Cold Hard Cash Read online

  I draw in a deep breath. It fucking feels like that’s all I’ve been doing today.

  “I can’t take that gift.”

  “Why not?” she asks. “You said my pussy—I mean, my cunt—was perfect. Don’t you want it?”

  “Oh, girl, I want it. But not like this.”

  “Then how?

  “You don’t want your first time to be with a guy you don’t know. It should be memorable.”

  I run my hands over her smooth skin. She’s flawless. Even her belly button turns me on.

  “I’m sure I will remember every single detail of this day. Don’t worry about me.”

  I look at her—and the truth is, before Gina there was a string of well-pleased females as I made my way through high school. My performance isn’t the concern. It’s the fact that the last thing I want to do is take something from Evangeline she can’t take back.

  “I can’t. You at least deserve a proper date before a guy takes your virginity.”

  “A date, huh? We had chips and salsa. That counts as a date.”

  I’m not going to budge, no matter how much I want to. Evie is different. She’s more than a hook-up.

  Her eyes alone.

  “I mean it,” I tell her, leaning over her perfect body, kissing her softly.

  “You are such a cunt-tease, Cassius. I’d never have guessed.” She wraps her arms around me.

  “What had you guessed?”

  “I guessed wrong.”

  “But you want to be right?” I whisper into her ear, letting my tongue trail over her neck.

  “Mhmm.”

  I taste her smile as I press my lips against her mouth. It tastes like a promise hinged on hope.

  She wants me and I want her, but I want to do the right thing. Maybe for the first time in my motherfucking life.

  “Do you have plans tonight?” I ask. “Let me take you on a proper date.”

  “And then you’ll sleep with me?” she asks, bringing me back to where we began.

  “You’re so singularly focused.”

  “I go to Julliard. I’m basically brilliant.”

  “Modest, too.” I plant kisses on her neck. My cock is solid between us, and damn, I deserve a medal for my self-control.

  “I’m so hot for you, Cassius,” she groans under me. “Are you really going to make me wait?”

  “I don’t even have a condom, girl.”

  “You aren’t a player than?”

  “I’m not a player. I just crush a lot.”

  She laughs again. “You really aren’t, if you’re using my lines.”

  “Is that a yes?”

  “Yes.” She sighs, resigned to the fact that I’m really not going to fuck her right now. “But just so you know, Cassius, I’m not going to wear panties tonight. And if you refuse my cunt a second time, I’ll take it personally.”

  “Oh, the refusal is plenty personal this time, too,” I tell her.

  “Oh yeah?” She squints her left eye, as if trying to read me more thoroughly.

  “Yeah, I personally want to take you to bed—but first, I’ll take you to dinner.” I stand, reaching for my shirt. I’m glad I didn’t discard my pants, because I swear to God it would be a challenge to stuff my wood back in.

  “Who are you, Cassius?” she asks, sitting up, her naked tits perky and sweet, and in need of much more sucking before the night is through.

  “I’m your dinner date.” I pull out my phone and tap on the Uber app, ordering a ride back to the apartment.

  We exchange numbers, and my phone pings, telling me my car is here.

  “I’ll be back here in a few hours—say, five o’clock?” I tell her, leaning over her naked body and giving her a soft kiss on the cheek.

  “A little early for dinner, isn’t it?”

  “Honey, if we wait to start eating until eight, we’ll only be hurting ourselves. This way, we can be back here by ten.”

  “With condoms.”

  “Plenty.”

  Chapter Ten

  Cassius

  Back at the apartment I check in with Mom. The nurse has left for the day, and Mom is sound asleep in her bed. I sit next to her, and see a drawer in her nightstand open. Inside, there’s a bottle of cheap vodka—God knows, I’ve cleaned the alcohol out of her room enough times to know that she always gets another bottle somehow.

  I’m guessing Gina got it for her; she’s the easiest around here to manipulate.

  Trying not to stress, I realize I also need to make a plan for what I’m going to do about Chad and Gina, before I see them again.

