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    The Bookstore, Fifteen Years of Love and Counting
    The Bookstore, Fifteen Years of Love and Counting
    The Bookstore, Fifteen Years of Love and Counting
    Ebook284 pages5 hours

    The Bookstore, Fifteen Years of Love and Counting

    By B.L Wilson

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    The Bookstore, fifteen years of love and counting tells the tale of somewhat wild and raunchy playgirl Vivian Johnson, who is also Leah Williams’ (Forever Woman and Sweet Sarah’s Bluez) editor and good friend. Fifteen years ago, while working on one of her client’s book tours, she meets an interesting younger woman. Patricia Davis has just opened a women’s bookstore on a shoestring budget. Vivian is impressed that such a young woman from Generation X would bet her entire future on opening a woman’s bookstore and community center in the heart of a low-income neighborhood.

    They bump heads at first. Vivian’s client, Melba Farris (Mr. Jefferson’s Piano and Other Central Harlem Stories), asks her to set up a book signing in the bookstore, but Pat’s womanizing partner, Etta, wants more than a book signing from Vivian. The two partners argue about Vivian, causing Pat to say things to Vivian that she has to apologize for later. The book signing is exceptionally successful, but the two women decide not to see each other again.

    As fate would have it, a tragic fire and a murderous cover up throw the two women together again. While Vivian helps Pat get through Etta’s funeral and mourning period, the two women begin to see each other in a different light. Can these two women from different generations and backgrounds get on the same page in The Bookstore?

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherB.L Wilson
    Release dateDec 2, 2017
    ISBN9781370258765
    The Bookstore, Fifteen Years of Love and Counting
    Author

    B.L Wilson

    B.L. has always been in love with books and the words in them. She never thought she could create something with the words she knew. When she read ‘To Kill A Mocking Bird,’ she realized everyday experiences could be written about in a powerful, memorable way. She wasn’t quite sure what to do with that knowledge so she kept on reading.Walter Mosley’s short stories about Easy Rawlins and his friends encouraged BL to start writing in earnest. She felt she had a story to tell...maybe several of them. She’d always kept a diary of some sort, scraps of paper, pocketsize, notepads, blank backs of agency forms, or in the margins of books. It was her habit to make these little notes to herself. She thought someday she’d make them into a book.She wrote a workplace memoir based on the people she met during her 20 years as a property manager of city-owned buildings. Writing the memoir, led her to consider writing books that were not job-related. Once again, she did...producing romance novels with African American lesbians as main characters. She wrote the novels because she couldn’t find stories that matched who she wanted to read about ...over forty, African American and female.

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      Book preview

      The Bookstore, Fifteen Years of Love and Counting - B.L Wilson

      The Bookstore,

      Fifteen years of love & counting

      (Forever Woman Volume 6)

      by

      B.L. Wilson

      The Bookstore, fifteen years of love & counting

      Brought to you by

      Patchwork Bluez Press

      The Bookstore, fifteen years of love & counting

      Copyright 2017 by B. L. Wilson.

      All rights reserved.

      Smashwords Edition

      No part of this e-book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, without permission in writing from the author.

      This book is a work of fiction. Any similarity in name, description, or history of characters in this book to actual individuals either living or dead is purely coincidental.

      Please respect the rights of the author and do not file share.

      Edited by BZ Hercules

      www.bzhercules.com

      Author’s Note

      The Bookstore, fifteen years of love and counting was written and takes place in a time when technology was somewhat more simple. You will find references to flip phones and people not being as easy to reach as they are now. Social media was nonexistent, at least not like it is in the present day, and most of my characters did not feel incomplete without a laptop. Updating the technology might change the plot elements, so I have left the old-fashioned ways untouched and request that you enjoy this bit of nostalgia as it is written.

      Thank you.

      B.L. Wilson

      For all you women who have suffered so many tragedies in life … the loss of friends and family, take heart. You can make it through those trials and tribulations.

      Find that special someone and let them help you. Lean on them during those hard times. Allow them to lean on you when they need comfort as well.

      You will both be the better for it.

      Love has to be shown by deeds not words.

