Homecourt Advantage by Rita Ewing Read Free Book Online

coming from a place of love—even when they mercilessly teased one another.
    Casey crossed her arms over her chest and began tapping her Gucci-clad foot on the marble floor as Remy ran her fingers through her jet black straight hair.
    “Would you come on, girl? Aren’t you late enough?” Casey said, grabbing Remy’s arm.
    “I told you I had rehearsal for my ‘Happiness Is Divine’ video. You should be glad I made time for y’all,” Remy said, flicking her wrist in front of Casey’s face.
    “Oooh, so it’s like that now,” Casey began, giggling as she turned toward the long corridor that led them through her fourteen-room Central Park South penthouse. “I’m gonna tell them what you said. You know they already think you’re a prima donna as it is.”
    “Casey! Don’t you go in there playin’ around and embarrass me.”
    “Whatever are you talking about, dear?” Casey said with a wicked grin.
    “You know exactly what I mean.”
    As the two ladies walked through the wide hallway with the marbleized walls adorned by original Ernie Barnes paintings and Romare Bearden collages, Casey knew exactly what Remy meant. She had come to realize over the years that Remy avoided talking about her work with most people. Remy never basked in her own limelight. She regularly rubbed elbows with more stars than all of them combined would ever meet in their lifetimes, but she would rather discuss Trina’s latest recipe or Lorraine and Dawn’s work at the hospital than even mention her video shoot with the four hottest young male models in the industry.
    As Casey and Remy entered the library, all of the women looked at Remy’s slender physique silhouetted in the doorway. Trina had gotten comfortable and kicked up her thick, shoeless feet on the brown leather chaise lounge. Dawn and Lorraine were sitting around the mosaic tile coffee table on the suede sofa, drinking coffee, undoubtedly swapping hospital stories. The samplings of sweets Trina had baked were almost gone.
    “Hello, ladies. Sorry I’m late. You know how midtown traffic can be this time of the day,” Remy said, walking toward Lorraine and Dawn as they stood up.
    True to form, Remy mentioned nothing about the video. Casey watched Remy kiss the two women and then head over to a stretched-out Trina, who made no effort to budge from her seat. Trina looked bloated and exhausted leaning back in the chaise as Remy bent down and greeted her in kind.
    “Don’t even worry about it,” Trina began, sounding every bit like the wise fourteen-year NBA veteran wife she was. “You know what your girl brought everyone here for; you’re not missing anything.”
    Casey had already briefed Remy on what she planned to talk to the women about, swearing her to secrecy when she told her about the threat to sell the Flyers. Her best friend knew what a precarious position Alexis had placed her in. Remy, Dawn, and Lorraine had been no-shows at Alexis’s breakfast meeting three days ago, and Caseynow had been assigned to pass on Alexis’s message. Although Trina
had
attended the gathering, Alexis had been mortified by her appearance, pulling Casey aside to say that Trina looked “slovenly and tacky.” She believed Trina was in dire need of extra “coaching” on improving her image.
    “Mrs. Coach’s breakfast was a waste of everybody’s time,” said Trina. “I heard her and Coach been playin’ those trifling mind games for years, especially at play-off time. Now she’s just tryin’ to get Casey to do her dirty work.”
    It wasn’t as if Casey could blame Trina for feeling that way, but then again, Trina wasn’t in her position. Of course, Casey was still trying to figure what exactly her position was. She knew her concern for Brent’s career was a major part of it, but she was beginning to wonder if even that was worth manipulating her friends.
    “God, Casey, no matter how many times I come over here, the view always amazes me, especially on a day like this,” Remy