Chapter 43
43
KOLBI
I was good with walking around all evening pretending like I wasn’t completely in love with her. I was good with standing back, silently observing her, noticing how many of the men looked at her in a way that made me want to put their head through a wall. I was even good when she was openly talking about how much she loved me, taking pride in watching her stand up to her parents like she should have done a long time ago.
I was good.
Until I wasn’t.
The slap happened without warning and shocked everyone who witnessed it.
What shocked them more was me tackling William Sinclair to the ground like a professional linebacker, picking him off from the side and not holding anything back. Watching him hit her flipped a switch in my brain that I couldn’t ignore on a biological level. The attack on what was mine was enough to sound every alarm in my head and cause me to see red instantly.
Tackling him to the ground, I pinned him down and tried to keep him in place. I didn’t want to hurt him, I only wanted to stop him from hurting her again. I heard the cries of some of the guests as he overpowered me, ripped me off of him and landed a punch square on my jaw. He hit me several more times as I struggled to gain higher ground and brought my hands to my face to try and defend myself. Trying to get him to the ground again, I grabbed his jacket and swung him off of me, slamming him to the floor. He continued to hit me anywhere he could and was shouting words at me no one should ever shout in a crowded room. Hands grabbed my shoulders, pulling me off of him and dragging me to my feet. Once I was standing, William sprang up and sucker punched me in the jaw again for good measure before a man from the room came up from behind him and held him back.
“Our family has been here for nearly four centuries and have held the prestige we have since then. I will not let someone like you come into this house and ruin the good name we have built for ourselves,” he snarled, trying to break free from the two men who were holding him back from me.
“And my people have been here for just as long. I would encourage you to consider why that is,” I spat back. I looked to where Magnolia was standing next to her mother in total shock from what had just happened. I tried to wrestle free from the stranger who was holding my arms behind my back. A few of the men who worked for me were trying to step in and take control of the situation when three police officers came running into the room.
“Officers, please, arrest this man, he just attacked me in my home,” William demanded of them, shaking free from the men who had been holding him back. Susan quickly joined his side and started to fuss over him. The officers marched over to me and grabbed me by the arms.
“Wait, hold on a minute,” Parker, one of my men, tried to interrupt and stop the cop from wrapping the metal cuffs around my wrists.
“Sir, I need you to take a step back,” the policeman warned.
“Parker, don’t.” I shook my head at him and made eye contact with all the guys I knew and trusted who were watching their boss get arrested. I knew that if they interfered it would just make things worse.
“Wait, stop,” Magnolia’s voice broke and she took a few hurried steps towards me. “Stop, he didn’t do anything wrong, he was just trying to protect me.” Her hands were on my jacket as she frantically looked at both her parents. “Stop this, please.” They just stood there, stone cold and silent.
“You have the right to remain silent, anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law,” the officer rattled off my Miranda Rights as he tugged my wrists tightly behind me, leading me out of the crowded room.
“Daddy, Daddy, stop this. Please!” I looked over my shoulder towards Magnolia and felt a crushing weight in my chest as I watched the tears stream down her face. As I was escorted out of their home, I licked the corner of my mouth and tasted the copper tang of blood as it dripped down my busted lip. I looked toward William who was standing next to his wife who was still fussing over him, trying to straighten his tie as he stared me down from the corner of the room. His professionally pressed shirt now ruffled and missing a few buttons.
“It’s okay, flower. I’ll be fine,” I assured her over my shoulder as the officer behind me forcefully pushed me towards the two hundred year old front door.
“Daddy, please!” she begged again, screaming at her father and pounding on his chest with her fist. “You don’t need to do this. Tell them the truth, tell them what happened!”
William said nothing and stood with a hard expression, unwavering in his disdain for me. I wanted to call him a coward. I wanted to tell the officers they should be arresting him, seeing as how he was the one who hit me. But I knew it would do no good. No one would believe me against him, they never do in these types of situations. So I kept my mouth shut and said nothing as the officers escorted me down the cracked front porch steps towards the cruiser.
As they opened the backdoor of the car, Magnolia came from behind and slammed the door shut. Her raven black hair flying around me as she threw her arms around my neck. Feeling her pressed against me brought me the briefest moment of peace as I breathed in her scent before a third officer grabbed her to pull her off of me.
“Don’t touch her!” I yelled without thinking, lunging towards the man who had a tight grip on her arm. Bad move brother, bad, bad move. The two officers behind me slammed me into the cruiser and I felt a distinct crunch in my ribs.
“Kolbi!” she shouted at me a few feet away from the cruiser, the officer held her back as the other two shoved me into the back seat.
“I’ll be fine. I love you, flower.” She started to sob and I saw her fall to her knees as the cruiser sped down the long gravel driveway towards the main road.
I sat in silence in the back of the police cruiser and replayed the last eight months in my mind. My mama always taught me to mind my manners and be a good boy so that I wouldn’t end up in the very situation I was in. And I had listened.
I had listened up until the point where I couldn’t listen anymore.
Because my girl needed me and I had promised I would do anything for her.
And I wasn’t going to break that promise.
