Page 46

THREE MONTHS LATER

“Aris and Noble, did you get that information out?” I ask, looking around the table.

“Yes, sir. Aris tied up the final strings, and the information should be on the twelve o’clock news right . . . ” Noble glances at his watch and finishes his comment. “About now.”

“Good,” I reply as Marisa flicks the remote and the large-screen TV turns on to the midday news.

She turns the volume down a little while they do their intro, and I look around the table at each of my team members.

“We took a major blow, but we’re rebuilding and coming back stronger than ever.”

“I’m still fucked up about the part Parker played in this game,” Malik professes, shaking his head.

“Yeah, he was your day-one homie. If you can’t trust them, who the fuck can you trust?” Kim mumbles.

“Y’all. I trust y’all. I trust the eight of y’all to keep it real with me, to have my back, to hold it down when I’m not able to, and to always be true and loyal to me and this organization.

If you can’t do that you walk your asses out the door now,” I demand, jabbing a finger into the marble table as I glance around at Kim, Aris, Hakeem, Jamal, Janel, Malik, Noble and Marisa standing by the TV.

No one budges, and Marisa smiles at me.

“It’s still hard to overlook that sort of betrayal, sir. Hard to heal from that, so make sure you take time out for yourself,” Marisa suggests softly.

“Yeah, well . . . it’s a new day,” I declare, clearing my throat and looking at the TV screen.

I spin my chair around and stand from my seat. Shoving my hands into my pockets, I walk toward the seating area as Marisa increases the volume on the TV.

“. . . investigation into the funding of her campaign. Financial documents leaked to the mayor’s office, KGTV, and Chief David Haralson’s office late last night show that mayoral candidate Essence Hamilton has been accepting money to fund her campaign from Bryson Gregory, CEO of Duke Holdings.

“Gregory was indicted on charges of racketeering, prostitution, and drug trafficking eight years ago, but was only found guilty on the drug trafficking charges, of which he served four years before being released on parole.

He founded the company Duke Holdings two years ago, which is the parent company for two telecommunications companies and a capital funding company.

“The mayor’s office will be holding a press conference at one o’clock this afternoon. KGTV tried reaching out to Ms. Hamilton’s office for comment, but she was unreachable at the time. Nate, turning it over to you . . . ”

Marisa turns the TV down and leaves the room, as I return to the table, but I don’t take my seat.

“Frances and Marc have gotten all the charges against me dropped, thanks to the assistance from Detective Malone and Noble. My businesses have been cleared, and we’re working behind the scenes to rebuild the reputation of my gentlemen’s clubs and the car company in those communities.

Whenever a company takes a hit the way that mine did, even if only to its reputation, there will be a financial blowback to follow.

“As a result, we’re pumping more funds into marketing the companies, funding promotions that benefit the communities each company serves, and on PR campaigns to help rebuild our image.

As it relates to what happened with Parker, you all know that shit will never fly with me.

If you cross me up, you may as well be prepared to pay with nothing less than your life.

I don’t give a fuck who you are,” I snarl.

Everyone around the table nods eagerly.

“With that being said, there are a few changes or additions I’d like to announce.

But first, here’s a little appreciation for your dedication and loyalty to me.

Treat yourself to something nice,” I state, handing each of them an envelope with their name scrawled on it, holding ten grand in cash and a check for fifty grand each.

Shouts, whistles, and applause go up around the room, including Malik, who’s normally the reserved one of the crew.

Kim jumps up and starts twerking, and Janel smacks her on the ass, to which Aris blushes.

I shake my head at their shenanigans and wait for a few seconds.

Eventually, all eyes turn in my direction.

“The next announcement is that Noble will be your new VP of Security.”

“Damn, what type of increase does that come with?” Hakeem asks, causing everyone else to laugh and Noble to shake his head.

I smirk. “You ready to forfeit your job, Hakeem?”

“Nah, Bossman. I’m good on all that. I don’t even want to know what type of shit Noble’s gotta be responsible for.”

“Good. Now these next two changes are near to my heart, so don’t fuck shit up where this is concerned.”

Everyone scowls and looks around at each other before glancing back at me.

