Page 40

RIOT

Last night, she rode me like she owned me.

And maybe she did. Maybe I let her.

Allure had this way of making me feel brand new, like all the blood on my hands didn’t matter when she was looking at me like I was salvation instead of sin.

I went to sleep with her on my chest and woke up hard and horny, her scent still on my skin.

Everything about her felt like a reset. A clean slate.

But the second I stepped into this house, that peace evaporated.

The air hit different here. Heavy. Sour with memories.

I shut the front door behind me and stood in the foyer, jaw tight, letting my eyes adjust to the dim lighting and darker energy. My sneakers thudded against the marble as I moved, each step dragging old ghosts to the surface.

This was where it started. Where I learned how to hate. How to hurt.

The house was too fucking quiet. Not peaceful—funeral quiet. The kind of silence that crept into your skin and reminded you that no matter how far you ran, your past still had your address.

“You're early,” a tired voice muttered behind me.

I turned to see the nurse—Maria or Mona or some shit. She had bags under her eyes. She looked like she was two seconds from a breakdown.

“She’s upstairs,” she added. “Didn’t sleep last night. Didn’t eat this morning. Threw her meds across the room and cursed out the cleaning lady.”

I raised a brow. “She call her a dirty bitch and a lazy whore?”

The nurse blinked. “Yes.”

“Yeah,” I muttered, rubbing the back of my neck. “She’s still in there.”

She frowned. “Mr. King, respectfully, I think you need to consider bringing someone new in. Maybe someone trained in memory care. This job’s too much for one person.”

“No,” I said flat. “This job’s too much for the wrong person. You tired? Quit. I’ll get somebody who can handle her.”

She didn’t say another word as I walked off, deeper into the house.

Every hallway felt like a scar. Every wall held something I didn’t wanna remember. The den still smelled like cigars and cruelty. I stared at the leather chair my father used to sit in, that smug grin of his burned into my memory like a bad tattoo.

I killed him already.

And I’d do it again. Twice.

But even with that bullet to the head, he still lived here. In the corners. In my mother’s fading eyes. In the weight I carried every damn day.

I sat on the edge of the chair and let my head fall back. My knuckles cracked as I flexed my hands. Allure didn’t know this version of me—the version that grew up afraid of footsteps in the hall, of belts folded twice, of silence that lasted too long.

She saw me as a man. A protector. Not a broken boy turned monster.

And for her, I wanted to keep it that way.

But this house? It remembered everything. And today, I had to face it.

I stood and headed for the stairs, ready to check on my mother, even if she didn’t know who I was when I got there.

Because no matter how far I’d come…

This house still knew my name.

I made my way upstairs slow, hand dragging along the banister, feeling every notch in the wood like it was carved into my own spine. The closer I got to her door, the thicker the air got. Not just heavy with memory, but with dread.

She’d been slipping lately. Some days she called me by name. Other days she thought I was Silas. I hated when she did that.

I knocked once out of habit before pushing the door open.

The room was dark as hell. Curtains drawn, air stale. The only light came from the TV glowing low, some cooking show playing on mute. She was sitting up in bed, arms folded tight like she was cold even though the thermostat was set to damn near 80.

“They’re trying to kill me,” she said without looking up.

I paused in the doorway, jaw ticking. “Who?”

She blinked slow, turned her head toward me like she was seeing through me. “Them. The women. The ones downstairs. The ones in the walls. They whisper. You hear them, don’t you? They’re poisoning me.”

I let out a long breath and stepped inside, closing the door behind me. “Mama, there’s nobody in the walls.”

“You don’t know what I know,” she snapped. “They been creeping. Creeping and waiting. They want to take my place.”

I sat on the edge of the bed. “You didn’t take your meds, did you?”

She ignored that. Reached for my hand instead. “You gotta let Malia go.”

My stomach clenched. “Don’t start?—”

“She wasn’t good for you,” she hissed. “I told you. She was terrible. A liar. A snake.”

“She was pregnant,” I said flatly. “With my baby.”

“She was pregnant,” she spat like it was dirt in her mouth. “So what? That don’t make her a mother. Trust me I know! It takes more than being pregnant… or giving birth to be a mother.”

I stared at her. Something in her voice had shifted. Sharpened. Coherent. Focused. But the moment flickered away just as quick as it came. Was she trying to tell me something? Did she feel regret for how she raised us.

“Mama,” I started, trying to meet her eyes. “What are you talking about?”

She blinked, vacant again. “Don’t let the whispers in. Don’t let them crawl under your skin. They’ll eat you from the inside out.”

I rubbed my face, tired and tight. She was unraveling. Faster every time.

I leaned in to hug her, because what the fuck else could I do, and that’s when I smelled it.

Underneath the lotion, her Coco Chanel No. 5, the sweat and fear and old age—there it was.

Sickness.

Death’s knock.

Cancer.

It’s a smell I was too familiar with. Her mother had it. Boaz had it. The folks on my grandmother’s floor at the hospital. The animals too far gone to save. It had a stench—bitter and final. Like metal and mold and grief.

She tried to pull back but I held her tighter, closing my eyes for a second, letting that knowledge settle in my bones.

“You need to go to the doctor,” I said low.

“No more doctors,” she whispered, gripping the front of my shirt like I was the only thing anchoring her to this world. “Please, Silas. Just let me be.”

Ugh. She was back to calling me that man’s name.

“I can’t do that.” I stood and eased her up with me. “You raised me to be a savage, remember? You don’t get to tap out now.”

Her knees buckled and I caught her, my arm firm around her waist. “Come on. Let’s get you out the house. Get some air.”

She grumbled, weak and stubborn, but didn’t fight me.

I pulled my phone from my back pocket and hit Creed’s number while guiding her down the stairs.

“Yo,” Creed answered, voice clipped.

“I need you bro’.”

“Another body or something light?”

“I need you to meet me at the medical suite in Harlem. Mama needs to get tested. I think she has cancer.”

Creed went quiet. “Shit.”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll make the call. Be there in twenty.”

I hung up without another word and opened the car door, easing her into the passenger seat. She looked small as hell, like the woman who once scared grown men had finally folded in on herself.

I hated my father for what he did to her.

But I hated even more what he left behind.