Chapter 2
Lauren
The leather-scented cabin of my car was the only place I could find true peace during a chaotic shift. I shifted my weight in the driver's seat before I took a heavy bite out of my pit beef sandwich.
On the dashboard mount, my phone screen was lit up with Layla’s contact name.
We’d been checking in with each other a lot more lately.
Her therapist gently dragged her a few months ago, telling her that holding everything inside like an emotional vault was going to ruin her, and that she needed to practice being open with someone she actually trusted.
She chose to confide in me, and I wasn’t even surprised. Our sister bond was unbreakable.
The only thing I was genuinely thankful for was that she had finally kicked that habit of helping herself to my closet.
Back when we were still in the same state, that girl had zero shame about stealing my damn clothes.
I would drag myself through the door after a shift that had taken everything I had, and Layla would be somewhere in my room with a whole outfit on that belonged to me.
Then, she had the nerve to act like I was the one interrupting her.
She had her own money, but she always wanted to try on some of my shit. I loved that girl with everything in me and she knew it, which was exactly why I could not let her know just how deep it went because she would absolutely use it against me and never let me live it down.
I was thoroughly enjoying my lunch break, leaned back in the driver's seat with the food in my lap and the sun coming through the windshield, while Layla vented her entire lungs out about her marriage with Mr. Kylo.
"I get that I messed up, Laurie, I really do," she said, and I could hear her moving around whatever room she was in. "But this man needs to stop watching me like a fucking watch dog everywhere I went. It’s exhausting."
I smirked and chewed slowly. "Layla, you already know how crazy Kylo is about you, so instead of sitting there irritated, you might as well just reassure him and keep it moving.
" I took another bite. "Nobody told you to go mess around with John, so now you gotta deal with the consequences of that and let that man have his feelings for a minute. "
Layla let out a loud, theatrical groan. "Don't even say his name. Please."
"Girl," I playfully jabbed, "if you were going to step out on your husband, you at least could’ve found a nigga who knew how to keep his mouth closed."
A beat passed, and then Layla let out a dry, defeated chuckle. "I really fucked up, huh?"
Hearing the sudden drop in her tone made me pause. I swallowed my bite of pit beef.
"We all do," I said, my voice softening. "You're human, and you're being more present in your marriage. You are choosing to move past what happened. That's what matters."
There was a long sigh on the other end. "But is he?"
"Give him some more time," I told her honestly. "It hasn't been that long, Lay. I'm sure the wound is still fresh and healing. He’ll go back to normal before you know it."
"Well, I need him to hurry the fuck up," she grumbled, snapping right back. "I can't even get a late-night snack out of the kitchen without him talking about 'I'm coming too.' Like, damn, can I breathe?"
I rolled my eyes, a fond smile tugging at my lips.
Layla was so spoiled and such a brat, but everyone in our family knew that.
It was her default setting. We also all knew that if Kylo actually packed his bags and left her tail, she would be absolutely devastated—crying and laid out flat in the middle of the street.
She loved that man down to his core, even if she was terrible at showing it right now.
"Anyway," Layla cleared her throat, shifting the spotlight. "How are things with Malcolm?"
I hesitated. It was a split-second glitch in my matrix, a tiny, inexplicable catch in my chest, and I couldn't even pin down why it happened. Malcolm was literally perfect this morning. He was everything a woman could ask for.
"You there, Laurie?" Layla asked when the silence stretched too long.
I blinked, violently shaking my head to clear the fog out of my brain. "Yeah, yeah. I’m right here. I was just chewing on this food. Things are... cool."
"Cool?" Layla repeated, her nosy-ass radar instantly shooting all the way up. "Girl, what the hell does 'cool' mean? I thought yall were locked back in and riding off into the sunset."
"We are," I corrected fast, feeling this sudden, defensive urge to protect my relationship. "Things are good, Lay. My bad. I just twisted my words around."
"Mhmm. If you say so," Layla snorted over the Bluetooth. "But let me find out he ain't handling his business. I already know you like 'em big like throwback Rick Ross, but Malcolm is heavy heavy. We all knew you had a type but damn!”
“Laylaaa.”
“I'm just surprised yall didn't start a damn fire in that bedroom yet."
I busted out laughing, almost choking on my pit beef. "Girl, you get on my nerves! You forgot we big girls too? He not the only one big."
Layla scoffed so loud the car speakers crackled. "Excuse me? The term is thick. Plus-size. Voluptuous. We are curated, honey."
I rolled my eyes, biting the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing even harder. "Oh, okay. Is that why you got with Kylo back in the day when the man was as skinny as a damn twig?"
Layla completely lost it, busting out laughing so hard. "Girl! That man was skinny as fuck! I swear to God, I had to put some meat on his bones before I broke him in half! Whew, chilee... the struggle was so real."
