Father By Choice E-Book

Jamila Jasper

• Herausgeber: Publisher s23991
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017

Beschreibung

The night Blue Summers met Damon, everything seemed to be going wrong.Falling into his arms was easy... too easy for a girl who had sworn off men for good.Blue discovers that Damon is her biggest political rival but getting rid of him won't be so easy now that she's carrying his child.As the run for office gets tougher, Blue finds it hard to deny that her feelings for Damon are getting as hot as the race itself. This interracial romance is so deliciously hot it will melt your device. Reader discretion advised for this sexy, naughty story about an African-American woman and the white man she falls in love with.

Leseprobe

Copyright Notice

Copyright © Jamila Jasper Romance 2017

All rights reserved.

Dedication

Dedicating this book to all my girl friends involved in politics. Here’s to hoping you meet the man of your dreams and live happily ever after. -- J

PROLOGUE

Prologue: Blue’s Summer

Another summer home with her mother shouldn’t have felt like a fate worse than death. Blue’s family was better off than most of the others in the neighborhood so at least Blue and her twin sister Ruby would be fed and she’d have a lot to keep her busy. This summer, they didn’t have the good fortune of being shipped off to summer camps to stay out of Maritza Summers’ hair.

Both Blue and Ruby wished that they could leave their mother’s antics behind and spend the summer with their daddy. Kareem Johnson had his issues but at least he did a better job of minding his daughters than Maritza ever could. When Blue was a little girl, she believed in the stories her mother told. And did her mother ever have stories…

After their daddy had packed up and left, Maritza became a propaganda machine. They believed that their daddy didn’t love them. They believed that he was never coming back. They believed that he didn’t fight for them in court. Now that Blue and Ruby were nearing their seventeenth birthday, they had individually begun to piece together the bits and pieces of the truth out of the tall tales their mama had told them about their daddy.

Blue waited for Ruby to finish up in the locker room after track. Ruby was busy sweet talking a tall, stocky, light-skinned runner named Chris outside the locker room for a full ten minutes and Blue was getting sick of waiting up for her.

“Well… Can I see you later?” Chris asked.

Blue tried to pretend she wasn’t listening in. Ruby giggled.

“Of course you can see me later. I’ll take my mom’s car once she’s asleep and we can meet up.”

Blue felt her face getting hot as she heard Ruby promise something that was near impossible. Ruby kissed Chris on the cheek good bye and then sauntered over to her twin sister with a smug look on her face.

“You know full well that you can’t do that Ruby!” She hissed under her breath.

“Shut up, will you? You don’t control me.”

“Yeah, but mama does. She’ll whoop you if she finds out you took the car again.”

Ruby scoffed, “So what? I want to see Chris and she can’t stop me. If she whoops me, maybe I’ll whoop her right back.”​

Blue pursed her lips shut and didn’t respond. In some ways, she and her sister couldn’t have been more different. Ruby had a new boyfriend who was “definitely the love of her life” every other month. Blue had never kissed a guy and none of them seemed interested in her.

“You’re just jealous ‘cause Chris likes me. Did you know that he said I was the better looking twin.”

“We’re identical,” Blue mumbled.

She was getting tired of these petty fights with Ruby. When they were left alone with their mother and the stress of summer vacation right around the corner, they were bound to fight more.

“Identical? Sure genetically but you and I have a very different look.”​

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Blue… I told you… You dress like an old lady. You need to show a little skin. Flash your boobs! Guys are never going to like you if you dress like their mama!”

“Who said I want stupid high school guys to like me?” Blue retorted.

Ruby scoffed, “You can’t fool me. I know you want guys to like you. Play hard to get all you want… But when I’m eighteen, I want to have my life lined up so I don’t have to live with mama anymore.”

“And you think Chris is going to do that for you?”

Ruby’s naivety was delusional, even for Blue. And she considered herself to have the most fantastical day dreams about escaping life with their mother.

“Yes. Chris said he loves me.”

“Have you slept with him yet?”

Ruby scowled, “No! I ain’t fast you know.”

“And what’s going to happen after you sleep with him. Think he’ll still love you?”

“Shut! Up!” Ruby squealed, “You think you know everything Blue, but you ain’t shit. The one guy you had a crush on embarrassed you in front of the whole school and now you think you’re above it all. Just shut up!”