      ~ Swahili proverb~

      ONE: I hate book tours

      "The old man wants you there, Vivian, so you are going. Like it or not, you are going on this book tour! Maurice Altman stated, standing over her desk. He ran a hand through a thick mop of gray hair, then smoothed down his beard. He sat down in a chair across from her that she usually reserved for her authors. Come on, Viv. You know you like tours. You’re good at them. You find the most interesting places to display our authors. You get the public interested in them." He studied her, noting how good she looked this afternoon.

      When didn’t Vivian Johnson look great? he mused. He always thought of her as classy broad who wore her business dresses, suits, blouses, and skirts with elegance. She chose just the right amount of jewelry: sterling silver or platinum gold or pearl necklaces with matching earrings and bracelets. Her shoes and handbags blended with her outfits. Vivian was the only woman he knew that actually had leather gloves that matched her shoes and handbags. She always smelled great too. He wished she played around. He sighed inwardly. His wife would cut his balls off and feed them to him a tiny piece at a time if she knew what he wanted. Somehow, wives always found out when their husbands screwed around on the job … any job.

      Oh, quit staring at me like that, Mo. You aren’t getting some of this and you know why too, Vivian remarked, patting her chest and making her silver necklaces jingle.

      Maurice exhaled. A man can dream, can’t he, Viv?

      Humph! Vivian reached over to pop his forearm with her thumb and middle finger, making him flinch and rub his arm. You know I’m gay. I never hid that from anybody here. All I want is to be accepted for what I do at work, not for what I am in my bedroom.

      Maurice waved a dismissive hand at Vivian. Yeah, yeah, I’ve heard the liberation speech before. Just replace the gay part with gender or race, and I’ve heard the same thing over the years.

      You didn’t listen to those other folks who said it any more than you heard me, right, Mo?

      Maurice groaned. Please, just go on the damned book tour, Viv.

      Vivian groaned, then held her head in her hands. You know this wrecks the hell out of my social life, Mo.

      Are you still going with Stella?

      I’m not going with anybody. I never go with anybody, Mo.

      Okay, wrong terminology. Are you still seeing, dating, or otherwise socializing with stunning Stella?

      An image of Stella Cox sprawled across her bed drifted into Vivian’s brain and decided to stay. Maurice was right. Stella was stunning. She was of average height but that was the only average thing on her coppery body. Her shapely legs were long. Oh my, just right length for wrapping around a woman’s waist. Her breasts were the size of small grapefruits with their distinctive nipples that were made for licking and sucking on. She hadn’t even reached the best part of Stella located inches below her belly button. Stella Cox was simply gloriously spectacular. Well, almost the perfect woman. Stella didn’t care who else Vivian screwed just as long as Vivian was available when she needed her. Whenever Stella needed a place to crash, Vivian was supposed to drop everything. That included kicking other women out of her bed to make a space for Stella alone. The odd thing was how she went along with Stella’s games even when she secretly wished for more.

      Vivian? Maurice frowned when she ignored him. He noted the dreamy expression on her face and called her name again. Vivian? Earth to Vivian, talk to me? He snapped his fingers in front of her nose. After several finger snaps, Vivian finally smacked at his hand.

      What, Mo? I heard you the first time.

      Maurice walked to the door of her office. At the door, he turned around to face her. Viv, go on the book tour. It’ll be good for you to get away from … you know who. He sighed. Ida says I should tell you that.

      Vivian groaned. Mo, when are you going to tell her to stop reading those damned how-to psychic and fortuneteller manuals? We publish books after we research them and check out their authors. You know that stuff she’s reading is bullshit. Nobody double checks that crap. She’s not a psychic. She’s Jewish. You’re Jewish. She should find something better to do with her time instead of making false predictions about her husband’s co-workers. She watched Maurice squint, then rub his beard in troubled silence. God! I’m so sorry, Mo. I don’t know what I was thinking when I said that. She rose and went over to squeeze his arm while looking into his face. Tell Ida to email me her predictions anytime she wants to.

