Chapter 13
Rain tapped softly against the bedroom window while I lay there staring at the ceiling, tangled up in Booda’s arms with my mind refusing to quiet completely. My body still felt heavy from the night before, but not just from sex, from everything that had happened.
I didn’t know what to make of any of it.
While I silently lie there, struggling with my identity, Booda repositioned himself behind me, and his arm tightened around my waist. “You up?” he asked, his voice still rough from sleep.
“Yeah. Been up for a while now,” I replied softly, trying not to alert him of my troubles.
The dick had been good, great even, but it was a temporary fix. Now that the highs of my orgasm were no longer a distraction, I was right back at square one, wrestling with the realization that I was a far different woman than I’d led myself to believe.
He pressed a kiss against the back of my shoulder before settling again. “I know. I could hear you thinking in my sleep. That’s what woke me up.”
I let out a breath through my nose as my thoughts kept circling back to the money transfer from the night before.
At first, I hadn’t thought much about it.
We needed money, so I moved it. Simple. But lying there now, replaying everything in my head, I couldn’t stop thinking about how natural it all felt.
Last night should’ve been confusing. Stressful. I should’ve second-guessed myself at least once. But I didn’t. Everything flowed too smoothly, and that realization bothered me more now than it had while I was actually doing it.
Like breathing, it was all muscle memory.
“Booda.”
“Hmm?”
“I remembered that account.”
“I know.”
“No,” I said quietly, staring harder at the ceiling. “I really remembered it.”
That got his attention, and he lifted himself slightly behind me, watching my face carefully while I tried to piece the feeling together.
“I didn’t even think about what I was doing,” I admitted. “I just did it.”
A slow grin tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Good.”
I turned my head enough to look at him. “Good? Nigga, that shit scared me.”
“Why?”
“Because normal people don’t know how to move fifty thousand dollars around without getting caught.”
Booda shrugged, as if we were discussing the weather. “You ain’t normal, Koko.”
I looked away, but Booda reached over and grabbed my chin gently, forcing my eyes back to his.
“You gotta stop acting shocked every time you remember who the fuck you are.”
“Normal.” His thumb brushed slowly across my jaw before he shook his head. “Why the fuck would I want you to be normal?”
I frowned slightly, and his eyes softened.
“Normal bitches never did nothing for me. I fell in love with the woman who could walk into a room and make everybody feel her presence without saying a word. The woman who knew how to survive. The woman who always figured shit out.”
His fingers slid into my hair before he leaned closer. “You sitting here scared of yourself while I’m just thankful you’re still in there.”
I frowned. “So you liked me more when I was kidnapping people, laundering money, and cutting niggas up?”
“Hell yeah. That shit used to turn you on, and as soon as we got home, you used to wet my dick up afterward, too. It was a win for me,” he joked, and I rolled my eyes despite myself, making him laugh.
“There go my Koko,” he grinned, pressing that dimple deep into his cheek.
“What?”
“That attitude.”
I shook my head and pushed his hand away, but a small smile still pulled at my mouth before disappearing again.
My gaze drifted around the apartment. The place still felt cold and temporary. Even the floor was bare except for the blankets and pillows we’d been sleeping on.
Nothing about the place felt like home.
Booda followed my stare and already knew where my mind went. “You hate this shit.”
“I don’t hate it.”
“You do.”
I sighed. “I’m tired of feeling like I’m in survival mode.”
From sleeping in my car to pinching pennies, my focus had been on surviving the next memory and the next threat.
I was exhausted.
Booda sat up behind me before pulling me with him until I rested against his chest. “Then let’s do something about it,” he said simply. “Let’s deck this bitch out and shop ‘til you drop. You used to love dragging me to stores, and I used to love seeing you try on shit for me.”
I wanted to believe him. God, I wanted to. The idea of doing something that didn’t involve blood or money laundering or looking over my shoulder felt like a luxury I hadn’t earned yet.
“I don’t have money to just throw away on furniture and shit,” I said, but even as the words left my mouth, I knew they weren’t entirely true.
The fifty grand I’d moved last night was proof of that. There was money. There was always money in Booda’s world.
“You got whatchu need,” he said, and I felt him move even closer. “That’s never been the issue, and if it ever becomes one, I’ll get out there and get it. You never have to worry about that when I’m around.”
