No One in the World (5 page)

“This is something I have to think about. Will you at least allow me time to do that?”

“Yes. But we're on a deadline, remember. You turn thirty-four in less than a month.”

Feeling burdened, I downed the rest of my Scotch. “Is there anything else?”

“Actually, Cobi, there is.”

“What is it?” I said, not liking the grave tone of my sister's voice.

“A young man visited me today. He said he was doing a college internship at the DA's office. Do you know a twenty-year-old by the name of Kendrick Dunstan Wilshire?”

I felt myself becoming lightheaded. I reached for something to hold on to, then answered, “Yes, I know who you're talking about.” The moment he'd walked into my office at the beginning of his semester, I knew he was trouble.

He was handsome, tall, well built, had green eyes, and played college football. Immediately, I was attracted to him, but I was smart enough to leave that jailbait alone. There were already enough city and state officials in the news caught up in some kind of sexual scandal.

But Kendrick kept placing himself close to me whenever he could. He kept saying how much he envied me, how he wanted to have a law career just like mine.

One late evening, when we were in the office alone, Kendrick asked if I liked men. I told him no. He looked at me with those green eyes, ran a moist tongue over those pink lips, and seductively asked if I could possibly like him.

I reminded him that I said I didn't like men and told him our relationship was strictly mentor-mentee, and it would have to stay that way.

Obviously used to getting whatever he wanted, Kendrick lunged in and kissed me, full force on the lips. I pushed my palms into his chest, backing him off.

“Why did you do that?” Kendrick asked.

“Because I don't play with boys. And if I did, it wouldn't be with the ones that work under me,” I said. “Now get your things. You're done for the day.” The next day I got rid of him. “I never saw him again,” I told Sissy.

“Well, he's threatening to go to whoever's willing to listen, including your boss, saying you harassed him for sex, and when he didn't give in, you terminated his internship.”

I shook my head, feeling myself anger. “He's going to do that unless we do what? I know there's more to this than him just feeling wronged, because he wasn't.”

“I know he wasn't, Cobi. He's asking for money.”

“No. Hell no!” I said. “Let him tell the press, the AG, the mayor for all I care, but we aren't giving him a red cent. I've done nothing wrong.”

“Cobi,” Sissy said. “I'll handle this, okay? And no, I have no intention of paying this clown because he delivers an idle threat. At least until I hear all he has to say.”

“This is my reputation, Sissy. Once one mofo takes advantage of me, the floodgates open, then every cute boy I pass on the street is saying I felt him up, wanting a payoff. You can't let that happen.”

“Like I said, I want to talk to this Kendrick Dunstan Wilshire first. But I promise you, I'll stop this.”

I
sat in my office at work, thinking about how it was now just twenty-five days till my birthday. Sissy's idea to save the company still rang in my head. Part of it made sense, but did I really want to enter into a relationship, a marriage no less, based on lies? I would be lying to myself, to everyone that knew me, not to mention the poor woman, whoever she may be. What about what I wanted? I had always told myself that when I did get married, or devote myself to a life partner, it would be with a man I truly loved. Marrying a woman I didn't even know wasn't quite what I had in mind.

And then there was the situation with Kendrick Wilshire, that dirty little lying scoundrel.

I cleared my head of that for the moment, trusting that Sissy would take care of it. I reached into the bottom drawer of my desk and pulled out the huge book of white pages.

Over the past fourteen days, I had already drawn lines through half a dozen Eric Reeds confirming that none of them was my brother, but there were still at least another dozen to call in this city alone. I didn't want to think of how many there were left in the rest of the country.

Pressing a finger to the next phone listing, I picked up my office phone and dialed the number. I got a recording informing me that the number was no longer in service. I drew a line through that name and dialed the next number.

“Hello,” I said, after a woman picked up the phone. “May I speak with Eric Reed, please,” I said, hoping his name hadn't been changed as mine had been.

“Who's calling?”

