Page 60 of Priest

He looked like he wasn’t certain I knew what I was talking about, but he also knew better than to disobey a direct order. I had never led my crew astray, and I always had their backs.

I started my bike and pulled out of the lot. I pushed that bitch to one-hundred-twenty-five. My straight pipes ripped through the atmosphere, and the fury that I felt burned a hole in my chest. September had proved exactly why bitches couldn’t be trusted. Just when I let my muthafuckin guard down, she went and pulled some shit like this.

My jaw clenched, and every muscle in my body tightened. I hated the way this shit made me feel. I’d never trusted a bitch in my life, and the first time that I did, she betrayed me the minute I turned my back. I pushed my bike to the max as I zipped through intersections and traffic lights. I weaved in and out of traffic, but it still seemed that I couldn’t make it to the cabin fast enough.

How far could she have gone in an hour? She was on foot, and she had no other means of transportation, nor did she have a phone to call anyone. I knew she would have to be in the vicinity of my property. She couldn’t have made it too far on foot within an hour.

I was three-quarters of the way to my cabin when I felt my phone buzz on my hip and heard it ring in my ear.

Siri: Call from Sunny. Answer it?

“Answer.” I waited for the call to connect before I commented, “Yo, boy. Wassup?”

“Aye, you need to get over here to Morgan’s now.”

“I told you to handle that shit, nigga.”

“Your girl ain’t at the cabin. She over here, Priest,” Sunny replied.

I damn near spun out when I spun around to head in the opposite direction.

“Aye, she good?”

“I don’t think so. There’s shouting going on between her and her daddy. I told the team to stand down. The guards looked like they expected my ass. But when I got up here to the house and walked up to the front door, that’s when I heard the arguing. I can’t hear what’s being said, but that shit is loud from where I’m standing.”

“Don’t go rushing in. That shit might make everything go sideways. Hold your position until I get there unless you have to make sure she’s good, then tell Jagged, Knuckles, and Lyon to come through. Have everyone else go around the back. But only if needed. I’m less than ten minutes out.”

“A’ight. Be safe, nigga.”

I didn’t bother to respond; I just ended the call. I couldn’t figure out what the fuck she went to her father’s house for. And what the hell were they arguing about?

It wasa risk and a long shot, but I had to try it. Priest had shared too much with me for me to think that he didn’t trust me. He’d shared parts of himself with me that night that I doubted he’d shared with anyone else. But when he told me his real name, I knew that I had to do something. So, I bided my time.

I waited until he had to return to the clubhouse again. I banked on the discomfort that I’d felt the last time that I was there and the flashback that I had to protect me. I knew that after what we had both shared and how Priest had seen me in a bad state at the clubhouse, he would not force me to return. I was right.

I had overheard him on the phone with Sunny. He had told him that they needed to meet on an urgent matter with the entire council. I also heard him tell Sunny to order dinner because they would be there late. When he left, he told me to cook whatever I wanted.

Priest didn’t have a house phone, but he did have a burner phone that I spotted in a drawer in his home office. The only reason that I had seen it was because one day, when I came to ask him if he wanted me to cook, he pulled the drawer open and handed me a menu. The phone lay inside there.

I took the phone, texted Phaedra, and told her to answer my call immediately. I knew she didn’t answer calls from strange numbers. Phaedra was wary when she answered the call. When she realized it was me, I told her to order me an Uber, and I had given her the address. I begged her not to call that number back, and I promised that I would explain everything when I saw her again. I also asked her not to say anything to my father about the phone call.

“Hello?”

“Phae, it’s me, September.”

“Bitch. Where yo’ ass been? You ain’t answered a single call in almost a month. When I called your daddy, he talkin’ ’bout you needed a break from shit for a minute.”

“Yeah, I needed a break, all right. From his ass, not from you, bae.”

“Where the hell have you been, and what the fuck did he do?”

“Listen, I can’t get into all that right now. I need a big favor from you.”

“What’s up? You know I got you, bestie.”

“I need you to order me an Uber and send it to 3169 Aspen Falls Lane,” I replied, giving her the address that I’d seen on several envelopes.

“The fuck? Where you at?”

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