Sinful (5 page)

“Cool, because we'll need some extra money and I don't like fighting with my woman,” he said, softly kissing her on the cheek. “Let's go in and make up. I've got an hour before I punch in.”

“Ohhh, yeah,” she flirted seductively. “I've got something you can punch right here.”

“I'll bet you do. Let me put on this CD, then you can show it to me,” Marvin growled softly.

Chandelle tossed her eyes up at the sky and thanked her lucky stars, though she wasn't sure God had anything to do with her having gotten away with deceiving her husband. No sooner than she felt confident that the stars had aligned in her favor, the doorbell sounded. Chandelle was half dressed and almost deeply into an afternoon rendezvous with Marvin when the doorbell rang again. “Let it ring, baby,” she said, when he hesitated with the business at hand, pleasing her. “It's probably somebody selling something.”

“No, no, it's Sunday,” he said, grabbing a handful of Chandelle's hair.

“That's my point,” she answered cunningly.

The doorbell rang for a third time with an intermittent rally of bothersome raps thrown in. “I'll get it,” Marvin grunted, though not nearly in the intimate manner he'd laid on Chandelle to put her in the mood. “Don't you move an inch,” he said, slipping on his robe and house shoes.

Chandelle gestured at the rise in his robe. “I won't if you won't.”

“I'm coming,” he yelled in the direction of the door. “Hold on a minute.” One quick glance through the peephole deflated his hopes of finishing what he'd started. There were no peddlers bidding for a shot to make a sales pitch. As far as he was concerned, it was worse than that, much worse.

“H
ey, Marvin,” Dior said as quietly as a church mouse. She wanted to barge in like she'd always done, but Marvin was purposely blocking the door with his body. “Can I come in?” she whined.

Reluctantly, Marvin pulled the door open wider so Dior could enter. “What's with the bag?” he asked, flicking a quick glance toward the taupe-colored duffel.

“I saw Chandelle's car out front so I knew y'all was back from church service. I hope I didn't interrupt nothing,” she said, scanning his legs and anything else she could see pushing against the thin navy-hued silk robe.

“Nothing that won't keep,” he answered, casting another suspicious eye at her luggage. He didn't know what was happening, but he was sure he wouldn't like the outcome. “I'll go tell Chandelle you
stopped by.
You may as well go on and have a seat,” Marvin offered finally.

Oh, I plan to.
“Thank you so much, Marvin. I'm sorry for showing up without calling first. I know how you hate that.”

Marvin grumbled as he headed down the short hallway to the master bedroom at the end of it. He closed the door behind him, and then sat on the edge of the bed. He'd been gone so long that Chandelle had dozed off. “Your girl came by,” Marvin informed her, smirking his displeasure. “And she brought some clothes with her too.”

Squirming beneath the warm sheets, Chandelle sighed seductively. “So that's what took you so long? Hmmm, I'll call her later. Get back in the bed, baby,” she said in a noticeably faint tone.

After looking at his beautiful wife over his shoulder, he realized that she hadn't comprehended what he said. “Chandelle…she's still out there. Said she needs to talk to you.”

“Dior's still out there?” she asked, raising her sleepy head. “You left her out in the cold?”

“Nah, she's in the living room, probably cooking up a scheme to get in your pockets. You know, the usual,” he added, as if Chandelle wasn't already well aware of Dior's long-term bouts of mischievous behavior and her lack of funds. As she climbed out of bed, Marvin watched her nude body glide across the room. His expression conveyed how he'd rather she stayed to perform some of the intimate pleasures of life, but after Chandelle had cloaked herself in the woman's version of his stylish robe, his hopes up and fluttered away.

“Dior? Are you all right?” Chandelle whispered, with remnants of pleasure deferred in her voice.

Dior, possessing the inexhaustible ability to drum up nifty lies at a moment's notice, reached deep down inside her soul and came off with a world-class doozy. “Ohhh, Chandelle,” she moaned. “I didn't want to bother y'all, but I need some money.”

“Dior, you've got to be kidding me. I have some business of my own to sort out, too, and it was about to click so…Can't this wait? And anyway, what happened between you and Kevlin? Did he get rough with you?”

“Chandelle, I wouldn't even be here but I ain't got nowhere else to turn. I'm late on my rent, again, and now they done went and locked me out.” She had been summoned with a pending eviction and her locks had been changed, so that much was true. “Please, don't be that way. You don't know what I've been through. Kevlin kicked me curbside last night just like you said he would. He had some freak coming over and cussed me until I felt so bad I ran out of there. After my key didn't work at the apartment, I used my fist to bust the bedroom window to climb in and get some necessary stuff. When the mean old lady who lives upstairs heard me, she said she was calling the police. She didn't even care that it was my own stuff I was taking.” Merely for effect, Dior lowered her head in shame before continuing her onslaught. “I ain't never felt so alone so I drove around until I got too tired to drive. If the dollar movies weren't open until midnight, I don't know what I'd have done.”

