Page 24

Sahara’s drunk as hell by the time we make it to the hotel room. This shit working out perfectly. I didn’t know how I was finna get out of fucking her, but if the hard snores in my ear on the way up to the suite are any indication, that sedative I mixed in with that champagne worked like a charm.

I was scared on the dosage, in case I had to drink some, too, but then Mace let he.

“godbrother”

lay on her and eat her wings like I won’t kill all three of us.

Damn. I’ve fallen like my brothers for sure.

And I can’t even be stuck on her because the job’s not finished.

When I get us into the suite I dump that bitch onto the bed and take her purse with me into the bathroom.

It’s a long shot, finding anything in her phone. Van was very adamant in keeping her above board here and their hometown down south. So she’s green as fuck, but that would be the very reason why I find something in her phone.

I don’t have time to go all through it myself, so I take out my little prototype USB-C and connect it to her phone. Using a specific program I created, anything flagged with certain code words in her cloud will automatically come up on the screen for me.

A couple seconds later, shit starts popping up, and my temper flares so bad I almost drop her phone. I’m almost mad at myself that I didn’t realize none of the bullshit she’s been up to this whole time.

But at least she ain’t trap me.

I click on an old video, one before Sahara got that crazy ass bbl, and watch all two minutes of it.

Bitch lucky I never got anything or I’d strangle her myself.

Cheating? On me?

And getting caught like the rookie she is. Part of me wants to throw this in her face and act like I ain’t been dipping in finer, all-natural hoes this whole time. Shit, I’ve never been caught, so it really doesn’t count in my mind.

I take my USB-C out and pocket it, putting her phone back in her purse. My intrusive thoughts tell me to launch this shit at her back, but I don’t want her ass to wake up, so I just toss it onto the bed and take my kit out, sitting next to where she’s passed out.

I load the syringe up with one of G-Pops hookups, an undetectable tracker, and stick it into the bend of her wrist. She barely bleeds when I take the syringe out, and when I wipe it after keeping pressure for a couple minutes, nothing looks different.

I take a second to really look at her. At one point, I thought she’d be who I spent the rest of my life with. Then I thought, when she finally got enough of me, I’d still make sure she was straight, off the strength of her sister.

Now though? The shit she mixed up in? She’ll be lucky if she make it to the end of the year.

I leave her where she’s at and make my way back to my crib. Van doesn’t sleep much, especially when she’s OT, so after I shower and put on a fresh pair of draws, I call her.

Just as I thought, she answers on the second ring.

“I heard you popped back up. Why the late phone call, dy?”

I sigh, trying to find the words.

“Aw shit. What that girl do now?”

I lick my lips and rub my neck.

“It’s bad, Van. She got me so fucked up bro… I’ve killed for less. But even if I spare her, and get my bros to look the other way, the people she’s mixed in with won’t. I can try to get them all before they catch on but it’s no guarantee.”

The line is silent for a long moment. I don’t even hear her breathing. It’s been Van and Sahara since they were ten and three. For all the shit Sahara has done and seen for them to have a good life, a life together, Sahara resents her because she shielded her from most, if not all of it.

Just for Sahara to end up in the same bullshit anyway.

“What if I hide her?”

“Do you honestly think she’ll listen to you, Van? If you do, then do it.”

She sighs audibly, and I know she’s running her hands through her locs.

“Would… w-would Bully know–”

“Savannah. Please, please tell me you not back home visiting that nigga,” I seethe.

“It’s not like that. But would he know the people she’s mixed up with?”

her voice is low, and filled with shame, like it should fucking be.

“Yeah, Van. He would know them. Intimately. So do with that what you will. This my only warning about your sister, bro. If you can get her out the city under a rock, do that ASAP. But once it’s out of my hands, that’s it.”

“Thank you, dy. I’ll link with you once I get back.”

“Yeah, you do that.”

I hang up on her and groan. One thing at a time.

Dr. Bell would tell me it’s not my problem. Not my monkey, not my circus, she’d say. But as much as I know it’s not, it’s just not how I’m built. I can’t and won’t let my friends lose themselves, whether I’m good or not.

And the very last thing Van needs to ever do is let her punk ass ex-husband back in her life.

“Can we smoke in here? Cody ass don’t let nobody sleep if he not tired.”

“Nigga, this yo center. Fuck you asking us for?”

Nut scowls at Set.

“Well is this shit smell proof? I spark up, is Ms. Ayesha gone come down here accusing me of hotboxing the Center? You the one played architect.”

Set sparks up his wood anyway, pulling it deep before holding it.

“Y’all niggas gone argue like an old couple until y’all shitting in diapers,”

Turk shakes his head.

“Niggas be what, Ty-Ty?”

Ty looks up from his phone and smirks.

“Jelly as fuck, Dub. Shit, you don’t look like you got any sleep either.”

“Not ‘cause of Rue Bea,”

Turk grins and smacks his lips.

Ty sits up in his chair.

“It’s threesomes every night foreal?”

“Man, hell naw. I know it’s not that,”

Nut rants.

“Nah, it is that, prolly.”

Set exhales and ashes his wood.

“You know lesbians be strapping. No one has to bust a nut, so they fucking hours at a time and shit because the plasdick always hard. And Autumn and Pay be damn near finna fuck in public anyway. You know they turning Big Turk every way but loose.”

“I’m not confirming or denying shit about my sex life with my wives, and you niggas don’t need to be thinking about that shit either. And Set, please my nigga, stop watching that damn show. Sound like a damn female.”

