Chapter 29 Ares
Ares
“This Used To Feel Easy”
Los Angeles felt different when you owned pieces of it.
Private hangar. Black truck waiting. City waking up under morning haze while I slid on my shades and stepped back into my lane.
France was politics.
LA was mine.
I had to come home and act like my life wasn’t upside down. Yuna was in France, detoxing, probably giving the staff a hard time, yelling at the top of her lungs, but she couldn’t run away. So I needed to use this time to get out of the house before my crew was telling me I had to fly back.
By the time I walked into my label office, the energy had already shifted. Phones ringing. Beats leaking through studio walls. Staff moving like the building had a pulse.
My assistant, Darius, looked up first.
“Welcome back, Mr. Jackson. Busy day.”
“Always,” I muttered, handing him my duffel.
He started listing meetings, but my attention shifted down the hall where voices bounced off the glass.
My sisters. Big Ghost’s only other kids I promised to look after.
“Oh, yeah. They definitely are on your list of meetings. You might as well get them out of the way first,” Darius suggested.
I walked off and stepped into the conference room.
Raina and Nia Jackson.
Raina was the lyricist.
Nia was the digital artist.
Both worth millions. Both in their late twenties now, shining.
Raina was arguing with her producer through headphones, loud and animated like always. Across from her, Nia sat locked into her laptop, sketching cover concepts, color palettes scattered all over the screen.
They looked up at the same time.
“Ares!” Raina jumped up and hugged me hard. “You been gone forever.”
“Relax,” I said, smirking. “You know y'all got deadlines, right?”
Nia rolled her eyes. “Mr. Forbes walks in and immediately starts bossing.”
“That’s why the lights stay on,” I replied.
“Okay, so what’s our next move?” Nia asked, all business. I taught them everything they knew about being businesswomen. I went over the rollout plans. Budgets. Graphics. Marketing pushes. Tweaked a few things. Approved a campaign without blinking. Paid them what they were owed.
I made sure these girls wanted for nothing, and it wasn’t just because Big Ghost asked me to in his will. I wasn’t cruel. Never had been. I took care of what was mine and who I loved. These two had my whole heart.
“Stay out the blogs,” I told Raina. “Let the music talk.”
She saluted dramatically.
I tapped Nia’s screen. “Tighten that font. Send it to me when it’s cleaned up.”
She nodded, a proud smile slipping through.
Moments like this grounded me. Reminded me who I was outside the family politics.
I clapped both their shoulders and stepped back into the hall.
That’s when I heard her voice.
Leona’s voice hit the glass before I even saw her.
Low. Emotional. Smooth.
I walked straight to the studio she was in, knowing I shouldn’t have. Her voice always hit me in my soul.
She stood in the booth with her eyes closed, headphones on, body moving like she felt every lyric in her bones.
I stayed quiet behind the glass.
Watching.
The producer spotted me and froze. I lifted my hand slightly.
Keep going.
She finished the verse, voice cracking just enough at the end to make it real.
When she stepped out and saw me, she didn’t look surprised.
Just slow, knowing.
The producer left, leaving us alone.
I studied her.
“You look better when you’re not belligerent on the internet.”
She smirked. “You look better when you’re with me.”
I didn’t answer that.
She leaned against the wall, arms folded, watching me like she was trying to read something under my skin.
“You’ve been ghosting,” she said.
“That’s my name, isn’t it? I’ve been busy, though.”
“That’s what we’re calling it?”
Her voice still pulled at something familiar. Something easy.
I ignored it.
“What you working on?”
She shrugged. “Music. Healing. Trying not to think about men who disappear after the biggest breakup of their life.”
I almost laughed.
Some things never changed.
She stepped closer.
“I’m glad you’re here, though. Bianca emailed me, and she added Lyric to the email.”
That got my attention. Lyric had been quiet, but I knew she was still mad at being cut off, after being with me since we were young.
“She wants to sue you and wants us involved. Says the NDAs were shady. Says you played all of us.”
I stared at her.
“You respond?”
“No.”
“Why?”
Her eyes softened slightly. “Because I don’t burn the man who built me.”
Silence stretched.
I believed her, but I had questions I knew she probably didn’t have answers to.
She took another step forward.
“Fuck Bianca. You know you miss me as much as I miss you.”
“You don’t miss me too much, writing subliminal diss songs about me.”
“You know music is how I release. Now just admit you miss us.”
I missed all of them sometimes. The bullshit. The comfort. The way things used to be simple.
But simple didn’t exist anymore.
Still, I didn’t step back when she touched my dick through my slacks.
Her hands moved slow, familiar.
“You don’t have to pretend with me. I won’t tell anyone we were together,” she whispered.
I exhaled slowly.
She lowered herself in front of me and undid my pants, eyes locked on mine like she was making a decision for both of us.
I didn’t stop her.
Because kings got tired too.
Because sometimes moments like this felt easier than thinking.
The room blurred into low music and breathing, my hands gripping her ponytail while my mind drifted somewhere far away, while she deep throated me.
France.
Contracts.
Yuna’s face when she fainted from dehydration.
A future that felt heavier than this moment.
I let myself cum all down her throat. She stood back up, wiping her lip with a satisfied smirk.
“Can we finish this later?” she asked.
I adjusted my pants, calm as ever.
“I don’t think so. You just stay out of Bianca’s way.”
She smiled like she won something.
Maybe she thought she did.
“I will.”
A knock hit the studio door.
Darius stepped in. “Sir, legal just sent a message.”
I walked out of the room to speak to him in the hallway.
“It’s a rumor going around. Bianca is suing you. An email leaked. She added Lyric… and her.” He nodded toward Leona.
I looked at Leona through the glass. “Yeah, I heard.”
Something in my chest tightened.
If Bianca was moving, somebody was pushing her.
And if somebody was pushing her, then this wasn’t over.
Not even close.
This used to feel easy.
Now everything felt like a setup.
I walked to my office to call my lawyer.
Already thinking about the next fire I had to put out.