“So…” I drag the word, waiting for Chad to say something but he just stares at me expectantly.“Are you not going to say anything?” I ask him, the silence in the room is so loud that I feel uncomfortable.“When did you stop taking your medications?” He finally speaks and I sigh lowly.“Come on, Chad, you know that I don’t take those things anymore,” I reply to him and he frowns.“What does that even mean? They were given to you for a reason,” He raises his voice slightly and I click my tongue on my teeth, making a small clicking sound.“I’m not sick anymore,” I argue back and Chad scoffs.“You had a breakdown at the mental hospital the hospital a couple of months ago, you literally just had a hallucination!” He argues back.“What the hell do you expect?!” I yell back at him and I stand to my feet while he remains seated. He looks so frustrated and annoyed that I am not taking my medications, and I don’t blame him, I know that he is just concerned.“I literally thought my best friend d
I walk out of the room and I can hear the footsteps of Chad coming after me. The air smells like bacon and that gives me the hint that James and Carlos are back from the supermarket. James’ favorite food is bacon, the man is in love with it. He eats it any time of the day, no time of the day stops him from eating it.I don’t know what triggered his obsession with it, but since he came back from the hospital after the explosion, he just fell in love with it.“Jen, we are talking, stop walking away from me,” I hear Chad’s voice and I stop in my tracks. I turn around and I face him. He has a firm frown on his face and he does not seem pleased by my response to him going to West Africa.The thing is, it is not about the location. West Africa, Liberia is an aesthetic place, but it is about the reason he is going there.“I have made my decision, Jen, and I am not changing my mind. I have always supported you and been there for you, even when you decided to sidetrack our plan a year ago to a
As the young man walks close to me, I watch his every move. He is trying to act all tough and masculine, but I could take all three of these men within a heartbeat.“I said that I want you,” He says when his face is only inches away from me.“Well, that’s sad, because I don’t. I am taken and I have a son, so I am no longer eligible to play games,” I smirk as I tell him bravely.We lock eyes and he starts a staredown, not blinking as each second passes. I indulge in his little game and I stare into his eyes. He has green eyes and due to the fact that he has not blinked in a few seconds, they are getting teary.“Damn, Lil mama, you are a tough one,” He says as he finally blinks and walks a few steps backward. I laugh at his response and his friends are laughing too.“Well…” I boast and he nods approvingly.“I like you, I like how straightforward you are, and you even have more balls than Zeke here,” He refers to one of his friends. The friend with a buzzcut who I think is Zeke, punches
“Why do you guys act like you don’t know me?” Rob gives his friends a wink and he then walks away from us, towards the very front of the line.“What does he mean?” I ask Zeke and Jeff, but they both shrug, letting me know that they have no idea what Rob is doing either.We all watch Rob as he finesses his way to the front of the line. There is a guard standing there and also a round-shaped lady. She is the one looking at everyone's tickets and allowing them to enter the cinema. It seems funny to me because so many people are out here and the movies have already started. Before half of these people get in, the movie might be ending already, so what’s the use?When Rob has finally reached the lady who is looking at other people's tickets, he calls for her attention, but from the looks of things, she is clearly ignoring him. He then takes out his ID and shows it to the guard next to the lady.The buff man takes it from his hand tentatively and his facial expression softens. He then taps
“Oh my gosh, Rob,” I say to him, and he nods nonchalantly like he just did not tell me something traumatizing.“I’m so sorry,” I say to him and he smiles warmly.“It’s okay, she is in a better place, I’m sure,” He replies to me.I really don’t know what to do since Rob told me something as personal as that.“Do you want me to take you home?” He suggests and I shrug.“If that is fine by you,” I reply to him and he starts walking, leading the way. I begin to walk and I follow him. As we walk side by side, I notice that Rob might be doing a lot of thinking. He is reticent and his facial expression is serious.After a few seconds of walking, he finally speaks.“Whatever you may be going through, know that it is temporary and will pass,” He tells me and I smile in response. He must be thinking of his sister.“Would you like to tell me about your sister? What was she like? If it’s okay with you, that is,” I say to him.“Oh, that’s fine. My sister was a beauty,” He begins and a smile creeps
“What the hell are you doing?” I ask her and she chuckles dryly. The guy standing next to her looks insanely nervous, and he is looking everywhere else but at us.“No, what the hell are you doing?!” Her voice is loud and demanding, only causing my anger to become stronger.“Even if I come home at two in the freaking morning, that does not mean crap! I am a grown woman and you certainly are not my father!” She yells in my face and if she wasn’t a lady and the love of my life, I would have smacked her hard across her face already.I scoff at her in response and she rolls her eyes.“Of course, you barely care for anyone but yourself, which is why you drove your own best friend out the door just because he wanted to be happy!” We are now in a full-blown yelling match and I can already hear footsteps. It must be James and Carlos coming to see what is going on.My words seem to affect her and she is left speechless. Although I am pissed beyond what I can comprehend, the look that crosses Je
