Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 142866 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142866 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 714(@200wpm)___ 571(@250wpm)___ 476(@300wpm)
“That’s none of her business anymore.”
“Easy for you to say. You don’t have to work with her. You have nothing to lose.”
She turns and walks swiftly out of my reach and around the privacy screen. I step out, too, just in time to see her snatch up her clutch from the table.
“You’re wrong. About me having nothing to lose,” I say. “I could lose you.”
She glances up at me over her shoulder and says, “You’d have to have me first.”
Before I can respond, she strides to the door, jerks it open, and is gone.
CHAPTER 30
HENDRIX
This apartment has always been my haven, a place I can count on to retreat from the world when things get hard. But there’s no escaping the voice in my head calling me a fool. And no escaping the memory of last night in New York. The ghost of Maverick’s touch haunts me everywhere—kisses along my shoulders and tender brushes of his lips at the curve of my neck. His fingers threaded with mine while he made a mess of our kiss. Sloppy, greedy feasting; eating each other like a buffet.
As vivid as the memories of Maverick’s lovemaking are, they don’t eclipse the guilt I woke up with this morning.
Fucking a friend’s ex on her fortieth birthday? At her party?
But… are we really friends… per se? More like business associates. Acquaintances, even.
Didn’t she call you a friend last night? Are you saying that to rationalize your reckless, thot-ish actions in that coatroom?
I hate my inner voice sometimes. She’s such a bitch. Don’t let me get away with nothing.
But it is true that Zere and I are primarily business associates. It is true that I haven’t known her that long. And I have no doubt that Maverick was right and Zere and Charles probably screwed till the break of dawn.
Meanwhile, I’m here alone when there’s a magnificent, once-in-a-lifetime specimen of a man who wants me. A stunning billionaire motherfucker who donates millions to HBCUs, invests in Black businesses, and surfs.
Surfboard in my Beyoncé voice.
I flop back onto my bed and stare up at the ceiling. I caught an earlier flight out of New York. I hadn’t told Maverick where I was staying, but I didn’t think that information was beyond his reach. I didn’t put it past him to chase me down, so I got out of the city on the first thing smoking back to the A.
I roll onto my side and tug the waist of my silk pajama shorts down to expose the curve of my hip. Maverick left souvenirs, faint bruises where he held me so hard when he fucked me. I caress one smudge on my skin and moan, pulling my knees up to my chest.
I didn’t even tell Soledad and Yasmen I’m home a little early or that Mav and I smashed. They’re my best friends, but they will have questions, and of course advice—solicited and unsolicited. I just want a little time to process what happened.
What I did.
Is this a secret I’ll keep from my business partner forever? That I fucked her ex once?
Once? that inner bitch taunts. Like you wouldn’t do it again.
“Shut uuuuuuup,” I groan and squeeze my eyes closed tight.
My cell buzzes on the bed beside me with a call, and I glance over to see it’s the front desk downstairs.
“Yes, hello?” I sit up and push my hair back from my face. That wig is hanging in my closet and I washed my hair, which, after about fifty eleven products, blossomed into a big ol’ Afro.
“Delivery, Ms. Barry.”
“What is it?” I sigh and roll off the bed to check my reflection in the large mirror hanging on the wall. Pink silk lounge shorts and fuzzy slippers. I’m cocoa buttered and not planning to leave this place all day.
“Flowers again.”
“How many?” I ask, making my way down the steps and studying the empty surfaces in the living room and kitchen that were filled with Maverick’s flowers not long ago.
“Just one dozen this time, it seems.”
“Okay. Send them up.”
I hate that my heart is beating triple time at the thought that Maverick is still pursuing me, even though I told him to stop. Am I becoming that girl? The one who is coy with her refusal? Who says one thing and means another? Wants another?
I open the door to confront a bouquet of champagne roses so large it eclipses the delivery man.
“Thank you,” I say. “I’ll take them.”
He moves the flowers obscuring his face aside. Maverick staring back at me nearly pulls my heart through my chest. My shoulders go taut, and I steel myself against the way I melt a little inside at just the sight of him. Not speaking, I turn and head back into the loft.
“These are for you,” he says, placing the roses on my coffee table.