Chapter 6
JOSIE
I was sitting in my home office responding to emails when the doorbell rang.
I knew it was Huncho because he was coming by to pick up his cookie order.
Standing up, I pulled my yoga shorts out of my crack and headed to the door.
My newfound love for baking had added some extra pounds to my previously one-hundred-and-fifty-pound frame, and I wasn’t mad at it.
I stood five feet six, so that wasn’t too bad.
I didn’t even think the six extra pounds were too bad.
I stopped in the kitchen and grabbed the cute little box of cookies I’d packaged up nice and pretty for Huncho.
When I opened the door, however, I got a surprise. “What’s up?” he slurred with red eyes making my brows hike. I could literally smell the liquor wafting off him. My eyes darted over his shoulder and around the outside.
“You’re driving?” I asked in a puzzled tone. I couldn’t see inside his car because the windows were tinted. Surely, he wasn’t driving because he looked like at any moment, he was going to fall flat on his face.
“Yeah.” His glassy eyes bore into mine. “Those my cookies?” Huncho licked his lips as his gaze shifted from my face to the box I was holding.
I wasn’t even sure how to respond. Sure, he had arrived at my home, but what kind of person would I be to let him leave in the condition that he was in?
“Um, Huncho, step inside for a moment please.” He had left his car running, but I lived in a good neighborhood. I doubted anyone would come along and steal it.
“What’s good?” he questioned me with furrowed brows.
Huncho was handsome for sure. Even in his drunken state the man was one of the most beautiful specimens God had ever crafted.
Despite his good looks and the diamonds, he was rocking, there was a heaviness around Huncho that damn near dominated the energy between us.
It wasn’t anything I should be gravitating toward, but he was young.
And he didn’t need to be driving. Any decent person would know that.
“Um, I wanted to ask you about your brother. Like what kinds of things does he like? I don’t want my wedding gift to just be what I think my sister will like.”
Huncho’s eyes narrowed as he eyed me suspiciously. “You couldn’t ask your sister that?”
“I want it to be a surprise.”
“You trying to throw me some pussy, shorty?” he asked with an obnoxious gleam in his eyes.
“Nigga are you slow?” I snapped. “Please don’t piss me off. If you must know, you’re sloppy fucking drunk and don’t need to be driving. You can come in and sober up for a bit, or I can call your brother.”
Huncho frowned and drew back a little. “Call my brother? You act like I’m a lil’ kid or something, and Hymn can come whoop my ass.”
“Maybe you’re just childish and that’s the way you’re thinking. If I was shit faced I’d want someone to call my sister rather than let me get in the car and hurt myself or someone else.”
Ignoring me, Huncho eased his hand into his pocket and pulled out a bank roll. He peeled off two twenty-dollar bills and extended them toward me. “Can I get my cookies, please?”
“Nope,” I clicked my tongue and looked him up and down. “Cut your car off. Come sit down for an hour and drink some water. After that you can be gone.”
Huncho stared at me for a few minutes like he was either contemplating doing what I asked or slapping the shit out of me. I’d advise his ass to make the right choice. Matching his glare, I didn’t back down. If he chose to ignore me and something bad happened, it wouldn’t be on my conscience.
“I can’t believe this shit,” Huncho chuckled and turned toward his car.
I had no idea if he’d get in the car and leave or if he was going to turn it off.
Either way was fine with me because at least I had tried.
When Huncho left one leg resting outside of the car, I knew he was going to turn it off.
When he came back inside, he strolled past me with his lips set in a hard line.
Following him, I stood in front of him when he sat down and gave him the box of cookies.
“It’s kind of early to be smelling like a distillery, isn’t it?”
Huncho’s face scrunched. “I’m a grown ass man. I can drink whenever I want to. I didn’t know it had to be a certain time to get drunk.”
I chose not to respond. Instead, I walked in my office and got my phone. Placing one leg in my accent chair, I sat on it.
“Don’t call my brother, yo.” Huncho’s tone was stern, and I wanted to know who he thought he was checking.
“Why would I call your brother when you came in and sat down? I’m not trying to hold you hostage; I just want you to sober up. You can take some of that bass out your voice before I slap those cookies out of your hand.”
“That’ll be on you,” he shrugged passively. “You didn’t take the money, so I haven’t paid yet.”
“Next time I’ll let you wrap your car around a tree,” I replied sarcastically.
“That’ll be cool too,” he shrugged again, and I felt bad.
