Chapter 18
CHAPTER 18
RHODES
W e were in the air tub, and I was holding my baby as she lay on her side between my legs, her head resting on my chest. I could see that she was needing to be alone. She was holding in so much for the sake of her family. The way I understood her and could sense and see things about her was scary. It was like God was granting me access to not only her physical sanctuary between her legs and the one in her chest, but the sanctity of her spirit as well.
I rubbed her wet hair and watched the tight curls bounce back after my hand left them. She glanced up at me and said, “You said you would tell me what you saw while I was speaking to my family.”
I closed my eyes and held her tighter to me. “When your uncle put you on that table, it was like someone put a spotlight on you. Heaven had opened, baby, and God allowed me to actually see it. I literally saw you surrounded by angels. It took my breath away. At first, I was scared, thinking something was about to happen to you. Once I realized what was happening, I had to thank God for allowing me to see it.”
She sat up and turned to me with her eyebrows lifted. “You saw angels?”
“Yeah. It feels like God wants me to feel and understand what you feel. So, he allowed me to see why you felt the way you did. I remember you told me you get somewhat warm when God speaks to you, and that the hair on your arms and neck stand. Maybe that’s why. Angels are encamped around you, baby. I’m so blessed to be with a woman that’s so close to God’s heart. It makes me want to be better.”
She gently rubbed my chest. “You’re perfect for me, even with your flaws. It proves you’re human. There’s only one that’s perfect. I love you, Rhodes.”
“I love you more, KD.”
She laid her head back on my chest as my phone rang. I rolled my eyes. I meant to put that shit on vibrate. Karima sat up, but I pulled her back to me. Shortly after, the doorbell rang. Karima sat up and her eyes widened. “Shit!”
I was trying to enjoy time with my soulmate, and somebody was fucking that up. I got out of the tub and looked at my phone first to see it was a call from Ali. I also had a missed text message from him. When I opened it, I read, We caught a nigga outside your spot. Also, Milana Semien is here. She’s Karima’s cousin.
I frowned. I knew who Milana was, but I couldn’t understand why she was here. Clearly, her mama could handle whatever her issues were. Plus, Karima had told me that Milana had brought bullshit to her doorstep and was threatening to cause even more confusion. Quickly drying off, I said, “Milana is at the door.”
Karima frowned then stood to get out of the tub as well. I went to her, to help her and make sure she didn’t slip and fall, then hurriedly put on shorts and a T-shirt. Making my way downstairs, the doorbell rang again. When I got to it, I checked to see it was Milana and Ali. I opened the door, and she lowered her head. I could see the tears on her face. I invited them both in then said, “Karima will be down in a minute. Make yourself comfortable.”
She nodded and went to the kitchen and sat at the table. Ali and I remained in the front room. He sat in a chair, and I sat across from him. He pulled his phone from his pocket and asked, “You know this nigga?”
When I looked at the picture, I frowned. “What the fuck?” I voiced. It was my boy that I called when this shit first happened. “Yeah. That’s Percy. I been knowing that nigga since I was a kid. I called him before y’all got involved to see if he knew what was going on.”
“Well, obviously, that muthafucka working with them. We brought him to Watchful Eyes to get information out of him. Jungle, Vegas, and Jericho are with him. They plan to FaceTime Ryan. I’m not sure if he was just watching or if he planned to do more, but they will find that out. Rondo caught his ass. Had that nigga tied up like he was a fucking steer in the rodeo.”
He chuckled as I noticed Karima coming down the stairs. I tilted my head toward the kitchen.
“I’m gonna let y’all handle the family business. I gotta go. I’ll call you with what we find out.”
“Okay,” I said and slapped his hand. “Thanks, man.”
I walked Ali to the door and locked it after he left. When I turned to go to the kitchen to check on the two of them, Karima was holding Milana as she cried audibly. Karima glanced at me and slowly shook her head. Before I could walk away, Milana said through her tears, “She told me to get the fuck out of their house. What am I supposed to do? I don’t have anywhere to go, Rima.”
“You can stay at my house for now, Milana, but I don’t want no shit. You hear me?”
“You have my word. The family is going to hate me. My mama hates me!”
She broke down all over again, falling into Karima’s arms again. I made my way back to the couch, knowing that Karima would fill me in once she left. They continued talking quietly, then I could hear Karima praying for her. I swore, my baby was the one all her cousins went to. God had given her a gift, and I supposed it was her job to use it.
After ten more minutes or so, Milana left, and Karima flopped next to me. She took a deep breath then stared at me. “When all this happened between us, I questioned God, wondering why He allowed this to happen. I wondered why He would allow it when He’d already told me you were the man for me. I thought I knew the answer before, but I one hundred percent know the answer to that now.”
I grabbed her hand and gently rubbed it, waiting for the revelation. “My family needed me. Had you not done that, I would still be in Nashville, going to school and working. It would have been more difficult to leave. That was almost five months ago. I would be in my second semester, and I would have surely picked the women for my rodeo team by now. He needed me in Nome. I’m going to have to make a trip out there tomorrow to talk to Aunt Tiff.”
“What happened? I heard Milana say she put her out of their house.”
“Two of the guys that Ace killed was her ex and his brother. Apparently, they made up and decided to seek revenge against Milana. They also happened to be friends with the Anderson guy. My family has beef with the Andersons and that shit is decades old. Aunt Tiff believes she’s partly responsible for why Grandpa got attacked.”
“What do you mean they made up? What does that have to do with Milana?”
