Chapter 16 – Mariah
“Do you know who keeps calling, Kimmie? Did you break up with your boyfriend or what?”
“No, I haven’t. Why do you think that it’s for me? It could be for you or Sasha. You’re the ones who see more than one guy at a time.”
“Damn, that’s a low blow.”
“I didn’t mean it like that. I don’t know who keeps calling. I’ve answered it twice and there was no one there. It’s starting to get to me too.”
After three days of random hang-up calls, it was becoming clear that one of us had a stalker on our hands. Kimmie was right, of course. She always was. It was more than likely someone for me or Sasha. I didn’t think that it was anyone that I knew. No one would want to get ahold of me that much. But you never know. I hadn’t heard from Scott since the last time I’d seen him at the club. Anyone else, I really didn’t care.
“Well, I don’t know what to do. They’re coming through as private.”
“Since you changed your cell number, I thought that you knew who was calling all of the time.”
“What do you mean I changed my cell number?”
She pulled out her phone and dialed my number in front of me. I thought that the phone in my pocket was going to ring, but it never did. Taking it out of there, I looked on the screen and there was nothing. Kimmie was putting it up to my ear and letting me hear the recording saying that the phone number – my phone number – had been disconnected.
“Did you not pay your bill or something?”
I looked at her like she was talking nonsense. Of course I’d paid my bill. What was she thinking?
“I don’t know why they would cancel my number. That’s so weird, right?”
Kimmie nodded that it was. “I tried a couple of times. I was a little tipsy when it first came back like this, you know how I am. I thought I’d messed up the dialing, but now I know it wasn’t just me.”
“No, I didn’t know it had changed. I need to call them and see what happened. The phone is still on, though. It just doesn’t make any sense. I was trying to figure out why it was so quiet and no one had been texting or calling. At least now I know.”
Kimmie couldn’t understand what I was smiling about. I’d been so worried that I hadn’t heard from Scott, but now I knew that it was all a mistake. He hadn’t been calling because there had been some kind of fluke with the phone company. I didn’t care about the phone or anything else now that I knew Scott wasn’t mad or avoiding me. I would see him next week, and I couldn’t wait. The only thing I wished was that I had asked him for his number instead of giving him mine. Not that it would take much to find him. He was a powerful man, after all.
“What are you grinning about?”
“Nothing, I just thought someone wasn’t calling me, but I guess it’s because my phone is messed up. I didn’t see that one coming. I thought for sure he was just ignoring me.”
“Is it one of your clients? You’re not going to be like Sasha and fall in love with one of them, are you?”
I wanted to tell her that I wasn’t going to fall for one of them. It was a bad idea, after all, but the fact was that I had already fallen for him in a way. It wasn’t going to get any better, and if I had my way, I would want more than what Sasha had. I wouldn’t want to be with Scott if he was going to be with other women.
“Yes, but he’s more than a client.”
Kimmie rolled her eyes and told me that she didn’t know how I did it. I was thinking about Scott and I got sidetracked again. She had to rein it back in, and before long I was on my way to a restaurant for lunch. I hadn’t been off in a while, and all I’d wanted to do was sleep.
“Come on, Mariah, you need to get out. You’re even paler than usual.”
***
“You’re just seeing things. What would Greg be doing here?”
“I don’t know, but I swear I saw him when we were leaving the restaurant.”
I could tell that she didn’t believe me. There were hundreds of thousands of people in New Orleans, and more than likely there were one or two who looked like my ex. But something was nagging at me. It was all too coincidental. I didn’t put much stock in coincidence, so I had to go with the other possibilities, whether they made immediate sense or not.
“You’re just being paranoid. Are you sure you’re okay? You haven’t been acting like yourself lately. I just wonder what’s going on with you.”
“Nothing, I’m just a little spooked because I could have sworn that I saw him.”
“I know you think you did, but that doesn’t tell me what he would be doing here.”
“I don’t know. Greg has a side of him that you wouldn’t expect. That’s why I left when he was gone. There was no way that I wanted to face him right then to break up.”
