Instead of responding, he grabs the handbag and tosses it into the now almost full plastic bag before he ushers her out of the apartment. Similar to the ride there, Akeem ties her ankles together and her free wrist to the seatbelt before he gets in and drives off. The return trip is more uncomfortable and quiet. Akeem mentally reviews the items he found as Sunjiya plans her next move if the items found in the apartment don’t convince him she’s telling the truth.
When they make it to the ranch, he only unties her wrist from the seatbelt. He keeps her ankles bound and scoops her up bridal style to carry her inside. Resting is futile on her part. Aside from the guns, her shoulder, although healing, still hurts and she doesn’t want to risk setting her injury back. In case this doesn’t go her way and she has to use her hidden weapons, she needs her shoulder to be somewhat good.
Akeem carries her into the basement, and to her surprise, places her on the sofa and leaves her free hand untied. Then he journeys toward the table, dumps the items out of the bag, and sits facing her. She studies him carefully as he combs through the stack of random papers and envelopes. He’s intentionally saving her ID and cell for last and her anxiety steadily rises with each passing minute.
Although he’s facing her, Akeem is more concerned with the information in front of him than her. Amongst the cocktail of papers, he finds three prepaid credit cards in the name onthe lease of the apartment, Taya Jane, each with five thousand dollars loaded. He doesn’t find anything that correlates with the random sticky note he found on the fridge so he takes a picture to send to Axton. Figuring shit like that out is Axton’s specialty.
The rest of the items are junk mail, utility bills addressed to Taya Jane, and a random piece of paper with an Atlanta address and 770 phone number. He calls the number and the phone on the table rings. Sunjiya perks up hearing her phone and debates trying to move. Akeem challenges her with his eyes then silences her phone by pressing the red button on the screen.
It’s her phone.
“3544 Peachtree Drive. Whose address is that?” he asks.
“Mine,” she says, feeling hella vindicated.
“Convenient,” he huffs, still on the fence about her twin alibi. It’s outlandish and too perfect at the same damn time. Without commenting any further, he deflects. “You gotta use the bathroom again?” he asks.
“No but you’re not going to look at my phone or ID?” she counters. Not responding, he simply takes a picture of the paper, grabs her license from the small wallet, then stands. He heads upstairs, leaving her alone, frustrated, and wondering.
What the hell is he going to do with me?
Akeem texts three pictures to Axton before he reaches the main level: Sunjiya’s ID, the paper with the Atlanta address and number, and the sticky note from the fridge. His mind is all over the damn place. If she’s telling the truth, he’s on a fool’s mission and he doesn’t like being made a fool.
How does Marcelin not know his girl has a twin?
What’s this shit really about?
Is she telling the truth?
I need to blaze.
Two things calm Akeem the fuck down: shooting and smoking. He decides to do both so he can refocus and processthis shit while he waits for Axton to do his thing. The small ranch sits on three acres of land and the next ranch is miles away. He’s in the middle of nowhere and can do what the fuck he wants.
After walking into the main bedroom and pulling out his stash of premium pre-rolled blunts, he opens his locked gun case and grabs a box of ammo. He ventures to the kitchen next and finds targets: a jam jar, the bottle of wine from the welcome basket, and a bottle of olive oil from the pantry. Once he’s outside, he fires up his blunt, takes a long, much-needed pull, then exhales. As his smoke blends with the night air, he places his targets.
The first shot sparks an adrenaline rush immediately followed by a feeling of pure bliss. Akeem’s anxiety flees and things start making sense again. It has a different effect on Sunjiya. Hearing the gunshot in the basement causes an eerie chill to course down her spine and the reality of her possible death feels realer. Under no circumstances can her eyebrow razor and scissors stop a damn bullet.
This man can and will kill me,she thinks as she scoots forward on the sofa.
More determined to convince him she is Sunjiya than before, she struggles but manages to get off the sofa. Getting to the table proves to be an even bigger endeavor. Each step is an intentional and tiny waddle. The restraints on her ankles prevent her from taking normal strides. When she reaches the table, she eases into a chair and combs through the stack. She immediately notices he took both phones.
“Fuck!” she grits.
While shaking her head, she takes a deep breath and concentrates on what’s left. She finds her wallet first. Her license isn’t inside but her laminated social security card and three credit cards are and all clearly have her name on them, Sunjiya Daniels.
While she goes through the other items and separates them into two stacks—Tanjaya and Taya Jane—she tries hard to ignore the sharp thunderclaps each time he fires his gun. From the closeness of the sounds, she surmises he has to be right outside of the basement and that fuels her need to make sense of the stacks and prove who she is. The shots come in a steady rhythm for about thirty minutes then stop.
“Shit,” she scoffs in a panic when minutes pass with no more shots. “He’s coming back.”
His return to the basement isn’t as swift as she thinks because the shots stopped for a reason. Axton calls. Akeem feels the vibration in his pocket.
“Yeah, bruh. Tell me you got something ’cause this shit is wild,” Akeem answers.
“I got some things but I gotta dig deeper. I found info on both names, the normal social, birth and hospital records, and IDs. What’s interesting is that they have different birthdays. Sunjiya’s birthday is October twenty-eight and Tanjaya’s is the twenty-ninth, same year though and same hospital in Miami. They could be twins, just one born after midnight,” Axton says.
“Or they could be different people,” Akeem counters.
“Most definitely, they can be different people too because all I have is surface shit that can easily be made by a person like me. Everything on Tanjaya is in Florida and Sunjiya is in both Florida and Georgia hospital records and licenses. Records of Sunjiya in the foster system exist but none on Tanjaya. A fire at the facility destroyed many files. I was lucky to find Sunjiya’s. Still seeing what I find on Tanjaya. That address you sent, I’m still checking. It matches the license but I don’t have the lease or mortgage information yet. Let me dig deeper, I’ll have more in twenty-four,” Axton says and Akeem takes it all in. “’Preciate it, bruh. This shit is wild.”
