Try a Little Tenderness Read online

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Valdez, but Heaven’s Inn cannot process this card for payment.” The service representative interrupted his thoughts. “They will have to offer another form of payment.”

  “Okay, thank you, sir.” Mateo confirmed that he understood what the representative asked of him and ended the call. He nodded his head at Fredrick. “You have another form of payment?” Mateo repeated the instructions given to him as he handed the man his card.

  “You guys are bugging,” Fredrick complained as he snatched the card from Mateo’s hand.

  Mateo closed his eyes and shook his head. One more time, Lord, and I’m sending him to you in the next few minutes.

  Mateo forced a smile as Fredrick dug his hand into his back pocket and produced a black wallet. He put the card back into the wallet and pulled out five $20 bills and placed them on the counter instead of putting the money into Mateo’s extended hand.

  Mateo nodded. He thought it funny that Fredrick would pick a black woman to sleep with, but he couldn’t put the bills into a black man’s hands. It wasn’t like his hands were dirty. Mateo decided not to address the implied racism being directed at him as he picked up the bills from the counter. He got his bill marker and confirmed that the bills weren’t counterfeit. He counted out the man’s change. “Sixteen dollars and seventeen cents is your change, and you’re in room one twenty-four.” Mateo put the money and room key in Fredrick’s hand. “We hope you enjoy your stay.”

  “I hope this room is better than your service,” Fredrick replied as he palmed Godiva’s booty and pushed her ahead of him.

  Godiva turned around and stared at Mateo. She winked at him and licked her lips, enticing Mateo to steal her from Fredrick. The blood flow seemed to drop from his head to waist, almost transferring the decision-making role from his crown. Godiva was a beauty, and Mateo was tempted to oblige. Tall, dark, and stacked in the right places as far as he was concerned.

  The flesh wanted to go after her.

  Mateo sized Fredrick up again and decided the battle wasn’t worth it. True, Godiva had curves in places that would make a man forget he was saved and entertain the lust demon, but Mateo was trying to stay focused on his walk with Christ.

  God, help me not burst through these pants, Mateo pleaded. I’m trying to stay saved, but that girl right there gonna make me show her something.

  Just as the thought to live with God crossed his mind, Mateo heard a commotion at the front door. Problem solved, prayer answered. His thoughts had been diverted.

  The first man to walk through the door was his longtime nemesis, Turner Mustafa Spartenburg, and he knew why the man showed his face at the motel. Turner was trouble with a capital T. The man’s first objective in life was to run Asheville like he was the gangster version of Adolf Hitler. With his father being a former powerful councilman and criminal lawyer and his mother a prominent sheriff with the local law enforcement agency, Turner was practically king of his own castle. He had both the county sheriff’s office and the city police department in his back pocket. That made him a terror with a capital T.

  To say Turner was spoiled was an understatement. As Turner thought it, so it happened, at least most of the time. Drugs, cars, women, men, money: if Turner wanted it, he got it. He didn’t take too kindly to giving back things he’d stolen from people, nor did he let go of anyone who wanted to leave his circle.

  A few months earlier, Hammer had gone to confront Turner about some property, specifically a green Kia Rio that belonged to one of the new Christians named Sonic that Hammer was mentoring. Sonic had just re-dedicated his life to Christ after being in a relationship with Turner, and Hammer went to help him get his stuff. Turner got jealous after seeing Sonic with Hammer and assumed that Sonic had been intimate with him . . . that maybe Sonic was leaving him to be with Hammer.

  Turner bucked up to Hammer. Both men stood six feet four inches tall with physiques that could go toe to toe with LeBron James. Hammer’s well-kept dreads were bound together with a rubber band, and Turner’s French vanilla light skin complexion showed off the tight mohawk fade that resembled mountain peaks. Turner may have had youth on his side, but Hammer had experience on his side when he wiped the floor with him in a one-on-one square-off.

  Hammer was upset with himself at the time because he’d allowed Turner to provoke him when he pulled his gun out and struck him. The Bible says to turn the other cheek; Hammer turned Turner’s with his fist.

