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Well, well, well.

I leaned against the dresser.

The man continued, “And before you ask, yeah, they’re looking at the development division… specifically the projects you signed off on.”

Yonas lowered his voice even further. “I told you to make sure none of that shit came back to me!”

“And I told you there was only so much I could clean up after the fact. You approved the vendors, Yonas.”

“I approved what was put in front of me!”

“Man, stop.”

That made my eyebrows lift.

The voice on the phone went quiet for a second before adding, “We both know those weren’t random vendors. Half of them were shell companies tied back to people we knew. Contracts got inflated, money got kicked back, and everybody ate. You knew exactly what was going on.”

I stared at Yonas.

This mothafucka.

Now the whole sad-ass story he had fed Lakelyn when he showed up started rearranging itself in my head.

His job was in jeopardy.

People were blaming him for shit he didn’t do.

He was being investigated because somebody else had fucked up.

He needed somewhere to lay low for a few days.

Lakelyn had opened our home to his ass and let him settle in under her roof thinking he was getting fucked over at work, while this nigga conveniently left out the part where he had been right there benefiting from the same shit as everybody else.

“Keep your voice down,” Yonas gritted.

“Nigga, I’m on a phone, not standing in the same room as you,” the guy shot back.

Yonas rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. “Just tell me what they know.”

“They know enough that you need to stop acting like this shit is gonna disappear because you took a few days off.”

Yonas crossed the room and looked through the gap in the curtains before stepping away again. “I didn’t take a few days off.”

“Whatever you wanna call it.”

I shook my head.

That bothered me more than the scam.

I didn’t give a damn about Yonas robbing rich companies, playing with contracts, or whatever other corporate shit he and his coworkers had gotten themselves tangled in. That was between him, his conscience, and whoever came knocking with a warrant. But walking into my crib with that wounded-ass everybody is against me story when he knew damn well he had helped create his own problem?

Yeah… now I got a real issue with his ass.

The man on the phone sighed. “Look, I’m telling you now, if somebody starts cooperating, everybody’s names coming up.”

“Then make sure nobody cooperates.”

“Nigga, do you hear yourself?”