Page 19 of Forced Matrimony With An Unhinged Menace 4

The second our eyes locked, something moved through my whole body, something I couldn’t name, something that hit me low in my chest and spread across my body fast before I could even process what it was. I knew this little girl, even though I had never seen her before.

“Hi,” she said, tilting her head at me, unbothered, unafraid. “Are you looking for someone? Or do you have the wrong house?”

I couldn’t get my mouth to work. Out of everything that could’ve possibly happened to me tonight, out of every twist this crazy ass day had already thrown at me, I was not prepared for this.

She looked just like Tatti, but with my eyebrows and my nose. I didn’t need to ask the question that my heart already knew the answer to. I was a father, and I knew my kids. I knew how my heart beat for them. What I was feeling now was the same feeling I got when I was around my son.

“Who’s your mom?” I finally managed to get out. “And where is she at right now?”

“Mommy!” the little girl yelled back into the house, still standing there in that doorway looking up at me curious.

A few seconds later, Tatti’s aunt came around the corner and stepped up behind her.

The second her eyes landed on my face, she froze completely, all the color draining out of her, looking at me like she was staring straight at a ghost standing on her own front porch.

And that right there told me everything I needed to know.

—

The little girl backed away from the doorway when Tatti’s aunt, Shantel came up behind her. But, before that woman could get a single word out, I put my hand on my waist, letting the print of my gun show clear enough that she caught on immediately. I walked past her into that house, forcing my way through without waiting on a fuckin invitation. Anger and betrayal immediately filled me when I realized what was going on.

Her husband was sitting in that same recliner he use to be sitting in that summer that Tatti brought me over here and introduced us all them years ago.

This nigga was a lazy bum. Looked like he’d let himself go even more since I last laid eyes on him. This nigga gut was hanging over his sweats, remote control resting on his stomach like the world outside that living room didn’t concern him at all. His face was bruised up like somebody had just beat his ass recently too. I guess his big, funky ass did get out that chair and leave the house at some point.

Shantel called out to Nariyah, told her to go on back to her room instead of being there in the living room with the rest of us. I took note of her name and saved it in my memory. I walked further inside like I owned the whole house, took a seat on their sofa directly across from Ron, and then I told Shantel to sit her ass down too.

“What the fuck do you want?” Ron said, sitting up straighter now, his voice trying for hard but coming out shaky underneath it. His tone let me know that my presence irritated them. That was only because these muthafuckas had a secret that belonged to me. “What you doing here? You know showing yo face in these parts ain’t safe for you. And we don’t need you making our shit hot, so you need to leave.”

“You know, I do my research,” I said, keeping my voice level, calm, letting that calm sit heavier than yelling could’ve. “I got a few detectives in my pocket too. That case been closed cold for years now. I ain’t never even been a suspect. So I think I’m safe enough.” I leaned back into that sofa cushion. “But we got bigger fish to fry right now. Tell me what’s going on with that little girl. And think long and hard before you open your mouth to answer me with a lie. You two know what I’m capable of, clearly. And tonight, I’m not in the mood for games.”

“What about her?” Shantel said, arms crossed tight over her chest. “That’s my child. She ain’t none of your concern.”

“See, let’s not start lying to me after I begged you not to,” I said, tilting my head at her. “It’s funny how your child looks a whole lot like me and Tatti put together. You don’t think that’s a little strange?”

“What you want, Demon?” Shantel said, and I noticed the way she said my street name instead of my government, like she was trying to remind herself exactly what kind of man she thought I was. “That name says it all right there, don’t it. Last thing you need to be worried about is raising a kid. She’s out the question, and like I said, she’s ours! What can we do to make you leave outta here?”

“See, that’s where you got it wrong,” I said, my voice going colder now. “Ain’t nothing in this world that’s gonna keep me away from what’s mine. I came here tonight on a whole different mission, real talk. But I think my plans just changed the second that little girl opened this door. I need to take my daughter with me. And I don’t know why, nor do I give a fuck, why y’all had her in the first place.”

“Okay,” Shantel said, her voice cracking, hands coming up like she was trying to slow the whole room down. “She doesn’t know she’s not ours biologically. We raised her since birth. You left Tattiana alone and pregnant, and she wasn’t prepared to raise no baby on her own, so we stepped in. We didn’t want Tatti to miss out on her last years of high school, nor going to college. We adopted Riyah as soon as she was born. We loved that little girl like she was our own child from day one. You can’t just take our baby from us.”

I sat there for a second, letting that settle, my mind drifting back to conversations me and Tatti used to have laying up together all them years ago. We’d be talking about a future, the one we never got to build. We used to say we’d have four kids together one day. I ain’t ever mean that shit for real, not back then, young and reckless as I was.

But I knew Tatti well enough, even back then, to know for a fact she wouldn’t have willingly given away a child of ours. Not with how deep she was in love with me that whole summer. I had that girl doing whatever I asked of her without a question. So I knew, sitting there, that whatever happened to make her lose that baby to these weird ass people, it wasn’t her choice. This bitch was sitting in my face lying.

I pulled my gun from my waist and set it flat across my lap, not aiming it, just letting it sit there where everybody in that room could see it clearly.

Ron sat up straighter in that recliner, chest puffing out a little, trying to look like a man ready for whatever was coming, but I could see straight through that. I was about to show this nigga exactly how much of that toughness he was portraying was real.

“Take your phone out,” I told Shantel. “Dial up Tatti right now.”

She hesitated, hands shaking, but she did what I told her, pulling that phone out her pocket and dialing with fingers that couldn’t quite steady themselves. She didn’t want a bullet in her head, and I didn’t blame her.

Tatti picked up without even saying hello. I snatched the phone straight out of her aunt’s hands.

“Now is not the time,” she said, her voice tired, frustrated. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow. And I’m not giving you no more money, Auntie. I meant that.”

“Tattiana Taylor,” I said into that phone, cutting straight through whatever she was expecting to hear. “I mean Carter now, right? Why would you keep a whole baby from me? Matter fact, why would you give my baby away to these people. You know what’s done in the dark gone always come to light. If you really wanted to find me all them years ago, you knew exactly how to make a way happen. Now, I gotta take back what’s mine since I was never given that option,”