Blind Ambitions Read online

  She rocked gently, no longer measuring the words.

  “If it’s not what you want, though, please, please, please send me some sort of sign. Let me know these eight years haven’t been in vain. Let something happen that shows me, without a doubt, that this is what I am supposed to be doing. I ask these blessings in Jesus’ name. Amen.”

  Desi opened her eyes, feeling an immediate sense of relief from the act of prayer alone. She resolved to do it more often. For now, she’d leave the rest up to Him.

  She got up from the floor and began gathering up the rest of the food.

  DESTINATION MOON

  Yo … yo … yo … yo … yo!”

  The high-pitched, drawn-out words were accompanied by two ultraviolet beams of light that twinkled from bloodshot eyes peering around the cracked door.

  “Good God, girl! How long you been smokin’?”

  Sharon giggled as she opened the door completely and let the man in.

  “It’s not a quantity thang, Glen. It’s all about a state of being.”

  Glen smacked her on the butt as she closed the door behind him. She peeped him up and down as he walked into the foyer.

  He was an even six feet, with smooth, ultra-dark skin and close-cropped hair. His back was to her. Sharon could see the firm outline of his triceps through the finely woven fabric of his dark gray Gucci suit. Even in executive attire, he had the stature and bearing of an African prince.

  “ ‘It’s all about a state of being,’” he teased, mimicking her voice as he turned towards her. “Well, I hope your state of being includes being ready for me, and that it didn’t take no sinsi to get you there.”

  She slipped into his arms. He leaned down and kissed her.

  “Naw, baby,” she said, licking her lips, “it’s not even like that. The weed is for me. It’s like sipping on a fine wine. Purely an enhancement. Straight-up righteousness.”

  She kissed him again, long and hard.

  “Mmnmm,” he moaned. “I think I just got a contact high.”

  Sharon giggled, nestled her hand in his, and led him into the living room of her cozy Westwood town house. The room, an earthy blend of dark and light browns, was illuminated by the glow of candles and was softly tinged with the scent of myrrh.

  Not a hint of weed was in the air. The only giveaway was the exquisitely carved bong and the lighter sitting atop the wide, short-legged mahogany coffee table. There were two wineglasses and an open bottle of cabernet on the table beside the bong. The bottle was half empty. One of the wineglasses was half full.

  “Looks like that bong’s not the only thing you’re hitting,” Glen commented, examining the cabernet. “Is this the first bottle of the night?”

  “Yeah. I’ve only had two glasses.”

  Sharon had her arm around his waist.

  “And the one you’re working on now is your third, right?” His left brow was raised rhetorically.

  “Yeah. So? I got thirsty. My mouth was getting dry.”

  Glen set the bottle down and sank back into the overstuffed cream-colored couch.

  Above his head hung a magnificent tapestry of Robert Nesta Marley that Sharon had picked up in Jamaica. It was a mixture of fiery reds and radiant yellows that seemed to generate warmth and send it out into the room.

  Glen positioned himself so that he was comfortable, kicked off his expensive black leather shoes, and loosened his silk tie. Sharon, lounging in a short dashiki dress purchased in West Africa, sat on the floor beside him, slipping her bare feet under the coffee table and scooting close to the edge. She dug her toes into the tight loops of the neutral Berber carpeting and leaned her head back against Glen’s knees.

  Bob Marley’s Babylon By Bus CD was playing. “Exodus” was rocking from the speakers of her surround-sound system. The music was up just loud enough to set the mood.

  “We must be feeling mighty yardie tonight,” he commented.

  “Movement of Jah people,” she sang, bobbing her head.

  Glen, amused, casually placed his hand in her thick tangle of rust-colored locks.

  “It’s funny … I spent my whole life avoiding ghetto girls and street skanks, in search of a sensible, refined woman. And so I meet you, Miss Strong Black Mover and Shaker. You had a suit on and everything. Look at you now. You smoke more weed than Wu-Tang, and can cuss a hoodrat under the table. How’d I let you trick me like this?”

