today was cool. went to my mom's "friend's" house for a bbq. great food. nice conversation with the guy though i have to say i have a lot to learn in trying to decipher his thick, cajun accent. but it's all good. i couldn't help but to be VERY happy for my mom because i realized today, just by seeing her lotion and deoderant in the bathroom and the way she worked in the kitchen like she owned it that she was happy...that she found a space to breathe in. i don't think i have ever felt that content and just geniune happy before. it struck me, as it often does, how it doesn't take much to make one happy. my mother's happiness moved me today.
N.E.way-->i'm off to work on finishing my outline to the new story. as a treat, i offer you a new excerpt to DDIW. first, here's a brief synopsis of what the story is about:
Mystery novelists and twins, Jovan Parham-Anderson and Cheyenne Parham are young, beautiful, talented, and on their way to their sixth best-selling novel; that is, until Jovan learns her husband, Cordell Anderson, founder of Anderson Technologies, is having an affair with vice president, Alisha Stewart. Before Jovan can get upset about it, she finds Cordell dead in their bedroom, and evidence is mounting against her and her hotheaded twin. Despite homicide detective, Ian Davenport’s insistence that the girls stay out of it, Jo and Chey are determined to clear their names before they’re wrongfully accused…or the killer comes after them.
NOW...the new excerpt. this is the beginning of chapter one. have fun. leave a comment if you like.
CHAPTER ONE
Jovan Parham Anderson gripped the wrinkled silk sheets and gritted her teeth as her husband thrust himself into her.
“Relax, Jo,” Cordell whispered. “Stop being so uptight.”
Jovan closed her eyes as they began to well up with tears.
Relax? she thought. You bastard.
She sucked in a deep breath as Cordell’s hands took hold of her breasts and tweaked her nipples. A move that would have normally excited her made her stomach lurch.
Jovan moved her arms around to Cordell’s back and dug her nails deep.
“That’s it,” he grunted in her ear. “Hurt me, baby.”
Cordell grabbed Jovan’s full hips and rammed into her, causing her to cry out.
“Yes.” He groaned.
“Cordell,” Jovan said, panting, “you’re hurting me. Slow down.”
Jovan pressed her hands against Cordell’s chest, but he hunkered down and pumped ferociously inside her.
“Stop,” Jovan yelled.
A deep rumbling sound erupted from Cordell’s mouth, and Jovan knew he was about to orgasm. He lowered his head and took one of Jovan’s nipples into his mouth. He nipped it.
Jovan yelped and began hitting Cordell in the face.
“Stop, Cordell,” she said. “Please, you’re hurting me.”
In a flash, Cordell had Jovan’s hands above her head; he never lost his deep, quick rhythm inside her.
“Don’t you ever hit me again,” he said in a low voice.
Jovan’s eyes widened and tears leaked from them, sliding down into her ears.
She watched as Cordell’s eyes rolled up into his head. He bit his lower lip.
“Unh,” he moaned. “I’m there.”
He pushed himself as far into Jovan as he could as he moans overshadowed Jovan’s screams.
He fell upon Jovan and for several moments, the only thing that could be heard was Cordell’s heavy breathing and Jovan’s whimpers.
“For God’s sakes,” Cordell said, “stop your crying.” He rolled over and placed his feet on the floor. “You do your womanly duties, and I wouldn’t have to stay all pent up and act like this.”
“I asked you to stop, Cordell,” Jovan said. She opened her eyes and stared at Cordell’s smooth, brown back. “You come in here past one in the morning, frustrated over work to hear you say, and think you can just take me when you want to?”
The sirens from police cars silenced their argument, temporarily.
Cordell jumped from the bed and spun around. “Jo, stop being a bitch and get over it. You’re my wife, right?”
Jovan stared for a while before nodding.
“Get over it,” he repeated. He snatched his black slacks off the back of the chair that sat in the corner of the bedroom.
“What are you doing?” Jovan asked.
“Going out,” Cordell replied.
Jovan looked at the clock. “It’s barely six in the morning.”
“I need air.”
“You haven’t been here but a few hours.”
“What did I just say?”
Jovan stared at Cordell, the man she had vowed to love. The man who had just taken her though she cried for him to stop.
Air, she thought. In the past, she had doubts about Cordell. Did he lie? Did he cheat? Did he still love her?
But now, in the bedroom, sex lingering in the air, Jovan knew he was going for more than air.
“Hmm,” Jovan whispered.
“Got a problem with that?” Cordell asked. When Jovan didn’t respond, he slid his shirt on and stepped into a pair of Nike Air. As he swiped his wallet off his nightstand, he turned to Jovan and added, “Clean up the bed.”
