Geren kneaded Tempest’s neck with his fingertips. He didn’t want their first New Year’s together to be ruined. “Sweetheart, let Janessa handle her own business.” He pulled Tempest toward the dance floor, and she followed with great reluctance.
Back over at the bar, the head hoochie was busy trying to get into Dvontè’s pants.
“You still coming over tomorrow?” she asked, seductively rubbing her fake nails up and down his biceps. “I want to show you my new bedroom set.”
“Let me holla at you tomorrow, aiight?” Dvontè never took his eyes off Janessa, who was pushing through the crowd twenty feet away and closing in hard.
“Why you tryin’ to diss me, baby?”
“I’m not dissin’ you,” Dvonte stated, lying his ass off.
“Good, because after that bomb-ass blow job I gave you last night, I deserve a fucking medal,” head hoochie boasted.
Her two friends cackled while some other more conservative sistahs standing nearby rolled their eyes in his direction.
He pulled a twenty out of his pocket to pay the bartender waiting patiently on the opposite side of the bar. When he turned back around, Janessa was within striking distance, her arms folded across her chest.
Janessa looked the head hoochie up and down, giving her the once-over. Head hoochie returned the favor. “Dvontè, who is this skeezer?”
“Who the fuck are you?” the head hoochie yelled back, getting all up in Janessa’s grill.
“Dvontè’s woman!” Janessa stated proudly.
“Woman?” head hoochie chuckled. “Well, if he’s your man, he wasn’t last night.”
Janessa unfolded her arms and pushed Dvontè on the chest, ramming his back into the bar. “What the hell does that mean?”
“Yeah, Dvontè.” Head hoochie sucked on her teeth. “What am I talking about?”
Dvontè wanted to smack the shit out of the tramp, but hitting women wasn’t in his nature. He grabbed Janessa’s wrist. “Janessa, let’s go someplace where we can talk.”
“I think I’ve heard quite enough,” Janessa whispered, fighting back tears. “I trusted you. I thought you were different.”
All the hoochies started laughing, while everyone else just gawked and stared. One of the other two, the one with purple contacts, yelled after Janessa as she pushed her way through the crowd to the exit, “Chile, he’s a male hoe just like the rest of them! Cash that reality check, gurlfriend!”
Dvontè told the hoochie, “You need to shut your unbeweavable ass up!” He started after Janessa. “Come here, Janessa! Janessa!”
Tempest and Geren had been watching from the dance floor. They couldn’t hear the argument over the loud music, but the basics were obvious.
“I’m going after her,” Tempest announced, heading for the door.
“Shit,” Geren huffed under his breath. He left the dance floor and caught up to Dvontè, swinging him around by the arm. “You’re fuckin’ up big-time, and messing with my relationship in the process.”
“It’s just a misunderstanding, Geren!” Dvontè proclaimed, trying to look innocent. “I swear!”
“You’re not even fooling me! Tell that bullshit to someone who can’t read you like a book!”
Dvontè waved Geren off. “I need to find Janessa.”
“Let Tempest deal with Janessa.” Geren glanced over at the bar. “You deal with that trash over there permanently.”
Dvontè looked at the head hoochie standing over by the bar, profiling and basking in her glor
y while her trifling-ass friends gulped down the drinks he’d paid for. Damn shame—she’d sucked his dick the night before, and he couldn’t even recall her name.
Geren asked, “We understand each other?”
Dvontè made a fist and pounded it over his own heart. “As always, we’re right here.”