  I pour the bottle out in the kitchen sink, and instead of focusing on those problems, I look over some of the songs that KMG has sent over. The music is what it’s really about right now. While I have control over a few of the songs on the first album, I only get to use half of my original stuff.

  They want an LP produced before Elle’s tour starts in three weeks, which means I’m going to be in the studio for fourteen days straight, starting tomorrow.

  When I first found out about this two weeks ago, I was pissed, but at least I knew before I came down to LA today and signed the contact. These are the terms KMG is willing to offer, and the truth is, I have zero leverage.

  Mom’s health was shitty before the accident, but now it’s only going downhill. She needs my help, and those fucking court fines are piling up. She damaged property at a city park when her car crashed—thank God it was just a city-owned lawnmower, park benches, and a retaining wall. It could have been a person.

  But, fuck, it all costs money.

  So, I’ll play this shitty pseudo-rap shit, with lyrics that play up my prison time a hell of a lot more than I’d like. It isn’t the worst thing, and I need to buck up and remember the point of this. Maybe one day I’ll be like Jack Harris, able to call my own motherfucking shots.

  Until then, I’ll go on stage and deliver. I always deliver.

  In the meantime, I’ll keep working on my own shit. I have a notepad and pen in hand as I lay sprawled out on my bed, thinking about Gentle Evangeline, jotting down everything about our time together.

  It looks like I found myself a muse in the least expected place. KMG headquarters is a breeding ground for wannabes—musicians and groupies alike. But Evangeline isn’t like those fame-obsessed people hanging around in slinky clothes, draped on leather couches, hoping to be chosen.

  Evangeline is unlike any girl I’ve ever met.

  Probably because there were no girls like her in East Heights—privileged girls who never worried about things like lunch money and having shoes that fit, and keeping their younger siblings safe from an alcoholic mother or an abusive father.

  The girls I grew up with had to fight for survival. Evangeline avoided all that because she happened to be born in a home where money meant nothing, because there was so much of it. She doesn’t know the sort of heartbreak that jaded girls like Gina were raised on.

  And that makes me want to protect Evangeline from anything that might hurt her. That makes me want to wrap her in my arms and carry her somewhere safe, because she has no fucking clue how lucky she is to have lived twenty-one years without any scars. In this world, it’s a gift to have wide eyes and believe in possibility.

  I don’t know if it’s her innocence that draws me to her like a moth to a flame, but I can’t deny that I’m counting down the minutes until I can see her again.

  Taste her again.

  Fill her up for the first time.

  The front door opens, and brings me back to reality. Gina and Chad are back with a six-pack of Coke and a bottle of cheap rum. Fantastic.

  “Hey, motherfucker,” Chad says. “Wanna drink?”

  I shrug. I was all spun up after the morning photo shoot, and it took nearly fucking a virgin to clear my head. I want to keep it on straight.

  Gina struts in, then plops on the couch, picking at her long shellacked nails, nails I know she fucking loves. No matter how tight the money is, she always has enough to si
t and get her nails done.

  Not that I care. Gina grew up in the school of hard knocks. If shiny red nail polish dulls some of her pain, good.

  I just wish I had something I could use to coat over the places she cut into my heart. To seal the wounds. Seeing her makes my skin tighten and my jaw tense. She and I still haven’t dealt with any of our shit. She left my bed one night and went to my brother’s the next.

  Does that make me a weak-ass motherfucker? I don’t know. I want to believe it makes me strong—because, dammit I don’t want to push her, when I know how far she’s come to the edge, and how many times I’ve had to pull her back up to the land of the living.

  I don’t want to destroy her just so I can say my piece. That isn’t what it means to be a man.

  At some point, what she and I had was love. Maybe it was childish, love borne from desperate fools clinging to whatever they could find, but we found one another.

  That counts for something.

  Chad’s pouring rum and Cokes. Gina’s pursing her lips.

  The air is thick and I want out.

