The Best Thing He Never Knew He Needed (3 page)

After she calmed herself
down, she said, “Emily, where are you?”

“
I’m in the office,” Emily
said.

Sherita, with her cup of
coffee in hand, headed for the back office where she saw Emily
sitting behind her desk, staring at the computer screen. “Guess who
I ran into at the coffee shop.”

“
Who?”

“
Your crazy
brother-in-law.”

Emily smirked. “Oh.
Desmond.”

Out of the brothers,
Desmond was definitely the wildest of the three. He’d ride his
motorcycle rough like he was on top of a galloping horse. He was
extremely spry – had enough energy to create his own form of
electricity. Dimitrius swore his brother had some type of
hyperactivity disorder and, according to Dante, Desmond got up
every morning at four to put in two hours of exercise at his home
gym. And the man could eat a whole buffet if nobody stopped him.
Still, he didn’t have an ounce of fat on his lean, muscular
body.

“
Did he say anything to
you?” Emily asked as she typed.

“
He did,
actually.”

“
That’s surprising. I know
he’s been avoiding you for quite a while now.”

“
And you know I’ve been
doing the same with him, right?” Sherita asked.

Emily smirked. “Yes,
Sherita. I know.”

So he was
lying
. Sherita smiled. Relieved. She
should’ve known by the smug, satisfied look on Desmond’s face that
what he said about Emily asking him to help her babysit wasn’t
true. “Shrew. Good. Now I can breathe.” Sherita sat down in a chair
in front of Sherita’s desk.

Taking her attention away
from the computer, Emily looked at Sherita and asked, Girl, what’s
all that about?”

“
What?”

“
The sighing, and is that
sweat on your forehead?”

Sherita swiped the backside
of her hand across her face. “Emily, you have no idea what I’ve
been through these few minutes.”

Emily grinned. “At the
coffee shop?”

Sherita laughed, feeling
silly for letting Desmond get to her. “Yes. Desmond was bothering
me the entire time. Like the showoff he is, he placed my order,
tried to buy a scone for me and then paid for my coffee, and
everybody else’s by the way.”

“
Oooh, that’s sooo
terrible,” Emily joked.

“
I know it sounds silly,
but that’s not the part that really got to me.”

“
Then what
did?”

“
The fact that he said you
asked him to help me watch the babies tonight. Now I know he was
lying—”

“
Oh,” Emily said.
“Umm…Sherita, he wasn’t lying.”

Sherita’s eyes widened.
“Wait, I don’t think I’m hearing you correctly. Are you saying you
asked him to help me babysit?”

“
Yes, I did.”

Sherita’s face twisted.
“Emily!”

“
What?”

“
Why would you do
something like that?”

Emily offered an innocent
shrug, but nothing about what she’d done had been innocent. “I just
thought two babies were too much for you?”

“
Too much for me? I do
just fine with Ezra and Grace. Are you kidding me?”

“
Yeah, but you’ve never
watched them at the same time, and we’re going to be gone for six
hours, Rita.”

Sherita was so mad, she
could scream. How was she supposed to survive six hours with
Desmond when she could hardly tolerate him for ten minutes? “Okay,
Ezra is a bit rowdy, yes but Grace is mellow and calm. She does
nothing but eat, sleep and flash dimples all day. I can handle them
both just fine, so call Desmond and tell him he doesn’t have to
babysit tonight. I’m sure he can find some woman to occupy his
time.”

Emily grinned. She knew
Desmond liked Sherita. Everybody knew it. She had a feeling Sherita
knew it as well. “I can’t call him and cancel. He was pretty
excited about spending some time with his niece and
nephew.”

Yeah, I bet he is
excited.
“And what is Desmond supposed to
do to assist me besides get on my last nerve?” Sherita
asked.

“
Warm bottles, change
diapers, feed, burp, sing, rock the babies to sleep…he’s really
good with children…makes you wonder why he claims he doesn’t want
any.”

“
It may make
you
wonder. I could not
care less.”

“
Oh, come on, Rita. It
won’t be so bad.”

Sherita shook her head.
“It
will
be bad.
I haven’t seen him for nearly a year and now, all of a sudden, he’s
buying my coffee and offering me fruity lemon biscuits and
whatnot.”

“
What?” Emily
laughed.

“
And you got me
babysitting with him, too? I can’t do it.”

Emily laughed
harder.

“
I’m serious, Emily. I
can’t do it. I do not want to be anywhere near Desmond.”

“
Why? Because you like
him?”

“
No! I do not like
him.”

“
Oh yes, you do,” Emily
said, finding Sherita’s denial comical. “You like him. As I recall,
you told me he was handsome.”

“
So what? I can’t
compliment a man without wanting him? Desmond
is
handsome. So is Dante and
Dimitrius…doesn’t mean I want them.” Sherita shook her head,
exasperated. “Why would you do this, Emily? You know Desmond is not
the kind of man I would ever want to be involved with. I don’t date
men who date women for sport.”

“
That’s funny, because as
long as I’ve known him, I’ve never seen Desmond with a woman. Have
you?”

“
I can’t see the wind, but
I know it’s there. Look, bottom line is, I promised myself I would
never get involved with a man like Desmond. I told you about my
last relationship. Remember Thane?”

“
And how long ago was
that? Five years, Sherita? Listen, I of all people, know how
difficult it is to start over. When Melvin died, I didn’t want to
date another man. I thought I was done. Then I met Dante
and—”

“
And you fell in love and
have a beautiful baby boy,” Sherita interrupted. “What does that
have to do with me and Desmond, Emily? Are you actually trying to
set me up with him?”

“
Sherita—”

“
You are, aren’t you?”
Sherita interjected. “You’re doing all of this
intentionally?”

