Chapter 5 Sincere Bellamy
SINCERE BELLAMY
When I walked into Voss Contemporary House, Aria was standing at the receptionist’s desk.
The receptionist, Cecily, kept nodding and typing as Aria gave her instructions, “I need you to confirm the delivery window for the pedestals. If they can’t get here by two, tell them not to bother and send the backup order through the other vendor. ”
Cecily’s fingers flew across her keyboard.
“And email the collector back. Tell him the viewing is private. He can’t bring extra people. Two people. That’s it.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Cecily agreed.
Aria finally turned to me with a bright smile. She greeted me with a loving hug, like we were family, because our relationship had gotten to that point. By now, we were like brother and sister.
She angled her body toward the hallway. “Come on. Let’s go to my office.”
I followed her through the gallery space. Walking behind her, I took it in like a tourist, though I had been there many times.
Voss had a subtle type of luxury. It was bright, open, and clean with white walls, track lighting, and smooth concrete floors.
The art was spaced out, giving each its own spotlight.
There were sculptures positioned in corners, and very expensive furniture that didn’t look like it should be sat on was placed around the space.
Even the smell was sophisticated and expensive.
Aria stopped at a door near the back and pulled it open. I followed her inside her office. Aria motioned for me to follow her into the seating area. I allowed her to sit first. I sat after as she looked at her watch like she didn’t have much time. “I need you to meet someone.”
My brow lifted. “You asked me to come here so you can play matchmaker?”
She sucked her teeth and waved me off. “Not like that. Business.”
I nodded once. “Okay. Who?”
“Rhythm Brooks. She’s a new artist, and I’m excited about her. She’ll be the featured artist for our upcoming event, Mothers of the Block.” Aria slid a folder across the coffee table between us. “I want Bellamy Urban Development to sponsor it.”
Bellamy Urban Development is the LLC I set up to hold ownership of the Cartier's development project.
The Cartier's insisted the LLC be in my name, for both legal and personal reasons.
They needed a clean owner on paper, and they also wanted me to have confirmation that I had ownership in the project, too.
“This will help to show those protestors that you all are about community,” Aria advised. “It gives you all something community-centered to attach the development to before you break ground.”
I finally opened the folder. Inside of it were sponsorship tiers, press language, mockups, and partner lists.
She leaned in slightly with a convincing grin. “Let the project sponsor it and consider Rhythm for murals or pieces in the community center lobby.”
My eyes narrowed. “You’re talking about commissioning art for a building that doesn’t exist yet.”
“I’m talking about building trust with the community so they will start to trust the process. Rhythm is from that community. If we are saying this development is for the neighborhood, then the neighborhood needs to be represented inside it.”
I stared at her for a second, because she wasn’t wrong. “Show me her work.”
Aria picked up her phone, tapped, and slid it to me.
I picked it up and noticed it was Rhythm’s Instagram.
She wasn’t just making pretty portraits; she was telling stories.
She painted faces that looked like they’d lived through something.
There were portraits of mothers holding babies with exhaustion in their expression that didn’t ask for pity.
Her portraits evoked feelings of struggle, faith, and survival.
Just looking at them, I knew she had to be strong more times than she’d ever deserved.
I kept scrolling, then I landed on her. Rhythm was the kind of pretty that made you slow down without meaning to. She had chocolate skin that looked smooth even through the screen. Her waist-length locs were chef’s kiss. She had eyes that held you there, like she knew you couldn’t look away.
I got stuck, staring at how beautiful she was. “How old is she?”
“Twenty-five.”
“And she does this full-time?”
“She’s a medical coder and single mother. She paints outside of work.”
I was impressed that she had a career and responsibilities and still strived to be creative when she could.
I forced myself to stop being weird, scrolled past her personal portraits, and focused on other posts of her artwork.
Aria watched me with her smile reaching her ears. “You see the vision?”
I nodded slowly. “I see it.”
“So, you’ll do it?”
I leaned back, staring at Rhythm’s page, more so the images of her, at the way she existed in the frame like she wasn’t trying to be anything other than herself.
Her beauty wasn’t just surface. It sat deeper than that, like it came from somewhere quiet and sure.
And the longer I looked, the more something shifted in my soul.
I felt a slow pull and a strange warmth.
It didn’t make sense because I didn’t know her.
Yet my body reacted like it recognized her anyway.