They walked the rest of the way home in silence. Blue knew that she might have crossed the line with Ruby but she didn’t care. Watching Ruby’s face pinched up in anger, she felt bad for a moment. But Ruby was always ragging on her, so in a way, Blue felt she deserved it. Ruby constantly reminded Blue that she was born first. Ruby did everything first. She walked first, she won first place in all their track meets, she was the first one to get kissed at ten years old, the first one to win prom queen and homecoming queen, and the first one to get chosen by every guy at Southwest High School.

Ruby and Blue were identical, but Ruby was right about them being different. Blue weighed fifteen pounds more than her sister. She wore her hair in braids whereas Ruby had waist length relaxed hair. Blue wore glasses, Ruby wore contacts. Blue dressed modestly and Ruby flashed her boobs and wore tight pants or short skirts whenever she got the chance.

If they didn’t have the same face, Blue would have wondered if they were even siblings. As they approached the front door of their house, Blue noticed Ruby’s face softening up. As they approached their mother — their common enemy — the need to stick together superseded their petty teenage argument.

“You think dad’s sent her money yet?” Blue asked.

Ruby shrugged, “If he did we better get some money out of the ATM before she spends it all up.”

“He told me we could come see him this weekend.”

“And spend the weekend with that white bitch, Laura?”​

Blue shut her mouth after that. Ruby had a good point. Their father’s new wife hated them. She hated their dark skin. She hated the fact that she was infertile and her husband had kids with another woman before her. She hated Ruby and Blue and she wasn’t afraid to show it in big ways and small. While both girls would have done almost anything for time with their father, there were some costs that were too big.

Ruby opened the front door to the house.

“Mama!” They called out in unison.

No reply. That meant she was either out — and had left the door unlocked — or she was somewhere passed out. They walked towards the stairs and began to ascend slowly. If she was asleep, a single creak in the floorboards could rouse her. Waking up Maritza could be regrettable. Maritza Summers was the child of black Costa Rican immigrants in the U.S. She had killed the Spanish language in her household and ensured that her children were as American as possible.

Still, Blue and Ruby had never felt quite American. Their meal times were filled with arroz con pollo, fried plantains, fillets of fish and other foods that other black people in their neighborhood perceived as “weird”. Not to mention that Maritza was actually wealthy enough too. Her parents were immigrants who had built up a chain of nail salons in Boston. They’d been dispensing an income to Maritza for years. The only problem was that she mismanaged it, just like she mismanaged the child support from their father.

Once Ruby and Blue were upstairs, they checked Maritza’s bedroom. She wasn’t home.

“I don’t think she’s here.”​

“Then where is she?” Blue asked.

Ruby shrugged.

“Hopefully she gets back soon. I want to sneak out with the car tonight and see Chris.”

Blue’s face changed once she heard her sister mention her crazy plan once again. Wasn’t Ruby tired of getting into trouble? Maritza had been growing more and more unstable. If she caught wind of Ruby sneaking out, much less sneaking out to see a boy, she would go ballistic.

“I don't think it’s a good idea…” Blue mumbled.

“Well… Why don’t you come with us! Maybe Chris has a friend who will like you.”

Blue wrinkled her nose. She understood what Ruby was getting at but she wasn’t desperate. Just because she didn’t have a boyfriend and didn’t have any prospects of one didn’t mean she was going to fling herself at just anyone.

“No. I think I’ll stay home.”

“You know what Blue, you’re so caught up on being the favorite.”​​“The favorite?” Blue scoffed, “I’m not the favorite.”

“You are…”

Before Blue could retort, the front door flung open. The girls sat up, alert. They knew that it was her. Maritza’s loud belly laugh reverberated throughout the downstairs and ran up the walls of the house until it arrived in their bedroom. From her laugh, they could tell that Maritza was drunk.

Now Maritza wasn’t one of those drunks who made a big scene ‘round the neighborhood. She appeared to be a normal, beautiful woman. She was biracial, with tawny colored skin and green eyes. She wore her long black hair in a thick braid down her back and she dressed her age — always covering up skin whenever she left the house. Maritza was a prominent member of their local Catholic church and she had a way of charming people.

