Total pages in book: 130
Estimated words: 129571 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 648(@200wpm)___ 518(@250wpm)___ 432(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 129571 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 648(@200wpm)___ 518(@250wpm)___ 432(@300wpm)
“Do better, Jazz.”
“I will.”
“We can talk, when you come down from that high.” He left without figuring out, if I agreed or not, and shut the door.
Vivian and I stared at each other for a few seconds as if we’d just been caught doing something, and then burst out giggling.
“Why is Sherman so fucking intense all of the time?” Vivian took a hit.
“He’s always been like that. Even when we were young. Plus, only God knows what he’s seen in his lifetime.”
“You think he heard what we were talking about?” She offered me the blunt.
“I hope not.”
“So Miami?”
“Miami.”
“Let’s hope I meet an art gallery owner who is so captivated by my beauty he commissions me to make a massive mural.” She fluttered her eyelashes, but the effect wasn’t the same fun Vivian as it used to be. She was trying to be strong and bright, but all I saw was pain.
“Yes.” I hugged her. “Let’s hope.”
Chapter 27
Chase
After meeting with my men, I had to make a hard call. Our plan was crazy. So ridiculous it might work. In this world of psychos, Jasmine and I were kids pretending to be adults. Benny did the unimaginable and unspeakable. I could never guess his moves because I wasn’t crazy enough to predict them. He colored outside of the lines.
Now we had to do the same.
The engagement party would serve as a perfect trap. He’d probably think to himself that it was our cage, the cheese luring the mouse inside. But then he would realize how much smarter he was than us. He would assume that he could outthink us. Not this time. I’m going to go further than you would think, Benny. I picked up the phone and did what I should’ve done months ago.
I called my dad.
“Something wrong with your phone that you can’t pick up when I call?” Dad asked.
“I need your help.”
“You need my help? Mine?” he said again. “Our PR people are considering ending our contract, the publicity of Lucy’s body is all over the news channels. You don’t release a public statement or anything? And then the next time America sees you, it’s someone’s video from their cellphone of you entering a project building in a South End ghetto like you’re a mafia boss. Now no one can find you. It’s like you’ve disappeared or started hiding. The world thinks you’ve lost your mind, and I agree.”
“I don’t need your help on PR. The media is always hungry for something. I’ll give it to them tomorrow. For now, I need you to call some people.”
“You listen to me, Junior, you’re done—”
“Done with what? Running the business?” I laughed. “Stop. Let’s not waste each other’s time. You’re too old to come back and have no idea how to properly deal with the tech world. You’re slow in making fast decisions and confused during major negotiations. Replacing me is not even an option. Old age has kicked in. Who else would you let run our corporation in my place? No one. Why? Because I make us money, and the media eats me up.”
“You’re a big man now. Good job to the big man. You should be more humble in this conversation—”
“I’m your son. I never learned how to be humble.”
Dad chuckled. “Maybe you’re right about that.”
“But now we’re off topic. We need to talk about Lucy’s death.”
“Yes,” he said. “And you need to talk to your team of lawyers.”
“We both know who did this and how that person won’t bow down to the justice system.”
He remained quiet, probably nervous that someone would be listening on the phone.
“Father, I need your friends. To deal with the devil.”
“Those friends have high prices,” he warned.
“How high?”
“Money won’t pay their price. They need power. Our power.”
I rubbed my face and sighed. “They’ll want favors?”
“Yes, and sometimes there are no limits to their favors.”
I tapped my finger on the desk. “How bad are some of your friends?”
I knew Dad stirred in his chair without seeing him in front of me.
Every now and then, my father talked about his friends in high places. He called them gods and monsters. Told me that they weren’t one or the other, they represented both—something holy and all-powerful as well as vile and inhumane. I guessed that they dealt with terrorism or maybe even controlled drug cartels, although I never had their identities. Dad wanted to be the only contact for our family. He didn’t relish in the idea of people like this having any of the Stones on speed-dial. For that I was grateful. I believed terrorists and the cartels served as the scum of the Earth.
And here I stood, asking scum for a favor. Please, kill Benny.
What would we they ask from me in the future? Would it be worth it? Could I just figure out a way to avoid whatever favor they’d needed in the future?