  Gina’s next to me on the couch, in stilettos and skintight pants. Her blazer from this morning is gone, and she’s left with a sheer top with a black bra, hair knotted and tight. Nothing left to the imagination.

  I can’t help but compare her to Evie, who wore a dress and flats, who had loose hair and an open heart.

  “So what do you guys want?” I ask them, cutting to the chase. Chad hands me a drink, and I know it isn’t a peace offering—but it’s liquor, and that counts for something.

  “Gina and I are having drinks tonight with the KMG people, but we have a few hours so we thought the three of us should have a business conversation, bro. Before we meet with the big guy. Make sure we’re all on the same page.”

  I scowl. “Who are you meeting with, exactly?”

  “Actually, we’re having drinks with the head fucking honcho: Marshal Kendrick himself, at his pad. We were invited, personally.” He looks over at Gina, smiling like they have big plans for tonight.

  I fucking want them out of my business.

  “He’s the CEO. What do you have to do with him?”

  “I’m considering finding more talent. Becoming a scout. Meeting with Marshal Kendrick is a step in the process. I want his endorsement.”

  “You want to be a talent scout?” I scoff, shaking my head. Sure, Chad was able to mold me into something profitable, but that doesn’t mean he can replicate it.

  Or is that my gut instinct, to cut him down, because of the shit I’m holding against him?

  “He’d be good at it,” Gina says, scooting closer to me. Too close for comfort. She smells like my childhood, like memories I want to lay to rest.

  Maybe now is my chance to break ties with Chad. Maybe he’s looking for a way to let me go without hurting my fucking feelings.

  Though he’s never seemed to consider them before.

  Two can play that game.

  I look at Gina. “This what you want, Gina? To be with fucking Chad?”

  I don’t know why I say it like that. It’s not like I want to be with her, not at all. It just kills me that she’d pick a fucker like him over me. Like, what does that shithead have that I don’t?

  She sighs, like she knew this was coming. “You really wanna do this now, Cash?” she asks.

  “How do you wanna do it?” I look at both of them, my voice even—but I’m not calm. Not at all. Inside, my blood is boiling because the three of us have been tiptoeing around things that matter way too much.

  It’s like we’ve been holding it all together long enough for me to sign the fucking contract—but now it’s signed, and our hearts have space to finally explode.

  And, right now, I could burst. I hold a lot of shit against the two of them. They turned on me when I needed them most. Maybe I’m holding it against them because people have been turning their backs on me for a long time before that.

  Chad never went to prison. I did. I took the fucking fall for all of us.

  And, sure, I got out after thirteen months, but being incarcerated changed my life. I’m not the man I was, and I lost more than a year of my life. I lost my boys, my hood. My identity.

  And I’m no closer to finding it, two years later.

  “Cash, this can’t be a surprise,” Gina says.

  “Not a surprise?” I give a sharp laugh. “I promised you everything.”

  “And what was that?” she asks, plainly.

  And, God damn it, that slays me. Because, sure, I never had much to offer, but I was willing to give her all I had.

  It’s so fucking clear. Why Chad, and why not me.

  I don’t know who is the bigger fool.

  “You think Chad will end up with more than me in the end, is that it? That he’ll rise in ways I won’t? That he’ll give you a life I can’t.” I down my drink. “Gina, I’m the talent he’s scouting. I’m the product. I’m the reason we have money in the bank.”

  Her eyebrows raise; she’s not convinced.

  “I made you what you’re going to be, little bro,” Chad says, walking toward Gina, and pulling her to stand. “And I am going to make a dozen more just like you. You may have the chops, but I have the vision. Visionaries always win in the end.”

  “Fuck you.” I walk to the front door, throw it open. I want to fire him right here, on the spot, but I don’t trust my gut anymore.

  I can’t fuck this up—ruin my chance—because Mom needs me. And I have no clue how Chad might react to getting the boot.

  I can’t give in to the heat of the moment, because that would only confirm my fear: that I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.

