Lady Elect Read online

  Mother Gussie knew very little about Arykah, but the one thing she did know for sure was that Arykah was a stick of dynamite, or more like an M-80 waiting to detonate. She didn’t have the pleasure of being a fly on the wall in Arykah’s office yesterday, but Mother Gussie would bet a year’s salary that the scene behind closed doors was anything but serene.

  Mother Gussie walked across the hall and returned to her desk outside of Lance’s office and called her friend. “Pansie, I couldn’t get into Lady Arykah’s office. The lock has been changed already.”

  “That fast?” Mother Pansie asked. “We need access to her computer.”

  “Don’t worry about the lock being changed. If that fat broad thinks she’s got one up on us, she’s got another think coming.”

  “So what now, Gussie? We really need her computer for Plan B.”

  “Well, I can’t get into her office.” Mother Gussie sighed into the telephone. “So, we’ll move on to Plan C.”

  A half hour later, Mother Gussie sat at her desk waiting for Lance to appear. It was almost 9:00 A.M. He was due any minute. If Lance decided to go to his construction company and not come to the church, as he often did, he’d always call Mother Gussie before 8:00 A.M. to inform her of his plans. Lance hadn’t called that morning, so Mother Gussie anticipated his arrival. She was anxious to ask him about his and Arykah’s whereabouts yesterday.

  She wondered if Lance would tell the truth and say that Arykah had sat in red ink and needed to return home or if he would fabricate an excuse for missing morning service.

  Mother Gussie heard the front door of the church open and close. Then she heard footsteps climbing the stairs. Lance was right on time. Mother Gussie would prepare his coffee just the way he liked it before she grilled him about yesterday.

  Only moments stood between Mother Gussie finding out why the bishop and his wife were absent from morning service. Now the footsteps were just around the corner of her desk.

  “Good morning, Bish—” Mother Gussie’s words were cut off when she saw who stood before her.

  “Good morning, Mother,” Arykah said smiling. Her presence had startled Mother Gussie, and that’s exactly what Arykah wanted. She wanted to scare the h ... e ... double hockey sticks out of the old hag.

  There was no doubt in Arykah’s mind that Mother Gussie was the mastermind behind the red ink finding its way onto her $600 Diane Von Fürstenberg wrap dress that she had purchased when she and Monique visited New York City during fashion week last spring.

  Arykah knew that she was the last person Mother Gussie would ever expect to see at the church bright and early on a Monday morning. Mother Gussie’s eyes resembled a deer’s that had been caught in headlights, and in Arykah’s mind, it was proof that she was guilty.

  Arykah had to chuckle at the older woman’s uneasiness. “I bet you weren’t expecting to see me today, huh?”

  Arykah’s question could have been perceived two ways. An innocent person probably would have responded, “Yes, you’re the last person I had expected to see, but it’s a pleasure.”

  To Mother Gussie, however, Arykah’s question was an understatement, and she perceived it the way Arykah delivered it. Without actually saying the words, “I know you did it,” Arykah’s question told Mother Gussie that her secret wasn’t a secret. She had been found out.

  Seeing Arykah come around the corner had almost caused Mother Gussie to pee in her panties. Arykah had just told Mother Gussie, in no uncertain terms, that she knew what she had done.

  Mother Gussie presented a phony smile. “This is a surprise.”

  I bet it is. Arykah returned the bogus smile, but didn’t offer a response. She stood on the opposite side of Mother Gussie’s desk and glared at her.

  Mother Gussie didn’t know what to think of Arykah’s stance. What do you say to someone who glares at you with a fake smile when they know that you’ve wronged them?

  Arykah didn’t move a muscle. She became a statue with a fixed stare on her face.

  Mother Gussie felt a hot flash coming on. She knew Arykah was from the streets.

  Arykah’s position intimidated her, and it made her very uncomfortable. They were the only souls in the church. What would Mother Gussie do if Arykah became physical? Arykah’s stare burned through Mother Gussie and it was at that moment that she knew that she had crossed the wrong woman, but still she couldn’t admit to anything. “Is the Bishop with you this morning?”

