Page 48 of Taming a Menace

She never looked up from her computer screen as she replied. In fact she had yet to look away from the screen since I’d gotten here. Either what she was doing was important as hell or she was avoiding eye contact with me. I was willing to bet money on the latter.

“How has your day been? I would ask you about your weekend, but I already know the answer to that.”

“Do you?” I asked.

“I recall an instance where you lost your temper. Care to tell me about that?” she quizzed.

“Someone disrespected someone that I care about, and I stepped in.”

“Are you often compelled to defend others?”

“If they can’t defend themselves, yes,” I answered.

“Has there been a time when you needed someone to defend you and that didn’t happen?” she asked.

“Look at me. What do you think?”

“I’m sure you haven’t always been a big, scary guy.”

“You think I’m big and scary?”

I needed to know if Iyla was actually scared of me, or if this was just part of her line of questioning. I’d actually been wondering this since the night at the club. She’d given me the perfect opening to ask.

“That’s beside the point, Mr. Glover,” she countered.

“You’re right. Mr. Keywan Glover doesn’t have to worry about that for the sake of his therapy, but Key wants to know how Moon feels for the sake of his pursuit of her.”

“Do you feel like these are two different people? I need to know things like that for the sake of your therapy.”

“I know they’re not, but I needyouto consider that as true so that you open yourself up to the possibilities.”

“OK, good. I was beginning to think that we might have more work ahead of us than I initially anticipated.”

“For therapy or?” I asked.

“Yes. Well for both I guess.”

“So you haven’t decided to completely freeze me out?”

“That’s to be determined.”

“I can work with that.” I nodded, feeling a little more confident about her.

“Now let’s see if you can work on answering a direct question, Mr. Glover.”

I reached down and unzipped my backpack and placed Iyla’s lunch in front of her before responding to what she’d said.

“I like when you get authoritative, Ms. Iyla. Can you repeat the question?”

“What’s this?” she asked.

“I made chicken parmesan and cheesecake.”

“Key, you can’t keep bringing me food.”

“Key is trying to be your man, so yes he can. Keywan is your patient and knows there are boundaries.”

She narrowed her eyes and shook her head as I pushed the containers closer to her. I reached back into the bag and removed one of the mini cheesecakes to eat while I was there. As I removed the lid from my cheesecake, I thought about something.