  The gangsta wasn’t alone as he walked through the doors of Mateo’s place of employment. He’d brought his crew of ten troublemakers who knew how to shut down the club—and not in a good way.

  Mateo recognized two of the guys. The dark-skinned African American guy, LeMarquise, was some punk he’d been fighting off and on for most of their junior high and high school years. Even though they both were twenty-seven years old, the rivalry was still apparent. Mateo and LeMarquise were evenly matched at five feet six and one hundred and fifty-six pounds of muscle. Santos was the lighter, Dominican dude. He was so sneaky he’d steal the oxygen out of water and leave you with hydrogen if you weren’t careful.

  Surprised but alarmed, Mateo’s defenses went up. He’d had many fair fights with the two of them in the past, but he knew this one wouldn’t be.

  “If it isn’t that punk Mateo.” LeMarquise opened his big mouth. “I thought that crazy uncle of yours would’ve had you leaking by now.”

  Mateo thought it was a low blow for LeMarquise to bring up his child-molesting uncle. Before Mateo got saved, he’d messed around with his uncle’s new wife, who was fascinated with the phallus between his legs. In some ways, this was payback for his uncle raping his sister. When his uncle found Mateo and his wife getting down in their bed, he chased Mateo throughout the Kenilworth area of Asheville to the front door of Heaven’s Inn. That was how he met Hammer and got reacquainted with Jesus.

  “And I thought you would’ve learned not to speak unless your elders are talking to you.” Mateo moved from the behind the counter. As LeMarquise, Santos, and a few of Turner’s hellions drew close, Mateo held his ground. “What’s up?” Mateo greeted him.

  He looked over to see Hammer coming into the lobby from the office behind the counter. Mateo could see the disappointment in his mentor’s eyes. They were supposed to minister and spread the Word. At that moment, Mateo was more content in expanding his reach and landing a blow to LeMarquise’s jaw.

  Some of Mateo’s and LeMarquise’s previous fights flooded his mind. If they weren’t fighting over some girl, they were fighting for bragging rights over who whooped whose butt.

  LeMarquise wasted no time getting the confrontation started by calling Mateo a slew of offensive names that were derogatory to Mateo’s African American and Mexican heritage, and soon, Mateo landed with a right across the jaw. LeMarquise spit out some blood, looked over at Mateo, and said the ultimate Spanish curse toward his mother.

  “Oh yeah?” Mateo got animated and rushed toward LeMarquise. Santos punched Mateo, and the blow landed on the right side of his face. Mateo quickly retaliated and sent punches to both LeMarquise and Santos.

  Mateo was holding his own considering he was outnumbered two to one. He would go at it with LeMarquise for a little while, and when LeMarquise got in a bind, Mateo would find himself rumbling with Santos. When Santos needed some help, he and LeMarquise would double team him.

  Mateo could see the other eight guys and Turner had Hammer and a few of the other employees held up. Turner and three of the guys were jumping on Hammer, and the rest of the guys were giving the two coworkers a fit.

  A hard object struck Mateo from behind, and the next thing he knew, he was on the ground, trying to avoid the raining fists that were landing all over his face and chest. Feet fell next, and he felt more than four.

  Accepting defeat was difficult, especially for a fighter like Mateo. He curled his body as tightly as he could as his assailants multiplied faster than roaches. Raid couldn’t shake these jokers off. He heard a loud,
familiar popping sound and prayed to God he hadn’t broken a bone or something.

  Heaven’s Inn was under attack, and Mateo felt guilty for not being able to save it or himself. He could hear Turner yelling at Sonic, and a few more gunshots made their presence known in the room.

  Mateo felt a burning sensation in his calf. It felt like his leg was on fire. He bit his lip and tried not to curse as he reached down to stop the blood from leaking from his leg. As he looked up, he felt his head being forced forward from a forceful blow from the back, and he saw the soles of one of his attackers’ boots moving closer to his face. That was the last thing he saw.

  Chapter One

  Breaking News

  Six Weeks Later

  Whoever it was that decided that a big-boned, street-smart sista who once lived in Winston-Salem’s Cleveland Avenue Apartments deserved her own talk show must’ve lost their mind!