“Look, I don’t want to beef with you. I swear I don’t. I just did what I would want someone to do for me. Truce?”
“Yeah, we straight,” he mumbled. “Can I smoke in here?”
“Huncho.”
“What? The weed will mellow me out, I swear to God. I’m a smoker. Weed makes everything better.”
“Let me turn my air purifier on.” I stood up and walked back over to the corner of the room that the air purifier was in.
I sat back down and scrolled on my phone while Huncho rolled his blunt. Babysitting him hadn’t been in my plans, but I would rather be doing that than to let him leave.
“Boy, the way you looked at me when I asked if you were trying to give me some pussy,” Huncho laughed, and I lifted my head with a snarl.
“That’s not funny. It was actually kind of disrespectful. I met you once and had a ten minute conversation with you. Plus, you’re a kid. What I look like offering it up to you on a platter?”
Huncho’s smile vanished so fast it was almost comical. “A kid?” He leaned forward and stared straight in my face without blinking. “I’m twenty-four-years-old.”
“Anddddd I’m thirty-one. So respectfully, to me, you’re kind of still a kid,” I shrugged unapologetically.
“Yo’ old ass got me fucked up,” Huncho murmured and went back to rolling his blunt, meanwhile, my jaw slacked.
“Huncho.”
His brows hiked, but he didn’t look at me. He just kept rolling his blunt with a stupid smirk on his face.
“You are mad close. Mad close.”
“To what?” he chuckled.
“Getting on my bad side. The truce is about to be dead.”
“Why?” Huncho peered at me as his tongue sealed the blunt. “You can call me a kid, but I can’t call you old?”
The amused gleam in his eyes had my nipples tingling, and I didn’t like it. In fact, the frown that covered my face had more to do with my arousal than his words.
“Just smoke your blunt. Thanks.” I went back to my phone and seconds later, the potent smell of marijuana filled the air.
I didn’t smoke, but I loved the way weed smelled.
I had smoked a few times in college, and I didn’t trip out or anything, it just wasn’t something I had to do all the time. I was fine with drinking.
“So you wouldn’t date a guy my age?” Huncho broke the silence after about ten minutes.
“Nope.” I didn’t even look up from my phone.
“It’s a seven-year age difference. You act like I’m twenty or something. I have a job, my own place, a car, no kids, and money. I’m a good catch.” I could tell by his tone that he was borderline offended. “And I’m working on a college degree.”
Finally, I looked up at him. “A seven-year age difference a lot for me. Especially when you’re not stable.
By stable I mean, are you in the career you see yourself retiring from?
Got a retirement plan in place? How much could you have even put in a 401k if you have one?
You’re not a child, but I just don’t think we’d be on the same level as far as maturity.
I’m past the clubbing phase, and the sneaky link thing.
I want a cultured man. A distinguished well-traveled one that possibly speaks another language fluently and has seven figures in the bank. ”
“Get you a limp dick sugar daddy. That’s yo’ business. I hope he dies on top of you like that old coon did shorty in The Color Purple.”
Once again, my jaw slacked. “What the hell is wrong with you?” I half laughed while trying to pretend I was more offended than I was.
“It’s all good, baby. If rubbing Icy Hot on niggas is your idea of foreplay I can dig it. A man with my stamina might be a bit much for you.”
“You seem pretty sober to me. Get out.”
That made him laugh. “You can dish it out. You have to be able to take it too, baby.”
The way he called me baby and wrapped his lips around the blunt had me ashamed of myself.
I had just declared to Huncho that I wanted an older, cultured, distinguished man, and his little young ass had my yoni throbbing.
It had to be because I hadn’t had sex in a minute.
My hormones were making my body react in ways it shouldn’t be.
“You ever heard of Isaac’s Syndrome?” he asked as he sucked weed smoke into his lungs. The subject change was abrupt and caught me off guard.
“No. What’s that?”
“I went through damn near fifty different scans, MRI’s, blood tests, even a needle myomectomy or some shit.
I can’t even remember the name. The doctor finally said he thinks I have an autoimmune disorder called Isaac’s Syndrome.
It makes my muscles stiff and tight, all that good shit.
It causes intense spasms and the whole nine. ” Huncho pushed out a low chuckle.
“In college, there were times my calf muscle would be spasming and locking up so bad a nigga would dead ass cry tears. I thought it was a real bad Charlie horse or some shit. Sometimes it would last for thirty minutes, and my leg would be sore for the next few days. I always thought I was pushing myself too hard in practice and not drinking enough water.”