Page 22 of Creole Kingpin
“Not a fucking chance. Go to hell.”
I can’t help the smile that’s practically killing me to hide. “I’ll wait for you until they kick me out.”
She grabs the blunt, throws her head back, and that curtain of silky black hair goes flying as she bursts out laughing. “Try waiting fifteen fucking years, asshole.” Her mirth dies as quickly as it started, and she snaps her mouth shut. But she can’t take back what she said.
“You been waiting for me, mama? Because not a fucking day has gone by that I haven’t thought about you.”
After another deep drag, she puckers her lips again as she exhales, sending the cloud of smoke in my direction again. “I. Don’t. Care. And don’t fucking call me that. I’m nothing to you. Now, get the fuck out of my house before I shoot you.”
She lifts the shotgun as her amber gaze, a perfect match for the whiskey in the glass, spears into me like the blade that got her. She’s not fucking around, freshly painted walls or not.
“I’ll be waiting.”
She flips me off as she lowers the shotgun and reaches for the suture kit. I back away from the bathroom and show myself out of the house the same way I came in.
I’ll wait an eternity for you, Magnolia ... but I hope you don’t make me.
With a backward glance at the light coming from the top right window of the house, I blow her a kiss that she’ll never see.
Thirteen
Magnolia
As soon as I hear the door click shut, I drop my head back to the wall I’m leaning against. My heart hammers like I’ve just run ten miles from the cops.
Jesus fucking Christ. What is he doing here? He shouldn’t be here. Saying those things ...
“I’m here for you, Mags. That’s the only reason I’m back.”
His words wash over me before I can stop them.
I pluck the blunt from my mouth and clench my teeth. “I’m not drunk or high enough to have imagined that shit, am I?” I ask the empty room, and the lack of an answer tells me I’m right.
I lied to Moses. I have plenty to say to him. I’m just not ready to hear what he wants to tell me.Not at all.
Nothing he can say to me can make up for fifteen years of wondering why the fuck he never came back for me like he said he would. Fifteen years of knowing that it waseasyfor him to leave me behind. Fifteen years of knowing I wasn’t good enough for him. That I wasn’tworth it. That’ll fuck with a person.
“And how fucking dare he come back like this is something he can make right so damned easy?” I keep talking to the empty walls of my bathroom, but I wish there was someone to hear me. Even a fricking cat.
Maybe I should get a cat. A black one. Who hates men and has really sharp claws.
I set the shotgun down and reach for the bottle of whiskey. After a long pull, I nod to myself in the mirror.
Damn right. I’m getting a fucking cat. But first, I gotta sew myself up.
My hand is steady when I reach for the sutures and get set up. I sterilize the wound the best I can, and I go for it. As the needle punctures my flesh, I force my mind to go somewhere else. A trick I picked up at sixteen, when life on the streets should have killed me.
But instead of going to my happy place, it goes straight to the past ... and Moses.
* * *
Fifteen years ago
“You sure you know what you’re doing?” he asked as I pulled out the suture kit. The flashlight sat on the counter, reflecting in the mirror so I could see as much as possible.
I tilted my head at him. “You think I just keep this shit around for fun? Of course I know what I’m doing.”
“All right, mama. Then stitch me up.”