I swallowed hard and forced myself to hand her phone back. “Alright. Bellamy Urban Development will sponsor it.”
Relieved, Aria exhaled. “Good. I want you to meet with her. You need to be the one to explain what Bellamy Urban Development is offering and the sponsorship and what it includes.”
In my line of work, I’d sat across from street niggas to politicians, and I had never been nervous. But the thought of meeting Rhythm had my stomach doing some unfamiliar shit.
It was… anticipation.
“I got you,” I told Aria, feeling my dick harden in anticipation. “Set the meeting up.”
I met up with Icon and Legend right after my meeting with Aria for cigars and drinks.
The cigar bar had a private room that the Cartier's often used. Nobody came in unless they were invited.
Legend took a pull from his cigar and shook his head. “Do you ever think about how we ended up here?” he asked his brother.
“Here where?”
“Married,” Legend said like the word tasted funny. “With kids.”
I smirked. “You say it like it just magically happened.”
“It did,” Legend said, dead serious, then pointed his cigar at the ceiling. “I swear to God, I blinked and now I got a daycare of kids and a pregnant wife.”
I laughed. “How many is that now?”
“Six,” Icon laughed. “Unless it’s twins again.”
Legend slammed his hand lightly on the armrest. “See. There you go. Don’t even play like that, bro.”
“Aria is pretty fertile. It might be twins again.”
Legend glared at me. “It better not be.”
Icon taunted him. “You cried last time.”
“I did not cry.”
“You did,” I said. “You were so shocked and scared about those twins, you cried in the car.”
Legend looked between us. “Y’all some hoes.”
I tapped ash into the tray. “Icon, when you and Liv having another one?”
Icon’s expression changed for half a second. It was quick, but I caught it because I watched him the way you watch men you respect. You notice what they try to hide.
“I want another baby. But I think Livia is scared.”
Legend’s expression softened. “I get it.”
“After the miscarriages, and then Royal coming early... It did something to her. I know she is scared to go through any of that again.”
Legend exhaled. “Damn.”
I took a swig of my drink as everyone fell silent with sympathy.
Legend broke it first. “Look at us.”
Icon glanced at him. “What?”
Legend waved his cigar. “Three niggas in a cigar bar talking about wives and babies.”
I chuckled. “Life be lifing.”
Icon’s mouth curved. “Years ago, if somebody told me I would be buying diapers and formula, I would have shot them.”
We all laughed.
Then Legend turned toward me and narrowed his eyes like he was lining up a shot. “So, when you having kids?”
Icon looked at me too, waiting.
I held my drink up. “I’m not even thinking about that shit right now. I’m focused on money and staying out of the way.”
“You still scared to wife somebody?” Icon asked.
There it was. The real question.
I set my glass down. “I am not bitter.”
“Tempo did you foul,” Legend reminded me.
“She did. And I was taken aback. I’m not going to lie about that. But I am not walking around wounded either.”
Icon watched me like he could hear the part I wasn’t saying.
“It just made me more careful,” I added. “That’s all. I’m more selective about who I let close to me.”
Legend nodded slowly. “I respect how you handled it.”
I took another sip. “I am so careful that I don't even have sex with random women anymore.”
Legend’s eyebrows shot up. “Nigga, what?”
“I said what I said. I don’t do convenience pussy. The easiest way to get into some bullshit is to let your dick pick your company.”
Legend laughed hard. “That’s a bar.”
I had been so careful for so long that it was like second nature to me now. I could ignore temptation. But since I had been on Rhythm’s Instagram, I had not been able to stop thinking about her.
I thought about her mouth. I thought about her eyes.
I thought about the way she looked soft and grown at the same time.
I thought about her body in a way I had not allowed myself to think about anybody in a long time.
I thought about what it would feel like to pin her down and make her speak in tongues.
I thought about her saying my name like she meant it.
“So, you not getting no pussy?” Legend pressed.
I stared into my glass for a second before I answered. “Nothing consistent.”
Icon watched me. “Because you haven’t met another woman who makes you feel that kind of consistency.”
That wasn’t a question. That was him reading me.
I exhaled slowly. “No woman has given me that feeling again,” I admitted. “Not since Tempo.”
But in my head, Rhythm’s face flashed again, and it felt like my body already knew what my mouth wasn’t ready to admit.
I had not even met her yet, and I already wanted her, like it was a mistake I’d enjoy making.