Chapter Six. Eshe #3
Her voice breaks off as I drag down the zipper of my jacket and reach inside, then pull out a balaclava and hold it up for her and everyone else in the room to see.
So what if after Malachi left my house last night, I broke into his house, entered the code I’ve seen him use countless times on the safe in his closet, and borrowed one of his signature balaclavas?
Abena doesn’t know that, and neither does anyone else here.
As I hold up the black leather face covering with the pointed top that resembles the head of a crowned eagle, there can be no doubt that it belongs to the Huntsman.
And if I have the Huntsman’s hood, then not only is my story about encountering the Huntsman true, then most likely so is my claim about killing him.
This time, the noise in the throne room is as thunderous as the silence that came before it.
Shouts, curses, and even laughter punctuate the air.
The words bad bitch, just like her mother, and not to be fucked with circulate among the kapteni and the soldiers.
From the anger that steadily darkens Abena’s eyes and stiffens her body, I can tell she hears each and every one.
This is exactly what she hoped to avoid by sending the Huntsman after me. What she intended to stamp out before the roots could take further seed and grow vines.
Admiration for me.
Loyalty for me.
Desire for me.
And yet, her actions have given me the opportunity to sow those very seeds of discontent into her own ground.
Without breaking her gaze, I approach the dais and climb the steps.
“Here you go, Abena.” I offer her the balaclava with an almost-soft smile. “For you.”
To those watching, it appears like a gift from a devoted subject. When in truth, it’s checkmate.
She has no choice but to take it. Either that, or look like a sulky, petulant child in front of everyone in the room.
Or the bitter, jealous monarch that she is.
“I want you to keep that,” I say, backing down the steps, my hand pressed to my heart. “It’s a token and reminder that you’ll never have to worry about the bogeyman coming after you.”
No one but her and Ekon can see my smirk.
Oh, if looks could kill, I would be—shiiid. Who am I kidding? Abena couldn’t take me if Grandma went back in time and fucked T’Challa. Now, her Mirror …
Other than me and my Seven, he’s the only other real predator in the room.
The kapteni, soldiers … they’re dangerous, absolutely.
Hell, all Mwuaji are. It’s why we aren’t to be fucked with, not just because we run weapons and drugs.
We defend ours—territory, product, reputation, family—with a viciousness that has instilled fear in the hearts of many mu’fuckas in these streets.
But still, they aren’t on the same level as us.
I don’t include Abena in our category.
She’s only dangerous because her stupidity and greed know no bounds.
What makes her truly lethal is the soulless and unfailingly faithful killer she has at her side.
When I was fourteen, he showed up at the obodo, a damn-near-emaciated sixteen-year-old with haunting blue eyes who didn’t speak for months.
But he followed Abena around, never leaving her side.
Ma told me Abena found him in a brothel, dirty, starved, and bleeding from being used in whatever way the clients wanted to get their shit off—beatings or fucking.
The madam there made the mistake of thinking Abena fell into the category of desiring that kind of perversion.
My aunt is many things, but a pedophile ain’t one of them.
She tortured the fuck out of everyone there, then had the house torched to the ground.
To my knowledge, there isn’t a sexual relationship between Abena and Ekon. No, the bond connecting them goes much deeper than fucking. He would slit his own throat for her just after tearing out the heart of anyone who came for her.
Present company included.
That kind of devotion and the utter emptiness in his startlingly bright gaze makes him the second most dangerous person in the room.
I wink at him.
And he stares at me, unblinking.
I have no doubt he knows Abena sent the Huntsman after me. There’s no secret she has that he isn’t aware of. No order she’s issued that he hasn’t carried out. No body she’s laid out that he didn’t put there in the first place.
“Well.” I clap once. “This has been fun.” Not. “But I gotta get out of here. Fight night, y’know. Attempted murder and murder always get my blood pumping. I hope to see you there, Auntie.”
With a mock salute, I pivot sharply on my heel, but my name halts me.
“Eshe.” Abena waits until I turn back around to face her, and though fury still darkens her eyes, a smile curves the dark red slash of her mouth. “Aren’t you forgetting something?”
I tilt my head, waiting. Nah. I didn’t forget shit. But obviously she thinks I did.
“You didn’t bow before your oba before you left. Bow, Niece.”