  “No. It’s just you and me. No witnesses,” Arykah responded without moving from her spot. She kept the phony smile and continued to glare at Mother Gussie.

  Mother Gussie frowned. What did she say? “Excuse me?”

  Arykah laughed at her expression. “I said, ‘It’s just you and me.’”

  If there was ever a time when Mother Gussie wanted to run, it was then. She heard Arykah say there were no witnesses, and that meant that there was gonna be trouble. Mother Gussie knew that she had to remove herself from Arykah’s presence, and she had to do it quickly. She stood and grabbed her coat from the coatrack that stood behind her desk.

  “Um, I just remembered that I have an errand to run.”

  Arykah watched her put her coat on and reach for her purse that sat on the floor next to her desk. Without another word, Mother Gussie rushed past Arykah and practically ran down the stairs and left the church.

  Arykah laughed out loud. “You better recognize who you’re fooling with, old woman.”

  Mother Gussie wasn’t around to hear Arykah’s words, but by the swift exit she made to get away from Arykah, one would say that Mother Gussie definitely recognized.

  Arykah unlocked the door to her office and searched for her date planner, which was another reason she had stopped by the church that morning before heading to the realtor’s office. Putting fear in Mother’s Gussie’s heart was an added bonus.

  Arykah located her date planner in the center drawer of her desk. As she was leaving her office, her cellular phone rang. She retrieved it from her purse and saw Loving Lance on the caller identification.

  “Hello, husband,” Arykah sang.

  “What did you do to Mother Gussie?”

  I diced her up like bell pepper and onion. “What do you mean?” Arykah had a mischievous smirk on her face. She understood Lance’s question perfectly. How typical of Mother Gussie to call him. She probably told Lance that Arykah threatened to put her fist down her throat. Arykah’s smile got wider at the thought of that actually happening.

  “Are you at the church?” Lance asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “I stopped by to get my date planner. I left it in my desk drawer.”

  “You didn’t mention that you were going to the church.”

  “What am I, six years old? I didn’t mention that I was going to buy some weave today either. And I didn’t mention that I have a colonic scheduled this afternoon. Since when do I have to mention my every move?”

  “Don’t get flipped with me, Arykah. I know what you’re doing.”

  “Because I just told you what I was doing. I came to the church for my date planner.”

  “Mother Gussie said that you made her uncomfortable. So uncomfortable that she felt that she had to leave the church. What did you say to her?”

  Arykah exhaled. “I have no idea what Mother Gussie’s problem is. I wasn’t here five minutes before she got her coat and left. She told me that she had errands to run.”

  Lance knew his wife, and he knew she was hiding something. “But what did you say to her, Arykah?”

  “I didn’t say anything other than ‘good morning.’ Mother Gussie said she was surprised to see me and asked if you were with me. I told her that she and I were alone. That’s all.”

  Bingo. That was the information that Lance needed. “You told her that the two of you were alone and you were gonna do what to her?”

  Arykah laughed out loud. “Did Mother Gussie tell you that I threatened her?”

  “No. She
didn’t say that you threatened her. But I know you, Arykah. You’re still hot from what happened yesterday. You may not have verbally threatened Mother Gussie, but I believe that you did something to make her leave the church and call me.”

  You do know your wife, don’t you? Arykah glanced at her wristwatch. She had an appointment in an hour to show a home. And she had to stop by the realtor’s office before then. “Lance, I don’t have the time to go back and forth with you about your batty secretary. I have an appointment to get to.”

  “Okay, but we’re not done talking about this,” Lance said.

  Arykah disconnected the call with Lance and locked her office door. She exited the church, then got in her car and called Monique at the radio station.

  “How did it go?” Monique asked.

  “I did exactly what you told me to do, and it worked. That old biddie couldn’t get away from me fast enough.”

  Monique laughed. “Good.”

  Chapter 9

  When Myrtle opened her front door, Monique hugged her tightly and kissed her cheek.

