The Queen's Diamond Read online

  The Queen’s Diamond

  Niyah Moore

  www.urbanbooks.net

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Acknowledgments

  1 - DESIRE

  2 - DESIRE

  3 - DESIRE

  4 - DESIRE

  5 - DESIRE

  6 - DESIRE

  7 - DESIRE

  8 - LUXURY

  9 - DESIRE

  10 - LUXURY

  11 - DESIRE

  12 - LUXURY

  13 - DESIRE

  14 - DESIRE

  15 - LUXURY

  16 - DESIRE

  17 - LUXURY

  18 - DESIRE

  19 - LUXURY

  20 - DESIRE

  21 - LUXURY

  22 - DESIRE

  23 - LUXURY

  24 - DESIRE

  25 - LUXURY

  26 - DESIRE

  27 - LUXURY

  28 - EGYPT

  29 - DESIRE

  30 - LUXURY

  31 - DESIRE

  32 - DESIRE

  33 - LUXURY

  34 - LUXURY

  35 - DESIRE

  36 - EGYPT

  37 - DESIRE

  38 - DESIRE

  39 - LUXURY

  40 - DESIRE

  41 - LUXURY

  42 - DESIRE

  Urban Books, LLC

  300 Farmingdale Road, N.Y.-Route 109

  Farmingdale, NY 11735

  The Queen’s Diamond Copyright © 2020 Niyah Moore

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without prior consent of the Publisher, except brief quotes used in reviews.

  ISBN: 978-1-6455-6079-1

  eISBN 13: 978-1-64556-080-7

  eISBN 10: 1-64556-080-5

  First Trade Paperback Printing October 2020

  This is a work of fiction. Any references or similarities to actual events, real people, living or dead, or to real locales are intended to give the novel a sense of reality. Any similarity in other names, characters, places, and incidents is entirely coincidental.

  Distributed by Kensington Publishing Corp.

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  Acknowledgments

  I thank God for giving me the precious gift of prose. Without Him, I am nothing.

  I used to dream about being a published author when I was a child, and I must thank everyone who supported me while I made that dream come true. If it weren’t for social media, and the literary network I connected with over the years, my journey probably wouldn’t be what it is.

  To my husband, Malcolm, and my children, Cameron, Ciera, Londyn (Rest in heaven), and Miles, you guys are my backbone. You’ve allowed me to take time away from being your wife and mother to follow my dreams. I am forever grateful.

  Thank you to my parents, the best in-laws (in love) in the world, my siblings, and my family for showing your love and support.

  I would like to express my gratitude to N’Tyse, the best agent anyone can ask for. Thank you for believing in me and grinding so hard. We’ve been working with one another for only a year, and in that year, you’ve done so much for me.

  To Carl Weber and the Urban Books / Renaissance Team, thank you so much for my opportunity to shine with y’all.

  I’d like to give a shout-out to my extensive network of mentors and literary gems. I can’t name everyone, but just know that I love you all: Carla Pennington (Pen Twin), Zane, Karen E. Quinones Miller, Shonell Bacon, Shakir Rashaan, Phoenix Rayne, Nicki B, Rikenya Hunter, B. Love, Shan, Diane Rembert, Eric Jerome Dickey, Carol Hill-Mackey, Tee C. Royal, and so many more. Thank you for being encouraging and uplifting. Each and every one of you rocks.

  1

  DESIRE

  2015 – The Beginning of the End

  “Bitch, you ain’t nothin’ without me. I made you!”

  Luxury’s words were clear, vivid, and cruel. They hurt as they dug into me like a finger twisting into a bullet’s entrance wound. I would’ve liked it better if he had taken a knife to my skin than spoken those punishing words. He knew everything there was to know about me, every perceived flaw, every vulnerability, so I didn’t understand why he was talking crazy. At first, I thought he was just talking like that because he was drunk and high. He usually knew exactly where to apply pressure and how to get underneath my skin, but never to a point where I felt worthless. I was such a confident woman, but now he had me second-guessing myself.

