AVOIDING RESPONSIBILITY (Avoiding #2)

Chapter 2-1

2

SEPTEMBER ELEVEN MONTHS EARLIER

Using her excess student loan money, Lexi signed up for Pilates classes upon returning to New York. She just wanted to forget everything that had happened in Atlanta. She was still in shape from her semi-regular jogs around the city, but it wasn’t enough. No matter what she did, law school managed to add a few extra pounds when she wasn’t looking. Not to mention after two years without gymnastics, her flexibility was basically shot. She could barely fall into a regular split, and to any prior gymnast, it was an embarrassment.

Lexi rolled over on her purple mat as the teacher instructed her into a plank position. Her core muscles hardened underneath her as she struggled through the push-up like pose. She could feel her body begin to shake from the effort, but she held her head high and kept a smile on her face to loosen her features. Just when she thought she would collapse, the teacher instructed them to release. Lexi pushed over her toes, laying her legs flat against the mat, and arching her back. Her abdominal muscles expanded, and she let her head drop backward.

Rolling back over her toes, Lexi shot her butt up into the air in a downwards dog position giving her calves and shoulders a thorough working. She alternated feet, pressing each heel into the ground, and holding the move.

The tiny Pilates instructor came up behind her and flattened out her back, adjusting the position to extract the maximum potential out of the movement. “Very good,” she complimented. She flung her waist length braid over her shoulder as she stood and moved to another student.

Lexi breathed into the position letting all the built up energy of the past month release from her body. Her course work was rigorous for her final year of law school, but the anticipation of graduation looming over everything relaxed students and faculty alike. Relaxed was a relative term, of course, since she still had reading for obscure law courses in statutory interpretation and other such material that was supposed to prepare her for the Bar and the “real” world.

Just as the instructor began working them through the next series of movements, a loud jingle began playing from one of the bags stuffed against the adjacent wall. Lexi’s face colored as she realized that was her ring tone. Cell phones were strictly forbidden unless turned off. Lexi hadn’t even realized that her phone had been on until that second.

Jumping up from her seated position, Lexi scrambled to the other side of the room and switched it off. The teacher gave her a disapproving look, and then went back to her work. A few other faces still glared at her as she flipped open the phone and glanced down. Chyna’s name appeared across the front and a text filled the screen.

911! Get your ass over here.

Lexi groaned inwardly at the abrupt change of course her afternoon was taking. She stuffed her cell phone back into her purse and threw it into the pile with her other stuff. She wanted to kick herself for giving into Chyna’s hysterical whims, but her friend was important to her. And if Chyna said there was an emergency, Lexi came running. Chyna had always been there for her when she needed her most.

With that in mind, Lexi rushed back to her mat and began rolling it up. She slipped the cover over the squishy material and slung it over her shoulder.

“Kathy, I have to run,” she said.

“Come back and make it up later in the week,” Kathy said, her smile warm and understanding. The woman was a god send, honestly.

After signing up for a make-up session with the receptionist, Lexi rushed out on the busy Manhattan street and pulled her phone back out to text Chyna.

What’s the 911, chica?

She pushed a loose wisp of hair behind her ear and continued down the street dodging pedestrians. Almost instantly she had a return message.

Tell you when you get here. Hurry!

Lexi sighed and broke into a light jog. She wasn’t certain if it was necessary for her to be rushing to Chyna’s apartment, but she didn’t want to take the chance. Chyna was prone to dramatic flairs, but it wasn’t typically a 911 situation. Running out of breath and energy, Lexi briskly walked the next few blocks, resting momentarily as she reached the door front to Chyna’s apartment. Her lime green messenger bag smacked one last time against her back as she reached forward to hold onto a pole for support.

“Miss Lexi, are you all right?” a concerned Bernard asked her.

“Fine, just ran across town. Chyna said it was 911,” she managed to get out through gasping breathes. “You know anything about this, Mr. B?”

Bernard averted his eyes to the ground and gulped. “I can’t really say,” he mumbled.

The two years Lexi had known Chyna, Bernard had always given her a straight answer. Yes, he sometimes answered her in a goofy, even sarcastic, manner, but he still answered her. She had never been blown off by him. He had never had a reason to. His reaction pumped a fresh wave of adrenaline into her system, and she bolted through the open door. The elevator took a century to reach the top floor of the building. The classical music was more grating than normal. Lexi could feel her heart beating in her ears as the elevator stopped and deposited her on the floor. She pushed hard against the opening door forcing it to move a fraction of an inch faster.

Hopping onto the cream carpet, Lexi bolted down the hallway. She fumbled with her key too anxious to get the thing out of her bag properly. The keychain slipped out of her hand and onto the floor. She cursed under her breath as she reached down to pick up the thing. Inserting the gold key into the lock, she twisted the handle and burst through the open door.

“Chyna?” she called, racing into the immaculately decorated living room.

