Part 12 (1/2)
reminding you to do the right thing without making you angry. I held her place, because she wasn't supposed to do that for you, then. She had to remain a virgin. And not just s.e.xually. You wanted her to stay pure and separate from that part of your life. But not me.”
”Oh, baby... listen...” Carlos said softly as tears rose to her eyes. He wanted to hug her so badly that his arms ached.
”Com'ere. It wasn't like that.”
”I'm infected” she whispered, hugging herself. ”Dirty.”
”I'm immune,” he said quietly.
Slowly Juanita filled his arms with quiet defeat.
By instinct, he stroked her hair as she laid her head against his chest, and he could feel her holding back an intense sob as she breathed in stilted shudders.
”I held her place in your family, Carlos. She was supposed to be rising in her career as a singer and out slaying demons. I wasn't supposed to be anything special. But you needed someone there to look after your momma and grandmom so you could go out into the world and become all that you are now.”
He nuzzled her hair, remembering how good it smelled, what it felt like on his face when it spilled forward to wash him in silk.
The debt burden on his shoulders increased by another soul weight and made him kiss her temple. ”You are special... your heart is one of a kind.” He let her go slowly because there was more than her soft sighs that he also had to remember. He watched her draw away slowly and lean against his Jeep again, hugging herself to replace the loss of their embrace.
”Jose is a lucky man. Not many get to go back to a woman like you and pick up where he left off.” He raked his hair to give his hands something legitimate to do.
”I know... but, after time and distance, and things happening... sometimes the heat can change.”
Her statement was too profound, and his strange curiosity about the inner workings of the female mind drew him.
”I hear you,” he said, ”but, after y'all work through the changes, you can get that back, right?”
”I don't know,” she said, pure honesty threading through her voice as she hugged herself tighter. ”Sometimes, it's like we'd never been apart, and then there's this wall of private experience that we've had in between, and we can't share that with each other, so... it creates a... I don't know what it creates, but something always gets lost in that in-between. Am I making sense?” She was making more sense than she could ever know. He nodded and sighed.
”Then, I guess you have to work on creating something new.” He glanced back at the house and then at her. ”If we hooked up again, we'd have that black box, too. Comprende?”
Juanita looked at him, an old blaze smoldering and consuming her eyes deep within her irises. ”Yeah. I know. But... I remember too much sometimes...” Her husky voice trailed off as she stood straighter and pushed off the Jeep. ”What am I supposed to do with that?” Her gaze trapped his mouth, and then sought his eyes. ”Or, let me ask you... What do you do with that?”
Carlos swallowed hard and found the tree line. ”I tuck it away in a black box in my head, 'cause I love my brother, and ain't trying to hurt n.o.body ever again in life.” He folded his arms. s.h.i.+t. He shoulda said because he loved Damali... why hadn't that come out of his mouth, too?
”You're right. Guess I was just tripping down memory lane because my man came in this morning with the wall, and I knew where he'd been.”
Now she had more than his full attention. His line of vision snapped away from the tree line and captured her eyes. ”Talk to me, 'Nita. For real.”
She shook her head. ”It's my trip, not yours. Go to L.A., be safe, and when you get settled, let everybody know you're all right, cool?”
She came in close to him and planted a soft kiss on his cheek, and then brushed it away with a featherlight touch of her fingertips.
”I'm crazy, Carlos, to think I might be in love with two men at the same time. You're right. He's the one, now, I guess, and always has been. Forgive me for trippin' out here tonight.”
He could only stare at her. Women could do that? Be in love with two men at the same time... beyond s.e.x, heart deep, like that? Part of him was oddly jealous. It was an ego blow to know that someone else had taken his place so thoroughly, so completely, to be equated with the singular love that she'd always had for him alone. Now, he had to share that-even though it was the right thing to do and made sense.
He battled with his irrational feeling as he moved away from her. His emotions were all jumbled, but they were what they were.
True, he'd wanted her to be happy with somebody new... but not totally to the point where it eclipsed him. The whole conflict was also doing weird things to his libido. Right now, looking at her, remembering, thinking too hard, he was almost ready to ask her to go with him to L.A.
”Your eyes are glowing silver,” she finally said with a smirk when he'd offered no comment. ”I suppose it's time for me to go in the house.”
”Yeah, baby. Go back in the house. I'll watch you to be sure you get in safely.”
She didn't move for a moment. ”Remember that night you called me out of the house and I came to you?”
Again, he didn't answer her, shame halting his words. How could he forget calling her past his mother and grandmother's prayer barriers for what might have been his first real throat feeding? He didn't want to ever have to remember that or ever think about that.
”My soul knew what you were then, and it didn't matter,” she said in a breathy whisper. ”At that moment, I wanted you so badly that I would have been with you no matter what the final consequences.”
