Page 30 of Forced Matrimony With An Unhinged Menace 4

I apologized and he didn’t want to hear it. If he wanted to be hard about it, stay distant, I could match that same energy right back at him.

I got his card and told his ass that we wasn’t about to be sitting in the house all day. He told me that I could leave, but security would be with us all day. I didn’t care. I was about to blow a bag and relieve some stress at his expense.

When Nariyah walked inside and spotted Nyla standing in the kitchen, she took off running straight for her, little legs moving fast, wrapping both arms tight around Nyla’s neck the second she reached her.

“Are we having a girls day today?” she said, practically bouncing on her toes with excitement. “Is River coming too? Cause now I’m feeling like one of the big girls for real.” She smiled, and her little face was so beautiful.

“She can come,” Nyla said, laughing, hugging her back just as tight. “Let me call her up right now. We need to go do some shopping today, get ourselves pampered a little bit. Especially since Princess Nariyah is gracing us with her presence this morning.”

“Tatti,” Nyla said, catching my eye over the top of Nariyah’s head. There was a knowing look passed between us without either of us having to say it out loud. “I’ma let y’all talk for a minute. I’m gonna go call River right quick.”

She slipped off toward the back, her phone already lifting to her ear, giving me and my daughter the room we needed.

Nariyah settled herself down on the couch, and I gently reached over and had her pull them headphones off her ears, set that iPad down flat on the cushion beside her so I had her full attention.

“You know I love you, right?” I said, sitting down close beside her, taking both her small hands into mine, feeling how tiny they were compared to mine. “I need to talk to you about something real serious right now. Something real important. Okay?”

“Yes, I know you love me, and I love you too.” she said, crossing her little legs underneath herself, looking straight up into my eyes with an intensity that damn near broke me apart right there before I even got the first real word out. “And okay. I’m listening.”

I took a breath, steadying myself.

“When I was a teenager,” I said, my voice already shaking bad, “I got pregnant with a baby. I loved that baby so much, from the very first second I found out. I wanted her so, so badly, more than anything I’d ever wanted in my whole life up to that point. But I was told by every single adult around me at the time, that I wasn’t ready to have a baby. That I was too young, that it wasn’t the right time, that it would ruin everything.” I had to stop for a second, catch my breath. “And as much as I loved her, as much as I fought for her, I wasn’t allowed to keep her. I had to give her away. But every single day since then, every single one, I thought about her. I made sure I stayed close to her, even when I couldn’t tell her why. I made sure she always knew who I was in her life. I made sure she always felt loved by me, even if she ain’t understand the full reason behind it. My whole life since I’ve had to give her away has been real sad, cause I been missing a whole piece of my own heart this entire time, and all I ever wanted, every single day since, was my baby back with me for good.”

“Don’t cry, Tatti,” she said, leaning forward fast, reaching up with her small hand to wipe a tear off my cheek before I even fully realized it had fallen.

That gesture alone nearly broke me completely.

“I don’t want you to be mad at me, okay?” I said, my voice cracking apart worse now. “I need you to really try and understand what I’m telling you right now, cause I still gotta tell you the rest of it. The most important part.”

She went quiet, watching my face closely, waiting, her little brow furrowed like she was already piecing something together in her mind before I could even say it out loud.

“Are you trying to tell me,” she said finally, her own voice small and shaking now too, “that you’re really my mommy?”

The question hit me like a ton of bricks.

“Cause I already kind of knew it, in my heart,” she continued, not waiting for me to answer yet. “I hear my momma, I mean, Shantel, talking about it sometimes on the phone, when she don’t think I’m listening. I always hoped it was true though. I always hoped, every single day almost, that one day you’d come get me, let me live with you all the time, and we’d get to have every good day together, not just visits and stuff.”

Tears were streaming down her little face steady now, matching mine.

“So if I am your mommy,” I said, barely able to push the words out past the lump sitting in my throat, “you won’t be mad at me? For not telling you sooner?”

“No,” she said, shaking her head hard, fast, a real smile finally breaking through all them tears on her face. “I’ll be so, so happy, Tatti. For real. It might be a little hard for me to remember not to call you cousin at first, my mouth might mess up sometimes out of habit. But I’ve always wanted you to be my mommy. Always. Even before I really knew why. I’m sorry you couldn’t keep me as a baby. But now, we can make up for it. Will my other parents be okay? I know they’ll miss me. But I want to be with you.”

I pulled her into my arms right then and held her tight, tighter than I think I’d ever held anything in my whole life. I told her that everything would be okay and that I didn’t need her worried about anything. Both of us crying now, all them years of silence and secrets finally blossoming into something real between us, something honest, something nobody could ever take back from either one of us again.

I looked up over the top of her head and saw Nyla standing there in that doorway, her phone hanging loose in her hand, tears running steady down her own face watching the two of us love on one another. This talk went so much better than I ever could have imagined.

Soon as I left from dropping Nariyah off, I had just merged onto that highway and my phone rang. Mars was calling me back.

“Aye. I’m following the nigga right now,” he said, I could hear the road noise loud behind his voice. “He went in that house with bags, then came out damn near running back to his car. What you want me to do?”

“Drop me a pin to where you at,” I said, gripping that wheel hard, my knuckles were damn near cracking. “Don’t let that nigga out yo sight for one second.”

Mars sent that pin over, and I followed it, pushing that truck harder than I probably should’ve on a highway this busy this early in the morning. At first I was twenty-three minutes out, according to the map. I put my foot down and prayed we ain’t get pulled over. Right now, I had a gun on me still smelling like fresh gunpowder from Mallory, and I could not afford for no cop to run into that this morning. It was a brand new body on that bitch and that’s the last thing I needed to go down for.

At the same time, I couldn’t afford to lose this window on catching up to Demon either. Not after everything this nigga had done, and the ways he tried to cross my family. Today was the end of that shit. You could mark my words on it. This chasing niggas around the town ain’t ever been my game. He was getting put down like a dog today.

My mind was running fast, faster than the truck even. Twenty four hours ago, I ain’t have no brothers other than Zaire and Namier. Now I was just supposed to accept that I had another one. A nigga that had put a hit on my full blood brother, kidnapped my mother, kidnapped my stepdaughter, and way more shit.