The Velvet Rope - Softcover

Thomas, Brenda L.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0743477286 ISBN 13: 9780743477284

Verlag: Gallery Books, 2005

Inhaltsangabe

Life is a party, but be careful who you invite.

When Tiffany Johnson, a street-smart publicist at Platinum Images, decides to launch Teaz Entertainment and open a club, she's setting out to be the queen of Philly nightlife. Keeping it in the family, she partners up with her fiancé, Malik, and her sister, Kamille, and counts on her friend DJ Essence to bring the noise. Investors seem to be lining up and the buzz is gettin' loud.

When Tiffany finds out that Malik and Kamille had an affair—and that it might not be the only secret they share—she spirals downward and gets swept up in two unexpectedly erotic affairs of her own. Awakening to a new kind of sexual freedom and reeling from betrayal, Tiffany is raw and vulnerable. So vulnerable that she doesn't realize that her new lovers are involved in more than kinky sex, and that they might take her new club down with them...unless she takes them down first.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Brenda L. Thomas is the national bestselling author of Threesome, Fourplay, The Velvet Rope, Every Woman's Got a Secret, Woman On Top, Secret Service, and the deeply moving memoir of her 15-year struggle with domestic violence and drug addiction, Laying Down My Burdens. She has contributed short stories to the anthologies Four Degrees of Heat and Kiss the Year Goodbye. Brenda, a native of Philadelphia, is currently serving as Executive Producer of the movie adaptation of Laying Down My Burdens.

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Chapter 1: Hangover

It was almost noon when I found myself hanging off the living room couch. I wanted to sleep until Malik woke me and told me I'd had a nightmare. But when I looked around the ravaged room, I knew I hadn't been dreaming. The reality was that I'd found out my fiancé and my sister had had a child together.

I tried to sit up, but my entire body was too heavy to move. I squeezed my eyes shut, but my head hurt too bad to let me resume sleeping. With much effort I managed to drag myself upstairs. I screamed when I saw all my prized perfume bottles broken and empty on the bedroom floor.

I went into the bathroom and stepped into the shower stall, not even realizing until I turned on the water that I was fully dressed in my clothes from the previous night. I peeled off the ruined suede boots, stepped out of my stockings and my soggy suede dress, and tossed them toward the trash can. I turned the knob and ran the water as hot as I could and when my skin began to burn I turned it to warm. Sliding down into the tub, I cried until the icy water drove me out.

I found Bruiser panting at the bathroom door, begging to go outside. So I put on my robe and returned downstairs to the kitchen. Broken dishes lying among puddles of barbeque sauce and mayonnaise....Malik's cell phone floating in the dishpan....My God, I'd lost my mind! But didn't I have the right?

Why had Malik and Kamille done this to me? I tried to recall what they'd said, which only caused my head to start spinning. I held on to the kitchen sink to steady the pain that had started to dig a hole in my belly. I screamed out to the empty kitchen, "Please, tell me this isn't happening. Malik, why'd you do this?" My sobs racked my entire body. I looked around for somewhere to hurl the pain, but everything was already destroyed.

Gradually I realized someone was banging on the front door. I tried to ignore it, but the person was persistent, first pounding with the knocker and then ringing the bell. Surely Malik or Kamille didn't have the nerve to return. I kicked the overturned plants out my way and peered through the peephole. Essence. I pulled open the door and saw that her expression reflected what I was feeling. It hadn't been a nightmare. I sunk into her arms, sobbing.

"Baby, I'm so sorry."

"Essence, please tell me why this is happening."

She sat me on the couch and tried to soothe my cries. Her sympathy only made it hurt worse.

"It'll work out."

"How can you say that?" I asked, looking up at her, hoping that it could.

She searched for a tissue to wipe the tears and mucus that ran down my chin, all the while trying not to gawk at the ravaged house that had always been kept neat.

"I spoke to Kamille," she said softly, as if my sister's name might ignite a fury in me.

Falling back onto the couch, I told her, "I don't wanna hear nothing they have to say. You hear me?"

"Tiff, just listen, okay. Kamille called me last night, and she really feels bad about all this. You gotta realize this happened a long time ago."

