Hitts & Mrs. Read online

  Candace reached for the microphone, lightly brushing Lawrence’s hand while serving him her killer half smile, half smirk. Lawrence, wearing the dumbfounded look of cornered prey, grinned broadly as he released the microphone, while Melanie’s mother frowned. This was vintage Candace. She could strip the cool off any man in the room while simultaneously working the last nerve of every female. To look at her you’d never guess that she had such an ambitious and cunning legal mind. She was a top litigator at the small but prestigious law firm of Margent, Katz, Crawford and Thames, and had been Melanie’s best friend and closest confidante for nearly ten years.

  “Laughter and lots of it is something that makes my girl here happy. I’ve known Melo, as I like to call her, since our junior year at Hampton University, and she has always had a zest for life that keeps her curious and open to new challenges. I don’t think she could have picked a better partner than Will. All the best to you both. Keep the laughter flowing. And most of all, stay Melo.”

  Candace finished as another glass clinked, signaling the couple to kiss. She looked out at the two of them, genuinely happy for her best friend, but unable to stop the twinge of envy that was tickling her ego. Once again, Melo had it all, and here she was, alone and unescorted at yet another important affair.

  Will gathered Candace in a grateful hug before stepping to the mike and gesturing Mel to join him. She looked out into the crowd of friends and family and silently began to question herself.

  What is wrong with me? Will was the kind of man most women dreamed of and few were lucky enough to find. He was intelligent, compassionate, and responsible. Most importantly, he loved her with a quiet gentleness that made her feel treasured and secure. Why wasn’t that enough?

  Because, all romantic poems and flowers aside, the truth is, we barely know each other, Mel admitted to herself. She felt her heart begin to crumble as she stood viewing what could only be described as a human collage of gentle dignity. Romare Bearden could not have pieced together a more handsome work of art detailing the simple perfection of imperfection. From a slightly gap-toothed but sincere grin that penetrated his friendly brown eyes to his smooth bald head, everything about this man whispered quiet strength and genuine warmth. His robust body, dipped in creamy dark chocolate and wrapped in a navy blue Armani suit, crisp white shirt, and silk tie, stood erect with pride and integrity as he addressed the crowd.

  “Thank you all so much for being here,” Will said. “I wish my parents had lived to see this blessed day. It’s times like these when being an only child is tough, but I’ve come to love Melanie’s family as my own….” Consumed with emotion, he paused as tears of both sadness and joy rolled down his cheeks.

  “It is true that Melanie and I haven’t known each other long, but it doesn’t take years to realize when you’ve found the missing piece of your soul. Our minds and bodies have a lifetime to get to know each other, but our hearts have already been friends and lovers for years,” Will said, turning to face Melanie, taking her hands into his.

  “Baby, I look at you and know why I was put on this earth. You have me locked in a place where I am grateful to be,” he said, reaching in his pocket and pulling out a key tied to a white satin ribbon. “This is the key that unlocks the place where my heart is home—our new house in Mitchellville, Maryland.”

  Will’s extravagant surprise stunned Melanie into paralysis. Overcome by emotion, she could only stare blankly at him as the tears ran down her cheeks. Every sweet word Will spoke, every loving look he sent her way simply made the situation more intolerable. She had to do this here and she had to do it now.

  His announcement clinched her decision. She was certain that Will deeply loved her, but how well did he really know her? If he truly understood her, he wouldn’t have bought a house without her knowledge, even if it was located in the upscale, predominately black suburb. He’d know that she had not labored to earn her master’s degree from the New York School of Interior Design or paid her dues apprenticing in upscale furniture stores to make a career of choosing tile and curtains for suburban housewives.

  Melanie knew that if she really was to become a world-class interior decorator, Washington, D.C., was not the place to work. She needed to return to New York, the internationally recognized breeding ground for trendsetting ideas. She’d loved being back in Manhattan this spring and had high hopes that the recent collaboration with her architect friends to design and decorate an entertainment lounge for the prestigious Kips Bay Decorator Show House would pay off.

