Just Too Good to Be True (17 page)

CHAPTER
17

Barrett Meets Mr. Big

Dear Diary,

Tonight Nico left me a message and told me to expect a surprise this evening at a certain time. Sure enough, almost to the minute there was a knock at my door. I looked out to make sure it wasn’t Maybelline, and I see this really fine man standing there, so I open the door.

He asked me if my name is Barrett. I tell him “yes” and he hands me a silver box and tells me Nico sent him.

I can’t stop staring at this man. His face is so smooth, almost too beautiful for a man, yet he was decidedly masculine. I asked him who he is and in a gentle voice he said, “Kilgore.” And then he disappeared into the night.

I stood in my foyer and wondered who this mystery man was and then I remembered I had a gift to open.

I ripped open the box and out fell a beautiful silk daffodil-yellow and pale pink peignoir set with a note from Nico that said,
Dear Love…This should do the trick…

The next day, Barrett
bounced through the lobby of her well-appointed condo building on the way to the gym and spotted a tall, handsome black man looking in her direction. He was smiling, which didn’t surprise her because men always smiled when they saw her coming. Maybe it was her perfect smile? Or the perky twins? Barrett thought she would have a little fun before starting her workout, so she did a playful
drop it like it’s hot
move with the towel she’d brought to use at the gym.

She could feel the man staring at her firm yet plump ass, so she remained bent over for almost fifteen seconds before turning around and asking him if he lived in the building.

“No, I don’t, but I suspect you do. That boy always does things first class,” he said.

“I just moved here,” Barrett said, ignoring his last statement and moving in closer. The first thing she noticed, besides the expertly tailored navy blue suit, were his eyes. His steel-gray eyes with green rims were so piercing, she thought they could see right through and read everything that was going on inside her—the joy she got from flirting with good-looking guys, but also the pain she’d caused unsuspecting young men seeking their first serious relationship. From the way he filled out his suit, Barrett knew he’d been an athlete at some point in his life.

“What’s your name?” he asked.

“Barrett. Barrett Elizabeth Manning,” she said.

“Any relation to Archie Manning and his boys, Peyton and Eli?” he asked.

“You mean the professional football players. They’re white,” Barrett said.

“But you know who they are, which I find interesting but not surprising. Were you born with that name, or did somebody give it to you?” he asked.

“Excuse me? You’re asking a lot of questions, so now I’m going to ask a few. What’s your name?” Barrett said.

“John.”

“Do you have a last name, John?”

“You’re one of Nico’s girls, aren’t you?” His voice had changed from friendly to firm and businesslike.

“What’s a Nico?” Barrett asked, wondering how the handsome stranger knew about the man she loved. Maybe he had been sent by Nico to check up on her.

“Don’t toy with me, Barrett Manning. If that’s really your name. You look like the type of young lady Nico would put on a college campus. I could have spotted you a football field away with your perfect breasts, long hair, flawless skin, and that unmistakable aura of a professional gold digger.”

Barrett looked at him, puzzled and troubled. He did have Nico’s MO down to a tee, and now she was determined to let him know he wasn’t right.

“You must have me confused, John, but thanks for the compliments since you described me correctly, minus the gold digger part. I don’t know who your friend Nico is,” Barrett said.

“He’s not my friend and I’m not his,” John said. “And trust me when I say he’s not yours either, but you’ll find that out soon enough. But let me give you a bit of advice so you won’t end up like Brittany and Katie. Get your shit and run before you end up in jail like some of his other girls. You’re very pretty and won’t last long in the joint. But if you don’t stop what you’re doing, I’ll tell Brady and his mother what you’re really up to, and I think you know Nico won’t like it if you fail.”

And then he walked out the door, leaving Barrett with her mouth open and her beautiful body visibly shaking.

Barrett took a few moments to compose herself. She was debating if she should go to the gym or up to her condo when John walked back into the building. Barrett quickly headed in the opposite direction, but she could feel him close by and wondered for the first time if he was dangerous.

