The Family Business 3(20)

“It’s okay, little girl. Let it out. I know how you felt about him. I’m sorry it had to come to that.”

Usually I prided myself on being one ultra-tough bitch, but it felt good to be held in my daddy’s strong arms for a minute, just like I was a little girl again. I pulled back in a hurry, though, when I heard footsteps approaching and then my brother’s voice as he came into the room.

“I just got word that Vegas’s plane landed, Pop. Oh, and you were right. Junior’s gone,” Orlando said. He glanced in my direction, but if he had noticed me wiping away the last of my tears, he didn’t react.

My father’s face was grim.

“Where the f*ck did Junior go?” I asked, not happy that I’d been kept out of the loop.

“Where do you think?” Orlando said.

I shook my head in disbelief. I knew Junior was head over heels for this chick Sonya, but I couldn’t believe he’d be stupid enough to go see her when she was the cause of all this drama in the first place.

“That bitch gets my brother killed and there won’t be a rock she can hide under,” I seethed.

“Calm down, baby girl,” Daddy said. “It’s not just her. I told your mother that Junior wasn’t going to give her up, and he’s certainly not going to get over her right away.”

I couldn’t believe that he was taking this all so lightly. Daddy was acting like he’d been expecting Junior to go to her all along, while I was ready to go find him and smack the shit out of him for being so stupid. Then again, I was always the hotheaded one in the family.

“What do you want us to do, Pop?” Orlando prodded, staying much calmer than I was.

“Where’s Sasha?” he asked.

“Here I am, Uncle LC.” We turned to see her coming down the stairs.

Daddy looked at her and then at me. “I’ve got something I want you two to do.”

I preferred to work solo, so I wasn’t necessarily thrilled about being sent on a mission with my cousin. Still, if it meant getting the hell off the compound, I was down. “Sure, Daddy. Just point me in the direction of whoever I’ve got to kill,” I said, only half joking.

He ignored my attempt at humor and said, “With Vegas back we have a little more room to maneuver. Orlando, you and me are going to the office for a meeting. Paris, you and Sasha—”

“I know. You want us to find Junior.”

“No, I’ll send Kennedy and Rio to do that on their way to the airport to pick up Vegas. I want you two to find Brother X—and do it subtly. I know he’s somewhere in New York. Concentrate first here in Queens, then in Long Island and Brooklyn. Orlando will get you copies of all the information we have on him. Be careful, and read the file.”

“What do you want us to do with the body?” I jumped in, itching to handle my business.

He glared at me sternly. “I didn’t say I wanted you to kill him. I just want you to find him before he finds Junior.”

“Don’t worry, Uncle LC. We’ll find him and just run surveillance,” Sasha stated smugly, always trying to brown-nose Daddy.

Daddy caught me rolling my eyes at her, and he put me in my place. “You need to keep your attitude in check, Paris, and work closely with your cousin. This isn’t some ordinary guy you two are looking for. Brother X is a killer on another level, who trains men to kill.”





Sonya





13


As soon as Xavier’s men put me back in the car and pulled away from the curb, my phone started vibrating. I pulled it out of my purse to check the caller ID. “Junior,” I whispered sadly as I rejected the call. His name on my lips would be the closest I’d ever be to him again. The pain of that realization was intense, and suddenly I was wishing that Xavier hadn’t confiscated my pills.

Within seconds the phone was vibrating again. Each time I ignored the call, it would almost immediately start vibrating again. Junior blew up my phone during the entire ride home. By the time the car pulled up in front of my house, I’d given up and turned off the phone. As I slid it back into my purse, Xavier’s driver opened my door, extending his hand to assist me out of the car.

“I don’t need your help. I don’t need shit from you,” I snapped angrily as I stepped out of the car and slid past him. “You work for him, not me, so don’t get it twisted. I sure as hell won’t.”

“I understand exactly who I work for, Mrs. Brown.” I hated it when his men called me that.

“Look, I’ve had a long day, and the next time I look out of that window”—I nodded toward my house—“I don’t want to see you or anyone else sitting outside, unless you want me to call the cops. You got that?” I poked him in the chest, but it had no effect, since the mountain of a man was four times my size.

“You finished?” he asked with an eerie calmness.

My courage dissolved quickly as he stared me down. I stood there, trying not to shake in my stilettos as I prayed that he wasn’t the type of man who would hit a woman. When it came to Xavier’s people, I couldn’t be sure. They may have called themselves Muslims, but those murders had no moral compass whatsoever.

“You can call the cops, the National Guard, or the Marines. I really don’t give a damn. Ain’t no one going to stop me from doing my job.” With those words, he walked back to the driver’s side of the car, giving me the side-eye the entire way.