One Night: A BWWM Interracial Romance (12 page)

“Hmm, I haven’t seen this one before,” he said, opening the side door. “I thought I had read them all.”
 

“No, Dad it’s—”
 

Too late, she saw him reach in and pick up the book, turning it over to read the back.
 
“This
is
a new one,” he exclaimed, reading the description. “Naomi? What’s with this Naomi character?”
 

She shut the trunk and quickly walked over to try and rescue it from his hands. He held it away from her, giving her a scornful look. She cringed when he opened the front and saw the handwriting.
 

“To Natalie, Thanks for keeping me…” he mumbled the rest of the words to himself.
 

She stood there, feeling like a 5-year-old who had just been caught stealing a cookie, as he gave her a long inquiring look.
 

“He’s a friend, Dad. That’s all.” Even to her own ears it sounded lame.
 

“A friend that you keep warm at night, huh?” he said.
 

“Can I just have it back?” she said desperately, reaching for the book again. “You’re going to be late!”

“Nonsense!” he said, pulling the book out of reach again. “Honey, I don’t care what business you get up to with your ‘
friends,
’ but this is a new Nick Zane novel and I’ve got a 6 hour flight ahead of me. You don’t even like these kinds of books.
 

“I think it would be a gracious gesture of a loving daughter to let her father have first dibs,” he said congenially.
 

Natalie stared at him open-mouthed. “
Daddy!
” she pleaded, slipping into the label she only used when she was mad or happy.
 

“Can we please take this into the car?” her mother chimed in. “If you two keep at it, we really are going to be late!”
 

Her dad gave her a pointed look, holding the book out of reach. She sighed ruefully and rolled her eyes, jogging around to the driver’s side.
 
Her dad got into the passenger side while her mom sat behind her. She watched him out of the corner of her eye as she turned on the ignition.
 
He was re-reading the front page.
 

“Well look at that,” he said turning around to his wife. “Natalie is the ‘inspiration for Naomi’ it says right here.
 
Our very own daughter is a ‘muse,’ ” he said teasingly.
 

“How well, do you know this man, Natalie?” her mother asked with blatant curiosity.
 

“He’s just a friend, you guys!” Natalie insisted, backing out of the driveway. They both laughed.
 

As she headed toward the freeway she sincerely hoped that there wasn’t too much similarity between Naomi and her…at least as far as her interaction with Jake.
 

JAKE

“The early reviews are in and they loved it.”
 

Jake was with Martha at
Kelly’s
again. He was digging into a Spanish omelette, nodding his head after taking a full bite.
 
He washed it down with a gulp of black coffee.

“That’s great,” he said. “So why the big secret to lure me down here again?
 
You know you don’t have to play coy if you just want to check out my body, Martha,” he teased.
 

“Don’t make talk you can’t follow up on, sonny,” she chided. “If you’d seen me in my heyday, you would be putting your money where your mouth is.”
 

Jake laughed in response, enjoying the banter. He really was curious, though.
 
Martha had called with some “good news” that he “probably might not like.” Whatever that meant.
 

“So I guess that’s the ‘good news?’ ” he said. “So what am I not going to like then?”

Martha pursed her lips and gave him a speculative look. Finally she sighed and said, “They want you to do a book tour.”

Jake dropped the fork full of egg and potato and leaned back in his seat.
 
He brought his head back with a groan. “I knew I shouldn’t have come here this morning.”

Then he brought his head up to look at her accusingly. “You’re going to try and talk me into it aren’t you? That’s why you wanted to meet me face to face; butter me up with breakfast, try and sweet talk me into it?” he charged.
 

“Well it’s your own fault for coming out of the closet, so to speak,” she replied. “Now that they have a face, people are hungry to know more about the man behind it.”
 

“If I say no?” he prodded.

“It’s your right,” she said, matter-of-factly, “but don’t you think the people who support you deserve a little something in return? And besides, what is it to you? You get to fly to the best cities in the country and stay at nice hotels, all on Wright’s bill. Think of it like a vacation.”

