Chapter 29 Amethyst
Chapter twenty-nine
Amethyst
“Her building got hit,” Citrine said, and I nodded. The sound of the wind blowing hard as hell outside had my full attention. A storm was coming. Citrine reached across his desk and hit my foot. “Nigga, did you hear me? Her fucking building was hit.”
“It was supposed to be,” I said without looking at him. The sky behind him was getting dark as hell, and to the left, I could see the clouds moving closer. “I already spoke to Xayne about it. He was supposed to have one of his little niggas do it.”
“It wasn’t them,” Citrine replied. I moved my head in his direction so fast I felt like I was going to be sick, but I didn’t care. “I thought that would get your attention.”
“What do you mean it wasn’t them?” I stood, ready to move. This shit sounded like a good idea, but now other niggas were making moves. That wasn’t going to cut it. “Who the fuck was it?”
“I don’t know,” he answered and leaned back in his seat. “I got the call last night around eight.”
“Last night?” I questioned him, and he nodded.
Last night she texted me three times, and each time I almost broke down and replied, but I didn’t.
I stayed strong because I needed her to stay strong and keep that anger on display.
I didn’t want her to find out about his kids just yet, but that shit was going to come out eventually.
“And nobody thought to call and let me know?”
“She asked us not to,” Citrine replied, and I reared back, surprised as fuck.
“What?” I let out a humorless laugh. “She said not to tell me? As in those words came out of her mouth?”
“Yeah,” he nodded. “Said it more than once, shit even yelled it when I was going to go against it and pulled my phone out. Her short ass slapped that shit out of my hand and stomped it.” He pointed to his smashed phone on the desk.
His phone was fucked up. “Mama calmed her down and took her back to y’all’s spot.
I think she tried to stay the night, but Yale nixed that idea. ”
“Why didn’t you call me after she left?”
“My phone is broken,” he said slowly. “I’m waiting on a new one to be delivered now.”
“Other people had a phone!” I yelled. Citrine leaned back in his seat and smirked. “Ain’t shit funny, nigga!”
“You think so?” he swayed. “Because from my side, it is. You walked out on that girl, pulling some Nine ‘I’m protecting her’ bullshit instead of telling her what the fuck was going on and moving together. Now shit is happening, and you don’t know shit about it until it’s too late.”
“She could’ve been hurt!”
“She was at home,” he said, shaking his head, “Called us on her way to the shop. We were there before she pulled up. The place was fucked up. Whoever it was smashed everything they could. One thing I can say is Yale isn’t stupid when it comes to business.
Nothing of value was out. Which probably pissed them off more than they already were. Her safe was still locked up.”
“That shit is built to last,” I said as I started to pace. “Wasn’t nobody getting that thing open or out of there.”
“Yeah, she said the same thing,” he replied.
I continued to pace, thinking of who the fuck it was that went after her shop. She’d been there for years, niggas knew not to even think about touching her shit. Whoever this was didn’t give a fuck about their life.
“She texted me yesterday, said she needed to talk to me, that Quincy was basically about to dump Grant’s kids in her lap.”
“What did you say to that?”
“Nothing,” I said, shaking my head.
Citrine kissed his teeth, but I didn’t stop moving. The sound of him tapping a pen against his desk was the only sound in the room.
“She should’ve called me,” I said more to myself than to him. I nodded, ran my hands through my hair, then licked my lips. “Why didn’t she call me?”
“Probably because your ass is MIA right now,” he replied, and I cut my eyes to him.
Citrine threw his hands up in surrender, then smirked.
“Don’t be mad at me because it’s the truth, baby bro.
You didn’t respond to her text, but you expected her to call you and tell you that her shop got broken into?
Nigga, you’re slow as fuck if you thought that was going to happen. ”
“She should’ve called.”
“She called the people she knew who would show up.”
“I show up!”
“You disappeared on her,” he replied coolly.
I opened my mouth to correct him, but Citrine held up his hand to stop me.
“You’re trying to protect her, but going about it the wrong way.
I don’t care how you feel about me saying it because it’s the truth.
You left her wide open. There’s only so much that we can do because she isn’t with us all the time.
That’s the part of your plan that you didn’t think about. She’s out there alone. Fix it.”
