The Eleventh Commandment Read online

  Bo placed the toast on the island and then joined them. Once he sat down, Darius reached for his fork. “No,” Bo said, eyeing DJ as he took a piece of toast and tore it in half. “You’re going to grow up looking like either a chicken nugget, hamburger, or French fry because that’s all you eat.” After finishing a forkful of spaghetti, he added, “But don’t worry. You’ll be the finest chicken nugget the world has ever seen. In fact, that’s my new name for you: Nugget. You okay with that?”

  DJ was crazy about Bo, but in this instance adopted an appropriate look of chagrin before forcing out a begrudging, “Not really. I like DJ.”

  “What if I tell you that the next time you come over we’re going to create a special cookie and call it a Nugget, named after you. Would you be okay with that?”

  “Yes!” A pause and then, “To go with my Happy Meal, right?”

  They laughed and the conversation meandered from DJ’s lengthy dissection of the movie they’d seen the day before to Darius’s upcoming tour that kicked off with the musical benefit in New York’s Central Park. They made quick work of devouring the vittles and while Bo tidied the kitchen, Darius and DJ went to pack for DJ’s return to Stacy. As father and son chatted, Darius offered up a prayer of thanks that he and Stacy had been able to finally come to terms about custody. Because of Darius’s hectic schedule, DJ stayed mostly with his mother, but when he was available, Stacy never turned down a request from Darius to spend time with his son. Last year, DJ had even traveled to New York with Darius and Bo when they went to visit the extensive family Bo had there. Yeah, buddy, he thought as he watched his son zip up his Transformer-decorated carry-on, your life can’t get much better than this.

  “You ready, little man?”

  “Do I have to go home, Daddy?”

  Darius’s brows creased. This was an unexpected comment. He sat on the bed. “Don’t you want to go home and see Mommy?”

  “I want to see Mommy, but Tony’s acting funny.”

  Darius tensed. “What do you mean by funny?”

  DJ shrugged. “He just acts mad all the time and hardly plays with me anymore.”

  Darius relaxed. A little. “Aw, little man, don’t worry about that. Tony likes to play football, remember?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “He’s not playing right now and is probably a little upset about that. So just hang out with Mommy and give him his space, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  They walked from DJ’s bedroom back into the living room. Darius grabbed his keys from the fireplace mantel. “All right, Bo. I’ll be right back.”

  Bo looked up from the TV show he was watching. “Okay. You got a hug for me, Nugget?” DJ walked over and hugged him. “Okay, baby, hurry back.”

  As they walked out the front door to the Infiniti SUV waiting in the driveway, Bo went into the kitchen for a soda. Seeing a cell phone on the counter, he snatched it up, ran toward the front door, and opened it in time to see the brand new sporty BMW turn onto the road. “Darius!”

  But it was too late. Darius hadn’t heard him and, knowing how loud his husband played the car stereo, Bo knew why. He also knew that Darius hated going anywhere without his phone. He often even took it with him when he used the john. Oh, well. He’s just dropping off DJ. I guess he’ll live without it till then. Bo watched the car until it turned the corner and then walked back into the house. He was just about to set the phone down on the one-of-a-kind, stainless steel coffee table in front of him when it chirped in his hand. Someone had sent Darius a message.

  “Bo,” he said to the empty room, in a voice laced with warning, “you go looking for shit, you’re going to find shit.”

  But it was a temptation he couldn’t resist. He tapped the message indicator envelope. His jaws tightened when he saw the sender’s name. “Muthafucka, you are just like herpes. You won’t go away!” With anger mounting, he tapped the screen to open the message, and read it:

  Hey, Handsome: Heard the commercial where you’re going to be in NY on the 4th. Me too. Leave Bo at home and let’s do the town . . . and then each other. Let me know.

