Page 115 of The Prodigy

33

Jakari

Nayclenchedhisjaw.“We don’t know for sure.”

“What else could it be?” Eris said, his voice rising in panic. “Ain’t no good reason for that nigga to be there. None whatsoever.”

“I mean…it’s Jaz, though.”

I cut my eyes at Nay. “Exactly. Why the fuck would she lie about this shit?” I shook my head. “Maybe if I took her serious all along, I woulda had this information two weeks ago.”

Joe finally re-emerged from his office with a stack of papers in his hand.

“My bad. I swear I had this shit organized, but…it’s a lotta shit.”

He took his seat at the head of his dining room table, spreading the papers in front of him. “Alright. Prez got his hands in a lotta shit. Pop trusted him, so he was deep in the mix. And then, of course, there’s your cousins. What do we think?”

We all thought for a minute.

“It’s hard to say, man.” I scrubbed a hand down my face. “This shit so fuckin’ stressful to think about.”

Joe nodded. “We can put some men on them. See if there’s any contact. I just worry about us spreading ourselves too thin. We got Hightower, Prez, and now Ced and Randall.”

“Let’s hold off on that,” I said. “We’ll focus on Prez for now. Maybe it’s a way we can smoke them out about their father.”

“That’s a plan,” Nay agreed. Eris nodded.

I looked down at my buzzing phone and saw that Malika was calling.

“Hold up, y’all. I gotta take this.” I pressed the button. “Hey. What’s up?”

“Okay. Don’t get mad.”

I shook my head, but I was smiling. I already knew what she was on.

“How much did you spend, Malika?”

She laughed. “No, I haven’t been shopping. Me and Jaz were scouting apartments and I found something.”

“I told you it ain’t no budget.”

“I know, but I still wanted to check. I would never wanna waste your money.”

“I respect that. So how much we talkin’?”

“Well, first, let me tell you the amenities.”

Nay and them were looking at me all impatient like I was holding them up, but I didn’t care. Mal sounded happy as fuck, and I wasn’t about to interrupt that.

“Twenty-four-hour gym, pool and Jacuzzi, spa, balcony with a view of the river—”

“Oh, you talkin’ about The Cove at Lexington?”

“Yes…” She sounded uncertain, like she thought I’d say no.

“Y’all there right now?”

“Yes…”

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