AFRICAN AMERICAN ROMANCE: A Thug to Remember (Hood Alpha Male Pregnancy Romance) (African American Urban Contemporary Short Stories) (7 page)

“I hear he’s got the biggest cock in the whole city.”

I looked up at her, a little scandalised to hear that kind of language coming from the usually chaste girl, and waved her and Sam off. I’d had a good night, but there were other things that I was even more keen to do.

Swirling my last glass of beer around on the table, I tried to formulate a game plan. I had always been so confident and assured about my skills with picking up guys back in college, but how the hell was I meant to go about it here? I didn’t have that big reputation, and he was the one surrounded by adoring friends, not me. Or maybe they were clients? It was difficult to tell. The taboo nature of his career sent a shiver of excitement through me, even though I knew it shouldn’t have. He was bad news, but I wanted to hear him. Taking a deep breath, I had just about psyched myself up to go over and say hello when someone plopped themselves down on the seat opposite me. I lifted my head to protest, but was met by pair of startling familiar hazel eyes. Holy shit, it was him.

“Um…hey,” I nodded, thrown of my game by his approach. “I’m Renee.” I stuck my hand out over the table, and he took it, apparently charmed by my job interview flirting technique.

“Randy.”

“I know who…I mean…“ I stuttered over my words, not wanting to give away the fact that I knew who he was and what he did. Maybe he wouldn’t like me knowing?

He grinned widely, revealing a set of perfectly straight teeth, the kind that Beverly Hills women pay a pretty penny for. I noticed a slight layer of stubble on his cheek, and fought the urge to run my hand across it, suddenly desperate to feel it’s roughness underneath my fingers.

“Don’t worry about it. Pretty much everyone knows who I am. Hence…” he gestured at the bar, where his group of loud, excitable partygoers were chattering endlessly.

“Looks exhausting.”

“It is,” he pulled a face. “They’re all big into their coke, but it’s not really my thing.”

“You don’t…?”

“Unless we’re talking a Jack and Coke, I tend to avoid that kind of stuff altogether. It’s a waste of money and, anyway, I get to see how stupid people become when they take that stuff. It seriously isn’t pretty.” He shrugged. “Kind of put me off it for life.”

“Oh,” I replied, my mind reeling. For some reason, I’d imagined him engaged in every single stereotypical drug-dealer scenario- snorting cocaine of mirrors (did people even do that anymore?), his apartment strewn with glass pipes and rolling papers.

“So what about you?”

“Huh?”

“What do you do?” He smiled again, as if trying to encourage the words out of me. I wasn’t usually this useless in front of hot guys, but something about his power mixed with his disarming charm made it difficult to think straight. I didn’t think the beers had helped much, either, but then who was counting?

“I’m a student. I used to be a student,” I corrected myself. “I just graduated and moved in to an apartment up the street.”

“What did you study?”

“Marketing. It’s crazy-hard trying to find a job in this kind of climate, though, I’ve been looking everywhere.” I sighed, taking a sip of my drink.

“Marketing, huh? Maybe I could give you a job. You could come up with taglines and advertising campaigns for me.” His tone was playful, and I was once again thrown off by his demeanour. How could a guy this charming, this sweet, be a drug dealer?

“Hmmm, I’ll have to get back to you on that one. Though I’m not sure people need a reason to take drugs other than the fact that they need something to pose with on a Saturday night.” I realized what I’d said seconds after it came out of my mouth. “Shit, sorry, I didn’t—”

“No, really, it’s fine. It’s kind of nice to hang with someone who isn’t just looking for a few more pills to pop.” He threw back the last of his drink, then gestured towards mine. “Can I get you another?”

I glanced down at my almost-empty beer, swilling the last few dregs around the bottom on my glass. I kind of wanted to stay, but I knew I didn’t want to get stuck with his braying bunch of revellers. “Nah, it’s cool. I should probably be getting home now, anyway. I’ve got an interview to prepare for.”

