Page 25 of Certified Pressure 3 (Certified Pressure #3)

I waited for her to say something else, but she didn’t. She just looked at me for a long moment before finally speaking again. “Kashmere, may I ask you something?”

“Of course,” I said quickly.

Her voice stayed calm. “Do you know that my son is expecting a child with another woman?”

For a moment, I forgot how to breathe. I didn’t expect her to bring that up, not like this. My throat went dry, and I had to force myself to answer. “Yes, ma’am,” I said. “I’m aware.”

She nodded once, her expression unreadable. “Then I must ask you, how do you plan to move forward with him knowing that? Have you truly thought about what that means for your future?”

Her words hit harder than I wanted them to. I felt my body tense, but I kept my tone soft. “I’ve thought about it,” I said carefully. “And I plan on moving forward with Pressure. The baby situation came after he proposed to me.”

She raised her brows slightly. “I see. That makes things complicated.”

Her tone stayed gentle, but there was a sharpness underneath it that made me feel small.

“Our family lives by certain values,” she continued. “The men in this bloodline typically marry the women who bear their children. It is the way things have always been done.”

I felt heat rise in my chest, but I refused to let it show on my face. “I understand that, Mrs. Mensah, but Pressure made his choice. He asked me to marry him, and I said yes. I can’t undo that or control what happened before that. I don’t feel as though I should suffer because of his decisions.”

Her gaze didn’t waver. “You are right. You shouldn’t have to suffer because of his decisions.”

The way she said it made my stomach twist. She wasn’t agreeing with me. She was reminding me that I didn’t have to suffer but that I was choosing to by staying.

I swallowed hard. There were so many things I wanted to say, but I couldn’t, so I smiled and nodded politely like nothing was wrong.

She sat back, her tone still smooth. “I just want what’s best for my son. I want him to live peacefully, not in chaos. I respect that he loves you, but love is not always enough to protect a family’s order. When you marry into this name, you marry into everything it carries.”

I nodded slowly. “I understand.”

Inside, I felt humiliated. I wanted to defend myself, to tell her that her son wasn’t perfect and that I was the one trying to make things right… but I kept it to myself. The woman in front of me wasn’t one to argue with. She was powerful in a way that didn’t need to be loud.

Before I could think of anything else to say, I heard footsteps again. Pressure came back into the room with a bottle of water and sat down beside me. He glanced between us, sensing the tension, but didn’t say a word.

“Ma,” he said finally, “you talked to Pops yet?”

“He’s still in meetings,” she said, turning her attention to him. “We have family events coming up soon, and I expect you to attend.

Pressure nodded. “We’ll be there.”

They started talking about family things, but my mind was elsewhere. I sat there quietly, trying to smile when appropriate, but my thoughts were spinning. I felt invisible… I felt dismissed.

By the time we stood to leave, I was ready to cry but refused to let a tear fall. I smiled politely and thanked her for having us, but I knew that smile didn’t reach my eyes either.

As we walked out toward the car, Pressure reached for my hand. I took it because I didn’t want him to notice how shaken I was. He didn’t say much, and neither did I.

On the outside, I looked calm, but inside, I was burning.

Abeni didn’t have to raise her voice to let me know exactly how she felt. She made that shit very clear without saying much at all.

Even though I kept my composure, I knew that from this point on, things between us would never be the same.

On the way back home, I tried so damn hard to remain composed but I couldn’t stop replaying Abeni’s words in my head.

Every single one of them felt like they were echoing off the walls of my mind.

I was sitting in the passenger seat quiet, looking out the window, trying to keep my cool but my chest felt like it was on fire.

I didn’t even realize how tight I was holding my purse until my hand started hurting.

I was mad as hell, but more than that, I felt humiliated.

I couldn’t shake the way she looked at me, talking to me like I was some outsider who didn’t belong in her son’s life.

Pressure had the music low and his hand resting on the wheel while looking too damn calm for what just went down. I watched him from the side of my eye, wondering how he could be so unbothered after what his mama just said to me. He finally glanced over.

“You good?” he asked. His voice was too damn calm for my liking.

I didn’t answer at first. I just kept looking out the window like I didn’t hear him.

“Kash,” he said, this time looking right at me. “What’s wrong with you? You been quiet since we left.”

That did it.

“Your mama was rude as hell,” I said, my voice sharp. “That’s what’s wrong with me.”