Ruby and Blue left their bedroom and peered downstairs to see if their mother had brought anyone home. A deep voice from below told them that she had. Again. While everyone in their town had secrets, Maritza’s were the kind that if exposed could ruin her entire life. Ruby and Blue had been inducted into a cult of secrecy from the time they were young kids.

They listened quietly at the top of the stairs again. The voice was familiar.

Ruby whispered into her sister’s ear, “Mr. Holloway.”

Blue nodded. She’d recognized the voice too. He owned three apartment complexes in their town and lived in a mansion on the outskirts of town. He was also married. His wife, Anne Holloway, had mothered a son who was in their class. Maritza was up to her usual tricks again. Blue and Ruby heard her deep laugh approach the staircase and they fled into their bedroom, locking the door.

They knew that showing their faces while their mother had brought “a lover” home would result in a beating that neither of them wanted to experience. They’d made that mistake all too many times. When they’d interrupted her evening with Mr. Winter because Ruby had stomach flu, Blue hadn’t been able to expose her skin for a week. When they’d interrupted her evening with the Grisham’s gardener, Leo, their mother had held them both still and sheared their heads completely bald.

Ruby and Blue had learned enough lessons the hard way.

“See? She’s distracted, I’m taking the car,” Ruby whispered once they were locked inside their room.

“Don’t!” Blue wasn’t even sure why she was still trying to convince her.

If Ruby wanted to turn out just like their mother, she was going down the right path. Blue couldn’t understand what she was looking for in those boys, especially not in Chris.

“Why not? We know she’ll be passed out in thirty minutes. Mr. Holloway will go back to his wife and I can sneak out.”

A load moan came from their mother’s bedroom. Not even a sealed door could block the sound. Ruby and Blue winced. Both were disgusted, but what they were hearing was nothing new. Maritza probably knew they were home too.

Her moans came into their room again.

“This is disgusting…”

“So gross…”

“Yeah and it’s summer so we’re in for a treat,” Ruby said glumly.

Blue couldn’t imagine going through this for an entire summer again. Most summers they were off at camp. But they’d pissed Maritza off and she’d pissed their granddaddy and their daddy off. So this summer, there was no such luck. Ruby and her sister tried to distract themselves, but it was boring trapped in their bedroom.

Eventually the noises died down. They heard their mother’s bedroom door open. Blue knew she was passed out and the married man she’d taken to bed was likely sneaking out, returning to his family as Maritza lay in bed stewing in his shame.

Ruby peered through the keyhole. He looked around nervously, as if he imagined his wife popping out from behind one of the doors to the Summers’ home and catching him in the act of infidelity. He walked down the stairs and out the door. Ruby and Blue pushed the door open.

“I think she’s asleep.”

“So we can finally eat dinner?”

Ruby nodded. The girls walked out of their bedroom down the stairs. The man their mother had brought home was gone.

This time, Blue made dinner. Ruby had always been the better cook but it was now Blue's turn. As they cooked, Ruby started to tidy up a bit downstairs. If Maritza woke up and the house wasn't clean, there would be hell for both of them to pay.

After around 30 minutes, Blue's simple dinner was ready. She sat down and ate quietly next to her twin sister. Their mother's portion was neatly separated and kept in a container on the top shelf of the fridge. Both of them were filled with a glumness as the time bomb of Maritza's rousing threatened to go off at any moment. They also knew that if they were too loud, they would risk waking their mother.

Nothing could be worth that. After she had been drinking, Maritza was mean. Real mean. It wasn't the kind of mean that you could stand to ignore either. If Maritza had a problem, she would make it your problem too. Blue and Ruby had the scars from those lessons they'd learned the hard way.

Once they finished, Ruby took the dishes up to the sink and began to wash them quietly. She even tried to quiet the natural clinking of plates.

Blue did a sweep of the house for more cleaning that could be done. She was tired after practice. Too tired to be the perfectionist her mother wanted her to be. But she could see many spots in the house that were still messier than their mother would have liked.

She hoped that whenever Maritza did wake up, she would be too out of it to notice.

After 20 minutes, the girls started to hear shuffling upstairs. Maritza was awake. Blue and Ruby exchanged glances of silent solidarity. Their mother was awake and she was probably going to start in on one tirade or another the moment she came downstairs. Her small feet thumped down the stairs while Blue and Ruby were standing there in the kitchen holding their breath.

