“The hat and nothing else?” I ask, even though I heard him loud and clear.
“That’s it.”
“You’ve got it, cowboy,” I reply with a smirk. “Let me shower and I’ll be right out.”
“Don’t take too long,” he says when I walk off.
As soon as I’m in the bathroom, I open my linen closet and grab my new soap. It’s perfect for tonight. Reece asked me months ago to make a seductive soap, an aphrodisiac bar. I’ve been playing around with it for weeks and think I’ve perfected the blend of lavender, jasmine, sage, and ylang ylang. I gave her two bars today at Jubilee and kept two for myself.
When I walk back out of the bathroom in my all-natural state, my body feels refreshed and soft and I smell like heaven. He’s leaned back on my bed and the television is on, but when he sees me, he sits all the way up.
“Damn,” he says and I feel the appreciation permeate my skin from here.
With a smile on my face, I journey over to him, grab the hat from his head, and place it on mine. I straddle him and his large hands caress my back. Then he grabs the remote and turns the volume up.
“Why’d you turn it up?” I ask.
“Because you are about to have a Merry Christmas and I don’t want Amara to hear you.”
Epilogue
about four months later…
“Meleck, stop giving me that coat. I’m not putting it on. It doesn’t go with my dress,” Amara scoffs for the fifth or sixth time and I just laugh.
“What? I didn’t catch that?” he teases while holding his left ear.
“Ugh! You heard me,” she says, fighting to hold her laughter in for the sake of her anger at him trying to cover her up.
I’ve been laughing at these two for the last hour. It’s the Spring Fling at Amara’s school and this year she has a date, not a date-date but a group date. She’s not old enough for that and I’m not ready for it either. She and Kimmie are going with two boys, Braisin and Troy, and Traci is dropping them off and picking them up.
Amara looks beautiful in her coral, sparkly, tulle dress. Her spaghetti straps have 3D flowers and the same 3D flowers are on the bodice. She looks stunning and she definitely doesn’t need a coat. It’s sixty degrees outside for one, and for two, any coat would cover up her cuteness.
“She’s going with some YN with one thing on his mind, she needs a coat,” Meleck tells me and Amara rolls her eyes.
“Braisin is not a YN. He’s a good boy. He’s a roper in rodeo and all he does is go to school, train, and work on his daddy’s farm,” I tell him, still laughing. I’m not worried about Braisin at all.
“Right. He’s not like that,” Amara insists.
“He’s a boy. They are all like that,” Meleck counters.
“Were you like that?” Amara snaps back.
“I’m going to have a talk with this lil nigga when he gets here.”
“Oh my God! Wren! Tell him he can’t. I’ll die,” Amara cries.
“Calm down. He’s not going to. I won’t let him. Go get your phone and see where Kimmie is and spray a little perfume on your neck,” I tell her and she walks out of the living room.
“Why you tell her to put perfume on?” Meleck says with a frown.
“Because she’s a girl and she should smell good. Stop tripping. It’s a group date. Traci is driving them and picking them up. She’s fine.”
“We should have chaperoned,” he says and I just shake my head.
I love Meleck and Amara’s relationship. He’s so protective of her, and although she’s fussing now, she loves his protectiveness. Whatever she wants, he makes it happen. He spoils her. He spoils me too though, and I love every second.
Talking to him that night in Forty Acres and inviting him to stay in my attic were two of the best decisions in my life. I brought a real man into our lives who fully understands that loving me means loving my sister. He supports me and her and we support him too. In six months, we’ve created a family.
