Chapter 40
Indigo
I opened my eyes just in time to watch Daddy suddenly stand and stagger back.
Zaire stood right beside me, his gun out, gray smoke curling from the barrel. Daddy dropped his pistol with a heavy, hollow thud against the floor. Blood spread fast across his white linen shirt as he fell back into his chair, the air leaving his lungs in a wet, ragged gasp.
Zoe didn’t react; she just stood there with her arms crossed, shifting her weight slightly as if she were completely bored, like she had already known exactly what was coming.
I froze, my mouth hanging open, my pulse thundering in my throat.
Daddy looked down at the blood soaking his stomach like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
He didn't panic. He didn't beg. He tried to press his hand flat to the wound, his fingers trembling and slick with crimson, but when he lifted his head, his eyes were pure, venomous ice.
He slowly fixed his gaze on Zaire, hissing through his teeth.
“Why…?” he asked, his voice a weak, gurgling rasp, but laced with a terrifying, unyielding malice. “Mi son… why? Yuh weak, backstabbing little bwoy.”
Zaire didn’t even blink. He reached up and slowly wiped a small spray of blood from his cheek with the back of his hand, his eyes never leaving the old man’s face.
“Why?” he repeated, cold as hell. “Because I hate you. I hated you and your worthless ass son. You let that bitch Omnira kill my momma while you watched. You sold off my sister like she was property. Treated her like a fucking chess piece.”
Daddy spat a mouthful of thick blood onto the edge of his mahogany desk, leaving a wet, crimson stain.
“Your mother was a weak, soft gyal,” he snarled, his voice rattling violently in his throat but losing none of its raw cruelty.
“And you... yuh just like her. A coward shooting an old man from the dark.
Indigo is a pawn because she have no belly for this life!
I build this empire... yuh can't hold it, bwoy. It will crush yuh.”
My brain finally caught up. I didn’t feel any type of grief watching Daddy bleed out, but Zaire's sudden hypocrisy vexed me to the marrow.
“You watched all of that with the type of indifference that bordered on—”
Zaire cut me off, snapping his head toward me with a look so sharp I felt it in my chest.
“What power did I have, Indigo?” He grabbed the edge of the desk, leaning down until he was inches from Daddy’s fading, hateful eyes.
“I played the long game. I got good at pretending. Waited for him to give me everything. I stayed silent, and I held that shit in my chest like a poison so you could dance. So you could throw fits and break shit and feel like you were rebelling. You think I wanted to watch you be married off? You’re my little sister.
That shit hurt me to hold my tongue. Not kill Malachai's ass.
Crazy ass thinks everybody is scared of him, like he's the fucking boogeyman.”
He stepped closer to the desk, the gun still steady in his grip. He kicked Daddy’s dropped pistol across the floor, the heavy metal screeching sharply against the marble.
“But you seemed happy with him. So when Daddy ordered Malachai killed, I sent Zoe. You know how she gets down—straight headshots—but she didn’t even shoot him in the head.
Wasn’t trying to kill him. Just a couple of shots through the Range Rover door.
” He gave a short laugh that wasn’t remotely humorous.
“Enough to make you see he ain’t supernatural and you can walk away.
The nigga bleeds just like everybody else.
And I’ll paint this city in blood now that I can, if I have to. ”
Daddy let out a bloody, mocking chuckle, his eyes narrowing to razor-thin slits as he glared at Zaire. “You think... you think you are a king now?” he wheezed, blood spilling past his teeth. “Malachai will tear your throat out... and I hope I see you both in hell.”
Zaire looked at me head-on, his jaw tight, a single muscle ticking violently in his neck, completely tuning out the old man's dying curses.
“I love you. You can come back to Miami with me. Nobody is gonna make you do shit you don’t want to do. Not even the Hand of God. We see he bleeds.”
Then he turned back to Daddy. He didn't hesitate. He raised the gun, his finger squeezing the trigger.
Bang.
He put a bullet right between his eyes, effectively cutting off the old man's venom forever.
Daddy’s head snapped back hard. Blood and brain matter sprayed the wall behind him, ruining the expensive dark wood paneling. The sound was final. The heavy silence that followed was even worse.
Zaire lowered the gun, calm as ever. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a clean silk handkerchief, and began to wipe down the grip of his weapon.
“Clean this up,” he told Zoe, his voice dropping right back into that clinical, business-like tone.
She nodded once and moved without a word, already pulling a pair of latex gloves from her pocket. I guess me and her would have to wait until later, at the very least I was going to beat her ass for shooting Malac, despite the reason.
Zaire looked at me again, his eyes searching mine. “You ready to go home, little sis?”