Page 3

Nyoka

"Are you even packed yet?" Talia was pressuring me.

My clothes weren't even unpacked for an entire week before she wanted to hit the road and go somewhere. Granted, over the years, we hadn't had much time to hang out with one another because she was busy chasing behind the biggest baller when I wasn't traveling, fulfilling a contract. My cousin was a pretty ass girl with a big ol rack of titties on her. I could see why these country boys went crazy over her.

"Three days doesn't require much to pack," I said as I pointed at my Louis Vuitton duffle bag.

"Bullshit. This is what I'm bringing." Talia stepped further into my room, pulling a damn suitcase behind her.

I laughed because the girl was too much.

"For three days, you'll probably only need about six outfits."

"Okay, and bathing suits and different shoes and makeup."

I walked over to the window, pulled back the curtain, and peeked through the blinds as she went on about the last-minute trip she had put together. The cul-de-sac that Talia lived on was nice as hell. Despite that, I had the natural tendency to monitor my surroundings severely. A utility van was parked two houses down, and then this black Charger was parked two houses down from that. That's one thing about the south. These niggas were gonna go get some shit with a Hemi engine in it. The Charger had been sitting further up the block for a while, and because the tints on it were so dark, it made me nervous because I couldn't see who was in the vehicle. They even had the windshield tinted on that bitch.

"Who has a black Charger on this block?" I cut Talia off while she was going on about how fine the niggas were in Daytona.

Dating was the last thing on my mind because I was honestly still mourning Edward.

"Girl, about five of our neighbors have Chargers. I don't keep up with what they are riding in."

I removed my finger from the blind and let it close. Talia was so damn naive to the street shit, and I hated it. It was like she left the city, moved to the country, and lost all her common sense. In my line of work, I learned that some of the biggest criminals live within gated communities and in fancy subdivisions like the one she lived in.

"Stop being so paranoid, Ny. Can you finally live your life a little?"

I turned away from the window and then sighed. Ever since I was thirteen and caught my first body, I was picked up by an agency called The Heart Mirage and have been working nonstop ever since.

When I think back on it, I blamed my mother for everything. If she knew how to be motherly, she wouldn't have been my first murder. If she knew how to properly love her daughter, just maybe I wouldn't have been adopted by a team of assassins. Talia was right, though. It was time I lived my life, especially since there was a ticking clock on that bitch.

When the corners of my mouth turned upward, she did the Tootsie Roll.

"Let's hit the road, cuz," Talia declared in her squeaky voice.

As we were walking out of the front door, I made a mental note of all the stuff I had to get to make the room I was staying in mine. As we loaded our luggage into the trunk of my new Jeep Cherokee, I looked around for the black Charger, but it was nowhere to be found. Chill out, Ny, and live a little, I thought as I got in the driver's seat, waited for Talia to get in the passenger side, and then pulled off.

The drive was draining, especially since Talia acted like she was scared to drive. We had left her Lexus in the garage, and she told me that she didn't think that she would feel comfortable driving my Jeep because of how big it was. So, while I did that exhausting seven-hour drive, she played DJ. She had played all the throwbacks that we had grown up on. For seven hours, we sang our hearts out. It was a vibe that I didn't know I desperately needed. I'm glad that we had taken my advice about leaving at ten in the morning. Had we not, we wouldn't have had the pleasure of getting there while there was still some sunshine to be enjoyed.

By five in the afternoon, we had checked into our hotel suite, changed into bathing suits, and stopped at a nearby bar for drinks before hitting the beach. I walked along the shoreline, wiggling my toes in the sand. I finally allowed myself to relax a bit. I'm sure the tequila-mixed drink in my cup had a lot to do with that. Every once in a while, I eavesdropped on the conversation that was being had behind me. Talia had the gift of gab, and with a pretty smile, she could get damn near anything from a nigga. While we were standing in the bar, she had got this man to buy us some drinks. After a few shots, we agreed to walk the beach together. Being a loner, I naturally walked alone while she was walking with the dude who had gotten the drinks for us and his friend.

I don't know why she thought I wasn't serious when I said that I didn't want any niggas in my face, but I meant that. Walking ahead by my lonesome should have been the biggest hint that I was standing on business about that.

"Like damn, Talia, right? Ya cousin got some weight back there. Why is she acting stuck up, though?"

