1. Rakim
ONE
rakim
COUPLE DAYS LATER . . .
Initially upon my split with Daylin, I’d been sleeping at my crib, but I felt too damn far away from her. So, I took my ass back to the ranch house, a place she’d actually dwelled, and realized it brought me the tiniest slice of solace.
As soon as I came out of the bathroom from showering and brushing my teeth, I heard my personal cell phone buzzing, making me look to see it was the Godfrey Baking Co. manager, Raquel.
“Raquel,” I answered, dropping the towel I’d had wrapped around my bottom half.
“Hey, Rah. There is a girl here, and she is asking . . . for you.”
“For me?” I frowned.
My first thought was Daylin, but my baby had my number, and that just wasn’t her fucking style.
“Pretty much.”
“Raquel, what the fuck is going on?”
“Just come, please, because she looks like it is an emergency. Other than that, everything is running smoothly, per usual.”
“Aight.” I hung up, pondering for a minute or two.
Standing because it would make better use of my time to see who the fuck this girl was than to sit and try to conjure up my own theories, I immediately got dressed.
Once in my gray joggers, socks, slides, wife beater, and T-shirt, I removed my do-rag and dipped.
It took me a little minute to arrive to the Godfrey Baking Co. warehouse since I was out the fucking way at the ranch house instead of my actual residence.
Parking in the back, I climbed out, entering through the side door that required a code.
The front of Godfrey Baking Co. could be accessed by the general public, mainly for when store owners would come down to talk about or sign off on a partnership.
I didn’t want them entering in through the operations unit.
“Hey, so sorry I had to call. She is in the front waiting room,” Raquel informed, placing a hand over the phone to prevent whomever she was speaking to from hearing.
“Aight.” I mobbed toward the front and entered the waiting room off to the left to see a girl that was unfamiliar to a nigga, pacing. “Can I help you?”
“Who are you?” She froze, eyes wide as saucers as she took me in.
“Rakim. Ain’t you ask for me?” I frowned, already annoyed. Stopping by GBC hadn’t been on my fucking agenda for the day, and now she was playing fucking stupid.
“No, I asked for Zaire. Where is he? I’ve been calling, but it keeps going straight to voicemail.” She grunted out of frustration, tilting her head back and shutting her eyes.
Nearing her, I asked, “Why you looking for Zaire?”
It suddenly hit me why Raquel was seemingly speaking in code over the phone. Old girl hadn’t asked for me in particular, but Raquel wasn’t trying to divulge Zaire’s passing to a random.
“Um . . .” She licked her dry lips, eyes darting to the floor before regaining eye contact with me.
I was growing impatient as fuck but tried to remain cool since I could sense her nervousness.
I preferred intimidating bitch ass niggas, not women.
“I met Zaire at my job—Perry’s—one night, and we um, hit it off and had sex a few times.
” Her eyes couldn’t stay on me for shit.
“Calm down and talk,” I instructed.
Expelling a heavy breath, she continued. “We had unprotected intercourse because he ran out of condoms after we went two rounds.”
“Okay.”
I could see where this shit was heading, and I didn’t know if this bitch was bullshitting because she knew Zaire and his peoples had bread or if this was a blessing, my brother leaving behind an offspring.
“I’m pregnant and it’s his. I don’t have family, at least not family I talk to, but he mentioned how he had brothers he was close with, so I want my child to have some semblance of a familial unit.” She fidgeted.
“You high?”
“No. No.” She shook her head animatedly.
Moving closer, I gripped her chin and surveyed her for a moment.
“You are. You telling me you pregnant with my muthafuckin’ niece or nephew and getting high?” I let her face go.
“No. I got high and then I found out. I’m still coming down from it,” she instantly started explaining, eyes brimming with terror.
“What’s ya name?”
“Téa . . . Téa McGee.”
Sighing, I confessed, “Look, my brother died from an overdose. I can assume you knew he got high ’cause it seems like something y’all would’ve bonded over.”
“Oh.” She blinked rapidly, her eyes mistier with every flutter.
“I . . . I’m sorry. I didn’t know he . .
. oh my gosh.” She sat down, a few tears cascading down her ashen light cheeks.
“I wouldn’t have come . . . I shouldn’t have come.
My bad.” She wiped her face and tried to dart around me, but I caught her.