The rain picked up outside, drumming harder against the glass. I listened to it for a moment, trying to decide if I was actually considering this or if I was just tired enough to agree to anything that promised me some semblance of normalcy.
“You know what?” I said, sitting up a little straighter. “Let’s do it.”
Booda’s arms loosened around me, and I turned to face him fully. His eyes searched mine like he was checking to make sure I meant it, and when he found what he was looking for, that dimple deepened again.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah, but we can’t go crazy. We have to be responsible with how we spend.”
Booda nodded as he pulled me back down into his chest. “I hear you, but it’s not me you have to worry about. It’s you.” He placed a soft peck on the back of my neck with a chuckle.
I snorted. “Nigga, please. You the one who wanna buy the whole damn store.”
“And you the one who used to walk in for one thing and leave with ten bags,” he shot back instantly. “Don’t act brand new now.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.” He rubbed his hand gently along my side. “I want you to be comfortable in your skin again.”
My eyes drifted toward the ceiling again, but this time my thoughts weren’t on blood or money transfers. I found myself trying to picture what the apartment would look like with furniture inside it. A couch, a real bed, and maybe even a dining table would really spruce this place up.
“You thinking again?” Booda murmured.
“I can’t help it.”
“You overthinking?”
“Maybe.”
“Then it’s time to get up. Fuck that rain. A little water ain’t gon’ hurt us.”
Booda unraveled himself from around me before standing and holding his hand out toward me. I stared at it for a second before finally taking it and letting him pull me up from the floor.
A couple of hours later, we were walking through one of the bigger furniture stores on the north side while it continued to pour outside. I slowed near a cream-colored sectional big enough to damn near swallow my whole body and pressed my hand against the fabric.
“This will be comfortable as hell,” I said, a giant grin spreading across my face as I thought about no longer having to sit on the floor.
Booda dropped down onto it immediately, spreading his arms across the back. “Yeah, this is hard.”
I smiled a little at how fast he made himself at home. Even relaxed, wearing a dark hoodie and jeans, he looked like he owned half the city, and I loved every minute of it—until people noticed him. Women especially.
My eyes narrowed when a saleswoman walked past slower than necessary, her attention lingering in our direction.
“What?” I asked, trying to figure out why she thought it would be cool to stare at him while I was standing there.
She blinked. “Nothing.”
“Mhm.”
She hurried off after that, suddenly real busy with fixing pillows on another display.
Booda laughed under his breath. “You stay ready to cuss somebody out.”
“‘Cause bitches stay staring.”
“They keep staring at you.”
“No.” I waved him off, still watching the saleswoman out of the corner of my eye. “That hoe was definitely looking at you.”
Booda grinned but didn’t argue.
I ended up buying the sectional, a glass dining table, a king-sized bed, and enough other shit to make me slightly nauseous every time another total popped up on the screen.
And somehow Booda still kept finding more things.
“Get the rug too.”
“We do not need a damn rug.”
“Yes, we do. Rich people got rugs.”
I rolled my eyes. “Nigga, rich people got sense too.”
“Nah. They definitely be buying dumb shit,” we argued playfully.
By the time we finally left the furniture store, my phone had rung seven times.
Giani had called again and again and again, and I ignored it each time.
After what had happened last night at the club, I wasn’t ready to deal with her yet, if at all.
One thing I was not going to do was play with a bitch or keep anyone around me that didn’t mean me any good.
“Where we going next?” Booda asked as we headed to the car.
“To the mall. They won’t deliver the furniture until tomorrow after five, so we have the rest of the day to do whatever.”
“Let’s go to the mall then. I want you to model for me like you used to. That shit got a nigga rock hard,” he smirked as he hopped in the passenger seat of the car.
I glared at him, brows meeting in the center of my forehead. “I don’t know why you got me driving everywhere. Did you forget how to do it when you were in jail?”
Booda chuckled. “Nah, but my license suspended. Until I get that shit right, you gotta be my personal driver.”
“Whatever.” I rolled my eyes. “Just know when you get it back, I’ma be a passenger princess, and you bet not say shit about it.”
“I won’t.” Booda grinned, and for some reason, I knew he wouldn’t complain.