Page 10 of The Heir

“Gossiping asses,” Mayhem scoffed, with a laugh that sent the women parting.

“Damn,” he deeply drawled when he saw what was sitting on the cooler when they parted.

It took me a moment to realize he was speaking about my baby sister. No one had ever looked at Karlotti like that, at least not in front of me!

“Hey,” I tapped his arm, causing Easy to cackle.

“I’m sorry,” Easy managed, quickly looking away.

“What?” May looked between us.

“Hey, Blaze,” Karlotti quietly greeted.

“Hey girl, what you doin’ over here all alone, anyhow?” May answered for me, and before Easy could stop him, he slid onto the edge of the cooler with my sister and tried to throw his arm over her.

My eyes bugged, but there wasn’t time to say shit. Karlotti caught him in the ribs with an elbow, just the way Oak taught her. With the heft of her weight, she ground it in good, sending Mayhem off the cooler with enough haste to have made her daddy proud. He stumbled in the process, landing on his ass with a solid thud.

“Don’t touch me,” she blurted out, springing off the cooler.

She smoothed her blouse, shot me a disgusted look, and stormed off. Easy was barely holding it together. He’d given us his back, but I could tell by the rocking of his shoulders he was laughing his ass off.

The sound of Makaveli’s taunting laughter started low, but it cemented into an appreciative rumble when he got close enough to see May sprawled out still.

“You look like a goddamn beetle on its back. Get the fuck up.” Mak quipped, shaking his head as he leveled a look at Easy. “These youngin’s got no game, brother. None. These bitches were lined up to bend over for us in the day. Look at ‘em now… Dick in the dirt.”

I watched him without really saying much. I knew he was Marchella’s father. I’d known that when he stormed in a step ahead of us and put that asshole in his place earlier. I also knew he was a raging lunatic most of the time. Some personalities were harder to forget than others. Makaveli was my father’s bestfriend before his accident, I had crisp memories of him visiting our house when I was small.

His gaze locked with mine and though he didn’t move a muscle, I saw a smirk take hold in those nasty hazel eyes of his.

“That bitchis my baby sister,” I clipped, “Talk out of turn about her again and he won’t be the only one on his back.”

All the chatter around us suddenly died down. Mak’s eyes instantly narrowed, only for his smile to grow. He stared at me for a moment, and I honestly thought we were going to go heads up, until he shifted his gaze to Easy and snorted, a slow nod taking over.

“I like him,” he decided.

It wasn’t until he took a step back and the light reached the patch on his chest that I realized what I’d done.

The words Vice President were staring back at me, and so was everyone else.

“I–I, uh…” May stammered, running a hand through his long reddish-brown hair. “Sister, huh?”

“Yeah.” I answered my cousin.

“So, she’s my…”

“Nothing.” Easy answered him. “Karlotti is Oak’s daughter. She wasn’t my brother’s.”

“Karlotti, huh?” He sampled her name, barely getting it out before Aunt Trista’s hand caught him in the back of the head.

Her vicious pop sent May’s head forward a bit, but he made no acknowledgment of his mother’s disgust or outburst.

“Never mind Karlotti, you forget about her,” Trista hissed at him.

She strained to look around the crowd, when she spotted my sister, she shot off in her direction.

“Donnie boy,” Easy blurted out, ripping my attention back to him.

He clasped hands and shook up with another patched member. The man’s long, blond hair was a familiar shade, and something about the way he stood made the guess fly out before I could stop it, “Donovan?”

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