one night stand.

sixteen

Amber snuck out of the apartment leaving Rio still resting under the covers and his ice pack melting on his eye. She quietly grabbed her sandals and purse while crawling on the floor preventing the floor from creaking underneath her. Once out, she met with Hakeem in the lobby. He sat in an armchair with shades covering his face and his arms crossed like he was about business or had something shady going on. She took the seat in front of him and heavily blew air out of her nose as she just sat there. He scooted up to the edge and let a small laugh escape his mouth. He was still thinking about last night and how he was able to get his punch in. 

"Well, well, well, sleeping beauty has come to join us." He poked as he tilted his shades down to his nose. "Do I have a surprise for you." 

She wasn't bother by him and just listened since she didn't have the time to speak to him. Amber took a look at Hakeem's shoes and paid it no mind, she thought they were cute before she took a double take and gasped. The room she woke up in flashed back into her mind as she remembered those same shoes on the floor of the apartment. That same red paint stain on the toe and those same dirty laces. She slapped her hand against her mouth and moved from the chair scaring hakeem in the process. 

"No! Hakeem stop playing with me right now. It can't be you." Amber screamed as she kept pointing at his shoes. 

Hakeem just laughed as he watched Amber lose her mind over finally figuring out who it was this entire time. 

"How? We haven't spoken to each other since you broke up with me and left me in the middle of the highway." 

"Right, which led to the funniest thing, that night you were out trying to forget about me, I was invited by your sweet boy toy. Trey was the one who invited me and gave me the blessing to get with you. Hurts, doesn't it?" Hakeem confirmed as he showed Amber all the evidence he had against him. 

"The first meeting y'all had was planned, That dinner date too. None of the interactions you had with him were out of the blue. I told him to do that shit since you obviously wouldn't do it with me. Also, Devante was in on it too. 

Amber fell to the floor and started crying while Hakeem stood over her with polaroids dangling over her. Each photo of every interaction she had with Rio, Trey, Devante, and Anthony. She flipped through each of them and seen how she was posted up and stalked for months without a single clue. 

"That apartment you were in, Wasn't mine. It belonged to Trey." 

Hakeem left Amber to suck her tears up and gather herself before she had to face Rio and kiss him goodbye for his rescheduled flight. She took those polaroids and stuffed them in her pocket as she took the elevator back to her apartment. Devante came out of his apartment and seen Amber in the elevator, He stood there as she put her hand in his face and rushed past him. He stood there looking stupid as if he didn't receive a text revealing the work was done. She immediately took a bottle out of fridge and poured herself a glass. It was the only way to soothe her after receiving some low dirty shit. Rio woke from his slumber and planted a kiss on Amber's cheek before she pushed him off. 

"What's the matter? Did I do something wrong?" Rio asked confused.

"It's not you, I just found out some scummy ass shit and I'm not in the mood right now."

Rio placed his chin on Amber's shoulder and wrapped his arms around her waist. 

"You know you can tell me what happened."

Amber swallowed the last drop of her glass and threw the polaroids onto the counter for him to see. He removed himself from Amber and scanned through the photos as he seen a photo of him and Amber in the hallway and a photo of them the night when they made love. He was confused but shocked on how someone could've been watching them this whole time and hiding these types of photos. 

"Who did this? Who do I need to go find?" Rio barked as he grabbed his keys off the hook.

"Don't bother, I already figured out who it was and who was all in on it. I'm not surprised on who was all in it, they were after me but had to get through you in order to get me. That fight from last night was all planned." Amber exposed as she began putting the pieces together.

Down the hall, Trey and Devante were in Trey's apartment figuring out how to fix this and get rid of Rio. Trey stood by the corkboard filled with pinpoints, more photos, text messages, documents, flyers, and her ring. He was almost close to getting her back to the apartment if it wasn't for Shawn that night coming in and interrupting his plan. Devante wasn't actually setting up while the girls were gone, He was back in the apartment getting tips from Hakeem and following the driver all day before he beat them to the restaurant. Had Hakeem not told her or Amber putting the pieces together, they could've kept fucking with her, but it was too late. They tried to recruit Anthony in on it, but he threatened to tell Amber if they didn't leave her be. Chyna was also asked but she already somewhat told Amber the night of the exhibit. Their original plans of cornering her had fail through when Rio got a hold of her and gave her that watch and tried to fight off Trey. 

The other plan was trapping her in the car with Trey while she was asleep, but he messed up when he arrived at the art studio too fast and had to switch to plan B that also fell through. Every plan they had, she somehow outsmarted them, or they failed on their end. The trio had one more chance only and one attempt, they messed this up it would be over.