Scandal: Crossing Boundaries (Scandal Series #1 INTERRACIAL ROMANCE) (3 page)

It was an effort to get her key through the door with the bags in her hands, but once she was inside, she was greeted by a happy yell from one of her boys.

Her two boys sat in front of the Johnson's large sixty-inch flat screen in the center of the artsy, decorated living room, playing a video game while their babysitter, Maria, lazily lounged on the couch behind them, off into some Mexican fashion magazine.

The young woman was dressed in hoochie shirts and a short tank top. Keisha thought this was odd and kind of inappropriate, but it was kind of hot out so she could understand.

Smiling widely with happiness, Keisha sang, "My babies!"

"Momma you got food!"

Her sons, Jamal and Lamar, both five and four, ran excitedly over, clamoring for some of that good ol Wendy's. Lamar looked just like his mamma, while Jamal looked exactly like his daddy.

At the insistence of their father, the boys were skipping pre-school and kindergarten. Jamal would be entering first grade after summer and Lamar would be following suit next year.

While Keisha had initially resisted this decision, Davonte had insisted that the babysitter could teach them the basics of that 'Mickey Mouse shit' and spare them a few extra dollars of having to pay for a babysitter and childcare. Eventually, Keisha had relented. Davonte was the man of the house, after all, and arguing would not have helped their budding relationship one bit.

But after today, they would not need Maria's services anymore.

"Go over to the table and get ready to eat," Keisha told her boys. She watched them run obediently over to the table, and then she turned to Maria and said, "I got you a burger and fries too."

The Mexican girl looked up from her magazine and glanced once at the bags of food in Keisha's arms, a sickly expression crossing her face. "I don't want it," she declined. "I feel like I'm going to throw up."

"Oh, okay then," said Keisha. The poor girl did look kind of green-looking. Then she looked around the living room with curiosity. "Where is Davonte?"

As if on cue, Keisha heard a cough coming from the hallway. Davonte was walking out of their guest bedroom, looking like he'd just woken up. He had on blue jeans and a white t-shirt pulled tight over his well-defined abs.

She did not know why, but he looked so sexy to her in that moment with his light, caramel skin, curly hair, and hazel-green eyes. For months now, she had been spurring his advances, not feeling in the mood for anything because of the stress of her job.

But now that she was free of that nightmare, maybe she would finally get to enjoy her husband like she deserved to...like she had used to.

Maybe this was meant to happen.

"Hey baby," Keisha greeted him, turning to go over to the kitchen table with the food.

At their black, marble table she began setting out the burgers and fries in front of her children who began to greedily dig in the moment the food touched down. Now that Maria wasn't going to eat her portion, she could let Davonte have it.

Coming up to the kitchen doorway, Davonte casually leaned up against the wall, asking, "What you doing home this early, gurl?" Even his deep voice sounded sexy today.

Tossing a glance his way while she took out the last burger, she replied, "I could ask you the same thing...and I don't know why you parked your car in the garage all crazy like that. I was forced to park in the driveway."

"I'll move it in just a minute," Davonte said, glancing behind him into the living room. "And I'm home because I started feeling sick, like I was coming down with a cold." Putting his hand over his mouth, he let out several loud coughs.

Keisha sat down in the seat across from Jamal, scratching at her bra through her blouse. "I figured as much." For some reason Davonte's cough did not sound too sickly. He must have just started coughing. "Come sit down beside me, baby, and eat. I got some burger and fries from Wendy's for you."

Davonte hesitated for a moment before walking over and sitting next to his wife.

Keisha quickly snatched the wrapper from around her juicy burger and took a big bite, letting out a groan of satisfaction. She was so damn hungry.

Davonte picked up a few salty fries and munched on them, his face looking distant.

Setting down her scrumptious burger, Keisha touched her man's arm. He was burning hot to the touch. Maybe he had a fever. "What's wrong baby?" she asked when she'd chewed down the chunk of the burger she had bitten into.

Gazing at her with his gorgeous eyes, he shrugged. "Nothing."

She leaned over and pressed her lips against his cheek, his freshly grown stubble burning her skin. He hadn't shaved that morning for work, which was something he usually did every morning. "Everything is going to be alright."

