CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Vince and George were waiting downstairs, both in dark suits with wine glasses in their hands, as they held conversations with the various guests in attendance.
Although Vince was surrounded by a group of male senior executives from Fontaine-Bachman, in addition to some of his male friends from his social circles, a group of women still managed to find their way over to him.
Led by Brooke and Lori, two of Vince’s former sleep partners, they were only in attendance because the guest of honor, Linda Darsch, invited them.
At the time the retirement party was planned, which was several months ago, Linda nor Vince had any earthly idea that he would fall in love with a woman named Ricki and that she would also be an invited guest too.
But he didn’t mind their attendance. He wanted every woman he’d ever been with to know unequivocally that his status had permanently changed. “Hello Brooke,” he said as they approached. “How are you, Lori?”
Lori, who was always mischievous, was smiling from ear to ear. “Don’t you look, how shall I say? Scrumptious,” she said and grinned.
Vince smiled. “You don’t look bad yourself. Still working out I see.”
“Oh baby,” she said, her glass of wine wasting as she was already a bit inebriated, “you just don’t know how I’ve been working out.” Then she laughed and coughed at the same time.
“What a classy lady you are,” said George.
“Oh fuck you, George,” Lori said, giving him the finger. “You are such a party-pooper. I don’t know why Vince puts up with you.” Then she belched.
Vince smiled. She was always only in it for the fun and he got that. George shook his head. She was one female he never liked.
But Brooke, on the other hand, he thought, as he smiled and looked her way, was his definition of all class and all bombshell. “Nice to see you again, Brooke.”
“You as well,” Brooke replied. Then she looked at Vince.
Their parting wasn’t as amicable as his parting with Lori.
Mostly because Brooke, like Cecily, had visions of becoming the next Mrs. Fontaine.
It never was going to happen, Vince made that perfectly clear from day one, and she never showed any signs to him that she was in love with him.
But she was in love with him. “I left you several messages. You don’t return your calls anymore? ”
Vince looked at Brooke. Still so beautiful. It was a tossup, once upon a time, between Cynthia, whom he eventually made wife number three, and Brooke. He chose unwisely, he quickly realized. “I’ve been busy,” he said to her.
“She’s officially available,” Lori said. “You don’t have to sneak around anymore to be with her. That’s why she was phoning you.”
Vince looked at Brooke. “You’re divorced?”
“We were never married, but yes, I’m no longer with Peter.”
Vince nodded. “Sorry to hear that.”
“She’s not sorry,” Lori said, and everybody laughed. “But back to you,” Lori continued, looking at Vince. “Cecily claims you’re all involved with some beautician? I said a beautician? Bougie Vincent with a beautician? That can’t be accurate! And she’s black too?”
“Black?” Brooke, and the executives in that group, all appeared shocked to hear it. Brooke even shook her head. “Not true,” she said. “Cecily always exaggerates. I’m certain she’s doing so now. Vincent would not contaminate our circle with such a person. He would not do that. Would you, Vincent?”
But Vincent was staring at Brooke. He knew she was a snob, but he never figured her to be a racist too. Not that it ever came up. Their circles were as lily-white as they themselves were. “Why would dating an African-American hairstylist contaminate our circle?”
Brooke smiled. “It certainly goes without saying.”
“Pretend I’m slow,” said Vince. “Say it to me.”
They all looked at each other. Most in that circle were fiscal conservatives alright, but socially they considered themselves quite progressive. They viewed racism as a very unadmirable trait. Brooke’s comment made them uncomfortable too.
When she looked around and realized she was a woman on her own little island, she backed off. “No worries,” she said. Which, to Vince, was always a catchphrase that in the end meant nothing.
“The point isn’t what she will or will not do to our circle,” said Lori. “The point is,” she said and belched again, “can you confirm that what Cecily said is true? Are you fooling around with a black beauty?” Hiccup. “I mean beautician?”
“My lady is a hairstylist,” Vince said. “That’s correct.”