My ass was starting to throb from sitting on the wooden bench for nearly three hours. The men who arrested me took me to the local police department, booked me, and told me to wait until they came and got me. I’d asked if I could make a phone call and only got a grunt as a response. I was sitting with my head in my hands, elbows propping me up on my knees, when someone finally came back to get me.
“You’re free to leave,” an officer said, turning a key in the door and swinging the barred gate open for me to exit. I stood from the bench and hesitated for a moment before exiting. “Well, are you going or what?” he barked, flicking his thumb over his shoulder.
I exited the cell and started to walk to the front of the station as the officer who had released me followed me out. Once I reached the front, three bodies stood from the waiting room seats and looked at me with relief. Malcolm, Conrad, and Hank stood just on the other side of a clear paned door and watched as I was handed my personal items and buzzed out.
“Kolbi, what the hell happened man?” Hank asked first, reaching for my hand and giving it a pump.
“Yeah dude, out of all of us, I never expected it to be you who got arrested first,” Malcolm half laughed, trying to relieve some of the tension with a joke.
“Malcolm, not now,” Conrad chastised.
I was about to ask them if we could get the hell out of there when the door to the station flung open.
“Kolbi,” I heard her gasp and turned towards her just in time to catch her. I winced as her body slammed into mine and wondered if I had a broken rib or two. Her dark curls fell down her back as I held her close and breathed her in.
“Oh my god, flower, what are you—” I started to ask her how she knew where to find me. She pulled away and met my glance.
“Parker called Hank and told him you were arrested. Then I begged Parker to give me Hank’s number so I could call him and find out where you were. I am so sorry, I can’t believe any of that happened. My parents, my father?—”
“Shh, it’s fine. Just breathe, it’ll be okay.” I pulled her back into my chest and squeezed her, patting her hair down in an attempt to console her. I looked at my friends who were watching us, bewildered, because I hadn’t gotten the chance to explain what happened. I turned and looked at the group of cops who were watching us like we were prey and got an uneasy feeling in my gut. “Let’s get out of here.”
Our group left the station and agreed to meet back at my place. It was nearly ten o’clock and while I just wanted to go home and pretend like this day never happened, I knew my friends weren’t going to accept that. They all piled into Malcolm’s car and I helped Magnolia into her car. After buckling her in and taking my seat behind the wheel, I realized my own car was at the Sinclairs and I would need to figure out how to get it back. An issue for another day .
Before pulling out of the parking lot, I looked towards her and noticed how the light from the streetlamp reflected off of her sage green eyes. She studied me for a beat before tears burst from her eyes. She covered her face with her hands. I reached across the console and rested a hand on her thigh.
“Flower,” I tried.
“I’m so sorry. If I had just kept my mouth shut none of this would have happened. You wouldn’t have been arrested, we could have just kept pretending, my parents wouldn’t hate me,” she sobbed.
“Your parents don’t hate you, angel, they couldn’t. They’re just upset, that’s all.”
“You don’t understand. I only just got to the police station because I was finally able to leave their house. Kolbi, they kicked me out.” Her waterlogged eyes looked at me now. “I tried to convince them that we were good, that you were good, that you made me happy. But they wouldn’t listen.” Her voice broke and she dropped her head. “They told me to get out and not come back. They said that if I was choosing you then I couldn’t have them or anything to do with our family.”
“ What ?” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I knew the Sinclairs could be ruthless people but I never imagined they would resort to cutting off their own daughter because of who she loved.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do. They’ve given me everything. Everything I have or own is because of them. And I’m pretty sure they just took it all away from me.” She started to cry again, her breath becoming more labored as she broke down into heavy sobs. I got out of the car and walked to the passenger’s side where she was and opened the door. Reaching across her lap, I unbuckled her seatbelt and pulled her from the car before wrapping my arms around her into a hug in the middle of the parking lot. I wish I could do more to help her but this would have to do.
“Hey, hey, listen to me,” I encouraged, trying to get her to slow down and catch her breath. “It’s going to be okay. You’re going to be okay. I’ll make sure of it, okay? I promise.”
“But what about your business, your work? What if it all goes down the drain because of me? Because of what happened tonight?” She looked up at me with so much despair as the tears continued to stream down her face.
“Then so be it. I’ll start over. I’ve built a successful business once and I’ll do it again if I have to. As long as I have you, I’ll be okay. We’ll be okay. I promise to take care of you, whatever happens. I’m in your corner.” I leaned down and kissed her finally, something I’d been longing to do since I saw her wearing her party dress earlier in the afternoon. “And you know what else?”
She used the back of her hand to wipe away some tears. “What?”
“I’m really fucking proud of you.”
“You’re…proud of me?” Her eyes were confused as she stared up at me.
“Really fucking proud of you.” I squeezed her hands in mine and pressed a kiss to her forehead. “For sticking up to your parents, for standing up for yourself. You’d never done that before and I’m proud of you for finally doing it. You are the strongest woman I know and I love you more than anything.” She let out a wet laugh that almost sounded like a cough before tucking herself in against my chest again.
“I love you too. With everything I am.”