He chuckles.
I finally pull my eyes from the ceiling and find him standing in front of a bottle of Jack Daniel’s I didn’t even hear him pull out his cabinet. I savor his confession and this new annoyance I have for Beatrice while he unscrews the top of the bottle and pours the liquor into a glass instead of one of those god-awful plastic cups.
“And Rasheeda? What about her?” I ask as he turns around, sauntering back to me.
His warm body falls back between my legs.
“Rasheeda?” he hums, bringing the glass up to his lips with the blunt still tucked between his fingers. “Rasheeda…”
“Y’all are probably around the same age, huh?”
He stares at me over the rim of the glass, taking a sip. “We are.”
“Y’all probably went to Wesley together, and she probably had a crush on you back then?”
He takes another sip, shrugging. “She did always used to pick me to marry when we playedFuck, Marry, Killin the back of math class.”
I double over laughing, ignoring the sharp pain in my side. “She wishes.”
“Ooh you a jealousandnosy lil’ something, huh?”
I roll my eyes. “You know she likes the idea of you more than she actually likes you, right?”
He pulls the glass from his lips and smirks.
“Because she doesn’t really know you—the real you. The you who’s scared of the rain, the you who doesn’t celebrate your birthday because you weren’t taught to, the you who likes Mr. Copeland’s German chocolate cakes,” I blurt, looking at his hard abs. “Deep down she just wants an inherently good man with clout to prove everybody who ever said she couldn’t get one, wrong. It’s an ego thing—some silly high school fantasy she’s fulfilling.”
I don’t know where the revelation came from, but it fell out without a stutter and made me feel rejuvenated rather than depleted. It’s only the second revelation I’ve ever had about a man. The first one was when I figured out AJ probably only knew how to love me in the same way his daddy loved his mama.
Rich lets out a low hum that makes me squirm. “You think I’m an inherently good man?”
“Yes,” I whisper, tracing that gash along his stomach with my eyes. “Smitty said you were a hell-raiser, but I don’t believe him. I’ve loved a hell-raiser, and there were times I couldn’t even look at him without feeling like I needed to run away, but I can’t run away from you.”
He reaches out, pushing at my wild baby hair with the back of his finger before snorting. “A’ight, that’s enough. Time to eat.”
“But—”
“But nothing. Drink this.” He pushes his glass toward me.
“But I don’t want that.”
I wanthim.
He pushes the glass to my lips. “It’ll make the food go down easier.”
The tart smell makes my nostrils flare, and I choke out a dry heave. “I hate brown liquor.”
“What you drink then? Cosmos?”
I laugh. “Cosmos? This isn’t some early 2000s rom-com. I like French 75s.”
“And this ain’t New York. You gotta drink something that’ll put hair on your chest—not that soft shit.” He smiles at me. “Now drink.”
“I need a chaser.”
“You tough. You don’t need no damn chaser.”
“I do.” I whine, eyeing the rim where his mouth had been.