Lori was tipsy, but she wasn’t so far gone that she couldn’t understand what he said. “Your lady? You’re claiming her? You never even claimed your wives, but you’re claiming her? I don’t believe it.”
“Neither do I,” said Brooke.
“Believe it, ladies,” said George. “I’ve seen it with my own two eyes.”
“You’ve seen what with your own two eyes?” a now-irritated Brooke asked him.
George saw that Vince was already looking up the stairs. He looked too. “It’s not what,” he answered Brooke. “It’s her.”
Everybody else looked to see who George meant.
And that was when they saw Ricki, in white and pink stiletto heels, slowly descending the winding staircase.
She was dressed classically beautifully in a Valentino Garavani funnel-neck, crystal button, bright-pink mini dress that gave great contrast to her velvety-smooth unblemished brown skin, and showed just how remarkably shapely were her smooth-as-silk brown legs.
With her thick hair in a dramatic up-styled hairdo, and her professional manicure and pedicure, she looked like a perfect princess to everybody watching her.
Which was everybody at that party. Including the mostly-African American household staff.
She could see them proudly elbowing each other.
And then they were looking over at the boss as if they didn’t know he had it in him.
George couldn’t believe it was the same person.
Where was that messy ponytail? Where were the jeans and that sleeveless, tucked-in blouse she had been wearing?
And he never saw her with makeup on her face ever.
Not that she needed any. She didn’t. He had pegged her to be one of those natural beauties.
But that makeup, skillfully administered, truly highlighted just what a uniquely beautiful face it was.
And that magnificently slender-but-curvy body.
Even he was getting turned on. She was simply adorable!
But Ricki didn’t feel adorable. She felt terrified by all those eyes staring up at her.
The men, she’d admit, seemed enamored by her.
As if she was some circus freak they were trying to figure out.
But those women? All those white women were standing down there looking up at her with nothing but contempt on their faces.
As if not one of them could believe that somebody like her, a struggling hairstylist no less, would be capable of winning the heart of a man like Vince.
They couldn’t do it, how could she? She wasn’t entitled to a man of his stature, their looks seemed to say.
She knew it too. They weren’t saying anything she hadn’t already said to herself a thousand times over.
She was over her head. She was out of her league.
All of that. But regardless of how they felt, and how inwardly she agreed with them, she held her head high as she walked slowly down that staircase.
But her nerves were getting the best of her. So much so that she tripped over her own foot and had to hold onto the banister to stay upright.
Vince was so in love with her silhouette as she made her way downstairs that he didn’t consider how unnerving this moment had to have been for her. But when she nearly fell, he rushed up those stairs, taking them two at a time, just to get next to her.
Lori and Brooke and everybody else in that room were astonished.
Was it a mirage? Or was Vincent Fontaine actually running up his staircase to assist some beautician?
Vincent of all people? The man who never even acknowledged his wives in public were running to that woman’s aid? It looked crazy to them.
But what looked like crazy to them was becoming normal for Vince. That was why he wasn’t thinking about what it looked like to them as he ran up those stairs. He just wanted to get to Ricki.
When Ricki saw him hurrying up those stairs, and when he took her hand, her heart finally relaxed again. She could always count on Vince to be there for her.
“Okay?” he asked her in his soothing tone as their eyes met.
“Now I am, yes,” she said as she squeezed his hand.
They held hands as they walked down the staircase together. Vince kept looking over at her. He was just that proud. And when they made it downstairs, he ignored Brooke and Lori and took her straight to the retiree.
“Rasheda,” he said, “This is our guest of honor, Linda Darsch. Linda, please meet my girlfriend, Rasheda Richardson.”
Linda smiled, although Ricki could tell the word girlfriend had thrown her. “So nice to meet you, Rasheda.”
But Ricki had Vince. She had no points to prove to these people. She smiled too. “Nice to meet you as well,” she said. “And congratulations on your retirement.”
“Thanks.”
The head butler then eased over to Vince. “Dinner is served, sir,” he said, Vince made the announcement, and they all made their way to the dining hall.