I stopped pacing and stared out the window.
He was right. I’d left her open to be touched, which wasn’t smart.
I needed to take care of an unknown enemy, and she was left standing in the middle of possible crossfire.
Irritation swept through me, and I dropped my head.
I knew what the fuck I needed to do, and it was going to kill me, but it was my only choice.
Me: We need to talk.
**
Three hours later, I was standing at the airstrip watching as Tulane walked down the stairs.
This shit was getting redundant and pissing me off.
Three women followed him, each damn near a replica of the woman in front of her.
The only difference was their height and the shades of brown covering their skin. There was no denying their beauty.
“Back again, huh?” Tulane chuckled as he dapped me up. I stepped back, stuffed my hands into my pockets, and nodded. My eyes went to the women behind him, and my heart slammed into my chest. “What’s so important that I needed to drop everything and come here?”
“Yale’s shop was broken into,” I answered. “It wasn’t what we planned.” My gaze went back to him, and I saw the little twitch in his left eye.
“Young blood.” Tulane shook his head, then glanced back at his daughters.
“You had an agreement. You protect her, and I played my role. You asked, no, demanded that I step back and let you handle this, but now you’re telling me that her shop was broken into?
” He shook his head. “I’m not liking what I’m hearing, which is going to have me start making moves. ”
“I’m already on it,” I said, then licked my lips. “Shit is already in motion, and that’s why I called.”
“I’m tired of your motion shit,” Tulane grunted.
He looked back at the women behind him and sighed.
“These are Yale’s sisters. You’ve already met Spelman.
” He pointed to the shortest woman. Spelman Forrester was a big-time sports agent and was on Pyrite’s radar.
Spelman had a few players on her team that he wanted to connect with.
“That’s Clarke.” I knew of her, too. She was the architect who’d designed her beach house.
“Berkeley.” The sister who was with the shits.
Berkeley looked like she didn’t give a fuck and would try every nigga that stepped to her wrong.
“Ladies,” I said, then gave them a quick nod. “Now, for the reason I called you.”
“Listen, Young Buck, I’m going to have Mirror start making some moves-”
“Yale is in the car, sleep,” I cut him off. Tulane looked over my shoulder to the black Jag still running, parked behind me. “She’s going to be pissed when she wakes, but that’s to be expected.”
“Why?” Spelman asked. Her dark eyes were locked on the car. “What did you do to her?” I watched as all three of them turned their attention to me. Berkeley’s hand went behind her, and I knew what type of time she was about to be on.
“She’s alright,” I said, trying to ease any fear she or her sisters were having.
“Then why is she going to be upset?” Spelman asked again.
This time her voice held a hint of annoyance, and it took everything in me not to smile.
The facade of proper control she liked to show was slipping.
Out of all Tulane’s daughters, Spelman was the quietest. There was little to no information about her life, except for her career.
Which told me she held the biggest secrets. “What did you do?”
“I gave her something to help her sleep,” I answered with a shrug. The sisters exchanged looks, and I turned to Tulane. “Figure out how you are going to explain who you are to her when she wakes up.”
I left them standing where they were and approached my car.
This shit was a big ass gamble, one that I didn’t have a choice but to do.
I needed her gone, safe, because now I was about to fuck some shit up.
Believe it or not, I was sending her away because I wanted her home.
I wanted to spend every night lying under her.
I wanted to wake up every morning knowing that I get to see her smile.
I wanted forever with her, but I needed her fucking safe to do that.
I needed a clear head; I needed my attention on finding out who the fuck this boss of Grant’s was so that I could kill him.
And I knew I couldn’t do that with her being here.
I couldn’t concentrate on making some fucked up decisions with her next to me because my focus was going to be on protecting her.
My eyes couldn’t see her, my brain couldn’t think about her safety.
Tulane was my only fucking option because nobody knew who she was to him. His secret was my only fucking option.
I stood outside the car, hands on the roof, head resting on my forearm, a small part of me telling myself that this shit wasn’t going to work.
That what I was thinking, hoping, fuck it---praying for wasn’t going to work because I wasn’t strong enough for it to work.
I was playing a fucked-up ass game because of my pride.