Page 185 of Own It

For a moment, I took the white man in, deaf to his pleas for his life and explanations as to why he shouldn’t have been here.

“Shut the fuck up,” I commanded cooly, and he did, instantly, eyes widening in fear despite the fact that I hadn’t raised my voice.

“Name is Jonah Galloway. Niggas call him JG in the streets, but he been pushing fentanyl like he fucking chief of surgery round this muthafucka,” Mylo explained.

“Listen, I only sell to people in the suburbs!” JG blurted.

“Fuck you trying to say, nigga? We don’t look like we know muthafuckas who live in the ’burbs, bitch?” I spoke through clenched teeth, pulling my shit off my hip.

JG’s eyes bounced between my hand clutching my Glock and my face, nervous as fuck. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’d shit on himself by the way he was sweating and trembling.

“N-no. It’s just when people start looking for me, it’s usually because a crackhead off the street died. I don’t deal with those types,” he expounded.

“Is that right?” I eyed him. “So why the fuck you think it’s him?” I questioned Mylo.

“Nigga Téa met at the club connected me to him. Said he known for selling that shit and nothing else,” Mylo replied.

“Who is it? If it’s not a rich doctor, dentist, or celebrity, it wasn’t me. I can promise you.” JG heaved, looking as if he was about to fucking faint at any minute.

“Fuck.” Mylo shook his head, defeated. I loved that he cared as much as I did, though Zaire wasn’t his brother or shit, even his best friend.

I, too, felt disheartened until I replayed JG’s words in my mind.

“Celebrities you said?” I queried, and JG nodded profusely.

“Actual ones. No low level or unknown people,” he explained further, hope overflowing in his eyes as if he thought that tidbit of information would clear him.

“What about Big Bully? Nate Godfrey. The boxer.”

JG frowned, but then he lit up as if a light bulb had gone off in his head.

“Uh, yeah. I sold to him one time, but it was a very long time ago. It wasn’t anything recent.”

As the words spilled from JG’s mouth, Mylo’s head popped up with bulged eyes.

“Ain’t that some shit.” I aimed the gun at JG’s forehead, and he began to flail about as much as one could while tied to a chair. “Niggas like you are why my brother is in the ground.” I sent the bullet into his forehead, slumping him. “I know I sound like a hypocrite, but that fentanyl shit is another level,” I explained.

“Nigga, I already know. No explanation needed.” Mylo shook his head as he watched blood leak from JG’s dome. “I’m just not understanding why Nate would buy that shit.”

“Why you think?” I shot Mylo a look before realization and sorrow set in simultaneously.

“But why? Fuck would Nate wanna murk Zaire for?”

“Shit, same question I got.” I paced a little bit, racking my brain, but nothing came to me.

Nate Godfrey had never showed us love or care and that meant in all aspects. He never gave a fuck about us enough to kill one of us. Therefore, it had to be a very specific reason why my pops bought a fatal dose of a drug and administered it to my brother. What that reason was, I needed to find the fuck out.

Silence lingered as I left the room, Mylo trailing me. I needed a drink to help process what the fuck I’d just learned and to assist me in maybe putting the pieces together.

I always knew Nate wasn’t shit, but to murk his own son was an evil I didn’t even know the bitch ass nigga possessed. I was infuriated, finding it difficult to keep my emotions bottled in at the moment. Sending a bullet into JG eased my violent urge, but only slightly.

“You fucked Téa?” I asked after handing Mylo a glass of brown and sipping my own. I needed to think and speak on something else, or I was gon’ paint the fucking town red over what Nate did.

Mylo froze mid-sip.

“I did, Rah. I apologize I⁠—”

“Why you apologizing if you like the girl? She told me you brought her food and shit. Mylo I know don’t do them kind of favors just for any-fucking-body.”