MadameFrankie (5 page)

The catering staff for the Streisand fundraiser was gathered
in a conference room at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel. They listened attentively
as Ella Caldwell, a Team Obama social affairs assistant, dispensed detailed
protocol directives.

Jazz listened carefully too. He had already completed his
first assignment of the day. As chaperone to catering personnel, he had to make
sure they were rounded up for background checks and follow-up interviews with
the secret service and FBI, before their protocol orientation with Ella.

El was a no-nonsense type of woman with higher political
aspirations. The attractive thirty-year-old brown-skinned beauty from the
Bronx, a dead ringer for Kerry Washington, was pretty sure the president would
win a second term and she was ready to accept whatever White House position was
offered her, no matter how small.

And she had her eye on Jazz for more than one reason. He was
a hardworking foot soldier with a keen intellect. And he was as gorgeous as he
was smart.

It was no secret he was involved with that B-list actress
Frankie Templeton. And since El was not the type to get personally involved
with staff, she kept her distance and her resentment in check in spite of her
desires.

Still, every so often she’d get a glance of Jazz in her
periphery. And he’d get a glance of her getting a glance. His boyish smile was
a real turn-on, but she would always return it with a professional grimace that
couldn’t mar her pretty face.

“I need you to go with me to the Streisand compound,” she
instructed him after the orientation was adjourned. “Double-check the layout
with her people and Treasury.”

“Got it.”

“Oh and Jazz?”

“Yeah?”

“Great job,” she said, resisting a smile.

“Thanks, El,” he smiled freely.

“Meet me in the lobby in half an hour,” she commanded,
checking the time on her cell.

“Two-forty-five,” he said, checking his.

“Malibu is a hike. We need to get in and out to avoid rush
hour traffic on PCH.”

“See ya then,” he said, walking away.

This time she allowed herself to enjoy the view. What a
walk. What an ass. What a hot piece of man. She even allowed herself to smile a
little.

But never mind Jazz with his fine self, she thought,
catching herself and shaking herself out of her Jazz leer. She had plenty of
sexual and romantic options. Once the election was over, she’d be able to take
her vacation and get all the good loving she could handle from those beautiful Dominican
bugarrones
down at House of John.

* * * * *

Frankie was a vision of loveliness when Jazz rang her
doorbell at exactly nine p.m.

“Wow!” was all Jazz could say as he eyed her up and down.

“You like?” Frankie smiled as she smoothly twirled in her
doorway like a runway model.

“I love,” Jazz growled like Barry White, taking her in his
arms and kissing her tenderly. He then took her hand. “We better go before my
libido makes me wanna change our plans.”

“And miss my surprise?” Frankie giggled girlishly. She then
allowed her caramel prince to squire her down the walkway toward his rented
steed.

It was a beautiful summer night. The stars sparkled like
diamonds in the jet-black sky.

“So what’s the surprise?” Frankie asked as Jazz steered the
car up Highland Avenue toward the Hollywood Hills.

“You’ll see,” Jazz answered with a knowing smile, staring
straight ahead. He found Frankie’s knee with his free hand and brushed it
lightly. “You have the softest, most beautiful skin in the world, baby,” he
sighed with a mellow sexiness.

“And you have the softest, most beautiful touch,” Frankie
cooed slyly, taking his probing hand and moving it up her thigh. The warmth
between her legs caused Jazz to shudder ever so slightly. He gasped with a
whimper when his fingers found the trimmed silky hairs of her plump mound naked
underneath her dress. She helped his fingers find their way inside her. She
closed her eyes and licked her lips and heaved a bit as his fingers toyed
lovingly in her playland, finding her spot. She tingled with joy. But it was
just a tease.

“Tonight, my love,” he promised, tapping her treasure
farewell for the moment. “Later tonight.”

She opened her eyes to his smiling face as they pulled into
the parking area of their destination. They were at the beautiful, evocative
fairy tale-like amphitheater Frankie knew well. They were at the Hollywood Bowl
where concerts under the stars were the most romantic in the country.

Frankie’s eyes widened with glee at the sight of the marquee
lineup. It boasted Anita Baker and Esperanza Spalding as headliners. It was the
perfect combination of old school and new school jazz crooning and
musicianship.

“Oh Jazz,” she swooned, grabbing his thigh in amazement.

“That’s my name, baby.”

He found a spot in the lot and parked, got out, came around
to her door and opened it for her. Taking her hand ever so gallantly, he led
her around to the back of the car, aimed his keypad and popped the trunk.