“My name is”—I stopped myself. “My name is Everette Reed,” I said, using my pre-adoption name.

“May I ask why you're calling, Mr. Reed?”

I swallowed hard. “I have a brother named Eric, but I haven't seen him in thirty years. I'm trying to find him, and—”

“My husband doesn't have a brother.”

“There's a chance he wouldn't have known about me. Can I please speak to him?”

“I'm sorry, Mr. Reed, but Eric has been dead a year now. Car accident,” the woman said, her voice low.

“I'm so sorry,” I said. “I really don't mean to bother you, but can I please ask you a few more questions? Just so I'll know.”

“Yes.”

“Eric was my twin. I'll be turning thirty-four in three weeks.”

“My Eric was forty,” the woman said.

“Oh,” I said, feeling as though my brother would be lost forever.

“I hope you find him, Mr. Reed. Good-bye.”

After work, I was exhausted. I went home, took a nap on my living room sofa, and awakened half an hour later to the ringing of my home phone.

I had been dreaming about my childhood again, something that seemed to happen now each and every time I closed my eyes.

In the dream, I was sixteen. It was not long after my father had found me and the boy, Steve, in the garage. Since that day, it seemed my father had very little to say to me. He gave me instructions when he needed to, like “Make sure you're packed for tomorrow's trip,” but simple, everyday conversation between a father and son was no longer there.

Because all I wanted was the love of my father, I did what he told me to do. I had stopped seeing Steve and did the same with all the other boys I called friends at school. I had little interest in girls, and besides my sister, I was basically alone.

I could not be who I really was, and despite how much I tried to be
what my father wanted, he would never accept me as that person either. I was damned either way.

The dream shifted to a memory of me pushing through my parents' door, and gently shaking my mother till she awakened.

“Baby, what's wrong?” she asked.

I stood there in the dark room, tears rolling down my cheeks. “I . . . I . . .” I wasn't able to speak.

My mother hurried out of bed, wrapped her arms around me. My father didn't wake, didn't budge. She walked me down the hallway to my bedroom. Sympathy in her eyes, she begged, “Tell me what's wrong. Please.”

“I don't . . . I don't know if I can do it anymore,” I said, sniffing. “Nobody understands. Nobody cares.”

“Don't know if you can do what, Cobi? Nobody understands what?”

“Me, Ma. Me! And I don't know if I can live.”

My mother leaned away from me as if wondering who this strange boy was. Then she noticed what I had in my fist. Her eyes focused on the orange plastic bottle with the childproof cap. She snatched it from my grasp. “Cobi, what are you doing with these?”

They were her sleeping pills.

I didn't answer, just kept crying. She scanned my room and saw the tall glass, filled halfway with water. She quickly put two and two together. Her eyes ballooned. “No! You didn't!”

I hadn't. But five minutes earlier I had been on the verge.

I was scared and lonely and felt as though no one really understood me. But my mother had always been open and honest with me. I thought the least I could do was tell her what I was considering before I actually went through with it.

She shook me out of my thoughts. “Did you take any of these? Answer me!”

“No, Ma. I didn't,” I cried.

She threw the bottle of pills across the room and yanked me close to her.

Fully awake now, I sat up and picked up the phone. “Hello?”

“I'm at the gate. Buzz me in,” a deep, throaty voice said.

“What are you doing here?” I asked.

“I was in the neighborhood. I tried calling your cell a few times before coming over. You didn't answer. Were you asleep? Is this a bad time? I can come back.”

“No, no, I wasn't sleeping.” I lied. Wiping sleep out of my eyes, I triggered the gate out front.

When I opened the door, Tyler stood before me, wearing a gray pin-striped suit. He hugged me.

Tyler and I met a year ago at a One Hundred Black Men social downtown. I was standing near the bar, holding a beer, when he walked up. “Cobi Winslow, right? State's attorney and heir to the Winslow hair care fortune. My name is Tyler Hayden Stevens,” he said, extending a hand. “State senator from Illinois.”

