with a look of disappointment.
“So you’ve been keeping secrets? I can’t believe that this is the first time I’m hearing about this out of the seven years that we’ve been together. To find out that you have been in touch with your ex without my knowledge is bullshit! How could you keep something like this from me, Janet?”
“Kahlil, David is Iliana’s father! I’m not going to completely shut him out of her life because you have a problem with it,” Janet fired back, folding her arms with attitude.
“Janet, the child has no fucking clue whom this man is, so please spare me with the he’s her father, Kahlil shit,” I said sarcastically.
“I don’t like your tone or your attitude, so you need to calm the hell down!” Janet demanded.
The yelling inside the den grew louder and louder as the early hours of morning began to creep in.
“Look. Don’t get me wrong. I’m all for Iliana knowing whom her biological father is, and you know this, but what I’m not going to do is stand here and just take it after finding out that you two have been in contact with one another regularly this entire time! The P.O. box’s the fucking cake!”
“We’re not married, Kahlil, and let’s be real here. You haven’t even come close to asking me to marry you after all this time, so why do I need to justify everything I do?”
“Unbelievable! And you think pulling this stunt would even make me want to ask you for your hand in marriage? I thought we were up front and open with one another, but now I see we haven’t been. You don’t have to tell me shit!”
“Kahlil, you’re making this a bigger issue than it has to be!”
“Really! Is that what I’m doing? I know this for damn sure. If the roles were switched, you would have lost your damn mind, and you know it! So now I must ask. How honest have you been with me about your communication with David? Is there more that you care to disclose now that shit is out in the open?” I asked.
An unsettling silence engulfed the den. The stare between us lasted for only a second but felt like an hour.
“That’s not fair, Kahlil. I’ve been more than up front with you with everything else,” she yelled.
“I don’t trust what you’re trying to sell me right now, but you know what…never mind. I’m done,” I said, walking out of the den.
I hurried into the bedroom and changed my clothes. Once finished, I grabbed my keys and headed toward the garage. In the hall, I noticed that Iliana’s bedroom light was still on. I glanced down at my watch. It was 2:00 a.m. Softly, I knocked on her door.
“Come in,” she replied with a bit of hesitation in her voice.
Iliana was sitting at her desk writing in her journal. I watched as she wrote and cried with every angry stroke of her pen.
“It’s late, honey. You should be resting. You have school in a few hours.”
“I’m all right, Dad. I don’t want to see him, and Mom shouldn’t force me to,” she pleaded.
Before I could respond, Iliana jumped from her desk running into my arms again, crying so hard that she brought me to tears.
“It’s all right, honey. We will all sit down to figure out how to handle this. Right now, my dear, you need to calm down. Nothing will be solved right tonight.”
Iliana looked up at me simply responding in one word, “Okay.”
After kissing her on the forehead, we exchanged sentimental I love you’s before I walked out.
Headed down the hall to the glass French doors of my office, I keyed in the password to gain access and then grabbed my coat, laptop, briefcase, cell phone, and five thousand dollars from my safe. Once I reached the backdoor, out emerged Janet from around the corner. She glanced at my bag and briefcase I was holding and grabbed my arm.
“Kahlil, you leaving is no way to resolve anything,” she said, gripping my elbow with one hand while bracing the backdoor.
“You let me go. There’s nothing more for the two of us to discuss, so the best thing for me to do right now is leave.”
The two of us stood there staring one another down. Breaking the intense gaze, I looked down at my elbow which was still in Janet’s grasp and then gave her a stern stare prompting her to slowly release my arm. I walked out, slamming the door behind me.
Chapter 5
Deep within my intuition, I knew Janet still loved David, but was she in love with him was the bigger question. Janet called my cell several times, and each time, I sent her to voicemail. There had been enough arguing for the night, and all I wanted to do was find a nice hotel close by to get some sleep. I was so close to telling Janet to get the fuck out of my house, but realized if I had done that, she would have taken Iliana too out of spite just to hurt me even more.
After checking into a hotel, I ordered room service before directing my attention to the stocked bar that sat next to the window overlooking the city. I indulged in several drinks before passing out across the bed.
The next morning when I woke up, I sat on the edge of the bed with a slight hangover contemplating on getting dressed. In the midst of all of that, I noticed my cell phone was dead.
“I’ll take that as a sign,” I muttered as I leaned toward the desk phone to call the office to let them know I’d be working from home for the day.
Later on that day, once I got my faculties in order, I decided to head home. When I pulled into the driveway, I pressed the opener to watch the five garage doors open simultaneously. I took a quick inventory from left to right of what cars were there: Aston Martin, Mercedes-Benz CL550, Range Rover, and Cadillac Escalade were all parked in their respective slots. Damn it! I was hoping she’d be gone! Still nursing my hangover, the last thing I wanted to deal with was a damn argument. Féch had already come and gone leaving breakfast for everyone to eat. I had no outlet to decompress before the battle. She left a note on the table that read:
Sorry I missed everyone this morning. Dinner has been prepared in advance and is in the fridge. I’m catering an executive banquet this evening, so I will be unavailable. Sorry for any inconvenience.
Féch
It seemed like it took forever just to walk up the stairs to the bedroom because I knew the moment I saw Janet, there was going to be another blowup. I noticed the light was still on in Iliana’s room, so I opened the door to shut it off. To my surprise, there she lay in bed doing what appeared to be homework.
“What are you still doing here?”
Startled, Iliana damn near jumped to the ceiling like a cat out of a cartoon.
“Dad, you scared me!”
“I’m sorry, sunshine,” I replied, slightly chuckling. “You should be in school right now. So what are you doing here?” I asked in a much more stern voice.
“I went downstairs for breakfast this morning, but you weren’t there. So I waited a while once I was done because I thought maybe you were running late to take me to school. Mom came down and told me that you were gone. She called the school and told them I was sick and then told me to just hang out in my room for the day,” she explained.
“What?! Why the hell didn’t she just take you to school herself? You know what, don’t answer that. Just forget it. You have a science test today, right?” I asked.
“Yep. You remembered?” Iliana responded puzzled and a little worried.
“It’s my job to, and we worked off your study guide just the other day, so I know how much you wanted to ace it. Why do you ask me like you are not prepared for it?” I asked with irritation all in my face.
“Dad, I reviewed a little when I got to my room, but after last night I just went to bed. So