Chapter 36 Prime
PRIME
The amount of people that kept coming for me and my woman, was getting out of hand.
But thank God, Farah was sloppy. I found her purely on luck.
But I already knew it had to be her. No one else had this level of animosity to set up a pregnant woman to go back to jail. No one still free and breathing.
She also knew better than to actually kidnap or touch Yusef. She ain’t have it in her to pull no shit off like that.
But my pregnant Goddess, being back behind bars, made me sick. And I would do anything to make people suffer who harmed her. I should’ve dealt with Farah as soon as I found out Rashid died, but I let her slip, hoping she would just move on. That was a mistake. There wouldn’t be another.
The warehouse was cold and industrial. I liked spots like this because bad things can happen and nobody asks questions.
I’d rented it from an old colleague who owed me a favor. So there was no names, no paperwork, no cameras. Just four concrete walls, a drain in the floor, and enough privacy to do whatever needed to be done.
Farah had been awake for three hours now.
I sat in a metal folding chair about ten feet away from her, my arms crossed over my chest, just watching. Hadn’t said a word since she came to. Hadn’t moved. Hadn’t even blinked, far as she could tell.
She was tied to a chair with zip ties. Her wrists behind her back, ankles to the legs, duct tape over her mouth.
Her mascara had run down her face in black rivers, mixing with the snot and tears until she looked like something out of a horror movie.
Every few minutes she’d try to scream through the gag, but it just came out as muffled sobs that echoed off the concrete walls and died somewhere in the rafters.
Three hours of that. Three hours of her crying, begging, pleading with her eyes for me to say something, do something, anything.
I just sat there and let her marinate in her own fear.
This was the woman who’d sent my pregnant fiancée back to jail. Who’d stalked my nephew through a mall and used him as bait. Who’d been willing to destroy everything I loved because she couldn’t accept that her father’s empire was gone.
Part of me wanted to end her right here. Put a bullet in her skull and dump her body somewhere it would never be found. Clean. Simple. Final.
But another part of me—the part that still remembered Rashid’s hand on my shoulder, his voice in my ear, teaching me everything I knew about power and survival. And that part couldn’t do it.
I’d made a promise.
Years ago, when Rashid pulled me aside and asked me to look after Farah if anything ever happened to him. Said she was his heart. His weakness. The only soft thing in his life, and he needed to know she’d be protected.
I’d said yes. Because that’s what you did for the man who saved your life. The man who made you who you are.
And now here I was, staring at his daughter tied to a chair, trying to figure out if I was going to keep that promise or break it.
Finally, I stood up.
Farah’s eyes went wide. She started thrashing against the restraints, fresh tears spilling down her cheeks, her muffled screams getting louder. She thought this was it. Thought I was coming to kill her.
I walked over slowly. Stood in front of her for a long moment, looking down at the mess she’d become. Then I reached down and ripped the tape off her mouth.
She gasped, coughed, sucked in air like she’d been drowning.
“Why?”
One word. That’s all I gave her.
She blinked up at me, her voice raw and hoarse from hours of crying. “What?”
“Why did you do it? Why did you come after my family?”
“Because you took everything from me!” The words exploded out of her, all that pent-up rage finally finding an outlet.
“My father is dead because of you! Kasim is dead because of you! The money, the compound, the empire—all of it, GONE. And you just walked away like none of it mattered. Like WE didn’t matter. ”
“Your father made his choices, Farah. He was going to weaponize Kasim against me and my family.” I shook my head slowly. “I played by Rashid’s rules. The same rules he taught me. Don’t be mad at me for being a good student.”
“He LOVED you!” She was sobbing now, ugly and raw. “He treated you like a son. Better than a son. And you repaid him by destroying everything he built.”
“He tried to take what was mine. I responded. That’s how this game works.” I crouched down so we were eye level. “But you? You weren’t supposed to be part of this. You were supposed to take what was left and build a new life. Instead you came after my woman. My family. My nephew.”
“I wanted you to feel what I felt!” Her voice cracked. “I wanted you to lose everything the way I lost everything!”
“And how’d that work out for you?”
She didn’t answer. Just sat there, chest heaving, tears streaming, looking like a broken doll.
I stood back up and walked a few paces away, running my hand over my face. This was the part I hated. The part where I had to decide what kind of man I was going to be.
