Determining Possession (Connecticut Kings Book 3) Page 5

  “I should’ve called first,” I whispered to Naima. “I didn’t realize you had company. I don’t want to impose.”

  She sucked her teeth. “Oh please, Wil. You’re welcome to join us, we aren’t doing anything but kicking it. And besides – ice cream. These bitches aren’t about to turn you around. Hey ladies,” she yelled, and they all looked up from their conversation. “Wil is here!”

  She announced me like I was already part of their group, even though I wasn’t. They all lived here in Connecticut, and though I talked to Naima often, I didn’t physically visit enough to be welcomed into their fold. My other homegirls lived all over, so we couldn’t congregate like I knew Naima and her girls did.

  “Hey Wil!” Ashley waved, and I waved back as she stood to greet me. Cole and Margo followed suit, and Naima took the opportunity to make the introductions that hadn’t formally been made before.

  I scolded myself for the way my hands were shaking a little as I stood face to face with Margo and Cole, women who had the kind of respect in the sports industry that I dreamed about. They both brushed off the hand I offered, pulling me into hugs that weren’t unlike the one I’d gotten from Naima. I didn’t have to dig deep to surmise that those hugs were only partially “nice to meet you”. The other part was “Damn, it was jacked up what that man did to you for the world to see.”

  “I watch your show all the time,” Margo told me, making me blush.

  “Seriously?” I asked, and she gave me one of those half-nod, half-frown expressions.

  “Uh, yeah. Half the time it’s the only way I know what my clients are really up to.”

  “Same here,” Cole chimed in, nodding. “God knows you’ve kept me informed on JJ enough times.”

  “Jordan isn’t your client anymore, remember,” Naima teased. “That’s yo maaan now.”

  The women erupted in laughter, and I watched, enthralled, as the Cole Richardson I was used to seeing as ultra-professional, almost stoic, erupted in laughter like a schoolgirl. I – and everyone else – had seen Kendra Fulton’s “Love on the Highlight Reel” special about their fairytale love story after their unfortunate SuperBowl loss at the beginning of the year, but Cole herself had never been interviewed about the relationship.

  Hearing it from her perspective would be amazing, I thought. The struggle of the professional conflict, preserving her reputation, him maintaining his focus on the game. The ratings would be phenomenal!

  Stop it, Wil, I scolded myself.

  She was hanging out with her friends, relaxed, happy. It was so far from appropriate for me to be thinking about her “story” that it was a little shameful. I smiled along with the rest of them, and mentally put my “journalist” hat away.

  “Speaking of,” Cole said, “Ashley, I really need you to get him before I kill him. He picked me up again yesterday, when he knows better. Can you impress upon him that if he wants to play next season, he has to heal first, and he’s not going to be ready to get through training camp if he’s not taking it easy. The man acts like a broken collarbone is a damn scratch.”

  Ashley gave her a sympathetic smile. “I can try, but… I’m not his therapist, Rebecca is. Have you tried talking to her?”

  Margo laughed. “No, are you trying to get your coworker killed? Cole hates her.”

  “That’s not true,” Cole shook her head. “I don’t hate her, I just recognize her for what she is, so I don’t respect her.”

  “And what is she, Cole?” Naima asked, clearly amused. “Drop knowledge.”

  “She is exactly the kind of disrespectful, sorry excuse for a woman who thrives on getting dicked down by involved men. I don’t know why it’s so appealing to her, but she’s screwed half the team. If she wasn’t good at her job, we’d be rid of her ass, cause it’s not a good look.”

  “Involved black men,” Ashley amended Cole’s description of the physical therapist in question as we gathered at the patio table to dish out the ice cream. “Only ever the black ones. It’s weird.”

  Margo chuckled. “It’s not weird. Fetishization of Black sexuality goes back to the beginning of time. She’s chasing down her “Black Bull” porn stereotype. Let her be. They’ll learn.”

  “Nobody is bothering that girl,” Cole argued, then took a seat with her bowl. “Like I said, as long as her job is done within the team quality standards, I have nothing to say about her employment. I just warn my players to be careful where they’re putting their dicks.”