Lexi skidded to a halt at the end of foyer, her blood turning to ice at the scene before her. Chyna was seated on her leather sofa, legs crossed, in a demure, black, pant suit. Lexi wasn’t certain Chyna even owned clothes in this fashion. Her beautiful Italian skin was sheet white with the lightest twinge of green coloring her face. Her green eyes were glassy and near to tears, but her head was held strong. She was stubborn and refused to let the hardness leave her features for fear of breaking down. Lexi had never seen her friend look quite so distraught over anything, but she could understand why.

Standing directly in front of Chyna in a very expensive, black suit was a man who was everything Lexi imagined him to be. She had only seen him in photographs, never in person. She gulped hard feeling a knot form in her stomach and making it hard for her to swallow.

He turned at Lexi’s approach and made her body quiver even more at the incredibly threatening and overpowering aura that radiated from his very being. He was well over six feet tall with sharp, all-knowing brown eyes and cropped brown hair. With just one look, it was obvious he commanded attention, not unlike the woman sitting before him.

“Hello, Mr. Van Der Wal,” Lexi stammered.

His eyes traveled the length of her body taking in every detail while at the same time remaining strictly professional. He was observing her as if she were cattle ready for s*******r. No emotion marred his face as he continued his inspection.

Lexi was distinctly aware, in that moment, of her tight, black Yoga pants that hugged every inch of her lower half and the flimsy white tank damp with sweat from her class. Her hair was in a messy bun stuffed haphazardly onto the top of her head. Wisps were loose from her brisk jog to the apartment and the back of her neck was still slick. She shifted awkwardly onto one hip and waited for him to finish staring at her and actually say something.

“She’ll do,” he commented indifferently as he glanced back at Chyna.

Lexi had no idea what that meant, but she was sure that she didn’t want to find out.

“Are you sure?” Chyna asked. Sarcasm dripped from her voice as she c****d one perfectly waxed eyebrow to the ceiling.

“Don’t get smart with me, young lady,” he snapped.

Lexi was proud of Chyna for not flinching under such scrutiny. Instead she swept her long black hair over to one shoulder and smiled as sweetly as she could. A little bit of color crept back into her cheeks when his attention had been briefly diverted and given her the courage to speak up.

“Never, Daddy,” she purred.

He growled something incoherent and tore his eyes from Chyna. “Just do what you’re told.” Then he brushed past Lexi and exited the apartment.

The wave of relief that followed his exit crashed into the room. Chyna slumped back against the sofa and heaved her chest up and down. She placed her hands over her eyes to keep the tears back. Lexi instantly went to her side and wrapped a comforting arm around Chyna’s petite shoulders. It didn’t matter what had just happened. All that mattered was that she was here now to comfort her.

“Are you okay?” Lexi asked, pulling Chyna close.

“I’ll be fine,” she mumbled.

“I know you will eventually, but what the hell was all that about?” Lexi couldn’t help asking. “When I walked in, you looked like a ghost. What is your dad even doing here? I thought you two had nothing to do with each other.”

“We don’t,” Chyna said, standing from her spot and pacing the living room. “That’s the way we like to keep it. Didn’t you hear what he said?”

“About what?” Lexi asked confused.

“He told me not to act like my f*****g w***e of a mother.”

Lexi’s mouth dropped open. She knew the history between Chyna and her parents. They had divorced when Chyna was in high school because they were both sleeping around. Then after giving her the apartment Chyna was now living in, they had equally decided they wanted nothing to do with her. Chyna was too much like her father in personality and her mother in appearance for either of them to be able to handle their daughter.

“I can’t believe that,” Lexi said.

“He can’t even look at me without thinking of her. I can’t believe he had the gall to come here and speak to me like that in my own home. I don’t give a f**k if he paid for the place tenfold. He has no right to barge in on me and boss me around. Then he springs a f*****g bomb on me.”

“What happened?” Lexi asked.

Chyna turned around and faced her best friend. The color was draining out of her cheeks again at the realization that she was going to have to talk about what occurred. “My dad is getting remarried.”

“What?” Lexi balked. “Since when?”

“Since four months ago when he proposed to her,” Chyna muttered dejectedly.

“Four months? Oh C, I’m so sorry,” Lexi said, hopping up out of her seat and standing in front of her friend.

“I’ve never even met her,” she blubbered.

“The bastard!”

“I know,” Chyna said, pulling back and swiping at her eyes. “I’m sorry that I’m all…”

“Oh, you don’t have to worry about that. How many times have you seen me in a fit?”

“I know, but this is dumb.”

“What?” Lexi asked astonished. “You think it’s smarter for me to cry over Jack, then for you to cry about your parents?”

Chyna chuckled once and let a small smile tease the corners of her mouth. “Well, when you put it that way.”

“See, I’m much more dysfunctional than you. You have every right to be upset.”

“There’s more.”

Lexi didn’t like the way she said that. What more could her father want from her? After barely speaking to Chyna for two years and dumping that tidbit of information on her, it was an asinine move to then continue the conversation.

“What else could he possibly have to say to you after that?”

Chyna took a deep breath and crossed her arms over her chest. “He needs me to be at the engagement party this weekend.”