“
Sherita,
just—”

Sherita threw her hands up
in the air. “I can’t believe you, Emily.” She stood up and walked
out of the office. Fuming, with a flushed, reddish face, she
returned to the front counter, sitting on the barstool in front of
the cash register.

“
Jeez, Sherita. I didn’t
think you would be so upset over this.”

Sherita released a breath.
“Emily, if you want to set me up, fine. But it doesn’t have to be
with a man like Desmond. You and I both know he’s not marriage
material and I’m not saying I’m ready to get married right now.
What I
am
saying
is, I refuse to waste an ounce of my time on a man who’s not
willing to commit to me. I did it before, and I’m not doing it
again.”

Emily thought about what
Sherita said for a moment. She hadn’t realized how deeply Thane had
hurt her friend until now. Maybe that’s why she kept herself busy
with a few classes here and there, helping her out at the store and
traveling to take pictures of newly married couples. It kept her
mind off of what she didn’t have. Then again, how could taking
pictures of couples keep her mind off of what she wanted but didn’t
have?

Emily pulled in a breath
then walked up to Sherita and said, “I’m sorry, Sherita. I just
thought that maybe if you spent some time with Desmond, you would
like him, or could change him.”

“
Change him?” she asked,
tilting her head, not believing what Emily said. “A woman can’t
change a man.”

“
Dante changed for
me.”

“
That’s because
he
wanted to change. You
didn’t
make
him
change. Listen, Em, I’m speaking from experience here. When I
started dating Thane, I knew I was playing with fire. All the girls
wanted Thane. He was every woman’s dream. Tall, dark,
handsome…studying law. I can’t lie…I knew better…knew I should not
have given it a second thought when he asked me out, but I did
because he was soo handsome. And underneath all of those good looks
was a man who couldn’t commit to me. For two years, I was his
girlfriend, but he would still flirt with other girls. He even had
another girlfriend while he was dating me. After all that, you
think I’m supposed to date a man who is just like that? I won’t. I
can be cordial with Desmond, but as far as a relationship is
concerned, I’m not wasting my time.”

“
So you’re not going to
babysit tonight.”

“
I’ll babysit, but I’m not
doing anything else where Desmond Champion will be in attendance,
and I would appreciate it if you drop the idea of Desmond and I
being together.”

“
Duly noted,” Emily said.
“I apologize.”

“
Thank you,” Sherita told
her. And that was that. “Anyway, I know you guys are excited to get
out of the house.”

Emily, Dante, Melanie and
Dimitrius had a date night lined up for this evening and well into
the night. First stop was a Maxwell concert.

“
Girl, yes!” Emily said.
“I love Ezra to death but mommy needs a night out, and this is my
first Maxwell concert. It’s going to be a good time.”

“
Are you all having dinner
right after?”

“
Yes. Dante made
reservations. He wouldn’t tell us where we were going,
though.”

“
So what time should I be
at your house tonight?”

“
We’re leaving at seven,
so I would say you can get there at around six-thirtyish. You can
close the store at five.”

“
Okay. Got it.”

“
Perfect. Now let me get
my butt back in this office. I have a few more orders to complete
before I leave.”

“
Okay, Emily. I’ll take
care of the customers,” Sherita said, watching a few women come
inside the store.

CHAPTER 3

Sitting in Dante’s swanky
office, Desmond pulled up a blank note on his iPad while holding a
stylus in his right hand.

Dimitrius stared at his
computer screen, replying to an email.

Dante, leaned back in his
chair, was still on a conference call that had run over.

Desmond glanced at his
watch. The meeting was supposed to begin promptly at ten, but it
was already eight minutes past the hour. He didn’t care, but he
knew Dimitrius did. Dimitrius was a stickler for time. Usually,
when a meeting was a second behind schedule, Dimitrius would be
downright irate, annoyed and fuming with irritation. So why wasn’t
he going ballistic right about now?

Desmond observed his
brother, trying to figure it out. Seemed that since Dimitrius had
married Melanie, he’d leveled out, wasn’t so tightly wound and took
some time to relax. Marriage changed him. A baby changed him.
Fortunately, it had been a change for the better, but
unfortunately, not all marriages changed people for the
better.

Desmond stood up, lowering
his iPad and stylus to the table and stepped out into the hallway,
heading for the vending machine in the break room. He took some
change from his pocket and fed the machine enough money to purchase
a honey bun. And just to be on the safe side, he purchased some M
& M’s, too.

Ripping the clear, plastic
wrapper, he took a massive bite of the honey bun while heading back
towards Dante’s office. He opened the door, took his seat again and
dropped the packet of M & M’s on the table.

Using the stylus to bring
up his calendar, he scanned his schedule for the upcoming week
while cramming the remainder of the honey bun inside of his mouth.
While he chewed, low hums of
mmm
seemed to be coming from deep within his
throat.

Mmm…mmm…

Before he could even
swallow, he was already tearing open the M & M’s, tossing a
handful of them into his mouth, chewing hungrily, and the
uncharacteristic humming sound started up again.

Dimitrius looked at Desmond
and frowned. Since when had he become a junk food addict, and why
was he eating like food had been a new concept, and he’d just
discovered it? Dimitrius then glanced up at Dante as if silently
asking him these questions.

Dante smirked and shrugged
his shoulders. Finally ending his conference call, he said, “Sorry
about that. Some people are extremely long-winded.”

“
It’s cool,” Dimitrius
said.

Desmond tossed a second
handful of M & M’s inside of his mouth, catching Dante’s gaze
as he did so.

“
Did you skip breakfast or
what, Des?” Dante inquired.

“
No. I ate breakfast,”
Desmond told him and kept on chewing. He’d had fruit and a protein
shake earlier this morning before a strenuous workout and then a
scone while he was busy irritating Sherita.