Chapter Six. Asad #5
Sometimes I just want to run. Run and disappear into those trees or those mountains.
Shrug off the weight of decisions, responsibilities, lives and walk the fuck away, never to be seen again.
How freeing that shit would be. To walk without the ever-present concern of who might be running up to my back to pump a bullet in it.
To not always be thinking three steps ahead.
To not map out a room as soon as I enter it to be aware of the fastest exit should something pop off.
It’s fucking exhausting, and gotdamn, I’m tired.
Of the lies.
The betrayal.
The greed and envy.
The people.
I could never admit this to Ember, but I get it. I get her desire for freedom, to abandon it all. Besides being unwilling to allow her to leave this organization, leave me, maybe that’s the other reason for my refusal. Jealousy. I don’t want her to experience what I at times so desperately crave.
Yeah, that makes me a selfish li’l bitch.
“Prince?” Makeda softly calls my name and, inhaling a deep breath, I briefly close my eyes. When I open them, gone is the would-be wanderer, and the head of House of Cross returns.
I can’t afford to be anyone, anything else.
Spinning around, I face my street bosses again.
“Nothing,” I announce.
Makeda and Eli glance at each other, then back at me. Both wear identical frowns.
“What?” Eli asks, with “the fuck you mean?” all up in that one word.
“That’s what we’re going to do. Nothing.
” I shove off the sink and retrace my steps to the counter, picking up the tablet and powering it off.
Setting it back down on the island, I meet their confused, angry gazes.
“I’ll get with Ro, but we’re the only four who know this exists, and that knowledge stays here. ”
“Why?” Makeda demands, flicking a hand toward the device. “Ember murdered Marcus, the head of Cross, her father. We can’t just ignore what we saw or the implications of it. If she can take her own father out, then what else is she capable of? What else has she already done? She can’t be trusted.”
“I’m aware of their relationship. It’s because of that connection I’m deading this shit,” I bark, pacing away from Makeda, over to the stove, then retracing my steps.
Over and over. “That”—I jab a finger in the direction of the tablet—“was personal. If she’d sent someone else to kill him, I might agree with your argument.
But Ember didn’t; she handled that herself, and it was between father and daughter.
Whatever happened in that apartment didn’t have shit to do with Cross or me.
Don’t get me wrong. Ember Cross is very capable of more, and I’d turn my back on a starved pit bull while wearing a meat suit before her.
But what happened to Marcus don’t have shit to do with us. So. Forget. It.”
I halt mid-step, pin an unblinking stare on Makeda. To her credit, she meets it without flinching.
“But get one thing straight and never fuck it up again—I’m the head of Cross. Offer me your opinion, I welcome it. But don’t ever fix your mouth to tell me what I can and can’t do. Understood?”
After a moment, Makeda, arms crossed tightly in front of her chest, nods. “Understood.”
“Good.”
Neither of them was privy to the dirty, raw details of the history between Marcus and Ember.
So they couldn’t fully grasp why I didn’t give a fuck that she shot her father full of smack and left him like some dope fiend in a condemned crack house.
Given the father he’d been to her—the mu’fucking man he’d been to her—it was better than he deserved.
And shit, fuck I look like trying to swoop in and avenge him? Fuck Marcus.
My anger stems from her not confiding the truth with me.
Not letting me fucking protect her. Not letting me protect what’s mine.
Trust between us an ideological concept, but …
No but. I want it from her. Call me unreasonable and irrational considering I’d just threatened and blackmailed her into marriage, but I needed it.
Sighing, I drag a hand over my hair, then roughly scrub it down my face.
“So you don’t think she’s behind the drive-by today?” Eli asks, walking back to the table and reclaiming his seat. Leaning forward, he props his elbows on his thighs.
I shake my head. “I didn’t say that. I don’t know if she’s involved in that or not. Ember has her own reasons for wanting me dead so we continue to look into her and everyone else. Marcus and today’s attempt are two different instances. We treat it like that.” I look over at Makeda. “We good?”
Frowning, she lowers her arms and reaches for the milk. “Yeah, of course. Listen, I’m into that toxic shit. If you ain’t threatening my life, you don’t love me.”
I snort and head to the refrigerator. Pulling the door open, I grab a beer, no longer in the mood for Cinnamon Toast Crunch.
“Now…” I twist the cap off and lift the bottle for a long, deep pull. “Let’s go over this dinner. Everybody’s about to find out the difference between me and Marcus.”