“Barrett,” he called out to her.

“What do you want with your crazy ass?” Barrett said as she turned around to confront him. One thing she’d learned from Lita was to never run away from a fight, even if it was with a man twice her size.

“Here’s my card. And don’t forget to ask Nico about Katie and Brittany—they should be up for parole real soon.”

The man left again and Barrett stood holding a business card that read:

John Basil Henderson, XJI, Inc., President and Founding Partner.

CHAPTER
18

Carmyn’s Confessions

I
t was a beautiful Sunday afternoon. Lowell and I had just finished a brunch of fried chicken wings and waffles, scrambled eggs, and fruit salad. I was on my second mimosa when Lowell looked at me and asked, “So what happened between you and Brady last night?”

“What are you talking about?” I asked. I wanted to avoid this conversation, even though Brady’s questions had caused me a restless night. All I wanted to do was get in my car and drive to Atlanta and get in my bed.

“Well, if I’m not mistaken, it looked like you two were having a disagreement. And then you dropped those chips like they were covered in cyanide. Do you want to talk about it?”

“There is nothing to talk about. A coach from Texas told Brady that someone had sent his recruitment letters back,” I said, hoping Lowell would leave it at that.

“Why would someone do that?”

“I don’t know what that man was talking about,” I said as I sliced in half the single strawberry on my plate and then plopped it into my mouth.

“Can I ask you something else?” Lowell said as he poured hot coffee into his half-filled cup.

“What?”

“Do you think we’re too old to fall in love?”

“Damn, Lowell, you make it sound like we’re in our sixties. We haven’t even made forty yet. Why the questions about love?”

Lowell sipped his coffee for a few moments, then turned and faced me directly and said, “If I told you something really hush-hush, would you keep it to yourself?”

“Of course I would. Lowell, how long have we known each other? Anything you tell me will stay between you and me,” I said.

“You promise?”

“I promise. Lowell, come on. Tell me,” I pleaded.

“I think I might be falling in love,” he said.

“That’s great.”

“It might not be,” he said softly.

“Why not?”

“Well, he’s young.”

“How young?”

“He’s twenty-four, but he’s very mature,” Lowell said.

“Does he have a name?”

“Yeah, but his age isn’t the only problem.”

“I’m listening,” I said as I poured more champagne into my fluted glass. I could tell this was going to be good, and a little buzz would make Lowell’s news even better.

“He’s one of my students.”

“Stop it!” I shouted as I hit the dining table with my flat hand.

“I know. Isn’t that horrible?”

“What about your rule?”

“Carmyn, he’s is so damn fine I just couldn’t stop myself,” Lowell said with a swoon in his voice. “He came to my office at the beginning of the school year to get an override for my class. When I first saw him, my heart started beating fast and my neck and forehead started to sweat. He’s built like an Adonis and has these blue-green eyes like Vanessa Williams. Matter of fact, they look like they could be kin.”

“What’s his name?”

“Kilgore Roberts.”

“That’s a different name,” I said.

“Oh, he’s something else. He came to class the first week wearing a tight-fitting shirt and slacks. He didn’t wear those baggy jeans most of my male students wear. You know, hanging down on the butts. Kilgore would be the first one in class and the last one to leave. The one thing he did do, that the boys do, is hold on to his stuff.”

“So how did you know he was gay?”

“I didn’t. But during the second week of school he came to my office under the guise of asking what he could do for extra credit.”

“Extra credit my ass,” I said, laughing. I might have put too much champagne in my glass. I rarely drank, and when I did, it usually gave me the giggles or a loose tongue.

“Exactly. The next thing I knew, we were on top of my desk, kissing like we were supplying the other with lifesaving oxygen. If any of my other students had walked in on us, let’s just say it wouldn’t have been good. And then I just did something real silly.”

“What did you do?”