      Maurice nodded. I will. I know you didn’t mean it. He exhaled heavily, then scratched his beard. At least now she’s not sleeping the day away or staying up all night just sitting in Noam’s old room, staring at his baby pictures. This psychic stuff gets her out of the house. She goes to the library to get more books. She’s going to lectures and training sessions on the materials. She’s talking to people again. I’m not happy with her choice of topic either, but it’s inspired her to back into the world again. To me, that’s priceless, Viv.

      I know, Mo. I’m so sorry. You know, anytime you want to talk, you can.

      Maurice nodded, then patted her hand on his arm. Thanks. He stepped out of her office looking a lot sadder than when he arrived.

      Vivian sighed. She just stepped all over her tongue with Maurice. She remembered the depressing funeral. Since Maurice’s son Noam was Jewish, he was to be buried within twenty-four hours after his death. According to Jewish custom, his remains were not to be autopsied, but his parents had to find him first. At sixteen, Noam had shown such promise. Academically, he placed third or fourth in his graduating class of several hundred students from the private school for which his parents paid through the nose, eyes, ears, and mouth.

      By twenty, Noam was dead of an overdose of heroin. He’d dropped out of school after a year of failing grades, promises to improve, and more failures. After he dropped out, he started hanging out with questionable people he’d met in the street. It turned out Noam’s friends—and Mo said the word using his fingers to make quote marks—were drug users just as he was. Once Mo and his wife accepted Noam was an addict, they tried all kinds of interventions, but nothing seemed to work longer than six or seven months. Mo said he and Ida had run out of options after paying for rehab in-state and then out of state four times.

      The last thing they tried was a brand of tough love. They threw him out of their home, changing all the locks. They stopped taking his calls, texts, and emails begging for money. They saw Noam one more time before he disappeared. He broke into his used to-be-home to steal his mother’s jewelry, his father’s watches, iPod, three iPads, and any other small electronics he could cart away and sell quickly on the street.

      The next time Mo and Ida heard from Noam, it was actually one of his street friends who called but wouldn’t leave his name. The caller claimed Noam was doing some dangerous drug combinations. He might overdose and die, the caller warned. A month later, the same caller said he’d heard Noam had overdosed. They should check city hospitals in the South Bronx and Manhattan’s Lower Eastside. He and Ida had been checking all the hospitals in the areas the caller suggested. They hadn’t found Noam or anybody who fit his description.

      Vivian remembered going with Mo to check morgues in the area when Ida fell apart and refused to look for her baby among the unnamed dead. It was a horrid evening when she and Mo finally found his body after five days of sheer hell looking in the local morgues for Noam’s body. That was a terrible time for her good friend and his loving wife. Two years later, and they all were still trying to make sense of Noam’s life and his sudden death. She sighed. No child should die before his parents. It just wasn’t right.

      Vivian rose from her antique-looking desk to walk over and look out the small window of her office. At least she finally had a window to look out of. In the hierarchy at Tillary Publishing, large windows were reserved for supervising editors and agents that brought in best-selling authors. Office location and window size told the publishing world how important the occupant was to the company. She gazed up at the gray clouds. Soon enough, it would be cold and snowy. But winter wasn’t here yet. Thank God, it was only late fall. A cool, late fall day but only a matter of months until Thanksgiving and Christmas.

      She hated winter book tours the most. She was always hustling from one cold space to another cold place. The winter weather usually didn’t cooperate. Sometimes, they were late for the event. Correction, make that most times they were late either due to traffic delays because the old man didn’t like to spring for plane tickets on anybody but proven best-selling authors. Or they were late due to the bad weather. Book tours for her authors involved driving them wherever or taking Amtrak, provided they could do it cheaply. The old man’s version of cheap usually meant linking bookstore stops along a main train route or renting cheap cars to get from the main route to book signings and readings.

      Once, as a new hire, she made the mistake of setting up one of her tours using a well-known bus service. The bus route was a miserable way to do a book tour. Bus seats weren’t made for sleeping comfortably through eight-hour plus rides. Bus schedules weren’t kept in a timely manner. She and her very patient author missed several book signings and reading events because the bus arrived really late and she was unable to contact the bookstores in time to re-schedule. Or the bus arrived so early she and the author had to rent a room for the day. That tour was a mess, but she took it as a learning experience. She never used that bus service again or any bus service unless she’d checked out the service personally.

