We Take This Man

by Candice Dow, Daaimah S. Poole

Genres: General Fiction

Synopsis

Best-selling authors Candice Dow and Daaimah S. Poole team up for this dazzling tale of one man, two women, and a pair of marriages. When Dwight Wilson is offered a big promotion, the wrinkle is he must move from Florida to Maryland. Although Dwight accepts the job, his wife Tracey decides to remain in their new Florida home. Try as they might, their relationship ends in divorce, and Dwight eventually marries co-worker Alicia Dixon. And that’s when Tracey comes back into the picture—with some rather surprising news.

Release date: January 7, 2009

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing

Print pages: 320

Sample

PROLOGUE

Alicia

My vision blurred as my brain did somersaults. I scratched my wavy roots. How could this be? As I backtracked in my mind, I held my BlackBerry in my hand and scrolled through my calendar just to be sure. Ever since I was twenty years old, I marked the days I’d taken my birth-control pills. And just as I thought, I hadn’t missed a day in the entire two months Dwight and I had been seeing each other. This is impossible. My nerves percolated and my purple lace panties draped around my ankles when I stood up from the toilet. The Ocean Water scented–Yankee candle sitting on top of the bathroom sink flickered behind me, back and forth in the same motion that my knees rocked. I shook the hell out of that little indicator stick and still it told me the same thing. Here I was, thirty-two, in love with a married man, and pregnant with his child.

My head pounded as I staggered onto the side of my garden-style tub, pushing my wicker storage boxes to the side. How was I going to explain this to Dwight? Shit! Why do they make it such a hassle to tie your tubes when you’ve never had a baby? More than that, why didn’t he use a damn condom like most married men?

The two things I swore I didn’t want to experience were here in front of me, demanding my attention. Love and life were both inside of me and I didn’t know how to proceed. I vowed to myself a long time ago never to fall in love again or to have a baby. It seemed like having a man’s child granted a woman the freedom to be as stupid as she wanted to be for him. And I would never be anyone’s fool. I watched my mother cry for twenty years over my father, a married man who denied her and me.

As I sat there, grasping my hair, twirling my two-strand twists, tears would not come. I was angry at myself—angry at my heart. Me and love just don’t mix. That shit always lands my dumb ass in the wrong place at the wrong time, facing a life with a monkey on my back. Finally, when tears began streaming down my face, I thought about my last experience with love. Nearly ten years ago to the day, I stepped out of the shower to find federal police raiding my off-campus apartment at the University of Maryland. My then boyfriend, Deshaun Francis, was one of the biggest hustlers in the DC area and my fellow classmate. He was an upstanding student on a full scholarship, which is why I was able to turn a blind eye to his illegal dealings.

Love has a weird way of making you pay for its existence in your life. I attempted to argue with the police. “Let him go. He didn’t do anything,” I yelled at the top of my lungs, thinking they would somehow listen. And damn if they didn’t tell me to shut the hell up and put some clothes on. Not only were they locking my man up, I was going, too. My life flashed before my eyes. I was in my senior year, steps away from the real world and a well-paying job waiting for me. But instead of that, I was headed to jail in the name of love. No one ever told me that if you pillow-talk with a criminal, bitch, you’re a criminal, too. If I planned to stay out of jail, I had to enter a plea. It killed me to go free and leave Deshaun to suffer, but I knew that’s what he wanted me to do. For the rest of the semester, I had Erykah Badu’s “Otherside of the Game” on repeat and began letting my hair grow natural. I prayed that my holistic, sacrificial, spiritualistic ways would convince the universe’s cipher to evolve and mystically drop all the charges against Deshaun. Obviously, I was out of my natural damn mind and the love of my life got twenty years on kingpin charges. Once I snapped out of it, I swore I’d never fall into a situation that I wasn’t in control of again.

So please tell me why the hell I’m sitting here, banging the back of my head against beige ceramic tile, staring into the shower glass doors with a distorted, stupid me staring back. If I don’t abort this baby, I’ll have to carry this illegitimate, unexpected child for the next nine months. That’s some bullshit.

Suddenly, I had the answer to this dilemma. Just get up and run this baby out of me. I sprang up and rushed into my bedroom. My mind was delirious. Where were my gym clothes? My heart crashed against my chest. Sweat beaded on my forehead. I panted. Then I paused, trying to catch my breath and remember what I was doing. The black wall I’d painted in the name of being fashion-forward stared back at me. It defined my destiny, a damn black hole.

I flung each piece of my workout set from my dresser drawer and tossed it on my sleigh bed, the place where my adulterous acts occurred. Regis and Kelly giggled loudly in my ear. I glared at the television inside my mahogany armoire. What the hell was so funny?

