She closed the closet door, looked into the mirror to try and make some sense out of her long, naturally curly hair, but she couldn’t do it. She put it in a ponytail, kept a little bang up front, and took off. She was going to be late if she didn’t hurry.
But she had one problem: She had to avoid, at all costs, her landlord. There was no back way out: you had to go through the lobby. And she was convinced he had cameras in his downstairs apartment that showed him everybody coming and going.
Especially those already on his radar.
She hurried across the lobby and was five feet from the exit door, just five feet, when his grubby little body came out of his apartment like The Flash. He flung open that door so fast, in fact, that it startled her.
“Mr. Tanaka, you scared me!”
“You scare self,” he said in his broken English. Japanese was his native tongue. “That why you try get way. Next month no late. Will no accept late rent. You tell Kenny. No late rent. No accept. Next month no late.”
Jayda always paid her share on time. But Kenny, though he always paid, was always late. “Yes sir.”
“No late. No accept late no more. I clear?”
“Crystal.Sir.”
Then he looked down the length of her body, which made her frown. “What are you looking at?”
“You. I look you. You come bed and be late. Maybe I accept. Black I like. Ass I like. Ass you give. Maybe I accept late.”
Jayda couldn’t believe it. Was that all men ever thought about? Was thatit??? And it angered her. “Kiss my black ass,” she said to her landlord. “You’ll have your rent next month and you’ll have it on time.” She didn’t know that to be true, but she knew it had to be true or she was out on her rear. She hurried out of that building.
She shook her head as she hurried down the steps. And her reaction, she felt in a nutshell, was why she knew she didn’t deserve any help from the good Lord. She always put her own foot in it. He was a creep, but she should have learned by now how to manipulate creeps to her advantage. Her mother always told her that she expected too much from these men out here, and that she could catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.
But her mother wasn’t exactly the best teacher. She talked a good game, but didn’t live it. That was why Jayda couldn’t wait to leave Kentucky and all that drama in her family.When her parents divorced, her father made clear she was coming with him. Her mother objected, but the courts awarded her father custody of her. Her mother got the rest of the siblings, who wanted to stay in Kentucky with her, but he got their youngest child Jayda. Which she felt was the best thing that ever happened to her.
Not that Kentucky was bad. It wasn’t. It had beautiful countrysides and blacks and whites got along great where she came from. They were like family to each other. But that only meant they were trainwrecks too.
She hopped on her e-bike and took off.
CHAPTER SEVEN
It was the end of a long day and Harrison was just about to turn off his desk computer and get out of there. But throughout his super-busy work day he’d been thinking about that encounter he had that morning. He couldn’t seem to shake it. And that was why, at the end of the day, he thought about her again. Only this time he decided to pull up his security monitors before he left for the day.
He singled out the front entrance monitor and time dated it to that morning. When the young lady on the e-bike rode up on him, he zoomed in. And then he zoomed in on her. Specifically on her face. And he watched her.
And as he watched her, he knew he had to have her. Not for any real relationship with her. He wasn’t hooking his wagon to any one person. But he had to have her in his bed. That was a must. Anybody that turned him on that easily was somebody he wanted to spend some serious bed time with to see for himself just what was the unusual attraction.
But as he watched that monitor, he could tell the exact moment when she said those hauntingthat doesn’t mean I’m not herewords. When she did, he froze-framed her face. And he couldn’t stop staring at her.
On the surface, there was nothing about her pretty, deep-toned brown face that was amazing to him. But at the same time, everything about her deep-toned brown face was amazing to him! From her eyes that looked as if she could see right through him, to her nose and mouth and thick hair – it all justworked together perfectly on her. She had that look. Thatitabout her. She had his undivided attention.
He was so engrossed that he didn’t hear his office door open, he didn’t hear Carter say hello, and he didn’t see Carter walk over to his desk, around his desk, and look at the computer screen too.
“Who’s that?”
He looked at Carter, surprised that he didn’t hear him enter his office. Then he looked back at the screen. “I splashed her this morning.”
He then copied her image and sent it to his security chief. Then he pressed two numbers on his desk intercom.
“Yes sir, Mr. Bainbridge. How can I help you, sir?”
“I sent you a pic.”
“Let me look. Yes sir, I see it now.”
“Find out what you can about her.”