Seeming to notice her good mood for the first time, Davonte's expression brightened. "You ain't acted like this in a while. You must have some good news to tell me."

Looking at her children with a sly smile, Keisha nodded coyly.

"Damn gurl," Davonte said with a chuckle, "you getting me all excited and shit. Hurry up and lay it on me."

Keisha took another bite out of her burger, raising a manicured finger to stay Davonte's impatience. When she could finally talk, she craned her neck to look over into the living room and said loudly, "Maria you can go home now. We won't need you for the rest of the day."

Or ever again
, Keisha thought.

She really had nothing against the girl, but since she'd be staying home for a while there was no use employing her.

There was a pause before Maria jumped up from the couch, holding her stomach. "Okay Mrs. Johnson." The girl slowly went over to the living room table and grabbed her car keys. "Bye y'all, Lamar, Jamal and Davon—Mr. Johnson."

"Bye Maria," her boys and her man said in unison.

Keisha almost laughed at how cute they all sounded.

A moment later, the front door opened and closed.

"Now can you tell me?" Davonte pressed.

Keisha nodded. "I had to wait until she was gone."

Bafflement crossed over Davonte's face. "Why?"

"Because we won't need her no more."

Davonte only grew more confused. "Why the hell not?"

Sucking in a deep breath, Keisha proudly announced, "I quit my job today. That's why I am home early."

If she thought Davonte was going to jump up from his seat and whoop for joy she was sadly mistaken.

In fact, the nigga looked like he had been struck in the back by the crack of a slave whip.

Smiling anxiously, Keisha added, "I'll be home all the time now and can watch the kids, tutor them and...we will have more time for...you know." She winked at him nervously, not liking how he was staring at her.

But he continued to stare at her as if she had lost her damn mind. After a moment he quietly said, "Keisha...please tell me you just playin."

Keisha returned his stare, unsure as to why he was acting that way.

"You just playin right?" There was panic in his eyes. "Tell me you just fuckin with me."

Her heart beginning to race in her chest, Keisha slowly shook her head. "The boys will be totally prepared for any kind of math too, since I'll be teaching them, not someone who doesn't know common timetables."

Davonte's green eyes widened with disbelief. "You really ain't playing!"

"I don't know what the problem is, baby," Keisha objected. "You said you were getting a major raise."

Davonte slammed his fist against the table, startling the boys and sending several French fries flying about. "Gurl, what the fuck is wrong with you? I said I
was
getting a raise, not that I had one yet!"

"But you said it was all but certain," Keisha reminded him with a worried glance at their children. "And that I could probably quit my stressful job because you'd be making more than enough to take care of all of us."

Davonte grabbed at his curly hair, moaning with despair. Then he jumped to his feet, almost knocking his chair over and began pacing around the kitchen, looking as if he wanted to break something. "Even if that were true, you just don't go up quitting your job like that out of the blue. The fuck was yo ass thinking? We got a damn expensive ass mortgage, car notes, a babysitter, and a host of other bills on our back!"

Keisha was starting to get mad now. He was the one who had went around bragging about how much money he was making all the damn time which had only gotten worse when he started the talk about a raise. "Look nigga, you go work day in and day out and get disrespected by bad ass kids and have to deal with nasty gossip behind your back by people who should be professional, but are nothing but low-down, gutter tramps and then report back to me about how you feel!

Davonte paused in his pacing to glare at her. "If yo ass didn't want to be a teacher, then why the fuck you go to school for it then?"

"Cause I wanted to make a difference Davonte!"

"This don't make no God damn sense," he groaned, shaking his head.

Across the table, her two boys were frozen like statues, staring at their arguing parents, French fries hanging out the sides of their mouths.

Davonte crossed over to Keisha's side, towering over her like the grim reaper. "What you gone do, is go back to that motha fuckin school and ask for your job back," he growled threateningly at her. "You ain't bout to have us getting evicted off White People Lane. I can hear the bullshit that they'd be talkin' now." Davonte cleared his throat, mimicking a white person's voice.  "See, I knew those niggers were on welfare.”