Turk shakes his head and rubs his eyebrow.

“If y’all done gossipping, I can start… I got shit to do,”

I finally say. These niggas worse than women I swear.

Nut balls his face up even more.

“The fuck you gotta do on a Saturday?”

I look him up and down.

“I ain’t seen my daughter in three months.”

“Or Mace,”

Ty cackles.

“Y’all was in the champagne room long as hell. Don’t you know it’s no sex in there?”

I mock his ass like a lil kid, but I ain’t saying shit either. If I think hard enough, I can still taste Mace on my tongue, but that wasn’t planned.

And could have derailed all my actual plans.

But she was looking so damn sexy in that shirt showing them titties and short ass skirt.

And had the nerve to bring that lame ass nigga Brandon to her nigga’s concert.

Ain’t no bitch ever drive me crazy like she does. I’m trying hard not to crash out about her. The only thing saving me is I know she not feeling him. No, Mace is like me like that, used to dodging feelings like she Pootie Tang.

Except when it comes to me. Which means I’m in for the fight of my life.

But shit, challenges make my dick hard anyway.

“Focus niggas. I called this meeting ‘cause I got info.”

“Info? Nigga you touched down like less than twenty-four hours ago,”

Ty questions, scratching that rock head of his.

“You gone call a meeting every time you find out something?”

I cut my eyes at Turk.

“Well, I’m not tryna squabble with niggas ‘cause they feel like I’m hiding shit.”

“Oh shit,”

Reem mumbles.

“Too soon, nigga.”

I wave him off.

“I know who Sincere is working with… it’s the Mathers brothers.”

“The sex traffickers?”

Rico asks.

“B was engaged to Qi years ago. Set sent that nigga to Hell and I guess they figured it out and wanna even the score.”

“Aight, but why now? They had years to retaliate.”

“Yeah, but they own shit went south after Qi got popped. They prolly just now steady enough, and then they think they got an in with that nigga Sincere.”

“Sincere a mark. YT here to stay, and the way the Triplets been wreaking havoc he knows it, so he not finna try shit. The real issue is the Mathers brothers,”

Turk surmises.

Set rubs the top of his head.

“Aight, so what’s the plan, dy?”

“We know they sell pussy, so we need to work that angle.”

I shift my gaze to Rico, and watch his jaw clench.

“Nah. Absolutely not–”

“That’s the way you wanna go?”

Rico asks me, cutting Ty off.

But Ty don’t care about being cut off. He glares at me, shooting up from his chair and pointing at me.

“Yo ass foul as fuck for even suggesting that shit, on Foe.”

“We was just there last year–”

“Rico was in Belize, far away from that nigga. I’on care, that’s foul as fuck, Rahshad.”

Set and Nut subtly scoot their chairs back, but I shake my head at them. Ty’s shaking from his anger, but he not gone hit me while I’m sitting down. Which is why my ass is planted.

“Chill, Ty-Ty. I’m good.”

Rico holds out a joint to Ty, who takes it from him and sparks up, still standing.

When Rico turns to me, his eyes are dead.

“That’s our angle?”

I bite the inside of my cheek and nod.

He sighs, then smirks.

“Fasho. Set up the meet. I’ll, uh, get up with y’all later.”

He gets up and leaves. Ty shoots me a withering glare before following behind him.

“I take it Ty and his dad reconnecting ain’t going over so well?”

Set asks Reem.

Reem looks up from his phone and shakes his head.

“They only really talk when they leading a class at the gym. But even if it was, he was gone react like that. Don’t be surprised if Rico disappears to Belize after this.”

“Yeah, well, he deserves a break,”

I say, standing up with the rest of my bros.

“Especially if he don’t kill the nigga before we can use him.”

My lil shorty lights up as soon as she sees me enter the kitchen. Macy has her on the counter, feeding her a bottle, but as soon as she sees me she starts clapping and reaching toward me.

Dal swoons. Macy’s hater ass rolls her eyes.

I come and grab my lil shorty and let her grab all on my lips.

“Don’t touch his lips, baby. You don’t know where they’ve been,”

Mace says in a saccharine voice.

“They been all over yo funky ass mama.”

“Oop.”

Dal eyes Macy, who just scoffs and stomps out the room.

I take her seat and start feeding my baby. She holds the bottle with me, eyes never leaving mine.

“Yo daughter finna make Ms. Sheryl quit, FYI.”

“She can’t be that bad.”

I blow my baby a kiss, and one of her little hands reaches toward me.

“She’s worse. I never thought babies could be bad until I met Miss Reesey. Shit, Denver didn’t start acting up until he started school.”

“Aight,”

I say, not tryna hear anything negative about Sadé.

“She can be with me for a while, give y’all a break. Make up for lost time.”

Dal rounds the island and hugs me. Sadé’s little eyebrows furrow and she spits out the bottle to holler at her for touching her daddy.

“I’m glad you’re home, .”

She leaves me and Sadé in the kitchen, and only then does my baby accept her bottle again.

I can’t think about how if I followed through, I wouldn’t be here to feed my daughter. I wouldn’t get to sing to her, or annoy her mama, or avenge my brother. I’d be missing everything.

The pain’s still here. Muted, but here. The thoughts as well.

But I’m here, too. Where I’m supposed to be. And battling myself every day is worth the peace of watching Sadé look at me like I hold the answers to the universe.