CHAPTER ELEVEN
“The Hawk has landed.”
“That’s what they say about the eagle, not the hawk.”
“He’s both. Eagle Records. And his name is Hawk.”
“His name is Hawthorne, to be precise, and that phrase still refers to an eagle, not a hawk. I don’t care what name he slapped on that record company of his. Why do you insist on being wrong all the time?”
The younger bodyguard couldn’t say. Because it didn’t matter to him either way.
They were hired to meet the private plane of the record company founder and escort him to his various functions in Brackenridge.
That was what Eagle Records hired them to do.
The fact that he was William Webster’s son elevated their assignment too.
And he didn’t want any hiccups. That was all that mattered to him.
But when those airstairs dropped down from that private jet, and the younger guard saw that man responsible for the careers of some of his favorite artists, he couldn’t help but feel as if he’d arrived himself.
“Wow. That’s The Hawk,” he said when he saw him.
“The Hawk has landed,” he said again to the dismay of his older counterpart.
Although some in town insisted he named the record company he founded as a counterplay on his own nickname, others believed he named that record company as a slap in the face to his father.
Because he left town and soared like an eagle.
Almost becoming as big as his father. Almost becoming his father’s equal.
But Hawk didn’t care what any of those people in Brackenridge thought as he descended his own plane, in his own hometown, decked down in his white-and-red Versace tracksuit, his fifteen-thousand-dollar Stefano Ricci sneakers, and his Prada shades.
The younger bodyguard grinned. “That’s what I call style right there,” he said.
The older, old-school bodyguard shook his head. “Arrogance. That’s all I see. Just like his old man.”
The younger guard looked at his colleague aghast. “Like William Webster? Get out of here! You better start saying no to drugs because The Hawk ain’t nothing like his old man. Nothing!”
“You say.”
“Damn right I say. He’s nothing like him.”
But the older bodyguard, who’d been to that rodeo more times than he’d ever admit, wasn’t at all convinced.
Both men were filthy rich. Both men were so arrogant it wasn’t even funny.
Both men didn’t seem to care about anybody but themselves.
The only difference between them was that Hawk had a black mama and looked like a black man, while his father was all-white.
And they were only nineteen years apart.
But other than that? They both were just the same as far as that bodyguard was concerned.
Yet as soon as Hawk made it up to the waiting limousine, that same bodyguard smiled a grand smile and opened the back passenger door as if he was addressing royalty. “Good afternoon, Mr. Webster. So good to see you again, sir. I hope you had an enjoyable flight.”
Hawk didn’t respond. He knew the enemy when he sensed it.
“They’re waiting for you at the rehearsal hall, sir.”
The rehearsal hall, Hawk thought. The family home was now called the rehearsal hall? “They’ll just have to wait,” Hawk said as he ducked down and got into the limo.
“Yes sir,” the older bodyguard said with that same exaggerated smile on his face as he closed the door and got in on the passenger side. All the while thinking arrogant prick as he got inside.
The younger bodyguard, who knew to keep his mouth shut, couldn’t stop glancing at the music mogul as he drove him to his family home.
Shelly was supposed to have flown out with Hawk, but he had to deal with a union dispute that had to have their most senior boots on the ground.
Which was Shelly. He would show up later, for the actual wedding, he claimed.
Although Hawk no longer believed him. “Your ass orchestrated that union shit,” he said when Shelly called him with the news.
“You’d do anything to avoid Brackenridge. ”
Shelly laughed and denied it all, but Hawk still wasn’t convinced and ended the call.
When he drove up to his childhood mansion and saw the various luxury cars all around the huge horseshoe driveway, including a Lamborghini, several Bentleys and Porsches and Maseratis and Mercedes, Hawk knew his family was there.
Although he wasn’t certain whose car belonged to whom, he knew they were his siblings’ cars.
But when he entered the home and went down the side corridor that led to the banquet hall, he was confused.
Although his half-sister Amber and her family and friends were assembled throughout the hall on the backside of the family parlor, all of them laughing and talking and drinking as if they belonged there, he didn’t see one single member of his family. He saw the cars. Where were they?
He went back down the corridor, through the foyer, and into the living room. And that was when he saw his family.
Who he didn’t see was Matty, the brother one year younger than him and the sibling he was closest to. Matty, as CEO of Webster, Inc., was supposedly the most responsible of the siblings, and he was their father’s right-hand man.
He did see his brother Drayton, who was four years younger than him. Dray was the snazzy dresser of the family and was supposedly the least responsible of them all. Although it was a claim Hawk disputed. Dray, he felt, always got a bad rap.
But when Dray saw his big brother, he hopped up from the sofa. “Hawthorne!” he said happily and hurried over to give him that half-hug, half-handshake Webster men were known for. Without asking, Hawk knew immediately who that Lambo belonged to.
