Total pages in book: 62
Estimated words: 58947 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 295(@200wpm)___ 236(@250wpm)___ 196(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 58947 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 295(@200wpm)___ 236(@250wpm)___ 196(@300wpm)
“Believe me,” he goes on, “Mama has told me a million times I’m wrong. Everyone told me at some point, and I know it’s true.”
“You do?” I ask, my voice gruff with skepticism.
“It’s easier to blame you than to see in you all I could have been and had,” he says, a muscle clenching along his jaw. “And know I got nobody to blame but me.” He looks me in the eyes. “So I’m sorry. It’s overdue by years, but I’m sorry.”
“I appreciate that,” I tell him, nodding. “In a short time, I’ve come to care about your sister a lot. Scratch that. I’m in love with her.”
His stare is glued to my face.
“I hope one day we’ll be related,” I say with a wry smile, ignoring the surprise flashing across his expression. “And I want a better relationship with you, so I need to tell you something from jump.”
“All right,” he says. “Yeah,”
I pause, give it a second to make sure he’s looking right into the sobriety of my eyes. “If you ever disrespect Takira again like you did last week,” I say quietly, “I’ll fuck you up.”
“She’s my sister,” he says, not with anger, but just as a statement of fact.
“If you treat her like it, we won’t have a problem.”
For a moment, tension coils between us again, and I’m not sure he won’t punch me the way he did that coach, but then he cracks a wide smile.
“My man,” he says, patting me on the back. “Better you than me. She’s a handful to protect.”
I release a laugh, surprised and relieved by his comment. “I know, but I got it.”
He nods and looks back into the gym. “Well, I’m staying for the dinner. You?”
“Nah. I fly out tomorrow. Gonna go back to the hotel and get some rest.”
“So you ain’t leaving here and going by my mama’s house to see my sister?”
I can’t stop the smile that spreads over my face. “I might make one stop before I turn in, yeah.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Takira
“Mama, I got this,” I tell her, loading the dishwasher. “You can go on up.”
“You sure?” she asks.
“Daddy went upstairs like an hour ago.” I laugh. “Go be with your man.”
“Your daddy hasn’t washed a dish in forty years.” Hands on hips, she rolls her eyes up to the ceiling. “You know that man leave the kitchen still chewing.”
I nod, grinning and clearing the table of the dinner dishes.
“Ain’t heard from Cliff,” Mama says. “You suppose he all right?”
I freeze, my hand hovering over the stack of plates. I came this week because I love my brother, and if he needs me, I want to be here. That doesn’t mean I’m not still pissed for how he handled our conversation last week.
“I’m sure he’s fine.” I give her a reassuring smile. “Myron would have called if something bad had gone down.”
“Or Naz would have told you, I’m sure.”
I can’t fight off my smile. As much as I want to be here for Mama and for Cliff in case anything goes left, it was hard not driving over to Naz’s hotel last night.
“He would have called, yeah,” I agree. “Head on up, Mama.”
She kisses my cheek and makes her way to the steps. I hear Daddy watching Family Feud. Surely my father is the only one recording episodes of that show.
I make quick work of the dishes and fend off restlessness. I don’t want to bother Naz when he’s at the dinner. He said he’d call when he left to let me know how it went. As much for distraction as anything else, I climb the steps up to the roof. It seemed so much bigger when I was eighteen. It was the best place to come dream and hope. Now it feels smaller and, with all us kids gone and never using it, neglected. Out of forgotten habit, I check the storage bench and grab an old blanket, then spread it on the cement floor. It’s quiet up here, peaceful, and I wrap myself in memories—all the good times we had here as a family. Cliff was always on grill duty. I blink back tears as much for all that he lost as for how our conversation ended last week.
“Someone once told me the stars feel really close up here.”
I sit up on the blanket, turning my head toward the stairs leading back into the house.
“Naz.” I almost collapse with relief, glad to see him. Needing to hold him.
“Your mom let me up.”
He crosses the roof and settles down beside me, stretching out on the blanket and pulling me onto his lap. I cuddle into him, disrupting his neatly tucked shirt by slipping my hand under it and dragging my palm over his warm skin. He kisses my hair and squeezes me tighter.
“Go ahead and ask,” he says, his voice tinged with humor.