Page 41 of Mercedees: Forever An Atkins
“The shape is solely up to you ma’am. If my opinion matters though, I think almond would look nice with the length of your natural nails.”
“Almond it is then.”
Nodding, I hopped right to it. Fulfilling her request hoping she’d be a returning client. If I wanted this location to be successful as the others, I had to put in the work.
* * *
I sat in my home office going through the paperwork for Myth Nails starting with the original located in Miami. It was booming paying more bills than it needed to. I missed it, I wasn’t gon’ hold you. Too many memories was made there, and most of my father’s side of the family was still there. If Clover ever got her shit together, she could meet the gang.
Since I moved around a lot, Bentley was the chief of Florida. I never once wanted to strip him of it, even though I ain’t give him the title. I was proud of his ass for beating the odds and making something of himself. No parents to guide you or love you but everything they were ran through you. That nigga was cut from a different cloth with nothing but loyalty running through his veins. He took care of business so when a proposal was offered, I gladly accepted.
My focus shifted to the Greek Coast Cruise Line. The way I moved weight with that shit was crazy. Getting my guns, cocaine, weed, and anything else hard from here to there was like taking candy from a fuckin’ baby. With me having every government official you could think of in my pocket, I was pretty much having my muthafuckin’ way.
The vibration from my cell in my desk caught my attention, that was the business line. This phone only rung for one of two reasons, to say everything was copasetic or I needed to gas up the G6 and make an appearance cause shit went south. I was hoping it wasn’t the latter.
Fishing it out the top right drawer, I answered immediately. “Speak.”
“Scar, I just made it to the dock, and shit crazy out here,” Mag’s voice boomed through the speakers. Soon as I heard his tone, I sat forward in my chair.
“What the fuck you mean, crazy, my nigga?”
Kissing the back of his teeth, the nervousness in his voice let me know it was some bullshit. “The guards pulling every cruise in for inspection. They got medics out this bitch, checking temps and all types of extra shit. Everything backed the fuck up.”
Inspections were nothing new. However, we had intel and on when and where those happened. This was random as fuck, and I needed to make sure my team was good. “Is we clean?” I asked making sure they didn’t run across none of my product.
“As a new casket,” he responded.
I clenched my jaw instantly, but I was relieved. That goofy muthafucka in office was already fuckin’ the game up, and this was one of them situations where money couldn’t make shit move faster. We had to play this by the rules or else shit was going south… fast.
“Cool. Call it how you see it, Mag.” I could already feel the irritation crawling up my neck.
“Some shit popped off on another cruise. Niggas getting sick… dying and shit.”
I blew out a slow breath and pinched the bridge of my nose. “Say word. I don’t need this shit right now.”
“Word. They saying it’s serious, too. Like… another coronavirus type situation. If they shut these ports down, we might be tied up out this bitch fa real.” Mag sounded just as pissed off and irritated as I was.
When it came to them palm colored muthafuckas, you could always expect the unexpected. They were damn fiends treating this like the hunger games hunting down the nearest dumb nigga. They showed their ignorance as time went by. A bunch of fuckin’ bored ass billionaires playing with humans like it was a fuckin’ sport.
“Was the last shipment switched out?” I asked, forcing my mind back to the topic at hand. I could control that better than I can anything else.
“Yeah. Everything went smooth. Tok handled the swap clean. I’m just worried one of these stupid ass niggas gon’ run they mouth cause they scared.”
“Aight. Keep your ears open. The second some shit change up, you call me.”
“Bet.”
The conversation had come to an end. I hung up lightly tossing the phone on the desk. As much as I wanted to board my jet and get my ass back to the Keys, there wasn’t shit I could do. Mag was more than capable of making shit happen, even though he’d just left the Springs from giving these women full sets.
Swirling the 1942 in my glass, it wasn’t even five minutes later before my personal line rang.What the fuck? Is this irritate Arion day or something?I pulled my cell from my pocket and saw that it was my father calling. It was a lil’ past his bedtime, so I was wondering why the hell he was hitting me so late.
I answered with, “Wassup Pops?”
“Get yo’ ass down to the shop now. Some crazy bitch just shot it up and still there causing hell. You ain’t get the alert from the security system?”
Pulling the phone from my ear, I realized my phone had gone into sleep mode. All notifications were silenced. “Dammit. Nah, my focus turned on, so I missed it. I’m on the way. Where the hell is Shaun?”
“You asking me like I got a tracker on his ass. You better go see what the hell going on cause if I have to get up, somebody dying,” he threatened. He wasn’t doing shit but blowing smoke. His old ass wasn’t gon’ do shit but send them my way.
