Chapter 5 #2
We stared each other down. The bass in the club rattled in my ears like a war drum.
I felt like taking both of my fists and punching his ass at the same time right then and there; that’s how fucking mad I was.
But I had something else in mind. Since lines were already crossed, I was about to be the one playing tic-tac-toe in this muthafucka.
I ran my tongue over my teeth and then sucked them.
He was lucky this wasn’t five years ago because he would have been picking his broken jaw off the floor, and he knew that shit.
Fresh finally leaned back, cool like nothing rattled him.
The smirk he wore before he opened his mouth had me fuming.
“Guess we’ll see.”
I walked away; I had to. My chest was tight, knowing one thing for sure.
Fresh and I weren’t brothers anymore. We hadn’t been for a while, but this shit right here solidified it.
We were enemies. And one thing about me was that once a nigga was on my shit list, he was there for the rest of his fucking life.
Shenell was blowing my phone up on the drive home.
I guess she called herself trying to remind me that the next day was mine with OJ.
I hated how, at times, she liked to micromanage.
It was the controlling way she had. I knew what the fuck I had to do as a father, and I didn’t need her breathing down my damn neck.
I couldn’t get out of my car fast enough when I made it home.
I slammed the front door of my crib harder than I meant to, chest still tight from the bullshit at the club.
Fresh had me heated, talking slick like I was soft, like I wasn’t the one who used to fight his battles.
Like I wasn’t the one fighting battles for the whole hood.
I put East New York on my fucking back, and everyone knew that shit.
That type of disrespect sat heavily. Heavy on my shoulders and heavy on my heart.
The shit was festering in my head. I wanted to hurt the nigga like he had hurt my feelings.
I dropped my keys on the table in the foyer and rubbed my face, trying to calm down.
I was about to skip up my stairs and head to my bedroom.
That’s when I heard the faint clink of a spoon against one of my ceramic bowls.
I followed the sound to the guest room, and there she was, Cayla.
Sitting cross-legged on the bed, rocking one of those big ass moo-moos with a half-empty bowl of ice cream balanced in her lap.
Her calf was bandaged, a reminder of the night bullets flew.
A reminder of the night that brought us together.
She looked up at me, eyes wide but soft.
“You good?” she asked gently, spoon pausing mid-air.
I exhaled hard while pacing a little.
“Nah, I ain’t good. A nigga that’s dead to me now is disrespecting me.
Turns out, my little brother is fucking his wife.
Now, business is getting caught in the middle.
” I paused because I didn’t want to reveal too much to her.
Still, she held this glare of trust in those brown orbs that let me know this was a safe space.
“Before I decided to leave the streets alone, there was order. And now my brother is out here causing chaos. This ain’t what I built, Cay. ”
Shortening her name felt so regular. Talking to her freely felt like I had been doing the shit all my life.
Over the days that she had occupied my house, she had this thing of randomly checking up on me.
Whether it was asking how I was doing when I walked through the door, or randomly sending me a text throughout the day.
She was showing how she could look out for a nigga, and that, I was starting to appreciate.
Especially now, when I needed it. She set the bowl aside and leaned back against the pillows, watching me unravel.
My mind was running, so naturally, my legs started to as well. I was wearing my hardwood floors down right in front of her.
“Whatever is on your mind right now, drop it. Leave that drama on your front step. Your home is supposed to be your peaceful place. So far, from what I can see, you have been spreading yourself thin. You have been looking out for me, so I can only imagine how you are with the people closest to you. Is your load always this heavy?” She rhetorically asked the last question.
I stopped pacing to glance at her. That glare of trust she once had turned into seduction. I was reading her aura, and it was screaming lust. She gave a slight shrug.
“Maybe tonight you don’t gotta carry that weight around. Maybe, you can just… let it out.”
It was something in her voice and the way she looked at me like she actually saw past the tough exterior that hit me different. I sat on the edge of the bed with my elbows on my knees while shaking my head.
“Shit got me fucked up, Cay.”
Although Fresh showed me that he wasn’t shit to me, it was still hard deciding what to do.
“I know,” she said soothingly, like she understood exactly how I felt.