“A vacation full of people with nothing better to do than come hang out at bookstores and hear me read a page from my book,” he grumbled.

“Hey!” Martha said sharply, “These are your fans. They pay your bills, sonny. More importantly, they pay
my
bills.
 
I won’t have you putting them down.”

Jake put his hands up, appropriately chastised.
 

“Who knows,” she said, settling back, “maybe you’ll meet someone special…or run into someone special?” She gave him a mischievous look.
 

He went back to focusing on his half eaten omelette to avoid responding to that.
 

“Listen, I was only supposed to use this card if you were reluctant, but it looks like Hollywood is finally jumping on the Nick Zane bandwagon and there may or may not be talks about a movie,” she hinted.

“I’m supposed to be happy about some studio ripping my novels a new one?” he asked, incredulously. “I’d be surprised if the result even remotely resembled my book.”
 

“Well the more cooperative you are with everyone, the more creative control you’ll have in the end,” she said. “The tour ends in L.A. where you’ll get a chance to meet with some studio execs and it will all go from there.”

Jake took a bite of his omelette, pondering that last bit. Los Angeles. That’s where Natalie lived. Maybe she’d even come to one of the signing events.
 
Maybe he’d have time to seek her out, take her to dinner or something. He wondered if she still looked the way he remembered.
 
These days the line between Naomi and Natalie become slightly blurred.
 

“I thought that might pique your interest,” Martha said, reading his mind.
 

He sighed and put his fork down. “Ok, you’ve ‘piqued my interest,’ ” he confessed. “What does this thing entail? I’m not making any promises, mind you.” he warned.
 

Martha gave a satisfied smile. “Someone from Wright will get in touch with the details.
 
They’ll handle everything from the flights to the hotels to the locations.
 
You just have to bring that handsome face of yours.”
 

Jake sat back in his chair thinking about it. “Okay, fine,” he said. “Tell them to call. No promises!”
 

Martha only smiled in return, knowing she had him hooked.
 

NATALIE

Natalie was happily enjoying a binge marathon of
Game of Thrones
on the TV in her parent’s den.
 
God bless them and their subscription to HBO direct, something she wouldn’t dare splurge on.

No sooner had she settled down with a beer and some homemade nachos than she heard Pooh Bear start yapping his head off. Thinking the worst, she paused the TV and got up to go around to the back living room where he was standing guard in front of the sliding glass doors.
 

Natalie looked outside to see what was up and saw the cat that belonged to the neighbor, Ms. Jackson, which is how everyone in the neighborhood, old and young alike, referred to her. The feline was idly walking the length of the wall separating the two backyards, paying absolutely no attention to the torrent of yelps on the other side of the glass.
 

“Oh
hush
, Pooh Bear!” Natalie chastised the little dog. “You know that cat. She doesn’t care about your silly yapping. I’m trying to watch TV here!”
 

The cat glanced imperiously toward the glass doors as if to confirm Natalie’s assessment. That only got Pooh going that much louder.
 
If Natalie didn’t know any better, she’d swear the cat was actually taunting him.
 
Why couldn’t that damn Ms. Jackson keep her cat indoors?

She heard her cell phone go off in her purse on the kitchen counter.
 
Shushing Pooh Bear once again, she rushed to see who it was.
 
The caller ID read “Mom” and she pressed answer and brought the phone to her ear.
 

“Hey, mom,” Natalie said cheerfully as Pooh Bear yapped incessantly in the background.

“Hi Natalie, honey,” her mother said, “Is Pooh Bear acting up again? Everything is okay I hope?”

“Yeah, Ms. Jackson’s cat is in the backyard again,” Natalie assured her. “Hush,
Pooh!
” she yelled, sticking the phone between her ear and shoulder as she chased Pooh Bear around to try and pick him up and remove him from the aggravating influence of Ms. Jackson’s cat.
 