I put a little extra switch in my hips to make my ass jiggle more with each step across the sand. Talia's newfound company was okay looking, but his friend was ugly as fuck, and I'll be damned if I even entertained the thought. If I was ever going to move on, it had to be with a nigga that was some pressure. I didn't want this grimacing look on my face whenever I looked at my partner because his teeth were un-fucking even, his skin was not clear, and his swag was just all the way off.

"She ain't stuck up. She's chilling," Talia responded.

"Man, whatever."

I stopped walking and then just looked out into the water. It was beautiful and blue. Although the sight was breathtaking, the sound was more important to me. I was able to tune out the sound of music, chit-chatter, and even children playing to hear the ocean. The sound was serene and a calming experience I didn't think I would ever get tired of. In my life, I haven't had many chances to enjoy the beauty of beaches or the mountains. I made a mental note to plan a trip to the cabins, even if it was a solo trip. When I thought about it, the last time I was out on the water, I was jumping off a speed boat and climbing onto a private yacht to fulfill a three-man contract.

"Cuz, you good?" Talia asked as she and her followers stopped walking when I did.

"I'm good. Y'all keep walking. I'll catch up."

I walked away from the shore a bit and then had a seat on the sand.

"Um, Sebastian, I have ya number. I'll give you a call, okay," Talia said to the man who was sweating her.

"My name is Samuel…"

"Oh…" She did this awkward smile because of her fuck up. "Well, I'll call you."

I giggled as the muthafucka walked away defeated with his ugly-ass friend in tow.

That's one thing about pretty girls. A nigga would let you do any damn thing. Talia called him by the wrong name, and I could bet my entire life savings that he was still hopeful and would be waiting for her call at the end of the day.

"What's up?" Talia asked once she plopped her big ol' purchased booty on the sand beside me.

I knew I could be vulnerable in the privacy of just her and me. I missed who was supposed to be my person. Now, although I was ready to take him off the map to protect myself, it was something about him being taken from me that made me emotional. I think it was something about Edward's brown eyes that had me reeled in from the beginning. He had this charismatic aura to him that I had never experienced before in my life.

I really thought that I would have taken this more lightly, but I just couldn't. Since I had left New York, his mother and two sisters had tried reaching out to me about what had happened to him, so I had no choice but to ditch my old phone. The same day I went to purchase my new vehicle, I also changed my number. Whenever I had time to myself, I wondered how Edward's funeral was. I hadn't told Talia, but I was even having difficulty sleeping in my room because I had been sleeping next to someone for the past two years. The right side of any bed that I slept in was reserved for Edward. I sighed deeply as I fought back tears because all this shit was completely overwhelming.

"Are you alright?" Talia asked when I turned her way with watery eyes.

"I miss him…"

"Aw, cuz," she hugged me, and I laid my head on her shoulder as I still looked out into the water.

I let my tears freely flow because I didn't think it was in the cards for me as badly as I wanted to be loved and love someone. For two years, romantically, I was in bliss, and just three weeks before my wedding, the very person who had unknowingly shown me how to love was taken from me.

"I know, hunny bunny. Mourning isn't linear. It's progressive. It's gonna take some time, and some days may not be as good as others, but that's okay."

I smiled at the advice given because Talia was the kind of girl who believed that to get over one man, you had to get under another. I had only been with three men in my entire life, and Edward was one of them. I was selective with whom I spent my time and even more selective with whom I gave my body to. I had my mother to thank for that. Emotionally, she had fucked me up, and I knew in my adult life, it fucked up all the relationships that I had gotten into. Every single last one of them except Edward and me.

"I thought ya ass would say get me another nigga and get over it," I confessed as I wiped the tears off my pudgy cheeks.

"Well, that too, but this is different. It ain't like the man just up and left you and ran off with another woman. What I will say is dating is one hell of a distraction. Now, let's go and do a little retail therapy before we go out tonight."

Talia stopped hugging me, stood from the sand with her hands, and reached out to help me up. Once we got on our feet, I decided to have a childish moment.

"Tag!" I blurted before tapping her on the shoulder and then taking off running down the sand. I looked back and started laughing once I saw her chase behind me.

"Bitch, you know I used to run track!" she yelled as she picked up her pace to catch up with me.

