Free Word of Honor, Book 2 by Tiana Laveen

talked… and I dreamed about you… I dreamed so much about you Mia.” He narrowed his gaze on her, caught in her cleavage, and wouldn’t let go. “And I let you know what was happening with me every step of the way and you still fucked me over.”
    He leaned in close to her, so close, the woman trembled as her back pressed against the couch.
    “I didn’t fuck you over, baby… I didn’t!” Her voice finally rang free after allowing him to rant and rave for the past couple of minutes. But then she cut the rope and let the words escape. “I fell in love with you and didn’t want to hurt you.” A slow tear cascaded down her cheek. “I was jammed up, stuck. My lie caused trouble, but my truth was gonna set you free! So I tried!” Another tear and then another… “I saw you were all messed up inside, Aaron! You were tormented and picking yourself apart. I teach! It’s what I do!”
    “You sure as hell taught me a lesson, now didn’t you?!”
    “I wanted to turn my back on you when you told me what you were doin’, who you were affiliated with. Your ideas literally sickened me!”
    “Then why didn’t you leave me the fuck alone, huh?” He caught a whiff of mint on her breath… For whatever reason, the more she spoke, the more he gravitated towards her, loving her sweet, sultry feminine voice, loving the things she said… the expressive yet coherent words that came out of her mouth.
    “Why didn’t I leave you alone? Because everybody needs love and another chance and besides, I’d already seen your heart. Who would I be to think I’m better than you after that? I knew you had an opportunity to turn this around, and something inside of you wanted it. Aaron, I’d seen the potential in you, and you proved me right.”
    “You don’t know any of this…none of it at all. It could have been wishful thinkin’ on your part.”
    “No, it wasn’t, Aaron. Day in and day out, I study children and their potential. I can look at a child after spendin’ a bit of time with them and I know almost instinctively what gifts they possess. I like to bring that out of them, encourage it.”
    “I ain’t a child…”
    “This is funny, because I had the same conversation with a few people that mean a whole lot to me. I’ll tell you, like I told them. In some ways you aren’t, in some ways you are, ’cause you gotta take baby steps to completely turn your life around, Aaron…baby steps.”
    He looked at the woman, and his heart plummeted in his chest at her revelation.
    “You aren’t like everybody else and neither am I. I got past you being a Nazi.” She reached for him once again, and this time, he didn’t push her away as her fingers caressed the side of his neck, touching…kneading and rubbing the skin covered in a swastika. “And instead, I saw ‘Nice’… I got past you being Aryan, and I saw ‘Aaron’… I got past you being a Socialist, and I saw ‘the Sun’!” The woman’s face was wet with tears—so many tears—and his damn soul swelled with renewed life and faith.
    Those tears are for me. They aren’t for her. They are her hopes and dreams for me!
    “I’m black, you’re white, and to that, Aaron, I say so what?” She shrugged. “God made us like this and I’ll be damned if I’m going to question it. I love my skin, my frizzy hair, and my curves. I love my heritage. I’m a black woman with a dash of Creole from my mama’s people who came from Louisiana. We got a little French in us, but baby, we’re black and proud.” A sad smile creased her face. “When it’s time to go home, Heaven and Hell won’t be segregated, Aaron. I hate to break it to ya, but it will be divided totally differently and God ain’t gonna treat us like laundry. He gonna divide us by how we done ourselves and done others!” She swiped a tear from her eye.
    “When I look at you, I don’t see your race, Aaron, I see your heart, you know that? When I go to sleep at night, I see a rainbow inside of you,