“How’s New York?” Natalie asked, over the noise of Pooh yapping for dear life.
 
Of all the dogs to get, her mom had to go and adopt a crazy Pomeranian.
 
Then, of course, she had to call right when said Pom was in the midst of a turf war with the neighbor’s cat.
 

“Oh, you know, wonderful as always,” her mother said.
 
“Your father’s already been walking me crazy.
 
Speaking of which, he finished that book of yours, honey. I read it too. Obviously.”
 

Natalie’s ears perked up over that. “Really,” she asked, her curiosity getting the best of her. “What did you guys think?”

“Well…Natalie, you say this man, Jake Steele, is just a
friend
?” her mom asked with slight hesitation.

“Umm,” she stalled, trying to think of a good lie. It was difficult to do as she finally grabbed Pooh Bear by the collar and collected him in her arms while he continued to protest the trespass of Ms. Jackson’s cat. Fortunately, her mother continued before she could say anything further.

“It’s just that, well, the writing in the front makes it seem like, maybe you two are more than just friends.” her mother said. “And then the story, well, there
is
a relationship between the two main characters, after all.”

Yip, yip, yip!
Natalie wrestled with Pooh as she tried to grasp exactly what her mother was hinting at.

“You know I’m not
too
much of prude, and you know I have no problem with you dating white men.” her mother continued. “After all, you’re a grown woman and I have no illusions about your virginity—”

“Wait,
what?
” Natalie interjected, finally finding her voice. “What are you talking about, mom?”

Yip, yip, yip!

“
Hush,
Pooh!” Natalie shouted at the dog squirming in her arms.

“This book, honey,” her mother answered. “It’s quite….Well, you know I don’t read the kind of books your dad enjoys, but even
I
couldn’t put it down. It certainly is…very detailed in the
sex
department, if you know what I mean.”

Natalie knew exactly what she meant, though she certainly didn’t need that imagery coming from her mother.
 
However, she was suddenly
very
interested in whatever the heck was written in this book that had her mother talking this way.
 

Yip yip yip!
Pooh continued to bark with a high pitched yelp as she tried to talk and listen over him.
 

“Mom,” Natalie said patiently, trying to contain a squirming Pooh in her arms, “what exactly is in the book?”

“Well, the sex scenes, Natalie,” her mother confided with a lowered voice. “They were quite…
graphic
.
 
I’m your mother and I really shouldn’t say it but I’m going to. All I can say is, I’m certainly glad you’re in such capable hands after that horrible, awful Malcolm situation. I just hoped you used a condom.”

“Nonsense!” she heard her dad shout in the background. “Make as many babies as you want with this guy, Natalie. Think of all the free books!” He laughed heartily at his own little joke.
 
Her mother sighed into the phone.
 
Her dad, the jokester.
 

Natalie, on the other hand, wasn’t in a laughing mood. “Mom, how…graphic are we talking here?” she asked cautiously. Part of her wanted to know every horrid detail.
 
Another part of her certainly didn’t want it coming from her parents’ lips.
 

“Well, all I can say is, that part with the Vodka? It was pretty, inventive I’d say.” Her mother paused at that while Natalie’s dad guffawed in the background. Why in the world couldn’t her parents just be like other black parents and be indignant or offended?
 

“Ew, mom!” Natalie cringed.
 

Yip, yip, yip!

Ugh, would this dog ever shut up? Natalie had removed herself and her canine companion into the den, away from the presence of Ms. Jackson’s cat. It did nothing to calm Pooh down. Now her parents were talking about sex…and Jake…and this book. What the hell had Jake written?

“Mom, what vodka?” she said, trying to contain Pooh in her arms.
 
“What are you talking about?”

“Well, I just assumed
you
would know,” her mother said with surprise. “I guess maybe there was some poetic license at work? I suppose as your mother I should be relieved to hear that.”
 

Natalie gave up and set Pooh free to wage his war with the neighbor’s cat. By now she had other things on her mind.
 
Namely, every fucking detail from this book.