They heard their mother swear to herself in Spanish, the language she had never taught them, and then they heard that final sound of both of her feet planted firmly on the first story of the house.

Their mother emerged looking like a hot mess and Rudy and Blue greeted her in unison. Not greeting her when they first saw her was another offense that could lead to cruel and unusual punishments. Her hair was out of place, her eyes looked blood shot and then there was that smell. The smell that children of alcoholics knew too well.

"Dinner?" Maritza asked without returning their greeting.

She was still slurring, struggling to keep it together and to present an authoritative face to her daughters.

Ruby chimed in, "Yes mama, I left some in the fridge."

"Blue heat it up," Her mother demanded.

Maritza sat at the bar stool adjacent to the kitchen counter and put her head into her hands. Blue rushed to grab the food from the fridge and bring it towards the microwave.

"Ruby, I need another drink," Maritza sighed.

When she was drinking, she was forlorn and pathetic. Maritza, the injured dove. For now, it was better pathetic than angry. Ruby's lips pursed together in tacit disapproval. The last thing either of them wanted to do was get their mother another drink. But saying no to her wasn't exactly a an option either. You could get the damn drink or you could get a lash. Those were your options.

"Wine?" Ruby asked.

Maritza shook her head.

"Vodka," She mumbled.

Ruby walked to the liquor cabinet and pulled out a bottle of vodka that had been full yesterday. It couldn't have had more than 3 ounces left.

"Ice," Maritza said.

Ruby got a small tumbler filled with ice and poured the vodka that remained in the bottle into the glass. Her mother sucked it back like it was a glass of lemonade on a hot day.

"Did you all clean up around here?"

Ruby and Blue answered simultaneously, "Yes mama."

The false timbre of their enthusiasm was lost on their mother.

Maritza then got off her stool and proceeded to look around the house. Inspection time. How inspection time went was entirely dependent on Maritza's mood.

Ruby and Blue didn't want to hold out hope today. She had just slept with yet another married man and usually that sort of thing put her in her worst mood.

Maritza did a sweep of the kitchen. She checked the fridge, the oven and the microwave with scrutiny.

"Dust. On the top of the microwave," She said.

It sounded like a statement but really it was a demand to get cleaning or suffer the consequences. Ruby rushed to the spot with a damp rag. They had passed the kitchen inspection and now Maritza moved to the living room, where the real trouble would start. Blue and Ruby held their breath as Maritza stumbled clumsily into their living room. She was muttering under her breath in Spanish again, looking for a reason to be angry. Looking for a reason to take out her rage on her twin daughters.

In the living room, she found it. Ruby had clumsily forgotten a pair of shoes at the foot of the couch. Blue’s eyes met the pair of shoes first and then wandered over to her mother. Maritza’s drunken gaze hovered around the shoes. She steadied herself on the wall with one hand and then called her twins over.

“What’s this?”

“Oh… It’s my pair of shoes,” Ruby said calmly.

“Aren’t you supposed to be cleaning in here?”

“Sorry mama,” Ruby said.

She walked towards the pair of shoes but Maritza’s hand stuck out and gripped hers tightly.

“Where do you think you’re going.”

“To pick up my shoes, mama.”

Maritza glared and gripped Ruby’s arm tightly. Blue could see her sister’s dark skin pulsing beneath her mother’s fingertips. Her heart was already racing. She knew that nothing could stop Maritza when she’d set her mind on finding trouble.

“It’s too late for that.”​

“But mama!”

Ruby should have known better. Her mother’s hand struck her face in a hard and definitive slap. Ruby reached to clutch her face and Maritza struck her again on the thighs.

​“Blue get the switch,” She demanded.

“Mama, no!” Blue said. She knew it would be fruitless. And she knew that her attempts to step in and stop her twin sister’s lashing would only result in her getting punished too.

“I said get the damned switch Blue. And when you come here you’ll be getting that too.”

Shit. Blue knew she’d messed up but she wasn’t about to get in a fight with Maritza. Her rage could be unparalleled, especially when she’d been drinking. Blue walked to the kitchen and in the cleaning cupboard she pulled out the switch her mama had been using on them for years. Three long wires she’d pulled out from old phone lines were tied together around a long stick. Some of the wires were stripped. A select few of them had dried blood on them from previous beatings.

