Total pages in book: 79
Estimated words: 75003 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 375(@200wpm)___ 300(@250wpm)___ 250(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75003 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 375(@200wpm)___ 300(@250wpm)___ 250(@300wpm)
Even if you weren’t from the area, even if you didn’t have experience spotting them so you didn’t accidentally cross them. Even if you weren’t a criminal yourself.
“What do you think?” Cato asked, jerking his chin toward a trio of men standing around close to the street sidewalk, likely for easy hand-off of whatever drug they were selling.
“Good as place as any to start,” Seeley said, heading in that direction.
“Thirty per pill,” one of the guys said without even looking our way.
“Fifty for information,” Seeley said.
“Ain’t a narc, man,” one of them shot back.
“Then we can do it this way,” Seeley said, pressing his gun to the guy’s back. “Where’s T?”
There was a whistle, making Cato and I turn to see a man who was just a dark shadow and a burning cigarette in the dark until he moved closer.
You never knew what to expect of a leader of a crew around here. They could be old men or kids still in high school.
T was somewhere in his thirties with a stocky build hazel eyes and a bump in his nose from being broken and not reset properly.
“The fuck is this?” he asked with a surprisingly thick Southern accent.
“Didn’t say shit, T,” the guy with a gun pressed into his back insisted.
“Believe it,” T said, looking over the three of us, his gaze landing on our cuts, making a muscle tick in his jaw. “Don’t want no smoke with your club.”
“No?” I asked, stepping forward. “Then maybe you shouldn’t have put your fucking hands on my girl.”
“Your girl,” T repeated, brows pinched. “Don’t know what you heard, but I don’t put my hands on no girls. Real gentlemanly and shit,” he said, shrugging it off.
Criminals were good liars. We had to be. But nothing about T suggested he was making shit up.
“What girl is yours anyway?” T asked.
“Gotta be that new chick,” one of the other guys said. “Walking ‘round with a black eye and cut-up face.”
“Nice pull,” T said, nodding at me. “But like I said, I don’t put my hands on girls. My crew don’t either.”
I glanced at Seeley and Cato. After decades of knowing one another, we could have whole conversations with just a look.
We were all thinking the same thing.
This didn’t feel quite right.
“Alright. Let’s pivot then,” I said. “What’s your deal with a guy named Harvey? 7D?”
“Oh, that fuck,” T said, snorting, shaking his head at us. “He owes me.”
“Money? Drugs? What does he owe you?”
“Both,” T admitted, surprisingly forthcoming.
“Did you kill him?”
“I wish,” T said. “Nah. He got good and beat to shit. Then… poof,” he said, making an exploding gesture with one of his hands. “Haven’t heard from ‘em since.”
That was why they’d gone back to his place. To look for him. When they didn’t find him, they ransacked the place to try to find money or pills.
But someone had still been threatening Jade.
Telling her to mind her business.
If it wasn’t T’s business she was minding… well… that just left Harvey himself, didn’t it?
“You haven’t seen Harvey since the night your guys roughed him up?” I asked.
“Wish I had,” T said, shrugging. “If you see that shit, send him my way.”
“One more thing,” Seeley called as he tucked his gun away again.
“Yeah?” T asked.
“What does T stand for?” Seeley asked with a smirk.
To that, T shook his head.
“Thaddeus.”
“Yeah, I’d go by T too,” I said with a laugh as we moved away.
“What’s the plan now?” Cato asked when we were back at Jade’s building.
“Check out 7D’s place,” Seeley said, reading my mind.
The thing was, as we were making our way to the door, the door to his apartment opened.
All three of us reached for our guns in unison, making the wall of a man stop short, body stiffening.
His hands shot up as he looked between us.
“You’re not Harvey,” I said, remembering Jade’s description of someone more average-sized.
“I’m the super,” the man said.
“Booth,” I recalled from Jade’s account of events.
“Yeah.”
“What are you doing in 7D’s apartment?” I asked.
Booth, as it turned out, wouldn’t be able to win a single hand of poker. His guilt was written all over his face.
“You working with him? Hiding shit from T?” I asked.
“No! No,” he said, more calmly. “Don’t get involved with anyone around here. Not like that. Harvey, he’s my sister’s kid. Just… keeping an eye out. That’s all.”
“Yeah?” I asked. “Then how’d you miss him beating up and trying to strangle my girl?” I asked, watching him lose his color.
“I didn’t know,” he said, shaking his head. “I wouldn’t hide him if I knew he was fucking up that bad.”
“Where is he?” I asked.
Booth looked conflicted for a second. “My room. In the lower level,” he said. “Who’s your girl?” he asked, looking at me.
“6D.”
“With all the hair,” he said, making my brows pinch.
“Ah… yeah, I guess.”