so fast that it took me a minute to process what she actually said.

I cocked my head to the side. “You wanna go to church with me?”

“Yeah.” She sighed then nervously fingered the strands of her hair. “Yeah, umm…I need to get…centered. I feel like I’m floating through life, not really tethered to anything. This might sound stupid or…I don’t know…crazy, but I need like a…home base. I need somewhere I can touch down.”

I nodded slowly, before speaking—before smirking. “And when you think of church, you think of me?”

My question made her laugh again. I could see the relief on her face. Her facial features and even her shoulders relaxed when she realized that I wasn’t going to make things tough for her or awkward.

“No, not really. I was talking to my sister, and she said that Langston mentioned that you were your mom’s designated driver to church every Sunday.” She looked down for a minute. “You know…we were raised Catholic. I never found St. Monica’s very…churchy. I need to be somewhere that I can be fed. Anyway, I’m hoping I can bum a ride or that you’ll give me directions or something.”

A million thoughts ran through my mind. Julianna, the party girl, was asking to bum a ride to church. She was sitting in front of my desk, acting shy and meek, looking to attend church with me. This was not the Julianna I had met a few years ago. This was a completely different Julianna, and I hadn’t noticed. I wondered if her sisters had noticed…if her friends had noticed.

“Yeah, I’m the designated driver. Church starts at eight o’clock. I’ll come through to get you at seven.” I paused, awaiting her reaction to the pick-up time.

She didn’t give me a reaction.

“What’s the dress code?” She fidgeted with her hands in her lap.

I took a second to think about how to describe the way I saw people dressed at the church.

“It’s very uh…come as you are? The older crowd is the older crowd. The men are in suits or slacks and a button up, the women are in skirts or dresses. But I see just as many people in jeans or what have you. Whatever you wanna wear is cool.”

“Okay.” She finally stopped the fidgeting. “How’s your mom? Bunny mentioned that she was in the hospital.”

It took me a second to remember that her family referred to her sister, Jianna, as Bunny.

“She was. She’s out now.”

“Well, I hope she’s on the mend. Tell her I said hello. I really like your mom. She’s the sweetest. No shade to your father, but Coe’s dirty ass has really good taste in women. Between your mother and Natalya Hill, he’s one lucky bastard.”

I sniggered. “You have a point.”

Since connecting with my half-brothers, I’d had the opportunity to meet their mother, Mrs. Hill. Julianna was right. She was beautiful. I figured that she had to be in her early sixties, but she had the looks of a woman twenty years younger. She was kind, sweet, and nurturing. She cut Briscoe off, but she was accepting of all of the children he’d created outside of their marriage. She was a gem and so was my mother. Briscoe Hill was one lucky bastard.

Kayla hit me on the office intercom and let me know that Khalil had pulled Julianna’s truck into the first work bay.

“Your truck’s ready.”

She didn’t look happy about that or even relieved.

“You okay?”

“Yeah. I have mixed feelings about my truck. I mean, knowing the state it was in when you rescued it from the chop shop...” Her shoulders bounced up and down in a stiff shrug.

“Don’t worry about the vibes or the energy. Every area of your truck has been touched by my guys. It’s basically a brand new truck.”

“Okay.” She didn’t seem convinced.

“I wouldn’t shit you, lil bit. Come on. Let me take you to see it. If it’s still giving you the creeps, I’ll go to the dealership with you, and you can trade it in on something else.”

“Okay.”

* * *

I picked my mother up first on Sunday, hoping to get all of her questions out of the way before we scooped up Julianna.

“Why’d you need me to be ready so early?” she asked as soon as Donovan closed the truck’s door behind her.

“Because I have to make a stop.”

“A stop where?”

“We have a guest coming to church with us this morning.” I was purposely vague because I knew it drove her crazy.

“What guest? I know it can’t be any of your friends because they’re mostly wild, street guys.”

“Come on, Ma. Don’t act like all of my friends are out here?—”

“Okay. Okay.”

She cut me off as she dug around in her purse looking for who knew what.

“But who is this guest?” Her eyes widened. “Is it a woman? Is it a woman, Nico? Did you meet somebody? And she goes to church? She’s a church girl.” She gave a little clap.

I didn’t say anything. I navigated to Julianna’s neighborhood in silence.

“Domenico! Who are we picking up?”

I wanted to laugh so badly because my mom was impatient as hell.

“We’re picking up Julianna. You happy now?” I faked like I was annoyed when inside I was rolling with laughter.

“Julianna? Is that your new lady friend?”

“Julianna Outlaw? Nah.”

She racked her brain in silence for a moment or two. “Why does that name sound familiar?”

“Because she’s Gianni Outlaw’s youngest daughter. And because her sister, Jianna, married Dolton. Remember? You went to the wedding in New Orleans.”

“Ohhhh.” She made the connection. “And why is she going to church with us?”

“Yo.” I shrugged a little. “She asked me if she could go to church with us. I offered to scoop her, so we’re scooping her.”

I fought hard as hell to keep my eyes on the road, but when they wandered over to her, she had a little smirk on her face.

“She’s the little caramel colored one. If I remember her correctly from Dolton and his wife’s baby shower, she’s a pretty little thing. Short with a big old booty, right?”

I grunted my response because there was no way in hell I was going there.

“Gianni and his wife sure did make some pretty children. If I remember correctly, all three of the sisters are beautiful. But that one, that youngest one, Julianna…she’s got a little spark to her.”

“She lost that spark,” I confided. “Life’s been giving her the business. Pretty sure that’s why she’s running toward the church.”

“Well at least she knows where her help comes from because some people run to other things when life starts passing out licks. Like to alcohol, drugs, sex, overspending, overeating… I’m glad she’s seeking the church.”

I turned into a gated community in one of the ritzier areas of the city and came to a stop in front of a modern looking, three-story detached townhome. Before I could text her or even tap the horn, Julianna was coming out onto the small porch.

It was cold outside, and though most of her was covered by a wool coat, I could see her legs, which let me know that she was wearing a dress or a skirt. She bounded down the stairs in her high-heeled boots.

“Get out and open the door for her, Nico,” my mother urged, giving me a slight push on the bicep.

Without thinking about the fact that I was a grown man who lived in his own spot and paid his own bills, I started to move at her directive. I turned back and looked at my mom as I exited the warm confines of my truck.

“Aye, Bianca, don’t be on your matchmaking sh—stuff. This isn’t that. We’re only going to church. This girl isn’t your future daughter-in-law.”

“Okay.” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “But find out if she wants kids. She could be the future mother of my grandchildren, and they would be so pretty… just like Dolton’s babies. Prettier even because you have my genes.”

“Ma.”

She giggled like a kid just as Julianna made it to the truck.

“What’s good?” I looked her up and down. Julianna was more slim-thick than thick. That didn’t stop her from being curvier than a motherfucker. The wool coat she was wearing didn’t hide even one of those curves. “I see you decided to go for the traditional church look with a dress or a skirt.”

She grinned at me. “Shows how much you know. This dress is bodycon with a split up to each hip and a stomach cut out.”

I laughed aloud at that as I held the back door open for her.

I heard her speak to my mother as I closed the door for her.

* * *