Chandelle was cautious, but Dior's words came from that place she once knew too well herself: desperation. “If you put your hand through the window, why isn't it all cut up?” she challenged.

“I wrapped my hand in my coat like they do on TV, or else I'd have one more thing I couldn't afford to fix,” she babbled. “Please, just give me a couple of days to get something cracking. I can't take nobody else flipping on me. When I fell asleep on the back row at the movies, two men woke me up and one of 'em called me a crack head, and you know I don't get down like that, but still this manager and another man, they started loud talking me and then told me I had to go. Kevlin done dogged me. I ran the streets all night, and…now you're looking at me like I'm lying. Chandelle, I'm not lying,” she lied most assuredly, with misty eyes to help further her cause. “If I could, I'd do the same and look out for you. You know I would.”

“Oomph, this is too much,” Chandelle said, massaging both of her temples with outstretched fingertips. “Sit down, girl, I won't trip. Besides, your mother was there for us when mine got laid off. Blood is thicker than tears,” she'd determined.

“Thank you, Chandelle, thank you so much,” Dior sighed, while celebrating quietly so as not to disturb Marvin. “What about him?” she asked, gazing toward the closed bedroom door.

“You let me worry about that. Put your things in the other room. But this is not a permanent situation. You will look for a job tomorrow and every other day until someone's willing to pay you for something.”

“I will, Chandelle,” Dior agreed, although with reservations. “I'll come out of this on top, you'll see. Uh-uh, you won't regret this, not one bit.”

I'm already regretting it,
Chandelle thought, while turning the doorknob and praying that Marvin had somehow fallen asleep. Unfortunately, Marvin was fully dressed in the Appliance World uniform, khaki slacks and top. Feverishly lacing up his shoes, he was visibly consumed with getting away from there. “Do you have a minute before you leave?” she said, secretly wishing he didn't. “We should talk.”

“No, and no we shouldn't,” he replied rudely. “I don't want to discuss it and I don't like the idea of Dior crashing here because she's always putting in work on some scam.”

“For someone who
don't
want to discuss it, your mouth sure is moving overtime,” Chandelle fired back, louder than she meant to. Dior's dilemma had her in a rough spot. She'd given her word to help, and that was that. “I've…already told her I would. I should have talked it over with you first, but it wouldn't have changed anything. She's busted, tired, and probably hungry too. How can we turn our noses up at that?”

Marvin snatched a thin jacket off the bed. “Watch me!” he yelled, brushing by her like she was a hat rack. “She's trouble, Chandelle, trouble.”

“What family member isn't? Look,” she debated, extending her hands to summon a calmer spirit. “Honey, today's sermon was meant to address this exact issue. It's like a sign or something. What does the Bible say, ‘I was hungry and you gave me meat. I was thirsty and you gave me drink. I was a stranger and you took me in,'” she recited as best she could from Matthew 25:35–36. “Now, Dior isn't a stranger, but we should do our best to feed her and provide a warm place to lay her head as best we can. That's the Scripture. We said we would always strive to have a Christian home, not just when it suits us.”

Marvin stroked at his chin. Having heard the same sermon, he took his analysis to another level. “Feed her and take her in, huh? Don't forget the Bible also says to clothe the naked and look in on the sick. Well that cousin of yours is twisted all the way to the bone, and there ain't no cure for that.”

“Don't be so short-sighted,” Chandelle argued.

“And don't you get all
‘What would Jesus do'
on me. Dior doesn't know Him and He probably forgot about her a long time ago.”

“Watch what you say, Marvin. Neither one of us is in any position to judge or to be trying to guess who Jesus is pulling for or is still down with. Me and Dior, we've got a good understanding, and she'll be on her best behavior or I'll toss her out myself. You have my word on that.”

“Your word?” Marvin huffed. “It doesn't mean as much to me when you've already given it to her.”

Dior had been listening attentively with her ear pressed against the bedroom door. Marvin nearly stumbled over her when he darted out.
Slow down, dude, it ain't that serious,
she thought.
But ooh, isn't it cozy to have y'all fighting over me? Warm fuzzies.
” Dior realized then that Marvin was not even remotely happy with her being there. An array of mischievous ideas crossed her mind immediately. She was determined, willing to stop at nothing, to manipulate Marvin's attitude toward her.

