“Church?” I repeated, not sure I heard him right. “That her last name or her first name?”
“Her first name.”
I screwed up my face. I knew that black moms had the tendency to get creative when naming their children, but to name a girl child Church? I didn’t get it.
Lex kept talking. “You met Bright’s wife, right?”
I nodded. “Bailey? Yeah. She’s cool.”
“Church is her little sister.”
“Get the fuck outta here.”
He shrugged. “I wouldn’t hold ya. They got the same mom. Alisha. She’s married to Bayliss. And she got another sister that’s married to Beckham.”
My mind was sufficiently fucked up by that news. She had a mama and some sisters who were married to cousins of mine? Okay. “Why she come by the shop today? What was she dropping off?”
“Oh.” Lex smirked. “Her little, young ass is getting into her entrepreneurial bag. She bought a house with some apple trees on the property. Now most people would’ve thought to make pies or something. But nah. Church decided to use the apples to make hair care products.”
That was a coincidence because our family, the Sumners, had founded a hair care dynasty. Our family was the largest, most successful black hair care company in the Northeast, the Mid-Atlantic, the South, and the Mid-West until my grandfather sold the brand to a big corporation fifteen years earlier when natural hair came back in style.
Lex kept talking. “She makes a beard oil that almost all the shop customers swear by. I can’t keep the shit in stock, no matter how many bottles I buy from her.”
I nodded slowly. “Good for lil’ mama. She’s like a real businesswoman.”
Uzziah laughed at that. “She is . . . with her little fine ass.”
“She’s fine as hell. If she wasn’t so damn young, I woulda been tried it,” Lex admitted.
“How young is young? I ain’t as old as your old ass,” Uzziah joked.
“Shut your married ass up,” Lex told him.
“For real. How old is she?”
“Maybe twenty-five.”
“Shit, her brain fully developed.” Uzziah gave a smirk.
“And so is Paisley’s. You trying to have your wife on a murder charge?”
“Absolutely not,” Uzziah agreed. “Drop the subject.”
Shit. I was thirty-four. At twenty-five, she was probably too young for me, too. Besides, she’d seen me on my bullshit, . . . twice. Uzziah was right. We needed to drop the subject.
Chapter 3
Church
The following Saturday morning, I woke up giddy and with butterflies fluttering wildly in my stomach. After owning my own home for over eight months, my brother-in-law, Bright, was finally able to finish construction on it so that it was inhabitable.
After my breakup with Timi, I needed some place to live ASAP. It wasn’t like I didn’t have options. All three of my sisters and my mother lived within a ten- to fifteen-minute radius. But two of my sisters and my mother were married. I didn’t really want to crash at their houses. My oldest sister, Perkins, was single with three girls who adored their aunt Church. That wasn’t where I wanted to be, but it was where I stayed for the moment. After sharing a bedroom with at least one of my sisters my whole life, then living with roommates, then living with Timi, and then living with Perkins and her girls, I was more than ready for a place of my own.
When Bright initially showed me the home—where most people would’ve seen the terrible shape it was in, I saw what it could be. I made a lowball offer and couldn’t believe it when the sellers accepted it.
I bought the house right before winter got serious, so it sat for three months before Bright could even start on it. Five months later, it was finally ready. I took a quick shower and dressed in an oversized t-shirt and cut-off jean shorts. Once my hair was in a bun and covered with a bandana, I headed out.
I stopped by The Butterscotch Café to grab the breakfast sandwiches I ordered the day before and the boxes of coffee. I had a lot of people coming to help me move in and set up my house. The least I could do was feed them.