      She continued to gaze out the window, thinking about Maurice and his wife. She hoped he realized she’d been thoughtless in her comments about his wife. She also hoped he’d accepted her apology. Having loving parents with money to throw at their child’s education and later on the child’s problems was no guarantee the child would succeed. She guessed wealth, education, and intellect weren’t even a guarantee the child would live to see adulthood. She wondered, What did guarantee a child’s success in life?

      Vivian turned away from the window when she heard the office phone ring. She walked over to pick up old-fashioned ivory rotary phone and sat down in her matching antique chair. She was proud of the old-fashioned but comfortable look and feel of her office. Yes, Adele, what’s up?

      Hi again, Miss Vivian. Ah hmm, Ms. Cox is down in the lobby. The new security guy said she had to call up here before he can send her to you.

      Vivian smiled as she pictured Stella Cox. She was probably pissed off in a big way.

      Adele cupped a hand around the headset’s microphone and lowered her voice to whisper, The guard said she’s really angry. He said she looked ready to punch him and the rest of the guys out or kick somebody’s ass. Maybe you could get down there, Miss Vivian. You know how to soothe folks. Ms. Cox sounds like she needs soothing.

      Thank you for calling me, Adele. I’ve always appreciated your knowledge about what’s going on in the office. No matter what, you have a finger on the pulse here.

      Adele giggled. Thank you, Miss Vivian. Can I tell Security you’re on your way down to escort Ms. Cox to your office?

      Vivian smiled. Yes. I’m leaving now. She rose from her desk, walked down the hallway, and nodded to other office holders as she made her way to the bank of elevators at the front of the building. The ones at the rear of the building were strictly for hauling freight to the different floors. She rode the elevator down to the first floor and stepped off, then walked around the corner to the security desk. The guard signaled with his eyes where the attractive but troublesome woman was standing. He didn’t need to do that. She could feel eyes on the back of her neck and turned around.

      Stunning Stella Cox was ready to explode.

      Vivian strode over to her sometime lover and reached out to stroke an arm through her leather coat. Sugar, come to my office.

      Stella eyed Vivian, then sucked her teeth. She cut eyes at the security guard. That asshole should be fired. He made me wait while he called reception. I imagine Adele hustled to call you.

      Vivian tried again to distract Stella. Sugar, come to my office. Bet I can make you feel better, Baby.

      Humph! I’m not in the mood anymore. Stella continued to shoot daggers at the man behind the security desk. She was considering getting a couple of friends together to meet the bastard after his shift ended. She knew a couple of people who would do it as favor to get in her good graces and her panties. Another ballbreaker would charge her a couple of hundred, but he’d do a good job. The guard would remember her for the rest of his life. That is, every time he tried to walk without a limp. He’s a effing, I don’t know what! she muttered.

      Honey, stop messing with the man. He’s brand new here. It’s literally his first day.

      I should call Old Man Tillary and make it his last day too!

      Vivian pretended to scold Stella. Now, now, Baby Girl. Don’t be mean to the new guy. He didn’t know you weren’t dangerous … not to him anyway. Vivian winked at her soon-to-be conquest if she played the game just right. In that leather outfit, he doesn’t know how dangerous you are to my health. You could definitely give me a heart attack today. Don’t you dare go anywhere! She marched over to the security desk and used the phone to call Adele.

      Within several minutes, Adele brought her laptop briefcase, a leather shoulder bag that matched her shoes and topcoat that provided a nice contrast. Your private chariot awaits you outside, Miss Vivian. She eyed Stunning Stella, who still had plenty of steam coming out of her ears. Stella paced back and forth, snorting at the new guard like a bull ready to charge at the slightest provocation. Good luck calming her down, Miss Vivian. She looks ready to explode, she whispered.

