I Gave Him My Heart (13 page)

I couldn’t help but grin at the idea of opening up my own bar. I already had the name and everything. “How do you say ‘drink it’ in Spanish?”

Saint laughed a little.
“
Bébela.”

“
Bébela…” I whispered to myself, loving the sound of that. “You’re really gonna help me?”

Saint looked at me like I was crazy. “What’s the use of having all of this money if I can’t help out my family? You’ve brought me in so much clientele, I have to return the favor. You wanna set up shop here? I’m down. You wanna set up shop in Maryland, so you can go to school? That’s cool, too.”

I hesitated. “What about Nina? I need to run this by her.”

Saint shook his head at me. “You ain’t learning shit going to school online, Ma. The Knoxberry School of Arts is one of the best art schools in the country. Why don’t you just move up there? Make a life of your own. You’re never going to be able to live with yourself if you don’t spread your wings now. You’re beautiful, you’re young, and you’re free. Go live your life without her. Just say the word, and I’ll have your house built. I can have it done by New Year’s.”

I sighed. Hearing about striking out on my own was exciting yet scary as hell.

“You really wanna talk to Nina about this? She’s gonna tell you to stay your ass here; you know she is.” Young shook his head at me.

Saint cosigned. “Nina doesn’t want you anywhere that she can’t call you to come over when she needs you to help book her clients.”

I smacked my lips at Saint. “Boy, bye. My sista would be glad to see me venture off on my own. Are we partying tonight or what, Saint? A bitch cooked hot-wings and shit for your ass, muthafucka!” I watched Saint laugh.

“I might roll through;play like I’m surprised. But I can’t stay long. I hav
e
business to attend tonight.” Saint grinned.

“It’s your birthday, boy. Do you ever take a break?” I shook my head.

“I can take a break when I die, Ma. Until then, I’m about my business. You better get about yours, too, Kourtney, and think this business venture through. Reality show, tattoo shop, bar, and all.” Saint tried to convince me. “But, I’m telling you, when you mention this to Nina, she’s gonna shut you down. You might as well not even tell her, for real.”

***

“Move to Maryland? You wanna leave me?” Nina exclaimed the next morning from her hospital bed.

I guess Saint knew her better than I did.

I sighed, slouching back in the recliner that sat in the corner of her room.

Pretty, Lailah, Nancy, and Chelsia stood alongside Nina’s bedside.

“Nina, I can’t be your assistant forever!” I explained to Nina, who wasn’t getting where I was coming from at all. “I have talent, too! I’m tired of living off of you! I need to make it on my own! All my life, people have taken care of me; it’s time I take care of myself! I’m fuckin’ thirty-two! And I’m living off of my sister and her husband!”

“I understand you want to do some of your own things but moving to Maryland? Whose idea was this?” Nina asked, sitting up in her bed.

“Saint’s,” I mumbled.

“What was that? I couldn’t quite hear you,” Nina scoffed, pretending not to hear me say Saint’s name.

“Saint, okay? He’s opening up a club in Maryland and wants me to run it with Yin Young.” I watched the irritated expression growing on Nina’s face. “He’s also helping me open up a tattoo shop there and a bar here in Punta Cana. He’s helping me make major moves while you seem to want my ass to stay planted here in your soil, where you control all the moves.”

Nina shook her head. “No, that’s not what I’m trying to do, Kourtney. You’re just so irresponsible. All you do is party! You wouldn’t know the first thing about running a business on your own!”

I was really hurt by her lack of confidence in me. She sounded just like my mother when I told her that I was leaving California to go live with Nina and Aunt Toni. “What the fuck you mean ‘I wouldn’t know the first thing about running a business on my own’? You actually think you run that got-damn shop by your got-damn self? Who the fuck do you think brings all of your clients in, Nina?”

“And what is it that you do to bring the clients in, Kourtney, huh? Do you call that responsible?” Nina called me out for being a hoe, something she’d never done.

I gasped, at a loss for words for a few seconds.

Pretty, my ride-or-die, loved Nina but wasn’t about to let her talk shit about me.

