WTTW- Frisco SNeak peek 2 (unedited)

He opened the door to the lounge for me and urged me to walk in front of him. It felt like every eye was on me, but I knew they were looking at him. He held his hand out and let me sit down first. I eyed him as he sat down and he looked at me, smirking.

            “What? Why are you looking at me like that?”

            “I didn’t think you were a gentleman.”

            “What did you think?”

            “Well…”

            “Exactly. You want some hookah?”

            I nodded my head. The little buzz I had, had worn off. He waved a guy over and he ordered it for me. He put his arm on back of the couch.

            “Come over here. I’m not going to bite you.”

            “No. I don’t want people to think that I am on a date with you. I just want us to look like two old friends catching up.”

            “Uh-huh.”

            “Yeah, uh-huh, you still ain’t told me about that girl that came up to us with those bright eyes.”

            He squinted me. “Us?”

            “She walked up to a pair of people, so I could characterize that as us. Do you agree?”

            “I could.”

            “Oh, so…” I paused, waiting for him answer, but he didn’t.

            The confusing look on my face, made him smirk.

            “So, what do I have to do to get you to go on a date with me?”

            I shook my head. “Nothing, especially after you told me you what you told me outside.”

            “You asked though. Why would you ask a question you don’t want to know the answer too?”

            I shrugged my shoulders. “I mean… I don’t know.”

            “Why that question though? There are millions of other questions you could have asked me. Why that one specifically?”

            I looked him up and down, dressed in all black, looking so fucking handsome. His black jeans and long-sleeved shirt hugged his muscular body. Two perfectly placed gold and silver diamond Cuban chains hung around his neck, including one that he had tucked on the inside. Even under the blue light in the lounge, the diamonds around his neck and in his ears sparkled, but his eyes sparkled brighter.

            “Answer me honestly, Yakima. You can always be honest with me.”

            I swallowed. “Honestly, I don’t know. I mean, when you hear people—my dad, speaking about you the way he that does, I just don’t imagine the person to look like you. That’s all.”

            He licked his lips. “How do I look to you?”

            “Oh my God. You know you fine. Uggh. I hate when niggas be acting like they don’t know they fine.”

            He smiled.

            “And that smile is so wicked and vicious. I really can’t take it.”

            “I tell you what, if I can make you smile five times over the course of us talking, then you have to let me take you on a date.”

            I immediately relaxed my lips, making him laugh.

            “You so cute.”

            My lips spread across my face.

            “One,” he said with a wink and a click of his teeth.

            I gasped. “Wait. No. No. Let’s start over. You caught me off guard. I didn’t agree to that. I didn’t know we started yet. We hadn’t started yet, Francisco.”

            “Alright. We can start over, but I’ll keep that one as a freebie on the chart because when I get to four, if, and that’s a strong if, I need that freebie, I’m going to use it. Is that cool?”

            I shook my head. “No. If that’s how you run your businesses...”

            “It’s not. I gave you a choice. I run a dictator ship.”

            “Of course, you do.”

            The host brought over my hookah and lit it for me.

            “You want some food? Drinks?”

            “Not right now. How old are you? You look so young,” I said referring to his baby face, with only a light shadow of a mustache.

            “Thirty-six is young, nigga.”

             “Wow. I don’t know how old I thought you were. I’m twenty-seven.”

            “Oh, that’s what’s up.”

            “You don’t think I’m to young for you?”

             I pulled on the hookah and blew some smoke toward him.

            “Did you ask that doctor that?”

            “What the… wait, why did you ask me that? Did he say something to you?”

            “No. I’m just not a damn fool, Yakima, and I’m a great observer of people.”

            The way he says my name.

            “How did you pick up on it? Oh God, I hope other people haven’t picked up on it.”

            “The way he looked at you. The way you talked to him. The pinches of the needle got harder. You still fucking around with him?”

            “No. God no. He was married, but I didn’t know it. His wife is in the military. I was humiliated and no one even knew about it except my friends. Never doing that again. He was slick too. Taking me everywhere, okay. Buying me everything. Best ten months of my life. And I was even more pissed at myself because I said I never wanted to be the girl who fucked her superiors. Caught me slipping two years in.”

            “Well, when you know better, you do better.”

            “You know what… as smart of a remark that was, I am going to eat it, because you’re right. Now, tell me why you down here in Ridgeville bothering me? And how did you find out where I worked? You don’t think that’s weird?”

            “You and I made eye contact at my party, and then you broke into my house, and then your picture was the first one I seen when I clicked on the hashtag. I said the third time was a charm and then I found myself scrolling the whole timeline of one, @TallEbonyKim and it was the best decision I’ve made in a long time.”

            “Oh my gosh, Francisco,” I said, not being able to contain my smile.

            “I believe that’s one.”

            “Fine. I’ll give you that one. You won’t get another one.”

            “Uh-huh.”

            “You still ain’t told me how you found out where I worked?”

