Page 54 of 4 Corinthians

Thirty minutes later, we walked into Uncle Bradon’s house with a bag of food from Carter’s. He still lived in the same house that he did when we were kids. After we moved in as teens, we never went back to Robert’s house. Uncle Bradon fired him and Logan and let them know that if they ever showed their face again, he’d kill them. He didn’t know the full story of what we went through as kids. There were times when he would ask whether what we’d gone through was worse than he thought, and I always told him yes. It was never a secret that their father was abusive to them as kids; the only good child that came from Albert Strong was Uncle Bradon. None of his other children gave a damn about their kids, but from what I found out, Robert and Logan were the only physically abusive ones.

“Unc!” Nine called out. “We bought food; slide into the kitchen.” I shut the front door, kicked off my shoes, then followed Nine into the kitchen. I grabbed plates and silverware while Nine took the food out of the containers. We made our plates and sat at the table. “Where the fuck is this nigga?”

“No clue,” I answered between bites of food. “Probably in his office.” I picked up my plate and nodded towards the back. “If he in there, he ain’t coming out.”

“Shit, you right,” Nine said, getting up. We walked down the hallway to Uncle Bradon’s office. Nine knocked twice, then turned the handle and opened his office door. Uncle Bradon sat on the desk; his face twisted in anger, and a nigga dead on his floor. “The fuck happened, Unc?”

“I didn’t like the message he was sent here to deliver,” Uncle Bradon replied. He looked up from the body on the floor and smirked. “And he had a fucked-up attitude.”

“Who the hell is this nigga?” Nine asked.

I stepped further into the room and stepped over the body. I knew who it was, one of Robert’s men. I hadn’t seen him in years, but I would never forget his face. He was one of the niggas that would come and feed us when Robert was out. He thought it was funny to set our food outside the cage, just out of reach, and pee on it before kicking it into our cages.

“He works for Robert,” I said, sitting in the chair in front of his body. I rested my feet on his half-open skull. I would never be able to get the brain matter off my shoes, but I didn’t care. I would replace the shoes. Uncle Bradon nodded. “What’s he doing here, lying here dead?”

“He brought me those,” Uncle Bradon answered, pointing to a folder on the table next to the chair I was sitting in. I picked it up, opened it, and read the papers.

“He’s serious?” I asked, handing the papers to Nine.

“Yeah,” Uncle Bradon replied.

“This can’t be legitimate,” Nine said as he flipped through the papers. “We have to get the lawyers to look at this. There is no way that it’s right.”

“I already did,” Uncle Bradon chuckled, then pointed to the corner of his office. I looked over my shoulder to see his lawyer’s body. I hadn’t noticed him until now. “Apparently, he was working with Robert.”

“So you are no longer the majority stakeholder?” Nine asked. “What does that mean?”

“Robert is back in charge,” he answered, then wiped his hand over his mouth.

“How is he the majority holder?” I asked, looking between the two of them. I stayed as far away from Strong Pharmaceuticals as I could. I didn’t care about my stake, and the only thing that did come to me I reinvested, doubled, and used to open the company I shared with Nine.

“Denzel’s death,” he answered. “Apparently my siblings had a closed-door meeting, a few of them in fact.” He looked at us, and for the first time I saw how tired my uncle was. He’d been fixing his siblings' shit for so long. Not only personally but also professionally. “They buried him and his punk ass wife handed over his stakes to Robert.”

“That wouldn’t have been enough to overvote you though,” Nine said.

“Catherine handed over her stakes,” Uncle Bradon said. Catherine was Zero’s mama. “As of nine pm, I am no longer in charge of SP.”

“Fuck!” Nine said, then threw the papers. “That was our only in to knowing what Robert was or wasn’t doing.”

“Which never led to shit,” I chuckled. I moved my feet and readjusted in my seat. “Uncle, I know you are pissed right now, but what’s the next move? What do you plan to do?”

“Kill the niggas that thought I was playing games with them,” he answered as he stood. “Robert thinks I don’t know who he plans to put in charge, but I do.” He shrugged, then walked around his desk to get his jacket. “I let him think he was in charge. He likes to play games, so I’m about to show him how to do it properly.”

***

“Last house on the left,” I told Uncle Bradon. He pulled his car over, got out, went to the truck, and opened it. I got out just as he closed the trunk and walked around the car with a gas can. “Unc?”

“Robert was always a selfish nigga,” he said, shaking his head. He walked across the lawn, pouring gas as he went. “When we were kids, he wanted everything someone else had. Our daddy told him he could have it if he took it. No matter who it was.” He threw the gas can and walked to the car that was parked in the driveway. He smashed the driver's side window and reached into the car to open the door. “That wasn’t something you told to a nigga like Robert. He felt entitled to everything after that.”

“Is this nigga giving us a backstory after all these years?” I asked, even though it was just me out here, and Uncle Bradon was lost in his own little world. We’d been burning down building after building. House after house. And he didn’t look like he was stopping any time soon.

Uncle Bradon popped the gas cap and got out of the car. “Four, that shit he had you doing? He was made to do the same shit. All of us were.” He slammed the door closed. “I knew shit wasn’t right, but I couldn’t prove it.”

“I understand,” I told him because I did. Looking back at it, I realized that Robert perfected covering his abuse because it was another form of control. He controlled and manipulated everything and everyone around him because he fed off the power it gave him.

“Nah, I don’t think you do,” he said, shaking his head.

“I do, Unc, and I don’t blame you for not knowing.”