One Safe Place (13 page)

Then, she introduced a few VIPs in the audience. Several others were introduced before Gabrielle Brandywine. To her surprise, she received a welcoming response, and she stood and waved. Despite her politics, women seemed to understand she was an achieved black woman first, and her job couldn't have been unproblematic, whatever her political affiliation was. It did help that she was widely known for her fashion sense in clothing and hair. Gabrielle had been on the front cover of many magazines.

Gabrielle attended a black church while in Washington, D.C. and whenever asked in non-political interviews, she spoke of black music, books, culture, and other arts and entertainment. Her life, to many African Americans, was a paradox.

She'd had one rumored romance with a retired Black Hall of Fame NBA player prior to meeting Psalms, but that was all everyone ever knew of her intimate, personal life.

After the long ovation for Gabrielle, the co-host invited Psalms Black to the stage to play stand-up bass, and Mintfurd Big Boy to the microphone.

Both men looked to be able to knock Roman temple columns down like Hercules. Mintfurd seemed to make the stage shrink. Psalms played a few bass runs to get the groove going. Gabrielle smiled knowing those were the same expressions he made when
he was in the throes of making love to her. When he was about to get off, he would make intense, almost painful, expressions that were so sexy to her. Then as she always did, her eyes went to his fingers, and she became wet again.

Mintfurd opened his lips, and despite his massive size, his handsome face expelled words in a rich tone. Women in the crowd sighed and lost breaths. His hands moved while he recited his spoken word as if he were dancing, or holding, a woman.

Ode to Your Sweet Ass

Can't mask that scent

Please baby gurl, don't powder it, don't perfume it

Like a gold miner, I dig down into your cave and come out dirty, but satisfied

Both you and me

Can't dam your river

But I fill every hole that's open and it's still seeping wetness out of control

Smellin' it

Filthy but clean

Pheromone city

Erotic country

Slippin' into your darkness

Open to freak interpretation

Your hips speaking volumes

Slammin'

On my face

Dance baby dance

Spanking and snapping to the beat

Curlin' your toes

My tongue is putting it down in your groove

My tongue is polishing your crown jewel

Breasts sweating

Beast-like movements

Grunts

Uncontrolled

On time

Release the hounds

My tongue wallows in it

Side to side, and then, back to in and out

Tongue strokin'

Tight in between

Slide in where I fit in

I sit you down on mountain

Bootsy sings, “Stretchin' Out”

Damn…do you smell it?

It's funky in here

Play that funky music on my face

Do me, with your funky ass

Backing it up

Pounding forward

Breaking glass

You shout, “$#!+”

I say, “Take it, with all your sweet pretty little @$$”

I grab hair, pulling in the reins

Not slowing down, just controlling the action

Love your funky stuff

Love the feeling building up

I keep filling you up

You stay bent over taking it all

You feel me cummin' all the way through you

And it smells funky sweet in here

I go to sleep with my nose resting in that scent that can't be masked

Mintfurd stepped back from the microphone and bowed his head. Psalms changed the groove on the bass to a slow-jam pace as the crowd clapped and snapped fingers.

The single ladies, Velvet and Darcelle, sat at a table next to their married or coupled friends. The tables were almost connected, so Gabrielle and Darcelle were next to each other. The two had quickly connected, both being lawyers and with political backgrounds. Velvet and Gabrielle noticed Darcelle sat stone faced, like she was transfixed by a magic potion.

Little Darcelle, all five feet and stout, 130 pounds of her, got lost in Mintfurd's voice. His poem and how intensely erotic it was, and the power she felt from the visual of a man ten times her size seized her complete consciousness.

Maybe her own physical size had kept her from looking at men who tipped the scales at 200-pounds plus. Mintfurd clearly tipped the scales at well over, but something about him and his persona turned her insides into a whirlpool.

Gabrielle looked behind Darcelle's head as did Velvet, and they connected in thought, smiling at each other and nodding. Velvet knew Darcelle needed some mental separation from what had been happening in her life, yet had doubts those two could have a meeting of the minds.

Mintfurd and Velvet were close enough for her to know Mintfurd had a freakish nature, and was most likely the last thing Darcelle needed to encounter.

Mintfurd didn't know what a relationship was; he had no
experience in love. If he'd had any, it had been once upon a time before he'd become such a big boy, and that was a long time ago. His life was sex with prostitutes; he had shared that with Velvet. The thought of Darcelle moving from bad to bad made Velvet shake her head at the thought.

Lights on the stage and candles on the tables slowly moved side to side as if a wave must have hit the ferry. The room became quiet, and Mintfurd moved close to the microphone again. He recited another poem after Psalms had finished a bass solo and started walking his bass notes up and down.

Survived

Deep cuts

Burns of all degrees

Don't care

I need love

All of the past…made me come to my knees

I lay spread out in pain

Don't care

I give my faith to love again

I kneel in grace

Giving another chance

To love again

I will

I'll give my all

I'll climb up yesterday's ladder

From which I fell

To be loved again

Only thing I die for is love

Tears have left traces like growth rings of an old tree toppled over, but I spring anew with the scent of tenderness again

I have drowned in pools of hurt feelings, I couldn't make it to shore

But with love I can synchronize swim up from darkness

My heart will walk on water if love is on banks of reality

Before foolishness pushed my heart in front of train wrecks waiting to happen

Why would it be any different again?