Dray was a wealthy man too, but no one had ever been able to figure out where it came from.
Rumor had it that he was kept by older, wealthy women around town.
Rumor had it that he was a drug dealer. Rumor had it that their mother was bankrolling his lifestyle since their father didn’t believe in supporting grown children. But it was all just rumors.
Then there was Joe Nathan “Nat” Webster, the most explosive of the siblings, temper wise, and the owner of Nat’s, a prime night spot in Memphis that many celebrities frequented.
He was on the phone yelling obscenities to one of his club managers when Hawk first walked in.
It wasn’t Nat if he wasn’t up in arms about something.
And then there was Minka, a hairstylist and the owner of Shade, the most expensive hair salon in Brackenridge. The way they told it around town was that a woman of means was meaningless if she wasn’t one of Minka’s clients. Hawk always suspected that the they who were telling it was Minka himself.
“Hello Mink.”
Minka smiled and threw up his hand. He was not histrionic like Dray, but seemed bored as he stood in the corner with his arms folded. “Why are you here?”
“Pop’s request,” said Hawk. “He called me.”
“That was a call I would have never answered,” Minka said as he looked at his manicured fingernails.
But Hawk didn’t take offense. He knew that was his younger brother through and through.
He was there, undoubtedly because their father ordered him to be there too, but it was unseemly when Hawk was there for the very same reason. That was Minka.
And then there was Barbara, the youngest of Hawk’s biological siblings at thirty-two, and whom everybody called Babs.
She was a smart young lady, with loads of potential, but she never seemed able to get her act together.
Her Achilles heel were men. Bad boys to be more precise.
From broken heart to broken heart, she was a mess.
She still lived at home with their parents.
And in that moment Hawk saw her, she was on the phone with her boyfriend, yelling about how he was lying to her because she saw him with the bitch and on and on and on. Then she ended the call defiantly. But then she frowned as if she was ready to call him right back again.
“Don’t do it, girl,” Minka said to her. “Don’t you do it.”
But she was still in her feelings. And she moved further away from Minka, turned her back to him, and did it anyway. Hawk shook his head.
He looked at Dray. “Where’s Pop and Matty?” he asked him.
“In the parlor. The cops were here when we first got here, but they left a few minutes ago.”
“The police? Why?” Hawk asked.
Dray shrugged his shoulders. “They haven’t told us anything yet. You know how those two are. Pop confides in no one but Matty and Matty confides in no one.”
“Pop would confide in you, too, as his oldest son,” said Nat as he ended his call, “but your ass skipped town.”
“One thing I don’t do is skip,” Hawk said.
Nat smiled and hurried over to his big brother. They half-hugged and half-shook too. “It’s good to see you, bro. It’s been a minute.”
“It has,” Hawk said when they stopped embracing. “Did you see Amber and Pop’s other kids over in the banquet hall?”
Hawk nodded. “It’s crazy.”
“It’s outrageous,” said Nat. “They’re parked in the back all over Ma’s lawn like this is some trailer park. It’s awful. And the idea that Pop’s making us be in her wedding. That’s what’s crazy.”
“No, what’s crazy,” said Minka, “is that we all agreed to be in it.”
“It’s what Ma wants,” said Dray. “We’re doing it for her.”
“Quit lying,” said Minka. “All our asses still scared of Pop. We’re doing it because we have no choice.”
Then the parlor door opened and Matty walked into the living room. But he looked ghostly.
Which confused Hawk because he knew it couldn’t be about Amber’s wedding. Matty didn’t give a damn about that girl either. “What is it?” he asked his brother when he walked in. When they saw that look on his face, they all hurried over to him.
Matty’s hazel eyes looked bloodshot red. He’d been crying? Matty? He never cried! Not ever.
Now Hawk and his siblings were really worried. “What’s happened? Matty, tell us what’s happened?”
Matty placed his hands in his pockets. “It’s Mother,” he said.
Their mother? It was about their mother? Even the usually nonchalant Minka was concerned. “What about Ma?” he asked Matty.
Hawk could see that Matty had one of those where do I begin looks on his face. So Matty decided to just tell it to them straight. “She’s been kidnapped.”
When they heard those words, it made no sense to any of them. Even Babs, who ended her call when she saw the state of her brother, couldn’t understand it. Kidnapped? Their mother? What on earth was he talking about?
But not one of them asked a question. They were speechless.
But Matty wasn’t about to discuss it off the cuff anyway. The Websters were a duty-first kind of family, with the duty being to each other whether right or wrong or in distress. And their mother, if what he said was true, was in severe distress.
He led his siblings toward the family parlor room, and they like foot soldiers followed him to where their father, their patriarch, was holed up.