            He sighed and pulled his phone out of his pocket. He played around on his phone for a second and then turned his phone toward me. It was an article in the Ridgeville newspaper about the emergency response team that helped during a twenty-car pile-up. A picture of me and one of my coworkers was on the front page. I was so damn mad about that picture because I was looking a damn mess, but I did save five lives that evening.

            Air was starting to fill into my cheeks so I could keep myself from smiling.

            “Oh, looks like you want to smile for me.”

            I shook my head.

            “Give it to me. Let me see it.”

             I covered my mouth and laughed. “Oh my God. You’re so stupid, Francisco.”

            “Yeah, and that’s two.”

            “Here I was thinking that you had like an assistant who is great at hacking and now you have some super file on me or something. Isn’t that how most killers operate?”

            “You keep mentioning killers, you trying to become one?”

            I shook my head so fast. “No, I am so scary. I’m just very inquisitive by nature, an avid overthinker, if you will.”

            He nodded his head. “I can tell.”

            “You’re a great observer of people, I know. Mr. Francisco Matisse. I like that last name, but would you be offended if I asked you if you were Black, Black? Like two Black parents.”

            He laughed. “Nah. Every now and then, the sins of my great, great, times three—I think, if I’m remembering correctly— Italian grandfather comes through in the genes.”

            “So, in the grand scheme of things, you’re Italian?”

            “No, mam.”

            “Can you speak another language?”

            He nodded his head. “Not fluently, but I can understand fluently. I can hold a conversation though, in both Spanish and Italian.”

            “Wow, that is so cool. Well, I guess you would need too, since you gotta take small crop-dusters to Mexico to pick up your drugs and stuff.”

            “That is hilarious, and I think you watch too much TV, Sweetheart.”

            Ugh, I hated that he was becoming more attractive to me. I felt myself getting ready to smile, so I blurted out, “I’m going to go use the bathroom.”

            “I ain’t going nowhere,” he responded.

            My cheeks warmed, so I hurried to my feet and headed toward the bathroom. The whole time I was using the bathroom, I kept smiling, hoping that I’d be all smiled out by the time I got back to his section. After washing my hands, I refreshed my lip gloss and left the bathroom. As I got closer to the table, my stomach fluttered as he watched me, with a slight smile on his face. When he ran his tongue over his bottom lip before pulling it in between his teeth, my cheeks nearly lifted off my face.

            “Yeahhh, that’s gotta be four, five, and six right there.”

            I playfully rolled my eyes while shaking my head. “What, no. And you skipped three.”

            “You think I didn’t see that smile before you went to the bathroom. Don’t play with me. You playing so hard to get and that’s so fucking sexy.”

            I rubbed my lips together.

            “And you have a pretty dimple. Four. What you like to eat?”

            He licked his lips, prompting me to look away from him.

            “Honestly, I like a little bit of everything The last good meal I had was some lamb. It was covered in some type of sweet sauce, maybe.  I can taste it, now, it was so good. And then I had some really good crab cakes too. I can’t even remember the restaurant I was at; it’s been so long since I been out on a date… at a five-star place, that is. Me and my friends go out all the time.”

            “And why is that?”

            “Well, I been working so much lately and hadn’t had a chance to meet anyone that I can take seriously. I can almost always tell from one phone conversation that it won’t even make it to an official date. I hate to sound…” I shrugged my shoulders. “I don’t know. I am super picky... like Laila says that’s going to be my downfall, but I’m just twenty-seven, and I still have a whole bunch of time left before I have to lower my standards a bit.”

            “What makes you picky?”

            I thought about it for a second.

            “Well, you know what. I wouldn’t say picky. I would say that I cut men off for any little thing in the beginning, like worrying about my money, cut. Worrying about other niggas complimenting me in my comments, cut. Any little thing I notice that could lead to problems later, I block.”

            “Good. That’s not picky. That’s knowing what you want, and you want a nigga to step to you correctly. Ain’t nothing wrong with that, I respect it.”

            I couldn’t hide my smile.

            “Shit. I don’t even know what number we on now.”

“Whatever. Anyways, did you really cut yourself to get my attention? How did you even know that Dr. Boston would call me when you said that you wanted the best nurse in the building to do your sutures? I have so many questions.”

            “Of course, you do. How often you be in the Ville?”

            “Not often. Every time I’m in the Ville nothing but bad shit happens. You need to get control of your city. I should be asking you to replace my window that got shot out when I was down there years ago.”

            “Years ago? You just gon’ blame me for every lil’ thing that happens there.”

            “I think I could.”

            “And why is that? Because of what your father told you or what you think you know about me?”

            “It ain’t what I think, Francisco. People literally raided your house. They don’t do that for nothing.”

            “You sure about that?”

            The way he eyed me, had me confused about what I thought. I hated that he looked so… so… so innocent, but, he’s not. I knew he wasn’t. Before I could respond, my phone rung in my purse. When I saw it was my dad, I blew a sigh of relief. I also took that as a sign to get away from him before I got too comfortable with him. That had to have been the charming ways my father talked about.