Chapter 1
Six months later . . .
I only came to this birthday party for two reasons: cake and the single mothers with the childbearing hips and fat asses.
The fact that I knew Icelynn’s fine ass would be here had nothing to do with it.
At least, that was what I tried to convince myself as I glanced around my cousin’s backyard.
Her pretty ass wasn’t here yet. There were plenty of kids running around, though.
Keegan and Chyna hired a catering company to run the grill. The smoky smell filled my flared nostrils as I kept an eye on my surroundings.
I spotted KJ, who this party was for, running behind his stepbrother, Liam.
Those lil niggas were only four years old and a damn handful.
I loved them, though. I saw my cousin, who was more like my brother, Keegan, walking my way with a damn smile on his face.
I frowned. Nigga had been way too happy over the past six months after marrying Chyna.
His crazy ass proposed to her, moved her in, and married her all within a month, and he hadn’t stopped smiling since.
“You over here mugged up ’cause yo’ girl ain’t here yet?” Keegan asked as he slapped hands with me. I almost knocked his damn hand out of the way, but I maintained my cool.
“I’m a free agent ’til the day I die. You know this, nigga.”
Keegan chuckled before he took a sip from his red Solo cup. “You funny.”
I knocked his cup out of his hand. It spilled all over the grass, and I grinned triumphantly as I said, “And you a simp.”
I frowned again as I stalked away while Keegan laughed his ass off behind me.
“Stupid-ass nigga,” I mumbled. I loved him, but we fought like brothers, which was understandable since we grew up that way.
My parents loved the streets more than me, so Keegan’s parents, my aunt and uncle, raised me.
Keegan and I lived under one roof our entire lives, and Auntie Dayna said we were insufferable together because we were so strong-minded.
If we weren’t going at each other, we were going at someone else together. That never ended well.
Still grumbling to myself, I sat down at a picnic table and glowered at the kids jumping in the large bouncy house next to me.
Kids were cool with me. I just didn’t like other people’s kids.
KJ, Keegan’s son, had always been cool with me because I could discipline him.
Liam was Chyna’s son, and his little ass was considered my kinfolk now, too, so he was cool with me.
All these other snotty-nosed brats could leave as far as I was concerned.
With cake on a plate and flopping around violently as he ran, KJ ran up to me and plopped down right next to me. Liam wasn’t far behind.
“’Sup?” I asked as I stuck my fist out to both of them. Their little fists tapped mine at the same time before they dug into their cake.
“Why your face like that?” Liam asked. He had blue frosting all over his face, and I grimaced.
“Like what?”
“Ugly,” Liam replied.
I flicked his forehead. “Boy, I ain’t ugly.”
“Are when you look like that,” he said as he rubbed his forehead.
“Why look like that, Uncle Retta?” KJ asked, calling me by the name he’d used since he could talk.
“Yo’ daddy annoying,” I grumbled.
“You look constipated,” Liam summarized.
“Boy, what?” I almost wanted to laugh, but I kept it cool and waited for him to answer, but KJ beat him to it.
“Daddy look like that when he can’t poop,” KJ said.
I shook my head. “Eat your cake before I take that shit.”
“Maybe you need a nap,” KJ suggested.
“I ain’t takin’ no nap,” I replied with my brows scrunched together.
KJ shrugged and went back to his cake, but Liam wasn’t done yet apparently.
“You like my auntie Icelynn?”
My eyes bugged out. Why the hell would he ask me some shit like that?
“No.”
Liam nodded. “I think you do.”
“Okay.” I wasn’t about to argue with him. These two knuckleheads should be lawyers when they grow up because they sure knew how to argue and get under a mothafucka’s skin.
“You smile when you look at her.” KJ just had to add his two cents.
“No, I don’t.”
“Yes,” KJ said while Liam nodded.
I shook my head.
“That guy smile when he look at her too,” Liam said as he pointed a frosting covered finger toward the grills.
My head whipped in that direction so fast I almost got a damn charley horse. When my eyes landed on Icelynn, my heart felt peace for a split second before I registered that she smiled all in a caterer’s faces.
“Him not smiling now.” KJ pointed at me.
“But him looking at Auntie. Why him not smile?” Liam asked.
I didn’t pay them any mind. I rose from the table and stomped toward Icelynn, but then I stopped myself. Fuck was I doing? Icelynn wasn’t my girl. We’d fucked around . . . a lot, but we had an understanding. She could talk to whoever she wanted, but guess what? So the fuck could I.
