Lovers & Players by Jackie Collins Read Free Book Online Page B

jumped off the bed, stuck out her tongue at him, and yelled defiantly, ‘You don’t scare me , old man.’ Then she’d raced from the room.
    That night a very distressed Mama said things were difficult with Mr Diamond and it was best if she went to live with her aunt Aretha and cousin Cindi for a short while. ‘You’ll be happier there,’ Mama had said, staring at the floor. ‘An’ it’ll only be until I can talk Mr Diamond into having you back.’
    As if she had a choice.
    ‘Cool with me,’ Liberty had answered, holding back tears, because it really wasn’t cool at all: she had no desire to be sent away. ‘I hate it here, anyway,’ she’d added defiantly. ‘It stinks. An’ I hate that horrible man you work for. He stinks. I hate everything! ’
    ‘Maybe in a few months you’ll come back,’ Mama had said, holding back tears of her own. ‘Mr Diamond’s not such a bad man, you’ll see.’
    ‘No, thanks!’ she’d said fiercely. And she’d meant it.
    Moving back to Harlem to live with her aunt and cousin turned out to be a pleasant surprise. They’d recently relocated to New York from their home in Atlanta after the death of Cindi’s father. Aunt Aretha–her mother’s sister–was the total opposite of Mama. Overweight, cheerful and full of laughter, Aretha worked in a cake factory and obviously enjoyed her job, especially the perks. Nobody was crazy enough to turn down free cakes and cookies, not in Aretha’s world.
    Cindi, who was three years older than Liberty, welcomed her like a sister. The two of them connected immediately, and for the first time since moving to Mr Diamond’s house, Liberty felt like she had a family.
    The really good news was that she got to go back to her old school and there was Tony, fifteen and more handsome than ever. The bad news was that he had a girlfriend, a skinny white girl with lank yellow hair and a gap between her front teeth.
    Liberty confided her crush to Cindi, who immediately decided that the girlfriend presented no problem, and that they could easily do something about it. So, on Liberty’s thirteenth birthday, Cindi helped fix her makeup and straighten her hair so that it wasn’t a mass of unruly frizz. Next, Liberty put on her tightest T-shirt and skinniest jeans, adding a pair of high-heeled sandals, borrowed from Cindi, which were too big, but who cared? Then the two of them made their way to the bowling alley where Tony had a night-time job.
    At thirteen Liberty was already a knock-out, and with the makeup, tight jeans and new ‘do’, she looked at least sixteen. Tony couldn’t help but notice and, with a little coaching from Cindi on how to behave, Liberty got herself a boyfriend.
    Cindi’s coaching had included a lesson on how to give a boy oral sex. ‘You don’t have to screw ’em,’ Cindi had informed her matter-of-factly. ‘All you gotta do is give ’em a little of this,’ she’d added, demonstrating with her generous mouth on a banana. ‘Do it right, girl, an’ the dude’ll be yours for as long as you wanna keep him.’
    I want to keep him forever , Liberty had thought, so she did as Cindi suggested, and Tony put up no objections.
    Unfortunately, a year later Tony graduated from high school and moved to Miami with his mom, which was a big blow because having a boyfriend was a whole new deal: it had made Liberty feel important, like she mattered to someone.
    After Tony left there was no stopping her. Getting boys was easy. Cindi was right: give ’em a few minutes of what they liked best, and they hung around until you were done with them. She soon became an expert at pleasing whichever boy she fancied. Oral sex was no big deal and, as President Clinton had informed the nation, it wasn’t really sex.
    She didn’t get into the real deal until she was sixteen and fell madly in love with the lead singer in an amateur rock group. He was a white rapper from England who emulated Eminem. Skeleton thin, with piercing eyes and a tough