Frankie was thrilled to see the petite gourmet picnic basket
and the bottle of champagne in a silver cooler.

Carrying the picnic basket and the cooler in one arm, Jazz
slipped his other around his lady and led her toward the magic kingdom.

Inside the open-air arena, an eager teenaged attendant, with
a brilliant smile and gleaming braces, took Jazz’s basket and cooler and led
them down to a third-row center box. Frankie was impressed.

Throughout the concert, they drank the bubbly and munched on
dill salmon pate’ and Chambery Belgian chocolate truffles. But as far as
Frankie was concerned, that was just the dessert. Later that night, back at her
place, they’d feast on each other.

In the meantime, they were serenaded by the smooth sounds of
Anita and Esperanza, both backed by stellar instrumentalists, while a million
sparkling stars smiled down on them.

Snuggled in Jazz’s warm embrace, Frankie closed her eyes
often. She listened as the music resonated throughout her soul. The night
breeze against her face was caressing. She was in seventh heaven.

“Thank you for the sweet surprise,” she whispered in Jazz’s
ear.

“Oh that’s not the surprise, baby,” he whispered back.

“It’s not?”

“No.”

“Okay.”

“See the dude on bass?”

The tall skinny white musician, hauntingly handsome—his
jet-black hair and careless goatee in striking contrast to his smooth ivory
skin—was playing his instrument as if it were his lover. His long, agile
fingers plucked the bass strings with varied degrees of delicacy and
sensuality. It was as if he were stroking his woman, hitting every spot she
wanted hit and more. And the she-bass hummed “yeah” over and over again.
“Yeah.”

It was turning Frankie on. “Yeah.” She found herself
humming.

“And see the hot sister on the keyboards?”

Frankie slowly turned her head toward the lithe black angel
hovering over the keys of the baby grand piano. Throughout the night she’d been
mesmerized by the woman. She was as enamored of the smooth runs, syncopated
riffs and jazz-savvy solos as she was of her dark, Cleopatrian beauty.

“Yeah.”

“So what do you think about them?”

“God, Jazz. They’re both so talented. And beautiful.”

“Well we’re going to meet up with them after the show.”

“We are?”

“Yep.”

“Who are they?”

“My parents.”

Frankie was dumbstruck, flabbergasted and more than a tad
pissed off at Jazz. The last thing she wanted right now was a meeting with his
parents. She knew the inference of the gesture and thought the move
presumptuous and manipulative.

When the words fell out of his mouth—my parents—she was at a
loss for words.
How fucking dare he
, she silently repeated to herself
over and over again while a stupefying smile stayed plastered on her face. She
tried her best to maintain her cool.

“Nervous?” Jazz asked as he placed a matching backstage pass
around her neck.

“No, not at all,” she lied a little too enthusiastically.
The backstage pass around her neck suddenly felt like a noose. That and Jazz
trying to bum rush her to the fucking altar with this meet-the-parents bullshit
was making her skittish as hell. She never should have told him she loved him
she thought to herself as he led her weak-kneed in her Jimmy Choo cork wedge
pumps toward the backstage entrance. Yes, she did love him but that didn’t mean
she wanted to marry him.

“I need to check my face,” she whined lightly as they drew
nearer to the dragon’s lair.

“Don’t worry about it, baby, you look fine.”

“I want to check my fucking face!”

Jazz ignored her outburst, although it did turn a few heads
and some departing audience members even whispered and subtly pointed,
recognizing Frankie. She pulled out her compact and checked her face. Jazz
waited reverentially.

“They’re really cool people,” he gushed like a schoolboy,
taking Frankie’s hand and forging her through the sea of exiting concert-goers.
“You’re gonna really like them and they’re gonna really like you.”

And yes, Angelique and DeVon Mornay really were as cool as
Jazz said they were. And it was easy to see where he got his good looks, mellow
demeanor and gallantry. After twenty-eight years of marriage, the Mornays still
looked into each other’s eyes like newlyweds. They called each other “Babe and
Boo” and spoke in the hip lingo of musicians in love with their art and each
other. They were as hopelessly romantic as their smitten son.

“So this is the soul sorceress puttin’ the spell on my boy,”
DeVon gushed, giving Frankie a big brotherly hug. He couldn’t have been more
than four or five years older than Frankie. “And I can sho’-the-hell-nuff see
why.”

“Now stop acting so surprised, Boo,” Angelique, looking
younger than Frankie, chimed in with a big chuckle. “You know you had a crush
on her yourself, seeing her on TV fantasizing about getting underneath her
habit.”