He glanced over again and let out a small breath through his nose. “She don’t sugarcoat shit. She don’t do that for nobody, not even me.”

“It don’t matter who she do it to,” I snapped. “It don’t feel good, and you sitting here acting like it’s normal.”

He gripped the wheel tighter. “She my mama, Kash. She is who she is. I can’t change that.”

“So you taking her side now?” I asked, turning toward him fully.

“I ain’t takin’ shit,” he said quickly, his voice firmer now. “All I’m sayin’ is she direct with everybody. That’s how she talk. It don’t mean she don’t like you. It don’t mean she don’t want us together. You readin’ too deep into that shit.”

“Reading too deep?” I repeated, laughing out of disbelief. “Pressure, she brought up the fact that you got a baby on the way with somebody else. How the fuck am I supposed to just sit there and smile through that?”

He sighed and leaned back in his seat. “You can’t be in your feelings about everything.”

I turned and stared at him, my anger boiling over. “You know what? Maybe if you wasn’t fuckin’ me and Pluto at the same time, we wouldn’t even be going through this shit right now.”

He didn’t say anything at first. The car was quiet except for the sound of the wind slapping the windows. Then he spoke low. “You right,” he said, his voice calmer than I expected. “You right, Kash. And if that’s how you feel, then you can walk away. I don’t ever wanna be the reason you unhappy.”

That shut me up completely. The words hit hard even though he said them so cool. I turned my face back toward the window and blinked fast, trying to hold in the tears that were pushing up. I didn’t say another word for the rest of the ride. Neither did he.

When we finally made it back to the mansion, he parked the car, turned off the engine, and just sat there for a second.

I didn’t wait on him. I got out, grabbed my purse, and went inside.

I didn’t have it in me to walk far, so I stopped in the living room and dropped my bag on the couch.

My heels were killing me, so I slipped them off and sat down, burying my face in my palms. Everything I had been holding in on that ride came out all at once.

I didn’t even care about fucking up my makeup.

I felt him come in behind me after a few minutes. I heard his steps get closer, then the couch dipped beside me. He sat with his legs spread, his elbows on his knees and his fingers clasped together like he was thinking hard about something.

He spoke quietly. “I don’t even know what you want me to do at this point.”

I lifted my head and wiped my face with my hands, trying to breathe through the ache in my chest. My eyes were still wet, and when I looked at him, all I saw was the man I loved but couldn’t understand half the time. “I don’t know either,” I said honestly. “But somethin’ gotta give.”

He stayed quiet, just watching me. His eyes softened a little, but he still looked tired, like the weight of everything was getting to him too.

I took a deep breath. “Maybe we need to see a therapist or something ‘cause I don’t know if we gon’ make it without help. We keep arguing about the same shit, and it’s draining me.”

He looked at me like he was thinking it over, then finally nodded slow. “Shit, let’s go then.”

That caught me off guard. I was expecting him to argue or shut it down, but he didn’t. For a second, I didn’t even know what to say.

I sighed, pushing my hair back from my shoulders. “Okay.”

He nodded again and leaned back into the couch, his eyes on the floor. We didn’t say much else after that. The quiet was different this time, though.

Later that night, I took a shower by myself. Usually, me and Pressure showered together, but tonight I needed space. I let the water run hot until the steam filled the bathroom and tried to wash the heaviness off me. It didn’t work.

When I got out, I dried off, put on my silk gown, and climbed into bed. Pressure was still in the bathroom, and when he finally came out, he didn’t say anything. He turned off the light, slid in beside me, and faced the other way.

For a while, we just laid there in silence, our backs turned to each other. I hated it. I hated that this was what we had become tonight.

After a few minutes, I felt him move. The bed shifted, and then I felt his arm slide around me. He pulled me in close, his hand resting over my stomach. His skin was warm, and I could feel his breath against my shoulder.

Even after everything that was said, his touch still made me melt. That was the part that scared me most. No matter how mad I got, and no matter how deep we cut each other with words, I couldn’t unlove him. I couldn’t detach myself from the way he made me feel.

I held his arm tighter against me with my eyes closed, trying to stop the tears were trying to fall. He pressed his face against my neck and whispered, “I got you.”

And just like that, the tension eased. I didn’t forgive him in that moment, and I sure as hell wasn’t over what happened, but I loved him too deep to sleep without him holding me.

For better or worse, Pressure had my whole heart, and that was exactly why it hurt so much.