Keisha did not give a damn what those racist motha fuckas thought. And for someone so sick, Davonte sure did not sound like it.

"I can't go back," Keisha said quietly. After she explained, she was sure Davonte would see it her way.

Davonte paused. "Why can't you?"

After a moment, Keisha quickly outlined what happened with Demarion.

Expecting sympathy from her husband after her tale, Keisha was shocked when Davonte simply said, "So?"

Fire blazed to life in her chest at his casual dismissal and it was hard to resist the sudden urge to stand up and rake her nails across his light, caramel skin.

This nigga is really trying me!

Turning to look up in his handsome face, Keisha demanded, "What the hell you mean so? That was some out-of-pocket shit that nigga pulled. I had every right to quit!"

Glaring down at her silk, see-through blouse and large breasts, Davonte said, "Shit, you probably brought it on yourself."

Keisha's jaw dropped, needing a forklift to pick it back up. No this nigga did not just tell her some preposterous shit like that. If he kept on, he was about to find out that he was married to Cat Woman.

"And even if what you saying is true, women go through this type of shit all the time in the work place. Hell, it even happens at my job seasonally. Ain't nothing you can do about it, Keisha. It's just how the world works in a man's world." Davonte shook his head. "I don't care what that man did, you going back and asking for your job back. If he really did what you said, I'm sure he'll give it back because his ass will be afraid about what will happen if word gets out."

Shooting to her feet, not able to take Davonte's lack of empathy any longer, Keisha yelled in Davonte's face, "Motha fucka—"

Keisha almost thought she got slapped by Davonte's next words.

"Because I got some shit I need to tell you."

Feeling like the part of the burger she ate was about to rise up from the pits of her stomach, Keisha asked, "What?"

Davonte looked at the floor in silence for a moment, and then leveled his green-eyed gaze on her. Keisha knew then that she was about to be hit by a brick.

"I ain't gettin no raise."

"Y
ou need me to fly out there and whoop that nigga's ass?"

Keisha sighed into her cell while she lounged in her bubble bath the next day. "No momma." Davonte was off at work and her two boys were down in the living room, playing their Playstation, giving her a much needed break.

"Girl, he should know better than to talk to my baby like that. I don't care if he look like a model. I'll knock the little nigga out."

Keisha let out a little giggle. No matter how down she was, her momma Joy always managed to get a good laugh out of her. After a moment of chuckling, she leaned against the side of the tub, her arm hanging off the side. "Well when we had calmed down later, he did speak some truth like, what if he had upped and quit his job on me. How would I feel?"

Sucking in her breath on the other end of the line, Joy burst out with, "Gurl, I don't wanna hear that shit! Didn't you say the nigga was going around frontin like he was bout to have it like baby Jesus? Get on outta here with that mess. The nigga was just begging for you to quit!"

Chuckling, Keisha replied, "Well it is true momma. I acted kind of irrationally. We got a mortgage and nothing but bills to pay. I just had a bad day with those bad ass kids and those bitches talking about me. Now what they were saying was no worse than usual, but when Demarion tried me like that, I could not take it anymore."

"Oh yeah girl, what you going to do about that?" Joy asked. "If that were me, I'd already filed the lawsuit papers on his black ass."

Keisha sighed. "I don't know yet."

"Girl, go on down to that courthouse and file them damn papers. What's wrong with you? Once you sue the school board, you both won't have to worry about no damn job."

Keisha rolled her eyes. "Momma please, that broke ass school board ain't got no damn money. This corrupt ass city is bankrupt as hell. All I'll end up doing is going through a lengthy court case and wind up with nothing in the end, having spent a fortune on lawyers. Meanwhile, our black asses will be out on the street, or living in the projects on the Southside."

"Or coming back home to live with yo momma," her mom was quick to say. "I'll be more than happy to have my baby and my grandbabies with me."

That will never happen
, Keisha thought.

"Anyway momma, that will just have to wait until I get some legal advice." Keisha moved one of her legs to her left. The water was starting to get cold. "It's not something I want to rush into. If I go through with something like this and it doesn't turn out right, I might never be able to get a decent job again."