  “That’s the key,” Margo agreed. “Wrap it up with a condom you provided, make sure there’s no boyfriend involved, make sure you aren’t being set up, and the list goes on. I never have to give these warnings to the women or the gay men. The rest of these folks though…” she let out an exasperated sigh, then shoved a big spoonful of ice cream into her mouth.

  There were a million ways this conversation could be labeled “problematic”, but they were clearly speaking the truth as they knew it, from their inside vantage point of this world. It may not have been politically correct or pretty, but… it was real.

  So I stayed quiet and ate my ice cream, grateful that through my connection to Naima, I was privy to a conversation like this in the first place.

  “So, Wil…,” Cole started, and I nearly jumped out of my seat. “A little birdy told me that From The Sidelines is angling for exclusive access to the Kings this season.”

  I swallowed the ice cream in my mouth. “Oh, um… that’s really Ramsey’s thing, with his “Overtime” specials.”

  “Mmmm,” Margo groaned. “Ramsey Bishop. That is one fine little man.”

  “Little?!” Naima laughed. “That’s so shady, that man is not little. He’s average height for a running back, right Cole?”

  She nodded. “He’s actually almost tall for a running back. He’s what, like five-nine?”

  “Yeah,” I added. “We’re almost the same height. And Ramsey is like… solid muscle. Thick solid muscle.”

  “See?” Naima teased, nudging Margo’s chair with her foot. “Always calling somebody little cause you’re a damn Amazon woman.”

  Margo shook her head. “Ladies, let me clarify – I wasn’t complaining. Y’all can have these seven and eight foot tall men – that extra height usually comes directly from their dicks, and I don’t have the time.”

  “Margo!” Cole shrieked, then broke into laughter that infected all of us. Margo wiped tears from her eyes before she spoke again.

  “Tell me I’m lying!” she challenged. “I mean, sure, there are outliers, and the guys in the lower end of the six foot range are typically working with something. But hand over my heart, anything over six and a half feet… gain an inch of height, lose an inch of dick. Tell me I’m lying!”

  I was laughing too hard to get any words out, partially because in my brief period of sexual exploration before I started dating Darius my sophomore year of college, my experience matched what she was saying. It must have been true for Cole too, because she was wiping tears of laughter from her eyes as well.

  “Come on Naima,” Cole said, nearly wheezing with laughter. “I know you tried a few before you dove into the lady pond full time…”

  With her hand over her mouth, Naima scowled at Cole and Margo for a few seconds before she couldn’t hold it anymore, and burst into laughter again. “I swear I can’t stand you Margo,” she screamed, still giggling as she fell back into Ashley’s lap on the oversized ottoman they were seated on.

  “See?” Margo said, nodding as she pointed at each of us. “It’s true. And come on – going back to Ramsey, the man’s nickname is goddamn Sledgehammer! What does that tell you?”

  “Oh my God,” Cole yelled. “He got that name because an opponent said getting tackled by him was like getting hit with a sledgehammer. It is not about his dick!”

  “How do you know?” Margo challenged, barely keeping a straight face. “I’m just saying, I don’t think God would do him like that. A nickname like sledgehammer, with a small dick. That doesn’t even
match. Wil!”

  My eyes went wide at the sound of my name, and I looked up from my bowl to find all four women looking at me.

  “Give us the scoop girl,” Margo said with a smirk. “Does the dick match the nickname?”

  “I have no idea,” I stammered immediately, truthfully, and I’m sure my face was probably bright red. I’d definitely heard rumors, even before we worked together, that his nickname was definitely bedroom appropriate, but… Ramsey was my coworker, and my friend, and I had a man with enough dick. I wasn’t trying to think about Ramsey like that.

  “So you really haven’t slept with him?” Margo continued, only to be scolded straightaway by Naima. The instant shift in Margo’s expression confirmed her sincerity when she told me, “Oh, shit, sorry! I’m so sorry, I got a little carried away. My bad.”

