Chapter 15 Amethyst
Chapter fifteen
Amethyst
“You killed two of the Franklins?” Pyrite asked, and I nodded. “And they know it was you?”
“I left Charlie alive so that he could tell them it was me,” I answered with a chuckle. “You know his little ass likes to gossip.”
“He does, which means he’s probably running his mouth to his family and a few others,” Pyrite replied with a shrug. He patted me on the shoulder and smiled brightly. “You ready for this?”
I turned back to the house to see Yale talking to Cross through the window and nodded in acknowledgment. Hell, yeah, I was ready for everything that was going to come my way, the most important thing being her. I’d played games too fucking long to think about wasting any more time.
“I’ve been ready,” I replied with a nod.
“I mean, I ain’t mad at you for it, but why not go after the Kilmores first?” Pyrite questioned. “You’re allowing them to see you coming by not going after them.”
“I need some answers that they can’t give me if they’re dead,” I answered as I continued to watch Yale.
She looked good as fuck in the black fitted halter dress.
Her hair was wild and curly around her face, and her makeup was natural.
If I hadn’t known her and didn’t know that she was wearing makeup, I would’ve thought she just wore lipstick.
Her million gold bracelets were on her wrists, and, of course, her necklace, which I had bought her, was around her neck.
“How are you getting the answers?” Pyrite asked.
“Psalms is taking care of that for me,” I answered. Everyone stopped moving and stared at me. “What?”
“Psalms is taking care of it for you?” Pyrite repeated what I said as if he didn’t understand what I’d said. “What does that mean?”
“I called Cross-”
“First fucking mistake,” interjected and shook his head. “My wife is always going to support your shit, and you know it.”
“I know,” I chuckled and shrugged. Nine grilled me, and all I could do was smile at him. “I called her because I knew that she was the only person who could get Psalms out of her garden. I need her.”
“She’s itching to go to the warehouse and see what Psalms is up to,” Nine said, shaking his head. “It all makes sense now why she keeps saying she needs to make a few runs and check on her.”
“That’s what you get for marrying a murderer,” I laughed, and Nine grunted in response.
He knew what kind of woman he married, and he knew that trying to sit Cross down wasn’t going to last long.
She enjoyed killing too much to ever stay down for long.
The only thing that was saving Nine some stress was that she was pregnant and would never do anything to jeopardize her unborn daughter’s life.
“I know,” he said as he ran his hand over his face. “But now that you gave her to Psalms, what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to go see her in a minute,” I answered, and he nodded. “I’m just waiting on someone.”
“Who?” questioned.
I lifted my glass to my mouth but didn’t take a drink as I looked around the backyard.
There were a lot of people here to celebrate my birthday.
I didn’t want a big party or anything like that: just my people, some good food, drinks, and music.
The entire night, my attention had been on Yale, and I couldn’t help but laugh.
She thought she was slick and was avoiding me, but I let her have her time to herself.
Me stepping over the line this morning was going to fuck with her head, I knew that, which is why I was good with just watching for now.
“Nigga, who the fuck are you waiting on?” Citrine asked with annoyance heavy in his tone.
“Uri,” I answered. As if he knew we were talking about him, Uri stepped outside and looked around.
When he noticed me, he nodded, and I returned the nod.
I downed my drink, handed the glass to Citrine, and left my brother and friend standing there.
When I was close enough to Uri, I gave him a dap, and we left the backyard.
We’d already spoken earlier today, so there was no reason to have a conversation. I grabbed my keys from the table by the front door, then left the house. Consonance and Mama were talking, but stopped when they saw me.
“Where are you going?” Mama asked.
“With Uri real fast,” I answered her, then turned to Consonance. “Yale is staying here.”
“Forever or just tonight?” Consonance asked as she crossed her arms and smirked. “Because if it’s the latter and not the former, then I’m taking her home.”
“Forever,” I answered, then dropped a kiss on her forehead as I passed her.
“About fucking time,” she said, and I nodded.
“I already know,” I laughed, then jogged down the stairs. “I’ll be back. I love y’all.”
**
“Well, shit,” I said as I walked into the room that Psalms held Shelly in. The smell of blood, piss, and something else that I couldn’t identify hung in the air, and I had to wave my hand in front of my face to try to clear the air. “I didn’t expect this.”