Nodding toward the other end of the table, I blow out a heavy breath. “I know y’all have been wondering why Zechariah is at the meeting when he’s never here.”

They all murmur their agreement.

“As you know, he just graduated from Morris Brown last year and started his first year of law school at Emory this year. With that being said, he’ll be working closely with Frances Kay and Marc Silver to learn the inner workings of the business, as well as with me, while attending school.

He’ll be our future Chief Legal Counsel. ”

“That’s what’s up, young genius,” Kim shouts.

“I always knew that nigga had a big head for some reason,” Malik jokes.

Zechariah puts up both middle fingers to Malik and then shakes his head. Everyone congratulates my firstborn, hugs, or daps him up, and then returns their gaze to me.

I press the button in the middle of the table, and the doors behind me to my private inner office open.

Bayleigh steps forward as I make another announcement. “Meet your new VP of Operations, Bayleigh Reed.”

“Oh, my God! Lady Knight! Yes, wear your crown, sis!” Kim screams.

“I think it’s a sword that dubs you a knight, Kim,” Aris corrects.

Janel jumps from her seat and throws her arms around Bayleigh, and all the men nod their approval or say, “That’s what’s up,” before they rise and hug her.

It takes a minute before their congratulations are completed. When they finally are, Bayleigh takes a seat beside me to my right. Looking at her, I declare, “I couldn’t ask for a better partner to be my right hand.”

“Thank you,” she replies graciously.

It took a lot of convincing for her to agree to step into this role.

When she agreed to accept it, I encouraged her to take all the time she needed to settle into it.

She’d said that she needed to get to work right away to keep her mind off things.

The week leading up to and immediately after Riley’s funeral was rough on my baby.

Once everyone settles down again, I reply, “Now, this next announcement won’t be easy for any of you. It wasn’t for me either when I learned what I did. It was necessary, though.”

I press the intercom and speak into it. “Marisa, I’m ready.”

“Yes, sir, Mr. Knight.”

Everyone mumbles around the table and then leans into each other to whisper. They’re all staring at me, including Noble.

The doors open, and Marisa steps in and steps aside.

“Sir,” she states, nodding.

Ghalen walks into the room to gasps and screams.

“Oh shit!” Kim shrieks, slumping to the floor and just sitting there breathing hard.

“Your big ass better not faint. All that twerking you do, your ass better not faint now,” Malik warns.

“What the fuck?” Jamal mutters.

“Man, you’ve done my heart a lot of good,” Janel cries as she walks up and hugs him.

“Big Poppa! You're alive!” Kim shouts, popping up from the floor, jumping up, and wrapping her legs around him after Janel releases him.

Bayleigh clears her throat. Kim jumps down again and straightens her shirt. “My bad, Big Poppa. I forgot you got a whole wifey, with yo’ fine ass. Thanks, Ms. Bayleigh, for keeping me in check.”

“No problem, Kim,” Bayleigh comments sweetly beside me.

“What the fuck yo! Why didn’t y’all tell us this nigga was still alive?” Malik asks.

“It was necessary for the investigation. Parker was being followed in his last days, unbeknownst to me. So, someone saw when he rigged my SUV. Remember when we had that meeting here the day the car exploded?” I ask the team.

They all mutter “yes.”

“Was it when he said he needed to make an emergency call and stepped out for like twenty minutes during the middle of the meeting?” Janel asks.

“Yeah. That’s what he was out there doing. The way that my SUV was parked, you really couldn’t see him from the street unless you knew what to look for. An off-duty officer was watching him the entire time and phoned Ghalen to let him know what was up,” I explain, referring to Damascus.

“So, G, you weren’t in the car?” Aris asks.

“No, I wasn’t. I walked toward the car, but once I was on the other side, where you couldn’t see me from the street, I ran along the wall that divided the parking lot from the highway.

Once I got to the end of those bushes that covered them, I was far enough away that I was safe.

At that point, all I had to do was use the key fob to start up the ignition, which ignited the bomb,” Ghalen explains.

“That’s fucked up, yo!” Jamal exclaims.

“Did your family know you weren’t dead?” Hakeem asks.

