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Eden balanced her attention between the conversation and her texts.

Max: You really smacked it on your tongue and looked me in my eyes.

Eden: Where else was I supposed to look?

Max: Cut it out. I can’t touch you.

Eden: You can still smell it?

Max: Just enough. Gotta get back in my garden.

Eden bit her lip and locked her phone.

“What’s got you grinning and skinning?” Fatima asked as her bar manager slid another order of drinks over to them. “Your man?”

“He isn’t my man,” Eden huffed. “Anyway, we’re asking you all the questions.”

“Rudy and I have benefits. The relationship is beneficial. I have access to things, business opportunities, and leverage. He has his freedom.”

“So, this relationship is open?” Eden mused, her face scrunching.

Staysha nudged her, prompting her to fix her face. “You let him fuck just anyone?”

Fatima laughed. “Only when he’s on the road. I can’t go to every show or be everywhere, so it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make. All the women know their roles and have signed NDAs.”

Eden grunted. “Okay, keep it real with us, for real. You’re okay with that?”

Fatima looked around the space she’d built from the ground up. “We’re good together; I love him. I’ve had a bad run at love. Am I supposed to throw that away because he’s a man?”

Eden grunted again. “You’re supposed to honor you, and as long as you’re doing that...it’ll work, I guess.”

“Until it doesn’t,” Staysha huffed. “I don’t want you to misunderstand me.

I like you. My sister and Poppi taught me not to sell myself short.

Rudy is a great DJ, producer, or whatever, but I think you’re giving him one hundred percent, and he’s giving you whatever you accept. I don’t think that’s right.”

On the edge of tears, Fatima sighed, “What do I do?”

Eden shrugged. “I have limited knowledge on relationships, but I was raised by a queenpin who taught us to have our own money, our own minds, and our own love because niggas will sell you short every time. You’re selling yourself for a few more zeros and commas, but I really don’t think you sleep well at night. ”

Fatima lowly swiped a tear. “I don’t. In that big house, it’s cold.”

“Damn, we didn’t mean to make you cry,” Staysha hummed.

“No, it’s fine really. You guys had no clue what I’ve been dealing with, and the last couple of days it’s been rough. This feels like confirmation. I’ve been praying on a sign, and you two waltzed through the door.”

“You know if you need us, we’re here,” Staysha offered, and Eden agreed.

“I’m sure once I make this move, I’m going to need some friends.

I’m from Majestic Falls. I moved down here to be with him.

I haven’t made any real friends in this city, and you two are the first pair of women I’ve been around that didn’t support this,” Fatima admitted. “Or didn’t want to fuck him too.”

“Bitches that run in these circles can be delusional,” Staysha huffed, making Eden snap her head.

“Can be? Let’s try, are .”

“How’s that going for you?” Fatima asked Eden.

Eden shrugged and took a sip of her drink. “I’ve booked two shows, and Staysha is finding me brands that let me have creative control.”

“I would’ve sued the shit out of them niggas,” Fatima huffed. “Especially Rico. His ass is coked up half the time, paying cheerleaders and staff to piss for him.”

“What’s new?” Staysha grumbled. “Both of them will get what’s coming to them. We do not fuck with karma.”

“Don’t and won’t. I feel like my character will speak for itself.

There hasn’t been a thing I haven’t shared if I was asked.

Stripper, fatherless, robbed niggas, motherless, and raised by the Queen of Trae Way.

Shit, what’s in these drinks?” Eden huffed, looking down at her glass of rose-tinted gin, edible gold flakes, the dried orange slice, and rosemary sprig serving as garnish.

“Bitch, we’ve been drinking since earlier, you are drunk,” Staysha stated with laughter as if she wasn’t.

Fatima laughed. “Let me get on your level.”

Barely undressed from her day with Staysha, Eden sat on the veranda staring at the screen as Maximus dressed.

“How drunk are you?” he questioned.

“Very drunk. A lot of drunk, and it’s all Staysha’s fault. I have a question. You bought furniture and no window treatments?”

“What the hell are window treatments?”

“Blinds, curtains, things to make this big ass house feel like home.”

“Home? You trying to make it home.”

“Yeah, I mean for you. It’s your home,” Eden replied.

He smirked. “Heard you. You want to go shopping in those overpriced furniture stores for window treatments when I get back?”

Eden shrugged. “I don’t mind.”

“Aight. Finish telling me about your day,” Maximus spoke, wanting to hear her voice until she passed out. “Stay there?”

“Yeah, she’s knocked out in the guest room,” Eden answered. “Spa and a cooking class. I can probably successfully make Alfredo now. I heard that’s like a tier-two meal.”

“Ah shit, give you a year you’ll be making mac and cheese.”

They shared a laugh before Eden quipped. “Relax, that’s too much pressure.”

“Pressure makes diamonds, baby. Gotta keep growing and shining. I want to know how you got this lit?”

“We went to Uptown Sips, and I don’t know what Fatima puts in that shit, but everything is spinning.”

“Go get in the bed.”

Eden groaned as she untucked herself and trekked back inside, picking up the teddy bear in the process. In the California king bed, on his side, she looked at the camera. “Did you know Fatima and Rudy are in some type of open relationship?

Maximus scoffed. “He told me that bullshit one time. I ain’t with it. That shit always backfires. That nigga is going to be sick when she out with another nigga.”

“So let me ask you this. Am I supposed to possess you or experience you? Like am I just supposed to let you have your way.”

“Eden, you and I both know you ain’t going for that.

I prefer both, heard me? I look at it like this: if I’m yours, I’m yours.

I ain’t trying to fuck with your head or body in a way that’s going to cause you harm.

I expect that same respect. It’s respect.

The respect you hold for yourself and whoever you fucking with.

If I don’t respect you, I'm not fuckin’ with you on no type of level.

Heard me? Respect is a necessary foundation.

At the end of the day, regardless of what happens, it stays. ”

“I hear you,” Eden softly commented. Maximus’s words soothed her anxiety.

“Why you bring it up? Think I’m gon’ be laid up with you saying one thing and out here doing another?”

“I wouldn’t want to think that, but I also know that we’re just kicking it. So getting lost in my head isn’t really the best thing to do.”

Maximus stared at her on the screen for a long moment before saying, “Don’t nothing worth anything get birthed from living in your head. My first year in prison, I just sat there in my head. It’s dangerous. You too great to be spinning in your head, Eden. Heard me?”

She smiled faintly. “Heard you.”

“Good, go head and close your eyes. Get some sleep, I’ll be back in the morning.”