He held his hands up. “Hey, work comes first. Can I get you to the door?”

Damn, he was such a gentleman. More than any of the middle class kids I’d dated for the last few years. I cocked my head at him, weighing up the pros and cons of what I was about to do in my head. Screw it, I thought, it wasn’t every day you met a hot, alpha, charming man-about-town, even if he was dealing drugs.

“Can I leave you my number?” I asked, my voice a little higher than usual. He looked taken aback, but kind of pleased.

“Course you can. Here, put it into my phone.”

He pushed his smartphone across the table towards me, and I tapped out my cell number then handed it back.

“Alright, I’ve got to go now. But you call me when you get a chance, okay? Maybe we could hang out somewhere a little less loud.” I was surprised at the brazenness of my words. I thought that level of flirting was saved for student bars.

He raised his eyebrows at me. “Will do, Madam.” He stood up, and placed a hand on my waist, guiding me to the exit. His fingers gently traced my skin, and I felt shivers travel from the bottom of my spine all the way up to my neck. His hand was warm and firm on me, and I could see a couple of girls shooting my jealous looks from the bar. I guessed that they were more likely hanging around him for his drugs than his sparkling wit, so I didn’t let them bug me.

Randy pushed opened the door for me, and, with one last grin, sent me off into the night. I wobbled slightly on my heels, pulling the ponytail out of my hair and letting it fall loose around my shoulders. Maybe it was the fact that I’d just given a drug dealer my phone number, but I was feeling a little more wild than normal.

When I got back to my apartment, I made up a box of Mac and Cheese into the microwave, and grabbed myself a big glass of water to stave off the hangover.

Had I seriously just done that? Much as it was kind of exciting to have brazenly hit on Randy, I wasn’t genuinely expecting him to call me. He was probably just looking for someone to flirt with, like me, someone he could just hit on for an evening for an ego boost. But who knows, maybe he would find my number the next day and call me up and…then what? I wasn’t sure how one went about actually dating a drug dealer, but I would be expecting champagne and limos everywhere we went. Or…or maybe just him. I had felt more than a little flicker of chemistry between us, although that could have been the beer or the atmosphere in the bar. I resolved to push him to the back of my thoughts until he gave me a reason not to.

When I woke up the next day, I was mercifully hangover-free, my body just a little achy from wearing heels all night long. Stretching my tired muscles, I yawned, and ran over the events from last night. When I remembered Randy, my stomach curled in on itself slightly, my body clenching with the excitement of what had just gone down. But, as I’d promised, I peeled myself from the covers and started prepping myself for an interview I had at Stone’s Marketing, a small but quickly growing copywriting venture uptown.

Dragging myself through to the bathroom for a shower, I allowed the hot water to wash away all my memories of last night, and click me back into professional Renee mode. The last thing I wanted was for the people I planned to work for to find out that I may or may not have laid in bed fantasising about a drug dealer and his alleged big dick.

The interview went well. Better than I expected, in fact. They were interested in my ideas, and it turned out that one of the people I’d interned for back before college had a senior position at the company. I was walking on air when I came out, trying not to let myself get too psyched about working with such a cool group of people before I actually received confirmation one way or the other.

Pulling my phone out of my bag to distract myself, I saw that the screen had lit up to show one message. Clicking it open, I didn’t recognise the number, but read on anyway.

“Hope ur interview went well. Great meeting u last night. Would love to get a drink soon. R x”

Holy shit, it was from him! I hadn’t expected to hear from him so soon, if at all. My fingers hovered over the keys as I tried to figure out what to type back.

“It went great, thanks. Cool meeting you too. When are you free this week?”

Not too keen, but pushing forward for an actual date. My head intervened for a moment, asking me what my new employers might think of me dating a drug dealer, but I shook my head. It was just like Thea said: plausible deniability. Maybe I thought he was just a cool, popular guy who happened to always be surrounded by coked-up party girls, apropos of nothing? I snorted at the ridiculousness of the thought. Yeah, like that would work.