  “I’m good, baby,” Sharon crooned. “I thought you knew. I’m a shape-shifter.” She made a waving motion with her arms and her torso. “Don’t blink, or I’ll turn into a crack hoe on your ass.”

  Glen burst into laughter. He bent down and kissed the top of her head.

  “Mmmm,” he moaned, his fingers burrowing deep towards her scalp. “Your hair smells good. What’s that, almond oil?”

  Sharon nodded, enjoying the feel of his mouth and fingers as they played about her head.

  She had been growing her locks for the past six years. They were strong and regal, like tight pieces of Egyptian rope, and three or four of them had cowry shells attached to their ends. The locks fell a few inches below her shoulders and framed her brown face beautifully, giving her an exotic-yet-natural look. She was very proud of her locks, and consistently corrected people when they referred to them as “dreads.”

  “There’s nothing dreaded about my hair,” she always replied. “Does seeing my head make you scared?”

  While laughing was the instinctive thing to do at such a comment, seeing Sharon’s face as she delivered it squashed any thought of taking her or her nondreaded locks lightly.

  She slipped her hand beneath Glen’s pant leg and caressed his calf. He leaned back against the couch, lost in a reverie of peace.

  “How is it that you make me so happy?” he asked with a euphoric sigh. “You’re hike a tonic, baby. You take away all my ills. Don’t ever change that … please.”

  Sharon, caught off guard by his words, felt something warm bubble up in her heart.

  She gave his calf a gentle squeeze.

  “How was your day?” she asked, taking a sip of wine.

  “Long, hectic, unappreciated. What else is new?”

  “I appreciate you, baby,” Sharon cooed, once again bobbing her head to the music. She lifted his pant leg and kissed his calf.

  “You appreciate me now because you’re high,” Glen responded, “but if you were sitting across the table from me in a conference room, or were on the phone negotiating one of my clients’ contracts, believe me, it’d be a totally different story.”

  “Of course it would,” she replied, “but that’s not what we’re doing right now, is it? Right now, I’m about to take a gulp of wine and then suck your calf. Bet you’ll feel appreciated then.”

  Glen leaned his head back, laughing. Sharon took a quick swig, then started on his leg.

  “Stir It Up” billowed gently from the speakers.

  “Sometimes, I swear,” he said, “you’d never know that you were the older one.”

  Sharon halted, mid-suck, her hand still around his calf. She raised her head.

  “Glen, why does age always have to come up in our conversations? I thought it wasn’t an issue.”

  “It’s not. It only comes up in the sense that you just never seem to grow up. You’re way older than I am and …”

  “I’m not way older than you. It’s only twelve years. It’s not like I’m eighty and farting dust. Jesus, I’m only thirty-eight.”

  Sharon released his leg and took another swallow of wine.

  “And if I’m so damn old,” she snapped, “what the hell were you doing coming on to me in the first place?”

  “You look like a kid,” he replied, his laughter fading into a good-natured chuckle. He leaned his head back against the cushion behind him. “You look younger than me. And I told you, your age doesn’t bother me one bit. So what if you could technically be my mother, if you’d had me at twelve?” Glen was trying hard not to laugh. “It was your mind that drew me. And t
hat suit. And those sexy locks.”

  Sharon gripped her glass of wine, a little too tightly, and stared forward into space, scowling. The music couldn’t even change her mood.

  “You sure know how to kill a high,” she muttered.

  Glen lifted his head. His hand, still resting in her hair, gently massaged her scalp.

  “Baby, I was just playing.”

  “Well, don’t play with me,” she replied, brushing his hand away. “Just because your day was fucked up, it doesn’t mean you have to fuck up mine.”

  “My days are always fucked up. You’re just sensitive about your age.”

  “Funny, I never was until I met you.”

  She poured another glass of wine for herself.

  “Can I have some of that?” Glen asked.

  Sharon set the bottle on the table and lit the bong.

  “Pour it yourself, you bourgie bastard.”

