CheckMate 4: Winner Takes All (7 page)

Damn, now he might have clients
. She thought but continued to walk on inside of the building behind them. Once they were inside of the office, Candy cleared her throat then asked the couple, “Who are you here to see?”

The man politely responded, “Rico Mack.”

Thank God
, Candy whispered. She looked over to see Rico’s office door shut, but still instructed the couple to just knock on the door and Rico should’ve been in there to assist them. They thanked her then headed towards Rico’s office door as she headed up the stairs. Her heart was racing a hundred miles per second with each step that she took and when she reached the top of the staircase it only got worse. She looked down on the first floor to see that Rico had opened his office doors and let his clients in.

“My God, maybe I should turn around.” She whispered, but her feet continued to gradually make their way to Monty’s office. She passed by Maurice’s office, peeking inside it. He apparently hadn’t made it to work yet and she was glad. She didn’t want any type of eye contact with him right about now. She wouldn’t even know how to look at him. Before she knew it, she was at Monty’s door.
Just go in,
she coached herself.

“Knock, knock,” she said tapping on his already opened office door. Monty looked away from his computer with a surprised look on his face. Candy’s heart dropped to the floor the minute they made eye contact. In just that second, she felt maybe she should’ve left when she was inside of her car. “Uh… Hey,” she hesitantly spoke. “I saw MiKayla leaving and thought that I should come back inside so we can talk.”

Monty didn’t say a word. He just stared at her. He thought that she’d left earlier and he was cool with that. However, now she was back and he didn’t know what to say to her.

“Well uh… Well I uh…” Candy stuttered. Monty not saying anything was making this conversation extremely difficult to have. “Uh, is this a good time?” She finally got out.

“Actually it’s not.” Monty said finally looking away from her and down at his Rolex timepiece on his wrist. “I have a client coming in about thirty minutes. Can you make this quick?” He said turning away from her then looking back at his computer screen like he wasn’t fazed that she was standing there.

Candy wanted to say something, but she couldn’t. She didn’t like the cold shoulder that he as giving her. After just standing there for a few minutes like she was alone in the room she then said, “Never mind. I knew that this was a bad idea.” As she turned to leave, Monty looked over at her.

“Did you sleep with my cousin?” He asked.

“No,” Candy said as she glanced back at him, and then turned to walk out again.

“Do you love him?” Monty questioned causing her to stop in her tracks again.

She slowly turned to partially face him. “I do like him,” she admitted. “But, I’m not looking to jump into anything serious at the moment. I just want to live my life for me and not anyone else.”

“Even if it’s with my cousin?” he pondered almost with tears in his eyes.

“Does it matter, Monty? You don’t want me.” Candy said.

“I never said I didn’t want you.” He said.

“You didn’t have, too.” She said. “Your actions speak much louder than your words.”

Monty sat behind his desk feeling tense. He wanted to prove to her that he still loved her, but he didn’t know how to put his pride to the side. He glanced out the window at the now pouring rain then back over at Candy. She was beautiful standing there in a simple black Velour sweat suit and a new pair of black and pink Nike Air Max’s. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail like she was prepared for the rainy, cool weather from the briskly March winds. He then glanced back towards the window.

“Candy,” he said while standing to his feet while looking in her direction. He then slowly made his way over. Candy took in a deep breath seeing that Monty was getting closer and closer to her. A few seconds later, he was standing right in her face as she stood with her back pressed up against the office door. He cleared his throat “We’ve been through a lot since we got together. I know I’ve not been perfect and I just want to say that I’m sorry.” He said with the most genuine stare.

Candy was shocked to hear him apologize as she stood there staring at him. She was wishing he’d just say that he would change, but another part of her wasn’t ready, because she knew that he wasn’t ready. “Monty, let’s not do this.” She hesitantly said while taking in the invigorating smell of his Chanel cologne. This was the reason why she had stayed away. It was just something about his smooth chocolate skin, small slanted eyes, and his succulent soft lips that enticed her. That and his amazingly cool swag, charismatic demeanor, and handsome face kept her in a daze for years; a daze that she just couldn’t seem to shake.

“Tell me that you’ll stop seeing him.” He said hoping that she would.

Candy frowned. “Are you kidding me? Why should I tell you anything?”

Monty shook his head. “You should tell me because I want you to stop seeing him.”

“I can’t believe that you’re telling me to stop seeing someone when I’ve asked you over and over again to stop seeing MiKayla, yet you continued to do so.” She put her hand on her hip ready to give him the business. “Let me tell you something, Monty Banks. The world does not revolve around you or your demands. I will see who I want, when I want and there ain’t nothing you can do or say about it.”

“You won’t be seeing my cousin.” Monty straight up said.

“We’ll see about that.” Candy said pushing him out of her face. She attempted to walk off as Monty grabbed her by the arm to stop her. “Don’t touch me you selfish bastard.” She said snatching away from him. “I can’t help that whatever happened with you and MiKayla didn’t work out. One minute you seemed to be all in love and over me. Now you’re looking like a sad puppy dog telling me what I need to be doing. Well, you need to be minding your own muthafuckin’ business and not worrying about what I got going on. I’m a grown ass woman and I will do what the fuck I wanna do.” She said feeling pissed by this point.

“You don’t have to go there.” Monty said feeling the heat. He didn’t expect things to turn out this way. He’d had his way for a long time and surely he’d dogged Candy more than a few times, but she wasn’t having that shit anymore.

“I’ll go where ever the hell I wanna go.” She snapped. “You wanted MiKayla, so go be with MiKayla. I’m done being a doormat for your whorish ass.” And with that, she walked off.