  “Oh, you’ve got this shit real twisted, nucka.” Bo scrolled to the beginning of the message thread and saw that there had been several. While most had come from Paz, there were some that had been answered. “What? An independent project with my baby providing the sound track? Oh, H-E-double-L to the muthafuckin’ no! You think it’s that easy? You think you’re going to dangle some money and take my man?” Bo’s ire now had him walking the floor, boxing with an imaginary adversary. “You mess with him, Paz, and that will be your ass. You don’t want none of this Brooklyn-born playa. You don’t want none. Of. This.”

  As soon as Bo sat down to plot out his husband-saving strategy, an angel landed on one shoulder and a devil made himself at home on the other.

  Angel: He didn’t respond to the flirtatious e-mails, only the business ones.

  Devil: But that don’t mean he hasn’t called him, or met him somewhere.

  Angel: Except for Stacy, in all these years, he’s never given you a reason to doubt him.

  Devil: He’s never given you a reason that you know of.

  Angel: Don’t make a mountain from a molehill, Bo.

  Devil: Today’s Mr. Cool, tomorrow’s fool.

  Bo jumped from the couch. “Both of y’all shut the hell up!” Walking to the back of the house to the great room where the bar was located, Bo made quick work of pouring a shot of Courvoisier and slamming it down. It felt so nice, he did it twice. “Think, Bo.” And he did, back to the days and months following DJ’s birth, and Darius’s dilemma about who the person was with whom he should spend the rest of his life. His heart had said Bo while his head had screamed Stacy and their newborn son. It had been one heck of a tug-of-war, but eventually soul mate love and Stacy’s histrionics had pushed Darius right into Bo’s waiting arms. Now they coexisted amicably—Darius, Bo, Stacy, and DJ. Tony, not so much. The gay couple was tolerated because Darius was DJ’s father, but Tony had let there be no mistake made when, during a visit shortly after he and Stacy married, he informed Darius and Bo that “he didn’t get down with anybody who got down like that.”

  Bo had retorted, “Then I guess since your wife’s baby daddy is gay, you’re not getting down with her?”

  Stacy’s intervention had prevented an episode of Fisticuffs, Beat-downs, and Curse-Your-Ass-Outs, but since that confrontation, Tony had refused interaction except when absolutely necessary for the sake of the child. Meaning that if he were home when Darius dropped off DJ, he’d eke out a “how you doing” and then promptly leave the room.

  No, Bo. Don’t be a bitch about this. Don’t make waves until you know for sure there’s another boat in your harbor. Plan of action decided, he picked up his phone, stored Paz’s number, and cleared the screen just as he heard Darius’s keys jingling in the door. Bo poured another Courvoisier, this time on the rocks, fixed Darius’s favorite drink, and walked toward the living room to meet him. Halfway there he changed course and took the drinks into the bedroom. He was too happy and life was too good for anybody to think for a minute that he’d give any part of it up. Couldn’t nobody love Darius the way that he did and when it came to this fact, Bo believed that he could show him better than he could tell him.

  13

  Nosy Nannies

  Frieda heard the doorbell ring. She wasn’t expecting anyone and assumed that Cordella would send whoever had the nerve to solicit at her doorstep on their merry way. Having decided to end the suspense in at least one area of her life, she was busy researching DNA-testing companies. Earlier, she’d retrieved a few hairs from the comb that Gabriel had recently used and had placed them in a plastic bag. Gabe looked a lot like her, true, but the “good hair” on his dome was not the product of a texturizer, conditioner, or either person listed on the child’s birth certificate. There were a couple of past partners whose genes could have been the source of that trait. She hoped it was Shabach, a multi-platinum gospe
l hip-hop artist—because in the event of a divorce, he’d keep the paper rolling—but it could be Gorgio, her former running buddy and casual sex partner for many years. Either way, a sistah had to know. Raised voices from the foyer area brought her out of her musings.

  The female voice was clearly that of her house manager, Cordella. “I don’t care what she told you. This is my place of employment and you cannot come strutting through the front door as though it’s your due. Why didn’t you call and tell me you were coming?”

