17. AMAI #2
Her eyes flashed with fury. “I don’t belong to anyone.”
“You signed a contract that says otherwise.”
“The contract says I’m carrying your child. It doesn’t say I’m your property.”
“You think I don’t know that?” My voice was rising, and I didn’t care.
“You think I don’t know the difference? But you’re walking around smiling at your phone while some man is texting you, and you just had my child implanted in your body minutes ago.
So, yeah, Truth. I give a fuck about who’s making you smile like that. ”
“You have a girlfriend,” she shot back, her voice shaking with anger. “You just introduced me as a colleague to the woman you’re fucking. So don’t you dare sit here and tell me I belong to you when you can’t even be honest about what I am to you.”
“What do you want me to say?” I demanded. “That you’re more than a surrogate? That this stopped being just business weeks ago? That I can’t stop thinking about you even when I’m with her?”
The words hung in the air between us, raw and dangerous.
Truth stared at me, her chest rising and falling rapidly. “You don’t get to do this,” she said finally, her voice breaking. “You don’t get to have it both ways. You don’t get to keep me at arm’s length and then get jealous when someone else makes me smile.”
“I’m not?—”
“Yes, you are.” She stood abruptly, grabbing her purse. “Take me home.”
“Truth—”
“Now, Amai. Take me home now.”
I threw cash on the table and followed her out of the restaurant, my jaw clenched so tight it hurt. The drive back to the Seventh Ward was silent and suffocating. Truth stared out the window, her arms crossed over her chest, her entire body radiating fury.
When I pulled up to Delphine’s house, she had the door open before I’d even put the car in park.
“Truth—”
She slammed the door so hard the entire car shook.
I sat in the driveway, watching her storm up the porch steps and disappear inside the house, and realized I’d just destroyed whatever fragile thing had been building between us.
All because I couldn’t handle seeing her smile at someone else’s text.
All because I’d tried to keep her in a box labeled “surrogate” when she’d already broken out of it weeks ago.
All because I was a coward who couldn’t admit that Truth Renois had become the most important person in my life, and I had no idea what to do about it.
Two weeks.
Fourteen days of silence that felt like drowning in slow motion.
I’d texted her three times the first week. Casual check-ins that got no response. The second week, I stopped pretending it was casual and just asked if she was okay. Nothing. Read receipts turned off. Complete radio silence.
My throat felt like it was closing every time I thought about it.
About some other man being to Truth what I didn’t have the courage to be.
About her smiling at her phone the way she had at the bistro—soft, warm, unguarded.
About someone else making her laugh, making her feel safe, making her forget I existed.
The thought made me want to put my fist through something.
Instead, I stood in a Houston shipyard at midnight, watching Priest’s crew unload shipping containers under industrial floodlights that turned everything the color of old bruises.
“Manifest says forty-two units,” Priest said, appearing at my shoulder with a tablet. “All accounted for. No discrepancies.”
I nodded, my eyes tracking the movement of the forklifts. The air smelled like diesel fuel, salt water, and the particular kind of sweat that came from men doing illegal work in the Texas heat. Even at midnight, the humidity was oppressive.
“Quality check?” I asked.
“Already done. Sample from each container. Everything’s clean.” Priest handed me the tablet. “Numbers match what we paid for. No substitutions, no bullshit.”
I scrolled through the inventory list without really seeing it. My mind was somewhere else. Somewhere in the Seventh Ward, in a shotgun house where Truth was probably asleep right now. Or maybe she wasn’t. Maybe she was awake, texting someone who made her smile. Maybe she was?—
“Boss.”
I looked up. Priest was watching me with an expression I couldn’t read.
“You good?”
“I’m fine.”
“You sure? Because you’ve been staring at that screen for three minutes, and I don’t think you’ve read a single line.”
I handed the tablet back to him. “I said I’m fine.”
Priest didn’t push. He knew better. Instead, he gestured toward the containers. “You want to do a walk-through, or you trust my assessment?”
“I trust your assessment.” I pulled out my phone and checked it for the hundredth time tonight. No new messages. No missed calls. Nothing. “But I’ll do the walk-through anyway.”
We moved through the shipyard in silence, my shoes crunching on gravel, the sound of machinery and shouted instructions echoing off metal walls.