  As she took a long pull from the bong, Glen leaned down, lifted her locks, and gently kissed the nape of her neck. Sharon closed her eyes, savoring the sensation of his kiss and the infusion of the pungent smoke as it passed through her mouth and exited her nose. Glen kissed the side of her neck, then nibbled her left earlobe. Sharon raised the bong back up to her lips, but Glen took it from her hands and put it back on the table.

  “You don’t need that,” he whispered. “I’ve got something that will make you fly.”

  He turned her face around to his and covered her mouth with his own.

  Sharon closed her eyes again and placed her arms around his neck. She kissed him hungrily, searching his mouth for all kinds of solutions. For some reason, she just couldn’t find any.

  She pulled away.

  “What’s wrong, baby?” Glen asked. “I told you I was just messing with you before.”

  “I don’t know,” she sighed. “I’ve got so much on my mind. Work, you, me, my life.”

  “Here we go …” he groaned, sitting up.

  Sharon glared at him, her eyes narrowed.

  “What do you mean, ‘here we go’? I have a right to be concerned. I’ve been in this town a long time. You were still in high school when I came here.”

  “Now who’s bringing up age?”

  “Yeah, I’m bringing up age, because it’s not fair! I’ve been in this town for ten years. I’ve worked with everybody. And I still have yet to be really put on. But you, straight out of law school, you come out here, and you’re repping major movie stars and have nothing but A-list clients. How fair is that?!”

  “Perhaps you should have become a lawyer,” he joked.

  “Glen, I don’t find a damn thing funny.”

  She glared at him, her face rigid.

  “Is it to the point where you’re jealous of other people’s success?” he asked, adjusting his tone.

  “No,” she said with a frown. “You know I’m not about that. I don’t resent other people because they’re getting breaks. More power to ’em. I’m just tired of not having any.”

  “That’s not necessarily true, Sharon,” Glen commented. “You’ve had lots of breaks, and you’re very well-respected. Look at how many high-powered Hollywood jobs you’ve held.”

  “But where did they get me? None of them have proved to really put me over.”

  She toyed with the bong, listening to Bob singing about the concrete jungle. She leaned her head down on the table.

  “Glen, do you know how many actors, directors, writers, crew people, and other producers I’ve helped launch the careers of? And they’ve all promised to return the favor in a big way. Has it happened yet? Huh? This town is so full of shit.”

  “So leave it,” he said, his tone matter-of-fact.

  Sharon lifted her head and sighed.

  “I can’t. Not until I make it. I’ve put in too much time to leave.”

  “Well, now. That makes sense.”

  Sharon looked up at him. As she suspected, Glen wore a smirk.

  “Go on, Glen. Laugh at my career. You probably laugh at me when you’re out there cavorting with all your hot little nubile clients.”

  Glen stroked the back of her neck.

  “You’re hot and nubile, baby. And you’re kinda agile, too. That move you put on me two nights ago? Man! I don’t know. You sure you’re not in Cirque du Soleil or something?”

  Sharon couldn’t resist smiling.

  “Cirque du SoBlack,” she quipped.

  They both laughed.

  “Show me my feet,” he commanded, his tone soft but firm.

  Sharon, suddenly coy, pulled her left foot from beneath the table. She turned slightly and raised it towards him. Her small foot, a size six, was delicate and shapely. Her toenails were painted a deep chestnut brown. There was a tiny silver ring with the word love engraved on it encircling her fourth toe.

  Glen kissed the arch of her foot.

  “Mmmm …” he moaned, “I love my feet. These are my feet. Don’t you forget it, either. I just let you borrow them during the day to walk on. But these bad boys? These are mine!”

  Sharon blushed and giggled, all at once.

  “Who’s the silly one now?”

  “You just better not let nothing happen to my feet,” he mumbled, his lips still pecking gently at her arch.

  She watched him, suddenly feeling weak, swooning on the inside. Their eyes met and stayed locked for an eternal five seconds. Glen leaned down again and pulled her face close to his.

  “Stop being so insecure about everything,” he said reassuringly. “Let’s deal with you and me one day at a time. As for your career, nobody can take from you what the universe already has laid out.”

