Chapter 20 Adore
I hated rooms like this. It was always my goal to never have to sit in a lawyer’s office unless I was signing deeds and contracts.
Everything about this made me feel controlled.
The way the lawyer sat across from me and flipped through paperwork like he wasn’t about to change the direction of my life.
It didn’t feel like my world. In my world, shit moved fast and with intentions.
“Let’s start with what they actually have,” he said, finally looking up at me.
I leaned back in the chair and crossed my arms like I wasn’t about to hear something that could bury me.
“They don’t have you physically moving product. There’s nothing here that places you in any of the transactions. You’ve kept yourself clean of that, and it’s partially why you’re not sitting in a federal cell right now.”
I knew they didn’t have me doing any hand-to-hand transactions.
This shit wasn’t new to me and I was always careful.
If they had surveillance, it would be me chilling and smoking weed on the block, but that was the most they could have.
Shit, everyone from the hood did that, it didn’t make them a kingpin.
“Then what’s the issue?”
His pause made my stomach uneasy.
“They have your money. So, if they don’t get you on drugs, they can get you with your money.”
“Ummm, what do you mean my money?”
“Cash moving in ways that don’t match any legitimate business on paper. Large deposits and structured transactions,” he flipped a few bank statements around for me to look at.
“Questions don’t put me in prison,” I said. “I run a very successful club that brings that type of money in a night.”
“Not in your name. So again, no legitimate business.”
“And like I said, questions don’t put me in prison. My brother can tell you he put it in his name, but it’s mine.”
“This money has opened the door for more than questions, Adore.”
“And who the fuck is going to walk through it. This is a weak ass case.”
“A witness,” he replied.
“Who is the witness?” I asked.
“That’s the problem I’m having. We don’t know yet. But whoever it is, they know your operation like they are the ones who created it. Enough to explain how your money moves, how your system works. Enough to connect you to everything you’ve been careful to stay away from.”
“So, they are building a story?” I laughed.
“Nah, they are building a case, and if this damn witness takes the stand, you’re looking at ten years minimum.”
That number hit my ass like a Mack truck. My chest was starting to hurt. This muthafucka just told me ten years off some he say/she say shit. I wasn’t even thirty yet. I hadn’t had kids yet. There was no way I was going to do no damn ten years.
“I’ll fight the ten years as best as I can.
What I’ll also do is try my damndest to find out who this witness is, but I want you to understand that you have been compromised.
Keep your hands clean because you’re out on bond.
They are just waiting for you to do something so they can pick you up. We have a long road ahead of us.”
By the time I pulled up to my house, the sun was setting.
I hadn’t been home since they raided my spot.
Staying with Hollow was cool, but I need my own space again.
After hearing the amount of time I was looking at, all I wanted to do was come home.
I was expecting to walk in, and the house would be a mess.
There wasn’t one sign that they had come in and destroyed anything.
Whodie had the place cleaned from top to bottom.
I just stood in my living room, taking it all in.
All this shit I had built and everything was about to be taken away.
My first place was a bath. I ran it as hot as I could while I went back into my room and laid out a pajama set.
I then turned on some music and eased my body into the steaming hot water.
My mind wouldn’t stop running as I closed my eyes to try to drift to a more peaceful place.
I couldn’t though. All I wanted to know was who would betray me from my crew?
I made sure everyone was taken care of. Niggas families were able to go off to college and move out of the hood. The hood was eating because of me.
Then my eyes shot open. Zhane…was she the source?
The bitch did just pop back up out of nowhere with all that talking.
Nothing besides her ass popping up gave she knew enough about my shit that she could be anyone’s witness.
Unless my nigga was lying to me and pillow talking with the bitch.
I grabbed my soap and washcloth and started washing my body.
It was strange that I hadn’t heard from his ass today.
As I washed up, I let my overthinking get the best of me.
“Adore, Whodie would not cross you like that. You’re overdoing it,” I told myself as I dried off.