Blue held the wooden part tightly, feeling the grooves of her mother’s hand that had nestled into the wood. Without looking her in the eye, she handed Maritza her weapon.

“Mama no!” Ruby yelled.

Too late. Thwap! Maritza brought down the lash with full force. Ruby screamed.

“STOP IT. STOP SCREAMING!” Maritza yelled.

Ruby bit down on her lower lip and whimpered as Maritza hit her. She fell onto her knees and Blue couldn’t take it anymore.

“Mama stop it!” She yelled.

Maritza remembered that she was supposed to be punishing both girls. She grabbed Blue’s arm and started raining blows down on her one after the other. Blue screamed and screamed. Her mother didn’t silence her. She alternated between hitting Blue and Ruby. The lash landed in more than three places at once. Blue felt the warmth where the open wires cut her flesh.

She could feel the rivulets of blood flowing down her legs and her face. She and Ruby were together, kneeling before their mother with their backs bent forward to protect their faces. Maritza hit and hit them until their screams turned into too-loud cries that had the possibility of being overheard by the neighbors. She was sober enough to care this time.

“Stand up,” She snarled at them.

Blue and Ruby were shaking in fear and trembling from the pain of the wires cutting into their flesh.

“Head upstairs and wash. I don’t want to see your ugly little faces for the rest of the day.”

“Yes mama,” Blue and Ruby muttered.

Blue’s hand snaked towards her sisters. They clutched each other’s palms tightly and exchanged a solemn glance before walking upstairs together. Their mother went on cursing. They could hear her rifling through the liquor cabinet looking for another drink. Once they were upstairs and in their bedroom, Ruby locked the door.

“That’s it, I’m going out tonight and nothing she can do will stop me.”

​“Ruby!” Blue hissed, “Can’t you see she’s already in a bad mood?”

“And so what? She’s already beat me today. I have 1… 2… 3… 4… 5… marks from it. It’s going to be a bitch to get these clean.”

Blue started sobbing again. Not just from the pain but from her absolute desperation. Ruby seemed to be able to bounce back so easily. Even if it was just on the outside, Blue envied her sister’s strength.

“Hey… Hey… No tears,” Ruby said.

She hugged Blue tightly. Blue winced, but allowed her sister to hold her. They cried in each other’s arms for a few minutes. Blue allowed her twin sister to kiss her forehead and to lie to her, telling her that everything would be okay.

When Ruby pulled away from her, Blue asked, “You aren’t still going out are you?”

Ruby nodded, “I want to. Come, let’s get cleaned up and we’ll wait for that bitch to fall asleep.”

Blue winced when she heard Ruby referring to their mother as “that bitch”. She shared Ruby’s sentiments about her mother, but saying the words out loud still felt wrong. No matter how much she resented her, no matter how much Maritza deserved it, Blue still had a heart for the fact that Maritza was her mother. Still, she followed Ruby into their shared bathroom. Ruby ran the water until it became warm and then she disrobed and stepped under the faucet. Her brown skin flinched as the water touched the cut areas of her arm.

“Get the alcohol,” Ruby said through tears.

The sting. The sting was one of the worst parts of getting a beating. You might get used to the pain of being hit, but the sting of cold alcohol pressed against an open wound was never something your body could really grow accustomed to. Blue drenched a few cotton balls in alcohol and dabbed her sisters cuts as Ruby sucked air in quickly between her teeth. Blue winced along with her twin sister. Her turn was coming soon.

After Ruby was totally clean, Blue did the same thing and she cried and cried as Ruby cleaned her wounds. Ruby had always been tough. And Blue had always been the sensitive one. Ruby helped her wash down and then they got dressed in their pajamas.

“If you go out tonight, promise me you’ll be careful,” Blue made Ruby promise.

Ruby nodded. If their mother found out where she was, her safety couldn’t be certain. Both of them were solemn in acknowledging that Ruby was taking a big, big risk. Blue settled into her bed with a novel. She watched as Ruby got ready to go out. Ruby dressed in a tight black dress that covered everything but hugged her curves tightly. She overdid her makeup, covering her lips in a deep fuchsia and swiping cocoa colored foundation powder onto her cheeks.

She spun so Blue could see how she looked. Blue gave her stamp of approval. Really, she was worried about her sister. Their mother was too unpredictable for her to ever want to take a risk by this. Ruby marched to a different beat.