  She had stopped by Myrtle’s house on her way home from the radio station, and Monique was glad she did. She and Myrtle had been very close when she was engaged to Boris, Adonis’s cousin. Even after Monique married Adonis, the relationship she had with Myrtle hadn’t changed. She was still Myrtle’s “baby girl,” and Myrtle was still Monique’s “Gravy.”

  “It’s good to see you, Gravy,” Monique said as she took off her coat and sat on the sofa in Myrtle’s living room.

  Myrtle closed the front door behind Monique and joined her on the sofa. “I’m glad you stopped by. I thought I was gonna have to put out an APB on you.”

  Even though Myrtle had told Monique over and over again that she was so happy that she had married Adonis, Boris was still Myrtle’s son. She had birthed him and raised him.

  And when Monique jilted Boris at the altar and ran into Adonis’s arms, she couldn’t face Myrtle for a month.

  It was Myrtle who reached out after four weeks of Monique ignoring her telephone calls. Myrtle assured Monique that no love had been lost between the two of them, and Myrtle was as happy for her and Adonis just as she would have been if Monique had married Boris. Adonis was her nephew, but after his parents had died in a car accident when he was just ten years old, Myrtle had raised him as her son. She told Monique to get over whatever guilt feelings she had for marrying Adonis because Myrtle still considered her as a daughter-in-law.

  “I’m sorry that I haven’t called or stopped by in a while. Things at the radio station are crazy. Theresa, my secretary, is on maternity leave, so I’ve been working ten to twelve hours a day just to stay on top of everything. I’ll be glad when she drops that baby because I’m about to lose my mind trying to keep up with all of my appointments and meetings.

  “And it seems like my phone rings more now than it rang when Theresa was there. I must say, ‘WGOD radio station, Monique speaking’ at least one hundred times a day.”

  Monique exhaled a sigh of exhaustion. “It’s true when they say, ‘You don’t miss your water ’til your well runs dry.’ Theresa was my water, Gravy.”

  Myrtle chuckled. “Well, at least you know what you have in Theresa. A good right-hand woman is hard to come by.”

  “You’re right about that. So, what’s been going on with you, Gravy? What’s new?”

  Myrtle extended her legs forward and crossed her swollen ankles. “Chile, ain’t nothing new around here. I went to the church to play bingo this morning. But the highlight of my day was when I saw the ruckus across the street.”

  “What kind of ruckus?” Monique asked.

  “Everyone on the block knows that the lady across the street, Lorraine Mungo, is messing around with the mailman.”

  “Why do you say that, Gravy?”

  “Because he drops our mail in our boxes and keeps pushing that mail cart down the street. But when he gets to Lorraine’s house, he lifts the cart onto the porch and goes inside and stays for about forty-five minutes to an hour.”

  “So, what are you doing, Gravy, looking out of your living-room window watching with binoculars held up to your face? You keep time on how long the mailman stays in your neighbor’s house?”

  “That’s exactly what I do,” Myrtle said with no shame at all. “Once Oprah goes off, I ain’t got nothing to keep me occupied until The Young & The Restless comes on. But today, the mailman was in there for only about a half hour when I saw Mr. Mungo’s car pull into the driveway. He came home real early. I’ve never seen him come home in the middle of the day. I think he must’ve suspected something.”

  Monique’s eyes grew wide. “Uh-oh.”

  “Uh-oh, is right. I got on my telephone and called next door and told Bessie to look out her window because the crap was getting ready to hit the fan; then I hurried back to my window. Next thing I knew, the scene from that movie Friday was played out. The mailman came running out of the front door and down those steps so fast, you would’ve thought the devil himself was chasing after him. All he had on was his boxer shorts and one sock. I laughed ’til I just about wet my own underwear. That fool ran all the way down the street and around the corner in this cold weather, darn near stark naked.”

  Monique laughed along with Myrtle. “Ooh, wee. This is too good. What happened next, Gravy?”

