20. Nairobi Crawford
Bear
Need you to come to the warehouse.
“Work?” Kenya asked. I’d stopped by the house to check on her, something new to the both of us. After everything with Hana and the Order, I decided I could try and extend her a little more grace. Sterling had fucked us all up and left us to put ourselves together.
“Something like that,” I said, slipping the phone back into my pocket. “I do have to go though.”
“Before you do,” she slid a card across the table to me. I picked it up, it was the name and number of a therapist.
“Therapy?”
She shrugged. “I want to build a relationship with you, Nairobi. I can’t excuse how the past thirty-eight years have gone, but I can admit my shortcomings.
Your father was a manipulative prick, but he’s not here anymore.
We can try to fix this ourselves or at least get some help.
And you know I love throwing money at a problem. ”
I looked at the card again. “Who referred you?”
“Lorna. As you can imagine, most of the women I’m friends with are all a little messed up.” She chuckled softly. “I know you think we’re just a bunch of stuffy rich women, but they really are my friends.”
This was her way of trying. Pushing her away just kept me trapped in the same cycle Sterling had drilled into me. Plus, how the hell could I try with Fontaine but not my own mother? I had to keep doing the uncomfortable things.
I exhaled and tucked the card into my bag. “Okay. I’ll go. Set it up.”
Relief flickered across Kenya’s face as she made her way around the table to hug me. “Be safe, okay?” she said as I pulled away.
“Always.”
I knew shit was off the moment I stepped into the warehouse.
Cash was leaning against a stack of crates, stone faced. Jelani was quiet for once with no slick remark as I approached them. Slim, who was always the most relaxed of the four, had a distant look on his face.
Fontaine kissed the top of my head as I sidled up next to him.
“Um… hey, y’all,” I said.
“We’re all here,” Fontaine said, tipping his chin toward Slim. “Go ‘head, bruh.”
Slim took a deep breath and stood. “I know who’s behind the baby shower shooting.”
Cash frowned. “How’d you find out?”
“Because it was meant for me. Ol’ girl from New York… she’s Messiah Lawson’s wife.”
My stomach dropped.
Messiah Lawson used the Agency’s services when he needed someone high profile dealt with. Over the years he’d grown increasingly erratic and paranoid, but had too much control on the east coast gun market—and no one had the balls to take him out.
Cash’s eyes went wide as he pushed off the crate. “Whatchu you mean you been fucking on Messiah’s wife?”
“I didn’t know at first,” Slim swallowed. “She told me after the fact—she said they were separated, that she was leaving him?—”
“And you believed her?” Cash roared, closing the distance between them. “You brought bullshit to my door over some pussy?”
He jabbed a finger into Slim’s forehead. “You supposed to be smarter than that, my nigga. We forty! The fuck is this young boy shit?”
“You so fucking lucky my wife and daughter ain’t get hurt.” Cash shoved him and reared his arm back like he was about to punch him, but turned away instead.
Slim held his ground, clearly ready to take whatever punishment was coming.
Cash inhaled and looked over at me. “Nai, I know we good, but I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have been so quick to blame you.”
I nodded. “I did a job for Messiah a few years ago. If he knows you’ve been sleeping with his wife, he’s just waiting for the right moment to take you out. Trust me, that’s the type of nigga that measures twice and cuts once.”
“If you weren't my boy, I’d deliver your ass to Messiah my damn self,” Cash gritted at Slim. He looked at Jelani. “How you think we should handle this?”
Jelani looked surprised that Cash was deferring to him. “We should go talk to Messiah. It’s risky because the nigga is nuttier than you, but it might be our only option to keep this from turning into an all-out war.”
“CJ could probably get you a meeting,” I offered. “Messiah’s not exactly friends with the Reapers, but I’m sure they have some kind of understanding.”
Fontaine stiffened at the mention of CJ, but I ignored it—some things were bigger than old wounds.
“You,” Cash pointed at Slim. “Lay low. Matter of fact, lower than low. Be a ghost. And I hope you cut that bitch off.”
Slim nodded solemnly. “I fucked up. I’m sorry.”
“You’d be dead if this were anybody else,” Fontaine said. “Especially if the Council found out. No one needs Messiah coming down here wreaking havoc.”
“Shit, if this was a few years ago, I would’ve just killed you and deaded this shit,” Cash said.
His words hung in the air. We all knew he was telling the truth.
Cash exhaled and looked up at the ceiling. “This family shit really got me soft. I’ma hit CJ up and let y’all know when we’re leaving for New York. Fontaine, get this nigga a burner.” He shook his head and headed out without looking back.