“Angie!” DeVon blushed.

“Well am I lyin’?”

“No, I guess not, Babe.” DeVon had to chuckle.

“So how you doin’, Frankie?”

“I’m doing fine, Angelique, thank you.”

“Just plain Angie, girl. I am so glad to finally meet you.
You know you are all my baby boy talks about. He’s never been real big on the
dating scene. He’s a real bookworm. Course I know you know that already. But
when it comes to you? You laid down the spell, sistah and whatever else you
laid down…”

“Ma,” Jazz whined, slightly embarrassed.

“And he can be a little square too,” Angelique continued,
pinching his cheeks, causing him to blush even more, turning his golden skin
into a sexy sunset tangerine.

Frankie felt herself melt at the sight of her gorgeous
little mama’s boy. But she had to catch herself. His innocent good looks and
disarming sweetness and charm were not going to let him off the hook that
easily.

“But whatever you got, Sister Frankie,” Mama Angie smiled,
staring in her little boy’s dazzling hazel green eyes, “it’s dizzying the hell
out of my baby here.”

“Like how you dizzy the hell outta me, Babe?” DeVon growled
sensually, coming up behind Angelique, wrapping his arms around her waist and
kissing her softly on the neck.

“Like how we dizzy the hell outta each other, Boo.”
Angelique shimmied ever so slightly in her husband’s arms.

Frankie, more intrigued than embarrassed, looked from the
loving couple to her lover. Seemed as though good looks weren’t the only thing
he inherited from his parents.

On Frankie’s coded glare, Jazz’s complexion flushed near
crimson.

“Are we going to dinner, or do y’all wanna get a room?” he
teasingly interrupted.

And suddenly Frankie was looped out of her flirtatiousness.

Dinner?

As lovely as Jazz’s parents were, she was not ready to go
out to dinner with them. This was another one of Jazz’s surprises that gained
him no brownie points. That smile froze on Frankie’s face again, this time even
more stringent.

“Dinner?” she managed to ask.

“We’ll go up to Yamashiro’s,” DeVon said, releasing his wife
with a pat on the ass. He then shamelessly stripped down to his boxers and
began slipping into his street gear—Timbs, low-hanging jeans, baseball cap with
the brim facing back. “Get to know each other better. After all, just a matter
of time ‘fo we all be family.”

Frankie suddenly turned to Jazz with astonished eyes. The
forced smile stayed frozen on her face. “Baby,” she managed to whisper through
clenched teeth. “I thought we were going to my place, you know…”

“We will,” Jazz whispered back with assurance and a pat on
the hand. “We’ll have a quick bite.”

“But we had a quick bite during the concert.”

“Come on, sweetie. I haven’t seen my folks in a while…”

“Whatch’all over there whisperin’ about?” Angelique asked
with a friendly frown, lighting up a joint, catching them in the mirror while
DeVon zipped up the back of her paisley blouse. “Wanna hit this?”

Dinner with the Mornays was certainly no nightmare. In fact,
in spite of herself, Frankie actually had a nice, if somewhat guarded, time
with them. They regaled her with dishy but sweet anecdotes of their work with
some of the music industry’s biggest, naughty snippets from their bohemian
lifestyle and other tales out of school. Obviously doting parents, Angie and
DeVon took turns embarrassing their son with praises of his great academic and
artistic gifts, his political consciousness and his kind and giving heart.

“Didn’t surprise me one bit when he told me he was working
with the president,” Angie bragged.

“I’m just a volunteer, Ma.”

“Why that’s even better, baby. Ain’t that right, Boo?”

“Sho’ you right, Babe,” DeVon stated proudly, grinning at
his boy and tussling his hair. “Anybody can do it for a paycheck. You doin’ it
’cause you believe, son. My son is a believer,” he concluded, eyes tearing up
with pride.

By the time Jazz and Frankie dropped Angie and DeVon off at
the Hollywood Roosevelt hotel where they were staying, Frankie felt like part
of the family. And that was the problem.

She felt as if she’d been had. The drive back to her condo
was relatively quiet.

“So what did you think of them?” Jazz finally asked
blissfully, seemingly unaware of Frankie’s barely disguised malcontent.

“They’re very nice, Jazz.”

“See? I told you.”

“In fact, I probably like them a whole lot more than I like
you right now.”

“Huh? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You know, for somebody who’s supposed to be so bright, you
sure can be stupid sometimes.”

“Okay Frankie, what’s wrong?”

