Chapter 1
Solana Damita Ledesma
Igasped as he pushed us forward, tears blurring my vision.
?Hija? (Daughter?) When did he acquire a hija (daughter)? Was it Glow’s?
“?Espera! ?Tú no tienes una hija! (Wait! You don’t have a daughter!)” I screamed.
We entered the garage where his Maybach was already running, the exhaust from the pipe making me choke on my tears.
The night was eerily still, and the aroma of damp soil and fresh-cut grass distracted me from the fact that Shio had me in his grasp.
Shio shoved me into the car; the caring hands I’d felt last night were gone.
It wasn’t until my ass hit the leather seat and the slamming of the door that I was brought back to my current predicament.
Shio was in the driver’s seat in a flash, reversing with such force that it nearly sent me headfirst into the dashboard.
“Shio… You don’t have a daughter!” I screamed as he drove like a madman out of his neighborhood.
“Put your fucking seat belt on.”
His jaw flexed as he drove over a speed bump as if it were a rock in a road and not designed to slow a vehicle.
He steered the car with one hand while scrolling through his phone with the other.
When he held the phone up to my face, I saw that it was mine and that he had used it for face recognition so it would unlock.
Panic surged inside me. I tried to reach over to grab it, but he used his forearm to block me.
“Man, watch out!” He spat out harshly.
My breathing hitched as I watched him press the call log button and press the last number that had called. He held the phone up to his ear, and when the person didn’t pick up, he tried again and again and again.
“What the fuck is your brother’s number?”
I opened my mouth to reply, but giggles came out instead.
Shio looked so flustered and sexy, and I don’t know why, but it was funny.
There was a voice in me telling me to sober up, that I was in danger, and that Shio was upset with me, but the drugs were driving my body, my actions, and my emotions.
“Shits crazy…” Shio grumbled as he went through my phone until he found what he was looking for as I gyrated in my seat. There was no music playing, but I still had the tunes from the closet in my head.
He dialed that number a few more times before tossing my phone in the back seat and pulling out his own. We were now at a red light, and I was throwing my head as I shook my ass in the seat. I felt amazing.
“Aye…” His deep voice boomed, but I couldn’t stop dancing.
His scent invaded my space first, and then I felt his body heat.
He was close, and it was sending my body into overdrive.
His face met mine, and without thinking, I tried to grab him.
He jerked his head back, leaving his body close as he leaned over me.
It wasn’t until I heard the loud click that I realized he was securing my seat belt.
My eyes watered at the rejection, but he simply looked away and sped through the red light.
Placing his phone on speaker, he continued defying the law and going past the speed limit. His phone rang three times before the FaceTime call connected. I had gone back to twirling in my seat and was now snapping my fingers. The cocaína (cocaine) here would make the people back home crazy.
“Fuck you want, Moses? I ain’t fucking with yo’ biblical ass—”
“Nel.”
“Yo…” I could hear Nel shuffling through the phone and started rolling my hips to the rustling. “Aye, you good?”
“Nah…”—Shio rubbed his hand down his face—“But I will be. Aye, look… I’ll be out of pocket for a bit. I need you to make sure you check in on Hobo. I would say the nigga can croak over and starve to fuckin’ death, but I made Neltz a promise.”
Nel was quiet for a beat until he sighed. “Fuck that nigga! Come scoop me, and we can handle whatever got you tight in the chest together—”
“Nah, this ain’t yo’ problem, G.” Shio stressed to him. I wanted to stop my dancing and caress him, but the drugs gave my body nothing but energy to burn off.
“Nigga, we family. Cousins—nah! Fuck that. We brothers. Yo’ problem is my problem, and you ’bout the only one of us who don’t have too many problems, Shio, so that means this shit, whatever it is, is serious. Come scoop me.”
Shio quieted and made a merge onto the interstate. His words were low when he finally said into the phone, “Nel, handle Hobo.”
He ended the call and began typing on his screen. When I heard more ringing, I knew he was making another call. I had calmed down some, no longer dancing, and was now trying to focus on Shio.
“Wassup?”
Soft baby cries were in the background before shuffling, and then the call grew quiet.
“I ain’t gone be long, so you can get back to your jits. But I need you to make the drops tomorrow and for the foreseeable future. Ezio, he still off, and I know you just had babies, too, but I really ain’t tryna have him—”
“What the fuck Sabrina done did?”
“My name is Solanaaaaaa,” I sang out before huffing and throwing my body back into the seat.