Jovan watched him leave and then looked down. Spots of blood dotted the otherwise snow-white sheet.
*
“That son of a bitch,” Jovan said as she walked the sheets to the laundry room to wash. Her normally spry, hip-twisting walk became an open-legged shuffle as she walked downstairs.
In the kitchen, Jovan began a pot of coffee and poured herself a cup when it was done. She made it into the living room, sat gingerly on the sofa, and turned on the TV. Thin light from the early morning sun broke through the window shades.
She channel-surfed until what looked like the house two houses down from hers appeared on the screen—The Brockman’s. A marquee scrolled across the screen, April 15—Breaking News. The camera panned across the street to a house surrounded by police cars, black Cadillacs, and an ambulance.
“No,” Jovan said as she scanned the screen. She saw LIVE in the corner of the screen and immediately put down her coffee and walked as fast as she could out the door. All her neighbors were out in their yards, dressed in their nightclothes.
She walked across the lawn to her next-door neighbor, a short, portly judge who was known in the neighborhood as the enforcer. The neighborhood was far too upscale for such a person, but it always brought a chuckle to the judge when someone called him that.
“Judge Williams,” Jovan said, “what’s going on?”
Judge Williams pushed his glasses up his beak of a nose and coughed.
“From what I gather,” he said, “someone broke into the Brockman home.”
“That’s the third break-in this month,” Jovan said.
“I know.”
“Why the ambulance?”
Judge Williams lowered his head.
“Who?” Jovan asked, her breath quickening.
“Sarah.”
Jovan crumbled to the ground. Judge Williams knelt, took her in his arms, and allowed her to cry.
“I just talked to her yesterday,” Jovan said. “She can’t be dead.”
Judge Williams kissed the top of Jovan’s curly brown mane and sighed. “They have an alarm system that can wake the dead. How the hell this killer get inside the house and no one hear it?”
Slowly, Jovan stood and brushed off her bottom. She wrapped her arms around her. “I’m guessing there are no suspects?” she asked.
Judge Williams shook his head. “I’m thinking inside job.”
Jovan faced him. “Come on, now. You calling Mark a murderer? I mean everyone in the neighborhood figured he was sniffing up under skirts, but killing Sarah? I don’t see it.”
“Hon,” Judge Williams said, “that’s because despite what you write about, your mind is very idyllic. You don’t want to think there’s a world where husbands kill wives over things as little as infidelity.”
Jovan shivered. Questions of her own husband’s infidelity swirled inside her head.
“I guess I do sometimes,” Jovan mused. “Nothing wrong with being idyllic.”
“No, but it sure makes it tougher to deal with things like that.”
The two watched as Sarah’s body was brought out of the house in a body bag. A somber Mark walked behind the gurney.
“Sarah told me Mark was out of town,” Jovan said.
“He came back a few hours ago on the red eye from California. He found her.”
Mark looked up and noticed Jovan and the judge. Jovan wanted to yell out that she was sorry. She wanted to run up and hug Mark. Instead, she offered a slight smile and her hand over her heart.
She shook her head, turned, and rushed back toward her home. Before entering, she ventured one last glance toward the Brockman’s. In the sea of detectives, paramedics and lookers-on, Jovan noticed Cordell. She watched him step away from the scene and walk down the street.
“Where’s he going?” she asked. She shut the door behind her.
She didn’t give herself time to worry about that.
Sarah was dead. The person she had monthly lunch dates with, the person she complained about Cordell to was dead. Sarah and Mark were the very first people to welcome Cordell and
Jovan into the neighborhood. Sarah, being a good ten years older than Jovan, often advised Jovan in what not to do in her marriage. Sarah knew what it was like to live with a powerful, bull-headed man. She knew what it was like to question her husband’s fidelity.
Jovan slid to the floor and rested her back against the front door.
“I can’t believe this,” she muttered, wiping tears from her face. “You didn’t deserve this, Sarah.”
Just last week, during their lunch break, Sarah told Jovan she was close to finding proof about Mark’s affair.
“When I saw the e-mail,” Sarah had said, “I read between the lines. Something’s going on. I just need more time to figure out what.”
Sarah’s time was out. Jovan refused to let her time run out before learning what was going on with Cordell.
Jovan stood and took a breath. “What a morning,” she mumbled. She hugged herself tight. “Let’s see if I can make this day worse.”With reluctance yet a strong determination, Jovan walked toward Cordell’s office, hoping to be proven wrong about her suspicions.
No comments:
Post a Comment