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“Can I be mad at you for a few more hours?”

“How about until we get home?”

“Until we go to bed.”

“Deal.”

I leaned back. “I don’t want to do this again, Dez. I need you to hear me going forward. Not just tonight.”

“I hear you,” he said. “I’m not gonna get it right every time, but I’ll try my best. You’re gonna have to call me out when I fuck up.”

“Oh trust me, I won’t have a problem doing that.” I laughed. “Give me a minute, I need to grab my things from upstairs.”

Siani had my stuff ready by the door. “Y’all worked it out?”

“Mostly, but we’re still a work in progress.” I hugged her. “Thanks for tonight.”

“That’s what I’m here for.” She squeezed me back and then gave me a serious look. “Take that test soon, okay? You don’t have to say anything to him yet. But you should know. For you.”

“I will.”

I thought about the possibility of being pregnant on the elevator ride down. I’d never imagined motherhood, though I wasn’t completely opposed to the idea. What I couldn’t predict was Cardez’s reaction to the news. A baby would send his protective streak into overdrive, and I didn’t know if I could survive that on top of everything else.

Outside, he was still leaning against the car. He pushed off it to open the door for me.

I got in and watched him get in on his side. He didn’t start the car right away. Instead, he looked at me for a second in the dark.

“What?” I asked.

“Nothing.” He reached over and stroked my cheek, then started the car and drove us home.

I wasn’t ready to deal with taking a pregnancy test. Right now, I just wanted to go home with this frustratingly sexy, controlling ass nigga, and pretend to be mad at him for a little while longer.

38 CARDEZ MONTAGUE

I was gonna fuck this nigga Priest up, because we clearly had two different interpretations of what “low key” meant.

I thought we’d be on some chill shit at a lounge or something. Maybe the four of us with Tariq. But no, this fool had rented out Premiere and told everybody and their mama. There was a line wrapped around the block when we pulled up.

“This isn’t just the five of us, Priest,” I said, side eyeing him.

“It is the five of us. Plus whoever else showed up.” He clapped me on the back as we walked to the entrance. “This deserved a real turn up, and Solomon will think you’re really slipping.”

Tariq and Yomi were already in our section when we got upstairs. Yomi had on a printed button-down with black pants and loafers, looking like somebody’s rich Nigerian uncle. Marco was leaning over the railing watching the crowd below, and Tariq was off to the side talking to Zeke, one of my soldiers.

“Why you ain’t tell me you were doing all this?” I asked, taking the drink Marco gave me.

“Because your ass would’ve flaked,” Priest said as he waved over a bottle girl. “Now it’s too late for you to dip without looking like a bitch.”

Touché. I sipped the Hennessy and took in the club.

The second level wrapped around the whole spot like a horseshoe, with a glass railing separating the VIP sections from the straight drop to the dance floor below. The crowd was getting hype to Pop Smoke’s “Dior”⁠1 under a wash of blue and purple light, screaming the hook back at the DJ like they’d been waiting all night to hear it. Bottle girls moved through the crowd with sparklers raised over their heads like torches, a couple of them holding lit up signs.

“Drink up, nigga,” Marco said. “We gotta get you good and drunk tonight before Priest starts complaining.”

“Aight, aight.” I threw back the Hennessy and got another glass immediately. I stopped counting after the fourth one.

Someone ordered two hookahs for the section. The coals glowed in the low light. The scent of sweet smoke mixed with the blunt that Zeke lit.