Chapter 44
Chapter Forty-Four
Silas had lost weight.
At least a good forty pounds, I decided from my end of the visitation table.
I could see why, though, as Thanksgiving dinner for that evening consisted of four bags of potato chips he’d asked me to buy for him from the vending machine.
In the fifteen months he’d been here awaiting trial for Lauren’s shooting, today was the first time I’d visited him.
The visiting room was empty except for us, and the clock on the wall told me we were way past the visiting time window. Silas had to have pulled some strings to get this late night meeting. I pulled out an iron foldable chair.
“I didn’t have that girl shot, you know,” was the first thing he said to me when I sat down. Without a word, I nodded. I already knew this much. “So why you ain’t been comin’ to see me?” he asked, unable to sound anything but hurt.
“I’ve been busy with law school interviews,” I replied, which wasn’t a lie, but not entirely a good excuse. “And runnin’ all these clubs and shit. It’s been a lot.”
That was a better excuse.
“From what I’ve heard, you done dropped all the girls.
” My father shook his head and split open a yellow bag of chips in front of him.
He’d heard correctly. The drugs, I could keep up with, but I couldn’t make time to give attention to the network of pimps and prostitutes my father profited from.
Nor did I want to. “You leavin’ a lot of money on the table, Kain. ”
“Yeah.” I nodded, leaning back in my seat and welcoming whatever harsh string of words he had ready for me. The tongue lashing never came. Surprisingly, Silas’ shoulders relaxed. He changed the subject.
“Vance told me you’ve been workin’ on startin’ up a record label with Marlon.
” It was Thanksgiving and my shrinking father really just wanted to sit and make small talk with me.
I didn’t feel guilty for not having visited sooner, but something in me did sink.
Perhaps it was because I had to remind myself that even though Silas probably did deserve to be in here, he was innocent of the crime he was accused of.
“How’s Marlon been? You heard from his mama? ”
I chuckled at his last question, reaching for a bag of chips in front of me.
“Give it up, Dad. Marie don’t want your old ass no more. And Marlon’s a’ight. He finally got that PhD in communications, so it’s Doctor Marlon Xavier now.”
“Yeah, he told me last time he came by.” Marlon hadn’t told me he’d visited my father in prison, but I didn’t exactly ask. I could see why he would do it. Even though Marlon had harsh opinions about Silas, my father was as close to a father as he ever had growing up. “So a record label?”
“It just sort of happened.” I shrugged. “Marlon had the plans mapped out and he just needed the funding behind it. So came Montgomery Records and he was named CEO. I thought it was about time. There’s money in music.”
“Clean money,” Silas heard the hidden meaning behind my words. “Is that why you closed all the whore houses? Are the drugs next? You tryna get out the game?”
“I don’t know, Dad. I’m just tired all the time, and with law school coming up next—”
“Boy, fuck law school!” He slammed the bag in his hand down violently.
This was the answer he was trying to get out of me, and now that he’d gotten it, he was furious.
“I worked hard buildin’ up this city, and you not gon’ fuck it up because you wanna run around and play Law and Order at Yale, or wherever. ”
“Vance told you about that, too, huh?” Why should I be surprised that Vance told him about Yale? That might’ve been something to brag about for him, but to Silas, it was a waste of time.
“When I get outta here, I’m not tryna play around with some music shit. It’s money in music, but it ain’t never gon’ be nothin’ compared to pushin’ product and pussy, you hear me? You keep my money in check till I get back.”
“I don’t think you’re gettin’ out of here,” I hit him with the truth. “Lauren—” It still burned my tongue to say her name “—is fully cooperating in the case against you. It’s her word against yours, and she has story after story that shows you wanted her dead.”
“But that’s your bitch, right?” I inwardly cringed. “Well you find her, and tell her it was her fuckin’ Pops who blew that hole through her. You can fix this mess you made if you want to, Kain.”
If I want to…
“She’d never believe that,” I explained, leaning over the table’s surface. “Especially coming from me, after what I did to her father’s career last year. Dad, if you want to beat this, we gotta find some way to make him confess, and I bet he’d rather die than let his family see him that way.”
Silas shook his head, irritated with my response.
“You not tryin’ hard enough,” he told me.