  I closed my mouth from where it had dropped open in response to her question, and nodded. “Uh, no worries. But, to answer your question, no. Nothing has ever happened between us.”

  “Why the hell not?” Ashley muttered, clearly louder than she intended from the way her eyes bugged out when everybody’s attention shifted to her. But, she shrugged. “Sorry, but I’m just saying. If I were you, I’d definitely be exercising my temporary hoe-pass.”

  Cole’s head tipped to the side. “Do lesbians do post-breakup hoe-passes?”

  “Yep,” Ashley and Naima said in unison and then Ashley added, “I was dancing on a bar at a go-go club when I met Naima. Hoe pass. But back to you,” she said, turning to me again. “How are you holding up?”

  “She doesn’t want to talk about it,” Naima sang, but I shook my head.

  “No, it’s fine.”

  Naima and Ashley were family, and Cole and Margo were cool enough that it didn’t bother me to come right out and say, “I’m… not holding up. I’m pissed, and I’m lonely, and I’m hurt, and… right now, I’m just hoping that I don’t snap if I see him or her in public. He had the nerve to try to pull rank with me, I guess. Talking about some goddamn “are you really going to throw away eight years?” I cursed him out and hung up.”

  “More than his ass deserves,” Margo replied, reaching out to squeeze my hand. “I’d still be somewhere under the bed right now, so I admire the fact that you’re even upright.”

  “Only because of Ramsey.” I regretted those words as soon as they were out of my mouth, but the women didn’t seem moved to tease me about it, turning it into something it wasn’t. So I continued. “I mean, it was my own choice to go back to work, and my mother didn’t particularly like it, but I couldn’t sit around the house wallowing. So I’m trying to get back to life, as much as I can, which includes working out sometimes with Ramsey. The other day, he was like… you have to always be moving forward, working towards being okay even if it’s not immediate. So… I’m trying.”

  “He sounds like a good friend,” Cole said, and the rest of them nodded. “That’s great advice.”

  “Yeah.” I stirred the melted ice cream in my bowl for a few seconds. “He invited me to a wedding. The Bailey wedding.”

  Cole reared back, and then shook her head. “Okay, nope. I take it back – not a good friend. Why the hell did he invite you to a wedding, so soon after…?”

  “Because I want to go,” I countered. “I love weddings, and any other time, saying yes would be a no-brainer. Part of moving on has to be not avoiding things that I enjoy, things that make me happy, just because of this situation with Darius.”

  Naima pushed out a sigh. “You don’t think it might be a little too soon for that though, Willy? Like… there’s no way it’s not going to be hard as hell to watch their special day when you didn’t get to have yours.”

  “Maybe so,” I agreed. “But… it could also be pretty cathartic to watch it happen for someone, even though it didn’t happen for me. I gotta be honest - right now… I’m not feeling particularly optimistic about love, which isn’t like me. So maybe going could be the little jolt I need to… I don’t know. Put me back on track.”

  “So you’re thinking about dating again?” Margo asked, and I shook my head.

  “Hell no. No time soon. I was with Darius eight years. I spent the first few chasing and meeting my Olympic goals, and finishing college. Then, I spent time trying to nail down a career, and establish myself there. While being somebody’s girlfriend and fiancé. I’ve pretty much always had to consider him, instead of being able to just… focus on me. So that’s where I am on a personal level with that. I just don’t want to be cynical.”

  Margo nodded. “I understand. You want to believe in love… just not ready to be in it.”

  “I guess you could put it like that, but really… I’m still in it now. You can’t be with someone that long, and just turn the love off. That’s why it hurts so much, you know?”

  “All too well,” Naima agreed. “But… like Ramsey told you: You gotta keep moving towards being okay. And, he probably knows, right?”

  Right.

  It hadn’t even been six months since Ramsey lost his mother, and he’d been handling it with a strength I wouldn’t be close to capable of. He’d been different since then – a little quieter, more… serious, sort of. I didn’t really know how to explain the change, and I wouldn’t call it negative at all. He was just… different. But somehow, still the same.

