“Alright then. Move your hands.”
He challenged her by keeping his hands right on her hips. After a stare down with each other, she rolled her eyes and continued lining him up with his hands on her hips. She managed to finish despite him being a big-ass distraction. A confident smile graced his face as he eyed himself in the handheld mirror she pulled from her tool kit.
“You really cold as fuck with them clippers, shawty,” he praised her.
“Thank you. I learned from the best,” she said, referring to her father Deno. He taught her all his tips and tricks, and now, his clients were beginning to trust her to cut their hair.
It was second nature for her to clean up after every cut, so she dusted him off and ridded him of the cape and neck strip. “Where’s your broom and dustpan?”
“It’s cool. I got it,” he assured her while making his way to the supply closet to grab them.
As he swept up all the trimmed hairs, she focused on cleaning and sanitizing her clippers. Once everything was cleaned up, he was able to convince her to join him on the couch for a movie while he rolled a blunt for them to smoke.
“How was your day?” Remedy asked, causing his head to shoot up a little bit so he was looking at her. There wasn’t anything wrong with the question she asked. He just hadn’t been asked that since Cassie was alive.
A light smile canvassed his face wide enough for Remedy to see his gold grills that she found so sexy. Once he finished rolling the blunt, he repositioned her feet so they were resting on his lap.
“My day was good. I took baby boy to physical therapy and got the green light for him to go back to school.” His light smile widened at the thought of Aniyis.
“Awe, I’m so happy for him.”
“Yeah. Shit finally feel like it’s falling into place. How was your day?”
Remedy let out a long and dread-filled sigh as her mind instantly went back to the intense argument she and Melo had. Despite them resolving it and apologizing to each other, it still bothered her. From her sigh alone, Kross knew she needed to hit the blunt, so he sparked it and passed it to her. He watched her take two pulls from it and let the smoke stream out of her nostrils.
“Me and my little brother got into it really bad today. Slapped the shit out of him too. I felt so bad, I just had to apologize.”
Kross laughed as she passed him the blunt. “What’s up with you slapping niggas?” He raised a brow at her since he had been a victim of one of her slaps as well.
A heavy groan dispelled out of her as she shamed herself. “I don’t know. Soon as I hear something disrespectful, I just have my guard up, and it just goes from there.”
“Communication don’t have to be physical for it to be effective. I may raise my voice at you, but don’t ever think I wanna hit you. That was your past life. You don’t gotta worry about that nigga no more.”
Kross knew her irrational reaction to put her hands on people stemmed from her having hands put on her. Her fight or flight responses kicked in sooner or sometimes unwarranted and resulted in her getting physical. He let the first slap slide, but he wasn’t going to let it happen again, so she needed to figure it out or he was out.
With Kross, she felt safe. He stood on morals and principles, and that was so refreshing. She trusted him more than she should’ve so soon, but that was because she knew he was more of a man than Tone would ever be. While they passed the blunt back and forth, his thumbs kneaded into the soft soles of her feet. She felt as if she could melt away at any moment. Once theblunt was finished and they were both high as hell with low eyes, Kross gripped her waist and pulled her onto his lap with ease. She straddled him with her hands cupping his face, allowing his thick beard to brush against the palms of her hands.
“You were right about them videos,” his husky voice whispered lowly in her ear.
A giggle drifted out of her as he nestled his head in the crook of her neck and gave her light kisses. “I told you. Now you won’t be so resistant to making some more.”
“You a freak for real, shawty,” he lifted his head from her neck to chuckle.
Proudly, she nodded her head. “For a nigga who deserves it.”
Kross leaned in and pressed his lips against hers. Heat swirled the room as they slowly and passionately tongued each other down. Remedy could feel his dick brick up in his sweatpants, which filled her with anticipation. Smoothly, he parted his lips from hers and sat wet kisses along her jawline and down her neck. His hands went to the straps of her dress and slid them off her shoulders. Her eyes fluttered back open, and immediately, they were locked on the big canvas photo of Aniyis, Kross and Cassie.
“Wait. We can’t.” Remedy shook her head, prompting Kross to pull back. “I can’t fuck you in your girlfriend’s house.”
She got off his lap and slid the straps of her dress back onto her shoulders. Kross glanced around, realizing the photos of Cassie were just peering right at him and Remedy.
“Shit, I forgot about that,” he chuckled with a shake of his head. “I ain’t ready to let go yet,” he admitted shamelessly as he gazed at one of the photos of Cassie on the wall.
“I’m not asking you to,” Remedy clarified. “Losing someone is hard, especially someone you were building a life with. I don’t expect you to get over her just because I dropped some pussy on you.”
Kross leaned back in his seat on the couch as he shifted his gaze from Cassie’s picture to Remedy. “I appreciate you for understanding,” he expressed his gratitude for her while cupping her small hand in his.
As they gazed into each other’s eyes, they both felt a small part of themselves slowly coming back together and healing. They were both grieving and going through the rough roads of life, and they never passed judgment on each other. What they had couldn’t be put into words or defined as a relationship, but they knew whatever they were building toward was for the better. Kross was fucking with her heavy. He just had to sort out all his emotions and pain from losing Cassie before he went all in, and Remedy was understanding of that.