Once the door slammed behind Marvin, Dior sighed as she plopped down on the sofa, she was relieved to have slid in just under the wire. Chandelle exhaled, too, although for a different reason entirely. Her man was not happy, her home had been upset by an unannounced visitor whom he didn't much care for, and trouble was brewing inside of him. She felt that the one saving grace was making it through the weekend without having had her expensive purchase detected by him.

Then there was a knock at the door. Chandelle shrugged her shoulders. When she looked out of the peephole, her eyes found Marvin's face scowling back at hers. Chandelle wasn't sure what to make of it when she twisted the doorknob. “What is it, Marvin, did you forget your keys?” she asked.

“No, but you forgot to tell me about this,” he smarted. Before Chandelle had the chance to explain what a six-thousand-dollar fur was doing in the trunk of her car, Marvin iced her with a damaging assessment of their commitment to fiscal responsibilities. “I've been munching on pimp steak for a month now, saving every dime I could so that we wouldn't be strapped over buying a decent home, and you've been out there behind my back running through the mall and running up our credit. It's going back, Chandelle, today!” Without as much as another word, Marvin handed the garment bag to his wife, turned, and walked away.

“I never told you because I'd already planned on returning it,” she said to the closed door. “Besides, nobody asked you to eat all that baloney.”

“I told you he was gonna trip,” Dior chuckled, with her head in her hands. “Baloney? For a whole month? I ain't ever had a man love me that much,” she added as an afterthought. “And I hate baloney, even if it does have a first name.”

“So does Marvin,” Chandelle whispered, recognizing just how lucky she had been while being carelessly frivolous at the same time. “Give me a minute,” she said, before heading for the backroom. “We've got to go.”

“Go? Go where?”

“Where a woman should steer clear of when her man is sacrificing for their future by living on pimp steak. Girl, we're going to the Galleria.”

“I
am so blessed to have Marvin,” Chandelle admitted fondly, while patrolling the mall parking lot for an available space not too far from the entrance. “It's still hard to do what I'm supposed to, though. It's like they say, I shop, therefore I am.” She glanced at Dior, who was frowning curiously.

“I saw that on a swap meet T-shirt before,” she said, with her lips pursed momentarily. “Almost copped one, too, but it sounded like something a white chick would flow with so I put it back.”

“Uh-uh, white women don't have a lock on blowing money. That's always an equal-opportunity situation. Oh, here's a good spot.” Chandelle guided her car in and killed the engine. She turned toward her cousin and glared.

“What?” Dior said with the same curious frown as before.

“Don't what me. I want you to be on your best behavior in there,” Chandelle demanded. “Not that you would, but I don't need to get jammed up behind some stolen goods misunderstanding, and I'm certainly not in the mood to watch you try and urinate your way out of a shoplifting beef.”

“Chandelle, I wouldn't do that to you,” she answered, lowering her head in shame. “Anyways, I ain't even got to pee. Let's go.” Dior hopped out of the car like it was on fire. “Hurr' up, cuz, the quicker we can shake you loose from that funky coat, the quicker we can scout around for sales.”

“I thought you couldn't make rent,” Chandelle asked, as they stepped inside the entrance doors.

“I can't, but what does that have to do with anything?” Dior reasoned, despite her bleak financial predicament. “I left one of my favorite dresses at the apartment. Might not get it back after they find that window I smashed.”

“And if you had taken care of business like I suggested, instead of dashing over to Kevlin's, you might not be in this mess,” Chandelle told her. “Why don't you like normal men who want to treat you right?”

Dior's impulsive and sometimes carefree attitude was legendary. She had no use for
normal
men who actually were interested in working on more than merely perfecting various sexual positions. Dior craved drama and men who could deliver it by the bus load. Pure and simple, she was known in certain circles as a
jump off
, the kind of woman who committed men often kept on the side for quick hits and cheap tricks. While stumbling through life and searching for her place in it, Dior had grown accustomed to being the other woman. She preferred things that way. Her biggest weakness was a yearning to acquire without exerting the effort and energy required to do it honestly. After she continually managed to come up short, the same questions traced her lips:
Why does it take the wrong men a hot minute to love me while the right ones never seem to want to?

“I don't have time to sort through normal brothas trying to figure out why they don't already have a woman and what they did to chase the last one off. And I don't have room in my life for misfits. One's plenty, and I'm it.”

Inside of the glassed-in elevator, Chandelle pushed the button going up. She allowed Dior's flawed logic to play around in her head until she became dizzy. “Your way of thinking missed me. It almost sounds like you couldn't be interested in a man unless he has at least one woman in his life to start.”

