Page 104 of Makai

“Next subject,” I encouraged, uninterested in whatever he was saying.

Had it been Aeir in the same situation, patience wouldn’t have been a word he’d want to hear coming from anyone’s mouth. He was only weaponizing it because it wasn’t him staring at Glacier’s pictures every day, wondering if the world was a safe enough place for her now and how he could make certain that it was soon.

“Mercer doesn’t accept handouts. We must make sure he understands that this is not what this is.”

“He has no other choice. If he tries to march them broad ass shoulders out of the door then he—”

“Nothing. Then we wait for him to see things our way. He’s still getting acclimated to his new norm. Forcing him to accept something that we want for him isn’t the solution. We wait.”

“You can wait, Malachi. With all due respect, I’m tired of him sleeping on himself. It’s time to turn that nigga into the mogul we know he is—the legit way. The quicker, the more money we can clean.”

“It’s not even about that.”

“Never about that when it comes to us, but it is a bonus.”

“Yes. Yes, it is.”

We made it to our destination twenty-five minutes after leaving the cemetery. Milo and Mercer were exiting Milo’s whip as we climbed out of Malachi’s.

“What’s up?” I greeted Mercer, pulling him in for a quick embrace.

“What’s up?” I asked Milo.

He tilted his head, looking at me as if I’d lost my fucking marbles, rejecting my hand with a slap on the wrist.

“Fruity-ass nigga. Tight-ass jeans. I bet Niagara be pegging you, don’t it? You can tell us.”

“Nah, but Galactic probably let you sit on her finger every now and again.”

“Awwww, he thought of a new word.”

“New? Nigga, who you think I am, you? Learned that shit by second grade.”

“Ion know, you was kind of slow back then. I’m surprised you made it out of elementary.”

“You got me fucked up, Makai. Mixed up with you. Did you forget I graduated t—”

“Blah, blah, nigga. Let’s handle business,” I joked, pushing him forward, knowing that it would push his buttons.

Within less than a second, he’d circled me and placed me in a headlock. Unable to defend myself, I resorted to laughing because he was breathing down my neck like he’d just run four miles nonstop.

“Out-of-shape ass nigga, in my ear sounding like your name Albert.”

He loosened his grip before deciding to let me go completely. “I really don’t like this nigga.”

Mercer and Malachi said nothing, both standing beside each other as if they didn’t recognize either of us. I took a look around me, discovering home. Mercer had always said that it was a person and never a place. In the presence of the men that I’d grown from a boy into a man, I felt at home, at peace.

It was the reason I could laugh after over a week of feeling absolutely nothing but the ice over my heart. The moments I’d shared with Glacier and Lawe were the only exception.

“Here,” Malachi urged Mercer to take the key in his hand.

“What’s this?”

Malachi nodded toward the building we were standing in front of.

“That’s yours,” I clarified.

“Mine? For what?” His brows creased as he looked from one of us to the other.

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