  Melanie had no intention of staying in D.C. She’d only come back following her father’s heart attack last year. Even though she’d met and fallen in love with Will during her prolonged visit, the move was always meant to be temporary. If Will didn’t realize this about her, what else didn’t he know? And what important things about him did she not understand?

  Melanie found herself reaching not for the ribbon dangling in Will’s hand, but for the microphone. She cleared the tears from her throat and turned to face the crowd. Feeling nauseous and dizzy, Mel prayed not to faint or do anything to embarrass herself.

  “Will Freedman is a truly wonderful human being,” she began. “And any woman would be lucky to have him,” she said, her eyes pleading with him to believe her.

  Will merely smiled, seeming confused by Melanie’s anxious demeanor. Mel forced herself to look directly into his eyes as she delivered her crushing news.

  “I do love you, but I…I…can’t marry you.”

  Will stood there, clearly consumed by confusion and dread. The collective gasp and shocked reaction to Melanie’s announcement slowly rumbled around the room before settling into a muffled silence much like the eerie aftermath of an avalanche. Everyone, including Candace, the woman Mel confided everything to, was shocked by this totally unexpected turn of events.

  “My decision not to get married has nothing to do with Will. It’s me. I’m just not ready for this. I thought I was, but…” Melanie’s voice trailed off as she tried unsuccessfully to keep her tears under control. She kept her focus on the crowd, unable to stomach the anguish in Will’s eyes.

  “I only want what’s best for Will. He is entitled to someone who can love him like he deserves to be loved.”

  Melanie sobbed while quickly removing her engagement ring. She took Will’s hand, placed the diamond in his palm, and gently closed his fingers around the ring. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered. She took one last look and then swiftly vacated the room, with Candace, Francesca, and her mother following closely behind.

  Don’t look back, Melanie commanded herself. There was no thrill to be found in watching this particular bridge burn.

  Chapter 1

  Mel lit the candle, settled back onto the couch, and assumed the position. Slowly she dipped her chin to her chest, inhaled deeply, and then exhaled as her head rolled back. She repeated this action five times to regulate her breathing before settling into her daily meditation. Repeating her mantra, “I am,” Mel waited expectantly to be overtaken by the deliciously serene feeling of melting within herself.

  Just as she began to feel herself slipping deeper into the comforting and familiar void, the shrill ring of the telephone shocked her back into the room. Melanie tried to ignore the interruption, concentrating on her breath and chanting her mantra with added determination.

  The phone continued to ring and, surrendering in frustration, Melanie bounded from her seat and pounced on the offensive distraction. By the time she reached the handset, the caller had disconnected. She glanced down at the caller ID. It was a name and number she recognized. It was the same name and number she’d been trying to avoid for weeks.

  The six weeks she’d been back in New York, living with Candace on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, Melanie had successfully, though painfully, evaded any prolonged communication with Will. When she’d first left D.C., just a week following the disastrous engagement party, he had called or e-mailed at least twice a week, begging for some kind of rational
e for her unexplained decision and hasty departure. Mel had put off his requests for clarification with a lame plea for time and space. She wasn’t ignoring his outreach to be cruel. Melanie simply didn’t know what to say to the man whose dreams she’d shattered.

  “I left some clothes on your bed for you to send to your Mississippi ‘kinfolk,’” Candace said, walking into the room dressed in her Saturday workout clothes and carrying a spoon and a pint of coffee Häagen-Dazs ice cream.

  “Thanks. I’m sending their box down this week,” Mel said, speaking of the rural family she’d “adopted” through the Box Project, an organization established in 1962 to help fight poverty in America.

  “Who was on the phone?”

  “Take a wild guess.”

  “Eventually you’re going to have to talk to the boy. You can’t go on dodging Will like he’s some annoying bill collector.”

