Chapter Seven

Clubbin’

The moment Jucee and Mercedes disappeared down the stairs in search of the hallway where the bathrooms were located, a group of ball players arrived. The crowd on the dance floor seemed to double in size and the volume surged. I was out to chill with my people, but I couldn’t turn my business brain off. With so many people in the building—including prominent celebrities—now was the perfect time for “The Rest of You” to drop publicly. It had done very well at Sanity, with Jucee tagging me in every comment on her social media that asked when the song was gonna be available. Since then, I’d put it up on all streaming apps and uploaded all of the details onto Shazam. It was go time and I felt confident that this song was going to catapult Ray right into the spotlight. Tapping Xeno on the arm, I leaned into her ear.

“I’mma go holla at High-Fee right quick.” The DJ who’d been spinning when we arrived had wrapped up his set, and High-Fee was now in the booth.

Xeno nodded. “You finna slide her that track?”

I grinned. “You already know, my boy.”

We both stood and slapped hands.

Xeno tapped my shoulder with the side of her fist.

“I can’t wait to watch their faces from up here when the beat first drops.”

“Already!”

I descended the short flight of steps from VIP and pushed through the crowd until I reached the elevated booth. There was a seven-foot swole dude guarding the entrance to the stairs, but he stepped to the side before I reached him. There wasn’t even a need to flash my VIP wristband; he knew who I was already. I dapped him up and proceeded up the stairs. The DJ booth at VR was futuristic and functional as hell. LED lights ran underneath the rim of the countertop that ran the length of the eight-by-eight-foot space. There were multiple mounted, thirty-two-inch screens that could be connected to devices for larger viewing, which was an especially nice feature for dark clubs. The booth had a nearly 270-degree view of the dance floor and VIP sections, with a plexiglass shield across the front that rose five feet in the air. Fred Pierce had really put some thought into this design, and I applauded him for that.

“Aw, shit!”

The exaggerated exclamation pulled a wide grin out of me. She’d turned from her station to face me, bowing dramatically at the waist.

“I ain’t know greatness was in the building! Let me show my respects!”

I couldn’t help but laugh at her antics. DJ High-Fee, also known as Nacora, was about eight years younger than me, but instead of generation wars, we’d clicked from the moment we met and she’d been the homie ever since.

“Whatever, whatever,” I laughed. “Please cut the bullshit.”

Straightening, she cracked up and approached me with opened arms, her five-inch platform wedge-boots making her tall as hell with her titties hitting my forehead as we hugged. High-Fee looked like she was headed to a rave, and the neon-orange fishnets tucked into her mint green boots that matched her high-waisted miniskirt, the furry, cropped black coat over a white tank top, and the cat-ear head band were right in line with that.

“It’s not every day that a Grammy Award–winning producer steps into my booth. I’m honored.”

Groaning playfully, I waved her off.

“Chill out.”

She took a step back before she’d made it over to where I stood and mimed taking pictures of me.

“Cyn Tha Starr! Cyn Tha Starr! Look this way!”

Cracking a smile, I hit a couple poses to the beat of the song playing as Nacora cheered and depressed the imaginary shutter. We both busted out laughing after the third pose. She stood from a crouch and beckoned for me to cross the small space and join her at her setup, where she immediately resumed mixing.

“So, what’s up with you?” she asked, glancing my way. “How you been? How’s that Grammy treating you?”

“What’s up with me is that I have this new track I’m hoping you can slide in sometime during your set.”

Her eyes widened and she rubbed her hands together, a sly grin coming onto her face. “Is this the track that the girls been asking for?! The one Jucee danced to?”

My nod was slow, my answering grin full of pride that the buzz the song had already gained was strong enough for Nacora to catch wind of it.

“One and the same.”

Clapping, she bounced on her toes.

“Send it over! I been waiting to get my hands on this Cyn Tha Starr track.”

Chuckling, I pulled out my phone and airdropped the file to her. I watched as a notification popped up on one of the screens in front of her. She accepted the file on the mounted MacBook directly in front of her, nodding in satisfaction. Selecting the song, she dragged it over to the software she was using for the night.

“What’s the vibe?” she asked as I watched her scroll her queue.