Just as I stepped out of my underwear, my home phone rang. Then my cell phone rang. I knew it was Dwight. I just couldn’t talk. I really didn’t know what to say. I turned up the black iHome speaker beside the phone on my nightstand to drown out the constant ringing. During the past few months, I’d be playing Alanis Morissette’s “Ironic,” just because of the one line: Isn’t it ironic that you meet the man of your dreams and then meet his beautiful wife? How fucking ironic is it that I’m pregnant? Initially, that song blasted out and I rushed back to my iPod to change it. I scrolled forward to “You Oughta Know.” The rapid rhythm rushed through me, fueling my confusion. After I put on my workout clothes, I was armed to fend off all of my wrongdoings.

I pulled my iPod from the speaker base and plugged my earphones into it. I jogged out of my bedroom, through the living/dining room, to my front door, and down the stairs of the condominium building. Hoping the shock from pounding on concrete would make this all disappear, I stomped harder with each step. I wanted this to go away. I had to sweat this thing out. The brisk air crashed into my face. Yesterday, it felt like springtime, but Maryland temperature fluctuates like a seesaw and the sun outside my window deceived me. I considered turning around to get a hat, but I kept going.

Moments later the cold temperature felt more like a sauna as buckets of water poured from my body. Nearly ten miles in, a sour taste hijacked my mouth and I began to feel nauseated. My jog turned into a slow trot and suddenly my legs were too weak to move. I stood on the side of Route 198 and Route 1, right in the middle of the roundabout, and my insides splashed out. I prayed that somehow, the baby had been discarded, too. Once I lifted my head, I felt dizzy. As I checked my jacket pocket for a mint, my body swayed. Heavy morning traffic full of suburbanites rushed toward Route 95 heading to all the technology companies on the outskirts of DC. The rapid speed jerked my already-disoriented body. Staggering left and right, I tried to stand. A strong wind whipped past and threw me into the street. It was my punishment for trying to rid my body of its infirmity. I was sick. I was stupid. And I was on the ground, facing oncoming traffic. Raising my hands in the air, I tried to block the car about to run me over. I prayed . . . I prayed hard. Brakes screeched in my ear as I lay defenseless.

CHAPTER 1

Tracey

Four Months Earlier

A gentle morning breeze blew my white translucent curtains open, allowing the Florida sun to beam brightly in. I felt my husband’s hands caress my creamy butter skin. I removed his hand from my shoulder and lightly kissed it.

“Good morning, baby girl,” he said as he nibbled on my neck.

“Morning, baby,” I said, turning over to snuggle my waist into his pelvis and wrap myself in the warmth of his arms. I closed my eyes and attempted to go back to sleep, when I felt Dwight getting out of bed.

“And where do you think you are going?” I asked, trying to prevent him from moving.

“I have to get to the office.”

“No, don’t go to the office. Just stay in the bed with me,” I whined, sitting up and allowing him out of my clutches.

“As good as that sounds, I can’t, Trace. I have to get to the office. I have a lot of work to do.”

“But it’s Sunday, baby.”

“My job doesn’t care about the day of the week. You know that.”

“Damn, every time I want to just spend some time alone, you always have to work. Sometimes I think you are married to your work.”

“No, I’m not married to my work. If I could I would stay home with you. But I can’t.”

“Can’t it wait a little while longer? I wanted to have breakfast with you and then just lay in the bed until the girls come home,” I said, trying to convince him that our bed was the only place he needed to be.

“Tracey, I really have to get to the office.”

Instead of arguing with Dwight, I lay back down, turned over, and wrapped the sheets over my naked body, adjusted my pillow and continued to rest. There was no way I was leaving the comfort of my California king bed. My mother-in-law would be bringing the girls home this afternoon and I was going to relax with or without my husband. I heard Dwight turn the shower on. I thought about joining him. But sleep was calling me.

Fifteen minutes later I opened my eyes long enough to see Dwight walk out of the bathroom. He had a green towel wrapped around his waist and moisture all over his brown, stocky body. Dwight pulled his Ralph Lauren teal polo shirt over his head and zipped up his tan khakis. Then he sprayed on his Chrome cologne and splashed a little aftershave on his jawline.

“I’m outta here,” he said as he grabbed his cell phone and keys off the dresser and leaned over to me and kissed my forehead. “I love you. Don’t be mad at me.”

“I love you, too. I’ll try not to,” I said groggily.

“Don’t sleep your day away.”

“I won’t.”