“Whoa, Nina, okay, y’all need to chill. You act as if Kourtney is trying to be your competition. The girl just wants to try to make a name for herself on her own. Every idea this girl has ever given you, you have shut it down. The reality show, which would have made for good publicity, what did you do to that? Shot the shit down. When Kourtney wanted to open that strip club in that empty building around the corner, what did you say? You said no. One of our customers overheard the idea and went and opened a strip club in that same building, and that damn club hasn’t stopped hoppin’ since! This girl does miraculous things for you, and you wanna slick call her a hoe? That’s fucked-up!”

Nina was vulnerable. She was hormonal. She was hurt. I understood all of that, but she was still wrong. “Kourtney, I didn’t mean it like that. I just—”

I cut her off, disagreeing with her. “Yes, you did. You meant that all I am good for is getting down on my knees or laying on my back or riding a dick!
I haven’t sucked, fucked, or even touched a dick since the night of your wedding!”

They all looked at me, surprise crinkling their eyebrows.

“What? No dick? Not even a little?” Lailah couldn’t believe I’d given my lips, ass, and pussy a damn near eight-month break.

“While I was home studying or out with Saint planning major moves, y’all bitches thought I was out there fuckin’ niggas! Well, I wasn’t! Niq’ fucked that up for every nigga. I’ve been about my business; despite what you think I may or may not be capable of! I have made some irresponsible decisions, but I have always come through for you, Nina!” I shouted. “I’ve always had your back. Whatever you needed, whenever you needed it, I got it for you, no questions asked. No matter how I got the shit! Well, what about me? Who’s got my back? Who’s here for me? What about me, got damn it?”

Tears slid down Nina’s face. “I don’t want you to go.” She cried. “You have a good life here.”

I shook my head at her. “No, you have a good life here! I wanna live my own life; I want a life that is mine, not yours! I’m not a Nicolas; you are! Nina, it’s time for me to find my own way. I need to move. Come January, I’m going back stateside. I gotta do this. You have a life here with Ricque. He is your life now. I can change. I can be responsible. I want to find love again, somewhere. I can’t keep watching you get your happy ending. Where is mine? I gotta step aside and get a life of my own, too. I’m not leaving you, boo; I’m just going to find me… Okay?”

Nina didn’t like it, but she had no choice. She nodded, drying her face. “Okay, boo.”

***

I should have known that anywhere that I was going, Pretty was taking her ass with me. When I told my girls in Goldsboro that I was moving back stateside, they were psyched. They couldn’t believe their bitch was coming back. Though I told Nina I was moving back to the states, I was scared to death. I’d never been without my mother or Nina. It was scary. So, I took my time. Saint did as promise and opened up that club for both Young and I in Baltimore. We simply called it Young Chambers. On top of that, I’d been back and forth to Baltimore, recruiting girls and guys to work in my tattoo shop, Insertion. Daniella wanted to leave the DR so bad that she quit working for Nina and came to work for me. She held the spot down while I traveled between countries. I recruited six bomb-ass tattoo artists: Fallon, Kya, Chyta, O’Shea, Chae, and Marcel. Three girls and three guys.

“Girl, look at these fine ass niggas up in here!” Pretty fanned herself, looking at all the cuties that rolled up in the Tattoo Expo in Raleigh, North Carolina on December 12, 2016.

“Girl, focus.” I rolled my eyes, sitting down beside her at our table that afternoon in the Skylark Arena. “We’re supposed to be promoting my shop, and you’re over here, drooling over these niggas, most of the niggas who I’ve ran through over the years. Where are Chyta and Kya with our goodie bags? And I thought Fallon was supposed to bring the Starbucks?”

“Girl, you already know every store in the area is packed because of this expo. Not to mention, you know Starbucks is always packed. I think there’s crack in that fuckin’ coffee, for real. Muthafuckas be fiending for that shit.” Pretty watched me getting frustrated about volunteering to take attendance for the people who showed up to showcase their businesses. “Has everyone shown up for their tables?”

I sighed. “Girl, hell nah. At least ten booths are empty. Some nigga named Knox called and said he’d be a few minutes late. That his got-damn limo was stuck in traffic. What kind of name is Knox any got-damn way?” I picked up the nametag I’d made for him and then flicked it back on the table. I looked up at Pretty, who was paying my ass no attention.