“At least one,” she answered matter-of-factly. “Take Marvin, for instance. My friends think he's so cute, but they love the fact that he has a real pretty wife. Don't ask me, but that's the way it is, coming from where I'm from. His stock went way up when he married you.”

“Dior, promise me you won't tell anyone else what you just told me? That's two kinds of crazy.” Chandelle asked Dior to take a seat on a bench outside of the furrier's. She didn't need another dose of
ghetto rationale
to show itself while she was conducting business. It was a good thing because the saleswoman initially refused to accept the expensive fur that she deemed as a slightly used, nonreturnable item until Chandelle articulately argued that the coat not only possessed a peculiarly foul odor, but that her husband didn't like the looks of it whatsoever. After she threatened to complain to the platinum card company, the snotty saleslady reluctantly complied. With a signed charge-back receipt in hand, Chandelle strutted out of the store with a sigh of relief and a zero balance on her brand-new credit card. “Come on, Dior,” she said, grinning gleefully. “We have an hour to see what's what.”

“That's what I'm talking about,” Dior agreed. “Let's hit that boutique you like so much. I think they carry the Marc Jacobs bags everybody's packing, the real ones.” Through the specialty shop window, Chandelle remembered admiring that designer's line of purses as well.

“Yeah, I've seen those, the soft leather with the gold buckle. Uh-huh, real cute but not my style. Well, more like not in my budget since I've decided to do better.” She entered the shop, ogling the sales racks. “Dolce and Gabbana dresses, ohhh…that's hot,” marveled Chandelle, until she flipped the price tag over. “Humph, unfortunately the cost is not.” She craned her neck in search of the clerk who typically assisted her. The thin redhead sauntered closer, and then smiled brightly when she recognized one of her favorite customers.

“Chandelle, I didn't see you come in. And I probably wouldn't have recognized you over here at the sales rack.”

“Hey, Sally, I thought I'd luck up and find a steal. My man's watching my money, if you know what I mean.”

“Huh, that's why I can't afford to shop here unless it hits the clearance rack first.”

Chandelle laughed. “So you feel my pain? Does this red tag mean twenty percent off the sales price?”

Sally glanced at the sales tag she'd altered earlier in the day and nodded. “Yep, gotta make room for the latest stuff coming in on Tuesday. Hold on a minute, I'll get the catalog so you can check out all the cool winter skirts.” When Sally found what she'd gone after, she waved for Chandelle to meet her at the counter. “Here it is. Find what you like and I'll put back a few pieces of it in your size.”

“Miss 60?”
Chandelle moaned excitedly, while perusing the pages thoroughly. “These are really nice.”

 

Back in the fitting area, an ugly incident had taken shape. “Mrs. Jennings, how'd you know where to find me?” Dior yelped.

The blond woman, wearing a ritzy jogging suit and a crazed stare, held her right index finger to Dior's mouth to silence her.

Rosalind Jennings, a former employer and severely unstable 42-year-old socialite, used her other hand to caress Dior's face.

“Uh-uh, I ain't with that no more,” Dior said. “You got to get out of here.”

“Shush now, Dior. Now that we can talk face to face, it'll all be okay,” she answered in a hushed tone. “Be quiet and no one will get hurt.” There was something extremely unnerving going on behind the white woman's pale blue glassy eyes. If she meant to frighten the pants off Dior with her deranged-white-lady-in-the-fitting-room routine, it worked. “Oh, sweetie, why haven't you returned my calls? You should have. I left tons of messages. And the letters I sent, it wasn't very nice of you to ignore them. I've spent too much time following you, staking out the little apartment of yours and that other place on Britstone. It took some doing, but I had to find you again.”

Britstone,
Dior repeated, although silently,
that's Chandelle and Marvin's place.
Throwing down in the small booth occurred to her more than once. However, Mrs. Jennings didn't appear to be in her right mind while seemingly capable of anything. Dior had only played the part when it suited her. She'd seen her share of textbook fixations during her stint at Happy Horizons, and this was the real thing, a bona fide psychosis. Dior cowered against the mirrored wall then. “Mrs. Jennings, you need to see somebody—”

“I said to keep quiet,” the woman interrupted her through gritted teeth. “I would really like you to come by the house,” she offered pleasantly as if another personality had superseded the last. “I, we want you to work for us again. Wasn't it a mutually rewarding situation? We went out of our way to take care of you. You must know that. The sex was good and we paid you well for it.”

