A couple of seconds later, Lake and them joined me. We watched him pull out of the parking lot before Lakeland turned to me.
“What happened? Fuck you mean you were about to get jumped? How the hell you end up with them? How y’all keep ending up in the same place?”
“Right,” Alani said, her eyes steady fixed on the back of Exodus’s truck. “What’s really goin on?”
“First the nigga givin you bread, now you pullin up with him. Don’t let me find out!” Exclaimed Kiera.
Just as I was about to say something, Vellz whipped into the parking lot, stopping just a couple of feet away from us. He was going so fast and braked so hard that Alani jumped back, thinking he would hit her.
I rolled my eyes and turned to go into the building. A second later, he got out of the car, slamming the door behind him.
“Rei!” He yelled.
“I know you ain’t callin’ my cousin like you her daddy or some shit. Pipe down,” Kiera snapped. “And I heard you were supposed to pick her up but didn’t. Fuck on, nigga.”
“Sereia!” Vellz yelled again, ignoring Kiera.
I grabbed the door handle to the building to walk in, but he pushed it closed. “You fuckin’ with that nigga, for real ain’t you? That’s why you actin so fuckin’ funny. You know he got a bitch, right?”
I looked at him like he’d lost his mind, sizing up all 5’11 inches of him. “If you don’t get the fuck out of my face with that bullshit, Chevelle,” I said with a laugh. “You in my face like you don’t have a whole ass bitch yourself. Fuck out of here.”
“I thought you didn’t care?—”
“I don’t! I want you to leave me alone, nigga!” I yelled, snatching the door to the building open, hitting him with it in the process.
He had some nerve, didn’t he? In my face, questioning me about shit as if I was his bitch. As if he didn’t have someone himself. Did he forget I just beat the bitch up for stepping tome about his goofy ass? Niggas, boy. I swear, they had all of the audacity.
Before he could say anything, Lake stepped in front of him and told him to leave me alone. She said a couple of other things I didn’t hear. I was at the stairs, getting ready to take that uncomfortable trip up. My cousins were behind me, with Lake lingering behind a bit, talking to Vellz. Whatever she said got rid of him because not too long after I started my trek up the stairs, I heard the entrance door creak open.
CHAPTER 8
EXODUS
“How it go?”I asked Solo on the other end of the phone as I pulled into the parking lot of the abandoned potato chip factory Zeke had us at.
“Smooth,” Solo said through a deep breath. “You ain’t heard shit yet?”
I shook my head and killed the engine to my truck. “Hell naw.” I brushed my hand over my waves and looked towards the building. “It’s smooth though. You know it’s a reason for everything. I got a solution.”
“You do?”
I nodded. “Hell yeah. Big G put me up on game a couple ago.”
“If it came from Him, then it’s a move.”
“Fa sho. I’ll be back in about two.”
“Bet.”
We hung up and I stuffed the phone into the pocket of my gray joggers. Solomon was at the house with moms. I had a couple of moves to shoot with Kiss and Zeke, so I called him up and had him sit with her. He’d been at the crib all day with her, too. I did the hard part—got her up and showered—all he had to do was walk and sit with her. Anyway… yeah, today was a busyone. I had a couple of things to handle down at the docks. Had to meet with Detective Graves and now I was out here in The Bricks on the westside with Zeke on a mission at damn near midnight.
I didn’t know what he had going on. After we left the sit down with Detective Graves, he got a call and told me we needed to stay out this way for another hour or so. We stopped at Coney, ate in the lot, and here we were.
Speaking of Coney. Shorty was there. Sereia. She worked there. Had to take her back to The Woods. She was into some shit. About to get into a scrap. I had to step in the middle of that shit and take her back to the crib. She didn't need to be stomping around this bitch at eleven o’clock at night anyway.
On the way there, I was hit with a message. Not one that came from my phone nor neither one of my brothers. A nudge straight from Big G. She was the one. I got a look at her through the rearview mirror and heard ‘hire her’. So, it was a wrap on Guiding Light Nursing. You see how there was a delay? Yeah, that wasn’t coincidental. A nigga was looking in the wrong direction. Like I said before, me and Big G had a thorough ass relationship. Any time He told me to move, I moved. I pulled up at her entrance, got out, and told her I needed her tomorrow. She was perplexed—looked at me like I was crazy but didn’t question much. I didn’t know what her background was. Doubted she knew anything at all about nursing. But that didn’t matter. Neither me nor Genny knew what we were doing and moms was doing just fine. I wasn’t drawn to her credentials. It was her heart. Her spirit, though heavy, had a lightness to it. She was in pain but underneath all of that grief was a beautiful young woman who just needed a chance.
And well… shit… I was going to give it to her.
