From New York Times bestselling author Mary B. Morrison comes a powerful, sexy story about life’s ups and downs—and the wondrous ways in which love can save the day…

With some high-profile legal trouble behind him and a promising NBA career ahead of him—plus his engagement to his spirited soul mate, the irrepressible Fancy Taylor—former playboy Darius Jones is back on top. But bad news soon threatens to take him right back down.

When Darius’s wealthy stepfather falls gravely ill, the outcome leaves Darius’s mother, Jada, in a deep depression—and deeply dependent on Candice, an opportunistic writer friend who has less than her best interests at heart. But Jada isn’t Darius’s only concern. He’s hiding a potential health issue of his own—one that could cost him his professional future, and his relationship with Fancy. Worried about his mother, not to mention himself, Darius takes a time-out to go back home and care for her. There, thanks to Candice’s nosiness—and negligence—he discovers a shocking truth about the bombshell secret he has been carrying…

“The hottest book I’ve read this year.” —Carl Weber, New York Times bestselling author on He’s Just A Friend

“Morrison delivers a deep, passionate story that holds readers from beginning to end.” —Black Issues Book Review on Never Again Once More

MARY B. MORRISON is the national bestselling author of Nothing Has Ever Felt Like This, Somebody’s Gotta Be On Top, He’s Just a Friend, Never Again Once More, Soul Mates Dissipate, Who’s Making Love, and Justice, Just Us, Just Me. She lives in Oakland, California, with her son, Jesse Byrd, Jr., nearby on a full basketball scholarship at the University of San Francisco. Her new hardcover, Sweeter Than Honey, will be on sale in August 2007. Visit Mary at www.marymorrison.com.

Prologue
A black woman did it all... because she had to. She did it all and she did it well, caring for others while neglecting herself. Four hundred and fifty years of birthing babies for white masters and black slaves sold off to the highest bidder, leaving her to raise her children all alone. Four hundred fifty–plus years struggling for freedom, while black men died, for what they seemingly couldn’t live with today, dignity.

Whose fault was that?

If only a man could teach a boy how to become a man, then the question would be rhetorical. If the black woman birthed the black man, raised the black man, loved the black man she gave life to, then when did the black man begin disrespecting the black woman, replacing her birth name with bitch?

Bitch. Bastard. Incontestably the black man could win at one thing: throwing a boomerang. The black man’s life would forever remain incomplete until he learned how to love and respect the black woman. Good or bad—what he believed was golden—a dick didn’t mean shit when the black man chose not to give back to the black woman what she’d freely given to him. Unconditional love. Respect. Devotion.

Freedom came with a price, and now that the black woman could choose her mate, her fate was the same, leaving her to take on more responsibility than she should, but not more than she could, so she carried on doing all she could do, the best she knew how. It’s been proven that if one tried to do everything, one would risk doing nothing well.

After dropping off the kids, working nine-to-five and then sometimes five-to-nine, picking up the kids, cooking dinner, changing diapers, checking homework, and lying down for a four—should be eight—hours’ rest, did the black woman have any quantitative time to invest in her children’s future? If she made time, did she have any qualitative time for herself? If the mother was unhealthy, the children were unhealthy too.

When the alarm clock sounded, the next day was a replica of yesterday, and it seemed like the groundhog saw its shadow every day because each tomorrow for the next eighteen-years-plus brought sorrows that would make demands of the black woman to carry on, humming the same old hymn . . . “I won’t complain.”

Who would take care of the black woman while she sacrificed to rear her kids, pay the bills, and all too often, sleep alone at night, wondering if her direct deposit would post in time to keep the lights on, or balance her checkbook the day before payday to restock the refrigerator before emptying the cabinets, or feed her children the last few slices of bread while she watched them eat?

The black woman didn’t need anybody’s empathy. She was a survivor by nature. The Mother of Jesus, many denied the undeniable, but what the black woman fell short of was an epiphany: a lesson in how to love herself first. How to stop stressing about not knowing if her baby daddy—daddies—would ever show up at his children’s events, parent-teacher conferences, if he’d ever pay her child support, and ultimately to stop worrying about whom he had sex with when he wasn’t loving her, that is, if he’d ever loved her.

Love or the lack thereof, based on his mother’s mistakes, Darius reluctantly admitted to himself, what most men at some point in their lives experienced; he was terrified of two things: falling in love and failure. No one had taught him how to attain one while avoiding the other. Either, or would render him vulnerable. Destroy his character. Ultimately strip him of his manhood.

A man in love was weak for his woman. Would do anything for his woman. The more he gave, the more control she wanted. Darius didn’t want to be hard on women; he had to be. The cold, callous, careless, arrogant, inconsiderate, selfish person ruling his existence, primarily with his dick, wasn’t him. But if Darius didn’t protect his heart, who would? Surely not the women who’d emotionally broken him down. Like the one blabbering on the other end of his cell phone wasting his time, burning up his daytime minutes.

Sitting in the white Hummer limousine, next to his fiancée, Darius regretted answering his phone. If it were up to him, he would’ve ignored the call, but no, Fancy had to insist, “Answer, it.” Translation, “Put that bitch in check so I won’t have to.”

Darius was stuck again between the old and the new pussies.

Ashlee cried in his ear, “I’m sorry.” No, she wasn’t. “I never wanted to hurt you.” Yes, she did. Otherwise she wouldn’t have phoned. “And no matter what, I love you.” That was probably the one truth.

No woman could resist Darius’s six-foot-eleven, 240-pound muscular caramel frame with six percent body fat, his lustrous shoulder- length locks, chiseled chin, hazel eyes, perfect white teeth, his millions of dollars, or his big eight-inch dick and the fact that he knew how to sling Slugger and eat pussy oh so sweet that the strongest women submitted to him.

Ashlee continued, “But you need to know.”

Exhaling, Darius conceded, “Then tell me.”

Crying, like most women did when they wanted sympathy for something that was their fault, Ashlee said, “Our son, Darius Junior, died from HIV complications.”

Whoa, that was some cold-blooded shit to drop on a brotha on his wedding day. Hell, any day. “And you?” Darius whispered.

Sniffling, Ashlee said, “Positive.”

The numbness in Darius’s body caused the phone to slip from between his fingers.

Picking up the phone, Fancy questioned Ashlee. “What did you tell him?” Fancy looked at the phone, then said, “Hello? Hello?” Staring at Darius, Fancy began crying along with him. She muttered, “She hung up. Please tell me. What did she say?”

If Fancy had kept her damn mouth shut, he wouldn’t be trippin’ over Ashlee’s bullshit. Why in the fuck did he have to answer his phone?

“Move! From now on, don’t tell me what to do.”

“Don’t you dare turn this on me! Fine, forget I asked. You think you can handle everything by yourself. In here,” Fancy scolded, pressing her finger into Darius’s temple. “Well, you can’t. And I’m not marrying a man who doesn’t need, trust, or value my opinions.”

Softly, Darius said, “It’s not like that. I do respect you.” Her opinion was what he didn’t care for. Darius pressed a button, lowering the divider window, then instructed the driver, “Man, take me straight home.”

“Oakland or Los Angeles?”

That’s how Darius wanted his life, clear cut. Black or white. A or

B. Gray areas were like women, ambiguous and complicated. Darius answered, “Los Angeles.” Banging his face against the limo window, Darius worried, was his HIV test, taken years ago, a false negative? How many women had he possibly infected? Darius could start with the one sitting next to him.