I could feel myself bounce a bit before settling from the force. Shio cut his eyes at me, making me clamp my mouth shut. He turned back to look at the road as the car continued its speed down the road.
“Just do that for me,” he said into the phone. “And make sure yo’ hard-headed-ass brother handles what I told him to as well.”
I could hear the man suck his teeth and mumble before saying, “Shio?”
“Yeah?”
“You’ll call us if shit gets too crazy… Right? Cuz you know how we coming behind you.”
“Yeah, I know.”
Vello—he’s Nel’s brother, so that’s who’s on the phone, I said to myself as my brain was working overtime to function.
“These fucking women gone be the death of us,” Vello said.
“Wrong. They gone be the death of y’all. I’ll hit you.”
Shio switched lanes and placed another call after sending out what appeared to be text messages. I wanted to see what he was saying and if any of them were about me. When the third call connected, I looked over and saw a bright face with colored eyes.
Ezio, I think…
The extra line had sent me beyond my limits, and I giggled when I thought about what might have happened if I’d done the fifth. Shio had saved me again.
“Who the fuck we gotta kill?”
“I’m about to be out of pocket for a bit,” was Shio’s reply.
I found it interesting that Shio had said very little to his family members, but they automatically knew something was wrong with him.
My father and brothers were not like that with me, and I could feel my emotions taking over.
The cocaína (cocaine) was too strong. I tuned back into the music in my head to fight off the tears.
I let my body sway as if I were back in the club with the American mob wives in the quiet car, nothing but silence from the phone.
Ezio was quiet, just as the other men, until he finally said, “What happened?”
His tone was rougher than I expected. He seemed nice when we met.
“Solana’s bitch-made fiancé got Bahati.”
“And? If it’s the Bahati we used to cop from, what the fuck that shit got to do with you? You ain’t checking for that hoe… Unless…”
“I slipped up. And I ain’t allowed to slip up, Ezio.
I think shit through.” He pressed a finger into his temple.
“I sit back, and I aces shit. I never get into a blind situation. Before shit goes down, I already have sixteen different solutions to get us out of it. Having shit figured out is what makes me rise every fucking morning. A nigga ain’t never had one up on us, one up on me.
Because I’m always fifty steps ahead. But, this time, I fucked up. ”
“Bruh. It don’t matter how much you meditate, how much you train, how much you study—you are fucking human. I know… I know sometimes we put weight on you that I’m supposed to carry but you allowed to slip up, G. As long as we rectify that shit, that’s all that matters.”
“I got a daughter… With Bahati. She gotta be ’bout two, Ezio. Solana’s nigga done snatched them both up.”
I grinned and choked on giggles.
“You think that shit funny?” Shio’s eyes glossed over as his gaze shifted to me.
Instead of responding, I kept dancing. My brain would not let me accept what he was saying. There was no hija (daughter).
“You talking to Solana? What’s happening right now? Where y’all headed? I’ll meet you there—”
“They won’t answer the fucking phone, Ezio.
I don’t fuckin’ know. But I do know, I should never have let them put this girl on me.
From the jump, it didn’t feel right. Fuck her pops wants to give his precious daughter to a savage-ass nigga like me?
Shit was flaw from the beginning. And if Don in on this shit, your wife may as well pick out her good-fucking dress because I’m murking his bitch ass too!
You think I give a fuck about this mob shit?
Nigga, I despise the fucking mob! The mob changed my fucking daddy—” Shio stopped his sentence and took a deep breath.
His voice cracked when he said, “She on that shit, Ezee.”
It was then that my upturned lips fell, and my face started to burn. The cloud that was underneath my feet was starting to descend, and my heart rate began to slow. The colors faded, the music went mute again, and my hands that were once rubbing all over my body were now shaking.
“I opened the fuckin’ door to a broad that was doing cocaine as a fucking pregamer. Shit, she barely fuckin’ eats, so she’s probably havin’ that shit for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.”“Fuuuuuck.”
“Yeah…” Shio spewed. “Shits a no-go.”
“We beat addiction before. You helped me. We can help her. All we gotta do is get Don to get that knizzy shit again. Then we send her ass to rehab first and—”
“Nah. Her nigga wants to trade. A bitch for a bitch, so that’s what the fuck I’m doing.”
Sweat slicked my palms as my hearing cleared. The word “bitch” rolled off his tongue as if it were my first name instead of Solana.
“But you just said he wasn’t answering the phone.”