You, you, you, my love

I give in to you for hope and faith

Pain from emotional bullets and mean-spirited knifes, and modes of failed operations

I know the pain

But I live to stand before you

Even though my heart flatlined before

But then you, you, you, my love

Like an injection of love serum

I'm love ever ready

Again, I'm released from room A to Z

I walk out into the sunshine

On the curb in front of Loveland Infirmary of Hope

I wait for a ride to go give my love again

To you, you, you, my love

I survived…for you.

The recital was so emotionally performed, some women had tears on their faces, and almost all stood and applauded. His voice remained and echoed in Darcelle. She had not clapped or said one word. Frozen in place, she looked, but she'd heard it all.

Even at his massive size, Mintford moved with the grace of a man about to tango across the room. Many women had crushes on his voice and pretty-handsome face by the time he exited the stage, but Mintfurd's size was still too much for all, except for Darcelle.

With the entertainment over, dancing took place, and a Gerald Alston song played, “Take Me Where You Want To.” It went along nicely with the romantic piece Mintfurd had done.

Velvet had a big smile on her face while playing an inner porno movie in her head. She was watching Darcelle and Mintfurd having sex in her mind with Darcelle squatting down. She could see Darcelle riding Mintfurd's tongue, and it going into the small woman. She could imagine what else the two could do. Velvet's lips pursed tight in a sinister smile with the thought,
Some rivers can't be damned.

The evening ended with more dancing as the ferry returned to the dock.

P
salms made one more inspection of the boat, making sure everyone had vacated. The sound system was still on and Jimi Hendrix's “All Along the Watchtower” had Psalms walking to the beat. He double-checked from the engine room and helm. For what he planned, Psalms needed the boat to be secured, and no intrusions potentially causing an interruption. The security system guarded the boat against anyone coming aboard after docking, but maybe lovers had hidden away seeking adventure. It had happened before. Sometimes people had too much to drink, and passed out or hid away to have some private fun.

There was an incident on the ferry during the event. A husband and his wife on the lower deck got in a shouting match. The man grabbed his wife's face and cupped her cheeks tightly, trying to hush her. The security team broke it up and brought the husband and wife to a room away from spectators. Psalms came to the room along with Mintfurd.

Psalms stared at the man, but his eyes scanned the woman differently because of tell-tale signs of something more. He rolled his lips and spoke. “You were invited to be with classy people and enjoy all that we have, the food, drink, and music, and you act a fool?”

The husband tried to sound hard. “Hey, fuck you, man! And let me and my woman out of this room and off your fucking boat!”

Psalms moved quickly in the direction of the man, and everybody stepped back in fear, except for Mintfurd Big Boy, and Zelda. Zelda was a tough girl, training to watch how Psalms and Mintfurd operated. Psalms didn't touch the man, but instead he slowly reached for the wife's arm, and slid up the long sleeve of her sweater. She held her breath out of fear. Her light, tea-colored arms had black-coffee and plum-colored bruises. “Don't move,” he said. “I'm going to look—”

“Hey, get your hands off my woman! Who in the fuck do you think you are?” The husband stood maybe an inch taller than Psalms, but seemed smaller in stature. His voice was crumbling bravado as Psalms' face grew tight and his eyes narrowed.

Psalms ignored the man, more pissed that someone had vouched for him to be on the boat. He would check that person later. Psalms spoke to the wife again. “Don't move. I'm going to look at your neck.”

Her eyes blinked as he pulled her turtleneck sweater down to her collarbone. The same colored bruises were on her lower neck. A melting iceberg of tears was dissolving her makeup. One could see, at one time and not that long ago, she had a black eye. An extremely pretty woman in her forties was aging fast from stress and abuse.

Psalms nodded to Mintfurd, and he ushered the woman out of the room, and the other security officer and woman left Psalms alone with the husband.

The former Navy SEAL and ex-Secret Service agent went to work on the wife-beating husband. Unlike the husband's crudeness in inflicting pain on his wife, Psalms left no marks, and the man wasn't allowed to make any sounds.

When done, Psalms opened the door, and Mintfurd went to the
wife sitting across the way with the female security officer, and they brought her back into the room. The woman saw her husband crying like a child who had received a whooping. He was in immense pain as he whimpered.

“Ma'am.” Psalms waited for the woman to look up at him and connect eye to eye. “Listen to me; it's for your own good. This lady here is going to ask you some questions. Please answer all of them. Do you have children with this man?”

The woman shook her head, then said, “I have children, but he is their stepfather. My children, a boy and girl, are ten and eleven. We've been married for eight years…the beatings are getting worse.” She moaned as if she had a sour stomach and needed to have a bowel movement.

“You're getting a divorce, and he is going to pay you a reasonable amount of child support, and you, ma'am, will not see this man for any reason whatsoever. It's over. He's not coming home with you. He understands. Do you understand?”

She nodded her head.

“I'll have a lawyer contact you on Monday.” Psalms thought this would be one way for Darcelle to return a favor since he was going to help her with her ex-husband problem.

“You will not see this man ever! You will get counseling for you and your children; the lawyer will help you with that, too.”

• • •

Two hours later, Psalms walked through the empty ferry and either dimmed or turned off all the lights above the water line. He turned on the underwater lights on the open water side of the ferry. Streaks of red, yellow, and bright blue beamed through the water twenty meters away from the boat. With everything secure,
he walked into the stateroom. Designed to look like a luxurious hotel's open-floor planning room, it had every amenity.