Page 50 of Omar

"Again."

"Premie."

He came with a groan that rattled the headboard, his whole body going rigid for three seconds before he went limp. His hand was still wrapped around himself, his chest heaving, his eyes glazed.

"Damn, baby." His voice was heavy, spent. "You're incredible. You know that?"

"You're the incredible one," I told him, my voice soft, adoring and completely empty behind it. I didn't know how long I could keep pretending to be on board with his kink but I had to tell myself it was better than being made to have sex with him. If all he wanted from me was to watch him wank and get himself off then I had to grin and bear it. Only until it was time to cut and run.

He wiped his hand on the sheet beside him, so I'd be washing those sheets tomorrow. He pulled me against his side, kissed the top of my head, told me I was everything. His breathing slowed within minutes. His grip on my waist loosened. His body went heavy and his mouth fell open.

I lay there until his arm was dead weight across me, then carefully slid to my side of the bed. He didn't stir. Out cold, one leg hanging off the mattress, the used sheet bunched under his hip.

I lay there in the dark. Supreme's arm found me in his sleep, heavy across my waist, pulling me back against him. I let him and lay there with his body pressed against my back, his breathing slow and wet against my neck. I closed my eyes.

I let myself go back to the apartment. Omar's apartment. The wall where he'd pressed me. The bed where he'd laid me down. The way he'd looked at me before he touched me, like he needed to see all of me first. The way he'd said I missed you, every fucking day while he was inside me, and meant it. His hands on my hips, his mouth on my collarbone, the way he'd held still when he first pushed inside me because the feeling was too much for both of us.

Supreme snored against my neck. His arm tightened around my waist.

I was living two lives now. One of them was real. One of them would kill me if it ever found out about the other.

I closed my eyes tighter and went back to the apartment.

I stayed there until I fell asleep.

Chapter 19

Omar

Kadeem put the name on my desk at APEX with a Post-it note stuck to the top: Three months overdue. Handle it.

The name was Dwayne Colley. He ran a car wash on Atlantic Avenue that Baptiste money had set up two years ago. The deal was simple: we fronted the capital, Dwayne ran the business, profits split sixty-forty with a monthly payment back to us on the principal. He'd been current for the first eighteen months. Then the payments stopped. Kadeem had sent Devon to talk to him twice. Both times Dwayne gave a story about cash flow problems, promised to catch up, and then went dark again.

Three months was the limit. After three months it stopped being a business conversation and became my conversation.

James drove. I pulled up Devon's file on Dwayne while we headed toward Atlantic. Forty-one years old, lived alone in a duplex on Eastern Parkway, drove a leased BMW that cost more per month than his missed payments. He had a girlfriend in Canarsie and a second phone he thought nobody knew about. Devon knew about everything.

"What's the approach?" James asked, turning onto Atlantic.

"Depends on him. We go in civil, give him a chance to explain. If the explanation's good, we work something out. If it's bullshit, we adjust the terms."

"And if he runs?"

"He won't run. Where's he gonna go? His whole life is on this block."

The car wash was at the end of a strip of businesses between a tire shop and a liquor store. Two wash bays, a waiting area with plastic chairs and a vending machine, a small office in the back. The lot was half full, so business was clearly moving. A man in coveralls was spraying down a Honda in the first bay. Two more were wiping down cars in the parking area.

We parked across the street and walked over. James stayed by the entrance to the lot, leaning against the fence, casual. I went to the office.

The door was open. Dwayne was sitting behind a metal desk with a calculator, a stack of receipts. He was a big man, thick through the shoulders, with a goatee going grey at the edges. He looked up when my shadow fell across his desk. His face went through three expressions in about two seconds: surprise, recognition, then something that hardened into defiance.

"Omar." He leaned back in his chair and folded his arms. "Was wondering when y'all would send somebody."

"Not somebody. Me."

"Yeah, I see that." He didn't stand up. Didn't offer me a seat. He stayed in his chair with his arms crossed, looking at me like I was a customer complaining about a missed spot on his hood. "Look, I already told Devon what the situation is. Business been slow, the winter killed us, I'm working through it. I got a plan to catch up."

"Devon came to see you twice. Both times you gave him a story. Both times you went dark after."