Chapter Eight #2
Familiar footsteps eventually crunched behind him, slowly.
Crown didn’t bother to turn. He already knew who it was.
He’d made the call himself, telling him exactly where to meet.
And he’d heard the rumble of his engine long before it reached the cemetery.
Despite the bullet wound, his brother was still riding.
Some shit Danger refused to give up. His bike was one of them.
He came into view with his hoodie pulled up, walking with a slight limp.
The consequences of the night before weighed heavily on his body, but he didn’t complain.
His bloodshot eyes shot straight to Lil Mo’s headstone, and he stopped there, shaking his head as he stared at her name and the dates etched beneath it.
The streets had claimed her on her birthday, and that would never sit right with him.
Crown stood and met him halfway. They slapped hands firmly, which turned into a pull-in, their shoulders colliding. Whatever happened the night before stayed there. In their world, fights didn’t fracture blood. Their father had taught them that.
They stood in silence as Danger paid his respect, and Crown watched him closely. The anger from the night before had cooled, but the worry hadn’t. His love for Danger ran deeper than disappointment. He loved his brother fiercely, even when he was fucking up.
“Sup, bro?” Danger said, meeting his gaze.
“I’m good. Sup with you? You straight?” Crown asked.
“Yeah, I’m good. About last night, I apologize, bro. Real talk. I was outta line. But I didn’t mean none of that shit I said. I was just fucked up. My bad.”
Crown shook his head. “I don’t give a fuck about that. That shit’s water under the bridge. As long as you good, we good.”
“Respect,” Danger nodded.
Crown lifted his phone briefly. The screen replayed last night’s breaking news he’d caught on the drive over.
Smoke filled the display, flames tearing through what used to be The Ravens’ clubhouse.
The reporter’s voice cut through the chaos, explaining the gunshots civilians said they heard seconds before the explosion.
“I’m guessing shit went how it was supposed to.”
“Hell yeah. That shit’s in ashes. Dropped ten of them niggas, one being Kilo. No losses on our end.” Danger said.
Crown nodded. “Bet.” He slid the phone back into his pocket and turned fully to face him.
“On another note, I’mma ask you something, and I need you to be completely honest with me.”
“Wassup?”
“Do you need help, bro?”
Danger exhaled slowly, kissing his teeth.
“Nah. I ain’t back on it like that. My head was fucked up. My heart was too. I just needed something to numb the pain. I did one line. Don’t make it better, but that was it. The shit you flushed was the only thing I had, and I won’t get more.”
Crown studied him closely, not as the president of the Knights, but as the older brother who had been watching him his whole life.
“I’mma keep it a hunnid with you right now.” He said.
“I’m listening.”
“All these years, you and Mo always wondered why I stayed quiet, why I stood off to the side while everybody else was partying and turnin’ up.
It wasn’t because a nigga didn’t want to.
It’s because I couldn’t. I’m too busy thinking, watching, trying to stay ahead of everything and everyone.
” He paused, making sure Danger was locked in.
“I try to catch every shift in energy, every bad habit, every sign that something ain’t right with the people around me.
I try to see trouble coming before it lands, and if it does land, I’m already figuring out how to get us ahead of it.
But right now, I got a war on my hands, a business to run, Pete telling me the feds are circling, and a new lady in my life I gotta show up for and protect. ”
Danger stayed quiet, taking it in. In all the years they had been running together, he had never heard his brother complain. Not once. But here he was, wearing his heart on his sleeve.
“With that being said, I got a lot on me right now, bro. So much that I’m bound to miss somethin’.
So, if you need rehab, I need you to make it easier on me and just say that.
I’ll push everything else to the side, and hold your hand while you get the help you need.
Because you my brother, and I love you, nigga. ”
Danger nodded slowly. “I don’t need rehab, bro. I’m good. I promised Mo I wouldn’t go back the last time I was in that muthafucka. I slipped, but I ain’t falling back in that deep. And now I’m promising you too. I’m straight.”
Crown held his gaze for a long moment. Strangely enough, he believed him about the coke. But the pain sitting behind Danger’s eyes still made him uneasy.
“Aight,” he said, reaching into his back pocket. He pulled out a business card and handed it to him.
