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I collapsed onto my sofa and rolled my eyes. “Hear you tell it, any man could.”
She took a seat in one of two zebra-print accent chairs. “See, and we were getting along so well.”
“Uh, you’ve been ignoring my calls and texts for weeks.”
“But I texted back last night, and you didn’t even have the decency to let me know everything was okay after you sent me that cryptic message.”
“And it took you all night to start worrying about me?”
She shrugged. “I was busy with Warren last night.”
“Who is Warren?”
“Someone I just scratched off my list of potential husbands. He left for work this morning without washing his ass. You know how I am about hygiene.”
“Mm-hmm. So that’s why you’re up so early? Because he had to go to work?”
“Yeah…he said I could stay there as long as I wanted, but I left after he skipped out of there with yesterday’s funk still on him, and I’m not tryna go home right now in case Daddy is there and is still on that BS about me getting a job. So I thought I’d come check on you. When does Mr. Sexy move in?”
“I don’t know if he’s going to move in at all. I need to do the background check and stuff.”
“Girl, are you nuts? As fine as he is, he should get an automatic pass.”
“That’s not how I do business, Nicky. And besides, a serial killer can be fine.”
“Name one fine serial killer.”
I thought for a second. “Valid point, but I’m still doing the background and credit checks.”
“I guess, if you wanna do all that work. Or…you could just let me rent it.”
“Like you said…we were getting along so well. Why ruin it?”
She gave me a smirk. “Whatever.”
*****
“Hello?” His lazy drawl crawled through the phone line and settled in my right ear.
I held the phone for a moment, hoping he’d repeat himself so I could hear his voice once more before I began to speak. The background check had told me he was originally from Louisiana, but he now called Houston his home.
“Um…hello?” he repeated.
I smiled. “Mr. Boyé? This is Angela Strickland from Tennessee? I’m calling about your application…”
“Yes, yes. Can you hold on for just a moment?”
“Sure.”
He must’ve muted the phone, because silence now filled my ear. I wondered if he was with someone, an intimate someone. Then I wondered why I cared. I was against relationships, vehemently against them, thanks to Benny and Khalil. I was also against men. But something stirred inside of me when my eyes first beheld Mr. Ryan Boyé a couple of days earlier. Something that I had been trying to ignore, something that made my head hurt to think about. Desire.
I glanced down at his application—employed with Sable, Inc., impressive salary. Single. Fine. Okay, so his fineness wasn’t on the application, but it was embedded in my psyche.
I shook my head as I shifted my focus to the results of the background check—clean. And the credit check? Man, I’d kill, borrow, and steal for a credit score that good! He was almost too good to be true, so I told myself he was probably gay. Only that would explain how no one had snatched his gainfully-employed, handsome, good credit-having ass up.
Thankfully, he finally returned to the phone, cutting off my thoughts before they went any further in the wrong direction. “Hey, sorry about that. I’m at work trying to put out some fires. So, you were saying?”
“Well, I was saying that the apartment is yours if you’re still interested. All I need is the deposit and first and last month’s rent along with your signature on the lease.”