Hatred chokes me as we stare at each other, and just as she doesn’t hide the triumph gleaming in her eyes, I’m sure I telegraph the rage seething in mine.
I’d rather disembowel myself with a rusty spork than bow to this bitch, but to disobey a direct order would be outright disrespect at best, treason at worst. And the twitch at the corner of her mouth relays that she’s enjoying this.
Enjoying knowing that it’s killing me a little to genuflect to a woman I despise.
But I don’t have a choice.
Not for now.
But even if it’ll mean both of our blood coats that fuckery of a chair, she’ll pay.
For this.
For my mother.
For everything.
Grasping a hold of that thought, I bow so fucking deep at the waist, the cast of fucking Bridgerton could take notes.
And moments later, when I straighten and meet Abena’s gaze, neither one of us is smiling.
This time, when I turn around and stride out of the throne room, she doesn’t stop me. No one does. As I clear the doors, my kapteni follow, joining me in the foyer. We all remain silent as the soldiers at the front doors pull them open, and we exit the compound.
“That shit had to hurt,” Maura says, stating the obvious in her airy, cheery voice that belongs to a gotdamn Disney princess, not a murderer.
Penn backhands Maura across her chest, and the freckle-faced, petite redhead winces.
“Well, fuck. Ouch.”
Sighing, Penn pulls a pair of gloves from her back pocket. “What next, Eshe?”
“Let’s meet.”
That’s all I need to say as I jerk on my own gloves and stalk toward my bike.
Up until now, we’ve been moving slowly, chipping away at the foundation of Abena’s empire.
But the moment she sent the Huntsman after me, slow got drop-kicked out the window.
Fuck slow. We’re moving full force ahead with our plan to get that bitch off the throne.
I don’t even need to close my eyes to see my mother’s deep crimson blood staining that sidewalk like an oil spill.
And that blood still cries out for justice, for revenge.
Those needs follow me into my sleep. Only more spilled blood will appease them. Abena’s blood.
And I’m just the person to do it.
I’m the only person to do it.
Minutes later, the eight of us roll down the isolated obodo road, three of us on motorcycles and the rest in cars.
As I pull up to the gate, that reflexive instant of panic flares within me as it’s done since I was sixteen.
I’m waiting on the day when those big iron sentinels won’t open, trapping me on this compound.
I don’t know what I fear most.
Being trapped or dying.
But today isn’t that day, and as they slowly ease open, I release a low, heavy breath and hit the throttle, taking off as if demons unleashed from the pits of hell are on my rear wheel.
“I can’t believe that bitch. She’s got to fucking go.” Nef’s flat statement rings in the thick silence of my living room, and from the grim faces on the other six women gathered, they all agree with the sentiment.
I know I sure the fuck do.
I just played the recording that Laura gave me for my Seven, and their reactions match mine. Disgust. Fury. Betrayal.
Just when you thought Abena couldn’t sink any lower, that bitch hit hell.
Kenya raises her hand as if she’s in a classroom waiting to be called on. “So, we taking that ho out, right?”
“Is Lion-O the hottest ThunderCat?” I shoot back.
Kenya scrunches her face. “Nah. That’s Panthro with that big-dick energy.”
I blink. “Get out.”
“Okay, okay.” Tera holds up a hand toward me, palm out. “We have an assassination to plan. Focus.”
I mug Kenya. “I don’t even know who you are right now.” Tearing my gaze away from her, I roll my shoulders. “A’ight. I’m ready.”
For the next hour, we lay out a strategy for tomorrow night. It’s short notice, but we’re all professionals here. Highly motivated professionals.
“Good.” Tera lifts a shot of Patrón to her lips, taking a sip. “Now that’s settled, but we still have the match to get straight. The lineup’s good. We got Dane Graves versus Black Knell as the main event.”
“That’s gon’ be a beautiful fight.” Tyeesha nods her approval, tipping her Sam Adams beer to her mouth.
“Both have undefeated records, and their fighting styles are a damn-near-perfect match. The downside? At the end of it, we’re going to be down one good-ass fighter,” she observes with the calm and clinical reason that’s earned her the nickname Doc.
Well, reason and the beautiful precision that she uses while performing torture.
She’s not wrong though.