My eyes swept over the backyard, and I spotted the thick yellow bone mama I’d been eyeing earlier. She stood outside the bouncy house, scrolling on her phone. Licking my lips, I swaggered over to her.
“Which one is yours?” I asked as I slid beside her.
She glanced at me. Her light eyes brightened as she took me in. I wore all black, as usual, and a simple gold chain. I pulled my locs back earlier because it was hot as hell, and I had my signature cologne on that drove women wild.
Finally, she peeled her eyes off me and glanced around the yard, giving me the chance to look over her curves up close. Baby was stacked.
“I have three running around here somewhere.”
“Damn!” I didn’t mean to say that out loud, but shit. Three damn kids? And my bet was she had three baby daddies too. I recovered quickly as I smiled. “You look too good to have three kids, ma.”
Her scrunched brows and offended expression softened, and she smiled. I really wished she didn’t do that. Her teeth were fucked up. There was no way I would let her mouth around my dick with those chompers. Icelynn had pretty ass, perfectly straight teeth . . .
“I get that all the time,” she replied.
“I bet.” I tried to keep the grin on my face, but she kept smiling, and my lips balled up instead. I decided to look at a point over her head instead, to talk to her, and I saw Icelynn grilling me. That caused me to grin again. “You got a man?”
The woman giggled. “No, I’m single. You tryna change that?”
Not a fuckin’ chance.
“I’m sayin’, though, you look the fuck good. You tryna duck off somewhere and get to know each other while yo’ kids is occupied?”
She bit her lip in consideration, and I knew her ass was a bird.
Icelynn would never. I mean, we fucked within hours of knowing each other, but she made a nigga work hard for that shit.
My dick twitched just thinking about her, and my eyes found her again.
My smile widened when I noticed her stomping toward us.
“That doesn’t sound too bad—”
“Here. Drink this,” Icelynn said. She shoved a little carton of chocolate milk at me with a swirly, red straw.
I looked at her, confused, as she looked around impatiently.
“I don’t want this. Yo’ ass knows I’m lactose intolerant.” I tried to push the milk back at her.
“Drink.” Her stern expression landed on me.
I smiled. Baby was so pretty when she was mad.
“I don’t—”
“You need to hydrate,” she insisted.
“Why?”
Icelynn glanced behind her at the woman I’d been talking to and then looked at me. “You seemed thirsty, nigga. Drink.”
I chuckled. “You funny, Juicy.”
“Do it look like I’m doin’ mothafuckin stand up right now?” she asked as she cocked her head to the side.
With a sigh, I put the red straw to my mouth and took a small sip. “Happy?”
Her eyes narrowed. “All of it, Beretta. Don’t fuckin’ play with me.”
I may not have known Icelynn for long, but I knew her well, which meant if I didn’t drink this shit, the liquid in the carton would end up all over my clothes, and probably my hair too.
I huffed out another breath and chugged the damn chocolate milk before I shoved the carton into her hands. “You can go now. I was speaking to . . .” I glanced at the woman with three kids and fucked-up teeth.
“Uh . . . Krissy.”
“Krissy.” I finished my sentence with amusement dancing across my face.
Icelynn’s brow arched. Still without acknowledging Krissy, she asked, “Oh yeah? About custody battles? Joint custody?”
“Huh?” I asked.
“Excuse me?” Krissy crossed her arms over her big breasts.
Icelynn glanced at Krissy again and shrugged. “It looks like you don’t know how to keep a man, and I figured you got a kid since you’re here at my nephew’s party. That means you must know a lot about joint custody.”
“Bitc—”
“I wouldn’t finish that sentence, love. I beat bitches up for fun,” Icelynn replied as she looked at her nails nonchalantly.
Krissy needed saving, and she didn’t realize it. Icelynn was real-life crazy. I stepped between them and looked down at Icelynn. I grinned. “You tryna leave wit’ me?”
“Boy, fuck you,” she spat as she walked away.
I caught up to her and grabbed her arm. “I been doin’ that, baby. Why don’t you let me take you out on a date instead?” I had no idea where the fuck that even came from. Seeing her cute ass so jealous made me blurt some stupid-ass shit out that I couldn’t take back. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to.
“I’d rather date a pogo stick.”
I laughed way too hard at her smart-ass mouth. That pretty ass, smart-ass mouth was the reason I liked her ass so much in the first place. I never met a woman who could keep up with me verbally, jab for jab, but the day Icelynn turned thirty-six was the day I met my match.