  Amirah smiled when she looked out of the makeshift studio she’d converted from the spacious conference room at her church, Gospel United Christian Center. One hundred and fifty faces stared back at her and her guest, Thursday Jackson, as they discussed her situation.

  “I can’t believe Armaad would do this to me.” Thursday sobbed after her ex-boyfriend revealed some startling information.

  “I didn’t do nothing.” Armaad got up and walked off the stage.

  Amirah kept a straight face while she exhaled a sigh of relief. The Amirah Dalton Show was supposed to be a Christ-centered talk show that dealt with love and relationships. Thursday and Armaad were two seconds from bringing the action Jerry Springer was better suited for.

  “Yes you did!” Thursday shouted as she got up to go after him. Her honey-blond wig struggled to stay on her head as she shook it violently. “You slept with that nasty chick Tarsha”—Thursday pointed to the extremely pregnant woman in the front row of the audience. Tarsha shook her head and crossed her arms over her protruding belly. She looked like she was getting ready to pop at any moment—“after you told me that you were done with her trifling tail. Then you got the audacity to tell me you and her used to be married!” Thursday continued as she began to run off the stage.

  Amirah jumped up and ran after her guest. “Thursday, let’s sit down and talk about this. You don’t need to chase—”

  “Don’t tell me what I need to do!” Thursday snapped as she turned around and put her finger in Amirah’s face. “You’re not the one that laid up here and had three babies with this man. I did.” As her finger moved up and down, she continued, “You’re not the one he proposed to after we made love on his mother’s fifty-year-old dining room table. I did. And you’re not the one he gave chlamydia and syphilis to three times. That was me. Thursday Honesty Denyla Jackson.” Thursday, huffing and puffing, went and sat back down in her chair after she’d made her point.

  Amirah shook her head. I’m sorry, she told God silently, hoping that the Lord got her message. When she let her producers talk her into doing a show where her guests could learn to forgive their exes, she envisioned a show with more mature guests—couples who were trying to get Jesus back into the center of their relationships. These people were supposed to be screened before they walked into the church.

  Amirah intended to brush the blunder under the rug and hold up like a champ in front of the thousands of people who she knew would be talking about her in Asheville by the next morning. She had to think about what the students she had to face on her day job as a high school teacher at Shiloh Christian Academy would think. To say she was embarrassed wouldn’t begin to describe how she was feeling. Over and over again, Amirah was determined that she was not gonna cry, but even Mary J. Blige couldn’t comfort her tears.

  “Baby, I’m sorry.” Armaad kneeled before Thursday, his soft, gentle hands trying to wipe away her tears.

  “You know you sorry! But this is good, boo! Real good.” Thursday smiled and tried to laugh. “Thanks for the misery.”

  “And we’ll be back after this,” Amirah yelled as that song by Monica echoing Thursday’s last words began to play in the background. Amirah kept note of how good the sound people were. In the back of her mind, she was making mental notes on how she was going to clarify the format of her show to her new staff.

  “Yo, Thursday, you need to drop that punk!” she could hear Chris yell in the background. Chris was Amirah’s crazy friend that some people thought looked like a man. Chris sported a low fade, and her hairline was sharp. Her hardened pecan-colored skin betrayed her twenty-nine years of age—yet that didn’t stop dudes from trying to talk to her.

  Amirah knew for a fact that Chris wasn’t a lesbian, but anyone else who didn’t know would be hard pressed to tell. On the outside, Chris looked like a regular thug on the block with her oversized T-shirt and pants that weren’t even pulled up to conceal her boxer shorts. It was when she talked and the mercury that moved in the way she walked that let everybody know what the deal was.

  “Why don’t you shut up, playa?” Armaad yelled and jumped up as he began running into the crowd. Chris met him halfway.

  “Hey, hey hold on!” Amirah yelled in the mic. “You can’t swing on a female. We are about to go on air in a few minutes.”

  “Man, this show is so fake!” Tarsha yelled as she got up from her seat. She glared at Armaad. “Armaad, let’s go! I got to be in class in an hour. I don’t have time for this mess!”