Talia tapped me on the shoulder and then quickly ran around me. I stopped running and placed my hands on my knees as I cried out in laughter. Her damn titties were flapping out of the sides of her bikini top.

"Talia, roll those big ass titties back in your top, mama!" I yelled out in between laughs.

"Aw shit." She stopped running to fix herself. "And what the fuck are you looking at? You wanna put one in ya mouth?" Talia turned her attention to a white man who was seated on a beach towel nearby. He turned red in the face at her remark.

I couldn't stop laughing as I slowly walked to catch up with her. Letting my guard down and allowing myself to live was starting to feel good as hell. This little vacation was probably exactly what I needed to get back to me.

Adonis

"Muthafucka, you are taking dresses too?"

Dom was standing in the doorway of one of these big ass rooms, just looking at me as I snatched everything out of the closet and then started loading it into garbage bags. I didn't give a fuck that they were still on the hangers. I didn't have hangers back the crib, no way.

"You damn right," I quickly responded.

I didn't know who these bitches were, but they were designer-dripping.

"I'm gone start calling your ass Jody from Baby Boy. My nigga gone be out here selling dresses out the trunk," he joked.

"And muthafuckas better not argue with me about my prices, either. I don't wanna hear shit about no fortyyyy dollarssss."

Dom laughed when I mimicked ol' boy from the movie.

When I say that we cleaned out, we cleaned that muthafucka out. As we took numerous trips to and from the moving truck, I smiled, knowing I was about to be back on top. I had helped Dom wrap this seventy-inch television in some blankets and then move it onto the truck. I'm glad we both had experience with moving people because the way we packed the back of that truck was some professional shit.

"Put the damn air fryer back, dude."

"Aight… aight," I put the air fryer back on the counter as I laughed.

I walked back up the stairs and opened the closed door that was first on the right of me. I was in charge of cleaning out the left side of the crib and Dom the right, but his ass was too preoccupied with cleaning out the lower level first.

The décor in the room held smooth, earthy tones, and I wondered what shade of green was on the walls because I wanted that shit as an accent color in my room back at the crib. I grabbed my phone out of my pocket and then took a picture of the wall so that I could try to match the color when I took a trip to Home Depot later in the week. I started opening drawers to see if I could find some jewelry. There were a couple of pieces in the long dresser, along with some designer shades. I was careful to place them in the bag in my hand. I didn't need anything scratched or damaged to devalue the amount that I could resell them for. When I went over to the nightstand, this necklace on the surface caught my eye.

Instead of putting it inside the bag with the other pieces, I placed it in my pocket.

"Yo gang, look alive! We got action across the street!" I could hear Dom yelling from the lower level.

I peeked out the window, and when I saw the view, I knew it had to be the same room as whoever was peeking earlier in the day when we were casing the crib. Their neighbors were coming out of the house, and a group of girls were leaving. I could tell that they were drunk by the way that they wobbled toward the Kia.

"We gotta move, fam." Dom's voice was coming from behind me.

"We gotta wait until these drunk bitches leave."

He came and stood behind me to see what I was watching. When the silver car pulled away, we both hurried down the stairs.

"Damn, it's so much more shit to take. You think we could take the car in the garage if they got one?" I asked.

"Hell nah, we gotta move and like now."

"Shit…" I hissed as I ran and grabbed the same air fryer I was considering leaving earlier.

The dark sky aided in our crime, and like thieves in the night, we got the fuck gone.

"One thing I'ma do is get me a new muthafucking car."

I shook my head because, like most niggas that ain't used to money, the very first thing this man had planned to do was blow it. I didn't verbally express myself because that is exactly how I used to be with my own funds.

"What you about to do with ya money, fam?"

I didn't know what I was going to do, but I knew one thing I wasn't going to do was blow the shit.

"I don't even know yet for real."

"Woooooo!" he yelled as he pushed the moving truck down route 316. "Nigga, cheer the fuck up. This is what we have been waiting for," he added as he excitedly pushed me on my shoulder.

I just smiled as I welcomed the feeling of us being able to pull this off. I saw a couple of kinks in our operation, but I knew exactly how to fix every single flaw. Getting away was one thing, but getting all this off was another. I wondered how much we would get once we divvied everything up.

"Yeah, we did this shit for sure," I agreed as I just sat back and enjoyed the ride to the storage unit we had rented.