Terrell motioned for Aliyah to sit in one of two front seats, watching her as she did so. “You all right?”
She nodded.
“You’re not afraid of flying are you?”
“No, but I’m usually on a bigger plane.”
“Don’t worry,” Terrell said, continuing to the bar that was midway back. “This is one of the safest planes out there and when it comes to pilots, Stan is top-notch. He flew fighter jets in the air force. He can do this hop to San Fran in his sleep. What can I get you to drink?”
“What are you having?”
“Let’s pop a bottle—make it a celebration.”
“What are we celebrating?”
Terrell shrugged. “Life.”
“Sounds good to me.”
Terrell poured two flutes and returned to his seat. He lifted his glass. “To a wonderful time in the big city.”
Aliyah tapped his glass and sipped. “Mmm, this is good. I don’t like champagne that’s either too dry or too sweet. This is neither.” She took another sip. “What brand is this?”
“It’s called Diamond, a Drake Wines product.”
Ah, yes. The grape-growing brother. “Your family owns a winery?”
“My immediate family is in real estate, for the most part. But my brother Warren, the one who co-owns the land with my grandfather, planted several acres of grapes that are now thriving. He did so on the advice of one of my cousins, whose family owns a resort and winery in Southern California.”
“Lots of success in your family.”
“We’ve been blessed.”
The captain walked back and asked them to buckle up. Ten minutes later they were above the clouds that had hovered for most of the day, surrounded by brilliant blue skies and a sun that would not be setting before they landed.
“So tell me about your family, Aliyah.”
“It’s not like yours, that’s for sure.”
“Few are.” This answer got a raised brow. “I don’t say that arrogantly, but honestly. It’s a lifestyle that is not commonly experienced, one I’m grateful to have. But nothing was handed to us on a silver platter. My family’s achievements come from a combination of luck, good timing and lots of hard work.”
Aliyah nodded, her mind awhirl with how to respond to his question. She wasn’t ashamed of her family, nor the struggles they all endured growing up in a vibrant but gritty section of Brooklyn’s Prospect Heights. The drive, resilience and determination to succeed arose from the notorious neighborhood activities she sometimes witnessed, events that left some childhood friends and acquaintances incarcerated too long, pregnant too young or dead too early. Those experiences helped make her who she was today. But she knew all too well how the upper two percent sometimes viewed the working class, since she’d spent twelve years—high school, undergrad and graduate school—surrounded by students of privilege and families of wealth. While dating Ernest, she had a bird’s-eye view of how high society operated—the judgments, condescension and exclusivity, and how friends were chosen less by personality and more by zip code and pedigree. Not even her becoming a doctor was good enough to gain entry. “A charity case to fulfill quotas” was how her attending the same Ivy League college as Ernest was described by his parents. As if her high SAT scores and 4.0 grade average—an average maintained even after the baby and while working part-time—had nothing to do with it.
Terrell mistook her silence. “Listen, Aliyah, I didn’t mean to offend you.”
“Oh, no. It’s not that.” She took a sip of champagne and gazed out the window a moment before turning back to him. “Kyle’s father is from a wealthy family, one into which I was never accepted. They abhorred my background, disapproved of our dating. My becoming pregnant left them petrified. Their vitriol was unrelenting, to the point where even I questioned my worth. It took a long time to rebuild my confidence. There is evidently still some work to do.”
“Where was Kyle’s father while his family attacked you?”
Her smile was bittersweet. “Mostly, on their side.”
“Even after you gave birth to his son?”
“Oh, that was just to trap him, you see, and a determination made only after paternity was proven by not one official test, but three.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“As serious as his parents were when they demanded I take them. After Kyle was born, they ramped up the pressure for him to dump his low-brow girlfriend and find someone respectable to marry. Someone with the right...credentials. That’s what he did.”
“Then you’re better off without him. A man who doesn’t have your back, no matter what the situation or who the person is attacking, doesn’t deserve you.”
“I appreciate that.”
“Hopefully he helps out financially, at least.”
“The bare minimum, thanks to creative accounting and a savvy attorney. What they didn’t understand, and still don’t, is that Ernest’s presence in Kyle’s life would be more valuable than any check he could write. Every child needs a father, but for boys, it’s even more important.
“In the end, it’s probably for the best. I wouldn’t feel comfortable leaving him alone with that set of grandparents. There’s no telling how they’d poison his mind, or scar his soul.”
Terrell reached over and caressed her face. “Would it sound too selfish for me to say that I’m glad he’s not in your life?”
“Yes, that sounds selfish. But I’m still glad you said it.”
He leaned. She leaned. Their lips touched, softly, exploring. Soon their tongues intertwined, still bearing the essence of the wine. He kissed her thoroughly. She matched him stroke for stroke.
He pulled back. “I’d better stop while I can. We’ll soon be landing.”
Terrell’s kiss erased yesteryear’s heartache. Aliyah relaxed into the comfort of the supple leather, and began to feel the excitement of being in a private plane with a handsome man, soaring to a night of fun. She finished her flute of champagne and turned flirty eyes to Terrell.
“I’m glad Kyle is at your center. All of the men there, at least the ones I’ve met, seem genuinely invested in the program’s success and are great male role models.”
“Including me?”
“Especially you.”
Terrell extended his arm across the aisle. Aliyah placed her small hand inside his much larger one. “I’m glad he’s there, too. We’ll do our best to provide him with the mentorship he needs. Meanwhile, tonight—” Terrell raised her hand and kissed it lightly “—I’d like to make sure his mother, the lovely Aliyah Robinson, gets whatever it is she wants and needs as well.”
They landed at San Francisco International Airport and were whisked away to a cozy, upscale restaurant with stunning views of the bay and the Golden Gate Bridge.
Aliyah looked around. “I didn’t expect we’d be someplace this fancy. Glad I wore my crystal stilettos or I’d feel out of place.”
“You could walk in here wearing a garbage bag and outshine every woman in the room.”
Aliyah