It is the next morning and I am being taken home by James and Carlos; James is the one driving. We are almost at the compound and I have been very quiet. James keeps glancing at me, but I ignore him.I still can not believe that Jen pushed me down the stairs, I could have died. The doctors told me that I was lucky and if I had hit the ground any harder than I did, it would have been a different story. The reason that I was bleeding is that I had a concussion to the head, my head must have hit the marble tile at the bottom of the stairs real hard because I was even given stitches.“Would you like us to stop at the diner so we get breakfast?” Carlos suggests and a look of excitement crosses James’ face.“Yeah, that sounds like a brilliant idea. Isn’t that right, Robert?” James asks me.Both of them have to be joking or something, I have numb pain in my head due to my fall down the stairs last night, and Jen took my son to who knows where, this is not the time to go to a diner.“Take us
I like that I am finally talking to Chad, I feel like I should have done this sooner. Talking to him feels nice and refreshing. We have been talking for about half an hour and he has not even mentioned Jen once or asked how she is doing.I believe that he may still be hurt by their exchange a couple of nights ago, so I am treading carefully, trying not to mention Jen.“I want to invest the rest of the loan money in a business,” I tell him over the phone and he chuckles.“Why are laughing?” I ask him and he quiets down before speaking.“You did not loan that money, Robert,” He says to me and I feel my heart sink. How in the world did he know that?“And who told you that?” I ask him as I laugh nervously.“It’s no use playing dumb, I saw the check. It was not the bank you took the money from, the lady who bought your company gifted you the money,” He explains and I am left speechless. “How long have you known?” I ask him after a couple of seconds of silence and he scoffs lightly.“Two d
My eyes widen and I immediately try to open the door of the moving car so I can jump out but all the doors are locked. Adrenaline floods every part of my body, it is like it is all happening so fast and I have no control.“What are you doing? Stop that! Do you want to get yourself killed?” Russell shouts as Usman increases the speed of the car so jumping out would seem more painful to me if I decide to do so.“Stay the hell away from me!” I reply to him aggressively when he tries to reach out to me and he raises his hands in surrender.“Okay, okay,” He says and then he settles back into his seat.“What the hell is going on?” I ask after a full minute of silence. I am much calmer right now, I was acting out of instinct when I realized that the person that was sitting next to the driver was Russell.How is that even possible? Was he not in an induced coma a few days ago? “Are you finished with trying to jump out of a speeding car just to avoid me?” Russell replies to me and I hear Usma
“Natalie is smart, I will give her that. She had all the video evidence cleared before we could get our hands on it,” Taylor explains and I at everything else in the room but her.“May I ask, who are you professionally?” I ask her, and she smiles lopsidedly.“I work with the police department in Russia, I am the police chief,” She informs me and I nod slowly. “As I was saying, Natalie made the investigation a lot more difficult for us. Her skills in covering evidence are impressive, but I believe that she got some inside help,” Taylor continues what she was explaining.“And?” I beckon her to explain more. If Natalie covered up our tracks so well, how does she know that Natalie did it? That she was the one that pulled the trigger and not me.“I know you want to know how I know that she was the one who pulled the trigger, and I am going to explain just that to you,” Taylor tells me.“Okay,” I drag the word as I wait for her to tell me what she knows.“I am Russell’s third wife and it h
What in the world is happening? Why am I even being arrested? Even if this is about Russell Marshall’s investigation, the person they should be arresting is Natalie, I was not the one that shot the man in the head.“This has to be a joke, right?” Chad laughs but when he sees that the military guys are not even smiling, he realizes that this is serious.I gave the piece of document that they handed to me, I read it quickly and it authorizes them to arrest me, but what I don’t see is the charge.“Your hands, please,” One of the military guards says a bit softly and I do as he says. I place my hands behind my head and I hear Chad scoff.“Do you want us to do something?” The guards that we have at the entrance ask me but I disagree by wagging my head. It would only make things worse, from experience, going peacefully with the authorities is always the best thing to do.“I am calling Robert, and then the lawyer. We would get this settled in no time,” Chad tries to comfort me as he makes a