  The only thing that has felt real, true—good and honest—in a long fucking time is Evangeline.

  I need to see her. Maybe I can look in her gray eyes and see the truth I seek.

  Maybe my muse will set me free.

  Chapter Eleven

  Evangeline

  Is it totally lame of me to admit that I spent the afternoon getting ready for my date? Because I did. I so did. Now that I know I’m going to lose my virginity tonight, I’m determined to make it as perfect as possible.

  I shave. Twice. I put on thick black eyeliner, then wash it off and start again with soft silver shadow. I root around my closet in indecision, and eventually put on a strapless maxi and sandals. I braid my hair and pin it around my head, then unfurl the whole thing and let my dark locks fan over my shoulders.

  I’m nervous in the best sort of way.

  I google Cash Flow. I click a link, then two. Then three. I feel wrong for doing this, but learn that he’s from a neighborhood filled with crime and went to prison for beating a man, and he started posting his rap-offs on YouTube a year ago.

  His music is insane. Insanely beautiful. I was expecting something grim, or a song about bitches and hos, but Cash isn’t that kind of rapper.

  He’s a genius.

  I understand why my dad signed him. I’d sign him. I watch every clip, mesmerized, because with a mic in his hand he’s powerful. He’s electric.

  He’s fucking hot as hell.

  He has hundreds of thousands of Instagram followers. He tweets every hour.

  But I swear, not one of them is his own words.

  I’ve heard him speak, heard him whisper in my ear—and none of his inflections would lead me to believe that he could translate his heart and soul into one hundred and forty characters.

  Also, he went to prison for beating a man.

  Should that scare me?

  I shut my computer.

  I take off my panties, because, after all, I promised Cassius I wouldn’t wear any and I can make good on my promise. Then I discard my maxi dress, tie my hair in a bun, and put on a fitted dress and stilettos. I haven’t worn heels in two years. They’re out of style, but I need tight clothes and sleek shoes, because I want to appear more than I am. I want to look like the sort of woman Cash Flow would sleep with, because all I want right n
ow is to shed my skin and become something braver than I was when I woke up this morning begging my dad for a job.

  I can reclaim what I have forfeited.

  And I will.

  He’s here. I see an Uber drop him off. I told him I would drive, but we both know he’s going to take the wheel tonight.

  I will give him complete control.

  I grab my purse, lock the guest house, and meet him out front.

  “Hey,” I tell him. “You came back.”

  He looks me over, closely. Maybe too closely. Close enough that I’m second-guessing the shoes, the dress, the ruby-red lips.

  “You look different,” he says, cocking his head to the side.

  Okay, not exactly Romeo with his entrance, but I’ll take it. He’s still here. I’m no fool; if I know how much he’s not my type, I can tell that I’m not his either.

  “You don’t like my outfit?” I ask, looking down, insecure in ways I hate. I don’t want to be that girl. Not tonight. Not anymore.

  “Just looks more….”

  “I was going for celebratory.”

  “It looks very celebratory.”

  “You’re a bad liar, Cassius.”

  “I didn’t beg you for heels and tight skirts, is all.” He shrugs. “But like we discussed before, this is why we’re on a first date, to get to know one another. Maybe I read you all wrong. Maybe your anxiety attack hid parts of you that I’ll see now.”

  “It wasn’t a panic attack. You said so yourself. It was a meltdown.”

  Our eyes lock. I feel seen. I feel stupid in this dress that’s not me; I don’t even know why I own it. The tags were still attached when I found it in my closet.

  He may have gone to prison, but that isn’t why my heart is pounding, why my breath is hot, or why my pussy seems to clench in desire.

  I don’t need a dress to make me feel more than. Standing beside Cassius makes me feel like enough.

  “I’m gonna change. Give me a sec.”

  When I come back out I’m in the flowing maxi dress and the sandals. My hair is loose on my shoulders. I’m myself.

  And Cassius gives me a full-on grin, the dimpled one that makes me suck in air, fast, because he seriously leaves me breathless.