11. Crestwood Gazette #2
While she did let me go, she wasn’t a dance mom by any means. She didn’t stay and watch the rehearsal through the glass windows or attend any competitions. She called dance good exercise for my growing body, a line I knew was a dig at my weight.
Sharon never cultivated my love for dance by asking whether I wanted to attend a performing arts high school, or even if I needed help making an audition tape.
Once, my father had asked what I wanted to be when I got older, and my mom answered easily for me, “something that uses her brain because she doesn’t have the body type to be a ballerina. ”
I remember my Ddd rebuking her and them arguing about her cold words to me.
But what I remember more than that was my internalization of her words.
I believed Sharon Davis so much that I enrolled in the college she chose for me and chose a major that I knew would impress her.
I loved being an engineer. Hell, my background is what made me the best Queenpin, and it's how I met the love of my life, but this dance studio meant everything to me.
It was my redo.
A chance for me to pour into young people of all shapes and sizes.
“Point your toes, baby,” I reminded Amara gently.
“I am, Mommy.”
“You're flexing, which is close, but you’re not pointing at them.”
Amara groaned dramatically, and Genesis immediately bent down to help adjust her foot position.
“There,” Genesis said proudly. “Better.”
Aniyah looked over calmly from her corner stretch.
“She's gonna become your assistant manager one day.”
“She already acts like one,” I muttered.
Everything felt normal and relaxed. This was the first time since the kidnapping that I didn’t have an anxiety attack while being here.
My phone buzzed in my pocket, and an unknown number was calling. I ignored it, but it rang again immediately.
Annoyed, I answered quickly, “Hello?”
“Mrs. King?”
My shoulders tightened instantly.
“Yes. May I ask who’s calling?”
“This is Daniel Mercer with the Crestwood Gazette. I just had a few questions regarding an anonymous tip that was made to the Republican Party of Crestwood about Crown Logistics being involved in a money laundering scheme.”
“I will not be speaking slander or libel about my husband and I’s business .”
“Ma’am, can you please answer a few more questions?”
“You heard what I said.” I walked farther from the girls, lowering my voice slightly. “You do not get to spread rumors and lies about my family. That's defamation and libel.”
“That’s not my intention.”
“It never is with reporters.”
His voice stayed careful after that. “There are rumors that campaign money may be tied to previous business activity connected to your husband.”
Lord, I thought, here we fuckin’ go. I closed my eyes briefly. Because politics did exactly what I knew it would do: make people dig.
“Rumors,” I repeated calmly, “are what unsuccessful people use when they don’t have facts.” I hung up.
My heartbeat picked up afterward, though.
Because if someone looked deep enough, I was afraid they would uncover that drug money built our empire.
I was pissed that no matter how much legal money we made, no matter how legitimate Crown Logistics became, people would always look at Black wealth sideways first. I had chest pains thinking about a potential second war when my family hadn’t even uncovered where Cameron Price was hiding and whether or not that bitch had anything to do with my husband and brother-in-law’s past being uncovered.
Zay noticed the shift in me the second rehearsal ended. That man read my moods like breathing. “What happened?” he asked quietly while helping gather dance bags afterward.
“A reporter called, questioning the legality of Crown Logistics.”
His entire expression changed instantly. His face sharpened, and his posture grew dangerous.
“What reporter?”
“A man named Daniel Mercer from The Gazette.”
Zay’s jaw flexed.
I zipped Aniyah’s ballet bag harder than necessary.
Zay stepped closer, immediately lowering his voice.
“Baby. I need you to relax and let your husband handle it. Politics gon’ make everybody dig.”
I shook my head, looking up at him finally. My voice softened. “This feels bigger somehow, Zay. I have a bad fuckin’ feeling about this.”
Zay and I weren’t Bonnie and Clyde anymore; now we had kids, nieces, and nephews.
We were funding my brother’s campaign, and I would be damned if my brother spent another second of his life back in jail.
I was the thinker, the one who was cool and collected, but right now I had to admit I was rattled.
Zay touched my chin gently, making me look directly at him.
“You trust me?”
“With my whole world.”
His lips brushed my forehead softly. “Then breathe.”
I stared at him quietly. “What if they start connecting things?”
Zay looked at me. “You mean connect the drugs we used to move to the competitors we eliminated in the alley?”
I nodded once.
Real tension flickered through my chest. Because that alleyway connected too many people, too many secrets, and too much blood.
Zay kissed my forehead again. “X and I got that shit handled.”
And somehow? Hearing my husband say that made me believe him.
That night, we dropped Genny off at her family’s home, and we took the girls home. I stood barefoot in my closet, staring at Jare & Milla’s wedding invitation samples while my anxiety slowly climbed up my spine.
The invitations were beautifully wrapped in gold foil with red lettering. Photos of Jared and Camilla smiling like a damn Black political fairytale sat on my countertop.
The city was eating that story up. A wrongly incarcerated man comes home and finds love again.
He runs for mayor and gets a huge dream wedding with his high school sweetheart.
It was a beautiful narrative. Too beautiful, maybe.
And that was what scared me. Because every empire looked polished right before people started trying to tear it apart.