AMAI #2
The pain in my leg was a constant throb by the time I pulled through the gates of Winston’s estate.
Every press of the gas pedal sent a sharp spike of agony radiating from the graze wound up through my thigh. The bandage I’d wrapped around it was already soaked through—I could feel the dampness against my skin, warm and sticky.
I should’ve gone home. Should’ve elevated the leg, taken something for the pain, let the wound heal properly.
But I didn’t have time for that.
Not when millions of dollars had vanished from our vault.
I parked in front of the main house and killed the engine, sitting in the darkness for a moment to gather myself.
The rage was still there, simmering just beneath the surface. But I needed to be strategic about this. I needed Winston to admit what he’d done. I needed him to understand the magnitude of his mistake.
And I needed to figure out how the fuck we were going to survive this war without the resources we’d been counting on.
I opened the door and stepped out, immediately regretting it as my injured leg took my full weight.
Pain exploded through my thigh—white-hot and vicious—and I had to grip the door frame to keep from collapsing.
“Fuck,” I hissed through clenched teeth.
I stood there for a moment, breathing through the pain, waiting for it to subside to something manageable.
It didn’t.
But I forced myself to move anyway, limping across the driveway toward the front entrance. Each step was agony. Each movement sent fresh blood seeping through the bandage.
By the time I reached the door, I was sweating despite the cool night air.
I didn’t bother knocking.
I pushed the door open and stepped inside, my footsteps echoing through the marble foyer.
“Winston!” My voice was rough, edged with fury and pain.
No response.
I moved deeper into the house, my limp more pronounced now. The pain was making it difficult to think clearly, hard to focus on anything except the burning sensation radiating from my leg.
I found him in his study, sitting behind his massive mahogany desk with a glass of bourbon in his hand.
He looked up when I entered, his expression unreadable.
“Amai.” His tone was casual, like I’d just stopped by for a social visit. “I wasn’t expecting you tonight.”
“We need to talk.”
Winston took a slow sip of his bourbon, his eyes tracking my movements as I limped toward the chair across from his desk.
I didn’t sit.
Standing hurt like hell, but sitting would make me look weak. And I couldn’t afford to look weak right now.
“About what?” Winston asked, setting his glass down.
“The vault.”
Something flickered in his eyes—recognition, maybe, or guilt—but it was gone before I could identify it.
“What about it?”
“It’s empty.” My voice was flat, controlled. “Every dollar we had stored there is gone. The staff are dead. Someone cleaned us out.”
“What the fuck?” His fist crashed against the desk. “When did you find out?” he asked.
“Tonight. I went to check on it after Brandon called about Rahsaan planning to hit our money houses.” I leaned forward, bracing my hands on the edge of his desk. “Only four people knew about that vault, Winston. Me, Kaisen, Priest, and you.”
“And?”
“And Priest is locked up wherever the fuck you’re keeping him. Kaisen’s too smart to tell anyone—he knows what would happen if he did. Which leaves you.”
Winston picked up his glass again, swirling the bourbon slowly.
“You think I stole from my own family?”
“I think you told someone where it was.” My voice was low, dangerous. “And that someone cleaned us out.”
The silence stretched between us, thick and overpowering.
Finally, Winston sighed.
“Victor needed a place to hide some money. Federal investigators were closing in on some of his operations. He asked if I knew of a secure location—somewhere off the books, somewhere they wouldn’t think to look.”
The words hit me like a physical blow.
“You told Victor?” My voice was barely above a whisper, disbelief and rage warring for dominance. “You told Victor Baptiste where our vault was?”
“He’s family—”
“He’s a snake!” I slammed my hand down on the desk, the impact sending a fresh wave of pain through my injured leg. “I warned you! I told you not to trust him! I told you he was playing his own game!”
Winston’s expression hardened. “Watch your tone.”
“Fuck my tone!” I was shouting now, all pretense of control abandoned. “Do you have any idea what you’ve done? That vault had everything we needed for this war with Rahsaan! Millions of dollars in cash, weapons, resources—all of it gone because you trusted a man I explicitly told you not to trust!”
“We have other money—”
“That’s not the fucking point!” I pushed away from the desk, pacing despite the agony in my leg. “That vault was strategic. It was our war chest. It was supposed to fund operations, pay soldiers, buy information. Now we’re exposed. Vulnerable. In the middle of an active threat.”
Winston stood, his chair scraping against the hardwood floor.
“Don’t lecture me about strategy, Amai. I’ve been running this family since before you were born.”