She allowed her words to fall between them in an open offer. He knew what she was saying, just like she did. The ball was in his court.
”Go in the house, Juanita,” he whispered, but not as firmly as he should have.”Your eyes haven't glowed for anybody in a long time,” she said as she brushed past him, allowing the body contact to linger before they parted. ”I'm flattered that I was the one who brought the silver back. I didn't mind being her placeholder. Ever.
Thank you for that.”
”De nada,” he murmured, and watched her leisurely stroll down the path and up the steps, her round backside sashaying as she sauntered away.
The screen door slammed behind Juanita and snapped him out of the trancelike sensation. Carlos opened his Jeep door with care and slid into the seat and started the engine. Instant images slammed into his brain in jagged still frames as he backed out of his s.p.a.ce and pulled onto the road. A Navajo blanket covered his woman. Male hands ran down her arms and made her s.h.i.+ver.
A mouth nearly caressed her throat. Her eyes closed. He could feel the desire thick and hot within her. She laughed from way down in her soul-someone had made her laugh and had filled her with sudden joy, even with everything going on. He could taste iced tea in his mouth. Her eyes opened wide with surprise and also disappointment. Her ache to be touched by this intruder was palpable. He could feel her body sway to the invitation. The male smelled like Ivory Soap.
Carlos gripped the steering wheel. If he'd known all that, then fair exchange was no robbery-he should have told Juanita to get into his car. She had every right to be salty, if all that had gone down right under both of their noses. He'd been blind, but women always had superior second sight. He owed Juanita for that, now, too. Once again, girlfriend had had his back... like Damali should have, but didn't.
Yeah, he knew the blanket that rested on Damali's bed; it was the blanket that had made him sick, it was so hot... the bed that she couldn't get into with him... the blanket that she slept beneath each night... fibers that were alive with another male's energy.
Juanita didn't have to say a word. He knew the Ivory Soap and the scent that went with it, and the brown eyes that drank Damali in. Juanita's touch had transmitted that knowing to him... as did her sad agony for having to still compete-when Juanita shouldn't have had to compete for anything or anyone at this point. Just like he shouldn't, and Yonnie shouldn't.
This was beyond f.u.c.ked-up.
She took her time going out onto the back deck, sensing her environment, fully alert to possible danger. But she would not live like a prisoner behind locked windows and bolted doors. The dark side would not be allowed to take her freedom; otherwise she might as well be dead.
When she got outside, she flipped on the floodlights, needing illumination. The darkness had become suffocating around her. She carefully set down a bag of Red Sea salt close to her. By rote, she began to work her body, hoping that would bring clarity to her mind.
Her daily routine of exercise had been destroyed over the past months, and she wanted to regain all that had been disrupted in her life. Tonight she needed clear vision. There was only one way to achieve that; suspend all personal problems and then home in on a solution. She hadn't even been able to focus enough to raise an audience with the Neteru Queens.
Anything close to normalcy, in her abnormal world, was a soothing dream that they all clung to. Just like the holiday seasons were always celebrated the same way; no store-purchased gifts, only one handmade or self-made item given from the heart to each member of the house. The rest of the giving was for the community, spreading love and cheer, and offering helping hands to less fortunate people they'd heard about or seen on the news. For them, that was normal. She and the Guardians had their own rituals and ways to give thanks. Like Shabazz had always said, it was imperative to keep a routine, stay focused on one's blessing, lest one's spiritual, mental, and physical muscle give way to flab.
Her mind was muddled, her spirit was sagging, and it wasn't about letting the body go to pot, too. The trinity worked as a unit.
Personal gratification, personal problems, all that needed to be sublimated for something greater than herself.
Damali propped her feet up on a deck chair, her boot toes slightly bent. Her face repeatedly neared the wood planks, her left arm behind her back, her full weight on her blade arm-then she slowly stroked the muscles, made the burn work sinew in her upper body, torso, shoulder, stomach, and back. She needed her blade arm strong and readied at all times, whether Madame Isis was still with her or not. She needed Carlos, whether he was with her or not.
”Twenty-two, twenty-three, twenty-four, clear the mind!” she shouted, keeping time with the one-arm, military push-ups. At fifty, she switched arms, blew stinging perspiration away from her nose with a puff of breath, and began again.
Her body was in tip-top condition, so this sagging libido thing had to be a function of her mind. But why? Minor spats be d.a.m.ned. He was right. She shouldn't have been feeling this way. But her gut was rarely wrong. Lack of trust had been a shadow around her every time Carlos came near. Without that, she couldn't relax. If she couldn't fully relax in his arms... But that made absolutely no sense. What about him was not to trust? Even if it was some temporary infection... they were supposedly both immune.
She'd trusted the man when he'd become a vamp. Had trusted him with her throat and her very life. Had entrusted her family's safety with him. Now this?