“I bet.” His eyes dropped to my mouth. Quick. Then back up. “I can tell you been through some things.”
My throat got tight. “You don’t know anything about me.”
“Not yet.” He smiled. Not the smirk—something else. “But I’m patient.”
He stepped past me onto the porch. I let myself breathe.
Then he turned back, walking backward toward his car.
“I’ll be seeing more of you, Mehar.”
It wasn’t a question.
“That right?”
“Mm-hmm.” His eyes held mine. “Count on it.”
He slid into a red Porsche Panamera and pulled off.
I stood in that doorway way too long. Watching his taillights until they disappeared. Then just standing there like an idiot, staring at nothing.
His cologne was still in the hallway.
I looked down at my hand. The one he touched.
I rubbed my hands together, annoyed at myself.
Get it together, Mehar. You don’t even know this man.
But I wanted to. That was the problem. The way he looked at me—like he saw who I was NOW, not the broken girl who showed up eight months ago—made me want to show him more.
And that was stupid.
I knew what happened when you let a man see too much. Ahmad taught me that lesson in blood and bruises and years I wasn’t getting back.
But Thad wasn’t Ahmad.
Thad was something else.
I walked back into the house. Closed the door. Locked it. Stood there in the quiet, heart still beating too fast.
I’ll be seeing more of you, Mehar.
I didn’t know why those words stayed with me. Didn’t know why I was still thinking about the way his eyes dropped to mymouth. Didn’t know why his cologne in the hallway made me want to open the door again.
What I did know was this:
Thad was trouble.
And I’d never been good at staying away from trouble.
4
PRIME
All we got was five months of peace before the universe said “nah, nigga—you thought.”
Five months of waking up with my Goddess pressed against me, her belly getting rounder every day with my seed growing inside. Five months of watching her frost cinnamon rolls with that little smile on her face, flour on her nose, looking like everything I never knew I needed. Five months of me putting shea butter on her skin every night, talking to my baby girl through her mama’s stomach like she could hear me.