“Expect what?” Psalms didn’t look up from tracing her name in Shelly’s blood. She hung upside down, her eyes open but empty.
“Is she dead?” I asked as I closed the door behind me. Uri stood next to me with a blank expression on his face. I didn’t know if he was impressed or concerned, shit, he may have been both.
Psalms looked over her shoulder at Shelly, tilted her head to the side, and then used her right index finger to poke her in the middle of the forehead.
Shelly finally blinked, and Psalms turned back to me, nodding.
“You want to know what I found out?” she asked, then went back to tracing her name in the blood.
“Yeah,” I replied.
“You’re going to be mad, so be prepared,” she said with an innocent shrug.
“I’m good with whatever you’re about to say,” I said, even though I didn’t fully believe it.
Psalms looked up at me, smirked like she didn’t believe me either, then went back to tracing her name.
“You know the basics. Shelly and Grant have been together for a while. Have a few kids.” I looked at Shelly’s now-flat stomach, wrapped in Tegaderm, then back at Psalms. “She was close to eight months, not six like you said.”
“You killed the baby?” I asked.
Psalms lifted her head and slowly blinked. “I’m not Cross and the other one,” she said, shaking her head. “He’s at the NICU,” she answered. “Now back to her.” She pointed her bloody finger at Shelly. “She’s been with Grant for years, loved him, all that jazz.”
“Not past tense, she still loves him,” I said, shaking my head.
“Past, present, never happened, I personally don’t care what you label it. Just know her and her feelings are strong.”
“Alright.”
“Anyway, your girl here was a part of the plan to set Yale up.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Because they needed a fall person,” Psalms answered with a shrug. “They shit wasn’t grand or a well-thought-out plan. At least from what she knows.”
“She could be lying.”
Psalms’ finger stilled, but she didn’t look up from the blood she was writing in. “She didn’t lie,” she said with a low laugh. “She wanted to, shit, she even thought about it, but she learned quickly that wasn’t a smart decision.”
“What did you do?”
“I broke her fingers,” Psalms answered. I looked at Shelly’s hands and instantly knew that shit hurt.
They were barely connected to her hand and were black, blue, green, and swollen.
They were pale, which meant the blood circulation had stopped.
Whatever Psalms had broken them with had done some severe damage.
“I see,” I said as I walked around Shelly to try and get a better look at what Psalms may or may not have done. Her hands were the least of my worries as I looked her over. “So, what else did she say?”
“The Franklins are involved, which I figured you knew,” she answered. “This shit is personal on more levels than one. They want y’all, The Numbers, St. Thomas’, and us.”
“Why?” Uri asked, finally speaking up.
“All for different reasons, but none of them matter because I just decided to join the story.” Psalms looked up at me and smiled.
The crazy part was that her smile was genuine and sweet, and if I didn’t know her, I would’ve thought she was just an innocent hippie out enjoying her life, instead of a killer.
She stood and wiped the blood from her hands onto her pants.
“I’m going to be honest when I say this to you.
” Psalms looked at me with a serious expression.
“You really should’ve left me to play in my dirt. ”
“I-”
“They set up Yale to take the fall for Quincy,” Psalms cut me off to say. “Grant offered up Yale.”
“Why?”
“That’s what you have to ask him,” she answered with a shrug. “I’m going after the Franklins.”
“By yourself?” I asked even though I knew she would probably say yes.
“No, silly,” she laughed and shook her head.
“I’m calling Script.” She shrugged, and I couldn’t help but laugh.
Psalms calling Script meant a lot more than just him coming to her aid.
He was going to bring his brothers, and neither of them gave a shit about anything but killing.
Having Psalms back with the Lidell brothers meant people were going to die, no matter how involved they were.
“I owe him one from back in the day, and I know he’ll love this.
” She turned her attention to Uri, and her eyes went cold.
“The Franklins hurt me, but the Kilmores tried to destroy my sister.”
“I know,” Uri nodded.
“No, I don’t think you do,” she said, shaking her head. “Either you handle them, or she and I will, and I doubt you want that to happen because if we do it, then we’ll come after you next.”