“It’s low and sensual. Think anything Victoria Monét or Bey’s ‘Speechless.’”

Lips pursed, Nacora gave a deeper nod and inserted the song where she wanted it. I didn’t take it for granted that she was putting the song into her set without having heard it first. She trusted that I wouldn’t give her some bullshit, and I honored that trust by making sure I never did. Grabbing a microphone, Nacora turned a dial to lower the music a notch.

“How y’all feeling?”

She paused and allowed the cheers from the crowd to float up to her. The building was packed and the people were feeling good. High-Fee was a damn good DJ and knew exactly how to move the crowd just how she wanted.

“I’m lovin’ it, I’m lovin’ it.” Lowering her voice, she infused pure sex into her voice as she continued speaking. “I want to turn the heat up in here a little bit. Y’all cool with that?” There was whooping, some cries in the affirmative, and one person who screamed “Yes, lawd!” which had me cracking up. Nacora grinned and glanced back at me. “Aight, I’mma slow it down a little bit.” Switching the mic off, she raised the music and faded one song out while the opening beats of 112’s “Anywhere” faded in.

I shot off a text to Xeno, letting her know that “The Rest of You” would be playing sometime soon, and then I watched Nacora spin through a couple of songs. A server in a black jumpsuit entered the booth and handed Nacora two drinks. I raised an eyebrow at her double-fisting as the server disappeared. Grinning, she handed me one of the glasses.

“What is it?” I asked while bringing the glass to my nose for a sniff before taking a tentative sip.

“Mocktail version of my huckleberry mule. It’s good as shit, right?”

The tanginess of the odd fruit matched with the crisp bubbles and danced on my tongue. I nodded.

“Different, but not bad.”

I started to ask her how she knew to order me a drink when it was just her up here, but she shot me a look and nodded at the crowd as she picked up the mic. Turning the music down, she lifted it to her mouth.

“Who’s fucking somebody when they leave here?”

Straw in my mouth, I damn near choked when she asked that. There were a few whistles and several shouts that went up in answer of her question. The cheers from the crowd were almost deafening.

“Good,” Nacora said, her hand moving across the trackpad. “Let me play some mood music.” She cranked the volume up, and the opening beats to “The Rest of You” filled the air and the dance floor turned into the set of an early-2000s RB music video. Bodies pressed together and writhing. The strobe lights went from flashing white and yellow to pulsing red and green to the beat of the song. Ray’s voice had folks grinding and damn near fucking on the dance floor.

It was glorious.

Nacora turned to me, her face scrunched up like something stank to high heaven. All I could do was smirk and bob my head to the beat.

“This is a banger.”

She was right, of course.

“Thanks, Nacora.”

I’d made a radio edit that was only three minutes long, but the version I sent to Nacora was the full five-minute version, which included thirty-five seconds of Ray’s vocal runs as the instruments played. It was actually me on piano for part of the song, because I’d wanted to channel the seventies habit of giving the musicians time to flex their skills.

Nacora allowed the entire song to play, transitioning into Victoria Monét’s “F.U.C.K.” so damn smoothly that you would’ve thought the two songs had the same melody. My phone buzzed in my pocket. I checked the screen to see it was a text from Xeno. Preferring to get her reaction in person, I got Nacora’s attention and let her know I was leaving. She turned to give me a quick hug and then turned right back to her setup. I was down the stairs within seconds, feeling lifted from the crowd’s reaction to “The Rest of You.”

I’d taken two steps away from the booth before a woman stepped in front of me and blocked my momentum forward. Almost colliding with her, I held my hands up, half-finished drink sloshing around in the glass.

“My bad, sweetheart,” I murmured, stepping to the side so she could get to wherever she was going in a hurry.

“It’s all good,” she remarked in a voice infused with sensuality. When she stepped with me like a mirror image, my eyebrows shot up and I leaned my head back to take her in.

Face beat, titties sitting, dress serving sexy disco ball, and heels higher than my car note, she looked good. Real good.

How would that dress look on Jucee?

