12. Chapter 12 #2
"Oh, you must be talking to somebody, because you must’ve forgot I fucked your man without a care in the world!" Brooklyn spat out, her voice rising in hysterics. "He didn't give a fuck about you! He laid right there and fucked me!"
I opened my mouth, but Adanna didn't acknowledge me—it was as if I wasn't even in the room.
"You always trying to take someone’s man!”
Adanna squinted, confused. “Come again?”
“Don’t get confused now. We were cool until you took the man you knew I was checking for.”
Adanna pondered, and then shook her head. “I know you ain’t show your true colors over that. I know you not talking about who I think you talking about.”
“Quan wasn't even checking for you at first!” Brooklyn yelled.
I sat up straight as a spike of annoyance cut right through my headache. I glared over at my wife. “Who the fuck is Quan?”
Adanna rolled her eyes, waving her hand dismissively in the air. “Just an old ex from my past before I met you, baby. Pay her no mind.”
“He didn't want you until your big ass pushed up on him!” Brooklyn exploded, and her voice echoed into the quiet corners of the restaurant.
Adanna tilted her head, unbothered by the screaming.
“Girl, if you wanted to fuck Quan that bad, all you had to do was say that when he asked for my number,” Adanna snapped back.
“I didn't think you liked the nigga that deep!
It ain't my fault he likes big girls, and it damn sure ain't my fault you didn't speak up.
But then again, you like every nigga that eyes you for more than three seconds, so if you don't get out of my face with that bullshit, cause ain't no way you did all this shit behind wanting a simple man...”
“He came after me,” Adanna continued, tapping her chest with her nails. “I was on the other side of the club, sitting down, minding my own black business!”
“Then, you took my whole crew!” Brooklyn hollered. “Do you know how much it hurt to go to my own people and hear them talking about you?! You stole my whole damn life!”
Adanna’s posture shifted. She leaned clear across the table, getting right in Brooklyn's face.
“They were never yours to begin with, dummy. It ain't my fault they peeped your fake ass a mile away and were just waiting for a real one to pop up.”
Brooklyn sat there fuming.
Adanna picked up her napkin, casually wiped her fingers, and dropped the bomb.
"Oh... and take your family's official death certificates as a courtesy for the life of the Chairman. They've been officially claimed dead as of today… King Eze, I wouldn’t be caught by myself if I were you. Crazy karma has been happening and you at the top of the list.”
“W-What?”
"Oh, hell yeah. You got Dame all the way fucked up," Adanna said, "I really don't like the way you've been treating my man."
“The way I have been treating my son?” My father let out a harsh laugh, throwing his hands up in the air. "Oh, please! Didn't you fucking stab him?!"
She tilted her head. "But did he die, tho?"
My father’s face went pale. He opened his mouth, but Adanna never even looked at him.
She stood up gracefully, smoothing down her outfit. "Baby, let's go."
Then, she reached out and caressed my shoulder. The moment her hand touched me, the chemical compound in my brain went completely haywire.
A violent, disorienting shockwave slammed into my head.
The whole room spun wildly on an axis, and when I looked over at Adanna, my head warped her face straight into Brooklyn's, staring down at me with a smug, evil-ass grin.
Panic seized my throat, and a wave of adrenaline exploded through my blood.
I stumbled out of the booth, trying to breathe through these crazy feelings.
My father stood up. "You walk out of here with her and I'm cutting you off! You will no longer be my son!"
I turned my bloodshot eyes toward him, my vision blurring into heavy red streaks, but he just glared back, completely cold.
Then Brooklyn made the fatal mistake of opening her mouth.
"We have to talk, Dame!" she shrieked, standing up. "You can't leave! We have to talk because of the baby—!"
Snap.
The last wire in my brain broke in half. Everything melted into one wild urge.
I leaped right over the mahogany table, tackling her straight to the floor. Chairs clattered and people gasped, but I couldn't hear a single damn thing over the roaring static inside my ears. My big hands wrapped around her throat, squeezing with all the power I had.
A terrifying urge took over my whole body, and no matter how hard I tried to pull back, I couldn't control a single muscle. My mind was completely locked out while my hands kept digging deeper into her windpipe.
My mouth flew open on its own.
"You trifling as fuck!" I roared down into her face. "You and my father deserve each other! Y'all both some parasites!"
I was spazzing out, completely incapable of stopping the truth from pouring out of my mouth. I didn't have a clue why my brain was glitching or why my body was acting on impulse.
"Stop!" she gagged, her eyes bugging out in terror as I cut her air off.
I squeezed harder. Brooklyn’s hands clawed uselessly at my wrists while her face turned a dark shade.
Then, two arms wrapped around my chest from behind. She used her leverage to yank me off Brooklyn's body.
"Ease up, Killer!" Adanna commanded.
Brooklyn gasped for air, coughing violently as she scrambled back on her hands and knees.
Adanna hauled me out of that private room with my neck in a tight choke hold.
CRACK!
She brought her open palm around and smacked the hell out of my forehead right as she kicked open the metal exit door.
"Focus on me!" she said in my ear.
The warm air hit us, and before I could even get my footing, Adanna slammed my back against the damp brick wall of the alleyway. She reeled back and slapped my cheek. I snapped my head to the side and forced my eyes to lock onto her face.
"What the fuck is wrong with you?!" she barked. Her hands swept over me, evaluating the damage.
My tongue felt twice its size, so heavy and clumsy in my mouth as I started stuttering. "I—I don't... baby, I swear—I saw—"
"Dame, shut the fuck up and look at me!" She grabbed my chin, forcing my gaze onto hers.
That was when I felt a hot, thick foam bubbling over my bottom lip. Panic spiked through my chest, and the whole alleyway started tilting sideways into a blinding, bloody red mist.
Danni cracked me across the face a third time. The sting jolted my brain back to reality for two seconds.
She yanked my left arm up under the streetlight. Her thumb traced three jagged, bloody claw marks tearing straight through my skin.
Adanna smacked her teeth, letting out an annoyed hiss. "The guard scratched you? Ah, damn."
My heart pounded against my ribs like a trapped drum, and I lost my composure. "What?! What the fuck does that mean, Danni?!"
"I guess his side effects passed onto you," she said. She grabbed my face again, her thumb digging into my jawline. "Look at me and relax."
I did the complete opposite. I thrashed against her grip. Adanna didn't waste time arguing with a crazy man. She reeled back, and slapped the shit out of me one more time before dragging me to the car.
I collapsed onto the leather seat, panting, foaming at the mouth, and losing my mind to voices echoing in the air that weren't even there.
She slammed the door shut, rounded the hood, and hopped into the driver's seat. She snatched her phone out, and slapped it on speaker before she tore out onto the street.
"Shay," Adanna said into the phone. "How do I reverse the side effects? He's flipping out… Uh huh… Girl, what? Speak normal, I don’t know those terms... Okay. Got it… I told you I got it. I’'m not about to play with you. Bye.”
She hung up, and swerved into an empty parking lot. She threw the car into park, unbuckled her seatbelt, and turned her body toward me.
"Just go to sleep, babe," she whispered softly.
Before I could ask what she meant, her hands moved with lightning speed. She grabbed both of my wrists, twisting my left arm out, and dug her thumb deep into a pressure point below my inner forearm.
My lungs released a breath and everything went completely black.