Slim sank back into his chair and put his head into his hands.
Fontaine drove us back to his place in silence. His brows were furrowed together as he focused on the road.
“What’s on your mind?” I asked.
He rubbed his jaw. “He was fucking with this woman for two years and didn’t say shit even though he knew who her husband was. What if this shit came up when we were in New York tryna get Jas back? This shit could’ve gone left so many times.”
“You think he ever planned to tell y’all?”
“Hell no. If she hadn’t said shit to him, we’d still be looking for ghosts.” He shook his head. “I been knowing this nigga since we were kids, and not once has he ever done something so reckless. I’d expect shit like this from Jelani and even then, I don’t know. Shit is crazy.”
There was a kind of grief in his face I hadn’t seen before—not for Slim being in trouble, but for what this had broken between all of them.
“His actions put Jas and the baby at risk, Nai. He may not have known Messiah was behind it, but he knew he was the type and kept fucking with his wife anyway. I can forgive a lot, but I’m not sure if I can forgive that.”
A week later, we were on the Banks’ private plane headed to New York, everyone lost in their own heads.
The irony wasn’t lost on me. It was like déjà vu, coming back here to clean up another mess.
Only this time it wasn’t a rescue mission.
The plan was to meet this man and head back to Atlanta right after.
Messiah’s Midtown office housed his brokerage firm, a sleek high rise where money talked and everybody else fell in line.
We were patted down in the lobby before being sent up to the top floor.
The boardroom was huge with glass windows and big city views.
There wasn't any security visible in the room except three guys who tried their best to look intimidating, but I could feel eyes everywhere.
Messiah Lawson was an imposing dude. He was at least 6’5 and the type of nigga who watched Scarface one too many times—he carried himself like he was a mafioso.
His pinstripe suit was practically stitched on him, waves on swim, with a big-faced AP on his wrist. The man was objectively good looking, handsome even, but there was something about him that left a sour taste in my mouth—a darkness that hung over him like a dark cloud.
I had a similar feeling when I met Marcus a few years ago.
A beautiful woman, who I assumed was Sasha, sat to his left.
She matched her husband’s fly in a cream tailored suit that complemented her sable brown skin.
She wore at least four karats in each ear and a diamond tennis bracelet on her wrist. But underneath all that polish, I saw the fear she tried to mask with indifference.
“Say y’all peace so we can get this shit over with,” Messiah said as we entered.
“Is this how you welcome all your guests?” Cash asked. “We’re here to talk, Messiah. I have no beef with you, even though your little temper tantrum put my wife in early labor.”
A devious grin spread across Messiah’s face. “Money, you know just as well as I do that there’s no such thing as peace once your house gets violated. You blew up that councilman’s gala when that nigga Marcus snatched your girl, right?”
Cash’s jaw ticked at the mention of Jasmine’s kidnapping. “You know that shit’s not the same.”
“Look, man, we didn’t know—” Jelani started.
Messiah put his hand up to cut him off. “I’m not interested in what you niggas did or didn’t know. One of your own fucked my wife—been fucking my wife—and I’m supposed to let the shit ride?”
His eyes flicked to Sasha. She kept her head down as her lips trembled. Messiah stood and moved behind her, resting a heavy hand on her shoulder. Every instinct I had started screaming, goosebumps ran up my arms as the temperature in the room seemed to drop.
“I treated this woman like a queen,” he said as he stroked her hair. “House, cars, trips, clothes, anything she wanted, she got.”
His hand wrapped around the front of her neck. “And I get it—she’s bad as fuck. The pussy’s fire and got your mans caught up. But my wife seems to have forgotten her vows.”
He yanked her head back so she was looking up at him and bent down to kiss her sloppily. “For better or for worse, right, Sash?”
Sasha whimpered as he pushed her head forward so she was looking at us.
“In sickness and in health,” Messiah continued, letting her go and pulled the Glock from his waist. Sasha’s hands were balled tight in her lap, tears sliding down her face.
“And most importantly—till death do us part.”
He pressed the gun to the back of her head and pulled the trigger.
I flinched. The sound was still ringing in my ears when Sasha’s body slumped forward, her cheek hitting the glass table. Her eyes were open, fixed on me as blood spread beneath her.
I’d killed plenty of people. I watched plenty die. But I’d never seen a man kill his own wife and look so unbothered doing it.
Messiah tucked his piece away, his eyes dark. “You cross me, you lose everything. The only way this gets handled is Slim paying with his life. Either hand him over, or I’ll come get him myself. I don’t give a fuck who gets caught in the crossfire.”
He jerked his chin at the door. “Meeting’s over. Get the fuck out my office.”