“I don’t like you putting things into your body that could eventually prove harmful and prevent my getting you pregnant.”
“That’s not going to happen, darling. I douche with vinegar and water at the end of my menstrual cycle and—”
“Stop with the fucking douching, Precious!” Dennis interrupted. “Why are you messing with nature? It could be the reason why you’re not getting pregnant. And don’t look at me like that, because you know I can make a baby. I told you about the girl I knocked up before I married you. I told her I would support the child, but she wanted marriage, so she decided to get rid of it.”
Precious didn’t need Dennis to remind her that he wasn’t sterile. She was. And all because a lapse in what had been preached to her as a young girl was forgotten when she opened her legs to a boy because alcohol had dulled her senses where she hadn’t insisted that he wear a rubber.
If she had decided to have the baby, then give it up for adoption, she wouldn’t have found herself in a predicament where the complications from an illegal abortion had left her sterile. But Lillian wouldn’t hear of it. She had no intention of sending her away to have a baby, and then have to explain her daughter’s absence. No matter how good her explanation was, there were others who would speculate why Precious Crawford had gone to upstate New York to live with relatives. So having an abortion became the ultimate solution to a problem women had faced from the beginning of time.
“Okay, Dennis. I’ll stop douching.”
He smiled. “Thank you,” he said. And, after a comfortable pause, “I was thinking about us going away for a few weeks.”
Precious struggled not to panic. She didn’t want to believeher husband was talking about going away when she’d made plans for Justine to sleep with him. “When and where?” she said, forcing a smile she didn’t feel.
“I was thinking about going back to Mackinac Island for a second honeymoon.”
Precious loved the island on Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, where she and Dennis had checked into a cabin and spent more time in bed making love than touring the island that had been populated by Africans when Michigan was still governed by France.
“When do you want to leave?”
Dennis exhaled an audible breath. “I’m thinking we could leave sometime the first week in October and stay for a couple of weeks.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Yes, Dennis. I’ll be ready to leave whenever you are.” Precious estimated she had almost three weeks for Justine to sleep with Dennis, barring her menstruating, before they left New York for Michigan. “Do you want me to make breakfast for you, or do you want to wait for Miss Flora to get up?”
Dennis waved a hand. “Let Miss Flora sleep. Why don’t we get dressed and go out to that diner you like?”
Precious couldn’t stop smiling. It was as if she and Dennis were courting again. He would always ask her what she liked and where she wanted to go, and invariably, he would make it happen. It was what she had come to love about her husband. However, there was one thing she didn’t like, and that was his using foul language. Inasmuch as she’d tried to correct him, he would revert to the language he’d learned growing up on the streets in Harlem. It was only after he’d made enough money from bookmaking that Dennis decided it was time to sell the grocery store, rent out the brownstone, and move to Westchester County.
Precious always suspected her husband had ties to men who were involved in organized crime, but she hadn’t beenable to prove it. However, she knew for certain that the company he’d hired to renovate his properties had links to mob activity.
Dennis had reinvented himself as a real estate entrepreneur who lived in a fine house with an educated wife and professional in-laws. The only thing left was the possibility of his running for an elected office. When Precious had mentioned this to him, Dennis rejected the idea, because he had no interest in politics; however, it was something he’d want for the next generation of Boones.
Rising to stand, Precious circled the table and dropped a kiss on her husband’s hair. “I’d love that. I’m going upstairs to get dressed.” She walked out of the kitchen, silently congratulating herself that she’d fooled her husband into believing he’d made love to his wife. She did not want to think of how many more times Dennis would sleep with Justine before she’d come to her with the news that she was pregnant. Hopefully it wouldn’t take too long.
CHAPTER3
Aweek before Dennis and Precious were scheduled to drive to Michigan, Justine told Dennis’s wife what she suspected.
“I’m late.” The two words were delivered in a monotone voice. Justine had slept with the unsuspecting Dennis twice. Now, for the first time since she’d first menstruated at the age of twelve, Justine’s period hadn’t come on time.
“Are you certain?” Precious asked.
Justine nodded. “I’ve never been late.”
“How late?”
“I should’ve gotten my period four days ago.”
Pacing up and down the carpet in the sunroom at the rear of the house, Precious clasped her hands together. She stopped, turned, and faced Justine. “I’m going to call my doctor and ask him what we should do next. Wait here, and I’ll be right back.”
Justine sank down to a cushioned rocker. If she was pregnant, then it was over. She wouldn’t have to endure Dennis Boone jumping on her, ramming his penis inside her body, grunting like an animal, then ejaculating before pulling outand instantly falling asleep. And she prayed that Dennis’s babywasgrowing inside her, if only not to sleep with him ever again.
Justine didn’t have to wait long before Precious returned. “The doctor said to collect your urine in a jar when you first get up tomorrow morning. I will take it to him, where it can be tested. Once it comes back that you’re pregnant, then I will make arrangements for you to be set up in your own place.”