“Candy,” Monty called out to try to stop her. “Candy!” He called out again, but to no avail she kept it moving. He stood in the office doorway as he watched her walk down the stairs and straight out the door. Not once did she look back. For the first time ever, he felt that she was truly going to get over him; if she hadn’t already.

“Damn,” he said just above a whisper. “I’ve really fucked up this time.” Instantly, thoughts of MiKayla surfaced in his mind. He actually felt hatred towards her for fucking him over and ruining his relationship. He still wasn’t willing to take full responsibility for his actions, but little did he know that wasn’t going to get him very far and especially nowhere with Candy. 

***

 Meanwhile, not far away, MiKayla was just walking inside of her condominium. She was outdone with the way things had played out when she’d gone to see Monty at his office. With her eyes still teary, she headed into the kitchen to fix herself a glass of wine.

She sat her Coach bag on the granite countertop and somberly opened the kitchen cabinet reaching for a glass. She then stepped over by the wine cooler and opened it, grabbing a bottle of red wine to sip on. The minute she started pouring herself a glass of wine, Chad entered the kitchen. She turned to face him with a disappointed expression on her face.

“I take it that things didn’t go well with you and your man?” He questioned with an uncaring tone.

“That’s none of your business,” she said walking past him like he wasn’t standing there.

“Oh, it is every bit of my business.” He said as he followed her into the living room.

MiKayla sat down on the sofa and picked up the remote off of the end table next to her. Instantly, she started flipping through the channels as Chad stood there watching her. “You can leave now,” she told him.

“What if I don’t want to leave?” He questioned.

“What if you have no choice?” She questioned back.

Chad frowned. “You’ve become someone else in the time that I’ve been gone.”

“What, was I supposed to stay the same? I fucking lost my fiancé and my baby in a matter of months. I had to pick myself back up and carry on.” She said feeling the pain in her heart from the loss of their baby boy.

Chad stood there staring. For the first time, his eyes filled with water. He knew that he’d hurt and not once had he even mentioned the loss of their son since he’d been back. The only reason why he didn’t was because he was also hurt by it and he knew that mentioning it would destroy her.

“Baby, I’m sorry that happened. I lost a son, too.” He said trying to help relieve some of her pain.

MiKayla stood up and angrily faced him with mixed emotions. “YOU AIN’T LOST A DAMN THANG! YOU WEREN’T HERE, REMEMBER! WHERE THE FUCK WAS YOU?! YOU’VE YET TO ANSWER THAT SHIT! ALL I KEEP HEARING IS THAT YOU’RE BACK AND YOU WANT TO MAKE THINGS RIGHT.   BUT TELL ME, CHAD; WHERE THE FUCK HAVE YOU BEEN IN THE PAST TWO YEARS?”

Chad stood there feeling numb. He knew that he’d hurt her and he felt bad for it, but the last thing he wanted was for the shit to go down like it did between them. He did love her and he did want to marry her, but things didn’t go as he’d planned and there was no way that he could reveal his reason for disappearing. She’d never trust him again nor would she ever allow him back into her life.

“Baby please,” he said trying to hold his composure. “All that matters is that I’m back.”

MiKayla laughed at his comment as a way of covering her pain. Since he’d been back she’d been trying her best to process it all. It just seemed to be much too much for her. A part of her was happy that he was back, because at least he wasn’t dead, but another part of her wished that he would’ve stayed where the hell he was. His return had definitely turned her life upset down just when she felt that it was safe for her to move on and finally be happy.

“Say something,” Chad said waiting for a response since all he got was an awkward laugh.

“I have nothing to say,” she said and started down the hallway.

Chad was right on her heels. “Baby, please. I had to leave. I was protecting you. I was protecting me. I didn’t want anything to happen to you, so I left. I’m sorry. Please, forgive me.”

MiKayla ignored him as she entered her bedroom. She went straight over to the dresser drawer and opened it. Chad just stood back wondering what she was about to do. She then pulled a piece of paper out of the drawer and proceeded to open it up as Chad just shook his head as an indication that he knew what was on that paper. He couldn’t say a word as she started reading the contents written on it.

“This key is to secure your future. Take care of yourself, my love. I’ll always be with you and our son. I love you more than life itself, Chad.”

After reading that aloud, she then glanced away from the paper in her hand and back over to him. “You knew that you were leaving that day, didn’t you?” She said as the tears started falling. “You left me there pregnant with our son and didn’t look back. What kind of man does that? What kind of man has a heart like that?”

“This kind of man,” Chad honestly said. “I was doing everything in my power to protect you. I wasn’t a saint babe. I’d done things that weren’t legal. I’d screwed over a lot of people in the process of coming up and in the end; there was a price to pay for that. I had to go away to keep you and the baby safe.”

“But, you didn’t keep us safe, Chad. I lost our baby from the stress of losing you. I lost my whole world loving you.”

Chad disappointedly shook his head. He was hurt for her, but he didn’t think that she’d be this hard on him. What he expected was to show up and she’d take him back and not care what had happened. However, after the initial shock that he was back had worn off, MiKayla was now questioning his past actions and she wanted to know what happened. Fuck being happy to see him. She wanted to know why he fucked her over the way he did.

“Chad, if you can’t give me more answers than that then I need you to leave.”

“Babe, I left you all of that money to make sure that you were good. Shouldn’t that count for something?”

“It counts for nothing. You left me hanging. Our son died and you weren’t even there to console me. Tell me, did you even know that he’d passed away?” She questioned with tears in her eyes.