Chapter 6 #4
His heart plummeted at the sound of her voice, and his entire body locked.
It was familiar, he'd heard it a million times over in the past, but hearing it again made his soul tremble.
Searching for logic in an impossible scenario made his heart race at a dangerous level.
The fuck Promise put in that Tequilla? Monroe questioned internally, finally turning around, and there Sienna stood, alive.
The breath that had escaped Monroe's mouth was quick as he took a step back, and drug his hands down his face in disbelief.
"Monroe, it's me. You're not hallucinating," Sienna confirmed.
Monroe's eyes filled with tears, but there was only one he was unable to hold back.
"Sienna," he said, still in utter disbelief. "How?" He managed to say. "I thought you were dead."
"I know," Sienna whispered. "That's what she wanted you to believe," Sienna said, as the feeling in her legs and feet returned. But, as she moved towards him, he moved back.
Sienna took another step forward, but Monroe moved back again.
Sienna stood still, understanding his reaction to her.
She didn't take it as rejection. She knew Monroe was processing. His mind was moving like a wild bat trying to catch up to a reality that didn’t align with what he was cognizant of.
Monroe's eyes told a story that Sienna could read with her eyes closed once upon a time, but as she stood before him, she realized that the script had changed, even though the last decade of her life had been frozen in time.
For Monroe, on the other hand, life had gone on without her.
Fast forward at the highest level, maximum strength, and turbo speed, Monroe's mind had spiraled back, revisiting the day Sienna was ripped from his life.
What the fuck did I miss? He questioned himself, knowing he and his crew had killed the niggas who tried to rob him and everyone who had connection with them on the street.
Monroe had made sure they died a slow, long, and miserable death.
His mind traced back over every detail, and still, he couldn't understand how the hell Sienna was standing in front of him alive.
"Come sit with me," Sienna asked, resisting her urge to touch him, and opted for a different approach.
Monroe nodded, but didn't say a word. He watched her.
The way she walked. The sound of her voice.
The aura she exuded.
It was still the same, but she wasn’t. She was different in a way his heart couldn't comprehend.
He watched her as she took a seat at the booth in front of the restaurant by the window.
Monroe struggled with her presence, but he followed her to the booth, and took a seat across from her.
His lips were sealed shut, but he was listening.
Praying she answered all his questions without him having to ask because the women he thought he knew never would have let him believe she was dead for all this time.
The way he'd cherished her, he knew damn well there was no way she was able to exist in the world without giving him closure. No fucking way.
"There's no easy way to put this," she began.
"So, I'm just gonna give it to you straight.
You deserve to know the truth after all these years," Sienna said, fumbling with her fingers nervously as she sat under Monroe's skeptical gaze.
"Everything was orchestrated by your mother that day.
The robbery, me getting shot, and almost dying was all her," Sienna revealed.
"I don't know who she knows at the hospital, but she was dressed like a nurse as I laid there fighting for my life.
She threatened me, Monroe," she paused to stop herself from crying.
"She gave me two choices. Live, take seventy thousand dollars, and agree to move to wherever she wanted to ship me to...
or die. Either way, she said that you were too distracted with me being in your life.
She needed you to focus on the family empire, so I had to go," Sienna summed it up.
Monroe's skepticism quickly shifted to disbelief. Slowly, he grabbed the kush-filled blunt that was tucked in his pocket, and sparked up. He didn't give a damn about the no smoking sign that was hanging on the wall. He needed to help stabilize his emotions.
"Talk to me, Monroe," Sienna pleaded. "I know this is a lot to take in, but please don't shut me out. Say something."
Monroe gazed into her hazel brown eyes, and said nothing as he processed her presence further.
She was fucking gorgeous, the same as he remembered her.
How could a love so true be wasted? Monroe questioned within himself as he warred with the accusations Sienna had made against his mother.
He knew how Macie felt about love, but would she really go to this extent?
He also knew Sienna’s character, she wasn’t a liar, but that didn’t change that fact of the matter.
The fact was that he had paid for a funeral, and had buried the woman he once lived for, and now the same woman was sitting in front of him, unraveling a truth that uncovered parts of him that were buried with her.
Part of him that he hadn’t connected with in a long time because it’s how he stayed connected to her.
But now… Now it all felt like some bullshit.
"That's the best you can come up wit'?" Monroe finally spoke in a low tone that reflected his inner turmoil.
"You think I'm lying to you?" Sienna asked, tears pouring down her eyes.
"You know I've never lied to you. I would never lie to you," Sienna sighed hard.
"I'm risking everything telling you the truth right now," Sienna stood, unable to control the emotions shooting through her. "Macie wanted me to lie to you! She wanted me to tell you some shit like I was afraid of your lifestyle, and that I staged my own death! But I couldn’t do it. After all these years, coming back into your life with some bullshit was something I just couldn’t follow through with,” Sienna admitted.
“Think about this shit, for real. Why do you think the casket was closed for the entire funeral?
You don't think my mother wanted to see me one last time? ! All that shit was Macie's order!"
Monroe listened, beyond knowing Sienna didn't have a deceptive bone in her body; he needed to press her to get her to reveal more.
He needed more because in that moment it was easier to believe a lie, because the truth unearthed a wrath within him that would forever change the relationship with his mother.
He nodded. "I hear you, Sienna. I need time though. I'on really know what response you was hopin' for, but you got a nigga stuck right now," Monroe told her honestly, standing to his feet.
"Okay," Sienna replied, understanding where he was coming from.
"Where you stayin' at?" Monroe asked.
Sienna removed her phone from her pocket and started tapping. "I just texted it to you, but please... Please handle this situation carefully, 'cause if you don't, Macie is going to kill me and my mother for real this time," Sienna revealed on the verge of breaking down again.
Monroe saw the terror in her eyes, and looked away, searching for the right words to say. "You know I ain't moved by emotion."
Sienna nodded. "Can I please give you a hug?" Sienna asked, yearning to be in his space, but knowing she couldn't come unless he invited her there.
Monroe didn't speak, just looked at her, and she knew...
She knew that was all he had for her at that moment.
She quickly closed the space between them, and wrapped her arms around him.
He smelled like money, and Tom Ford's Noir De Noir, and the warmth of his body made her ready to melt.
As the side of her face touched his chest, she wept at the sound of his heartbeat.
He was her everything, and it would take a whole lot longer than twelve years to change that fact.
"I've missed you so much, Monroe."
Monroe didn’t respond. He couldn’t because he was afraid of the next words that would proceed out of his mouth. Instead he moved back, looking at her once more before making his exit. He needed air because the type of pain Sienna's presence brought up in him made it hard to breathe.