Page 44 of Grand Master

PATIENCE WINS WARS…

Today was the first time I let her leave.

Not escape me by figuring out a way to break free from me but leave willingly with Staress.

A week had gone by, an entire seven days of her playing the violin every single day for me.

She asked questions about each one of my owls that she spotted at night or during the day watching her.

Mira was eager to see everything again and again inside of Grand Corp and I let her.

She walked amongst my staff, smiled in their faces and even spent a lot of time with me down in my lab.

We fucked right next to my fresh bed of Owlette flowers.

She loved the way they glowed whenever the lights were dim.

Mira expressed how she fell in love with the smell of them, then she begged me to teach her how to help care for them.

I agreed, not because I wanted to, but because I enjoyed the way her big eyes lit up whenever I said yes.

Mira mentioned how Darius let her drive his car from time to time.

That day my mood completely shifted, anger rose inside of me but to my surprise it simmered down when I realized that maybe it was good for her to talk about the little things that he fucked her over on.

Pops was a shitty husband, but he would never allow my momma to walk the streets when he had plenty of cars for her to drive.

The next day after having that conversation with Mira, I took her down to my underground parking garage and let her pick out whichever car she wanted.

I had several cars, half of them I never drove since I always had a driver.

I remembered the way Mira’s eyes danced with delight the moment she spotted the smallest of the luxury cars, her fingers pressed eagerly against the glass as she peered in, already imagining herself behind the wheel.

The car was a sleek, pearl-colored coupe, a toy among titans in the Grand Corp garage, but it drew her in with its quiet promise of freedom to roam and explore new things without having to catch a bus.

She was almost childlike then, she twirled the key fob between her fingers, her laughter rung through the concrete chamber as she slid into the driver’s seat and ran her hands along the buttery leather.

It all did something to me, seeing her like that—a kind of joy unburdened by worries, a brightness that made the edges of the world seem less sharp in my own eyes.

I leaned against a pillar and just watched and savored that moment as she adjusted the mirrors and pretended to navigate invisible streets, her smile was soft and unguarded.

I already knew once I gifted her the car the next thing that would follow was her asking to test it out.

I had pushed those thoughts out of my head and just continued to enjoy the moment.

It was rare for me to witness happiness so untainted, and rarer still to realize I had offered her the opportunity for it.

When she beckoned me over, Mira insisted for me to join her for an imaginary spin, I felt the warmth of her excitement settle inside me, then surprised myself when I joined her.

Each moment with her was something different, yet something I longed to do or try over and over again with only her.

The soft clack of ivory against my mahogany board echoed through the stillness of my study. Bringing me back into reality as I slid the black knight into the position with a steady hand, even though my mind was ten miles away, trailing behind my little owl like a fucking shadow.

This morning, she cheerfully declared a girl’s day out smoothly and even offered for Staress to come with her.

Mira wanted to get out of Grand Corp for the day and check on her friend Yvette.

It was on the tip of my tongue to say no.

But those big hopeful eyes forced me to give her two hours, then I added four more hours when I discovered that this would be a good test.

I had some of my men follow her and Staress discreetly, but it still felt like I couldn’t breathe right with her outside of Grand Corp away from me. I moved the white queen diagonally, taking my bishop. A small sacrifice. Strategic. Measured. Calculated loss to ensure greater control later.

I looked across the room, all three of my owls watched me with an eerie silence as I played the board.

Two of them accompanied Josie, they followed me from my room into my study once Mira had left.

My owl Sable, the dark feathered one blinked slowly with his age-old glare like he was judging every move I made.

Most of the time he stayed in my room, close to the roof.

At night he roamed then came back late in the day covered in blood.

Then there was my owl Zeus, he kept tilting his head to the side out of curiosity.

Zeus was always quiet and observant and would leave for days at a time but always seemed to make his way back home.

Josie fluffed her feathers close to the window; her eyes darted around like she too was waiting impatiently for Mira to walk back in breathe life into this stiff space we shared. Josie felt the good shift and aura that came with Mira. Now that she wasn’t here, it bothered her as much as it did me.

“She got you tripping too, huh?” I muttered to Josie as I pushed my next piece forward.

I placed my focus back on my board since it never lied to me.

Everything in my life boiled down to this…

black versus white. Power versus patience.

Once I made my move, I owned whatever consequences that followed.

But with Mira, she made me second-guess some of my moves.

I glanced at my phone for the fifth time and cringed with self-awareness.

Mira had a phone now with only my number locked in.

I expected a call, I wondered if she was thinking of me like I was of her.

Mira wasn’t just some pawn that I slid across my board.

She was the queen piece that I didn’t see coming, powerful in her own right, and smart with soft edges.

I thought about calling one of the men that I had watching her closely to force her back here but decided against it quickly.

I tried to tell myself that I was just being cautious when I picked my phone up and thought about calling her.