Hours later I awoke and still wasn’t ready to leave the comfort of my bed. I looked around my spacious master bedroom and then reached for my robe. I walked into my bathroom and began running my bathwater.

I stood in front of the mirror wiping a piece of a sleep out of my eye and began cleansing my golden yellow skin. I pulled my chocolate brown hair back into a ponytail and noticed a purplish mark on my neck. Dwight still nibbled on and kissed my neck like we were kids. We had been together since I was thirteen and he was fourteen. Almost twenty years together—that sounded strange coming from a thirty-two-year-old woman. But it is true I had known my baby for almost my whole life. He played basketball with my brother and came over to our house all the time. My grandmother raised us because my parents died when I was younger. Then Nana passed away about twelve years ago. I guess that’s why I am so close to my husband’s family. My only real family is my older brother, Wade. He has two years on me but acts like the younger sibling. He is so immature and ain’t never been nothing but cute his whole life. He passed through school and a little bit of college just because he had hazel eyes and curly hair.

Dwight and I wanted to get married when I turned eighteen, but our family and friends talked us out of it. They convinced us to wait until we finished college. I thought they were hating, but I thank them for it now. I got to pledge Sigma Gamma Rho and experience college life. I went to Bethune-Cookman and Dwight went to Georgia Tech. He stayed for about a half a semester and transferred to Bethune-Cookman with me. He couldn’t stand being away from me or his mama. Since then we have been inseparable. We married and settled here in Jacksonville, with our two daughters, Jordan, who’s six, and Destiny, who’s four.

Dwight is hands-on with our daughters. He irons their clothes, feeds them breakfast, and drops them off at school, all before I wake up sometimes. Then he heads to the office; he’s a systems engineer at Horizon South. My husband is such a good man and I have his mother to thank. Dwight’s father walked away when he was younger. And I guess his mother just wanted to raise a good man, and she did. Dwight treats me, his mama, and his sister like queens. Dwight said I’m materialistic and I shop too much, but that doesn’t stop him from spoiling me. I do hide shoeboxes and new bags from him after I go shopping. I blame my need for everything on being raised by my grandmother. My grandmother loved me, but kept me unfashionable like grandmothers do. The minute I could get a job I did, so I could buy my own clothes. And now I’m just addicted. I shop so much I have filled up my walk-in closet and halfway took over Dwight’s. I walked out of the bedroom and into my large open hallway and took in the beauty of my new home.

We just moved in two months ago and it is still taking some getting used to. Sometimes I get up in the middle of the night and can’t believe I really live here in this fabulous 3,000-square-foot house. Ever since I was a little girl I dreamed of a house like this. My house has four bedrooms, four and a half bathrooms, an in-law suite, and a den downstairs. I have a fifty-five-inch plasma TV mounted on the wall in the family room. My contemporary kitchen has upgraded honey-maple cabinets, absolute black granite countertops, and an island in the middle. My oldest daughter Jordan’s room is decorated with pink butterflies and white clouds on the walls. Destiny’s is fuchsia pink with Dora the Explorer accessories. We’d put a contract on our house almost two years ago. The model home for our development wasn’t even finished yet. I knew it was my dream home based on the floor plan. So there wouldn’t be any problems, we immediately put our townhouse on the market and the first person who saw it, bought it. We had to put our things in storage and move into a cramped apartment. We had only two bedrooms for the four of us and we had to share a bathroom. We were only supposed to live like that for six months before our house was completed. But the construction schedule went nine months over schedule. Our original developer was shut down because he was using illegal immigrants. We were supposed to be moved in by October but the work didn’t finish until July.

But now all that was behind us. What matters now is that my daughters get to grow up in a beautiful home that I wished I grew up in. When we moved into our new home, all the rooms were empty, like a blank canvas, and since then I feel like I have created a masterpiece. I turned every room into a page out of a home decor magazine. I drove myself crazy at first with decorating. I wanted to buy everything to match—the borders, the towels, the sheets. But now each room is exactly the way I wanted it to be. And now that they are perfect, I want them to stay that way. I don’t want anything out of place. Not even a pillow. I’ve asked Dwight if can I hire a housekeeper; he told me no. But I’m going to keep asking him, even though he said only rich people have housekeepers. My response to him was that smart people have housekeepers. He doesn’t get it, but he’ll give in eventually. He eventually gives in to my every want and need.

As soon as four o’clock came, Mama Dee was stomping across my lawn. She was wearing a pearl-pink pantsuit and beige sandals. She had my little girls in tow and she didn’t look happy. My vacation was officially over. Mama Dee’s brown flipped wig bounced up and down with her every step. I still wasn’t dressed, so I threw a wrap dress over my voluptuous frame. I opened the door and she playfully yelled, “Here, take your little replica divas back.” She then handed me their pink Barbie overnight bags.

