Page 2 of What the Leos Burned (BLP Signs of Love #6)

They hopped back into the car, talking and cracking jokes the whole ride downtown.

Zay had taken a left off Jefferson and parked near the Detroit Riverwalk.

The city buzzed behind them, but out here, it was quieter.

Calmer. The water moved like a slow lullaby, reflecting the lights from Windsor, Canada, across the river.

They hopped out of the car and walked side by side under the dim streetlamps, fingers brushing but never quite intertwining. Princess wore a bubblegum pink hoodie, the strings pulled tight around her face, and a pair of gold hoops that caught the light every time she turned her head to laugh.

Zay couldn’t stop looking at her.

“You ever think about what life could really look like if we made it out?” he asked. His hands were tucked in his jacket pockets, and his Timberlands scuffed against the pavement.

“Out of what?”

“Detroit. The grind. The mess. Just . . . out.”

Princess looked at the water thoughtfully. “I think about it every day. But I also think . . . the story starts here. All the best ones do.”

He smiled at that. She always had a way of making things sound like poetry.

Just as he was about to say something else, the sky cracked open, and rain poured down without warning.

Princess shrieked and covered her head, but Zay grabbed her hand and laughed, pulling her into a sprint.

They ran, drenched and breathless. They laughed so hard they could barely see where they were going.

By the time they reached Chene Park’s amphitheater, they were soaked through.

Their shoes squished, and hair clung to their faces.

They didn’t care. They were alive and young and in love with a moment that didn’t cost them a thing.

Zay let go of her hand and jogged up the steps to the stage. The open-air roof covered them, and the city skyline stood like an audience in the background.

“One day,” he said and spread his arms wide, “I’m gonna play this stage. Whole crowd screaming my name. You watch.”

Princess raised an eyebrow. “Just one day?”

He pointed at her, eyes lit with fire. “Soon. You’ll be front row too. Pink hoodie and all.”

She laughed and shook her head then turned it back toward the water.

Zay reached into his coat pocket and pulled out his digital camera. It wasn’t fancy, just something he’d saved up for from selling CDs and helping his cousin clean out basements.

“Hold still,” he said.

She turned just slightly with her hood up, eyes soft, lips curved in a half-smile, looking out at the river like it had all the answers.

Click.

He captured her right in that moment.

She didn’t even know how beautiful she looked to him, like something you didn’t frame because it would dim the real thing. Like light, warmth. Like a reason to keep going.

“I wish I could stay right here forever,” he said, barely loud enough to be heard over the rain hitting the roof.

Before she could respond, a flashlight flickered from the side steps.

“Hey!” a voice called. “This ain’t no playground. Y’all can’t be up here!”

Princess gasped and grabbed his arm. Zay just laughed again.

They jogged back down, hands clasped tight as they rushed toward the sidewalk, breathless and soaked all over again. By the time they reached his car, Princess was shivering and giggling.

He opened the passenger door for her and tossed his hoodie in the back seat.

As he slid into the driver’s seat, she looked over at him with eyes that shined like the water that dripped from her curls.

“Still think about making it out?”

He turned the key, the engine sputtering to life. “Every day, baby.”

She nodded. “Good. ’Cause one day, when you’re on that stage . . .”

“You’ll be there?” He cut her off before she could finish.

She grinned. “Front row.”

He smiled. She forgot to finish her sentence as she was lost in his gaze.

She touched his hand, and he pulled off from the curb.

They laughed all the way down Grand River Avenue to her house.

However, when he pulled into her parents’ driveway, the silence grew heavy.

Zay turned the speaker down and stared at her.

“What?” she asked, flirty. “You got something to say to me?”

He sat there a moment longer before he responded and twiddled his thumbs.

“I do,” he said, softly.

“What?”

He swallowed. “I’d rather write it for you.”

She smiled. “Then I guess I’ll wait for the song, Westside Zay.”

She kissed his cheek, just soft enough for him to remember later, and stepped out into the night. He watched her walk up the walkway, into the door, and waved before he pulled off.

On his drive back to his stepfather’s house, his thoughts raced. For once, they weren’t about surviving. They were about becoming.

The city lights blurred past him like a music video as he leaned into the curve of Grand River, the radio up just enough to catch the tail end of the track. His verse was playing.

He grinned.

“They really playing us on the radio, Ma,” he said aloud, like she was riding shotgun. “I told you I’d make it out.”

His chest filled with a rare warmth. Something like hope.

Like a fire that didn’t burn. He flashed back to a few hours ago when he’d danced with Princess in the street like they had no past and nothing to be afraid of.

He could still feel the soft press of her kiss on his cheek. Like a promise wrapped in lip gloss.

She believed in him. She saw him.

Every verse he wrote since he’d met her that summer hit harder. She reminded him what it meant to feel, without demanding he say it.

His thoughts wandered back to his mama. She would’ve cried hearing his voice on the radio.

He missed her laugh. Missed how she called him her little man even when he grew and towered over her. Missed how her arms used to fold around him like armor. He was doing it, just like she said.

He was gonna make it.

He pulled into the driveway, still smiling, still high off the win. Still lit from love and legacy and something bigger than pain. He parked the car, stepped out, and walked up the stairs of the front porch.

Suddenly, the door swung open, and his stepfather met him with a fist. Zay’s head jerked back. He stumbled but caught himself before he fell down the stairs.

“You walkin’ in here smiling like you earned somethin’,” the man growled. “You out there actin’ like you somebody, and you still under my roof.”

Zay blinked, stunned, but not surprised. The old man stepped toward him again, but this time, Zay didn’t flinch.

His anger and rage that silently built up from the abuse over the years unleashed like seven pounds of pressure when pulling the trigger of a gun. He swung back, hard.

The sound echoed loudly outside like a dropped cymbal.

They went at it—fists, knees, shouts. A few neighbors stuck their heads out their doors from inside their homes and yelled for them to stop.

Zay didn’t hold back. Every blow came from a place deeper than anger.

It came from grief. From every time he kept quiet.

From every bruise he wore like a secret.

From the silence after his mama died and the way Kennedy always looked at him with worry in her eyes.

He wasn’t a boy anymore, and he refused to shrink for anyone again.

Before he knew it, the police were pulling him off his stepfather who laid slumped in the snow, bleeding, wheezing, and cursing through swollen lips.

They booked him that night. It was the first time he’d ever been arrested. Kennedy stormed out of the house and begged the officers to let her hug him. He only nodded to her once before ducking into the back seat of the squad car.

The holding cell was cold. Cinder block walls. Rusted sink. No clock. Time stretched. He sat on the edge of the cot, head down, hands bruised, and his knuckles cracked open. Somewhere between midnight and morning, they brought him a pen and a notebook.

He didn’t think about his court date. He didn’t think about his rap group. All he could think about was her. The only person who made the world feel quiet.

He opened the notebook and began to write.

The song was trash. Straight garbage. Too many metaphors. No rhythm. No structure.

But the hook? The hook stayed with him. It replayed in his head over and over. He didn’t know it then, but he’d rewrite it a hundred times over the next fifteen years.

The beat would change. The girls would change. The stage would change.

But every version was still about her.