Fire and Desire (BWWM Romance) Read Online Free Page B

location.
    Shayla walked around knocking on walls, shaking pipes, and testing the stairs, giving the building a thorough inspection. She checked every inch of it from the structure itself to the plumbing before she finally gave it mid-thumbs up little over an hour later.
    Dusting off her hands, she commented, “There were a few things I want to discuss with the seller before putting in a bid for you to purchase it.”
    “That’s what I’m paying you the big bucks for,” Emily joked.
    Once outside, Emily nudged Shayla, looking in the direction of a woman going into the back door of the strip club.
    “She better go make that money to pay for the state tax increase,” Shayla said.
    “She better do more than some shaking up in there if she wants to pay those or property taxes,” Emily said, still ticked off at the increase on hers. She could more than afford the increase, but the fact that more than tripled still had her eyes sore from popping out her head when she opened her mail.
    “On a more serious note…” Shayla hugged her. “I am so proud of you. You’ve always been a hustler when it came to getting what you want and taking care of business, even if it was something as simple as convincing me to walk up to a prison to get out of the cold.”
    “Thanks girl.” Emily laughed. “I can’t believe you brought that up. That’s a pre-Mercedes tales of the broke experience!” She popped her friend in the arm.
    “See you later!” Shayla dodged the playful blow and took off in the opposite direction.
    Emily was still laughing as she made her way to her vehicle. Her mind went back to her college days. The weekend had arrived, and she and Shayla were on the road to a party at another nearby college. After driving forty-five minutes, they arrived and realize they’d been tricked. The party was nothing more than a group of guys getting high, drinking, and pretending to be rap stars.
    “Oh hell, no, let’s go!” Emily had backed up to the door.
    “Come on have a drink,” one of the guys coaxed them in.
    It was either get back on the road or stay and have a drink. Emily gave in and was soon laughing with the rest of them. She waved off the marijuana but had more than her fair share of alcohol.
    A few hours later, they had decided to call it a night. Twenty minutes into the ride, Emily’s check engine light came on, and the car slowed down to a crawl. Emily pulled off to the side of the road just before it completely died and they were crushed by one of the many semi-trucks whizzing past them. This wasn’t the first time the car had issues. Her car was a beater, purely drive at your own risk.
    “Shit!” Emily had smacked the steering wheel.
    “Well, we could walk to the nearest gas station, or we can wait until a truck driver came by, show him some skin, and take his truck,” Shayla said with a straight face.
    “Shayla, shut your high ass up.” Normally she would have gotten a kick out of Shayla’s commentary when she was high because she always said the funniest things, but this was not the time.
    She cursed her decision to attend a Midwest school and not stay in the south. It was the middle of January so the temperature was at the highest fifteen degrees, and there’d been a major snowfall earlier in the week. Sobering up, Emily checked out their surroundings. She vaguely remembered an exit a few miles back, but the prison they were in front of looked rather inviting.
    Maybe I really hadn’t sobered up that much to think a prison was inviting , her present-self reasoned.
    With little effort, she had convinced Shayla to walk up to the gate with her so they could at least use the phone. The area they were in was a dead zone, rendering their prepaid cell phones useless.
    Paranoid from the marijuana smoking had Shayla babbling. “There are more black men in prison than there were in college. It’s a government design in place to destroy the community and the black family…”
    Emily fought the urge to