Page 50 of Creole Kingpin
Keira.Thank God.
I tap the screen and lift the phone to my ear. “Hey, Ke-ke. What’s happening?” My voice sounds as close to normal as I can manage under the circumstances.
“Oh no, you don’t. You’re not going tohey, Ke-keme, Mags. What in the hell is going on? My husband just told me I need to be ready to stand up with you at yourwedding.”
Oh. Fuck.
So much for a life raft. This will be more like the Spanish Inquisition. While part of me says I’ve got no one but myself to blame for the fact this conversation is happening right now, the rest of me knows Ido,in fact, have someone else to blame.Moby.
My scowl focuses on Moses, and it’s fueled with so much frustration, I’m surprised the skin doesn’t melt off his face.
His grin just widens, and I can feel the vein throbbing in my temple.
I pop out of my chair, mouthing, “I’m going to kill you,” and stride for the door because I won’t spend another second watching him stare at me with a silly smile on his face while life as I know it changes completely without my consent.
When Keira speaks again, her tone is shrill, but in an excited and wildly curious way that only best friends take with each other. “Mags? I can hear you breathing, damn it. You can’t dodge the question. What in the hell is going on?”
Through my grinding teeth, I reply, “Hold on. I’m going outside. I don’t want to talk about this in front of him.”
“He’s there?Right now?”
The squeal in Keira’s voice threatens to blow my eardrum clear out of my spinning head, and I hold the phone out a few extra inches as I step into a meager patch of shade.
“He’s inside. We just had coffee.”
“You had coffee with him?”
Spinning around, I face the street and sigh. “If you’re just going to repeat everything I say, this conversation can be cut a whole hell of a lot shorter.”
“Oh, shut up. I’m the one who just had to hear from my husband that my best friend has some long-lost love who’s back to claim her, and this blast from the past wants tomarry her. What in the actual fuck is going on?”
I clear my throat as I form an answer that will be brief enough to wrap this up quickly, and sufficient enough that she doesn’t feel slighted by me. “One. He’s not my long-lost love.” I roll my neck as I speak, not liking the flutter in my chest when she called him that. “Two. He’s ... fuck, I don’t know what he is. A mistake. The sort I thought was never coming back. If I had, I would’ve told you.”
She’s calmer now. “When did this start?”
I pace a few steps and then back to the cover of shade. “Katrina. You were away. It wasn’t something I was bothering you with back then. Just like your husband shouldn’t have bothered you with it now.”
“Uh. No, bitch. Back up right there,” she says, attitude clipping her words.So much for defusing the situation.I can practically feel Keira get pissy again at my statement. “He absolutely should’ve bothered me with it, because I hear you right now. I hear that tremor in your voice. You’re freaking the fuck out, and you didn’t even think to call me for help? Or does that only apply to me? I call you with my problems, but you don’t share yours with me?”
Keira hits me hard where it hurts, because ... in a way, she’s right.
She’s my best friend. The girl who refused to snub me, no matter what people had to say about my reputation. She even defied her own mother when she told her she wasn’t allowed to speak to me again. Keira Kilgore Mount is one of those good humans you count yourself lucky to know, and I’ve always wondered why she stuck by me. I sure didn’t always deserve it.
“Magnolia.” Her voice sounds less self-righteous when she says my full first name to break the silence hanging between us.
“I can’t ask you to carry my burdens, Ke-ke. It’s just different. You know that. There’s no way in hell I could’ve laid it on you. I wouldn’t.”
She’s quiet for another moment, and when she speaks, her irritation is gone just as quickly as it came. “You don’t have to protect me anymore, Mags. You know that as well as I do. You could’ve told me about him. That’s all I want you to know.”
These damn emotions of mine are all swirled up again. “Jesus Christ, you’re gonna make me fuckin’ cry on the damn sidewalk. You’d think I’m a fourteen-year-old girl with how fucking mixed up I am right now. I don’t know which end is up or what the fuck to do about this man. I just ... fuck me, Ke-ke. I never saw this coming. Not after all this time.”
“Oh, honey. I’m so sorry. I should’ve started with—how are you?”
I chuckle at Keira and her manners. “To tell you the truth, I’m not sure how to answer that question.” I lean against the building and release a long breath. “He’s got me so damn confused. I don’t like how I fucking feel.”
“How’s that?”
“Like I’m losing my grip on control, and I can’t have that.”
