1
ZAINAB
“Who the fuck are you really?”
Prime’s voice was so calm it scared me. It put more fear in me than when he first showed up in my apartment. There was a hint of disgust in the way he asked it. This was going to be something he would never forgive.
I opened my mouth to respond, but nothing came out. Not a single word. My brain was short-circuiting, stuck somewhere betweenexplain yourselfandgirl, just RUN. But running wasn’t an option anymore. Meech had made sure of that.
ZAINAB! WHERE IS ZAHARA? WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO TO HER?
His voice was still ringing in my ears even though the guards had dragged him through those metal doors a whole thirty seconds ago. Thirty seconds that felt like thirty years. Thirty seconds that had completely dismantled the life I’d spent two years carefully constructing.
And now here I was. Standing in this cold, sterile prison hallway with its ugly fluorescent lighting and its industrial tile floors, watching everything I’d built crumble around me like a Jenga tower in an earthquake.
Prime was staring at me with those ocean eyes I’d fallen in love with, waiting for an answer I didn’t know how to give. Rashid was standing off to the side, looking at me like I was a roach that had just crawled across his dinner plate. And Yusef—my sweet, traumatized nephew I’d been raising as a son, who’d already been through way too much for a twelve-year-old—was pressed against the wall crying silently, probably wondering why the adults in his life couldn’t seem to get it together for five consecutive minutes.
I wanted to go to him. Wanted to wrap him in my arms and tell him it was going to be okay. But my feet weren’t cooperating, and honestly? I wasn’t even sure itwasgoing to be okay. I’d been lying to myself about that for two years. Might as well stop now.
“I—” My voice cracked like I was a boy going through puberty, which was just fantastic. Really adding to my credibility here.
“SPEAK!”
Rashid’s bark made me flinch so hard I probably looked like I’d been electrocuted. And I hated that. Hated that this man—this manipulative, puppet-master of a man who’d been pulling strings behind the scenes this whole time—could make me cower like a child. I’d spent my whole life flinching away from powerful men. My father. Meech. And now Rashid, with his expensive suits and his calm demeanor and his eyes that calculated everything like the world was just one big chess game and we were all his pawns.
But before I could spiral any further into my daddy issues and general distrust of men in positions of authority, Prime stepped forward.
“Aye.” His voice was pure ice, and it wasn’t directed at me. “Calm all that down.”
Rashid’s head snapped toward him so fast I’m surprised he didn’t get whiplash. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me.” Prime didn’t yell. Didn’t raise his voice even a little bit. He didn’t have to. Prentice Banks could make a threat sound like a lullaby, and it would still make grown men reconsider their life choices. “You ain’t about to be barking at her like that.”
And just like that, something loosened in my chest.
He was defending me. Even now. Even after finding out that everything between us had been built on a foundation of lies and secrets and borrowed identities. Even knowing that the woman he’d fallen for—the woman he’d killed for, protected, provided for, made love to like she was the most precious thing he’d ever touched—wasn’t who she said she was.
He was still standing between me and danger.
Lord, this man. This frustrating, complicated, beautifully broken man who had no business being this loyal to someone who’d done nothing but deceive him from day one.
I really, truly, absolutely did not deserve him.
Rashid straightened his posture, adjusting his suit jacket like he was trying to physically pull his composure back together. “Prime,” he said, and his voice had shifted into that patronizing tone that men like him used when they wanted to remind you of your place in the hierarchy. “This situation is no longer your concern. This is family business.”
A cough rattled through him—deepand wet—and he turned his head slightly to suppress it. When I glanced at Prime, he was watching his mentor with an expression I couldn’t read. Not anger. Something else. Concern, maybe. It was gone as quickly as it appeared, replaced by that cold mask he wore so well. But I’d seen it. Something about Rashid had unsettled him.
“Family business?” Prime laughed, but there was nothing funny about it. That laugh was hollow and sharp, the kindof sound that should’ve made Rashid take a step back. “Nah. Zahara?—”
“Zainab,” Rashid corrected, and hearing my real name come out of his mouth made my stomach turn. It felt wrong. Violating almost, like he’d reached inside me and pulled out something private. “Her name is Zainab. And she’s been lying to all of us.”
Prime didn’t even hesitate. “Zainab is my concern.”
The words landed like a bomb in the middle of the hallway.
I watched Rashid’s jaw tighten. Watched the power struggle play out between these two men in real time—the mentor and the protégé, suddenly finding themselves on opposite sides of a line neither of them expected to be drawn.
An officer appeared at the end of the hallway, one hand resting on his belt in that universal cop stance that saidI’m about two seconds away from making this my problem. “Folks, I’m gonna need you to take this outside. Now.”