  “Mr. Mungo came on the front porch and pushed that mail cart down his steps and put it on the sidewalk with the mailman’s uniform on top of it, then went back inside. I called the post office and reported an abandoned mail cart on my street. Fifteen minutes later, I saw a United States Postal Service van drive up. Two mailmen got out and put the cart and uniform in the back of the van and drove off. Me and Bessie were on the phone laughing about it for an hour.”

  “I bet you won’t be seeing that same mailman come around here anymore, Gravy.”

  Myrtle laughed. “No, I probably won’t.”

  Monique shifted on the sofa. “So, how is Boris doing these days?”

  Myrtle shook her head from side to side. “Not good. Not good at all, baby girl. You know he was fired from the electric company, don’t you?”

  “Yeah. Adonis told me. What is he doing now?”

  Myrtle shrugged her shoulders. “The heck if I know. Boris doesn’t come around anymore. I haven’t seen him since he got fired almost two months ago. He stopped coming to church. Morning Glory had to hire another organist. Whenever I call Boris’s cell phone, he answers, then tells me that he’ll call me back, but he never does. He’s on that stuff heavy. That’s why he lost his job. He was going to work high on a daily basis.”

  Monique felt horrible and responsible for Boris’s predicament. Boris was on drugs throughout their relationship, but he always got himself together to report to work. The fact that he lost a good-paying job proved to Monique that Boris was worse off than she ever imagined. “Wow. That’s too bad, Gravy. Maybe if I hadn’t married—”

  Myrtle cut Monique’s words off. “Don’t you dare blame yourself. Boris is a grown man, and he made his own choices. He chose to inhale that crack pipe, and he chose to stick that needle in his arm. And don’t forget the way he treated you when you were together. You remember all that suffering and crying you did? You made the right decision, baby girl. Don’t you ever second-guess that. Had you stayed with Boris, you would’ve been a miserable soul.”

  “Boris is your son, Gravy.”

  Myrtle turned her entire upper torso toward Monique and cocked her head to the side. She slightly raised her voice an octave higher. “And your point is what? I’m not one of those mothers who defends her child when he’s doing wrong. How many times in the past have I told you to pack your bags and leave Boris’s trifling butt? I knew he was no good for you. Humph, you gave Boris way too many chances, if you ask me. You certainly gave him more chances than I gave his father.”

  That was what Monique loved most about Myrtle. She was always straightforward and fair. “I know you’re right, Gravy. I
just can’t help but wonder that if I had not married Adonis, maybe Boris wouldn’t have gone so far off the deep end. Marrying his first cousin, the cousin who was raised in the same house as his brother, had to have hurt him.”

  “Well, you can stop wondering,” Myrtle snapped. “I know for a fact that Boris would not have made a good husband for you. And why are you so concerned about him anyway?” Myrtle pointed her finger at Monique. “See, that was your problem when the two of you were together. You always cared more for him than he cared for you.”

  Monique didn’t respond. When Myrtle was right, she was right.

  “Let’s talk about you and Adonis. Y’all got a bun in that oven yet?”

  “We ain’t even been married for six months, Gravy. We have plenty of time for a baby.”

  “Maybe you and Adonis got plenty of time, but I ain’t got all that time to be waiting on a grandnephew or grandniece. I’m getting old quick. My knees hurt, my back aches, and my right shoulder is acting up real bad. Y’all better bring a baby around here before the Lord calls me home, because it won’t be too much longer.”

  Monique waved her hand to dismiss Gravy’s comment. “Gravy, please. You’re too honory to die. You’ll probably outlive me, Adonis, and our children too.”

  “Just don’t make me wait too long, baby girl. Maybe Adonis needs some of them Viagra pills.”

  Monique’s dark skin turned crimson red. “Gravy, what in the world do you know about Viagra? And Adonis doesn’t need any help in that department, thank you very much.”

  “Is he shooting blanks?”

  Monique’s mouth dropped wide open. “Oh my God. Gravy, I am not talking about our sex life with you. And no, Adonis is not shooting blanks. When we’re ready to hear the pitter-patter of little feet, we’ll make it happen.”

  “Well, what about Arykah and Lance? Are they trying to make a baby?”