Page 219 of Own It

Since I’d found out about what he’d done to Zaire and my mother, I’d been elusive as far as he was concerned, evading his ass every chance I got, because I was cognizant of my temper. I knew if I was vicinal to him for any amount of time, he’d be as good as dead before I could get answers.

“Nothing much. Excited to get you back out there,” he said as I shut my front door.

“Why?” I laughed it off, walking toward the den.

Following me, he said, “Between me and you, Ayan is great, but he’s not like us. We’re exceptional boxers, and I can’t have a simply great boxer carry on my legacy. Muthafuckas need to know Godfreys are extraordinary. You know, I was unprecedented in my day. Ayan is just as great as any great boxer. You, though, would be like me.”

He confirmed what I figured was the case, so I simply nodded as we entered the den. Seeing Ayan and Josias on the couch confused Nate, causing him to halt his next words.

“We wanted to have a discussion,” I said, seeing the questions in his gaze as he swept the room like he was expecting more people to jump the fuck out.

“Questions? What the fuck is this?” Nate’s face balled up.

“Have a seat, Pop.” Ayan gestured to the couch.

“I’m good.” He shoved his hands down in his pockets, dwarfing everyone in the room and trying to physically assert his authority like usual. Only now, we were thirty-something-year-old men and no longer elementary school kids that would piss ourselves at just the sound of his impending footsteps.

“We found JG,” I said.

“JG?” Nate’s brows bunched. “Look, I don’t have time for whatever the fuck this is. Say what the fuck you gotta say like men before I dip.”

“We found the nigga you bought that fentanyl from to give Zaire, nigga!” Josias hollered, about to charge Nate, but Ayan restrained him.

“Let me guess.” Nate snickered. “Rakim told you this.” He shook his head before shifting his attention onto me. “You got a fucking obsession with making people hate me. Shit eats you up inside that as much as you try to be their father figure, it’s still me. I’m their father, Rah. I’m yo’ muthafuckin’ father, and that means at the end of the day, I’m gon’ always get the most respect.”

“Nigga, fuck you!” Josias spat, writhing in effort to break free from Ayan’s hold.

“Yeah, I did inform them, but the shit is true. I don’t need to make people hate you, Nate; they just do. Only muthafuckas that don’t are people that see you on their TV screens. But anybody that don’ sat down and got to know you in any kind of way can’t stand you. Yo’ own wife and kids ain’t fuck with you.”

I watched his jaw twitch, making it obvious he was grinding his back teeth in vexation.

“I’m—”

“Like I said, we met JG, and the white boy told us all about how you copped from him right around the time Zaire died. So that shit got me to thinking about why you’d do that shit to yo’ own son. I know you a trash ass, selfish ass, jealous ass muthafucka, but it still ain’t make sense. Then I remembered someone else—my mother. So I looked into that. Found out the ME who did her examination was the same one who did Zaire’s. Ain’t that some shit?” I smirked, watching the soul damn near leave Nate’s body. “Nigga also told me he never ordered her autopsy, just submitted some shit.”

“All a coincidence. You should know you need more than that shit to convict a muthafucka since you so smart, Rah.” He tried to smirk sardonically, but the fear had yet to drain from his eyes.

“That’s true, but see, I ain’t gon’ let the court handle you. Only jury you gotta worry ’bout is the jury of ya remaining sons, and in our eyes, you guilty, nigga,” I said.

“As fuck,” Ayan threw out, finally having let a calmer Josias free.

“Shut yo’ bitch ass up! You ain’t ever had yo’ own mind! Now you don’ let these two bums put a battery in ya back! You can’t recognize when someone is trying to take you out and drop you to their level, ’cause you soft!” Nate roared at Ayan, spit flying from his mouth like a rabid fucking dog. “Always been a lil bitch too! You the only one in this room besides me that got an actual fucking career, and you let a drug dealer and wayward womanizer convince you to act beneath your level! You a muthafuckin’ disgrace, and you always have been!”

Before we could react, Ayan decked Nate in the face, sending him staggering back. At that point, Josias jumped in, and I stood back as my brothers whupped on this nigga. I’d fought Nate all my life and had no interest in getting any extra licks in. I was more interested in seeing the life bleed from his eyes once I put a bullet in his forehead.

After a while, once they had Nate down, I called the shit off, twisting the silencer on my gun. Nate was laid out and bloodied, heaving as my brothers stood before him.

“Bitch!” Josias stomped on his stomach, causing him to fold and cough.

I aimed my gun at him, ready to blow his head open.

“I hate that the nigga I paid to kill you that afternoon fumbled,” he revealed, referencing the random who made an attempt on Josias’s and my life outside the boxing gym. “And yeah, I killed ya brother. He was a waste of fucking space anyway. Should’ve never been fucking born, but like usual, ya mother can’t ever do shit right. That’s why I got rid of her ass too. She was worth more to me dead than alive.” He cackled, teeth dripping in crimson. I noticed Ayan and Josias staring down at him, horrified, as if he were a man morphing into a monster, and truthfully, he was. “That was a good year for me, when Helen died. I took that insurance money, flew y’all to my parents for the summer, and had a good ass time in the DR with Jessi. Y’all remember her?”

I did, and I hated it. She’d called the house before—like many of his discarded women—arguing with my mother and informing her that Nate would be leaving my mama for her and very soon. And while Nate did fuck with Jessi—after my mother’s death—long enough for me to remember the bitch, he was beating her ass, too, and eventually tossed her to the side like the mistresses before her.

“Shoot this nigga!” Ayan yelled, voice quivering some, and when we caught eyes, I saw them glistening.

“Nah.” I put the gun back in my waist. “Since you wanna be funny, I got some other shit for you. Talked yaself out of an easy death, nigga.” I smirked, seeing how terrified Nate was.