Page 50 of Buy Back My Love

“And you’re still with him?”

Her mouth tightened. “Yes. I’m still with him.”

I sat back and looked at her.

“That’s the part I don’t understand.”

Her eyes narrowed. “I didn’t ask you to understand it.”

“I know.” I held her eyes. “But you just told me you did five years over some drugs that weren’t yours, and when I asked whose they were, you started talking about your man.”

She put her fork down. “Because it wasn’t that damn simple.”

“Then what am I missing?”

Leona looked down at her plate for a second. “They offered me a deal.”

I waited for her to keep going.

“They wanted JB. They knew them drugs wasn’t mine, or at least they believed they wasn’t. They wanted me to tell them they belonged to him and give them enough to build a case against him.” She picked up her fork, then put it right back down without touching her food. “If I cooperated, they were willing to cut my time.”

“And you told them no?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

I waited a second. “Why?”

Leona looked at me like the answer should’ve been obvious. “Because I knew what they was trying to do. They already had me. The shit was found in my building, and my name was on everything. Giving them JB wasn’t gonna change the fact that I was caught up in it. It was just gonna make sure both of us ended up in prison.”

“So you could’ve gotten less time?”

“Probably. They never promised me I was walking out of there.” Her voice got quieter. “And JB would’ve been looking at way more than five years if I gave them what they wanted.”

I sat there looking at her. “So you took the five.”

“I took the five.”

She said it like she’d made peace with it a long time ago, but I still couldn’t understand it.

“You don’t regret it?”

Leona took a second before answering. “I regret going to prison. I regret losing five years of my life. I regret a whole lot of shit about what happened.” She looked me straight in my face. “But if you asking me if I wish I would’ve sat in front of them people and told everything I knew about JB so I could come home sooner? No.”

That answer bothered me more than I expected it to. “You don’t seem like the type of woman dumb enough to do five years for a man.”

Her fork hit the plate harder than it needed to.

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

I knew then I’d pushed too far. “I ain’t calling you dumb.”

“You just fucking did.”

“Leona-”

“No, because you don’t know me and you damn sure don’t know JB.” She crossed her arms and sat back against the booth. “You sitting here judging a decision I made off one damn conversation.”

“You right.”