Vince pulled out Ricki’s chair and sat her to the right side of his seat, while George sat on the left side. Vince sat at the head of the table. Linda, in her capacity as guest of honor, sat on the other end of the table directly facing Vince.
Ricki felt at home because Vince was so near.
He joked and talked with his friends and employees, and she enjoyed their conversation.
What she loved most about the night, however, was how he included her in all of it.
That was when Ricki got to see the power of Vince.
Because all of those people, who wouldn’t ordinary give somebody not anywhere near their upper-classness the time of day, was asking her what her opinion was on all kinds of topics and were including her in the conversations too. She enjoyed herself.
What Vince especially loved was the fact that she held her own.
A few times Brooke or Lori mainly tried to insinuate that she was uneducated or unsophisticated or didn’t know her ass from her head, but she didn’t even entertain their rudeness.
She, instead, focused on the positive people around that table, which was most of them.
She was going to be a star in his world, Vince was certain of it.
And later that night, after every guest had gone home, Vince and Ricki were in the master bedroom naked and in bed. She was on her stomach. He had entered her from behind. And he was pounding her ass so hard that both of them were on the verge of cumming the entire time.
Mainly because Vince would pound, and then slow down, and then pound again.
It was masterful to Ricki because it kept her near an orgasm for minutes on end.
It was wonderful to Vince because he got to enjoy his usual hard-charging sex-making ways that he implored with his other ladies.
But by slowing down it also kept that wonderment only Ricki could give to him, as it allowed them to go as long as they could possibly hold out.
When they couldn’t hold out any longer, they finally dropped over the edge and came. It was one of those long, intense cums that had them moaning and groaning and still holding on to the sweet end.
If Vince’s phone had not rang, they would have probably gone for another round.
It was just that intense. Vince even ignored the ringing and kept on pounding away, determined to go another round.
But Ricki knew it could be about Milton.
She grabbed his phone from off of the nightstand, even as her body was shaking from his pounding, and saw that it was Milo.
“It’s Milo, Vince,” she said to him as she swiped his phone to answer the call.
Vince finally stopped pounding and took the phone from her. He pulled out of her, moved off of her, and laid onto his sweat-filled back.
“Yeah?” he said to Milo as Ricki, still on her stomach, turned to look at him.
Vince started looking at Ricki as Milo spoke to him, as if he was getting some serious information. And when he finally ended the call, he held onto his phone for several seconds, looking at the ceiling, as if he was still trying to figure out what it all meant.
Ricki was bursting at the seams to know. “What did he want?” she finally asked him.
It was only then did Vince look at her. And she could see grave concern in his eyes. “What is it, Vince?” she asked anxiously.
He, instead, began getting out of bed. “Get up,” he said. “We’re going back to Milton.”
“Milton?” Ricki was getting out of bed, but she was confused too. “Why are we going back there? Has something happened to my family?”
“I told you nothing was going to happen to them. Didn’t I tell you that?”
He seemed irritated to Ricki. “Why you jumping down my throat? What did Milo say?”
Vince exhaled. “They found the head guard.”
Ricki’s large eyes stretched larger. “What did he say?”
“Before he took his own life,” Vince said, “he told them who paid him to kill Erica.”
It was the news Ricki had been waiting for. “Who? Who paid him?”
Vince moved over to Ricki. “According to that guard, it was your brother Davey.”
Just as Vince expected, Ricki stood stunned.
And then she was shaking her head. “No. No way. Davey? But that can’t be true!
He would never do that, Vince. He wouldn’t pay somebody to kill Erica, that’s insane!
There’s no way,” she said as tears came to her eyes, and as Vince pulled her into his arms.
He knew she wasn’t going to accept that news. He knew it as soon as he heard it. But what he also knew was that Milo’s news told them that Erica didn’t hang herself. Which probably meant she didn’t kill that doctor.
Which meant, Vince realized as he held her, that Ricki had been right all along.
Was her brother being set up too?