“What’s wrong?”

“Yeah. What’s wrong?”

“You!”

“Me?”

“Yeah, you, Mr. Jazz-ass Mornay. You’re what’s wrong!”

“What did I do?”

“You’re jumping the gun on this marriage thing.”

“Jumping the gun?”

“I told you I’d think about it, but you’re carrying on like
it’s a done deal, introducing me to your parents, sitting down to dinner like
we’re already planning the goddamn wedding.”

“So what’s so wrong with that?”

“I haven’t fucking said ‘yes’ yet. I haven’t fucking said
anything yet.”

“What? You don’t want to marry me?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Then you do want to marry me.”

“I didn’t say that either, Jazz.”

“I love you, Frankie.”

“And I’m…I’m very fond of you, Jazz.”

“Fond of me.”

“I like you a lot.”

“It’s not the same thing.”

“Actually it is. But the problem is whenever I tell you I
love you, you take it the wrong way.”

“So asking you to marry me is taking it the wrong way.”

“Look, Jazz. I loved all four of my ex-husbands.”

“Even your brother’s husband.”

“I loved him like a brother. Still do. I’m very fond of
him.”

“See?”

“What?”

“Fond is not love. Love is love.”

“But love does not mean marriage, Jazz. Yes, I loved all my
ex-husbands. But they’re all exes.”

“So you have a problem with marriage.”

“You want me to be honest with you?”

“Yes.”

“Yes, Jazz. I have a problem with marriage. I really don‘t
want to get married again.”

“Oh I see. You want the milk without buying the cow.”

“I want the milk and the cow, baby. I just don’t want to be
chained to it.”

“I’m not an it, Frankie. I’m a man. I’m a man who’s
desperately in love with you.”

“Then maybe you should try not being so desperate.”

“Oh, is that what I am?”

“You said it. Not me.”

“I see.”

They continued the drive to Frankie’s place in chilly
silence. Frankie knew Jazz was terribly hurt. But realizing truth can be
painful at times. She was glad she’d gotten it out; let him know exactly where
she was coming from.

Jazz parked the car in front of Frankie’s building. He got
out, circled around and opened the door for her. He walked her to her door and
waited for her to open it.

“I’ll never stop loving you, Frankie.”

“You’re not coming in?”

“I don’t think I should.”

“Listen, Jazz. Try to understand.”

“That you don’t want to marry me.”

“That I don’t want to marry anyone.”

“I’ll try.”

He began to walk away. She took his hand. He turned to her,
his head bowed. He looked up into her eyes. She looked into his, with a
reassurance he wasn’t quite sure of.

She kissed him gently on the lips. The kiss made him almost
change his mind. But no. He knew he had to go. He couldn’t stay. Not tonight.
It would be too hard for him.

“Goodnight, my love,” he managed to say.

“Goodnight, Jazz,” she said, kissing him again.

And with a smile, somber and resolute, he walked down the
long path from her door to the street where his car was parked. She watched him,
knowing that her truth had hurt him, but knowing she had spoken the truth.

* * * * *

Jazz entered his hotel room with a mood as dark as the
space. He flipped on the light and heaved at the emptiness of his heart.
Listlessly, he peeled off his clothes and left them in a pile in the middle of
the room.

He slowly moved his naked body to the bathroom and climbed
into the shower. The warm water was soothing, but not soothing enough to ease
the pain that filled his empty, aching heart.

He stood in the shower stall, beaten, assaulted by the warm
spray that rained down on him. Aimlessly he soaped himself, rinsed himself, got
out and dried himself.

A glance of his pathetic self in the mirror was revealing.
There was a little boy lost in that mirror, abandoned by the love of his life,
rejected by the woman he loved.

Unable to take it any longer, he turned away from that
pathetic mirror image and went back into the living room where his clothes lay
piled at the foot of the bed. He stared at the pile, then slowly moved toward
it. He bent down and with a trembling hand, reached inside his pants pocket and
pulled out the small velvet case, stared at it, took it to the bed with him. He
climbed underneath the covers and sat up in the bed. He placed the case on his
lap and opened it slowly.

The diamond in the sterling ring glistened like the tears
that filled his eyes and ran down his cheeks. And as one tear fell upon the
diamond ring, he couldn’t hold it back anymore. He sobbed and he sobbed.

All night he sobbed, until he cried himself to sleep. The
velvet case containing the diamond ring stayed firm within his hand’s embrace.
Even through his sad slumber, he held on to it, wishing in his dreams that it
was Frankie.