The Family Business 3(50)

“Just Paris . . . and Popeye and Tony.”

I shoved him against the wall. “You stupid ass.”

Orlando shook his head, still not putting the pieces together. “No, man, Popeye and Tony were helping us. It wasn’t them.”

“Did Tony send any of his men for this raid you had planned?” I asked slowly.

“No.” He still wasn’t making the connection, so I spelled it out for him.

“That’s because he didn’t want any of his men killed—after he told X you were coming. That booby-trap wasn’t there for the cops; it was there for our men,” I said, slamming my hand on the wall just inches from his head. “You better hope like hell that they don’t kill my cousin, Orlando.” I stormed off, leaving him to think about the shit storm he’d just created.





Junior





33


We’d had a consultation with the entire medical team in charge of Pop’s care, including hospital executives who were probably there to make sure we didn’t intend to sue. They were all pressing us to come to some kind of decision about his future treatment. The longer we listened, the more times we heard their fancy ways of saying the same damn thing: They didn’t think our father would ever recover, and considering the alternative, they thought that he was better off dead. They hadn’t put it in those direct words, but what they did talk about was atrophy. They said that he would gradually waste away from being bedridden. They presented charts and summaries of worst case scenarios, all offered to convince us that we really only had one decision.

Not one of the doctors could be one hundred percent certain about his brain activity. They may have been experts, but as far as I was concerned, they didn’t know shit. Every time they did an MRI it came back differently, from no brain activity to slight activity and everything in between, which made it possible to believe that somewhere in there, the great LC Duncan was pulling some elaborate hoax.

“They’re acting like they need Pop’s bed or some shit,” Orlando said. He had been relegated to the dog house since he screwed up Vegas’s plan and got Sasha snatched, so he’d been pretty quiet up until now.

“Fuck them. We will buy that hospital and put those same doctors out of work. He’s going to wake up, and right now that’s all we need to be focused on,” Paris fumed, pacing the length of the living room floor.

“You know what they’re suggesting? There is no way I’m ready to do that,” Vegas said, his voice cracking with emotion.

“Me neither,” I jumped in, adding my vote. Of course, Pop’s death wasn’t what anyone wanted, but I felt like I had even more at stake than they did. If he died, everyone would blame it on me and Sonya. I didn’t know if I could survive the guilt, and I definitely didn’t think our relationship could survive that.

Sonya caught my eye, probably reading my mind. She was across the room laying out a feast for our family.

“I talked with a Dr. Lindquist in Stockholm,” I told them. “He’s one of the world’s leading neurologists. According to him, there are all kinds of new treatments that aren’t approved in America. He says we can’t get caught up with the percentages that the doctors are giving us. His exact words were, ‘For every terminal diagnosis, there are people who have long outlived them.’”

“I just want him to get up off that bed and prove all these motherf*ckers wrong, ’cause no way are we pulling the plug,” Paris added.

“That’s not really up to you guys,” Harris announced as he walked into the room holding up a manila envelope. Rio was following behind him. “At least not according to these.”

“What the hell is that?” Orlando snapped.

“Hopefully nothing you can f*ck up.” Vegas dug in again, pushing all Orlando’s buttons.

“It’s a health care proxy form that LC signed two years ago,” Harris answered, still holding on to the paperwork.

“What’s a health care proxy?” Rio asked.

“It a legal document stating that in a situation like this, your father doesn’t want to be kept alive artificially. He wants to be left to die.”

“And you let him sign this?” Orlando snatched the envelope out of Harris’s hand and pulled out the document. “What kind of lawyer are you?” he asked, perusing the legal paperwork. I went and stood over his shoulder to read it along with him.

“I didn’t let him do anything. Can any of you imagine trying to stop LC from doing something he wants to do? Ain’t a lawyer in hell can control that man.”

I happened to believe what Harris was saying. LC was stubborn as hell. Orlando, on the other hand, wasn’t convinced.

“Ma would have never let him sign that. Must have been you,” he accused Harris.

“Well, to be honest, she signed one too,” Harris explained, shocking us all. “I wish you guys would stop acting like I’m the bad guy all the time, especially when I’m as loyal, if not more, than people who should be.”

I knew he was poking at me, but Pop would have wanted me to help keep the peace, and the way folks were acting, I needed to take that position seriously. So, I decided to give him that one.

“He ain’t lying,” Orlando announced, looking down at the paperwork. “Pop did sign this. It’s his signature.” He looked around the room, making eye contact with each of us. “Maybe we should give this some thought.”