Page 37 of A Don & His Doll

Monroe noticed, but continued. "The shit is crazy ‘cause she ‘posed to be dead. I mean she been dead for the last twelve years, and the coldest part ‘bout all this shit is she said mom's was the culprit. Said she threatened her, then staged her death. I’on know what to bel-"

"She tellin’ you the truth," Mitch cut in and confirmed.

The words hit the room like a body dropping. Neither of them moved, just held eye contact as reality set in.

"Hol’ up," Monroe paused briefly. "So, you knew ‘bout this shit all along?" he asked, eyes unwavering as he sat his glass down on the other side of Mitch’s desk.

"Nah, I just found out when I opened the letter Dad left for me," Mitch told him truthfully. "You know I'd never keep no shit like this from you.”

“You expect me to believe that?”

“I expect you to know me,” Mitch replied. “You know damn well I wouldn’t keep no shit like that from you.”

Monroe looked away, jaw pulsing.

Mitch continued. “I was waitin’ until I had the right moment to bring it to you. That ain’t the kinda truth you just throw out there without knowing how to help him carry it afterward.”

“I don’t need help carrying shit. I needed the truth.”

“A’ight, nephew. Now you got it,” Mitch said.

“Nah,” Monroe snapped. “I got pieces. And everybody else seem to know the full story longer than me.”

The hurt beneath his anger made Mitch’s chest tighten. Monroe had always been lethal, but this wasn’t the same. This wasn’t business. This was personal in a way that could make a man burn down everything he was supposed to protect.

“There’s more,” Mitch said carefully.

Monroe’s eyes narrowed.

“What?”

Mitch reached into his desk drawer and pulled out a blunt, taking his time because there was no clean way to say what needed to be said.

Monroe watched him, his patience growing thinner by the second.

“What the fuck else could there be, Unc?”

Mitch sparked the blunt, inhaled once, then released the smoke slowly.

“Sienna was pregnant with your daughter.”

Monroe was speechless. For the first time all night, the anger vanished. Not because it was gone, but because the shock of the revelation had swallowed it whole. Keepin' a man’s daughter from him is at the top of the list of things you just didn’t do to men like Monroe. Macie's ass was out of line for this shit, but how to handle her would have to be Monroe’s decision.

“The fuck you just say?”

“Sienna was pregnant when Macie forced her to leave.”

Monroe blinked, like his mind rejected the sentence. “Nah.” Monroe shook his head harder. "My daughter?" Monroe repeated. "Fuck you mean I got a daughter? I'on have no kids. Don’t play wit’ me like that, Unc."

“Yea, man. I ain’t playin’ wit’chu. Shit is all fucked up,” Mitch voice lowly, but there was nothing he could do to weaken the truth.

Monroe stood and paced the floor, and silence filled the space. Sienna was alive. Macie was responsible. Promise was waiting for answers he wasn’t ready to give. And Monroe… He was a man who had spent his entire life mastering control, yet he felt like everything inside him was slipping. Monroe saw nothing but black.

Mitch sighed, watching as pain seeped into his nephew’s heart, and hated every second of it. He opened his drawer and pulled out a blunt. "Macie ain't leave the girl no other choice. It was leave New York or die. Macie knew she was pregnant, and still her heart was so fuckin' cold she didn't budge."

Monroe’s glass slipped from his hand and shattered against the floor. He hadn't shed a tear since the day the doctor told him Sienna had died during surgery. Mitch knew that. Everybody close to Monroe knew that. That grief had changed him, hardened him, and made him colder than he had any business being at seventeen. But this pain was worse.

It came with stolen time he could never regain.