Instinctively, my eyes swept up toward the VIP section, where she was likely shaking her ass with Mercedes. The way the lights were situated, I couldn’t even see up there, but I wondered what she thought of the club’s reaction to “The Rest of You.” I squinted, and the motion made me realize what I was doing. Blinking out of my thoughts—especially that initial random one that came out of nowhere—I acknowledged the woman in front of me. Her voice had what sounded like a natural rasp, the depth not matching her bubbly appearance. She sounded like she should be scatting at the Red Rooster, but she was dressed like a top-forty popstar.

As she stepped closer to me, I tried to place her face. It was possible that she was in the industry, but she didn’t look familiar.

“You lookin’ for me, or is this just a happy accident?”

Sauntering over to me, hips rocking from side to side, she licked her lips and shrugged. “Can’t it be both?”

I cocked an eyebrow, lips curving into a smirk. “It’s like that?”

“It is,” she insisted, practically purring. “I’ve been looking for you all night, but running into you right now was a coincidence. Fate, maybe.”

“Fate,” I found myself repeating. “Oh, so you think this was meant to be.” It wasn’t a question. There was no need to ask, because clearly that was what she was telling herself. I recognized her point as one fans—groupies—believed in on a regular basis. It was a little unrealistic, but I rarely said no to a beautiful woman when she was so obviously interested in me.

She threw her head back and laughed uproariously as if I’d just done stand-up comedy, and my eyes widened as my head snapped back a bit. I was known to tell a lil jokey joke or two, but this wasn’t one of those times. It was still wild to experience groupie shit, and this felt like that.

But there was something else wrong here though. Something was off. Like a Jacuzzi with no bubbles. The water is heated, so your mind registers that you aren’t in a pool, but without the jets it’s just a public bath.

Shorty was gorgeous, without a doubt. She was one of those aggressive femmes that I lowkey loved, pushing up on me and telling me how much she was feelin’ me. The icing on the cake was that she was clearly down to fuck immediately.

It had been a few busy weeks since I’d been back, with me in the studio twelve to fourteen hours most days, and before that I’d been chillin’ after me and a girl I met at H-E-B stopped kicking it. I wasn’t exactly hard up for sex, but if she was down, then I was with it.

Except...

There was something in the rhythm of her laughter that made me cringe. It was in the wrong key or something. It was nails on a chalkboard, the way it grated at me. We were in a loud-ass club with hundreds of people around us and we’d just met, so I had no idea about her personality outside of her not being afraid to go for what she wanted, but her good looks could only take us so far. I took a step back, putting some space between us, preparing to make my way back up to VIP. She immediately clocked my movement and slid forward, getting right up on me, brushing her titties against mine as she fingered the crown medallion on my chain.

That was all it took for me to reconsider. I mean...if things were going right, there wouldn’t be too much to laugh about, and hopefully her moan was more D-flat than E-sharp.

She put her lips directly at my ear. “So, whose place are we going back to? Yours or mine?”

Her breath tickled my neck, but instead of it being a sexy caress, it itched. It was perplexing. Tilting my head to the side, I placed my hands at her waist and leaned back.

“Tonight’s a no go, but gimme your number and we can link another day.” I’d never had such a negative response to someone’s laugh like this, so I needed to process this phenomenon. I might not be interested in fucking her anymore, but I was definitely interested in testing this out.

Although I hadn’t given her the answer she’d wanted, asking for her number brought a smile to her face.

“It’s Jackie,” she offered.

As she rattled off her digits, I typed them into my phone and jotted a quick note in the contact.

Wild ass laugh.

Satisfied that I wasn’t planning to curve her, shorty dropped a sticky kiss on my cheek and strutted off. I stared after her, full of wonderment about our entire interaction, feeling like I’d just unlocked a new level in my brain. I couldn’t wait to tell my daddy about this.

On my way back to VIP, I was stopped no less than four times by someone who either wanted to tell me how much they loved what I was doing for the city or wanted to get in the studio with me. As I told the latter to hit my DMs, I heard Xeno’s voice in my ear call me extra friendly. I’d accept that. There was no way to predict which package talent was going to arrive in, and I’d dealt with being underestimated enough in the music world to know not to do the same.

Trisha met me at the top of the stairs, pushing a shot into my hand.

“Everyone already took one. You gotta catch up.”

I eyed the brown liquid in the glass and raised an eyebrow at Xeno’s girl.

