NINE
“ANYTIME. ANYWHERE. WON’T YOU TRUST IN ME BABY.” MARY J. BLIGE
“I’ll call you when I leave the bank. Do you have time to get a coffee?” Nina asked her friend Danyelle.
“Yeah, as long as I can bring work with me.”
“I need to catch up on a few things myself, so that works for me. See you in a second.”
“Where are we meeting?”
“We can go to the one with the beef patties.”
“Cool, I’ll see you in a sec, girl.”
Nina hung the phone up and dropped it in the cup holder. She was running in to make a deposit and coming back out. Around this time, the bank should have been empty, so she didn’t foresee this taking too long.
Jio was good for giving her lump sums of cash every three or four days.
Nina wasn’t sure what he expected her to do with the money, but the way her parents had been acting lately, she’d been dumping the funds into different investment accounts.
She refused to depend on the Marcelles or the Gottis even for that matter.
Nina and independency once didn’t belong in the same sentence, but with age came wisdom, and she was done holding her breath waiting on the other shoe to drop.
She’d swapped out her normal Romance and Women’s Fiction reads for more business development and books that focused on strategy and marketing.
Nina held her head high as she walked into the bank. Not because she assumed people were staring at her, but because she was a woman who possessed confidence and it radiated through the building with every step she took in her Manolo loafers.
“Next,” the bank teller said with a warm smile.
Nina looked up and nearly stopped in her tracks.
Gosh, she’s gorgeous.
Pretty didn't even begin to cover it. Her sleek and silky black hair fell down her back.
Her complexion was rich and radiant. She had the kind of skin that looked expensive because somebody was drinking their water, minding their business, and seeing a dermatologist on a regular basis.
From one quick glance, Nina could tell she was living well.
Two diamond tennis bracelets rested effortlessly on her wrist and they weren’t the flea market specials folks swore were “real enough,” either.
The stones caught the light every time she moved her hand.
Her almond-shaped nails were flawlessly polished in a soft nude that somehow looked understated and luxurious.
“I love your nails,” Nina said before she could stop herself.
“Thank you, how can I help you today?”
“I need to make a deposit. I don’t know how much it is,” she said innocently.
“I’ll run it through the counter.”
She stood behind the glass window that separated them and patiently waited for her to count the stacks of cash.
The woman glanced up at her after she opened the Gucci weekender. Nina gave her an awkward smile. The assumption was always that she was a stripper. Nina never said anything because, depending on who it was, her face was recognizable, and to others, it was not.
She pulled the money out stack by stack and set it on the counter.
The first time, she felt judged and it didn’t feel good.
Nina saw a hint recognition flash across the lady's face.
“Have you ever noticed the tiny G’s?”
She looked confused so the teller pulled out one of the bills and turned it around. “These.”
Nina looked at them carefully. Tiny gold G’s marked the corners of the bills, something that Jio did for whatever reason.
“That’s so weird, I never paid much attention,” she admitted.
“Damn. Jio ain’t taught you nothing, huh?” The teller smirked.
Nina’s stomach tightened.
Oh…you’re one of his.
The woman’s interest was piqued even more. She openly took in all of Nina’s presence and Nina’s facial expression remained neutral.
“I don’t think I caught your name,” she asked politely after realizing that she didn’t have a name tag on.
“You can ask Jio what my name is.”
Nina stared at her and she decided to take it even further.
“He tends to say it a lot.”
And just like that, the peace she had been building cracked down the middle. She was so fuckin’ angry. She forgot all about coffee with Danyelle. Nina went straight to his crib, but he wasn’t at home. When she got back into her car, all huffy puffy and out of breath, Danyelle was calling.
“Hey…my bad, I got caught up.”
Danyelle picked up on the tone of her voice and asked, “Is everything okay?”
Nina was prepared to lie. She was good at wearing the mask.
A long time ago, she’d concluded that no one cared about her feelings, so she never shared them.
Being lonely pretty much your whole life was some wild shit.
She was used to talking herself off the ledge when Ephrem wasn’t available, but God had been kind to her recently.
Not only had he sent her Danyelle, who was a new and true friend, but she’d been slowly allowing her heart to open to First Lady Raymond.