  “Go on and go!” Amirah encouraged Armaad. “I don’t even want you to honor your contractual obligation and stay on the show.” Amirah was ticked and had no way to hide it. She knew this wasn’t the vision of the show, and she almost called off the whole thing.

  The spirit inside of her wanted to do the same thing, but Amirah wasn’t a quitter. She promised herself to see this idea to the end and then use clips of this show to remind future staff why ideas like this didn’t work.

  “And if I weren’t pregnant, I’d be contractually obligated to whoop your tall, Medusa-looking fat—” Tarsha hurled the insults with hopes of inflicting mental harm. The harshness of her voice felt like jabs as Amirah studied Tarsha’s stern face as she called her everything but a child of God. “You know what? I changed my mind. I don’t even know why I mess with Armaad anymore, let alone have babies with him. I’ll leave by myself.” His ex-wife/current side chick angrily grabbed her things and left as fast as she could.

  God, this is not what I signed up for—Amirah was in mid-prayer when she was told by one of the producers she had fifteen seconds to fix her face and get ready to continue her live taping.

  The audience watched as Tarsha got up and waddled off. Armaad came back and lowered his lanky, oak-colored frame next to Thursday. The two of them looked like total opposites. Give Armaad some glasses and a high top and he’d look like a darker version of Ron Johnson from A Different World. Thursday, in turn, moved her chair away from him. The only person who was semi-cool with the situation was the slightly effeminate pretty boy that Armaad had been creeping with. He cheesed and waved from the audience like he knew he was going to be asked to come on stage.

  “Ya lo ves, ya lo ves. Ya lo ves amor esta vez te olvide.” The irreplaceable hit anthem by Beyoncé played in the background. It was a surprise that half of the audience still knew the words to the Spanish version. The song was so old.

  “All right now, we’re back on The Amirah Dalton Show. If you are just now tuning in, let me say this is not normally how we do things on this show.” Amirah wanted to scold her staff before the live studio audience. She could see the pastor’s wife standing at the back door with her arms crossed. The big green hat she wore with green, black, and gray feathers did a poor job of hiding the look of disdain on her face. Amirah definitely wasn’t looking forward to the end of the show. She could hear the chastisement from the church leadership for how the taping of this episode turned out.

  “We are here with Thursday Honesty Denyla Jackson, and she has sent her man, Armaad, to the left. And I see someone thought it was cute to put these boxes
with his name on here to the left—wait, am I being punked?” Amirah stopped reading the cue cards and addressed the crew.

  The producer shrugged her shoulders. She looked at the boxes that were stacked three high with Armaad’s name splashed across the center. Amirah shook her head and resisted the temptation to yell “Cut!”

  “I want to remind you that it is okay to come on The Amirah Dalton Show to air out your differences, but when you come on the show, we are going to do a better job of representing Jesus than what was displayed today. If you have an issue you need to address, call me at 828-555-7118 or visit us online at AmirahDaltonShow.com. Thank you for watching our show, and have a blessed day.”

  Amirah could take no more as she brought her hand across her neck and pretended to cut it off. Thursday got out of her chair and stormed off, leaving loose papers flying a few inches off the floor. Amirah could feel the tears roll down her face and onto her suit jacket. She never pictured that she’d be as thoroughly embarrassed as she was, and she was tempted to cancel the rest of the season.

  As Amirah walked toward her dressing room, she felt free and was sure that she could overcome the unnecessary and embarrassing drama she would endure for the next two weeks. Two weeks would be all that was needed for the drama to die down in Asheville. Sure, people would be able to rewind and play the clip over and over on YouTube—but she wouldn’t have to face anyone from out of town.

  Amirah looked at her phone and noticed that Chris had called and was trying to reach her. Thursday brushed past her. A strong whiff of the Tommy Girl body spray left its mark, invading Amirah’s nostrils.

  “Girl, I’m gonna have to call you back.” Amirah talked to the phone and rushed to catch up with Thursday. The woman was cursing at the same fast pace she was walking.