She grinned. “It’s just Coke.”

Relieved, I brought the glass to my nose and sniffed out of habit. The tell-tale notes of the cola hit me, and I quickly tossed it back. My hesitance wasn’t because I didn’t trust Trisha, but I knew all too well how easy it was to accidentally drink in environments like this one. With the low lights, it was nothing for glasses to get mixed up, or vodka to be mistaken for water or bourbon for apple juice. I handed Trisha the empty glass, and she shot me a wink before tilting her chin over her shoulder.

“Jucee was looking for you.”

Laughing at the smirk she wore during her announcement, I nodded. Jucee and I were never too far away from one another when we went out. Not even just on a buddy system type of thing, but we were always on the same vibe, so it happened that way. My mind flashed back to the dance we’d shared before she left to the bathroom. It was out of the ordinary like a muthafucka, but even then, when I rocked, she rolled. I couldn’t even explain why I’d been on her like that because that definitely hadn’t been my intention, but it felt right in the moment.

My eyes swept the section until I found her. She was off near the railing that looked over the dance floor, dancing with Mercedes and some women from a nearby section. Although each of them looked good, Jucee stood out. She was a sunflower in a field of daisies. I frowned, because why did it suddenly feel like I was seeing her for the first time? I’d had a good look at her outfit when she’d came to my house and I’ve objectively acknowledged that she looked good, but for some reason, staring at her now, watching her wind her hips under moving strobe lights, I was struck by how sexy she was.

The sheer tube dress did a masterful job of displaying all of the skin Jucee wanted to be visible, and I was entranced.

“Whatchu lookin’ at, bro?”

Xeno’s sly question was accompanied by an elbow poking me not once but twice in the ribs. Smirking, I rolled my eyes and shook my head.

“You know damn well I’m looking at the group of baddies over there.”

Dipping her head, Xeno acknowledged my words.

“You’re right, I should’ve asked who you lookin’ at? ’Cause I know damn well you ain’t staring that hard at the whole group.”

My eyebrows met as I slid my gaze over to my friend. There was something in her voice that caught my attention. A hidden message, as if she were speaking in code.

“The hell you tryna say, bro?”

Xeno laughed. “Nah, don’t play dumb. You know exactly what I’m asking you.”

I looked at her, wondering what the hell she was going on about and why she thought I knew it.

“Aight, man, you’ll tell me later, I guess.”

Leaving Xeno’s side, I approached the group of dancing women. Phones were out recording Jucee as she bent at the waist and twerked to the beat of the song while Mercedes slapped her ass a few times. She straightened and moved out of the center of the circle as another woman replaced her and started dancing. I rounded the group of women until I came to where she and Mercedes stood laughing and rocking side to side. Sliding up behind her, I dropped my chin onto her shoulder.

“You were looking for me?”

Her eyes slid over to me for a brief moment before sliding right back to Mercedes as she gave a half-shrug with one shoulder.

“I guess. That was before I saw you all booed up though. I’m good now.”

Confused, I frowned, my brows furrowing. What the hell was she talking about? “Booed up?”

“Mmhm,” she murmured. “With Lil Miss Afro Puffs.”

It clicked then who she was referring to.

“You talking about Jackie?!”

I watched her roll her neck as she sucked her teeth.

“Oh, is that the raggedy heifer’s name?”

I tossed my head back as I laughed. “You know damn well that girl wasn’t raggedy.”

I was cracking up. Not only because I’d been anything but booed up with Jackie and her discordant-ass laugh, but also because Jucee’s lil attitude had me tickled. She was so damn jealous. If I spent too much time with any woman that wasn’t her, she turned into a brat, and while that was a trait that would have me chunking up the deuce in a relationship, on her, I lowkey found it adorable. Because of her history, Jucee kept her friends close to the chest and was a bit overly protective of them. There were only like three people she even used the word friend with, and I counted myself lucky to be one of those people.

I might’ve been the love ’em and leave ’em type before I met Jucee, but now that a couple of the songs I’d produced had won awards, I was in the studio so much that I barely had the time for the love ’em part of that equation. Yet, if I gave the little time I did have to “some random,” Jucee wouldn’t be the only one to make her displeasure known. My family would have something to say as well. Hell, even Xeno would be giving me the side-eye.