However, when she was in the middle of making irrational and impulsive, stupid ass decisions, she didn’t need a friend to talk her out of it.
“Hmm, hmm…yep. All is well,” she lied.
“My coffee was good. They were out of beef patties,” Danyelle shared with her.
“We can get dinner later if you’re free. Something came up, I should’ve called.”
“What happened between the bank and the car?” she questioned.
If only you knew girl, Nina thought.
“Hello?” Danyelle said into the receiver after she went silent.
Nina sighed, “I’m sorry… I’m currently trying to find Jio’s lying ass.”
“Is he lost?”
Those three words made her pause and think about what she was spending her time focusing on right now. Danyelle was right, that nigga was not lost.
“No, he’s not. You want to get a drink? I could use a glass of champagne.” She had a change of heart.
“What about a chilled shot? I’ve had a rough ass morning,” Danyelle admitted.
“I’ll take a double. Let’s meet at the St. Regis bar. I’m fifteen minutes away.”
“Pulling up right behind ya, friend,” she said happily.
They ended the call and Nina blasted her music as she sped through the streets.
He’s not lost… so why was I about to go looking for him?... She couldn’t help but to ruminate on the thought.
A couple of hours later, she swore that she didn’t plan on pulling up on anybody, but she couldn’t help it.
She could easily blame it on the liquor.
Danyelle was such a good time. Nina loved her energy and it was needed after today’s incident at the bank.
Nina was unsuccessful in talking herself out of popping up on Jio at the club.
It felt like her life was falling apart and she didn’t want to become that girl.
The girl whose whole day turned upside down because of a man or the one who canceled plans to chase a nigga around the city.
Jio was not lost… Danyelle’s words played back in her head on a loop.
She didn’t want to have to confront him in public over his happenings with another chick.
Nina checking locations, replaying conversations, calculating his time when he wasn’t with her…
she didn’t want to do it. It’d never been her and she didn’t want to start now.
She was supposed to be above all of this.
Nina was a boardroom baddie. She didn’t go back and forth with women in an attempt to prove her worth and her position.
She led meetings, not riots. But her common sense always seemed to fade whenever Jio was involved.
Nina sat stupidly in the back of Roberto’s truck, rehearsing what she was going to say to him.
She’d been too drunk to drive and so she dialed the person who was paid to drive her around in the first place.
Every now and then, Nina missed hopping behind the wheel and today was one of those days.
She stared up at the entrance of VIBES, Jio’s club.
Was she angry enough to cause a scene? Did he mean that much to embarrass herself in front of a crowded space?
Unfortunately, the answer was yes. He meant every damn thing to her. To be this madly in love was sickening. Nina prayed she recovered soon.
The bank teller’s words wouldn’t slip her mind.
You can ask Jio what it is. He tends to say it… a lot.
Nina tried to act like it didn’t bother her, but oh, when she got to drinking, her feelings exploded and so did her heart.
She had tried to be above it. She was smart enough to know that the girl was only trying to get under her skin because that was what women like that did.
They wanted proof that they mattered. She needed to feel powerful enough to disturb the woman who really had his heart.
Right? Nina didn’t fuckin’ know, but she did know that she was past disturbed.
She wanted answers. Did she care if Jio was really cheating on her?
Or was her only concern being if he wanted them or was just using them for sex?
Was it pure entertainment or was he distracted by their sex appeal?
Nina knew that she didn’t give off “fuck me” vibes.
She liked worn hoodies and dusty sweats.
A good time in her eyes was a new puzzle and the last few chapters of a book that she needed to finish up.
The bank teller lady looked like she did all the nasty shit Nina would probably gag at.
However, one thing she did know was that Jio’s love was too obsessive to spread around.
He wasn’t exerting that much energy on other folks.
He wanted them. Used them. Got entertained by them.
Distracted by them. Maybe even comforted by them when he was mad at Nina and too prideful to come home.
Nina didn’t want to ever grow comfortable with being disrespected by a man who claimed he would burn the world down behind her.
Roberto glanced at her through the rearview mirror. “Are you sure about this, Ms. Marcelle?”
Nina looked towards the double doors that led into the club.