“Aye, look, I’m glad you did come, and I’m willing to help you out, get you cleaned up especially, so long as that baby in ya stomach is actually my blood.”
“It is. I swear.” She nodded profusely, and I studied her to see if I could detect any artifice in her body language.
“Aight.” I retrieved my iPhone. “Give me ya number.”
She immediately read it off, and I called it so she could have mine.
“Got it.” She waved her phone.
“Where you staying? You not homeless or no shit like that, right?”
“No. I have an apartment in Hawthorne.”
“Shoot me ya address. I wanna help you, but we gotta be sure that’s my family you carrying before I do all that because I won’t hesitate to put you in the ground for a fucking hoax, especially one involving my dead brother. You understand?”
“I do.” She sniffled, staring up at me.
“Meantime, hit me if you need something.” I went to open the door to the waiting room so she could exit.
This was some shit.
Once I saw Téa off, I continued on with my initial plans for the day but couldn’t forget about the shit I’d just learned. I truly prayed I didn’t have to smoke that girl for playing with me, but I knew myself and knew I would if I found out this was some type of fucking scheme she’d set up.
Stopping by some place named Cava, I read off the order I had in my notes then paid once everything was put together.
Since being split, Daylin and I chopped it up on the phone every night and every morning, and during one of those conversations, she’d told me that her favorite spot to get lunch from was this Cava shit.
Acting as if I were simply making conversation, I asked what was good there, and she ran down her whole fucking order.
I then questioned how she could eat all that and go back to work, knowing she would give me the time she usually went to lunch in order to explain how she was able to fight what niggas called itis.
Now that I had her food, I pulled up to her warehouse, smirking at the fact that this was where I’d snatched her ass up.
Gathering her food and some flowers, along with a bank bag, I stepped out the car and made my way up to the heavy metal door, pressing the red button beside it.
“Hello?” The voice of a pure LA hood rat poured through, seemingly scarring my fucking ears since I expected to hear Daylin.
“It’s Rakim,” I said.
Silence lingered before the door came open, and I spotted a girl with a somewhat familiar face, but I couldn’t place the shit. I must’ve seen her in passing somewhere and paid the shit no real mind, because my memory was fleeting and spotty when it came to her.
“Heyyy.” She purred, poking her hip out in the tiny ass shorts that showed the imprint of everything. “I’m Morgin.” She stretched her hand out.
“How you doing? I’m looking for Daylin.” I kept it polite but didn’t oblige her handshake, hoping she’d pick up on the fact that I was more than uninterested.
“Oh.” She sort of jerked back out of surprise. “One second. Come in though.”
I trailed her into the humungous ass room flowing with air conditioning and shelves upon shelves of fucking phone cases. Daylin’s branding was everywhere, and I admired the way she had this shit running, people off to the side packaging up orders in an assembly line.
Daylin stepped out of her office, and her face lit up at the sight of me, causing me to let out a fucking sigh of relief.
For some reason, I was on edge, wondering if she would change her mind about us the more time we stayed separate.
However, I’d rather her do it now than do it after I got down on one knee or some shit.
“Thank you, Morgin.” Daylin spoke as soon as she walked up to me since old girl was still standing there as if we were about to have a three-way conversation.
“Oh shit, my bad.” Morgin eyed me, seemingly sending a signal that said she would let me fuck if that was what I wanted, before flipping around and switching off, her ass hanging inappropriately out of her shorts.
“I thought I wasn’t supposed to see you yet.
” Daylin beamed up at me before I kissed her.
“I know, but I couldn’t help it, baby.”
She smiled, and we kissed some more, right in front of all her employees while whoever Morgin was watched like a fucking hawk from behind a laptop.
“Come on. It’s just my lunchtime.” She checked her Rolex, still wearing the other pieces I’d bought her as well.
I followed Daylin to her office, letting the sway of her hips in the tight ass jeans she wore hypnotize a nigga. Though in a tube top and fucking jeans with her curly hair piled on top of her head, she was the baddest. Old girl with her ass hanging out needed to take a few notes.
“I knew it was ya lunchtime,” I said, handing Daylin the food plus the roses and shutting her office door before taking in the environment.
She had this shit smelling and looking nice. I loved everything about her.
“How?” She immediately began unboxing her meal. “And you got my exact order.” Her brows kissed.
