“I am.”
“You were going to leave me.”
“And you were leaving me.”
Chapter 8
Bryse
“Are you angry?” She pushed her hair back from her face.
I knew that we looked ridiculous sitting up on the big rock that overlooked the city, her in her formal gold and black ballgown, and me in an all-black tux with a gold cummerbund. Our masks were set aside like a discarded remembrance of happier times.
“No, I’m not angry,” I confessed, dragging my fingers through my beard.
“What are you feeling?”
“Confused. Disappointed. Hurt. Hopeful.”
“Why disappointed, Bryse?”
“Because I’m wondering how in the hell we could have allowed ourselves to get here. We’re two brilliant people who know ourselves and each other very well.”
“Or so we thought,” she interjected with a sad laugh.
“Yeah.”
She rested her head on her knees and turned her face sideways to look at me. “How come you never told me that you liked Hennessy punch?”
“Same reason that you never told me that you liked walks in the rain or that autumn was your favorite season,” I replied.
She closed her eyes, and I took a moment to take in the delicate features of my woman’s beautiful face. The high cheekbones and pointed chin gave her face such an angular structure, but her full, heart-shaped lips and Nubian nose softened her features. When she opened her eyes, her nut-brown, tilted, almond-shaped eyes assessed me the same way that my eyes did her, as if we were seeing each other for the first time.
My woman was beautiful and fine, with her petite ass, and smart as shit.
“You almost got someone killed.” My tone was calm and nonchalant, as though I told her the oven had just reached the right temperature.
Her eyes widened, and she sat upright. “Excuse me?”
I inhaled sharply and turned to look back out on the city. We had left the ball, grabbed some coffee, and came here to wait for the sunrise, something we discovered we both liked to do, but no longer did because of our busy lifestyles.
“I thought you were cheating on me, and I may have arranged to have you followed and for the problem to be eliminated.”
“Bryson!”
I shrugged. “You knew who you were getting involved with when you met me. You know my background, and you know the things that I’ve done for clients. What makes you think that I won’t take those same measures when it comes to my woman?”
“But murder, Bryson? Why not just leave me or confront me, or even him, for that matter?”
“I wouldn’t leave you because I didn’t want to lose my woman. Even when I was speaking with you on that app, I was inturmoil, because I knew that I didn’t want to leave. But you gave me no other choice.”
“I didn’t leave murder on the table though.”
“The next nigga will know that he should keep his hands to himself, and we won’t have those problems.”
“The next nigga? Are you serious? Can you hear yourself, Bryson? There was no other nigga. There was only you.”
“But you didn’t know that. Be warned: If you cheat on me, that nigga will be pushing up daisies from six feet under or swimming with the sharks. You choose, I ain’t picky.”