  Am I nothing without him?

  To think that his pressure made me into a diamond, but now he was trying to crush me. How could he annihilate a diamond like me? Diamonds were supposed to be the hardest natural material in the world. I learned quickly that hardest didn’t mean indestructible.

  “You hear me, bitch?” he said. “You ain’t shit without me!”

  Luxury’s words were ringing in my ears like a gong, reminding me of my forgotten pain, my worst memories, and of the times I had felt most abandoned. Here I was, at the height of my professional music career, shining, without a care in the world. Overnight, I had become a star with his guidance, but he hadn’t made me. He wanted me strapped at his side like his 9 mm pistol so it would be hard for me to leave. He thought those words would remind me of everything he had ever done for me.

  With his hands gripping the collar of my black mink coat, he dared me to fight. He wanted a boxing match, and part of him was craving it, but I didn’t want to fight. I just wanted to move on with my life, because this Luxury and Desire thing wasn’t working anymore.

  “Luxury,” I breathed out, and my breath turned into fog. That was how cold it was that winter night. We were standing right in front of his Hellcat in the parking lot of Square Eights Club. Tears welled up in my eyes as I pleaded, “Please, let me go.”

  He smirked at the way I pleaded. My pleading only made him feel more powerful.

  “Hell nah, bitch! I ain’t lettin’ you go. Get yo’ ass in the car right now. You out here playin’.” He ground his teeth together as his jaw moved from left to right. The E-pills he had popped earlier in the night made his jaw do that.

  How we had got to this point ran through my mind like a speeding bullet. Before we’d left Square Eights, a nightclub where I had a paid appearance, the night had been Gucci. We had smoked a few blunts and had had a few drinks, but after a couple of pills, he had started feeling himself a little too hard. I’d been ready to go by then, because he was in some bitch’s face like I wasn’t standing there, trying his hardest to make me jealous. His level of disrespect had risen to a new height. He had never tried no shit like this before, because he already knew how I felt about other bitches.

  When I’d bolted out of the club, he’d been on my heels.

  That was when I’d stood in front of his car and screamed to the heavens, “I’m done. I can’t take this shit anymore, disrespectful-ass nigga. I’m gone.”

  Blame the liquor for giving me the courage to finally let off what I had been thinking, but now that my truth had spilled out of my mouth, I couldn’t take it back.

  I had turned to walk away to hit up Uber to pick me up, but he’d snatched my ass up so quick, my cell phone had hit the concrete. I wasn’t used to Luxury lunging at me, tearing me apart with no holds barred, as if I had crossed some invisible line in the sand, so I hadn’t understood what was going on at that moment. There were too many witnesses outside, so I hadn’t thought he would be stupid enough to put his hands on me. It was clear
to me now that either he didn’t give two fucks or he was too high to pay attention to his surroundings.

  Run, a voice screamed inside my head. I needed to break free and run like hell to anyone for help, but he had a tight grip on my neck. Out the corner of my eye, I spotted a group of drunk women heading to jump into a Lyft parked right in front of the club. No sooner did I think I could scream to get their attention than he backhanded me. The smack was as loud as a clap, and it stung my face. I was no longer intoxicated; it felt like he had slapped me sober.

  “Bitch, you think I’m playin’ with you?” he shouted. “Get yo’ ass in the car! You ain’t goin’ no fuckin’ where. Don’t make me say it again.”

  I could feel a small cut where his pinkie ring had caught me right below my right eye. I staggered backward, clutching my face. He grabbed my neck again to make sure I wouldn’t run. I felt more pain as the second blow came for my abdomen. A sudden gush of pain jolted throughout my body. My stomach ached, and my legs began to weaken. His hard fist hit me in the head again, and this time, I fell from the force of it on the ground. His fist kept cracking me in my face, snapping it back with the strength of his blows. My head reeled as it slammed into the concrete.

  “I poured everything into you! Now you wanna up and leave? Mothafucka, it don’t work like that,” he yelled.