“And look where that’s gotten us!” I whirled to face him, my vision blurring at the edges from pain and fury. “Priest is off the board thanks to you. Our vault is empty. Rahsaan is making moves. And you’re sitting here drinking bourbon like none of it matters!”
“It matters,” Winston said quietly, his voice dropping to that dangerous register that used to terrify me as a child. “But losing your temper won’t fix it.”
“Neither will trusting Victor.”
“I made a judgment call—”
“You made a mistake.” I limped closer, closing the distance between us. “You trusted the wrong person. And now we’re all paying for it.”
Winston’s eyes narrowed. “Careful, son.”
“Or what? You’ll shoot me again?” I gestured to my leg, where blood was now visibly seeping through my pants. “You’ve already done that. What’s one more bullet?”
The study door opened before Winston could respond.
Kaisen stood in the doorway, his expression wary as he took in the scene—me bleeding and limping, Winston standing behind his desk with his hands clenched into fists, the tension so thick it was disgusting.
“What’s going on?” Kaisen asked, stepping into the room.
I turned to face him, eyes wide.
“The vault’s been hit. Everything’s gone.”
Kaisen’s face went pale. “What do you mean everything’s gone?”
“I mean someone cleaned us out. Took every dollar. Killed the staff. Left the place empty.”
“How?” Kaisen’s voice was urgent. “Only four people knew about that location. You, me, Priest, and—” His eyes cut to Winston. “Dad.”
“Winston told Victor,” I said flatly.
The silence that followed was deafening.
Kaisen stared at our father, his expression shifting from confusion to disbelief to pure, unfiltered rage.
“You did what?”
“Victor needed—”
“I don’t give a fuck what Victor needed!” Kaisen’s voice cracked like a whip. “You told him where our vault was? The one place we kept our emergency funds? The one location that was supposed to be untouchable?”
“He’s family—”
“He’s a fucking snake!” Kaisen moved closer, his hands balled into fists at his sides. “Everyone knows that! Everyone except you, apparently!”
Winston shot Kaisen a furious glance. “I made a decision based on the information I had at the time.”
“The information you had?” Kaisen laughed, but wasn’t shit funny at all. “Amai’s been telling you for years not to trust Victor. Years! And you ignored him. You ignored all of us because you thought you knew better.”
“I do know better!”
“Really?” Kaisen gestured wildly. “Because from where I’m standing, it looks like you just handed our entire war chest to the enemy. It looks like you trusted a man who’s been playing both sides since the beginning. It looks like you fucked us all over because you were too arrogant to listen.”
“Watch yourself, Kaisen.”
“Or what?” Kaisen stepped closer, his voice dropping to something cold and lethal. “You’ll shoot me too? Lock me up like Priest? Bury me in a hole like Amai did?”
I flinched at the reference, but Kaisen wasn’t looking at me. His entire focus was on Winston.
“People call me stupid,” Kaisen continued, his voice shaking with barely controlled rage.
“They say I’m reckless. Impulsive. That I don’t think things through.
But look at this shit, Dad. Look at what you did.
You gave Victor—Victor fucking Baptiste—access to our most secure location.
And now it’s empty. Now we’re vulnerable.
Now we’re fighting a war with no resources. ”
“We have other accounts—”
“That’s not the point!” Kaisen’s shout echoed through the study. “The point is you made a decision that put all of us at risk. You trusted someone you shouldn’t have. And now we’re all paying for it.”
Winston’s expression was stone, but I could see the tension in his shoulders, the way his hands gripped the edge of his desk.
He knew we were right.
He knew he’d fucked up.
But admitting it would mean acknowledging that his sons—the ones he’d spent years controlling and manipulating—had been right all along.
“We’ll recover,” Winston said finally, his voice tight. “We always do.”
“With what?” I asked, my voice hoarse. “We don’t have the funds to pay our soldiers. We don’t have the resources to make moves against Rahsaan. We don’t have leverage. All we have is whatever cash we’ve got stashed in personal accounts—and that’s not enough to win a war.”
“Then we’ll figure something out.”
“We shouldn’t have to figure something out!” Kaisen slammed his hand against the wall, the sound sharp and violent. “We had a plan! We had resources! We had everything we needed! And you gave it away because you wanted a damn friend!”
Winston’s eyes flashed with anger. “I am still the head of this family—”
“Then act like it,” I said quietly.
The words hung in the air between us.
Winston stared at me, his expression unreadable.
“What did you say?”