Page 64 of Rich and Rotten

Tatiana

“Been That Way” by Bryson Tiller

I sat in bed with a glass of wine on the side table working through the night. It was a little after ten when I finally washed the day off my body and climbed into bed. My fingers glided across my keyboard like butter on toast as I confirmed a few meetings like it wasn’t the early hours of the morning.

My digital clock slowly waited its moment to turn four o’clock. I continued to work as I listened to my favorite Pandora channel lowly, careful not to disturb Nazira while she slept next to me. She randomly had those nights when she wanted to be close to me, and I never fought her on it.

There would come a time when all she wanted was time away from me, so I soaked up the moments where she just wanted to be my baby. I smiled at her as she made a little snorting noise. Lightly brushing her hair from her forehead, I placed a few kisses on it before shutting my computer down and climbing out of bed.

My alarm would soon ring, reminding me that I needed to work out before my day started. Routine was what kept me in order, so I tried hard never to stray from the routine that helped with mourning the death of my husband.

Lately, my workouts were less about routine or my late husband and more about Nazir Kane. I was trying to work out to forget about the night we shared a few weeks ago. I wanted to desperately forget that night. Like our last night before he left, that night was now forever etched in my brain.

The way he catered to my body, reminding me how much he loved and missed me. Reminding me that no other man would make me feel this way. Even with Karim being dead, I felt guilty because he had never been able to get that kind of reaction out of me.

Karim and I had a healthy sex life, and it was amazing. However, it wasn’t like what I expected with Nazir. Years later, and this man still owned my body, and he knew it. When he pushed inside of me, he knew that he controlled me. I was torn between hating it and loving it all at the same time.

Aside from never being able to sleep much, I was becoming frustrated with my realtor about the second location. After seeing the location before Vegas, I knew I wanted it, but he hadn’t moved on giving us any more information on it. He was using the excuse that he was out of the country to hold us off.

Rex thought Yaya was beautiful, so she was always able to get anything out of him with a simple bat of her eyelashes. I knew things were bad when he wasn’t answering the call for her. This second location for Hush was so important to me because it would bring new energy. It was something Karim would have wanted for me, and I always wanted to make him proud. Our Greenwich location generated a lot of revenue because so many people traveled to us. With a location right in the city, I knew the buzz would be everywhere.

I quickly did my morning routine and changed into my workout clothes. Instead of going to work out with Yaya this morning, I was going to work out in the home gym. I didn’t need her pressuring me to talk about what I had going on. All I needed was to run on the treadmill with my headphones and thoughts.

I grabbed my phone and headed downstairs to the kitchen to grab a smoothie from the fridge. My body froze when I saw Nazir sitting at the kitchen island with a bowl of cereal.

He spotted me and continued to eat his cereal. “Good morning, Mrs. Kane.”

I paused, trying to decide if I had heard him correctly. He surely didn’t call me Mrs. Kane, and he wasn’t eating my expensive protein cereal out of a mixing bowl. I had to be dreaming, because that wasn’t what was taking place right in front of my eyes.

“Nazir, what are you doing in my home?”

“Security, Tata. Emilio been working around the clock, and the nigga needed a break.” He shrugged like this wasn’t crazy.

“I…I don’t even know what to say,” I stammered, no longer concerned about the smoothie I couldn’t wait to have seconds before. “There are other members of security that could have filled in for him.”

“Why the fuck would I do that when it’s a man’s job to protect his wife?”

“What the fuck? Nazir, you sound crazy.”

He shrugged, getting up to put his bowl in the sink. “Nah, I sound like a nigga that had some of the best pussy and ain’t letting up on it.”

I stood by the fridge, and he moved closer to me. My legs wanted to move, but they were stuck like they had been glued down.

“It was just sex, Zir.”

Nazir looked down at me, holding my chin between his pointer finger and thumb. “Not even you believe that shit, Tata. All that whimpering you were doing as I fucked you hard enough to let you know I’m back, but gentle enough for you to know I missed you…us.”

A small moan escaped my lips. “Zir—”

My phone ringing interrupted the moment, and I wanted to kiss whoever was calling me. I removed myself from him and went to grab my phone from the end of the counter. Rex’s name popped up on the screen.

“Hey Rex,” I answered with a shaky voice, trying to control myself and slow down my breathing.

“Um, hi, Tatiana. Is it a good time?”

“Yes, the perfect time. What’s going on with the location?”

Rex sighed, which was a sure sign that something was wrong. “It was sold, Tatiana. The buyer offered above asking and didn’t want to send in an offer. The seller went with it and didn’t consider our offer.”