Anyway, I wasn’t planning on running away and marrying this guy, just dabbling a bit in a dating pool that I’d left relatively untouched for the last few years. And hey, life is nothing without risk, right? I had to take advantage of the opportunity while it was in front of me.

My phone buzzed again, and I glanced down. One word lit up the screen: “Tonight?”

Hmm, maybe a little keen after all, Randy. I texted back, suggesting tomorrow night at a quiet, hole-in-the-wall bar I used to take all my first dates to downtown. It was the sort of place where he wouldn’t get recognised by potential future clients. At least, that’s what I hoped. He texted back minutes later, agreeing, and I dropped my phone back into my bag, satisfied. A great interview and a date with an alpha bad boy. Did it get much better than this?

By the time the next night swung around, I was genuinely excited. My stomach was knotted with nerves, a sensation I was not used to feeling as the queen bee of my college’s sexual scene. I had dressed a little more conservatively than I had on our first meeting. Now that I was looking at actually having a job, I wanted to be sure that I was projecting the right kind of “professional woman” vibe at all times and, hey, when else was I going to get the chance to wear that fantastic slate-grey pencil skirt with a retro Run DMC t-shirt? Slinging on a pair of heels and fluffing up my hair so it fell in soft waves over my breasts, I admired myself in the mirror one last time before I called myself up a taxi.

He was already there when I arrived at the bar, sitting with his drink in a small corner booth. He was wearing smart jeans and a crisp white shirt, and I was impressed at the effort he’d put in to make himself look nice. He strolled over to me and planted a soft, swift kiss on my cheek, sending my heart fluttering once again. The scent of his aftershave lingered on my skin.

“Renee! You look great. I’m so glad you could make it.”

“Great to see you, too,” I smiled coyly at him, heading towards the bar and ordering myself a rum and coke. I slid into the booth opposite him, carefully placing my drink down so it didn’t spill.

“So,” I nodded, trying to take in the situation in front of me, and not get distracted by his gorgeous cheekbones.

“So?” He asked, his voice raising as if he was asking a question.

“I guess I’m kind of curious as to what a guy like you is doing on a date with a woman like me.” There was no need to beat around the bush here, or to play silly games that would just lead us both down the wrong path. He was cute, I was cute, but we came from different worlds, and I wanted to make sure that he didn’t forget that important point.

He shrugged. “I’m just looking for people to hang out with who aren’t part of my normal social circle. You know.”

“And what is your normal social circle?”

He looked at me, his eyebrows raised as if to say “seriously?” “You saw them. Party guys, coked-out models, hangers-on looking for a handout.”

“There must be
some
decent people in…your industry.”

He laughed, a deep and comforting sound that made me crave more. “My industry. That’s cute. I’ll have to call it that on my CV when I’m looking for new work.” He sipped his drink. “And yeah, there are a few good people. But most of them would be good people to hang with even if I was nowhere near, um, my industry.”

My ears pricked up, holding on to a certain comment he’d just made. “New work? Are you looking for new work?”

He glanced away from me for a moment, as if considering what he was going to say next, then continued. “I guess, kind of.”

“Why?”

“I’m bored. I got a degree in business management a few years back, and I feel like I’m not really doing anything with it.” He corrected himself. “Well, not anything useful.”

“So…you’re getting out of the business?” This wasn’t what I had expected when I’d agreed to come out with him, I could tell you that for free.

“Yeah. Seeing all the college kids like you finishing up and heading out into the world to do something constructive always gives me a kick up the ass, but this year I think it’s probably best I actually do something about it. It’s dangerous work, and there are so many people I could hand it off to. Just leave it behind, you know?”

Wow. I struggled to take in everything he was saying. So my hot alpha drug-lord was actually just a hot alpha? This was some of the best news I’d heard all year. I nodded, trying to react appropriately to everything he was saying. “Yeah, of course.” I paused as a thought flitted across my mind. “Is that why you asked me out?”