“You told me all that shit on the phone, and I guess without realizing it.” I sat across from her.
“I sure did.” She chomped down on the contents of the bowl while ripping the paper off the straw to shove it down into her drink. “You are sneaky.” She took a sip, and even that shit turned a nigga on.
“I like clever better.”
“This was so sweet though, Rah. I know my staff is gonna be all over me because they’ve never witnessed me with someone.”
“Yo’ nigga ain’t never dropped by?”
“No. He works all day pretty much.” She stabbed the food with her fork and ate some.
I kept my thoughts to myself, but I knew a nigga like Shaun wasn’t working all damn day. And if he was, he needed to quit and clock in somewhere because a muthafucka working twenty-four hours a day and still living like him wasn’t making no real bread.
I didn’t know everything about Shaun, but I knew enough from when I had him looked into, and he was a typical local hustler, block hugging and taking up small hood jobs here and there to make some cash. By saying that, the muthafucka had more than enough time to buy his girl some roses and lunch.
“This for you too.” I set the bank bag on her desk.
“For what?” Her eyes mushroomed.
Shrugging, I said, “Shit, for whatever. I know you said there were some designers you wanted to do a line with, but you knew they’d charge a pretty penny, so do that.”
Daylin didn’t say anything right away; she just watched me, chewing on her food.
“I must’ve done something really good for God to lead me to you.”
“Or maybe I did.”
Getting up from her chair, she put the top on her bowl and rounded the desk to descend into my lap.
We kissed before she said, “Shaun is out of town, but he will be back in three days, so that is when I will talk to him. I think in person is best.”
“I’ll be around.”
“What do you mean?” She giggled while wearing a confused expression.
“Fuck it sound like? While you breaking up with that nigga, I’m gon’ be in the cut.”
Chuckling nervously, she replied, “Shaun is harmless though.”
“I’m gon’ make sure he stay harmless. Don’t worry, baby, you won’t even know I’m there.” I kissed the corner of her mouth as her eyes stayed pinned on me.
I could see the cocktail of emotions swimming in her expression, so I smiled.
* * *
TWENTY-FOUR HOURS LATER . . .
I sat at the writing desk, waiting in the dark as the hotel room door opened and closed. Shaun exhaled heavily, then turned on the light before damn near jumping out of his skin.
“Sit down.” I kicked the other wheeled chair toward him, and he stood frozen. The sound of me taking the safety off my gun got him moving a little quicker though.
“F-fuck is this?” He sat gingerly in the chair as I stayed relaxed, gun still in hand as I watched him. “Nigga, is you crazy?” he questioned with a creased forehead.
I noticed he spoke with a lisp he didn’t have the last time we met.
“Yeah.”
I could tell he wasn’t expecting that answer because his glower relaxed before he put the tough nigga mask back on.
“Listen.” I sat up, twirling the gun around my finger. “When you arrive to LA tomorrow—”
“How the fuck you know when I come back?”
“’Cause I do, nigga, and I ain’t gon’ get into why Daylin thinks you gon’ be gone for a few more days, but it don’t matter at this point. When you land and see Baby, she gon’ break up with yo’ ass, and you gon’ accept it.”
“She ain’t gon’ break up with me and—”
“She is, nigga.” I nodded. “And you not gon’ put up a fight. You gon’ nod ya muthafuckin’ head and go on about yo’ fucking life.”
“And why would I do that? She don’t even wanna be with you.”
“Damn, and to think I was gon’ invite you to the wedding. You just lost yo’ fucking invite.” I rose. “Do what I said, bitch.”
“Or what?” His voice trembled, probably from the memory of that uppercut in the club that had his mouth leaking.
Pressing my gun to the middle of his forehead before he could blink, I said, “Or I’m gon’ kill you.
See, you and Daylin’s story is over with, nigga.
Even if she don’t fuck with me, she not gon’ fuck with you.
So do anything but agree to the breakup and you dead.
It don’t get no muthafuckin’ simpler than that.
We got an understanding, or do I need to knock ya teeth into ya esophagus for the wheels to start turning? ”
“W-we got an understand . . . ding,” he sputtered.
“Cool.” I stepped around him, putting the safety on my heat and concealing it before stepping out the room and going about my fucking night.
I had a phone call with my baby in a bit.