We both laughed as the tension melted away for a quick second. As fast as the laughter came, Layla’s tone shifted.
“What do you think about Malcolm?”
“Are you actually asking my opinion about something? Has hell frozen over?”
“Girl, I’m just trying to practice what that expensive therapist has been telling you about being open. Now, hurry up before I change my mind.”
"Mhmm," Layla hummed. "Uhh... Malcolm is… alright. You seem happy. To keep it real I feel like your settling, but then again, that's just me."
"How the hell am I settling?"
"I don't know, Laurie. You always choose the safe choice," Layla said, her voice dropping into a reflective place. "But since Mom and Dad were way worse on your ass than they were on mine, it makes sense. You're just wired to play it safe, like every other big sister with a conscience."
I rolled my eyes, a familiar, bitter knot tightening right in my throat. Our parents were... well, they were something else. They gave us the discipline and the drive to secure our bags, but they always managed to emotionally fuck all of us up in the process.
There were four of us total—me, Lay, and our two older brothers—and every single one of us carried the deep scars of their hyper-critical, suffocating expectations.
I was the oldest girl, the golden child, the doctor.
I was the one who had to be perfect. I had to choose the safe, correct, respectable path. Always.
"When am I going to see my baby sister again?" I asked, smashing the brakes on the conversation before we got dragged into family trauma.
"Hell if I know, since you want to stay up north with all that obnoxious snow."
"That's why we always vacation in warm areas?"
"That’s exactly why," she said. "I am not about to freeze my ass off for a family reunion."
“Well, damn.”
"I’ve been told your tail to come back home and stop playing games… I gotta go jump into this meeting," Layla said, her tone instantly snapping right back to business. "I love you, Laurie. Thank you for listening to me."
My smile widened. "Thank you for finally opening up and not trying to act like Superwoman twenty-four-seven."
She smacked her teeth hard over the line. "Whatever. Love you, bye."
The line went dead with a quiet beep.
I sat back in the heavy stillness of my car. The silence filled the leather cabin while Layla's words started looping through my mind like a broken record, picking at a scab I didn't even know was there.
Safe choice.
My man was a safe choice?
Settling.
Was I settling?
Malcolm was stable, he loved me, he treated me like royalty. There was nothing unsafe about him. He was a good man.
Suddenly, a vibration rattled from my phone.
I reached down and pulled my phone off the mount, assuming it was a text from my mother since she called earlier. I didn’t feel like being gaslit so I didn’t call her back. She was known to follow up a call with a text. But the second my eyes hit the lock screen, the air left my lungs.
My heart damn near leaped straight out of my chest.
The notification banner displayed a sender name I hadn't seen pop up on a phone screen in an eternity.
B.B.
The initials stood for Big Bane.
My fingers were violently trembling against the glass as I tapped the message open.
BB: Saw the news. You safe?
I bit my bottom lip, staring at those four words until the screen blurred. My heart was slamming against my chest like a caged animal. I tried to fight the involuntary smile that was threatening to break across my face, pulling my lips into a tight line.
It was crazy. Bane was the only man on this green earth who could make me nervous as fuck without even being in the same room.
The man held an aura that usually made people run the other way.
One thing he never did was play about me, even if we no longer speak.
He never called. We didn't follow each other on social media.
But every single year, like clockwork, a huge arrangement of exotic black roses would show up at my house with no card attached.
And outside of that, he only ever reached out when something was off with me.
It was as if the nigga could literally feel a shift in my atmosphere from hundreds of miles away in Georgia.
Back then, Bane was my very first big guy that caught my attention.
I was young and had absolutely no clue how protective a large man could actually be until he stepped into my life and completely wrapped me in his shadow.
His hugs were one of a kind. When he hugged me, I felt like he breathed me in.
He was the exact reason I realized I had a type, and nobody else had ever been able to measure up since.
He always had a fresh haircut, his 360 waves literally swam under the lights whenever he moved. He didn't really smile like that, and kept the rest of the world at a distance. But when he looked down at me and let that rare smirk break through his jaw?
Whew. It was an absolute wrap.
I really should’ve saved some pictures of him on my phone.
I should’ve kept a few memories to look at during those long, quiet nights in Baltimore.
But with the way things were left between us, it just didn't feel right to hold on.
I had forced myself to clear out my digital history, trying to convince my own soul the wild part of my life was dead and buried.
The more I believed my thoughts, the more it became real. I was over him, but he would always have a small, tiny place in my heart
I typed out a quick, casual reply.
L: I'm fine. Hope all is well with you.
Before hitting send, I stopped myself. I deleted the text, and opened the message settings, scheduling the text to send four hours from now, late into the evening. I wasn't about to seem eager.
I locked my phone, tossed it into the passenger seat, and pushed the memory into the quiet back corners of my mind.