“Why you call them divas?” I said, laughing and giving my babies a hug. They both look just like their father, with beautiful brown skin and teddy-bear noses.

“Well, let me see. First they said, ‘Mama Dee, why you don’t have a flat television? How come you don’t have any bottled water?’ Then that little one right there told me my polish was chipped on my nails and I needed a manicure.” She laughed and then asked, “Where is my son?”

“At work.”

“On a Sunday? Does he spend any time at home?”

“That’s what I told him, but he said it is some important project going on, so I just deal with it.”

“Well, I have to get back home. Tell him, although I love flowers, I would love to get a visit from my son.”

“I will, Mama Dee. Be safe.”

“I will. I got to hurry up and have things ready before Danny and Reggie get back from their honeymoon.”

“I can’t believe she married that man,” I said, shaking my head.

“Me neither. What you going to do?” she said, sighing. “We all told her not to. She didn’t listen, so whatever happens happens,” she said as she walked back to her car. I closed the door and caught up on my daughters’ weekend.

CHAPTER 2

Alicia

When I pulled up to the regular Thursday night happy hour with my girls, I couldn’t wait to relax after a stressful week and talk trash with my friends. It is such a blessing to have friends like mine. We are just real with one another, and we’ve been that way since we all met at college. We all grew up within twenty miles of each other, from Prince Georges County to Montgomery County to Anne Arundel, but didn’t meet until we were freshmen at University of Maryland.

We always tried to pick a new point to hit every week. Usually somewhere around the 495 Beltway, but for some reason someone picked DC this evening. It was always a hassle finding parking, especially near the Verizon Center. I drove my silver convertible Saab from G to H streets, back and forth, until I finally settled on valet parking. The parking attendants at IndeBlue were in the street, waiting to get my money. They probably noticed my car circle the block and figured I’d be back. Before I got out, I checked my BlackBerry and thankfully I hadn’t received any messages from work. Then I said a short prayer that there would be no crisis requiring my attention this evening. I planned to have a night away from the computer to relax and analyze life. I slung my black Coach satchel over my shoulder and handed the guy a five-dollar tip.

The moment I stepped into the lounge, I felt less tense. The dimly lit bar with walls the color of the sunset and cosmopolitan decor reenergized my spirit. Smooth R&B blasted through the speakers, and just as I was about to text Andrea to see if she was here, I saw Tammy’s red mohawk peeking out over the crowd. She and Andrea were propped on the sleek brushed-nickel stools at the opposite end of the room. It appeared they’d reserved a seat on each side of them for Gina and me. I adjusted my black-and-white printed wrap shirt, straightened my posture, and sashayed past all of the men in business suits surrounding the bar. Andrea and Tammy were so engrossed in a conversation that they hadn’t noticed me. I crept up to them. “Hey, y’all!”

“Hey, girl . . .” came out in harmony.

I gave hugs and asked, “Where’s Gina?”

Tammy said, “She just texted me and said she’s looking for a parking space.”

We giggled because Gina was the cheapest of the crew and I guess we were all thinking the same thing: Why couldn’t she just valet? That’s our girl, though. I slowly slid on the stool, adjusting my low-rise trouser-cut jeans; although I got a tattoo of a bird and the words FLY FREE on the small of my back, I’m still very conscious of my ass spilling out of my jeans when I sit down. I looped my forearm in the gold chain handles of my purse and plopped it on my lap.

Andrea leaned in on the bar and faced me. “So, what the hell is going on with your job?”

Tammy grabbed my wrist. “Wait until Gina gets in here so you won’t have to tell the story twice.”

While we were waiting on Gina, a male shadow hovered over me. He motioned for the bartender’s attention.

“A French martini for the lady and . . .”

His voice sounded familiar, so I turned to see who it was. The caramel-colored man resembling Jay-Z smiled back at me. We’d kicked it a bit a long time ago, but he seemed a lot slimmer than I remembered. Maybe he took my advice and started hitting the gym. His cheap blue dress shirt was tucked nicely into his black pants. He smiled and his brand-new veneers nearly blinded me. His gap was gone.

“How are you, Ms. Alicia?”

When the bartender set the drink down, he slid it in front of me. I blushed. “How did you remember I drank French martinis?”

He laughed. “Because I remember every time we went out you’d have to explain . . .” Imitating me, he continued: “Chambord, pineapple juice, and vodka.”

I laughed a little longer than I needed to, because I couldn’t remember his name. He said, “You were quite a number. . .