  He kicked me while I tried to curl up into a ball to protect myself. I didn’t remember how many times he kicked. I just remembered thinking, Why is Luxury trying to kill me?

  2

  DESIRE

  Rewind to 2012 – Young Street Dreamin’

  Tyga’s “Rack City” sounded as my alarm on my HTC One X to wake me up.

  It was 6:00 a.m. on a Saturday, and I had to get up to go to Saturday school. I still couldn’t believe they had ordered me to attend school on a Saturday as a way of punishing for ditching too many classes that week. This shit was stupid, not to mention it was my eighteenth birthday. If they thought I would spend my birthday handwriting dumb essays, they were gonna have to think of another form of punishment.

  Slowly and reluctantly, I pulled back my purple sheet and uncovered my face. I blinked, closed my eyes, and blinked again. Streaks of sunlight coming through my window blinded me as I opened my eyes. Kicking the covers on the floor, I sat up, dragged my feet off the bed, and rubbed my eyes with my knuckles. I stretched, reaching toward the ceiling, and yawned.

  I turned off my alarm on my phone and looked around my junky room. I needed to fold the clean clothes that were spilling out of the basket and put the dirty clothes that were piled high in the corner in the washer, but I didn’t feel like it. Laundry was always the last thing on my mind and one of the many things my mom complained about. Today was my birthday.

  “Happy Birthday to me,” I said to myself dryly.

  I wasn’t excited about my birthday, because we were in the midst of hurricane season. It was tax-free storm-supply week at the stores, so that was what my parents were focused on. I checked the weather report, and it was devoid of hurricanes, so I didn’t want to waste a beautiful day in Saturday school.

  “Nope, I ain’t going,” I mumbled to myself.

  We had only three more weeks of school anyway. I wasn’t about to waste my time.

  My bedroom door swung open, making a whooshing sound, and my mom barged into my room like she was the Miami PD.

  Why can’t she just knock for once? I thought as I scowled at her. While scratching my messy head, I realized I could’ve been naked or something. But she wouldn’t care even if I was naked. I didn’t pay any bills, so I had no say about anything around here. This was her door and her room. I couldn’t wait to move out. I didn’t know why she was on me so tight all the time. She acted like she paid bills. She didn’t pay for shit, either. She didn’t even have a job.

  My mom had been born and raised in South Florida and had lived in different parts of the region. She looked like she could be my older sister. Her long, curly black hair was pulled into a high ponytail, and she had a scarf tied around her head like Tupac. There was always a deep scowl on her face, her nose was usually turned up, and her big eyes always looked like they were going to pop out of her head. Curse words flew out of her mouth every single time she addressed me. I didn’t get what I did that made her hate me so much.

  I stared at her through half-opened eyes, waiting for her to say something.

  “Get up and get yo’ raggedy ass ready for detention,” she barked.

  I can’t get a “Happy Birthday”? Why I gotta be raggedy?

  “I ain’t gotta go,” I answered, rolling my eyes.

  “What you mean, you ain’t gotta go? You ain’t got no choice. Get yo’ ass up right now.”

  “But, Ma, it’s my birthday,” I whined.

  “I don’t give a shit if it was Jesus’s birthday. Hell, I know what today is. You the dummy that keeps fuckin’ up in school. It’s bad enough I get a call from the principal yesterday, talkin’ about you missing some credits. Did you know you ain’t graduating? Huh? You know that, li’l bitch?”

  I wasn’t shocked that she called me out of my name. But I didn’t know I wasn’t graduating. I knew I had a couple of Ds and Fs, but damn. My heart sank into my stomach as I smacked my lips. “What? Man . . .”

  “Man, my ass, Desirae. You and this li’l funky, half-ass attitude is really starting to work my last mothafuckin’ nerve. You better start actin’ right. I mean that shit. I ain’t raising no dummies.”

  I took a deep breath and exhaled as I swiveled out of bed. Standing on my feet, I glared at my mother. She was always nagging and tripping. “You be on that bullshit,” I mumbled.