The containers were stacked three high, each one marked with codes that meant nothing to customs officials and everything to the people who knew how to read them.
Priest opened the first container. I stepped inside, my eyes adjusting to the darkness. Rows of wooden crates, each one stamped with shipping labels from a furniture company in Malaysia that didn’t exist. I pulled a crowbar from the wall mount and pried open the nearest crate.
Electronics. High-end components that would be worth triple on the black market what they cost to acquire. Clean, undamaged, exactly what we’d paid for.
I moved to the next crate. Then the next. Checking serial numbers, looking for damage, making sure nobody had tried to fuck us over somewhere between the port in Kuala Lumpur and this shipyard in Houston.
Everything was perfect.
Everything was exactly as it should be.
And I couldn’t stop thinking about Truth’s face when Alexis kissed me at the bistro. The way her expression had shuttered. The way she’d gone cold and distant and unreachable.
The way I’d claimed her like property and then defended my relationship with another woman in the same breath.
“Boss,” Priest said from the container entrance. “We’re good here. You want to check the others, or you want to call it?”
I looked at the crates surrounding me. Hundreds of thousands of dollars in merchandise. A shipment that had taken three months to coordinate and cost enough in bribes to buy a house. The kind of operation that required precision, focus, and attention to detail.
And all I could think about was Truth’s silence.
“Call it,” I said, my voice rough. “Get it distributed. I want everything moved by morning.”
“Copy that.”
I climbed out of the container and walked back toward my car without looking back.
Behind me, I could hear Priest giving orders, the crew moving with practiced efficiency.
They didn’t need me here. They never did.
I’d come because I needed the distraction.
Needed something to do with my hands that wasn’t texting Truth again like a desperate fool.
It hadn’t worked.
Nothing worked.
I drove back to New Orleans with the windows down and the radio off, letting the highway noise fill the silence. Three hours of nothing but asphalt and darkness and the weight of my own thoughts pressing on my chest like a physical thing.
By the time I pulled into my driveway, it was almost four in the morning. The house was dark except for the porch light I’d left on. I sat in the car for a long moment, my hands still gripping the steering wheel, trying to find the energy to move.
My phone buzzed.
I grabbed it so fast I nearly dropped it.
But it wasn’t Truth.
It was a notification from my security system. Front door unlocked 11:47 PM.
I frowned, checking the timestamp. Three hours ago. I hadn’t given anyone my code except?—
Fuck.
Alexis.
I’d given her the code two weeks ago after she’d complained about waiting outside when I was running late. Told her to let herself in if she got there first. I’d forgotten about it. Forgotten she even had it.
I climbed out of the car and walked to the front door, my jaw tight. The house was quiet when I stepped inside. No lights on in the living room or kitchen. But I could see a faint glow coming from upstairs.
My bedroom.
I took the stairs slowly, each step deliberate, trying to figure out what I was going to say. Trying to figure out what I even wanted.
The bedroom door was open. Alexis was in my bed, asleep on top of the covers, still wearing the dress she’d probably worn to whatever event she’d been at earlier. Her shoes were on the floor next to the bed. Her purse on the nightstand.
She looked peaceful. Beautiful. Exactly like the kind of woman I was supposed to want.
And all I could think was, She’s not Truth.
I stood in the doorway for a long moment, watching her breathe. Trying to feel something. Anything.
Nothing came.
Just the hollow ache that had been living in my chest for two weeks.
I moved into the room, my footsteps quiet on the carpet. Started unbuttoning my shirt. Alexis stirred, her eyes opening slowly, focusing on me in the darkness.
“Hey,” she said, her voice soft and sleep-rough. “I didn’t think you were coming home tonight.”
“I wasn’t planning on it.”
She sat up, pushing her hair back from her face. “Long night?”
“Something like that.”
She watched me undress, her eyes tracking the movement of my hands. When I was down to my boxers, she reached for me. Her fingers were warm against my skin.
“Come here,” she said.
I should have said no. Should have told her I was tired, that I needed to sleep, that this wasn’t a good idea. But I didn’t. Because the alternative was lying in this bed alone, staring at the ceiling, thinking about Truth and whoever the fuck was making her smile.