Yes, we certainly need to talk. I put Jake down from my arms and he protests that he wants to tell me secretly. James, Natalie, and Cara watch my exchange with him with smiles on their faces.“Okay, what is it?” I ask him as he gets close to my ear.“I love you,” He whispers in my ear and I can not help but smile. Some people say having kids is a nightmare, and the truth is that it is at times, but most of the time, it is the greatest joy anyone could have.“Mommy heats you right back,” I reply to him in a whisper, and he giggles before he runs onto James.I stand upright and I bid James and Jake goodbye as I join Natalie and Cara in the living room.“We have a serious hiccup in our plans,” Cara begins when we have all sat down on the couch.“I know,” I reply to her, and Natalie chuckles but I can hear the worry in her voice.“Of course you do, it is all over the news,” She tells me and I stay quiet, not knowing exactly what to say.“So what are doing?” Cara asks no one in particular
“What do you mean that he’s alive?” I ask Robert as he stands to his feet, he looks worried but that is in no way compared to how I feel right now. Gosh, does Natalie know this? I need more information.“Which news channel did you learn that from?” I fire another question at Robert, not giving him the chance to answer the first. “Here, take a look, it is all over social media, and all the big news broadcasters are airing it,” Robert says as he hands his phone to me. The last time I held it was when I found out that he was partially cheating on me.I can not say that he was actually cheating because he did not sleep with Amanda, but he did receive nudes from her and whatnot. In my book, that is cheating, but I am just going to call it partially cheating in light of what Robert and Amanda explained to me.But that is not the issue at hand right now, we have a huge freaking problem. I need to get dressed and let Natalie and Cara know what has happened.I take the phone from Robert and I
Some might say that we are moving a bit too fast, but I have known Robert for close to a year now. Still, it seems like such a limited amount of time to decide to spend your entire life with someone, but why wait any longer?Robert and I have had our fair share of storms and problems, but we have weathered everyone one of them, plus we have a great support system. Chad, James, Carlos, and Jake are sure to be there for us if we happen to begin to feel the storms of life raging again, and of course, we will.The amount of crazy that I have been through individually is insane, my entire life has been far from normal and I am starting to stop wanting normal. Besides, normal is a bit overrated. Marrying someone you have known for only almost a year is not very expected, or should I say, normal? But that is the thing, I am not normal and do not even want to be anymore.“Well?” Robert asks me as I drag my body off the unmade bed. He suggested that we should get married next week after I ment
I can not believe that this just happened, Robert proposed to me! This is amazing and I feel so good, but I also feel like this is too good and I don’t deserve it. But I am just going to sum that up as insecurity trying to present itself in the form of me not being worth it enough to get proposed to.After I said yes, I think Jake was more excited than everyone else. Chad and the others came out soon after and I have a strong feeling that they somehow knew that Robert was going to propose. Robert placed a very expensive ring on my finger and he rose from his kneeling, I placed Jake in the chair where I was sitting and Robert and I embraced. We then shared a kiss and everyone joined Jake as he clapped. As soon as the applause died, the rain ceased gradually and the sun began to shine through the dark clouds. It seemed too perfect that I literally had to pinch myself two times to make sure that I was not dreaming. Good thing I was not, because I would have been so mad at myself.We e
It is usually sunny here, but today is different, and besides, it is a Saturday. I think the weather chose the best time to be like this, I don’t have to drive Jake to school and I get to spend the entire day with him.Yesterday was so eventful, I had to explain all that happened to me in Russia to Robert, James, Carlos, and Chad about three times before they finally could grasp it all. I also had the responsibility of explaining why I have suddenly decided to trust and forgive someone that caused me so much trauma, Cara was quiet when I took my time to make them all understand that I have finally decided to bury the hatchet concerning what she did.I am not going to pretend like I don’t feel a stab of emotional pain when I look at her, but I am going to try my best to move on. I am currently sitting on the porch alone while listening to the beating of the rain on the ground and roof, it is very soothing and I have never felt so relaxed in my life. Everybody else is in the house and
I open the door of the house and I walk in as Cara follows behind me slowly and tentatively. We are out of Russia and in Cyprus, though only Cara came along. Natalie took a later flight because she wanted to come with Susan, her grandmother.It took us a couple of hours to fly from Russia to Cyprus, especially because I did not have my passport on me. Cara had to pull some strings and call in some favors at airport security, and to my pleasant surprise, it all worked out smoothly.“Are you sure that they would want to see me?” I hear Cara’s voice as we walk further into the house. Everything looks pretty much the same, but I don’t see anyone here. “Where is everyone?” I say to myself in a low tone as I continue to explore the house.Suddenly I hear heavy footsteps and I look toward the source, someone is walking down the stairs. As soon as the person's eyes meet mine, they stop in their tracks.“Whoa, am I tripping, or am I seeing Jen Davis?” Chad asks me and he continues his descent