“I got a pogo stick you can jump on.” I leaned in to kiss her, but she held her hand up and mushed my face away.
“Nuh uh. Go ask the bitch with the fucked-up teeth and chicken legs to hop on that community dick. It ain’t gonna be me. Out here offering up dick to bird bitches and think I need parts like I’m grouped in with the needy. Yeah, aight. I think the fuck not.”
We both knew that was a damn lie. The thing that made us so good was the fact that we craved each other, even if neither of us wanted to admit it.
She could talk big all she wanted, but I knew she wanted this dick.
What she didn’t know was that it definitely wasn’t community dick.
At least, not anymore. Since I met Icelynn’s crazy ass six months ago, I hadn’t fucked another woman.
To deflect, I said, “You was over there talkin’ to that caterer.”
She cackled. “You mean that man that was old enough to be my damn grandpa? Is that why you was talkin’ to yuck mouth?”
My brows pulled in as I looked around the backyard.
When I located the caterer at the grill, I realized he was old as hell.
Probably in his sixties, with gray hair and a beer belly.
I didn’t care what he looked like or how old he was when I saw Icelynn talking to him.
I only cared about the fact that her hot in the pants ass spoke to another nigga.
I grunted. “You was smilin’ all in his face.”
“Because I helped his old ass carry a pan of potato salad out here on my way in. He was struggling, and being the good citizen I am, I helped. He made a joke about being too old to carry more than his damn dentures around. It was funny, Beretta, so I laughed. Fuck wrong with you?”
Before I could respond, Chyna popped up out of nowhere with Liam and KJ by her side.
“You good, Ice?” Chyna asked.
“Why wouldn’t I be?” Icelynn snapped.
It was good to know Icelynn’s attitude wasn’t only reserved for me. The way she just asked her cousin that had my dick a little hard. She better watch out before I put somethin’ in her life for real.
“Girl, boo.” Chyna waved her cousin off. “Save that attitude for someone who deserves it.”
Icelynn looked at me with a smirk on her face before she opened her mouth, no doubt to say something smart, but KJ spoke up first.
“Uncle Retta, is her your new girlfriend?” KJ pointed a finger at Krissy, who was only a couple of feet away from us, with a stank look on her face.
Krissy glared at Icelynn, and I shook my head.
Shorty really needed to go find something safe to do.
When I walked away after Icelynn, that was me protecting Krissy from a situation she really didn’t want to be in.
She served her purpose and pissed Icelynn off.
It was in her best interest to walk away.
Icelynn snorted at KJ’s question. “Yeah, Retta. Is she?”
“I thought Auntie was him girlfriend,” Liam said as he pointed at Icelynn.
It was my turn to snort, only I did it because I was uncomfortable.
Somewhere deep inside me, the idea of Icelynn being mine didn’t really sound all that bad.
The fact that I didn’t know the first thing about having a girlfriend, nor had that ever been a desire of mine, stopped me from ever listening to that tiny voice inside me.
“Oh, that’s funny?” Icelynn asked. I stared at her and could tell I hurt her feelings, but her hardened mask slipped back onto her pretty face within a second, making me think I’d imagined it.
“I didn’t—”
“It’s cool.” Icelynn turned to Chyna. “I’ma head out.”
“But you just got here.” Chyna pouted.
“I’ll come by tomorrow,” Icelynn assured before she gave KJ and Liam a hug and then left the backyard.
“You just gonna watch her go?” Chyna asked.
I glanced over at her. She glowed with love.
That was what it looked like anyway. I couldn’t understand how Keegan’s mean ass had fallen so in love.
Chyna was gorgeous with her caramel-colored skin and big brown eyes.
She always had her makeup on point and her hair down her back.
Truthfully, she looked a bit like Icelynn, though Icelynn was darker and sported braids. Their family resemblance was strong.
I shrugged. “I’ll catch up wit’ her later.”
Chyna shook her head. “Y’all need to get it together.”
She walked off with the boys, leaving me alone with my thoughts.
Krissy walked over to me. I had forgotten about her just that fast. “So, you got a girl and was all in my face?”
I barely looked at her when I responded. “Worry about a dentist, shorty. Don’t worry about what I got goin’ on.”
I lightly mushed her in the forehead before I walked away, mentally making a plan. I would give Icelynn some time, but I’d also make good on my promise. By the end of the night, I’d be in my favorite place in the world: Icelynn’s pretty-ass pussy.