“I gave him my address and asked him to come after ten. I told him the back door would be open. That evening, I heard the back door open and it was on. I felt like I was twenty years old again.”

“So you think you’re falling in love with him?”

“Carmyn, it might be too late. I live for the boy. As soon as you leave, I’ll call or text him and spend the rest of the day in bed with him.”

“I guess I should say I’m happy for you,” I said.

“Thank you. But what about you? When are we going to find someone for you?”

“I’m fine, Lowell. Maybe I’ll start dating when Brady goes to the league,” I said, giving my standard reply.

“So how much in love were you with Brady’s father?”

“I don’t want to talk about that,” I said quickly. Suddenly I didn’t feel giddy, as memories I had tried to erase entered my mind. They must have shown on my face, because Lowell took my hands and said, “Carmyn, you can trust me. What really happened between you and Brady’s father?”

Maybe it was the champagne, but I looked into Lowell’s eyes and they looked like a safe place to leave some things I had tried to forget.

I took a deep breath. “It’s a long story,” I began. “A twenty-year-old story. It started when I enrolled at the University of Texas.”

Lowell frowned. “I thought you graduated from Clark. I never knew you even lived in Texas.”

“I told you a lot of things. Now I’m going to tell you the truth. My name is really Carmyn Johnson, but I was known by my childhood nickname, Niecey, until I had Brady.

“I went to the University of Texas in 1987, but left after…” I paused, wondering if I could really say the words aloud. “When I was a freshman, I was…I went to a party…had a few drinks.” I stopped, not able to go on.

Lowell chuckled. “Girl, everyone has a night or two like that in college. You don’t have anything to be ashamed of. Hell, I can tell you stories that are a lot worse.”

I shook my head. “Nothing’s worse than what happened to me. Nothing’s worse than what I let happen to myself that night.” I sank in the chair and faced Lowell, although my mind took my eyes away, back to that time, back to a night I had tried to pretend never happened.

“My boyfriend was a star football player for UT, and he invited me to the party for the prospective high school recruits. I didn’t even want to go, but I wanted to please…Woodson.” It was the first time I’d said his name aloud in more than two decades.

“At the party, I drank a little, smoked a little. I wasn’t trying to get drunk or high. I’m the daughter of a preacher. I had lived a sheltered life, and I just wanted to have a good time. I wanted to fit in, be popular and make my boyfriend proud of me. I don’t remember much about the party, but I remember everything afterwards,” I said as tears formed in my eyes.

I continued unfolding the story as it glided from my memory: how I’d awakened in a room not knowing where I was, Woodson finding me naked, and then the smear campaign that Daphne, Woodson’s former girlfriend, launched, and then the letter from Woodson that drove me from campus, back to my parents and Houston.

“Didn’t your parents want to know why you came home?” Lowell asked.

“I told them I didn’t like going to a big white school like UT.”

“Didn’t you have friends you could talk to?”

“No, not really,” I responded. “Can you believe that Daphne called me the other day after all these years?”

“What did she want?”

“I didn’t talk to her long enough to find out. I just hung up,” I said.

“Good for you,” Lowell said. “This Daphne sounds like a playa-hating bitch. Women can be so evil towards each other. But look at you now. You’ve done so well for yourself and Brady. I envy the relationship you two have.”

Every time Lowell said my son’s name, my tears returned. “I haven’t told you the real story yet.” I took a breath. “I’d been in Houston about a month when I suspected that I was pregnant. Shortly after that, my family doctor confirmed that I was, and two months later my parents had me on a plane to Atlanta, so I could have the baby without anyone finding out.

“My parents were mortified. I couldn’t answer any of their questions. They assumed that Woodson was the father. I couldn’t tell them what happened. I couldn’t tell them who the father was, because I didn’t know. They looked at me with such disgust and disdain in their eyes and then told me I needed to disappear faster than ice in a hot drink. As a prominent minister, my father couldn’t have a pregnant unmarried daughter. My mother was so embarrassed that she wouldn’t speak to me, so she sent me a letter.