  “Is this line of conversation blowing anyone else’s ice cream high, or just mine?” Margo asked, and I shook my head.

  “No, you are absolutely not alone. I’d rather talk about literally anything else.”

  Naima nodded. “We’ve got you boo. One thing these heifers aren’t ever short on is a line of conversation.”

  “Damn right,” Margo added. “As a matter of fact, let me tell you what I heard about America’s lil’ favorite light-skinned basketball player.”

  “This has to be a joke.”

  “It’s not a joke.”

  “Forty-five hundred American dollars a month?”

  “Forty-five hundred American dollars a month.”

  “For this?”

  “For this.”

  “No.”

  “Yes.”

  “You’ve gotta be shitting me.”

  I managed to clamp my mouth shut after that slipped, not letting out the longer stream of curses I wanted to – not in front of the realtor. My eyes slid over to Naima, whose expression mirrored mine. We were in agreement – this was some bullshit.

  Maybe I’d been spoiled – okay, I’d definitely been spoiled. My parents had a thing about paying my expenses through college, and as my years at BSU came to a close, I started getting serious about my Olympic training. They paid for my expenses through that too. Their investment netted four Olympic gold medals flanking my high school and college diplomas on what they affectionately referred to as the “honor wall” in their home.

  From there, I’d moved in with Darius, who I’d been dating more than four years at that point. It was his place, so he insisted on paying for it, and a year later, we bought a house together.

  I had money, that wasn’t the issue. I’d just never had to spend it to live on my own. And now that it was imminent, I couldn’t help thinking – this is bullshit.

  It wasn’t that anything was necessarily wrong with any of the apartments we’d seen. A studio in Harlem, a one bedroom in Park Slope, the one with the great hardwood floors in West Village. They were all perfectly fine. I just refused to pay so much for the spatial equivalent of a goddamn matchbox.

  It was damn near as much as the mortgage on the house with Darius, which would be on the market as soon as I could help it. Yes, we were out in Kensington, and had to drive into the city, but at least we had room to breathe, a yard, privacy, and a kitchen that could hold more than a week’s worth of food.

  I pushed out a sigh, shaking my head at the tiny, beautiful Chelsea apartment we were currently viewing. Maybe I was going to have to adjust my expectations to make this happen – and soon. I loved my parents, but I was too damned old to be ge
tting my covers snatched away by my mother as she declared there was “No good reason for a grown woman to be in the bed past eight in the morning.”

  As if I hadn’t gotten my heart yanked out of my chest barely two weeks ago.

  “Maybe we’ve seen enough for today?” the realtor suggested, in a tone that vaguely suggested we’d wasted enough of her time. Luckily for her potential commission, I agreed. We’d looked at nine different apartments, none of which moved me, so regrouping was probably for the best.

  In my hand, my phone started buzzing, and I excused myself when I saw Ramsey’s name on the screen. While Naima talked to the realtor about setting up another time to meet, I stepped into a “bedroom” that was barely bigger than my current closet to answer the phone.

  “How is the apartment hunt going, Champ?” he asked, as soon as I said hello. “You got us a place to watch the game yet?”

  I shook my head, as if he could actually see me. “No, unfortunately not. I swear it’s like this realtor is committed to showing me the least bang for my buck.”

  “New York is just expensive as hell,” he laughed. “Glad I bought my spot when I was young and impulsive and a fan favorite. Signed jersey and a slice of pizza with the owner’s kid knocked a hundred thousand off the asking price.”

  “Lucky you.”

  “Could be lucky you. I’ll be a fair landlord, promise.”

  My eyes went wide. “Wait… so you decided? You’re going for it?”

  “Don’t get excited,” he warned, with a chuckle. “I’m still considering. Today I’m eighty-twenty. Tomorrow might be a forty-sixty day.”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know why you keep going back and forth about this, Ram. It’s heavy on your mind for a reason. I think you should go for it.”

  “If I do that, where does it leave you?”

  “Don’t worry about me,” I countered. “We’re talking about your passion, dude. Doing the show is cool and all, sure, but we both know it’s in your blood.”