Page 13 of Beautiful Noise
No, she’s dead ass serious. I know my mother.
“You don’t seriously expect me to let a stranger live in my house.”
“I do and before you argue or disagree, it’s my house, Ezren. I’m majority owner of Grand Diamond LLC, so for the sake of argument, that house is just as much mine as it is yours. Kori’s staying and if you don’t want to live with her then you can leave.”
“Leave? This is my fucking house. I had it built just the way I want it. I’m not going anywhere.”
I lifted my eyes just in time to see my squatter whose name I now knew was Kori coming down the hall dressed in an oversized T-shirt and black biker shorts that stopped just above her knees. She wasn’t wearing a bra because I could see her nipples pressing against the fabric.
Why the fuck do I notice that?
“Then I suggest you figure out how to co-exist with Kori because she’s welcome to stay as long as she wants.”
“Ma, come on.”
“Goodbye, Ezren. Figure it out and you better be nice because if I find out you’re being disrespectful to my guest you won’t be happy with the results.”
And then she hung up.
“This is not happening,” I mumbled and narrowed my eyes at the squatter, who smirked as she crossed the living room en route to the kitchen. I lowered my head, brushing both handsover my head, inhaling several deep breaths before facing the issue.
She was waiting. With her back to me while she piled food on a plate, one of my plates, she spoke. “That call didn’t go as planned, did it?”
“What?”
“Gwendolyn told you I could stay. That I was just as welcome here as you are, inherhouse.”
“Yo, I don’t know what the fuck she told you, but this is my house. I designed it, picked everything in it, and paid to have it custom built. My shit, not hers.”
“But it was purchased under Grand Diamond LLC, which she’s majority shareholder for.”
“By one fucking percent, which was my decision, one I’m seriously regretting.”
“Well, either way, I’m not going anywhere until she tells me I have to, but I will stay out of your way because I can imagine this isn’t something you were expecting.”
“No shit,” I murmured.
She moved my way carrying two plates, one of which she shoved toward me and had I not moved quickly, it would have landed on the floor because she let it go before brushing past me.
“I’m going to eat in my room to give you time to process that we’ll be sharing this house for a while.”
Stunned, I watched her walk away like she truly belonged here, pausing just before she bent the corner. “Oh and that’s my food you’re eating. I cooked it. I’m not expecting a thank you, just clean up your mess when you’re done.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Kori.
The next morning I was exhausted. After picking over my dinner, I went through a rotation of pacing, stopping, placing my ear to the door to listen for anyone coming my way, back to pacing. I kept that up until about just after two in the morning when I was too exhausted to worry about the cops bursting into the guest room I’d chosen to drag my behind out ofhishouse.
Eventually I crawled into bed, burrowed under the covers, and with some effort, drifted to sleep, only to wake a few hours later in a panic remembering I was an intruder in Eccentric’s home.
Multi-platinum selling R&B crooner, sinfully handsome, and worldly sex symbol… Eccentric.
What are the odds?
And God, the man was just beautiful with his broad shoulders, dark eyes, and signature bearded face which housed a section of auburn. And that smile, I’d only been blessed with it for a brief moment but it was the kind of smile that caused problems. The kind of problems I wasn’t prepared to handle at the moment.
I was a fan of his music. Had every single album and could sing the lyrics to almost every song but his presence in person, versus the snippets I’d grown accustomed to from videos, live performances, and interviews, did little to truly highlight the man I’d experienced last night.