      Vivian grinned confidently at Adele, then squeezed her arm. Or hot enough to … Well, you just fill in the blanks. Honey, I learned a long time ago, anybody that can get that angry has passion times ten in the bedroom when channeled in the appropriate direction. Tell Maurice I’ll call him later tonight about that book tour.

      Adele nodded. Yes, Miss Vivian. I’ll tell him.

      Vivian tugged gently on Stella’s leather-covered arm. Come, Baby Girl, let Mama show you something you’re gonna love. Stella pouted, then sulked but allowed herself to be pulled into a private town car parked outside. The driver was leaning against the car, waiting to help his passengers into the rear. The nice thing about town cars was their privacy and their discreet drivers. Driver, leave the door open until I tell you to close it.

      So show me, Viv. Show me whatever shit you’re talking about. Stella pulled away from her lover’s grip to place her hands on perfectly shaped, leather-covered hips.

      Vivian perused her young lover. Her gaze—actually, a leer more than a gaze— started from the top of Stella’s relaxed blond fade to large dark eyes down an enticing neck, then cut to large succulent brown breasts emphasized by the tight V-neck tee. Her eyes lingered there for long moment, then she licked dry lips as her eyes traveled down a flat waist to the fly on the extra snug leather pants.

      God, Baby Girl, you know how much I love leather on you, Vivian whispered, dropping her hands to reach out to stroke the fly on the leather pants with a palm. She pressed into Stella’s fly until Stella moaned, then rested her chin on Vivian’s shoulder. Vivian knew as soon as she heard the sensual sounds that Stella wasn’t angry anymore. Vivian also knew what came next. Stella would shift her locked-up-tight stance to wide open and offer up her lush body. Without seeing, just relying on touch, Vivian unbuttoned and unzipped Stella’s fly just enough to slide her hands into her snug pants to play. She searched through silky panties. Where are you? she sing-songed as she stroked, caressed, and dragged fingers across a hairless triangle just above her target.

      Oh shit, Viv, Stella murmured, wiggling her crotch against the hands playing with her stuff. Don’t tease me like this!

      I can’t find her, Baby Girl, Vivian taunted softly as she continued to drag her hands lightly up, then down hairless but juicy lips, feeling their readiness. She prayed she hadn’t guessed wrong. Stella loved PDA as much as she did. Anybody can walk by and see us. Want me to stop searching?

      Don’t stop. Stella moaned louder, then leaned up, pulling Vivian’s head closer to thrust her tongue inside Vivian’s mouth. In, then out, faster and faster. Tongues whirling and twirling around each other. Lips meeting, sucking, licking, and kissing again.

      Driver, close the door. Vivian’s fingers entered Stella’s core. Take us home.

      Stella strained against them, fighting the climax but at the same time wanting it to last. Stella grabbed on to Vivian’s strong shoulders for balance so she could move slowly against the fingers inside her. Oh God! She shivered when Vivian’s thumb pad continued to stroke her clit. You found her. Now fuck her good! she rasped as she lost control of her body. She pushed Viv’s fingers deeper, humping like she’d never screwed before. She closed her eyes. She was exploding into Viv’s trusted hands. She became aware of Vivian’s sweating forehead resting against her forehead.

      Whew! Baby Girl, you may have to carry Mama upstairs to the bedroom.

      You know I could do that with no problem. I love seeing you in this condition. Stella pulled Vivian against her until she braced Vivian against the town car’s door. She nuzzled Vivian’s neck, tasting the salty dampness. You’re all wet and sweaty. I worked you hard, huh?

      What do you think? Vivian sighed. She was suddenly sleepy, very sleepy. If they were at her place, she’d roll over in bed and take a nap. Usually, Stella found other ways to entertain herself until she emerged from her cocoon. Her video tape collection of classics was also available, as were her CDs, her Gameboy, and some video games she could hook up to the TV in the living room. Once Stella grew bored with non-human playthings, she’d wake up with Stella nuzzling her or tickling her or poking her until she opened one eye. Stella wanted to be petted and screwed until neither one of them could move another muscle.

      Stella kissed Vivian’s forehead, then tilted her chin to look in her eyes. "You’re ready to fall asleep. We’ll be at your

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