Ten years in a cell. Ten years, no fucking freedom.
Ten years without having any control. The number just kept creeping in as I got dressed.
Not only was the number bouncing around in my head, but old triggers started slowly creeping to the surface.
Shit that I buried. I walked to the kitchen and squatted to reach the liquor bottle I had hidden under the sink, where the cleaning supplies were.
Whodie always hired someone to clean, so I knew he would never look there.
I twisted the cap off and took a gulp straight from the neck.
I had been drinking so long that the burn never fazed me anymore.
My drinking started when my brother left to go to school, and I was left alone with our uncle Drex.
He hated everything about me, and he made sure he told me and showed me.
Drinking was the only way I could numb the pain of what he was doing.
I knew the type of person my brother was.
Had I told him while it was happening, he would’ve dropped what he was doing and come to handle it.
I knew that would’ve cost him his future.
When I met Sosa, I stopped drinking because I finally felt safe.
I loved him, and he still did me dirty. Another nigga that was supposed to protect me had harmed me.
The drinking started again once he died.
A part of me died, and I stopped depending on people to be there for me.
It was just me and my bottle. Like right now.
I took a bigger gulp this time. I slid down the cabinets until my ass hit the marble floor.
The same feeling I had as a teenager with no control was how I was feeling right now.
I lifted the bottle again, taking another long drink, letting it numb everything before it had a chance to take over completely.
Because if I let myself feel all of it at once, I didn’t know if I would be able to come back from it this time.
Falling apart was never something I allowed myself to do. Not then. Not now. Not ever.
“Adore, what the fuck? I’ve been blowing yo’ damn phone up for almost an hour! Whodie’s voice boomed.
I didn’t even hear him come. My mind was too loud to notice anything outside of myself.
Shit, I didn’t even know how long I had been sitting here.
At some point, I had stopped trying to hold my tears back.
I didn’t have the energy for them anymore.
For once, I wasn’t thinking about how weak I looked.
I was drowning in everything I had been holding in.
The possibility of losing everything I built before even having the chance to really enjoy it.
Every moment I told myself I got over something, was me really just moving around it.
“I…I just needed a drink,” I said, wiping my tears.
“A drink? Adore, the whole fuckin’ bottle is gone. Where the fuck you get liquor from anyway? I thought I threw all this shit out.”
I didn’t even respond. Hell, I couldn’t. Whodie sensed this was deeper than me just needing a drink. He knew my struggles with alcohol, just like I knew his struggle with prescription pills. He came down on the floor next to me.
“Adore, talk to me. What’s up?”
“I’m good. The alcohol always fixes it,” I told him.
“Don’t do that shit.”
“I said I’m good.”
He snatched the bottle and threw it across the kitchen.
“Muthafucka, you’re not good. That bullshit makes you feel like you good.
That’s all you do is mask behind this shit and try to move the fuck on.
You said you want a marriage and some kids.
How the hell do you plan on doin’ that drinkin’ like this?
Do you think I want my kids comin’ in some dysfunctional, unhealed shit? ”
“I feel like you judging me.”
“I’m not judgin’ you, baby. We both got scars that need healin’. You try to make it seem like shit is all good, when it ain’t.”
“The lawyer said I’m looking at ten years. Whoever the witness is is going to put the nail in the coffin for me. Right now, they don’t have much. They are banking on the witness to finish me.”
Silence fell between us. Like we were both thinking about our next move.
“And the lawyer don’t kno’ who the witness is?”
“He said he would try to find out. I mean, technically, I’m not supposed to know.”
“True! What if I told you that I may have an idea?” Whodie said.
I was drunk and trying to stay awake. So I wasn’t sure I heard him correctly.
“Come on, let me get you in the bed so you can sleep this shit off. When you sober up, I have something to show you.”
Whodie picked me up and carried me to the bed. He later came back with some water for me to drink right before I drifted off to sleep.