“But they were good Christians.” I chuckled bitterly. “After a few days of tears from my mother and silence from my father, they told me they forgave me and that one day God would forgive me. And then they sprang into action. Abortion was never an option, but after some research, my mother found the Pure Life Home. It was a Christian home for girls in my situation.”

“I can’t believe your parents sent you away. That sounds like some shit from the fifties.”

I nodded. “I cried every day for the first month I was there, but then I had to get on about the business of finding the perfect family for my baby.”

“You were going to give Brady up?”

I nodded. “At Pure Life, that’s what you’re supposed to do. That’s why my parents sent me there. The plan was for me to have the baby, give it up for adoption, and then return to Houston as if I’d just been away at school. I agreed. I was just eighteen. What was I supposed to do with a baby?

“Pure Life introduced me to five families, and I met an African American couple, Rex and Sophie Maddie. Both of the Maddies had Ph.D.s, and I was impressed with the beautiful home they had just built in an exclusive gated community. I knew they would treat my baby well, because Sophie couldn’t have children and they wanted a baby so badly. I was six months pregnant when I met the Maddies, and for the rest of my pregnancy, they treated me like their daughter. They took me out to dinner, took me shopping; I even spent a couple of weekends in their new home. And they were different from my parents. There was never any shame in their eyes when they looked at me. All I ever felt from them was love. They thought I was a blessing.

“Sophie even encouraged me to write a letter to my baby explaining that I loved him but that I wanted him to have a better life.

“Sophie was in the delivery room when Brady was born. But I wasn’t prepared for what happened next. When my baby was delivered, the plan was to take him out of the room right away. But I begged them to let me see him, let me hold him so that I could say good-bye. And although they hesitated, the nurse handed me the baby.” I paused. “And I never let go. I felt such an immediate and intense love for him.”

“You kept…Brady.”

I nodded. “It was so hard. He was my reason for breathing. Sophie cried, and Rex threatened to sue me for all the money they’d spent. For days I pleaded with them to understand, but all they could feel was their own pain. Sophie told me that I might as well have snatched her heart from her. I cried for them, but I just couldn’t give my baby away.”

I smiled. “I held my baby’s hand. I counted his toes and his fingers. And when he looked at me and stopped crying, he took my breath and filled my heart with love. I couldn’t give him up.

“The nurses were happy for me. They asked me what I was going to name him. I hadn’t considered any names, but I looked up at the television and
The Brady Bunch
was on. I always loved that show. I had registered at the hospital as Carmyn Bledsoe, using my mother’s maiden name, and I liked the way Brady Bledsoe sounded. Also, by keeping my mother’s maiden name I didn’t totally lose my identity. That day, Niecey Johnson left the building.”

Lowell exhaled a long breath. “I know your parents probably went crazy.”

“That’s one way of putting it. They tried to force me to change my mind, but when I didn’t, they told me I couldn’t come home. My preacher father and my mother, the first lady, told me to stay out of Houston so I wouldn’t embarrass them. They told me they would welcome me back with open arms if I ever gave up my baby.

“I was in shock. I was a teenager, on my own, living in Atlanta, a city I didn’t know. But it didn’t matter. I kept Brady and made a life for both of us. I did get some help with diapers, formula, and other items from an organization called Brandon’s Room that was started by a young woman who gave up her son but then regretted her decision and didn’t have money for a lawyer to get him back. I’m still so grateful for the help I received that every year I send the organization a donation.”

Lowell leaned forward and took my hand. “You made a wonderful life for you and Brady. You did what you had to do, but I think you should tell Brady.”

“What? He might start to hate me. No, I can’t do that.”

“So you did send back those letters from the University of Texas,” Lowell said.

“What could I do? Brady couldn’t end up at the place where I ruined my life. I couldn’t let that happen to my baby or to me. I sent back every one of those letters.”