Page 34 of Objection

I’d never been to the French-speaking Caribbean Island before, but I’d heard a lot about it. A lot of wealthy people vacationed there, and it was known for its luxury, which was why it appealed to me.

Our conversation topics continued to shift before we fell into a comfortable silence and let the sound of music fill the car. That gave my mind time to process the fact that I’d be seeing my parents in two hours. I told Taylor but she didn’t want to come. She was still feeling some type of way about Daddy trying to keepher from coming to see me. His plan backfired, clearly, because now she was here permanently. If only he hadn’t poked that bear, she would still be there. I was glad he did, because now she was in school pursuing her degree, and that’s what she should have been doing all along.

By the time we made it to Jasper Lane, my intuition was telling me this wasn’t going to end well. I told Kaos not to even bother with checking into the hotel. It was only a three hour drive, so if he didn’t want to drive back, I would. I didn’t even have the confidence that we’d make it through dinner.

As he pulled onto their street, my heart palpitated. I started sweating and rocking in my seat. When he noticed, he held my hand.

“You’re really nervous about this huh?” I nodded. “If you don’t want to do this, you don’t have to, Serenity.”

“It’s not that I don’t want to. I do want things to be better between me and Daddy, and I don’t want Ma to be in the middle of it. I just know him, and unless I apologize, I don’t see us making any progress this evening.”

His head shook as he parked the car. “I’m all for being the bigger person when the situation calls for it, but I’m not for stroking a nigga’s ego just because. You didn’t do anything that you should apologize for.” After cutting the car off, he used my chin to turn my head in his direction as he said, “Look at me.”

“Yes, sir?”

A low groan escaped him. His eyes lowered as he tugged his bottom lip between his teeth. As his hand went from my chin to my neck, Kaos pulled me closer and gave me a deep, passionate, wet kiss.

“You distracted me. Now I done forgot what I was about to say.” I cackled before giving him another quick kiss. “Oh yeah, if at any point you want to leave early, just let me know. I’m not going to let anyone disrespect you—not even your father. Hemight have helped bring you into this world, but if he hurts you in front of me, I have no problem taking him out of it.”

“Oh God. I’m going to forget you said that.”

“You ain’t gotta remember. You gon’ see it if he try you.”

“Kaos, please. That’s my father. You can’t kill him just because he hurt me.”

He frowned as he looked at me before scoffing and opening his door. My head shook as he muttered something about me not knowing who he was as he got out of the car. Now Ireallydidn’t want to be here. Maybe this was why I didn’t have a good feeling about this. I’d forgotten what he’d done to Mario. There was no doubt in my mind if Daddy said something disrespectful that Kaos would address it.

Kaos

Stepping close to Serenity, I wrapped my arm around her from behind. Her body was literally shaking, but when I touched her, the shaking ceased. After placing a soft kiss on her neck, I reminded her, “We can leave whenever you want to.”

She looked up at me with watery eyes and a soft smile as we heard the door unlock. Seconds later, a woman that looked like an older version of her answered the door. Her focus was so much on Serenity that she didn’t even notice me.

“My baby!” she screamed before pulling Serenity in for a hug.

Serenity giggled as she held the woman whom I assumed was her mother. “Hey, Ma.”

“Oh I’m so happy you came. You don’t know how much this means to me.”

“I missed you.” When I heard the crack in her voice, I reached out and rubbed her back. “Where are my manners?” Serenity pulled away, and her mom immediately gripped her hand. “Ma, this is my boyfriend, Kaos. Kaos, this is my mom, Yolanda.”

“Boyfriend?” Yolanda repeated, extending her hand for me to shake. “It’s nice to meet you, Kaos.”

“You as well. I hope you don’t mind me crashing the party.”

“Not at all. Please, come in.”

We made our way inside, and it was clear the party was well underway. Music was playing, people were dancing or engaging in conversation, and the food smelled good as hell.

“Let me find your father, then y’all can speak to everybody and fix yourselves a plate,” Yolanda advised.

“Uh, okay,” Serenity agreed, reaching for my hand absently from behind.

I grabbed it and made my way to her side as I caressed her hand with my thumb. We followed her mom through a maze of people, all of whom stopped us so they could speak to and hug Serenity. It was clear her people missed her, and I hated that she’d felt the need to stay away for so long. At the same time, I commended her for maintaining her peace . . . even if that meant staying away.

We ended up outside by the grill where three older men stood. I assumed the one working the grill was her father, because I didn’t know too many men who’d let someone else handle his grill at his home . . . even if it was his birthday.

“Honey, look who’s here,” Yolanda almost sang.

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