Read Online The Deal, the Dance, and the Devil by Victoria Christopher Murray - Free Book Online

had shocked them into silence.
    “Girl, you’re so funny,” Tamica said, waving her fork at me.
    Brooklyn laughed, too. “Yeah, that’s a good one, Evia. Too bad it’s not true ’cause let someone offer me five million for anything, and they got it.”
    “You know it!” Tamica was still laughing.
    I took a bite of my garlic bread, and when I looked up, Tamica’s eyes were right there. She was still chuckling. Then, small giggles. Then her eyes became slits.
    “Wait a minute,” Tamica said slowly. She put down her fork.
    Brooklyn said, “You’re not kidding?”
    I shook my head. “Nope.” Then I told them all about Shay-Shaunté’s offer.
    Before I could get all the way to the end, Brooklyn interrupted, “You sure she got the money?”
    “Oh, yeah. This is Shay-Shaunté.”
    “Then do it,” my friend, the pastor’s wife, said.
    “Are you kidding me?” Tamica glared at Brooklyn. Turning to me, she shook her head. “Don’t.”
    Brooklyn rolled her eyes. “Spoken like a woman who’s never had a man.”
    Ouch! I said inside for Tamica. Brooklyn didn’t have togo that hard. But the thing was—that was just B. If you were gonna be in her world, sometimes you got hit.
    In her no-nonsense tone, Brooklyn asked, “Has Adam found a job yet?”
    I shook my head.
    Brooklyn asked, “Could you guys use the money?”
    Duh? Who couldn’t use five million?
    “I’ll take your silence as a yes,” Brooklyn said to me. To Tamica, she said, “I rest my case.”
    Tamica may have been knocked down by Brooklyn’s comment about her man-status, but she was not knocked out. “How could you tell her to do that? You wouldn’t give your husband up for money.”
    “You’s a lie!” Brooklyn said, shocking me and Tamica. “It wouldn’t even have to be five million. I’d take two. And for two million, I’d give her more than my husband,” she said. “For that kind of money”—Brooklyn raised her hand and began counting off points with her fingers—“she could have the good bishop, and our kids, and our cars, and the TV remote. What?” she said, sucking her teeth. “Give me a few more minutes and I’ll think of a couple of other things to throw in.”
    “You don’t have any kids,” Tamica sneered.
    “For two million, the bishop and I would get busy. I wouldn’t mind giving up this girlish figure when you start talking about that kind of money.”
    Okay, I had to laugh at that. But only Brooklyn and I laughed. Tamica shook her head, and her scowl told me that she didn’t find a single thing funny.
    “Don’t be a fool listening to her,” Tamica said. “The Bible says that the marriage bed should not be defiled.” She growled, but I wasn’t sure who she was angrier at—me or Brooklyn. “And as the pastor’s wife, you should be the one telling her that.”
    Brooklyn waved her hand in the air. “You don’t even know what that scripture means. And even if you did know, you don’t have a marriage bed. Become a wife before you start doling out marriage advice.”
    Tamica was not about to back down. “I may not have found the man of my dreams yet, but I found God long ago. And right now, He’s the only Man we need to be concerned with.”
    That shut Brooklyn up for a moment.
    Tamica continued, “There is no way that either of you can shape it for this to be all right with God.”
    “You preachin’ to me?” Brooklyn asked.
    “Someone needs to … because you’re acting like you know of God, but not like you know God. Because if you really knew Him, there would be no way that you could advise Evia this way, Brooklyn.”
    “You don’t know nothing about me.”
    Okay, it was time to break this up. “Ladies, go to your corners, no need to fight. I’m not even considering this deal.”
    “What?” Brooklyn said like she was stunned.
    “There’s no way Adam and I would do something like that.”
    “Good.”
    “Adam said no?” Brooklyn asked.
    “No; I didn’t tell him. But if I