In truth, I wasn’t trying at all. Silas being in prison, though I’d never say it out loud, hadn’t exactly depressed me as much as it depressed everyone else in my family.
My days were peaceful. My nights were predictable.
There wasn’t an aging father over my shoulder who I felt bound to out of respect.
Silas was in prison.
But I was finally free.
“I’ll try to visit more often, Dad.”
And I let that be the last thing I said to him.
***
Eden sings like an angel.
It was a Friday evening at a one-room jazz club in the heart of the city—family-owned of course. Eden Xavier was giving a debut live performance of all the songs on her upcoming album for a room of music journalists, bloggers, and influencers. She was very much in her element.
When Eden gets lost in a song, she closes her eyes and tosses her head back slightly.
Her tongue creeps out to glaze her lips just before every high note.
And like always, the room shakes into a somehow audible silence.
People watch her, enamored by the harmonies she spins with ease, but when her head bowed to the closing of the song, her opened eyes scanned the crowd and ultimately stopped on me.
She stared me down, an eyebrow climbing over the fact that I was the only one in the room not clapping.
I broke eye contact, checking my phone for any new messages, and to remind myself that I could have any woman in this city that I wanted.
Except for two.
Marlon’s little sister was definitely off-limits.
And the other? Well, I couldn’t get within one-hundred yards of her. I had the restraining order to prove it.
The lit screen in my hand glowed with three unread text messages, each of them asking if I wanted them to stop by tonight.
I thought about it, trying to decide if I wanted the company.
It was a little after midnight, and from the energy of the crowd, I just knew Eden’s album release party was going to be a long one if she wanted it to be.
Marlon’s sister was the first artist signed to the label we’d started a few months before.
After getting his PhD in communications with prime focus in emerging media and entertainment marketing, Marlon was convinced he had just the right combination of tools and skill to take the music industry by storm.
From the look of the media coverage he’d managed to secure for Eden’s private show, I believed it.
He was the brains; I was the bank. Thus, Montgomery Records was born.
“You texting one of your hos?”
I looked up from my phone at the sound of Eden’s question, the teasing quality in her tone not all the way genuine. She actually was curious; maybe a little jealous, too.
Eden and I were same age, but it was easy to forget from the way her brown eyes always seemed to shine with mischief. Like her older brother, I’d spent my childhood with her, all the time seeing her like an honorary younger sister—that is, until she got older and started flirting with me.
While I didn’t discourage the attention, I can’t say that I welcomed it either. Eden was a gray area woman in my life. I’d seen way too much of her growing up—from taking loose teeth out from under her pillow to teaching her how to drive. Even though she wasn’t, she was practically my sister.
Then she went away to Berklee to study music, staying gone for four years. After graduating, she came back to Miami two inches taller and a couple inches thicker, no longer the little girl I grew up with. It was only then that I couldn’t help but remember that Eden wasn’t my sister at all.
But she was Marlon’s little sister for sure.
Honestly, if I had well-meaning intentions, it wouldn’t have been a problem to welcome Eden’s flirting. However, lately, I wasn’t looking for anything meaningful. Just trying to have fun, I wasn’t really trying to build anything with anyone.
The women behind the texts in my phone knew this, and although I could feel them attempting to change my mind, to inspire love out of me, I was quick to remind them to stop trying. I could be that way with them because they knew what they were signing up for, but I wouldn’t do it to Eden.
“I don’t have hos, Eden.” She rolled her eyes at the obvious lie, setting her mic down on the table in front of me and pulling out the second seat. “Don’t you have interviews to give?”
“They can wait.”
I chuckled. “Spoken like a true star.”
“You weren’t impressed with my performance, huh?
” she asked, grabbing a bit of her straight hair, twisting the brown and green strand around her finger.
Objectively speaking, Eden was beautiful.
Her mid-toned brown skin looked like she got the right amount of sunlight year-round, even though we were late into November.
She had a face that kind of reminded me of a 90s-era Jada Pinkett Smith, and when she smiled her big brown eyes lit up in a way that was vaguely familiar.
“The performance was fine,” I assured.
“I didn’t see you clapping.” I set my phone down and clapped for her quietly, which made her frown. “You heard my voice crack on that second note, didn’t you?”