She made me feel free to open up. To give her all the parts of me that I wished I could have given a woman before her. She touched my shoulder. Her hand was warm, and it grounded me.
“Trust me. I’m here.”
That broke something in me. I turned and really looked at her.
It was the way her lips parted slightly, and it was the concern in her eyes.
The weight of everything pressed down on me, but for once, I didn’t want to carry it alone.
I leaned in slowly to test her. Her breath caught, but she didn’t move away.
Our lips met. The interaction was soft at first, then hungrier, deeper.
The taste of ice cream lingered on her tongue, and it was sweet against the bitterness still in my chest. She shifted, letting me pull her closer, and my hand slid up her leg to her thigh.
I was careful not to press against the bandage on her calf.
Her fingers curled in my shirt like she’d been waiting for this moment, too.
I would be a liar if I said that by the first night she spent in my house, I didn’t want to bang her down. I wanted her badly.
By the time the bowl hit the floor, everything was forgotten.
I wasn’t thinking about Fresh, my brother, or the get back.
All I could think about was her. And just like that, the chaos of my world faded, at least for the night.
When our lips broke apart, I didn’t move right away.
I just looked at her, and I mean really looked at her.
Cayla had this soft glow to her. Her curls framed her face, and her nightgown stretched a little tight over her curves.
She tried to pull the hem down like she was shy, but I caught her hand.
“Don’t do that,” I said lowly, “you don’t gotta hide from me.”
Her eyes flickered with something. A look that I saw in a lot of women.
Her look meant so much to me because she was fucking beautiful, and a piece of me knew that deep down inside, she didn’t see it.
She had more pounds than most that I had dated, but it didn’t stop a damn thing.
Her face was fucking gorgeous, but still, she held that look of insecurity and doubt.
She didn’t pull away, though. I kissed her again, slower this time, letting her feel every bit of it.
My hand slid to her hip; the fullness of her curves fit in my palm like it was meant to be there.
She trembled, soft whimpers caught in her throat as I eased her back against the pillows.
I wanted to take things slow with her. She had this way of being gentle with me that I wanted to reciprocate. Her nightgown rode up, revealing the softness of her stomach. She started to move her hand like she wanted to cover herself again, but I caught it and pressed it gently back down.
“Nah, Cay. You are beautiful just like this.”
Her breath shuddered out, and for the first time that night, she let herself relax under me.
I kissed down her neck in slow trails that made her shiver.
Her skin was warm, her body responsive in ways that drove me crazy.
My hands explored her entire frame. The dip of her waist, the thickness of her thighs.
I loved the softness that made her so damn real.
“Orion…” she whispered, her voice trembling, half a plea, half disbelief.
“Yeah?”
“I ain’t… I mean, it’s been a minute. I don’t want you to think—”
I hushed her with another kiss.
“Don’t overthink it. Just feel me.”
By her bent eyebrows, I knew she wondered what I would think of her.
She probably wondered if she was moving too fast. When I eased the nightgown over her head, she froze for a second, covering her chest with her arms. I gently pushed them aside, kissing the tops of her breasts, making her arch instead of shrinking away.
Her body was plush, generous, and I wanted every inch of it.
“You're perfect, Cayla. Don’t ever doubt that.”
The way she looked at me, wide-eyed, vulnerable, almost like she didn’t believe a man could say that and mean it, made me slow down even more, savoring her. By the time I slid inside her, her breath hitched, and a gasp that escaped those lips turned into a moan.
She clung to me, her nails dug into my back as I moved slowly and steadily.
I was giving her time to adjust to my size.
Giving her a moment to get used to what I felt like.
Her body wrapped around mine, soft but strong, grounding me in a way nothing else had.
The world outside of us, the beef, the streets, and the weight I carried all disappeared.
All I could hear was her moans, all I could feel was the warmth of her body, the way she gave herself to me, even with the scars she carried.
She whispered my name like a prayer, and I lost myself in her, holding on tighter than I meant to.
When it was over, she lay against me with her chest rising and falling; her curls were damp with sweat. For the first time in a long time, I felt… peaceful. And I think she felt it too.