“Milana’s ex was cheating on her. She knew he had a brother that he wasn’t getting along with, so she had sex with him, and he caught her leaving his brother’s house.”
My eyebrows hiked up to my hairline. “She fucked her ex-boyfriend’s brother?”
“Yeah. Aunt Tiff knows, because I made Milana tell her. That was when I told you she brought bullshit to my doorstep. That nigga was at my house looking for her and instead of calling her parents, she was going to call Ace, SS, and PJ, Philly’s son. Well, Ace ended up doing what he probably would have done that day. He and his brother were both killed.”
“She was dating a nineteen-year-old? I thought she was like twenty-two or so.”
“She just turned twenty-two and yes, she was dating a nineteen, almost twenty, year old.” Karima slowly shook her head. “Aunt Tiff is already in her emotions because Grandpa just died, but to find out that your daughter’s fuck up partially inspired the retaliation is beyond heartbreaking. I told Milana that she had to accept Aunt Tiff’s reaction to the ratchet shit she did. They already weren’t on the best of terms after she told Aunt Tiff what she did.”
I could feel the heaviness in Karima’s heart as I held her. This was a lot. Tomorrow she would find out her cousin’s fate for blowing their brains out. He’d shot two of them in the head and the other in the chest. The judge would be reviewing everything again.
She pulled away from me and asked, “Why was Ali here?”
“They caught someone traipsing around my property. Turns out it was a nigga I was cool with. We practically grew up together. They are trying to get info out of his ass as we speak.”
“Okay. Well, I’m going to take a shower since I didn’t get to wash up.”
“Okay. How are you feeling besides emotionally heavy? Do you need help?”
“I’m okay, baby. Handle your business. I’m glad they caught him, but I hate it was your friend.”
“Yeah, me too. I’ll be up there as soon as I’m done.”
“Okay.”
Right when I was about to call Ali, he was FaceTiming me. I picked up and saw Percy’s punk ass. He had a bit of blood in the corner of his mouth and his jaw was swole the fuck up. When he saw me, he said, “Man, I ain’t got shit?—”
“Shut the fuck up. If you were just visiting, I would have known you were coming. If you here, then you got everything to do with everything.”
Ali brought the phone to his face. “Ryan is having a sit down with Trouble tomorrow. He got him to meet with him in L.A. Shawn and a nigga named Nathaniel are going with him but will stay hidden just in case there’s any funny business. This nigga here is working directly for Trouble.”
“Well, I appreciate y’all taking care of it,” I said, insinuating for them to permanently shut Percy’s punk ass up.
“Got’chu. Talk to you tomorrow evening. Hopefully, the talk goes well, and you will be in the clear.”
“Thanks, man. I owe y’all big time.”
“Mm-hmm. A time will come where you will pay us back in full.”
He chuckled, and I did as well. “I look forward to it. Talk to you tomorrow evening. Hopefully, this will all be over with.”
“Yep. He got his payment already… three years ago. This should be done.”
I nodded. “Thanks, bruh.”
He gave me a head nod then ended the call. After taking a deep breath, feeling some relief, I headed upstairs to check on my baby. It had been an extremely rough day. Shit, it had been a rough few days. She had a lot on her plate trying to see after everybody. I didn’t know how she was able to do that. I would get sick of hearing everybody’s shit.
When I walked into the room, I could hear she was on the phone. Somebody was on the phone yelling, and I could hear my baby crying. Shit.
“She fucked up! I do my fair share of dirt and did a lot of that shit when I was young too, but she took the shit too far! I didn’t raise her that way, Rima! I was pissed before now, but my daddy is dead partly because of her ratchet ass bullshit! Those muthafuckas wouldn’t have been in on that had she not pissed those niggas off! Fuck! This shit hurts so bad, Rima!”
“Aunt Tiff, where’s Uncle Ryder?”
“He went to go see about her ass! He can stay at your place with her! She’s spoiled, and she needs to be on her own if she wanna pull shit like she did. She can’t be hanging around me, because she proved to me that shit ain’t safe.”
“You’re angry and hurt right now. Wait until you calm down.”
“Fuck that! I ain’t gon’ ever calm down about those muthafuckas killing my daddy! You may as well get used to her being in your spot, because she can’t come back here, and she sure in the hell can’t work in the office with me no more. I can’t stand to look at her ass!”
As I stood there watching the tears fall down my baby’s face, my heart sank to my feet. This was too much on her. She took her phone and threw it at the wall. She was so damn angry. I went to her and scooped her up in my arms and grabbed her purse from the dresser. She laid on my shoulder and cried her eyes out.
When we got to the bottom, I lowered her to her feet and helped her slide on her Crocs. “Where are we going, Rhodes?” she asked softly.
“I’m just getting you away for a little while. Your dad has my number. If they need to get in contact with you, he knows how to reach me. I need to get you away from everything for a couple of days. Okay?”
“Okay.”
I grabbed a pair of jeans, socks, and my Forces from the washroom and put them all on. After grabbing my wallet, keys, and phone, I led her out to my garage and pulled the cover off my Range Rover SV Carmel Edition. Her eyes widened. We’d never ridden in it, because there was no reason to. Once I helped her inside, I walked around the vehicle and got inside with her.
“You need this, baby. I’m so sorry for everything that’s going on, but you are my main priority… you and my baby. I can tell that all this shit is stressing you the fuck out. I refuse to allow that.”
I gently caressed her cheek then called my aunt to let her know we were going out of town for a little bit and peeled out to refresh my baby’s spirit.