I was confused. “And this all happened out of nowhere? He just took off unprovoked?”
“Well, I don’t know if I’d call it unprovoked.” She looked out of sorts, and I could see why. Between that asshole in the conference room and Johnny disappearing under her watch, I was fuming, and I was sure she could see the agitation on my face. “It all happened so fast, but as we were leaving the breakroom, we saw that man you were talking to in the conference room leaving the building. I’ll admit he’s a pretty scary-looking man, but Mr. Brooks looked more than scared—he looked petrified when he saw him.”
“So petrified that he took off out the back way?” I asked.
“Yes, sir,” Sherry replied. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone look that scared before in my entire life.”
Nevada
3
“Rise and shine, everybody!”
Dad’s yelling woke me. I looked out of the window and saw that we were pulling through the gates at our house. The last thing I remembered was Danielle asleep on my shoulder and seeing him and Marie exiting the van to go into the grocery store. I must have fallen back to sleep after that. But it was good to be home, because I was hungry, and I couldn’t wait for my dad to start grilling.
“Damn, this is where you live?” Danielle sat up, excited.
“Yep,” I said pridefully.
“Y’all rich!” She leaned forward to look past me, not caring that her breasts were all over my face.
I glanced over at Kia, who just kind of shrugged.
“Can you give me a tour?” Danielle asked.
“Ah, sure,” I replied, and she grabbed hold of my arm as we exited the van.
“Nevada!”
We were halfway to the front door when my dad shouted my name. We stopped and waited for him to catch up.
He said, “Danielle, can you give me and Nevada a minute? Rio will take you inside.”
Danielle let go of my arm and grabbed Rio’s, and they continued toward the house. I could see Kia hesitate, but she followed Rio when he waved her on.
“What’s going on?” Marie eased over when she realized we’d stopped.
“Nothing. Everything’s cool, babe. We’re just having a little father and son talk. We’ll be right inside.”
Marie looked skeptical but didn’t protest. She gave him a kiss and then left us alone.
Dad turned to me. “You all right?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. Why? What’s up?”
He gave me a knowing look. “Danielle’s what’s up. I saw how she’s pressing up on you. She’s definitely trying to offer you an opportunity. I just wanna make sure you’re good, in case you plan on taking it.”
“Would you take it?” I asked. “I mean, if you were me? Would you take that opportunity?”
Dad looked away for a second, taking a deep breath. I could tell this was not the direction that he’d planned our conversation to go in. “You and me are not the same person, son. But back in the day, if a pretty woman like Danielle offered me some . . .” He hesitated briefly, then just said it: “Yeah, I’d probably have taken her up on it. But that was me. I was a little more out there than you.”
“I’ve had girlfriends before, Dad.” I wanted to make sure he didn’t think I was scared, although there was some scariness to what we were talking about.
“This ain’t no high school cheerleader we’re talking about, son. This is a grown-ass, experienced woman. I’ve seen grown-ass men lose their minds over women like her.”
“I can believe that,” I replied.
“Good, because time spent with her could be invaluable—or detrimental as hell.” He placed his hand on my shoulder. “Unfortunately, this is something you have to decide for yourself. Just know this: whatever you decide, I got your back.”
Since the day we’d met three years earlier, my dad had not only proven to be a great father, but also my best friend. However, in that moment, I could tell he was finally beginning to see me as a man and not his little boy.
“I appreciate that, Dad, but the truth is, Danielle isn’t exactly my type. She’s a little too loud and aggressive for my taste.” I took a deep breath. “Don’t get me wrong. She’s beautiful and nice, but not my type.”
“That’s kind of what I thought. Good luck getting that message across. But that being said, it’s still my job to make sure you’re prepared for anything.” He chuckled, taking out his wallet from his back pocket. He opened it and handed me a gold foil–wrapped condom. “Why don’t you hold onto this just in case? Not necessarily for Danielle, but you never know when these kinds of things are going to happen. Always better to be prepared than not. I keep a box in my top left-hand drawer.”
I stared at it, not knowing whether to laugh from the hilarity of the moment or die from the embarrassment. After all, this was my dad handing me a condom.
I didn’t have time to choose a reaction or even respond because suddenly, an SUV pulled up, and of all people, my mother stepped out. I shoved the condom into my bathing suit pocket.
“What’s she doing here?” my father mumbled.
I shrugged, putting on a fake smile and heading toward the car. I loved my mother and knew she was flying in from the West Coast to spend the week with me before school started, but she wasn’t supposed to arrive until the next day, and her being there was not a good look at all—especially since she had that angry look that usually made me find somewhere to hide because there was about to be a whole lot of cursing in Spanish.
“Vegas Duncan, what the fuck have you gotten my son into?” she snapped, stomping toward us.
I wasn’t sure what she was talking about because I was