Danger glanced down at the card. “What’s this?”
“A therapist. I remembered her from when I designed the space she runs her practice out of, so I reached out. Turns out, she specializes in trauma and grief among other shit. You gon’ call her, give her your schedule, and lock in three days a week. If you need more than that, I’ll bump it.”
Crown couldn’t be Lil Mo. He couldn’t watch Danger’s every move, every hour of the day.
But he could still show up for him in his own way, even when Danger swore he didn’t need it.
He saw his brother slipping and struggling, and that alone was enough.
He wasn’t waiting until he crashed and burned to fix it.
Danger scoffed, shaking his head. “A therapist? Bro, what the fuck?”
“Don’t argue with me on this, nigga. That pain you feelin’ ain’t just gon’ disappear overnight. And then what? You back on coke again? Or worse… findin’ somethin’ else to cope. If it comes to that, my next move is an intensive program. So, man up, go get the help, and tighten the fuck up.”
Danger grew quiet, bowing his head. He couldn’t argue. With Lil Mo gone, he felt like a piece of him was missing. He was hurting. Bad.
“This ain’t the time for pride. You need help, even if it’s just somewhere to talk that shit out. Go get it. It’s on me.”
Danger rested his hand on Crown’s shoulder, expressing his gratitude. “I appreciate you, bro. More than you know. A nigga forever indebted to you.”
Crown shook his head. “You ain’t indebted to me for nothing. And I appreciate you for what you did for Nivéa.”
“Always,” Danger replied without hesitation. “You know I got you, same way I know you got me.”
They stood there quietly as the sun climbed higher, light spreading across the family plots. Crown took one last look at Lil Mo’s headstone and said,
“I’m out.”
Without waiting for a response, he walked away, leaving the quiet behind him and stepping back into a world that didn’t stop moving, even when it took some shit from you.
An hour later, Crown stepped onto the site. His crew hadn’t arrived yet. It was just the steel frame climbing upward, the concrete core poured, and the raw bones of what would soon dominate the skyline.
With his hands tucked into his utility jacket, he moved on a mission.
He started with the footprint, setbacks from the property line, street frontage, and pedestrian flow.
The tower crane hung over everything, and the reinforced core stood solid at the center, elevator shafts already boxed in.
Good, he thought. That was the spine of the building. Everything else would wrap around it.
He headed toward the street-level service side and stopped at the future loading dock entrance, scanning the approach and clearance.
He knew service trucks would need clean access without cutting through tenant traffic.
In real life, the turn looked tighter than it did on the drawings. He clocked it and kept it moving.
Inside the open ground level, columns rose in a clean grid, and steel beams stretched above. Crown walked the perimeter where the curtain wall would eventually lock in, imagining glass replacing open air. The eastern exposure was wide open, and that meant morning light would pour in heavily.
He crossed to the street-facing side of the structure and stopped where the main entrance would sit.
Crown tilted his head back, studying the temporary decking above.
In his mind, dust and steel turned into polished stone, a double-height lobby, floor-to-ceiling glass, and security gates.
He pulled his tablet from under his arm and brought up the blueprints.
His eyes moved between the renderings and what was actually in front of him.
A few things didn’t sit right. He made quick notes.
And just as he finished up, his burner rang inside his pocket.
Sighing, Crown glanced at the screen and shook his head when he saw who it was. “Yeah,” He answered.
“Crown,” a member of the Council said, firmly.
“I thought we made it clear that we would be peaceful because too much noise brings attention. And attention brings cops. Your shit is all over the news. That kind of heat is bad for everyone’s business.”
Crown looked back across the empty site, unfazed. “You have that nigga Nico to thank for that. Ravens broke the truce first, Hem. And now, I don’t feel so fuckin’ peaceful.”
There was a pause on the other end of the line.
“Meeting Friday. Six o’clock. Don’t be late. Tell Danger to join us.”
The call ended before Crown could respond, and he wasn’t surprised. He stood there for a moment longer, staring out at the land. Two different worlds were pulling at him simultaneously. And both required structure, strategy, and foresight.
Truth was, Crown was tired of carrying it all. He needed a vacation. But there was no time for that. Instead, he texted Smoky and Danger in a group message, calling an urgent meeting.
∞∞∞