I traced her line of vision to a group of guys who strolled through the arena, looking like a group of young rappers. I was tired of thugs, whereas Pretty was infatuated with them. These young niggas came strolling up to the table like they owned the place. The cutie at the front of the pack grinned at Pretty and I, looking us both over. I’d admit, me and my bish were looking fly as fuck, but he still didn’t have to stare.

“So, you gonna sign in or what, youngin'?” I asked, looking him over a little. From his baseball cap to those expensive shoes. Whoever made those shoes, they were way above my pay grade to even know the designer’s name.

“Sign in? Everyone here knows me.” He grinned, perfect teeth and all.

I scoffed, rolling my eyes. “Well, I don't know who you are, muthafucka.”

Pretty nudged me, eyes widening. “Do you ever have any chill?”

I rolled my eyes from her back over to him. “Who are you supposed to be, little nigga?”

“Timothy Knoxberry.” He shook his head at me, taking the sign in sheet from Pretty's hands.

My eyes widened a little. Yeah, I knew him. Who the fuck didn’t know his work? I'd never seen a picture of him, but his artwork was everywhere. Shit, he’d designed the building that we were sitting in. I was told he wasn’t white, but in my head, when I thought about Timothy Knoxberry, I pictured some nerdy, twenty-something-year-old white man, dressed in Old Navy. But the man before me was definitely not white or nerdy. He had an almond brown complexion. His head was covered with a titled baseball cap, but I could still see the smooth wave pattern of his low haircut. He had a perfect goatee. He had the cutest smile and the most perfect set of lips. He was dressed in a black and white plaid short-sleeved shirt, white t-shirt, and baggy black jeans. Fresh sneakers covered his feet. And a plaid baseball cap covered his head. Tattoos laced his muscular arms. That nigga was fine, and he knew it.

“How was I supposed to know it was you, Timothy Knoxberry, especially when your name is not on the got-damn list?” I wasn’t falling back just because he was worth octillions. “And we’re gonna have to do something about that name.” I shook off my long gaze and looked up into his face. “I don’t like Tim’s. Every nigga I know named Timothy is a got-damn asshole.”

I hated niggas named Tim. From this nigga I used to fuck with back in high school, who only got with me to make his ex-girlfriend mad, to Aunt Toni’s perverted husband, whose ass should’ve been under the jail after what he did to me.

“Well, my people call me Knox.” Knox picked up the nametag from the table that read “Knox.” He grinned at me before looking back at his entourage behind him. Then, he looked back at me. “And you, your name is Kourtney, right?”

I looked at Pretty, who was grinning her ass off. I rolled my eyes. Every nigga made her smile it seemed. I looked at Knox. “It's ‘next in line’, homie. Now keep it movin’.”

Knox and his niggas laughed at my arrogance.

Knox smiled. “Okay, Miss Kourtney, I got you. I’ll see you around, wit’cha sexy, mean ass.”

I rolled my eyes at the nigga as he strolled over to the huge booth that was set up for him and his crew. “Young niggas kill me.”

“Kourtney!” Pretty slapped my shoulder. “Girl, that nigga is every got-damn thing! Do you know who he is? That nigga is the youngest male in the Knoxberry family! Has paintings and murals in museums all over the country! He designed this building!”

I brushed her off. “Yeah, yeah, I know who he is. And?”

Pretty rolled her eyes. “The fuck you mean ‘and’? Just that nigga’s signature is worth about fifty million dollars! His sister dances for Jamie Green and Anastasia Jones! That nigga’s family is the richest family in the United States and probably the fifth richest family in the world! You betta recognize, ‘Miss Kourtney’!”

I scoffed, glancing over at Knox’s table. “Ask me how many fucks I give, Pretty.” I held up a zero with my fingers. “Zero, zero, zero, zero!” I sang, in my Chris Brown voice.

Pretty looked at me like I was crazy. “Girl, you’re trippin’. I’d fuck the tattoos off that nigga!”

I laughed out loud. “Girl, you say that about every nigga who’s got tattoos!”

Pretty rolled her big, pretty eyes. “And? Shit.”