10,000 Hours With A Rich Menace (Caselli Family Book 1)

She slept peacefully, her curly hair was freshly washed. I could smell the almond and rose shampoo and conditioner I kept in all the bathrooms in the house. She smacked her teeth like she was eating something and did a few small jumps as she slept.

Her chest slowly lifted up and then fell as she made small noises while she was asleep. There was no doubt that she was beautiful. I’ve had my fair share of women, some of what the world would consider the baddest, and it was this unique shorty that had me sitting in her room watching her sleep.

There was a part of me that wanted to slide into bed beside her and lay next to her. Shit was weird because I hated for anyone to touch me. I remember when I was fucking Kim and she strung her arms around my neck, I nearly head butted her for doing something so stupid and out of the norm for our situation.

Even thinking about the shit now had me wanting to call her, invite her over here, so I could headbutt the shit out of her for trying that shit with me. Wonder stirring from her sleep pulled me from my thoughts. A soft melody played from her phone and her hand found its way to the night table as she blindly felt around for her glasses.

It was dark, a little after ten at night, and here I was showered and sitting in her room in my monogrammed robe. She took a little minute before she located her glasses and then rested them on her chest.

“Jesus, what did I get myself into?” she spoke out loud. “He’s not that bad… aside from the weird rules and full sanitizing mist to enter the house. You can live with that, right?”

“I’m not bad at all. You’re the one talking to yourself and then answering yourself, Wonder.” I made my presence known and she shot up in the bed, her wild hair all over her head.

Her curls were thick and full, perfect coils that framed her face. She quickly put her glasses on as she looked across the room at me sitting in the seating area. “Were you watching me sleep?”

“I was.”

My honesty caught her off guard. “Why are you sitting in the dark? I can’t even see you.” She finally found her words, while turning the lamp on next to her.

With the size of the room, the small light only illuminated the area she was in, leaving me in the dark.

“I like the dark, Wonder… calms me.”

She nodded her head and looked around the room. “Your home is very beautiful.”

“Appreciate it.”

“Like a fortress… nobody is getting in here.”

“I take protecting myself seriously… I have a soon to be wife to protect, too.”

She smiled. “Yeah, right.”

“What’s on your mind, Wonder? I can hear your thoughts way over here.” She pulled the covers off her body and sat on the edge of the bed until she got up and walked toward the windows.

She hugged herself as she looked out the window, as I took in the cami pajama set that she wore. Witnessing her ass in those shorts made me happy that I was still in the dark because I was about to fucking drool.

As she remained quiet and stared out the window, I observed her. My job was to observe women, make sure they were up to the standard of Case House. Observing them wasn’t just physical, either. I had to mentally get inside these women’s minds, and learn who they were. I was a good judge of character, and now with so many women under Case House, I wasn’t as hands on as I used to be.

Hence why I allowed some thieves in my camp, and it was really fucking with me that I couldn’t kill two of the people involved. The Case House women that thought they were slick were no longer breathing.

I didn’t sit around and wait for shit; I moved on things the minute I found out about the shit. The only reason Raye and Priscilla weren’t stinking, was because of the beauty in front of me. She was the person holding their lives in her hands.

“All I wanted was a vacation. It’s been so long since I’ve been on one… not since my mother passed away. Life has been so up and down… I have my high moments and then the low moments are so low that it makes me think what is life for anyway,” she rambled.

I removed myself from the chair and walked across the room, standing beside her and taking in my massive backyard, and view of Staten Island. Whenever I took in this view, I always felt like the king looking down on its subjects. I would never say that shit out loud, but the shit made me feel like royalty.

“Why the fuck would you do some dumb shit like transferring money into your account?” I asked, and she was caught off guard by the question or I guess how blunt I was.

Her head snapped in my direction before she turned to look back out the window when she realized I wasn’t going to apologize for the way I asked the question. “She’s my friend, I didn’t think she was doing something that could come back to kill us.”

“Was.”

“Yeah… was,” she sighed.

I slipped my hands in the front pocket of my robe and picked with the seam as we both took place in the window. “Look, I trust Jeffie with my life. There’s not much I do without getting her advice and she seems to think this shit is a good idea for the both of us. I need a wife, and you want your father and ex-best friend to live. The other side of this is that I kill them and you don’t marry me… and I really want to kill them.”

“How would this work?” she finally turned and was staring up at me. “Are we allowed to have relationships outside of this, you know, because this is fake. Do we continue to live together… I have so many questions.”

“Wonder, the minute you let another nigga touch you is the moment you gonna see why they call me Menace.”

She raised her eyebrow, skeptical of my statement, then folded her arms. “I’ve seen how you get down… earlier in that stinky warehouse.”