So, I kissed her instead.
It was rough from the start. Urgent and desperate and completely devoid of tenderness. I pushed her back against the mattress, my hands already pulling at her dress, yanking it up over her hips. She made a sound—surprise or arousal, I couldn’t tell—and wrapped her legs around my waist.
I didn’t slow down. Didn’t ask if she was ready. Just pulled her underwear aside and pushed inside her with a force that made her gasp.
“Amai—”
I didn’t want to hear my name. Didn’t want to hear anything. I covered her mouth with mine, swallowing whatever she was about to say, and started moving. Hard. Fast. Primal.
She matched my rhythm at first, her nails digging into my shoulders, her body arching beneath mine. But something was off. I could feel it in the way she tensed. In the way her hands went from pulling me closer to just holding on.
I didn’t stop.
Couldn’t stop.
Because if I stopped, I’d have to think. And if I thought, I’d have to admit what I was really doing. Who I was really thinking about while I fucked someone else.
It didn’t take long. I came with a violence that felt more like anger than pleasure, my body shuddering, my mind blank and mercifully empty for exactly three seconds before reality came crashing back.
I pulled out and rolled off her, my breathing harsh in the quiet room.
Alexis didn’t move. Just lay there staring at the ceiling, her chest rising and falling rapidly.
The silence stretched.
Finally, she spoke. “What the fuck was that?”
I didn’t answer. Just closed my eyes and tried to find something resembling composure.
“Amai.” Her voice was sharper now. “Look at me.”
I opened my eyes and turned my head. She was propped up on one elbow, her expression somewhere between hurt and fury.
“What’s wrong with you?” she asked.
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit.” She sat up fully now, pulling her dress down, her movements jerky with anger. “That wasn’t sex. That was—I don’t even know what that was. But it sure as hell wasn’t about me.”
“Alexis—”
“Don’t.” She held up a hand. “Don’t try to smooth this over with some bullshit excuse. I’m not stupid. Something’s been off with you for weeks. Ever since—” She stopped. Stared at me. “Ever since that lunch. When I ran into you and your ‘colleague.’”
My jaw tightened. “This has nothing to do with her.”
“Really? Because from where I’m sitting, it has everything to do with her.
” Alexis climbed out of bed, her movements sharp and deliberate.
“You’ve been distant. Distracted. And tonight you fucked me like you were trying to prove something to yourself.
So, yeah, Amai. I think it has everything to do with her. ”
I sat up, running a hand over my face. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Then explain it to me.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “Explain why you’ve been pulling away. Why you look at your phone every five minutes like you’re waiting for someone to text you back. Why you just—” Her voice cracked slightly. “Why you just used me like I was nothing.”
The words hit harder than they should have.
Because she was right.
I had used her. Used her body to try to forget someone else. Used her presence to fill a space that wasn’t hers to fill.
“I’m sorry,” I said finally. The words felt inadequate. Hollow.
“I don’t want your apology.” Alexis grabbed her purse from the nightstand, her movements quick and angry. “I want you to get your shit together.”
“Alexis—”
“No.” She turned to face me, and I saw tears in her eyes. Not falling. Just there. Threatening. “I care about you, Amai. I really do. But I’m not going to be your emotional punching bag while you figure out whatever the hell is going on with you and that woman.”
“There’s nothing going on.”
“Stop lying.” Her voice was quiet now. Tired. “To me and to yourself. There’s something there. I saw it at the restaurant. I’ve felt it every time we’ve been together since. And I’m not interested in competing with a ghost.”
She walked toward the door, her heels in one hand, her dignity somehow still intact despite everything.
At the doorway, she paused. Looked back at me.
“For what it’s worth,” she said, “I hope you figure it out. I hope you find whatever it is you’re looking for. But I’m done waiting around while you do.”
Then she was gone.
I heard her footsteps on the stairs. Heard the front door open and close. Heard her car start in the driveway and pull away.
And then there was nothing but silence.
I sat there in my bed, alone, surrounded by sheets that smelled like sex and regret, and finally admitted what I’d been trying to deny for two weeks.
I’d fucked this up.
All of it.
Truth. Alexis. Everything.
And I had no idea how to fix it.