  “What you just say?” She stepped farther into my room, with her hands on her wide hips. “Speak up.”

  “Nothin’, Ma. Dang.”

  “Oh, I heard you. You think you are grown now? You turn eighteen, and now I be on that bullshit?”

  Feeling my insides boil, I screamed, “I am grown.”

  “Well, get yo’ grown ass on up outta here, then. See ya. Wouldn’t want to be ya.”

  Storming out of my bedroom, my footsteps thudding loudly against the wood floor, I yelled at the top of my lungs, “Papi.”

  She was behind me, walking fast. “Tell your papi. He ’bout sick of ya fast ass, too, but he acts like he too scared to tell ya that. Out here fuckin’ on these nasty-ass boys all the time. You think we didn’t know that, huh? He out in the backyard with your brother. At least Javier knows how to help around here, unlike your lazy ass.”

  “Jav is a grown-ass man. He needs to start paying some rent, don’t ya think? Why you ain’t sweatin’ him like you sweat me?” I slid open the sliding door in the dining room, and the crisp morning air chilled my body. I screamed, “Papi!”

  “What?” he asked as he kept trimming the bushes.

  My papi was born Diego Fernández and had been raised in Cuba. His family were poor coffee farmers, but they were hard workers. When his family moved to Miami’s Little Havana, his father started a coffee factory that sorted, washed, dried, milled, and bagged Cuban coffee beans. Grandpa became the coffee plug, with his connection to Cuba. That little coffee factory grew, and our family brand expanded all thanks to my papi. In South Florida, people thought Cuban coffee was superior. People loved drinking dark-roasted blends from small cups.

  When Papi met my mom, it was love at first sight. He loved her black ass. He was seventeen years older than her, and Javier was already three years old. He wasn’t my papi’s son, but my papi took care of him like his own because Javier’s dad was in prison, serving a life sentence for trafficking cocaine from Colombia. Papi was a good man. He wanted his family out of the ghetto, and he gave us the world. Once business took off, he moved us to East Little Havana, where the houses were nicer, and we had grass to play in.

  “Papi, Ma is tryin’ to kick me out.”

  “Tell him why I’m kickin’ yo’ ass out,” she hollered, opening the sliding door wider so Papi could see both
of us. “Diego, I’m tired of Desirae’s mouth. She’s in here talkin’ too much shit.”

  “Don’t talk shit to your mamá,” he replied nonchalantly, keeping his eyes on those bushes.

  He was used to me and Mama going back and forth, and most times he had my back, so I didn’t understand that he was so quick to take her side this time just to shut her up.

  Javier’s fat ass brought the lawn mower from the garage and positioned it on the grass.

  “Don’t you cut that on, Javier,” Mama ordered.

  Javier wore a confused look. “Why? What did Des do now?”

  “She lost her damn mind, that’s what. You need to have a talk with your sister before her hot ass ends up on the street, sellin’ pussy,” Mama said. “Her mouth tryin’a write a check her ass can’t cash.”

  Javier didn’t respond as he put his headphones on. His iPod Nano was the only thing he cared about. He walked past us into the house. He never, ever had the big brother, little sister conversations with me. We didn’t get along like that, and we were only five years apart. How was he going to give me any kind of advice when he had never left home? He couldn’t even take care of himself at twenty-three years old, with his big, grown, overweight ass.

  Papi stopped what he was doing and walked closer to me. “Are you getting ready for school?” he asked, finally looking at me through his thick glasses.

  “No. I don’t have to go. It’s my birthday.”

  “You think because it’s your birthday, you deserve a pass?”

  “Yeah,” I replied, with my arms crossing my chest. “Who wants to spend their birthday at Saturday school? It’s not mandatory. Hell, I’m not graduating, anyway, so what’s the point?”

  “Mierda,” he cursed in Spanish under his breath. “You know you won’t get a pass this time,” he said to me firmly. “Get dressed, and I’ll take you to school.”

  My mouth nearly dropped open, because he never talked to me that way. “This ain’t fair.”