Page 70 of Anything Necessary for Her (Crenshaw Kings #9)

ONE WEEK LATER . . .

Since Wyatt had been on his shit, I wanted to reward him. He hadn’t been giving me too many issues out of the ordinary, and he’d been going to his shifts at the diner like clockwork.

He was at the women’s center today, spending his Saturday helping out, so I wanted to scoop him up and give him the rest of the day off.

Pulling up to the front, I expected to see him out there but didn’t. Figuring he had been given duties inside today, I hopped out the whip, saying what’s up to a few of the niggas guarding the door that knew me.

“You seen Wyatt?” I queried one nigga named Cash.

When he looked at his homie as if he didn’t know what to say, I immediately saw red.

“He—”

“Nah, I asked you a question, nigga.” I intercepted his homie’s statement.

“Behind the building,” he replied instantly, realizing how stupid it was to protect Wyatt’s ass.

Storming down the block and around the corner, I saw it was an alley that I heard voices flowing from.

As soon as I ventured down in it, I spotted Wyatt squatted to the floor with a bunch of other niggas, jacking his hand before shooting the dice out onto the gravelly alleyway.

“Fuck is wrong with you, niggas!” I barked, making everybody jump to their feet and race off. Wyatt tried to as well, but I snatched his ass back by the collar.

“That bitch ass nigga stole all the cash ’cause of you!” He snapped on me as I slammed him into the wall.

“Shut up!” I roared in his face. “Fuck is you doing? Back here fucking gambling! Not only that, this Sif’s wife’s shit! That nigga find out and you fucked!”

“Fuck you and bitch ass Sif!” Wyatt spat, and I couldn’t hold back.

I folded his ass in half with a knee to the stomach, then delivered two solid ass uppercuts, making him collapse to the ground. Before he was even down good, I sent my shoe into his stomach, causing him to gag and yowl.

“Fuck who?” I asked, going across his face back-to-back as a crowd started to form. “Who? Young punk!”

“Aight!” He cried, coughing, moaning, and groaning.

“Get yo’ ass up!” I yoked him to his feet, dragging him around the corner and then another corner to toss his ass into the passenger side of my whip. “What the fuck is wrong with you, nigga? Real shit,” I questioned as soon as I got into the car.

I didn’t understand niggas like Wyatt who wanted to do shit they didn’t have to. This lifestyle wasn’t pretty, fun, or none of that shit; yet, muthafuckas whose families resided in Beverly Hills always migrated this way in effort to be down.

Granted, Wyatt wasn’t as privileged, but he was still attempting to dip his foot into some shit that he didn’t have to.

Sighing, he grabbed a napkin from my glove compartment to wipe his bleeding mouth.

“The diner money ain’t much ’cause I got minor hours, and this shit here is for free.

” He gestured toward the women’s center we were still parked in front of.

“I need my own money but more of it. It’s shit I wanna do, and them little ass checks from the diner is barely enough for me to take a bitch to the movies and handle business like driving school and some other shit.

In order to do what I gotta do, I need to either sell or gamble. ”

“Nah, you ain’t gotta do shit. I make you work to keep yo’ ass occupied, not ’cause it’s an issue breaking you off when necessary. You not grown, Wyatt, so when you need shit that cost money, that’s where I come in. Just speak the fuck up.”

“I want my own money.”

“You got yo’ own money coming from the diner, little nigga.

Everything else is for me to handle. You only wanna do this stupid shit ’cause you think it’s a cooler look than clocking in somewhere or making honest money.

” I stared at him, but he wouldn’t look my way, lowering his head as he fidgeted.

“I’m gon’ show you some shit.” I started my whip, yielded, then pulled off from the curb.

After a while of driving with the absence of conversation and only music, we ended up at Inglewood Cemetery. The construction was crazy, so I had to find the best parking spot in order to hit all the areas I planned to.

“Why we here?” Wyatt frowned, and I ignored him, climbing out of the car.

He watched me for a moment before following my lead and then trailing me onto the grassy area filled with plots and headstones.

We meandered a bit, me mainly trying to remember where everybody was since, although they were in the same location, they were spread the fuck out. We may have been family through the streets, but it wasn’t by blood, and therefore, none of the old homies were buried near one another.

Finally, I located the first one and came to stand before the homie’s headstone, bearing a picture of him smiling innocently as if he didn’t run the streets like me, putting niggas in the place he’d eventually ended up as well.

