Page 17

Last night had been better than I ever could have imagined. When I woke up to find Ri still in bed, all I had wanted to do was to play hooky at the clubs and fuck her all day and night.

While neither of our schedules would allow us to fuck all day, fuckin’ in the shower had been pretty damn great.

Tonight, Ri was hanging out with Gina, which meant me and the fellas were able to discuss Paradox business.

Even though I told the guys that she knew what happened to Rev now, we still didn’t want to drag her heart through all of this.

It was our mess to clean up.

Not hers.

Except for the old timers up front rolling fresh cigars for an event tomorrow, the cigar lounge in the back of my grandfather’s restaurant was damn near empty, but that shit was on purpose. The lights were low, and the smell of rich tobacco was thick.

As predicted, my abuelo had met a tourist and was somewhere in Utah camping or some shit. In a day or so, I’d check on him and make sure he wasn’t getting himself into some mess that he wasn’t ready for. Sal was running the place in his absence.

“If you have everything you need, I’ll head out,” Sal stated, placing a small Cuban coffee in front of each of us.

“Nah, we good, Sal.” I dabbed fist with him and lit up my Montecristo cigar as he shut the door behind him, then took a swig of my drink.

Leaning back in the wide brunet chair, I let the smoke roll from my mouth and into the air, the burn of whiskey settling in my chest like a warm hug on a cold day when it hit the smoke just right.

Across from me, Storm swirled his glass, staring into it like it held all the answers we didn’t have, while Titan was posted up against the wall, arms crossed, and his eyes cold, and deep in thought.

The vibe in the room was heavy, just like it always was when we talked about Rev. Our brother.

Our fourth.

Our friend.

The missing piece.

There was nothin’ that pissed me off more than knowing that the muthafucka who betrayed us and gave away our location was still breathing.

My annoyance prompted me to say, “This is what we do. We find people who don’t want to be found, and we extinguish those muthafuckas.

” I looked from Storm to Titan. “So why the fuck can’t we find out who the hell is responsible?

Because I’m sure as shit that McAllister ain’t have soldiers just hiding in the mountains. We scoured the area ten times over.”

Storm exhaled, taking a sip of his drink.

“I get what you’re sayin’, but we ran through every name twice.

Yet, every lead has been a dead end. We have to look at the facts.

It’s possible that McAllister was smarter than we thought and did have another crew waiting for orders in case some shit went down. ”

“Bullshit,” Titan spat, taking a seat. “Dude couldn’t even fuck right, and everything from the file that Rev put together after searching the dark web, and what Cruz’s contact told us, McAllister was a cocky muthafucka who never thought he’d be taken out.

He was sloppy, wit’ too much money to waste on inhumane shit.

He wasn’t smart enough to have more backup. ”

“Especially when they were betta at shooting than his guards that we took out,” I added, flicking the ash from my cigar.

“Do you think Calvin had anything to do with us being set up?” Storm asked me.

“Nah. He was responsible for a lot of crap, but mainly with the cops. Plus, everything he did was because his greedy ass wanted money, not power.”

“I get that,” Storm said. “But a greedy man will never find peace, for his hunger grows with every crumb that he devours.”

I pinned him with a blank stare. “Can you repeat that shit in English please, Professor?”

“Calvin’s heart remained empty no matter how much he took,” Storm explained. “That’s why he kept betraying you. It wasn’t only for the money.”

“But from the thrill he got from fuckin’ me over,” I finished, finally seeing Storm’s point. “Even so, Calvin was accounted for when Rev was killed. I already checked. Doesn’t mean he ain’t have help, but damn, could he have been working for McAllister?”

My jaw tightened at the thought. “We’ve been going through every suspect from rivals and old grudges, to contacts we broke ties with and people on the inside, but nothing is adding up.

The hit was too clean. Too perfect. Until Rev caught the bullet that should have never been his.

Rev wasn’t just some regular muthafucka.

He moved smart when we battled and always stayed three steps ahead. ”

“We all were the target on those mountains,” Titan stated, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms over his chest. “But the shit felt personal with how Rev was taken out. Out of all of us, he was the one hit.”

I nodded, Titan’s words being the thought that none of us had wanted to say out loud. “Like Rev was who they wanted.”

“Yeah,” Titan muttered. “Sometimes the most important piece is the one you never knew was missing.”