Wrapping my arms around her from the back, I nuzzled Jucee’s neck teasingly.

“Not you being jealous of a groupie.”

She lifted her shoulder to squeeze me out of her space, but I didn’t let her go. After a second she dropped her crossed arms and busted out laughing.

“Man, get off me!”

I froze for a second, not immediately releasing her as my mind raced with questions. I’d heard Jucee’s laugh a million and eighteen times and never thought twice about it, but suddenly I was faced with the sharp realization that her laugh—while loud and goofy—was actually quite melodious, especially in comparison to Jackie’s raucous laugh. It didn’t just sound perfect; it pleased me. I dropped my hands from around Jucee as if she were fire and I was oil.

That was...new.

I’d never compared her to a love interest before—potential or otherwise. I’d never wanted to. Hell, I prided myself on having friendships that were truly just friendships and not loading docks for future romantic relationships.

Was I trippin’?

Yeah, I was definitely trippin’. I mean, things were weird because Jackie’s laugh was jarring and had thrown me off of my natural rhythm, and Jucee was my safe space, so it made sense that my brain would use her to right my mental metronome.

That’s all it was.

I was certain.

Jucee turned around, already saying something slick. I couldn’t tell you what was coming out of her mouth. Couldn’t recall a thing. There was a lot happening in my brain, but where I was usually more than capable of handling it all, now, I fell flat. I felt a little unsteady. Like I would stumble if I took a step. The legs that had supported me my entire life suddenly felt foreign.

When Jucee fully spun around, she stopped speaking midsentence. Didn’t trail off, didn’t choke. Just came to an abrupt halt. Her smile never faltered, but there was a subtle change in her expression. Eyebrows dipped just a fraction. Eyes narrowed a hair. She saw something on my face—in my expression—that gave her pause. This woman could read me like a book, and it was both a blessing at times and a curse right now. She didn’t need to see this hiccup in real time. I needed to process and then tell her about it after I figured out what happened and fully bounced back.

Acrylics pressed into my skin, the familiar sensation comforting me, as Jucee wrapped a hand around my bicep, leaning into my ear.

“You good, Poppa?”

She pulled back as soon as the question left her lips, tilting her head to the side to watch my face as I answered.

Fuck.

It was a simple question asked in a low tone, but it felt like she’d sung the last lines of a love song to me. The adlibbed riffing at the end that wasn’t planned, but I hadn’t stopped recording and just let the artist do what she came to do.

I was so not okay.

Of course she wanted to see my face. One of her favorite phrases was “Lips can lie but eyes can’t.” This woman knew me so damn well that I couldn’t even fake the funk with her. Shaking my head one time, and one time only, I gave her what I hoped was a reassuring smile.

“Nah, but I will be.” Her already narrowed gaze shrank even further, and I hurried to calm her before she went into full mama bear mode. “It’s all good, trust me.”

I placed a hand on her hip and leaned forward to drop a kiss at the corner of her mouth. I called myself doing something normal to help cull her suspicion, but I’d fucked myself. The moment my lips touched her skin, a burning desire to shift my aim a little to the left shot through me.

It’s not enough.

That prickling thought startled me more than Jackie’s discordant laugh. Where the fuck had that come from? And why did the thought bring an almost impossible-to-ignore urge to grab Jucee’s chin and bring her lips to mine?

“Was it that groupie chick? Lil Miss Afro Puffs?”

Laughter bubbled out of my throat, and I mentally wiped my brow, grateful for the obvious annoyance in her tone, which was the perfect distraction from my wayward thoughts.

“So, it is jealousy?” I asked rhetorically.

Bringing a fist to my mouth as I continued laughing, I shook my head in mock disappointment. “Never thought I’d see the day.”

She rolled her eyes and walked over to where Mercedes was twerking on Xeno’s bodyguard, Lonnie, who stood laughing, his arms folded across his mile-wide chest. Neither of them was interested in each other, but Mercedes had been bothering that man from the day they met. The fact that Jucee didn’t refute my words proved them to be true, and I know I’d just teased her less than ten minutes earlier, but dammit, why did the idea of her truly being jealous make me a little giddy?