“You remember Doe?” I asked Wyatt, nodding my head down to Donald’s grave.

“Kind of. He hasn’t been around in a minute, and I guess I know why,” Wyatt replied, almost mindlessly as he regarded the headstone.

“Yep. Come on.” I waved him on, making my way over since now that I had pinned down Donald’s grave, I knew how to get to the others. “This is Marcus. I don’t think you ever met him.” I stopped.

“You knew him too?” Wyatt looked up and over at me. He was almost my height, standing at six feet, one inch, whereas I was six feet, three inches.

“I did.” I nodded. “He was as much my friend as Donald was.”

“What happened to him?”

“Shot, just like Donald while making a play.” I let my eyes latch onto Wyatt’s and watched him swallow the lump in his throat. “Come on.”

“There’s more?”

“Of course. I told you this shit I do only got two routes; you either end up dead or in prison for the rest of ya fucking life. No matter what the outcome, though, they both leave you unable to spend that money you crave so much.” I halted again at another headstone.

“Dwayne Richards,” Wyatt read it off. “Shot too?”

“Yep. Drive-by on some retaliation shit,” I said.

“Well, at least it wasn’t drugs.” Wyatt attempted to snicker, but it ceased when he saw I wasn’t amused.

“It’s all the same game, Wyatt. You doing this shit and you gon’ make enemies, ’cause muthafuckas is always gon’ be jealous ’bout some shit.

You fuck on a bitch another nigga was checking for?

He’ll kill you. You popping it too much at the club, looking too rich and happy?

A nigga wanna kill you. You don’t wanna kick it or feed into a nigga’s groupie behavior?

He wanna kill you. It’s hard to find loyalty in this shit and even harder not to make enemies.

” As I noticed Wyatt looking uncomfortable, just like I wanted, I waved him on again.

He trailed me, quiet as hell, until we ended up at the last grave I planned to take him to. There were more, there always was and would continue to be, but I felt like four was enough.

“Van. I remember him.” Wyatt frowned. “Wait, I just saw you with him last year?” His brows furrowed further as if Ivan’s face on the headstone was a mistake. “And he was only twenty? I thought he was your age.”

“He not, and life moves quickly in this shit.” I eyed him before sitting down in the grass.

After Wyatt sat beside me silently, I continued.

“I ain’t gon’ front and act like some of this shit ain’t nice.

The money comes fast and is abundant, but that’s about it.

Everything else is negative. You rich as fuck but you always on edge, always vetting a muthafucka no matter how normal they seem—women included—and even the sound of a siren will have you paranoid.

I can’t remember the last time I was able to sleep peacefully by myself. ”

“If there are only two ways out, then how did Sif get out unscathed?”

“He ain’t get out unscathed. Nigga got shot a couple times, but by the grace of God, he made it.

” I glanced over to see Wyatt’s shock ridden face.

“Important part is he wasn’t greedy and got out of this shit eventually.

A lot of niggas get comfortable and start feeling invincible, and that’s where you mess up. ”

“So you’re gonna get out then, right? Like Sif and not be like the others?” he inquired, hopefully.

I nodded, realizing for the first time that Wyatt did love me.

“That was never my plan.” I stared out over the decline of the cemetery, knees drawn up as my forearms dangled over them. “I was gon’ ride this shit out until I eventually crashed, just to make sure y’all was good, but not no more.”

“’Cause of Banks?”

I smirked.

“Banks, yeah, but also ’cause of you and Waverley.

I realize I do care to be around and see what the fuck y’all do and make sure you stay on the right path.

I worried about a lot of shit growing up, Wyatt, and I don’t want that for you.

All I want you to do is be a fucking teenager and enjoy the shit.

Make something of yaself.” I finally gave him some eye contact.

“Jail ain’t fun, I been there, and I can only imagine prison.

This shit I do every day ain’t fun either.

If you only knew the solace I feel when I make it home to y’all or my girl, you wouldn’t ever think about doing what I do ever again. ”

“I’m not too interested in being shot or put in prison,” he stated, making my body sag subtly in relief.

He’d never said anything even remotely close to that shit.

“Good. I don’t either, but I also don’t like having to stomp a mud puddle in yo’ ass, so tighten up, aight? You got an opportunity to be any fucking thing you want to. Don’t get swallowed up by this shit because it looks easy and it look cool. Neither of those being true.