I laughed. “Nah, baby, that was light compared to how I come… not many can speak about it because they’re no longer with us.”

“So, you’re allowed to have relationships and I’m not.”

“Never said that.”

“Then we’re supposed to be miserable in this house without companionship… I mean, I’m not looking for anything right now, men kind of suck… especially Cornell,” she rolled her eyes and muttered to herself.

“Tony… Cornell… who the fuck are these people?”

Her head snapped up when I mentioned Tony. “How do you know Tony?”

“Wonder, you mentioned it at the warehouse.” I looked at my watch, and then over at her as she watched me.

“You and Jeffie always look at the time… what is so important that you need to know the time of the day at every second?”

I yawned. “You hungry?”

“Starving… Beans was very nice and got me chicken one of the days, but if I never see a sandwich again, I would be perfectly fine with that.”

“I see Beans had favorites.”

She smiled. “Maybe he knew I was innocent and I’m not a thief.”

“You steal grapes while food shopping… you’re a thief.”

I watched as she stomped her foot, sending her thighs jiggling. She squinted her eyes at me, then wrinkled her nose at me in this cute smirk. “Tell me you haven’t eaten a few grapes while food shopping.”

“Don’t food shop, so I wouldn’t be able to tell you.” I turned to head toward the door and looked over at her. “It’s just us tonight, so you can wear a robe or not.”

I watched as she looked at the robe with the Caselli crest on it. She grabbed the robe and put it on as she followed behind me.

Some nights Duke stayed in the guest house in the back with Lupita, it was two units. Other than security making their rounds around the property, it was always only me in the house after Jeffie left for the day.

I coolly walked down the hall and heard her bare feet slap against the floors behind me. “Why does one need a house this big?”

“I like having space.”

“You don’t get lonely here?”

“Nah.”

She continued to trail behind me. “I would get lonely here… then again, I’m lonely in my apartment sometimes. Estella usually keeps me company, but when she’s not there I get lonely. Why are you talking about your loneliness?”

I stopped and turned around. “You talk to yourself often, Wonder?”

She goofily smiled at me. “Is that a problem? I mean, we don’t have to get married if that is a problem.”

“You didn’t have many friends growing up, huh?”

“No.” She looked down.

I lifted her chin. “Me either.”

She smiled at me and then continued to follow me down to the kitchen. “Can I make us something? I’m a really good cook.”

“My food is already prepared.”

“Meal prep? Are you on a meal plan?”

“Nah.”

She whispered something to herself as she followed me into the kitchen and then into the walk-in fridge. I went to the fridge that was designated for my prepared meals that Lupita made every day.

She would make all my meals for the day before I was up in the morning and have them sitting on the counter to cool, then put them in the fridge if I didn’t get around to eating them for the day.

Like now.

I was busy all day and hadn’t eaten anything except for breakfast. Stevie looked at the meal in the plastic container and turned her nose up. “You can have anything in the world, and this is what you’re eating?”

Baked chicken, white rice and corn – fresh corn.

“The fuck wrong with my food… here… I didn’t eat lunch so you can have that one.” I handed her the second container and she looked at me and sighed.

We went back into the kitchen, and I pressed the button, and the microwave came out the drawer. While my food heated up, I leaned on the counter and watched as she shook the food around in the container.

“Guess I’m confused on why you’re having the same meal twice in one day? I can understand being on a strict diet… but you don’t take me as someone who is.”

I wasn’t about to get into why I liked what I did. This had been one of my favorite meals since I was a child. I didn’t eat it every day, but I did have it often. I was picky when it came to my food, and what I had.

My food couldn’t touch, and I didn’t like sauces on my food. The shit freaked me out whenever Landon squirted a ton of fucking ketchup on his eggs. What sociopath used ketchup on their eggs anyway?

I enjoyed shit the way that I did and lived alone because I never had to explain anything. With Stevie looking down at the meal, I knew eventually I would have to explain my way of life to her. It was one thing to hear it from Jeffie, and another thing to hear it from me.

I wasn’t there with her yet.

After I snatched the container from her and heated her food, we sat at the counter together. She pushed the chicken around the plastic container before she took a small bite.

I waited for her to say something because although it was a simple meal, Lupita made the best baked chicken. “Wow, it’s so flavorful, and moist. Chicken breast is almost always dry.”

I cut into my chicken and nodded my head, while she ate her food. Silence consumed us, neither of us feeling like we needed to have a conversation right now.

A lot happened today, so we didn’t need to sit and discuss anything. When I woke up this morning, I didn’t think that I would be welcoming a woman that stole from me into my home.

Stranger shit has happened… I guess.