  “I don’t know what to say to him, Candy. He wants answers and I don’t have any to give him. I really can’t talk about this now. I was just getting ready to meditate.”

  “Not this time, Melo. You’ve been holed up in my apartment for weeks refusing to talk to me or your parents and hiding from the one person you really owe an explanation to. I don’t get you, Melanie Hitts. You’ve snagged a successful, handsome man and you’re willing to throw it all away because he had the audacity to buy you a house? What the hell kind of sense does that make?” Candace asked in a tone underscored with irritation.

  “The issue is not buying the house, it’s the fact that he didn’t tell me.”

  “Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t a surprise supposed to be kept secret?”

  “This isn’t as simple as being disappointed with some gift. Look at the reality of the situation, Candace. Will and I met in February, got engaged after three months, and were supposed to get married two weeks ago just five months after our first hello. Everything happened so fast—too fast. Will insisted on a July wedding, my mother was intent on throwing that stupid engagement party, which was more about her than me, and I was coming back and forth to New York working my butt off on the show house and worrying about my dad the entire time. I didn’t have time to really think about all of the ramifications of my decision. It was like I was caught up in the eye of this monster hurricane and the next thing I know I’m standing up in front of a hundred people engaged to a man I barely know,” Melanie tried to explain.

  “So why call off the engagement—in public, no less? Why not just postpone the wedding?” Candace continued to probe.

  “Because it just felt like the right thing to do. Do you know what I was thinking about the entire time I was standing up there? Divorce. In five generations of the Hitts family, there has never been a failed marriage, and all I kept thinking was that mine would be the first.”

  “I’m your best friend and you never once mentioned to me that you were having second thoughts,” Candace pointed out.

  “I thought they were just normal jitters. I knew that I loved Will. I thought things would be okay.”

  “You love him and it’s been damn obvious that he worships your dirty draws. That’s not enough?”

  “It’s not that simple,” Melanie repeated slowly, her frustration apparent. How could she make her parents and friends understand how she felt? It wasn’t that she didn’t want to be married to Will. Until William Freedman, Melanie had met no other man with whom she’d even considered sharing her life. It was simply that she didn’t know how to be married to him, or to anyone, for that matter. While her kinfolk held up traditional beliefs and customs as the glue that kept family together, to Melanie they represented just the opposite. In Mel’s mind, the conventions of married life symbolized the strangulation of her independence and individuality—two vitally important characteristics in the makeup and survival of any creative person’s soul.

  “If you ask me, you’re being a real chickens hit about this whole marriage thing.”

  “But I didn’t ask you, Candace. You know, dating married men doesn’t make you an authority on marriage,” Mel snapped angrily.

  “I may not know a lot about being married, but I can tell you this: Black men like Will Freedman come few and far between. You have no idea how lucky you are. Do you know how many women dream about that whole love at first sight thing? Women who would love being in your situation,” Candace stated, dramatically waving her spoon in the air for emphasis.

  “Candy, my situation isn’t one to be envied at this point,” Melanie said, her voice tainted with distress. “But you’re right, I really screwed up. I should have never gone through with the party if I had doubts and maybe I shouldn’t have broken up with Will in public, but I did. And it’s over, and now I have to move on with my life.” Her thoughts were once again interrupted by the telephone. She felt herself bristle with apprehension. “If it’s Will or my parents, I’m not home,” she said.

  “Sorry, you’re on your own,” Candace said before heading toward the kitchen.

  “Hello,” Melanie said, checking the caller ID before picking up the handset.

  “Melanie Hitts? Paco Benjamin from the BenAlex Design Group.”

  “Yes. I know your work. I love your bar in the Tribeca Royal,” she commented, speaking of the city’s latest rage in trendy hotel watering holes. “Definitely an inspiring use of color.”

  “Thank you. I’m calling because I was really inspired by your work in the Kips Bay Show House. You’ve been all the buzz since the opening night gala, though you disappeared right after the party. Look, we’re looking to expand and bring on a new designer and I think you fit the bill nicely. Would you be interested in getting together next Tuesday afternoon at one to discuss it?”