  The mumbled male voice sent a squiggle through Frieda’s nana. Clark! She closed the browser of her latest search and made quick work of the distance between her shared office with Gabriel and the front part of the house. “It’s all right, Cordella. I asked Clark to come here.” Actually, she’d had no idea that her lover would show up on the front door of the home she shared with her husband but ... okay. Gabe was sleeping, his father wouldn’t be home for several hours, and it had been two days.

  “What?” Cordella looked at her with both scorn and skepticism.

  This witch has been tripping with me ever since I checked her about helping Gabriel get all up in my business. She made up a story on the spot. “The last time he was here he, uh, told me about a new computer program. I asked him to come over and teach me how to operate it.” The lie came so quickly and so easily that had she been more limber, Frieda would have patted her own back.

  “Forgive me, Mrs. Livingston, but I don’t believe it is proper that my son visit you in this way.”

  “And I don’t think it’s proper for you to question my behavior! Three months ago, when you needed to quickly get money to your grandchild, you didn’t believe it improper that I gave you an advance on your salary, and that your son came over then, did you?”

  “No, missus, I didn’t.”

  “Then don’t try and check me on what I do. Your son helping me is working to your advantage. Do you understand me?” Silence. Frieda took a step forward. “I said, Do. You. Understand. Me?”

  “Yes, Mrs. Livingston,” Cordella replied, hands clasped, eyes shifted downward. “I understand. My apologies.”

  “And just so we’re clear, I don’t need you reporting back to my husband about this visit, just like I didn’t need you running down my schedule to him before. If there is anything happening in my life that Gabriel needs to know, I will tell him.”

  “Mrs. Livingston, I simply told him what he asked me.”

  “If he asks you another question with my name in the sentence, you refer him to me. Okay?” Cordella nodded. Frieda was tempted to curse out the help, but considering the tongue-lashing in store for her lover, she chose not to die on this particular hill. Instead she fixed Clark with a pointed look and said, “Come on back to the office.” She turned and began walking, not waiting to see whether or not she was being followed. Her actions had clearly told him that he’d messed up. His obeying was a given.

  As dramatic a move as it was, it may have been worth her while to look back. Had she done so, she would have seen the daggers that Cordella was shooting at her back. Unfortunately, out of sight was not out of mind. She’d feel more than the tip of these knives before long.

  Frieda remained quiet until she and Clark had reached the office and she’d closed the door. Then she rounded on him like a boxer. “What the fuck are you doing?”

  “What? Me wanna see you.”

  Trying to not let that sexy-ass accent, those juicy lips, or the outline pressing against his shorts get her off track, she continued her line of questioning. “Coming to my house without calling first, and ringing the front doorbell? Have you lost your damn mind?”

  “Have you lost your nerve, woman?” Clark crossed his arms and anyone looking would have sworn that his chest grew another inch as he puffed it out. “You told me that you got it handled over here, that you were running things. Don’t look like it, the way you’re acting right now.”

  His audacity was as sexy as his accent. Standing in her house, in her office, reminding her of words she’d boasted and making her feel like she was on the defensive in the process. How did this script get flipped? Frieda didn’t know, but she was definitely getting ready to get the train back on track.

  “Look, you got some good dick, but it’s not the biggest one, the longest one, or the only one in LA. Don’t think I’m sprung on your ass, ’cause I can blink my eyes and move you to the left faster than you can roll a blunt.... Feel me?” Clark lost that extra inch of chest that it looked like he’d gained moments before. “Your boy Spencer was looking pretty good when we were at the club last week. Don’t think I won’t hollah at him. As you know, since I met you because your mother is my nanny, I don’t have a problem keeping it in the family.”

  Mentioning Spencer was like striking a match. Born only months apart, Clark had had a love/hate relationship with his cousin—feeling he’d readily take a bullet for him, yet kill him at the same time. He closed the distance between himself and Frieda in one long stride. “What the hell you telling me, girl?” he asked as he placed a viselike grip on her arm and pulled her into his hard chest. “He say something to you?”

  Umph. Ain’t nothing like a take-charge man. This type of delicious friction would never happen between her and Gabriel. He was too logical, too civilized. But this, this animalistic palpitation in the room, the sexual tension, the inevitable argument that precedes incredible makeup sex . . . only came with someone like Frieda dueling with someone like Clark. She knew this and, for whatever it was worth, Clark knew it too.