“Nobody knew except Detective Malone and a couple of other detectives working the case. It was hard as fuck on my family, though.”

“Yeah, I can imagine it was,” Malik agrees.

“Shit, nigga. This makes me wanna pull yo’ big ass up and kill yo ass all over again,” Jamal professes.

“Yeah, had niggas like J shedding thug tears,” Malik confesses, mugging Ghalen.

“Yo’ punk ass too,” Jamal reveals. “Had us niggas up here fucked up, and yo’ ass was alive! This is fucked up.”

Changing the subject, Noble comments, “Parker’s traitorous ass got off too easy in my opinion.”

“Nah, that muthafucka suffered,” Janel counters quietly with a distant look in her eyes.

“When did your family find out?” Aris asks.

“This morning. After they . . . well, can I say anything?” Ghalen asks, looking at me.

I look to Bayleigh, and she nods, closing her eyes.

“So, they finally got concrete evidence against Essence Hamilton for killing Riley. The man she paid to kill her, Derek Sawyer, agreed to turn state’s evidence against her.

Sawyer got immunity because he recorded their conversation with Essence when she ordered them to kill her.

He turned the recordings in as well as handed over a key to a storage unit.

“That sick bitch wrote down everything she’d been plotting against Zaire, his family, his businesses, even how she got Parker involved, and her detailed plans to kill Riley and Parker when she finished with them. She didn’t kill Riley the way she’d originally planned, but she still had her killed.

“Not to mention that she had journals going back thirty years. In one of them, she wrote that she had set Z’s daddy up by planting drugs in his house to take him down, all because he wouldn’t leave their mama.

She even had information about concealing evidence in some of the cases she worked on over the years.

And it was all right there in black and white in a journal in that storage unit,” Ghalen explains.

“What the fuck!” Kim mutters, shaking her head.

“We ain’t seen that shit on the news yet,” Malik declares.

“The arrest just happened this morning. They haven’t released it to the media yet. But when they do, there will be a frenzy in this city like nothing we’ve ever seen,” I explain.

“Yeah, they contacted my wife this morning and had her and the kids brought to the station before they told them.”

Ghalen gets choked up for a minute, and I take over.

“Detective Malone visited me at the same time they called Pam. He came to my home this morning and told me what was going on.”

“You had to think that nigga was lying,” Noble states.

“I did at first, but I know that he wouldn’t fuck with me like that. So, I went down to see what was what, and my big homie here was standing there smiling at a nigga,” I profess, looking up at Ghalen and smiling at him.

That shit was emotional this morning. I almost didn’t make it here to the office for this meeting, but too much shit had to be taken care of. Ghalen’s been my big homie almost as long as Parker.

“Damn, that nigga was ruthless,” Malik huffs.

I press a button in the middle of the table again.

“Yeah, he was. But like I said before, it’s a different day.

We’ve talked about that shit for the last few months.

Now we gon’ dead that shit right along with that dead nigga.

Essence Hamilton was nothing more than a gnat in the big scheme of things, and she’s been squashed. Who’s ready to rise?” I ask, standing.

“We are!” Their voices rise in unison in an ecstatic shout.

Marisa opens the doors again and rolls in a large cart with four bottles of champagne on ice and a catered lunch.

“Boss Lady, what about your business?” Kim asks.

“I’ll still own it, but I have two very talented designers who will take on the work. I’ll spend most of my time here getting to know the business better and building a different relationship with you all than the one I enjoy currently,” Bayleigh explains.

I pop a bottle of champagne and give my big homie, Ghalen, a side-armed hug. Malik, Hakeem, and Noble follow suit.

While Janel and Bayleigh pop the other bottles, Jamal’s the last of the guys to come up to Ghalen.

He mugs Ghalen. “You know that shit was fucked up, don’t ya? I ought to body your ass.”

“Nigga, shut up. You know I had to do that shit to catch that nigga and that bitch. ’Sides yo ass cheesin’ inside at seeing a nigga.”

“Damn straight,” Jamal agrees, breaking out into a smile and giving Ghalen a side-arm hug and pounding him on the back.

This shit feels good, seeing my crew whole and complete.