Page 85 of Solomon’s Temple

I exited out of the app and just looked straight ahead with a smile on my face.

“Come on, Temp! I got one more game!” Toni yelled out, the champagne now getting to her loud ass.

“Okay.”

I stood, and for the first time since becoming a wife, I stopped thinking about what came next. I wasn’t thinking about wedding plans, expectations, or what marriage was supposed to look like.

I wasn’t thinking about whether I was ready for my new life to begin.

I was simply Temple, a woman surrounded by women who loved her.

And tonight, that was enough.

The Wedding Day

The private suite at the Luxe Grand Ballroom was quieter than I expected.

Not quiet enough to hear my own thoughts, though.

Karon stood in front of the floor-to-ceiling mirror while Gabriel adjusted the sleeve of his tuxedo jacket. Dominic was sitting on the edge of the velvet couch, watching with an amused expression while a tailor crouched in front of him, pinning the hem of his pants.

I stood a few feet away, staring at myself in the mirror.

Black tuxedo, white shirt, black bow tie, and cufflinks my father had given me.

A man about to get married.

I almost laughed at the thought.

Not because it wasn’t real, but because there had been so many moments in my life when I thought I wouldn’t make it this far. I looked at my reflection and wondered if the man staring back at me would recognize the version of himself from years ago.

The angry one.

The reckless one.

The one who thought he could outrun consequences. The one who believed survival was the same thing as living.

I’d been through hell. Some of it I’d walked into willingly. Some of it had found me, and some of it had nearly buried me.

I still remembered the night I almost died, every detail—the cold, the darkness, the sound of my own breathing becoming weaker. The realization that I might not see another sunrise.

That night changed something inside me. When you were staring death in the face, all the things you thought mattered suddenly become small.

Money, pride, reputation, and being right, none of it meant anything.

I remember lying on that cold concrete and asking God for another chance while blood leaked from my head and my chest. I didn’t ask for money or power, not even for revenge on the nigga who pulled the trigger. Just another chance to become the man I knew I was supposed to be. Who I was before Rosaria.

And the Big Homie gave me one.

I didn’t understand the path at first. I thought living righteous meant everything would suddenly become easy.

It didn’t.

If anything, it got harder because doing right meant letting go of things I’d spent years convincing myself I needed.

It meant accountability, discipline, and forgiveness. It meant choosing peace when I had every reason to choose anger. It meant trusting God even when I couldn’t see what He was doing.

Then I met Temple.