“Until you’re standing in the ruins and realize you could have saved it all had you just paid more attention,” I finished, rolling my cigar between my fingers.

“Look who’s sounding all smart and shit,” Storm teased.

“Shut the fuck up,” I spat, nodding to Titan. “He started sayin’ smart shit first.”

Storm leaned forward, placing his forearms and elbows on his knees as he clasped his hands together. “What I should have said is, you gotta get out of your head with this.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“We all had our own unique friendship with Rev.” Storm shared a knowing look with Titan before turning back to me.

“But you and him went way back. Titan and I have our own ways and methods of figuring this out, but in order to eliminate more people, we have to look into folks we haven’t considered yet. ”

I frowned, playing with my tongue ring out of frustration. “You mean Baarbie.”

Storm nodded. “Yeah. If you remember, it took a while for us to track McAllister, but back when we were trying to find out intel about him before we ever started planning our attack, Baarbie was essential to giving you the information Rev needed.”

“He may have worked for Jeremy McAllister, but that was years ago when McAllister was exiled from his family. If you remember, Baarbie was dropped from the NBA team that the McAllisters owned at the same time that Jeremy was disowned. Baarbie was butthurt, so when he got offered the job at Jeremy’s company, he took it,” I reminded them.

“But he left when he was at one of Jeremy’s events and discovered a room full of women waiting to be sold overseas, only to realize the truth behind why the McAllisters disowned him in the first place. So yeah, he had the intel we needed.

“And it took us a while to track Jeremy down,” Storm recapped. “He sensed the Feds were hot on his tail instead of us.”

I released a loud exhale in frustration when Titan and Storm shared another perceptive look.

“Baarbie’s too strung out to have been capable of setting us up,” I argued, failing to keep my tone even.

“I’ll widen my search. We focused too much on who betrayed us, and the bigger issue is that we didn’t kill all the men on the mountains that day.

The one who shot Rev may still be out there, and with Ri living with us, we have to keep her safe and away from all this bullshit. ”

I dragged my hand down my face. “You both are my brothers, but this shit ain’t right. What about the Foremans? They were our target before McAllister. Maybe they set us up.”

“We killed them all,” Titan reminded, even though I knew that already since I was there and killed most of those muthafuckas with him.

“That don’t mean shit,” I spat.

“A ghost didn’t pull the trigger,” Titan retorted.

“You’re deflecting,” Storm pointed out. “We’re missin’ something big, and we can’t ignore Baarbie as a suspect.”

I felt my blood pressure increase, the heat rising up my neck, causing me to tug at the collar of my dress shirt.

I took another pull of my cigar, my eyes hardened as the silence stretched between us.

Yet, it wasn’t that empty kind of silence.

Instead, it was weighted and full of understanding because these men still had my back even if I ain’t like the situation.

Meaning, I needed to have theirs and man the fuck up.

“How are you feelin’?” Storm asked, his voice laced with concern.

“Overwhelmed,” I answered honestly.

“I can schedule for us to kill some folks later,” Titan stated, his voice firm. “I know you need to let this information settle, but when you do, you let us know what you need.”

I nodded, working on my breathing since sometimes, my anxiety got the best of me.

“I know I still got some moles in my crew,” I admitted.

“I ain’t figured out all of ‘em yet, but I will. And when I do?” I let the words hang, the weight of the promise settling over the room.

“I won’t hesitate to kill whoever is responsible. ”

Storm clasped one of my shoulders while Titan clasped the other, both of their eyes brimming with pride.

“You ain’t in this shit alone,” Storm affirmed. “We got yo’ back.”

Titan nodded. “Whateva you need, we in this shit together. We’re all ready to let Rev rest in peace. We owe it to our brother to give him the justice he deserves.”

“For Rev,” I added, lifting my drink in the air.

“For Rev,” they both echoed, lifting their glasses with their free hand.

If Baarbie was the one who was responsible for Rev, I would show him no mercy. In fact, killing him would be the best thing I would have done all year because Rev was my boy. My best friend. I was sure I wouldn’t even be alive today without his friendship.

Yet, Storm and Titan didn’t have to go through the inner turmoil that I was currently going through. The guilt I was feeling since all fingers did point to Baarbie being the McAllister mole.

The fellas and I didn’t talk about it often, but they knew that when I moved to Miami it bought a host of folks into my life who I never expected.

Grandpa Raphael.

Cousin Mekhi.

And Baarbie … my half-brother.