Page 22 of Chosen By a Billionaire (Rags to Romance #24)
When Jayda made it back home that Saturday morning, she was surprised to see that her apartment door was unlocked. But when she pushed the door open, to see who had entered her apartment, she wasn’t surprised at all. Kenny and Makela were making out on her living room sofa.
Angry, she barged on in. “What do you think you’re doing?”
Kenny jumped up, pulling up his pants, and Makela got up, closing up her blouse.
Jayda slammed the door shut. “Where do you get off coming in my apartment like this?”
“It’s mine too. I paid my rent.”
“But where your half for next month? You moved out,” Jayda said angrily.
But then she knew he fed on drama. He knew how to push her buttons. “Why did you come here anyway? And why did you have to bring that bitch with you?”
“Who you calling a bitch?” Makela said. “I’m just helping him out, that’s all I’m doing.”
“Yeah, you’re helping him out. I saw what kind of help you were giving him on my sofa! Just get out of my house, Makela. And you too,” she added, to Kenny.
Kenny began picking up the piles of papers he had on the coffee table. He began stuffing them in the trash bag he had with him.
“Will you hurry up and leave? I can call the cops on your ass.”
“Call’em. Who gives a damn about cops? All they gonna say is that I live here too.”
“But you left, remember? And your name ain’t on this lease. So your ass trespassing. That’s what they’re gonna say.”
“Whatever,” Kenny said as he looked at the time on his Apple watch, and knew he had to go.
“I wanted to be sure to get my papers out of here. The landlord told me the day I left that he’s evicting you if you don’t have the full rent next month, which I’m sure you don’t have.
I’m gonna make sure I have everything I own out of here before next month.
They aren’t putting anything of mine out to the curb. They aren’t embarrassing me.”
“How could anybody embarrass you when you do a bang-up job of it all by yourself?”
But Kenny noticed something else. “Since when you been staying out all night?”
Jayda suddenly looked defensive. “That’s none of your damn business.”
“She got her a new man already, Kenny,” said Makela, laughing. “She been with her rich man. I’ll bet he paid her rent for her. I told you it was true.”
“That shit ain’t true,” Kenny said.
“Where she been then? Raymond told me all about how this rich white man took a shine to her. That’s where she been. With him.”
Kenny stared at Jayda. “That true? You gonna betray the race with some white dude?”
Jayda looked at him like he was crazy. “Man, if you don’t get out of my face with that nonsense.” She began walking to the front door. “Just leave,” she said, holding the door open. “And give me my key back!”
He gladly gave her that key. He wanted no parts of the new month’s rent responsibility.
“If you throw me out now,” he said at the door, “then I’ll have to come back next week sometime to get the rest of my shit.
I still got more to get. I can’t come sooner than that so you’ll have to be here to let me in. ”
“Nope. I’ll be out of town next week. So you can forget coming back here. Just tell me what you left and I’ll gather it together and leave it with the landlord.”
But Kenny was stuck on what she’d said first. “You’ll be out of town? Since when? You’re always in town. Your ass don’t go nowhere.” Then he looked at her suspiciously. “Where your ass going?”
Jayda was rather proud of it. Or at least proud of who she was going with. “I’ll be in Kennebunkport for a few days.”
Both Kenny and Makela were floored. “ Kennebunkport ?” asked Makela. “Ain’t that’s where them rich folks live? See I told you, Kenny. She already hooked up with him.”
“Girl bye!” Jayda knew she had said too much, but she wanted both of them to realize they weren’t hurting her.
It didn’t work on Makela. She didn’t care who she dated just as long as it wasn’t Kenny.
But it worked on Kenny. “Wait in the car, ‘Kela,” he said.
Makela was offended. “Why I gotta wait in the car?”
“Just do it!”
Makela didn’t like it, but she knew Kenny could be cruel. She left.
“You might as well follow her,” Jayda said, still holding the door open.
“What you think you’re doing with this white dude? He don’t want you.”
“You don’t know anything about what I’m doing or what he does or doesn’t want. So you can stop that bull crap right now.”
“What about us?”
Jayda knew she hadn’t heard him right. “ Us ? There’s no us!”
“You know how I have to blow off some steam sometimes, Jayda. I just needed some time away. But I thought you still . . .”
“You thought I still what? Wanted a man who called me a loser? Who said I wasn’t up to his standards. Who only wanted my body? You thought I still wanted that?” Her anger turned to rage. “Get out!” she yelled.
“Okay, I’m going,” Kenny said, bitterly.
But just as he was walking past her, he smiled.
“You still want me. You can claim you don’t, but you still want me.
And you’re right, all I ever wanted from you was what you did for me between them sheets.
And you’re barely on my level even there.
You aren’t up to my standards. I wasn’t lying about that.
You’re just a piece of meat as far as I’m concerned.
And that’s all that rich dude wants from you too.
Watch what I tell you. That’s all you’re good for. Sad, but it’s true.”
Jayda pushed him out and slammed that door so hard that it just missed slamming into his bubble butt. He had to scoot out faster to avoid the hit.
But when the door closed, Jayda leaned against it. Because she had been wondering if that was all there was to Harrison’s interest in her. And because she gave him what he wanted, would that be the end of them too? Was she just a piece of meat to him too?
And just like that all of those happy feelings she felt as she made it home from his penthouse melted into the reality of her life. And it was a sinking feeling.
But that only made her more determined to fulfill her obligations at work. If it all backfired on her with Harrison and he lost out to his brother, or just flat didn’t want her around anymore and reneged on the job offer, she would still have her hustle.
She took a shower, got dressed, and hurried to work.