They waited together for nine p.m. to roll around. By this time, they were sure that Maritza would be asleep. She had to be asleep. Blue became an accomplice. She snuck to their mother’s bedroom and pressed her ear against the door. Her mother was fast asleep. And snoring. The booze had hit her just right.

Blue returned to the bedroom she shared with her sister. Ruby was looking impatient.

“Chris is outside in his car,” She said.

“Well she’s asleep. You’re lucky. Where are you guys even going?”

Ruby smiled broadly, “A party.”

“Be careful,” Blue replied flatly.

“Always have been, always will be.”

Blue didn’t know if she trusted her sister completely, but she had no choice. Ruby was determined to sneak out of the house and spend the evening with her new boy toy. Blue just hoped that nothing would go wrong. Ruby snuck out the front door, taking a key with her so she could let herself in long after Blue was asleep.

Blue watched from the bedroom window as Chris’s car pulled away. She couldn't help but think that something felt wrong. Nothing bad had happened, yet she was still on edge. Blue decided to make herself a tea before bed. The mug of tea went cold before she had a sip and she fell fast asleep.

Blue woke with a start and knew something was wrong. Her bedroom was pitch black except for the silvery moonlight wafting in through the window. Ruby wasn’t in bed yet and Blue knew something was amiss. It was two in the morning, long after she should have come home. Maritza usually woke up at four and the last thing Ruby would want was for them to cross paths.

Blue opened up her flip phone and dialed Ruby’s number. The phones had been a gift from their father and Blue was sure that she’d seen Ruby leave the house with hers.

But there was no answer. Blue tried dialing her twin sister again. But again, there was nothing. Blue was starting to worry. She sat up in bed and tried dialing Ruby again. Still nothing. Blue walked over to her sister’s side of the room and started rifling through her things to find Chris’s contact number. There had to be some way to get in touch with Ruby.

“Where are you stupid,” Blue muttered under her breath as she flipped through Ruby’s journal.

Chris’s phone number was nowhere to be seen and all Blue could do was wait until Ruby got home. At four in the morning, Blue was in a full blown panic. She knew that their mother would be up soon and that when she did finally discover Ruby’s absence, she would blow a fuse. Blue considered walking into her room and telling her. Ruby’s absence was an emergency after all. But Blue was still bruised from the night before and she had no desire to be the sole recipient of Maritza’s misplaced rage.

Blue couldn’t go back to sleep. She tried calling Ruby again, but there was nothing. She left a voicemail this time. Blue heard her mother waking up slowly. She heard the water turn on in the bathroom and she knew that shit was about to hit the fan. Maritza was done in the shower. The smell of her morning coffee filled the house.

At five, Blue left her bedroom and took a shower herself. She detangled her long natural hair and then rubbed the ends of her hair in shea butter. Blue parted her hair and then braided two cornrows into the sides of her head.

She didn’t have track practice that morning, but she’d already worked out a lie to tell Maritza so she could head to the mall with some of her friends — the perennially uncool friends that Ruby shunned. Blue was worried about her sister but she knew that there was nothing she could do now except pray that whatever wrath rained down on Ruby didn’t also rain down on her.

At six, Blue walked downstairs. Maritza was in the living room. Quiet. She hadn’t started drinking yet. Blue wondered what went on in her mother’s mind when she was alone on a morning. She wondered if Maritza ever regretted the actions of the previous night or if she really did feel justified in exacting random wrath upon her daughters.

“Good morning mama!” Blue said in a cheerful voice.

“Morning dear,” Her mother mumbled.

Mumbled, but didn’t slur. By some stroke of luck, she was sober.

“Where’s Ruby?” She asked.

Blue’s mouth suddenly felt dry. She paused in the kitchen and pretended not to hear her mother. Luckily, Maritza bought it.

“Mama, where’s the strawberry jam?” She asked, trying to divert Maritza’s attention.

“Top shelf of the fridge. Didn’t you hear me ask you where Ruby is?”

Before Blue could think of a decent lie, Chris’s car pulled into the driveway of her house. Her eyes widened and she awaited their doom. Chris got out of the car and he pulled Ruby out of the passenger seat. Blue watched out of the corner of her eye. She suddenly felt her mouth go dry.