Ducane #2
A heart monitoring machine tethered to me for a week scared my ass straight.
I looked at the number on that blood pressure machine and understood that I was going to win every argument and lose the whole war if I didn’t change my bad habits.
A man my age with those numbers was not living.
It was a reminder that I had more life to live.
I set the water down and looked at the photo strip one more time.
In the first frame, we were both trying to look cool. By the fourth one, she had her head thrown back, laughing, while I watched her instead of the camera. Like always.
I folded it carefully and put it in my jacket pocket. One day, I hoped to return it to its rightful owner.
My mother’s text came in right after.
Mama: Congratulations, son. You always make Mama proud. I wanna see you. Let’s do lunch.
I’d text her later.
The Premier Wings confirmation was sitting in my email. Infinity Island. Six days out. I had booked the trip when the dizzy spells came back, and the doctor stopped being subtle about what he was telling me.
I was going for a week, maybe longer, depending on how I felt.
After that, six months off. All of it in preparation for the entertainment division expansion when I returned.
No more measuring myself against my father’s version of success.
I was doing what I wanted and what was best for the firm. He’d better bring the Navy to stop me.
The knock at the door came before I finished the thought.
“Boss.” Devon, my executive assistant, cracked the door. “Your team is out here looking for you. Lola is threatening to come in herself.”
“Tell Lola to give me thirty seconds.”
“She said twenty.”
I stood because Lola ran a tight program, around the office and around my life. She was my personal assistant, and whatever I couldn’t get to, she could. The heart of a thing, the parts I didn’t have hands for, she handled.
I straightened my shirt and took one more look around the office. My grandfather’s name was on this building. My mother’s name was on this building. My name was on this building.
Everything that happened next was mine.
I opened the door and walked back to my party.
I gave my team an hour of stories, cake, and laughs before I was ready to pack it up. I had more plans tonight. Ducane Simmons Esq was putting his suit down. Cane was emerging.
Mudd’s party was going to be twofold, which was exactly why I wasn’t going to be in that building long. Show my face. Collect my extra cheese. Go about my business.
I had been rocking with Mudd before real fame and long before this case.
His boys had been in and out of court for years.
The feds had been hungry to put Mudd away permanently.
It took them until now to find someone willing to go against the code.
That someone was going to have a very interesting few days ahead.
I spotted my father sitting in his office when I walked past. I tossed a head nod his way, and he did the same.
He had damn near forbidden me from taking Mudd as a client, but I refused to abandon the very people who had been rocking with this firm from the beginning.
The killers. The high rollers. The forceful businessmen.
They deserved the best representation, too.
That was the less savory part of the business.
It was the real reason we had the suits, the cars, and the rest of it.
He maintained the business, but I was about to push it to the limit.
When I made it home, I showered and changed into something that officially put me in downtime mode.
Cream Sugarhill nylon lounge shirt, Denim Tears jeans, fresh-out-the-box white Air Forces.
I kept the jewelry minimal. The pinky ring was non-negotiable.
Every Simmons man owned one. My father passed mine down, and as much as that man worked my nerves, I felt the weight of that ring every time I put it on.
Being a Simmons meant something, whether I liked the man or not.
I added the rope chain and the gold Rolex and called it done.
I was driving myself tonight. No Kareem. No partition. Just me and the city.
The 1974 El Camino had been sitting in my garage waiting for a night worth taking it out. Sky blue, cream interior, rims that caught every streetlight on Fifty South. My grandfather bought it new. I had it restored three years ago because some things you don’t let go.
The windows were down as I hit Highway West, that Lil C song playing through the speakers, the one about being celebrated, not tolerated. The city opened up in front of me after the biggest win of my career. This city was supposed to be mine and Skye’s by now. Instead, I made do.
I pulled up to Mudd’s estate in Cressman and headed in. When I stepped inside, the lights were low with people all over the place. Smoke in the air. I spotted Mudd next to Alexis and made my way over.
“Damn nigga, I didn’t think you’d make it. You know you be low as a bitch.”
“I’m always willing to move for the money. You know that.”
“Word. Let me holla at you in the back.”
The music grew faint as he led me through the estate to his office. A few of his people were already in there. Nobody I didn’t recognize.
Mudd closed the door. The party became a low hum behind us.
He went straight to the safe behind the painting and came back with several tightly banded bundles of cash, setting them on the desk between us.
“Cane, I meant what I said today. You a solid nigga. You ain’t steered me wrong yet. I appreciate that. Three fifty on top of your fees. Don’t argue with me about it.”
I looked at it then at him. “I wasn’t going to. Nobody else would’ve gotten your reckless ass off.”
“That’s why Alexis copped this for you.”
He laughed and reached into the desk drawer. Pulled out a box and slid it to me.
I opened it. Audemars Piguet Royal Oak. Rose-gold skeleton dial, with the movement visible through the face. I put it on and looked at it next to my grandfather’s ring.
“She said you looked like a Skelly type of nigga.”
“This shit is nice. Damn, you must’ve told her what we talked about?”
“I talk to Alexis about everything. No hiding, no holding shit back. But I needed a man’s perspective on this one, and I fuck with you like that. We appreciate you for not letting these folks trick me out of my position.”