Dior had no idea what to think. Visibly shaken, she became more withdrawn as if succumbing to a fearful alternative. Dior had hired herself out before getting arrested. She was employed by the wealthy white couple to play with the kids during the day and then later entertain the parents after hours for $500 a week and another $500 for her nightly duties. After two months, the Jennings introduced Dior to other couples and things were getting increasingly more aggressive. They were heavily into bondage, role-playing, and other kinky sexploits. Dior received bonuses when performing the parts of strippers and prostitutes, but she charged double for playing the role of a plantation wench being taken advantage of by the overbearing white master. Incidentally, Rosalind Jennings became jealous when catching her husband, Paul, in Dior's room without having been invited to join them. When Rosalind discovered them, she displayed mere hints of the frantic behavior unleashed in the fitting room. After Dior sneaked out in the dead of night, Rosalind grew verbally abusive over the phone. The threatening notes she posted on Dior's car windshield intensified. She was petrified to be home alone. All of that had culminated into Dior being held hostage.

What if I have to kill her to end this?
Dior contemplated nervously.
I could end up in jail just like Billie. Huh, I'd be better off if she killed me.

 

Near the front of the store, the mood wasn't nearly so tumultuous. “Uh-oh, Sally, you were right. There might be trouble over Tuesday's shipment. Sale or no sale, I want one of everything.” Chandelle continued thumbing through the magazine until a cold chill ran down her spine.
Speaking of trouble, where's Dior?
she thought. “Sally, have you seen another black woman in here? I came in with my cousin.”

“There was one, a minute ago, shorter than you and real cute,” answered the clerk. “She was taking a few things into the fitting room last I looked.” The telephone rang near the cash register. “Excuse me, Chandelle, I have to get that.”

And I have to get back there to see if Dior is going back on her promise,
Chandelle thought.
Lord help her if she's ripping off the boutique and using me to run interference.
Chandelle tipped into the fitting area of the store, whispering her cousin's name. “Dior? If you're back here, you'd better speak up,” she demanded finally when rustling noises from the rear stall drew her attention. “Dior, bring your butt out of there or I'm coming in to do it for you,” Chandelle threatened. Cautiously, she shoved on the swinging door. “What the…” was all she could get out before her eyes told her to shut up. She gawked at the white woman holding her hand over Dior's mouth, like a 7-year-old playing a quiet game. Chandelle gave the odd scene a once over, then lowered her purse to the floor. She called Dior's name, this time with disbelief written all over her face. “Uhm, what are y'all doing back here?” she asked the both of them at once, although her stern tone was directed at the woman she hadn't seen before. Neither of them moved, so Chandelle motioned with her hand for Dior to come forth. The piecing stare she shot at Rosalind held her at bay for the time being. “What's this about?”

“Mrs. Rosalind Jennings,” answered Dior, humiliated by Chandelle's presence but thankful for it simultaneously. “She's the lady I was working for as a nanny, only she didn't like it that I quit.”

“Who're you supposed to be, Dior's girlfriend?” Rosalind huffed, as she made a sudden move to exit the stall.

“Naw, you got me messed up,” Chandelle replied, refusing to let her pass. “See, I'm the cousin about to break you down.” She glanced at Dior to question why she allowed another woman to play her weak. “Dee, tell me why you're afraid of her? What's she holding over you?”

Dior exhaled like she'd rather not say, but Chandelle had sufficiently taken over the situation leaving her no choice. “She's been leaving messages on my phone and on my car saying if I don't come back to work she'll make life hard on me or worse. That's why I wouldn't let you drop me by the apartment. Chandelle, she won't let me out.”

“Won't let you?” Chandelle barked heatedly. “You're a grownup, Dior.

“Please tell her I don't want to be a nanny no more,” Dior whined.

“You tell her yourself, once and for all. Here and now.”

“Mrs. Jennings, you can tell your husband that I'm through with that life and I mean it,” she spouted with a renewed assurance.

“We'll just see about that,” Rosalind challenged, with both arms folded. She talked tough but at no time did she try to run over Chandelle the same way she'd manipulated Dior.

“Want to see about it now?” Chandelle offered boldly. “Right now, we can iron out any misunderstandings you might have concerning ever coming around my family again. I'm not above breaking the law to end this if I have to. Believe you me, there're lots of us, and we don't scare so easy. You can bet your life on that.” Chandelle felt Sally standing behind her. She raised her hand, signaling that she had a handle on things. “Mrs. Robinson or whatever you call yourself, I will not entertain having this discussion again. You can go now.” As soon as Chandelle stepped aside, the disgruntled socialite stormed away before experiencing firsthand the willful woes of a South Dallas “breakdown.”