  “No, he didn’t say nothing. I’m saying that I might say something.”

  “Don’t push me, girl. . . .” Clark loosened his grip on her arm.

  Frieda took a step away from him. “You better check yourself.”

  “So what ... you kicking me out? You want this to be over? Or do you want me to”—he gave her the once-over while stroking his rod—“show you how to work that new computer program?”

  Frieda got to within inches of Clark’s face and dropped her voice to a low growl. “Don’t you ever come to my place again unless I personally invite you. Not to see your mother, not because you’re in the neighborhood, not for any reason. Do you understand me?” She pointed a finger in his face for emphasis.

  “I understand this,” Clark drawled as he tweaked the hardened nipple beneath Frieda’s strappy top.

  She cursed the spontaneous wetness that occurred in her panties at Clark’s touch, then swatted his hand away. “I’m not playing, Clark. This is my life we’re talking about.”

  “Your life . . . or your lifestyle?”

  “Whatever it is, it’s mine, nucka. You want to play with Frieda, you play by my rules. My way or the highway. Now which one do you want?”

  Clark’s response? Not a word. Just closed the gap between them with one step, and without breaking eye contact, wrapped his muscular arm around her waist and pulled her to him. It was a surprise move, and Clark swallowed Frieda’s gasp in a bruising kiss, forcing his swordlike tongue into her mouth in a merciless assault. She wore a twelve-hundred-dollar Mondo original, but Clark scrunched the skirt up around her waist like it had been purchased on the clearance rack at a garage sale. His hand found her booty and squeezed each cheek before pushing her closer, slamming her pelvic area against his massive hardness. Swirling his tongue inside her moistness, he walked them over to the large cherrywood desk that anchored the left side of the room. Pushing books, files, and medical periodicals to the floor, Clark lifted Frieda by her booty and placed her on the desk. He stepped between her legs, slid a finger up her thigh and began circling motions precariously close to her heat. The oral assault continued.

  Frieda shivered, totally caught up in the wave of feelings overtaking her senses. It was a heady combination of shock, anger, lust, satisfaction, and overwhelming need. For this. Sex. Hot, hard, and with Clark. A strand of her thoughts toyed with the question of what it was about this particular brothah that had her so twisted. A finger sliding betwe
en her drenched folds combined with a wet tongue creating a trail from her neck to her tank top provided a partial answer.

  “Why didn’t you call me back?” The voice was low, almost growling, breath hot and pungent—Newport Menthols—against her stomach.

  The words, or at least their sound, wafted between the haze of her desire. Huh? What? Did he just ask me a question? Does he actually believe I can think right—“Ooh.” He’d parted her paradise to slide a long thick middle finger inside.

  He slid his face closer to where his finger lounged. “Huh? Why didn’t you call me?”

  “Couldn’t,” Frieda panted as she grinded against his finger. Wait a minute. I’m in control, mutha—“Ahh.” His tongue had found out where his finger was hanging out.

  “When I call, you need to answer.” His breath teased the inside of her thighs. “You know who this belongs to.” As she spread her legs to allow better access, Frieda was vaguely aware of a knocking sound. It crept into her lust-filled conscience, a nagging distraction that gained in intensity even as Clark’s tongue strokes gained in speed. What is that? His legs against the desk? My head next to the ... no . . . wait . . . it’s the door! She placed her hands on the sides of Clark’s head, forcing him to stop. “Shh!”

  The knock again, followed by a rattling of the doorknob. “Mrs. Livingston, your husband is on the phone.”

  Damn! Thank God I locked that door! “Okay, Cordella. Thanks.” With both sets of lips quivering, Frieda slid off one side of the desk and wobbled over to where the phone sat on the other side. “Hey, baby.” Her voice was far more breathy than she’d hoped, but it was what happened when one was literally at the peak of orgasm, and then unexpectedly interrupted.

  “Frieda? What are you doing?”