Farah was dangerous. That much was clear. She’d proven she was willing to go to any lengths to hurt me, and she wasn’t going to stop just because I asked nicely. If I let her go, she’d come back. Again and again and again, until one of us was dead.
But killing her felt wrong. Not because she didn’t deserve it, because she’d made her choices, same as her father, but because of what it would make me.
I wasn’t Rashid. I didn’t want to be Rashid. I wanted to be the kind of man who could look his daughter in the eye someday and not see a monster staring back.
“I could have loved you.”
Her voice was small now, all the fight drained out of her.
I turned back around. “What?”
“I could have loved you, Prime. I DID love you. From the first moment my father introduced us, I knew you were special.” She was looking at me with those desperate eyes, like she could will me into feeling something back.
“I would have been good to you. Better than her. I would have given you everything—my body, my loyalty, my life. All you had to do was choose me.”
I stared at her for a long moment, trying to find even a shred of what she was looking for. Some spark of attraction, some hint of possibility, some alternate universe where this could have worked.
There was nothing. Just pity.
“Farah…”
“I know you felt something. That night you threw me in your trunk…”
“I felt sorry for you.” The words came out harsher than I intended, but they were true. “You were Rashid’s daughter. Off limits. And even if you weren’t, I’m already in love with someone else.”
Her face crumpled. “She’s not better than me. She’s not—”
“She’s everything to me. And you tried to take her away.” I shook my head. “Whatever sympathy I had for you died the moment you sent that text to her phone.”
The sound of a door opening echoed through the warehouse. I turned to see Quest walking in, duffle bag over his shoulder, looking like he’d come straight from the airport.
“Damn.” He surveyed the scene—Farah tied to the chair, me standing over her, the whole grim setup. “This is cozy.”
“Thanks for coming.”
“You said you needed me. I’m here.” He dropped the bag and walked over, giving Farah a once-over. “She looks like shit.”
“She’s been crying for three hours.”
“Sounds about right.” Quest turned to me, his voice lower now. “What’s the play here? We handling this tonight or what?”
“I need you to watch her for a day or two. Until I get things sorted with Zainab.”
Quest raised an eyebrow. “Watch her? Like a babysitter?”
“Like someone I trust not to do anything stupid.” I glanced at Farah, then back at Quest. “Can you do that?”
“Yeah, I got you. But…” He stepped closer, lowering his voice even more. “What are you gonna do about her? Long term?”
I looked at Farah—this broken, desperate woman who’d been a pawn in her father’s games long before she became a pawn in mine. Who’d lost everyone she loved and channeled all that grief into destruction. Who was dangerous and pitiful in equal measure.
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I’m ruthless, Quest. But I’m not a monster. At least… I’m trying not to be.”
Quest nodded slowly. “Aight. I’ll keep her fed and watered. But you need to figure this out soon. We can’t keep her here forever.”
“I know.”
I started toward the door, ready to leave, ready to push all of this out of my mind and focus on Zainab.
“I HATE YOU!”
Farah’s scream stopped me in my tracks.
“You hear me, Prime? I HATE YOU! You’re leaving me with one of your sick-ass family members AGAIN!” Her voice was ragged, hysterical. “After what Thad did to me, you’re just gonna walk away and leave me with another one of your people?”
I turned around slowly. “What are you talking about? Thad was just supposed to watch you.”
“WATCH me?” She laughed—a horrible, broken sound. “Is that what he told you? That he just WATCHED me?”
Something cold started spreading through my chest. “Farah. What did Thad do?”
“After you cut off my ear and left me bleeding in that warehouse, your precious cousin was supposed to take care of me. Guard me until the trade.” Tears were streaming down her face again, but her eyes were filled with pure hatred.
“He raped me, Prime. Multiple times. While I was tied up and helpless and still bleeding from what YOU did to me. He raped me over and over again and told me no one would believe me if I said anything.”
The room tilted.
I felt like I was going to be sick.
Thad. My cousin. My family. The man I’d trusted to handle a simple task.
“You didn’t know.” Farah’s voice was quieter now, reading my face. “Of course you didn’t know. You were too busy playing hero for your precious Zainab to care what happened to me.”
“I didn’t—” My voice came out strange. Strangled. “I never would have—”