Told myself that it was only right to keep her safe, to keep tabs, but even as I continued to glide pieces across my chess board, I couldn’t seem to stop the uncertainty that gnawed at me.

The seconds ticked on, deliberate and loud, as if the room itself measured my restraint.

Outside, I imagined the city blooming with sun, Mira’s laughter carried by wind over rooftops and her weaving in and out of busy L.A. traffic. Maybe that was why the silence here in my study felt so sharp, every tick of the clock with Mira out of my sight was a reminder of what I couldn’t control.

I traced the carved lines on a pawn, thinking of how easily a small piece could tip the balance.

How much I wanted to trust her, to trust her out in the world without me beside her.

But old habits die hard, and for every hour she was gone, I felt myself unravel just a little more, threads of my anxiety tangled with threads of hopefulness that she would return to me with no hiccups.

Did I truly own her yet? Maybe it was too soon…

The more my owls shifted with their eyes glinting with quiet judgment, I found myself ready to make a move off my impulse alone.

Soon as I touched my phone, it buzzed. It was Tone, I let it ring two more beats before I answered, greeting him with silence.

Tone rarely called unless it mattered so this phone call immediately placed me on edge.

Tone not saying nothing right away was the first code spoken loud and clear.

“Yeah.” I stated flatly.

“I was just tapping in with you, everything good with you over there?” Tone’s voice sounded off in his usual normal tone.

“Define good.”

I pressed the speaker button then sat my phone down next to my chess board.

“Well, I could imagine you sitting in front of a chess board with your owls as the audience on your good ol’ Robin Hood tip.” He chuckled. “Meanwhile, our women are in Los Angeles, going about their activities without concern.”

I didn’t respond. The rustling on his end told me he was walking, probably pacing like he always did whenever something was off. I closed my eyes then opened them seconds later eyeing my board.

“Where’s Dre?” I asked calmly.

Tone hesitated in his response, which automatically alarmed the fuck out of me. I sat up straight, my heart rate picked up as I waited for him to speak.

“He’s…been takin’ care of business.” Tone answered.

That was another secret code, someone was close to him listening.

“What business?” I pressed.

Tone clicked his tongue twice, my chest tightened as I waited for the next set of code words to leave his mouth.

“Black Knight, white pawn?—”

“Streets been active.” I cut him off finishing his sentence.

A shift happened, a dark one. The board in front of me blurred for a second, then my mental board formed in my mind.

It wasn’t wood and pieces, but people and moves.

Power and betrayal. I saw it clear as fuck.

A black knight with an eyeless poisonous snake wrapped around the chess piece in my mind.

The rook at the edge of the board was Dre.

Suddenly everything clicked in a violent, cold rush.

Dre’s patterns. The silence that Dre had been keeping a little too tight lately.

I hardly said much too him but always observed each man that worked for me.

Dre never presented himself to be unloyal.

He and Tone were close, they hung out a lot outside of me.

“Tone,” I said, voice low. “Dre’s helping Smack.”

“I started to feel that way when he was a little too slow on getting you the information you requested…I didn’t want to believe it though…”

That made my brows raise because Tone never held back.

“I always figured if it was disloyalty with Dre, you’d see it before I did.” He added.

My jaw clenched. I looked back at the physical chessboard, then swept the white pawn off the table with one smooth flick.

“You get one warning in this life,” I murmured, more to myself than him. It was one of my Pop’s favorite lines. “After that, you become a lesson.”

“Dre’s in the middle of picking up something…” Tone said cautiously.

Which meant Dre was in the middle of picking up money from a new drop over on the south side of L.A.

“He left his personal phone in the car,” Tone sighed. “I don’t know what made me go through it, that’s some shit a bitch would do, but I did it and?—”

“Save it and bury the emotions that you feel from finding out whatever you found in that phone. Fuck Dre.” I spat.

“You want me to handle it?”

“No,” I said eyes burning into the empty pace where the pawn used to be.

“Let him think he’s up next to take over the board, he’ll think his next move is grand.” I chuckled.

“And then?”

“Then I’ll show him why the fuck I own the board in the first place.”

I traced the outline of a pawn on the table with my thumb, the wood cool and smooth, another piece waited to be moved, sacrificed, or crowned.

“Dre’s been playing checkers,” I said finally, “But as always this is chess. And every pawn dreams of crossing the board.”

Tone sighed into the phone roughly “So what’s the play?”

I flicked the pawn, watched it tumble twice before stopping at my palm.

“He’ll make noise. He wants to be seen. Let him. The more he moves, the more space he leaves behind. Smack must have offered him a fake fortune to get him to turn against me.”

A crooked grin tugged at my mouth.

“You really gonna wait him out?”

“Patience wins wars,” I replied. “Right now, I’m forced to have patience because someone very dear to me roams freely without my ownership. You stay glued to him, watch every fuckin’ move then go about your day like you would any other day. No suspicions.” I hung the phone up.