"It doesn't matter when it happened. Don't you understand? Malik is my nephew's father. He slept with my damn sister, Essence."

"You can't be so sure of that. At least not yet. Malik told me they plan to get a DNA test."

"He called you, too?"

"No, he came to see me last night at El Vez."

"For what?" I asked, knowing that Malik didn't do the club scene unless he was accompanying me.

"Malik loves you, Tiffany. You know that. He's devastated that you found out this way."

"Are you crazy? I can't believe you're taking up for them. They betrayed me, Essence." I sat there shaking my head and crying while Essence rubbed my back.

"Listen, sweetheart. You know what? You're right, they did keep a terrible secret from you, but you can't let it destroy you and you damn well better remember that we have a club to open. You know you're gonna have to talk to them at some point."

"Look, Essence. This is too much for me to think about right now. The club, them, my nephew. Let's just talk about this later, okay? Now, go on and get out of here so I can try to get myself together."

"You sure you don't want me to help you clean up?" she asked, picking up an overturned lamp. "What about a cup of coffee?"

"No, I'll be fine," I lied, ignoring the debris and opening the front door for her.

But when she left all I could do was lie on the couch crying. I knew I was far from fine and seriously doubted if anything in my life would ever be right again.

After I'd wrung myself dry of the seemingly endless tears, I managed to get dressed. By habit I got in my truck and drove around the corner to the Coffee Room Café at Twenty-sixth and Pennsylvania Avenue. It was where Malik and I went every Saturday morning for breakfast.

I wasn't in the mood for chatting with the familiar waitress, and she got the message when I mumbled my order and refused to look at her. I needed to make sense of what had happened in the last twenty-four hours. I popped two Tylenol and chased them with coffee, scalding the roof of my mouth trying to drink the liquid too hastily.

I thought about my younger sister. We were best friends and probably as close as sisters could get. We confided everything in each other, yet she'd held back about her relationship with Malik. As I stared out the window onto East River Drive, I just couldn't fathom how Malik had become Kareem's father. Kamille had told my parents and me that the young man who'd fathered Kareem when my sister was seventeen had gone to jail right before Kareem was born. She'd only been seeing him for a few months before she became pregnant. And whenever I'd asked about Kareem's father, she said he was still incarcerated.

But who knew, maybe there never was another man. Maybe that had just been a story she and Malik had concocted so as not to ruin his budding career and now our relationship.

And Malik, as far as I knew, had never cheated on me. If he had, he'd been damn good at it. I used to believe he loved me, but maybe he didn't. Right now I didn't know the answer to anything.

My racing thoughts were making me crazy, as was my ringing cell phone. I looked at the number. It was Malik calling me from his car. There was no way I was answering it.

I was just about to leave when I noticed a black Lincoln Town Car bearing municipal tags conveniently parking in a no-parking zone. I prayed it wasn't anyone we knew. When the driver's door swung open I saw that it was G-dog. Damn it, he was a pain in my ass.

Gregory D. Haney III, also known as G-dog, was a patron of every club in the city, so needless to say our paths crossed on a regular basis. To make matters worse, he never missed the opportunity to flirt with me. To add to his self-importance, he boasted he was the biracial son of Philadelphia's powerful new district attorney. I'd seen his father on TV several times. A sharp dresser with striking features, he was known as a ladies' man, and his son liked to think he was, too.

I kept my eyes on G-dog as he strolled through the door. I tried to figure out a way to slip out of there without being seen. For the first time I noticed that he wasn't particularly tall, barely six feet and kind of squatty, but handsome nonetheless, with his high-yella complexion and short curly hair. At the clubs he always wore a baseball cap and jeans, but now that he was probably coming from his job at the Department of Recreation, he wore a button-down sweater, khakis, and a brown leather jacket.

After a few moments I realized there was no way I was going to get out of the café without him seeing me. While he stood talking with the cashier, I pushed my chair back and was about to get up when he smiled and made his way to my table.

"What's up, Tiff? You look like you had a rough night," he commented, pulling out a chair...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Gallery Books
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2005
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0743477286
• ISBN 13: 9780743477284
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 256
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Simon and Schuster Netherlands BV; info@simonandschuster.nl; ; Herculesplein 96; Utrecht; 3584 AA; Niederlande