  Melanie bit her lip while writing down the directions in an effort to keep her excitement from spilling into the receiver. “That would be great. Thank you. How did you find me?”

  “When the advance copy of September’s issue of Interior Design hit my drafting table, I took it as a sign that I had to talk with you, so I called the architects you worked with and they gave me this number. Having your entertainment room so prominently featured was quite a coup. Congratulations.”

  “Thanks,” Mel replied. She had absolutely no idea what he was talking about, but she intended to call her design partners to find out. “I’ll see you Tuesday.”

  She quickly got Jacques Augustan on the phone and pumped him for information about the magazine and Paco Benjamin. The news about both was encouraging. According to Jacques, the influential Interior Design had not only showcased her work, but called her “a young designer worth keeping an eye on.” Paco was one of two partners at the BenAlex Design Group, also a firm with a “must watch” alert. Jacques informed her that they were small—two partners, two designers, and a couple of young assistants—but growing fast. At the moment they were the best-kept secret in the hospitality market, but in his informed opinion, were about to catch fire. Her friend’s bottom-line advice was that for Mel, BenAlex was the way to go. The firm was small enough to groom her, but high-profile enough to get her noticed.

  Melanie hung up the phone feeling like she’d just done a swan dive from pity’s platform with an elastic tether tied to her waist. Just moments ago, while discussing her painfully aborted romance, she’d been free-falling toward the emotional ground with her heart in hand. Now, fifteen minutes later, she was bouncing skyward, riding a momentary adrenaline rush and clinging to her professional bungee cord.

  Melanie took a deep breath as she walked over to the couch and resumed her meditation position. She gazed into the candle’s flickering flame, feeling a desperate need to slip into the gap, center herself, and balance this agonizing sentimental seesaw.

  Chapter 2

  Melanie wasn’t sure if it was the bright August sun pouring through her bedroom window or NYC’s unrelenting triple-H weather—hazy, hot, and humid—already in full scald that woke her. It was minutes past six o’clock, still a half an hour away from her radio wake-up, courtesy
of the local smooth jazz station. She yawned and considered going back to sleep, but with the ceiling fan providing little relief from the sticky heat, a cool shower proved a far more powerful temptation. Damn Candace and her unwavering aversion to air-conditioning.

  Mel stood under the invigorating spray and let the brisk water wash away the sleepy cobwebs, allowing her to concentrate on the tasks that lay ahead. First up on her To Do list was to stop by the post office and mail the package to the Hawkinses, her Box Project relatives. She’d learned about the organization in college when her sorority, Alpha Kappa Alpha, adopted a family in Louisiana as a community service project. After graduating, she decided to take on her own family and each month Melanie sent Mamie Hawkins much-needed supplies to help feed and clothe her seven children in Greenville, Mississippi. It was a simple task that took very little effort but made Melanie feel good about making a difference in somebody else’s life.

  Following her detour, she would head straight to the office. Today, like all the rest of these past four weeks, would be grueling and nonstop—more eight-to-ten than nine-to-five—and Mel loved every minute.

  Now a full-fledged designer, Mel had been hired to work with BenAlex Design Group’s residential clients. Initially she was disappointed, feeling like she’d been once again relegated to homeowners’ hell, but with subsequent reflection Melanie decided that this was definitely a one step back, two steps forward opportunity. The reputation of the BenAlex Design Group was growing steadily among the coveted chain of wealthy clientele, particularly among New York’s young new millionaires with adventurous attitudes and disposable income. By working with the Wall Street princes and enterprising dot.com kings, the funky fashion divas and heroes of hip hop, Melanie realized that she would have greater opportunities to unleash her design savvy and creative risk-taking. These jobs would become her stepping-stones to resorts, museums, and the larger, more important projects she intended to become known for.