“He didn’t hit you or anything, did he?”
“No, it was never anything like that, although I know there were times when he wanted to. I could just see it in his eyes, but he never really touched me out of anger. I just… I don’t know if he’s the type to not let things go. Sometimes I wondered if he would try to chase me down. You know, the whole ‘if I can’t have you no one can’ scenario.”
“I never got that vibe from him. He has a job. I mean, he can’t just take off whenever he wants to chase you around. I’m sure that it was just someone that looked like him.”
“You’re probably right.” I said it at the same time my stomach knotted thinking about it. I just had a feeling that Greg was around and sooner or later I was going to have to have it out with him. I don’t know why I was so nervous. I didn’t think he would hurt me, but Greg was known for his threats and he got particularly vicious when things didn’t go his way. He also knew far too much about my past for me to be at all comfortable.
***
The hang-up calls kept coming. I still wasn’t sure who it was, but each time I got one I imagined that it was Greg. I still couldn’t quite figure out what he was doing, but knowing him he was investigating me. That was what he did as a cop, and I didn’t like the idea that I was his target now. He was really good at his job.
Then I thought about what he would think when he found out what I did now. It wouldn’t take much to figure it out. In fact, chances were that if he was already down south, he already knew anyway. What did he want, then? If he knew what I was doing, and that I was no longer the delicate girl he’d fallen in love with, what could he possibly want from me now?
I called into work and told Elie that I wasn’t feeling well. The two days off had given me a lot of time to think, and I’d come to the conclusion that I needed to try to figure out what was going on in my life. But there was more to it than that. I couldn’t think when Elie was trying to sell me off to the highest bidder.
He wasn’t happy that I canceled, but he didn’t give me too much lip about it. All he said was that the next time I came in we’d have a lot to talk about. I had a feeling that I wasn’t going to like the conversation, but it was about time that we did have a talk. If I was going to keep working at the club, things were going to have to change.
The knock at the door pulled me from my thoughts. I didn’t even check the peephole. The girls were out dancing, and I half figured that it was them and they had misplaced their keys again. Considering that we’d had to get a few extra ones already, it wasn’t that far out of the realm of possibility.
The words on my lips stopped when I saw who was at the door. What was he doing here?
“Greg?”
“Mariah! God, it’s good to see you! You don’t know how much I’ve missed you and how worried I was when you took off. I was afraid I was never going to see you again!”
He pulled me in for a kiss, and I was too shocked that he was there to stop him. I could feel the familiar pull that my body had to his. He’d given me many nights of pleasure, and even though I didn’t want to go back, my body was all ready for him in seconds. The kiss was broken when I realized what he was doing and what I was doing. We weren’t together anymore.
“Wait, Greg. I don’t know what you’re doing here, but this is not going to happen anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that I left because it wasn’t working out. Did you really think that you were going to come chase me down and everything was going to be okay?”
His face changed to the one I’d seen over and over again when I told him no. Greg was nice and all of that, but once he was told no to something that he wanted, everything about his demeanor changed. Now was one of those times.
“I came a long way to see you, Mariah. Are you not going to let me in?”
He’d come a long ways and he looked good. There was a familiarity with him that I didn’t have with anyone else, and I was moving back to let him in before I really thought about it. After everything that Greg had done for me, I at least owed him that much. I needed to hear him out, and then I would give him whatever answers that he needed. I had no intention of going backwards, though.
“Come in, Greg, but I’m telling you now, it’s not going to be like old times.”
Greg didn’t look very happy, and I didn’t blame him. I wasn’t making anything easy on him, and I certainly wasn’t going to fall into his arms like I suspected he thought I would. Did he really think that just because he’d come down here I was going to be all beside myself trying to get back with him?
“I don’t want it to be like old times, Mariah. I want it to be better. Not having you was one of the hardest things that I’ve ever gone through, but it showed me how much I really love you, Mariah. It showed me that we were meant to be together.”