  “So what does that mean?” she whispered.

  “It means you’re destined to succeed, baby. Nobody can take that away except the Big Man himself. You just have to be ready for your success when it happens. Not taking a quick drag off a bong and missing the moment when it comes your way.”

  Sharon opened her mouth to say something in protest, but Glen quickly covered it with his own, probing her mouth with deep determination.

  He pushed the coffee table back with his foot, then slid off the couch onto her, pressing her back into the firmness of the carpet.

  “You said you could make me fly,” she moaned, leaning into him as he covered her body with caresses and kisses.

  “I can,” he whispered. “Where do you want to go?”

  “Take me as far away as I can get,” she replied, her voice thick.

  “How about … New York?” he replied, tickling her neck with a flurry of licks.

  “Not far enough.”

  “What about Jamaica?”

  “Uh-uh. Bob’s already taking care of that for me.”

  He slid down her belly and lifted her dashiki. He flicked his tongue into her navel. She arched helplessly towards him.

  “Well, baby, how far do you want to fly?”

  Sharon pressed his head downward, deep between her legs. When he opened his mouth and she felt the magic, she leaned her head back, closed her eyes, and moaned.

  “That’s right, baby,” she cooed. “Keep flying, just like that. And don’t you … unnh … stop … unnnh … until you take … me … to … the … moon.”

  SMILES TO GO BEFORE I REAP

  Alright, Bettina … I’m outta here!”

  A few people here and there were passing through the sumptuous lobby of the Massey-Weldon building on Avenue of the Stars in Century City, on their way home or back to their offices for late-night work.

  Randall James, six three, dark brown, with a shiny, clean-shaven head and rich thick brows, looked fit and fine in a well-tailored dark blue suit as he stepped off the elevator. He strode past the elegant towering water fountain that spewed eternal. The owners of the company, the powerhouse husband-and-wife creative team of Wade Massey and Anna Weldon, made sure the fountain was never turned off. According to them, it was a symbol of how prolific their production house was. It was also a constant, not-so-subtle reminder to themse
lves and their employees that they remain that way.

  Randall’s heels resounded loudly as he made his way across the freshly polished caramel and cream Italian marble over to the reception desk.

  “What are you so excited about?” Bettina asked, adjusting her headset. “I haven’t seen you this fired up in, well—”

  “A long time,” Randall replied, cutting her off, sensing where she was going. “I’ve been excited since. You just haven’t had the pleasure.”

  “And what a pleasure it was, Mr. Arrogant.”

  The phone rang. She raised her finger for him to wait while she took the call. She smiled innocently.

  Bettina’s smiles. They always seemed so innocent. Everything about her seemed innocent. And, when it came to Bettina Hayes, seemed was truly the operative word. The appearance of innocence had gotten her out of numerous situations, from failing to deliver important messages, to reprimands for arriving late to work and returning late from lunch. All she had to do was flash that naïve smile and bat her long-lashed, slightly slanted eyes, and people relented.

  It was why Massey-Weldon, one of television’s most powerful production companies, had tolerated her for so long. It seemed an honor to be bestowed with Bettina’s smile. People worked for it, especially men. Once they got one, it didn’t matter what she’d done wrong. That innocent smile made everything alright again.

  Tall, delicate, and curvaceously lean, light brown with short, curly, jet-black hair, Bettina was fresh-faced and naturally pretty. She never wore makeup, but always radiated cover-girl beauty. She looked every bit of twenty-four.

  Bettina was every bit of thirty-six.

  Her strikingly natural beauty had afforded her the privilege of choosing from LA’s most elite men, including high-profile celebrities—actors, athletes, agents, and all kinds of powerbrokers in between. Many of them included high-profile married celebrities. But she didn’t care about that. She took her lovers as she could get them, hoping to gain opportunity and position along the way.

  Bettina’s sexual prowess was legendary, although none of her lovers ever really kissed and told. But there was a secret society of men who all knew that each had had her.