I looked down at his hand, saw the Rolex Milgauss peeking out from under his cuff and then the platinum wedding band on his finger.

“Pleasure to meet you,” I said. “And to what do I owe this pleasure?”

“I was watching you since you walked in the place. Just thought I'd come over and say hi.”

“Are you a stalker? On the way home, should I be worried that I'll look into my rearview and see you following me?”

“Only if you want me to,” Tyler said with that dapper smile. “Say that you want me to.”

“You're married,” I said.

“I am.”

“Wouldn't that be a problem?”

“Only if you made it one. Will you make it one?”

I blushed a little. “Not at first. But I need to let you know up front, I'm going to want more than what you're looking for.”

“What do you think I'm looking for?”

“Wild, sweaty, no-strings-attached-sex with a handsome man.”

“Yup,” Tyler said, showing a beautiful smile again. “That's what I'm looking for.”

I closed my front door and walked back into my living room.

“How are you?” Tyler asked.

“I'm managing, but it's rough, you know. I still expect Mom to step into the room and ask me if I'm hungry or walk in on Dad up in his study.”

“I'm sorry about that.”

“Me, too.”

“Have you found out any more about your brother?” he asked, mercifully changing the subject.

“I mailed a letter off to the Social Security Administration yesterday, like the lady said.”

“You're going to get through this.” Tyler had a seat on the sofa. “And like I said, you know I'm here for you.”

“Are you?”

“Cobi,” Tyler shook his head as though he didn't want to start with this discussion. “I told you—”

“I've been having nightmares. If I wake up at two in the morning and wanted to call you, or come over, could I?”

“You know you can't. I have a wife and children. You know that.”

“Yes, I do. You have a wife and children. You don't have time for this, for me.”

“Don't say that.”

“We've been doing this a year. I told you when we first met, this wasn't what I was looking for,” I said.

“I know.”

“When my father was alive, I had an excuse for not seeing you as often as I wanted. But now he's gone and . . . I want someone who can be here for me.”

“I'll do better.”

“Will you?”

“I will. I promise.”

“I need for you to be telling me the truth, for you to be serious about this.”

“I am, and I will,” Tyler said, pulling me to him. “I'm so sorry about everything that's happened.”

“It's not your fault.”

“I know. I just missed you.”

“I missed you, too. But I need for you to keep your promise and—”

Tyler leaned in to kiss me softly on the lips. He was about to pull away, but I wrapped my arms around him, kept him there, only then realizing just how much I missed him.

After our kiss, Tyler said, “It's been too long. I want you.”

I laughed sadly. “If you knew how much I wanted you too . . . but I'm worn out. It would be a waste of two minutes.”

“Don't worry. I'll do all the work,” Tyler said, pressing his hand into my chest, and pushing me back onto the sofa. “You need to take it easy anyway,” he said, lowering himself to his knees, spreading my thighs, and moving between them. “All I want you to do is relax, okay?”

“Okay,” I said, laying my head back, closing my eyes, and taking this time to forget about all that plagued me.

T
wo days later, halfway through reading the sports section, I heard the front door open. My sister called out. “Anyone home?”

“In the family room, Sis.”

She walked in wearing a suit and carrying her briefcase. She set the case down at the door, walked over, and lowered herself onto the sofa next to me. I could tell by the blank, sad stare on her face that she had bad news.

“We have to pay off Kendrick Wilshire, Cobi.”

I shot up from the sofa, waving my hands hysterically. “No! No!” I shook my head. “I told you no! I did nothing wrong, and for us to lie down and take this from that little lying, manipulative mofo—it's not going to happen.”

“Okay, Cobi,” Sissy said, her voice very low and calm. “What do you think will happen if we don't pay him?”

I paused for a moment, having not thought that far into the potential, dark future. “I'll file charges against him for blackmail.”

“Okay, I'll play,” Sissy said. “So do you have proof that you didn't sexually harass him?”