Page 87 of Omar

"Don't think on it now. Let's concentrate on getting out of this place."

Nene looked around the room one more time. Her face was tight with anger, her hands balled into fists at her sides. She wasn't scared. She was furious. Furious at Supreme, furious at the situation, furious at being used as leverage against the person she cared about most.

"Let's go," she said. "I been in this room long enough."

James went first, clearing the corridor. I walked behind Nene with my hand on her shoulder, guiding her toward the front entrance. We stepped over the inside guard who was still on the floor holding his arm and moaning. He looked up at us with his face twisted in pain.

"Who are you?" he managed.

I didn't answer. We kept moving.

The two outside guards were still down. One had rolled onto his side, the zip ties holding. The other hadn't moved at all. We walked past them to the corner where Devon had brought the car around. Nene got in the back seat. I got in the passenger side. James took the driver's seat from Devon, who moved to the back with his laptop.

"Clean?" Devon asked.

"Clean enough." I looked over my shoulder at Nene. "You hurt?"

"No." She was rubbing her wrists. "They didn't touch me. Just tied me to that chair and left me there."

"Did they say anything? Mention Supreme by name?"

"One of them said 'the boss wants his girl back and this is how we make that happen.' That's it. They fed me once, let me use the bathroom twice, and otherwise just sat outside that door scrolling their phones." She looked at me. "Real professional operation he's running."

"Did they take your phone?"

"Yeah, soon as they grabbed me. But they didn't turn it off." She shook her head. "They left it on the table in the hallway outside that room. I could see the screen glowing through the crack under the door. They wanted someone to trace it, Omar. They wanted Asha to come running."

That confirmed it. The phone ping wasn't a mistake. Supreme's people had left it powered on at the location on purpose, banking on Asha tracking it herself and walking straight into their hands. They hadn't counted on Devon finding it first and sending me instead.

"Where'd they pick you up?"

"Outside my building. I was coming back from the store. Two of them, black sedan, one grabbed my arm, the other opened the door. Thirty seconds and I was in the car." She paused. "They knew where I lived, Omar. They knew my schedule."

I filed that. Supreme's people had been watching Nene before they took her. Surveillance on Asha's known contacts. He was organized about this, methodical. He wasn't searching blindly for Asha. He was mapping her network.

James drove us back to Bed-Stuy. The streets were quiet, the car moving through Brooklyn at a speed that said nowhere urgent. Devon ran his scanner in the back, checking for any communication about the Sterling Place location. Nothing yet. Supreme's people hadn't reported in, probably because the guards were still on the ground and nobody had checked on them.

We had time. Maybe a few hours before Supreme knew his leverage was gone.

Nene was quiet in the back seat. She sat with her hands in her lap, her eyes on the passing streets, her face still tight. Devon kept his distance, working his laptop, giving her space.

We pulled up outside the apartment. I got out and opened Nene's door. She stepped out and stood on the sidewalk looking up at the building.

"This where she's been?" Nene asked.

"Yeah."

"It's nice." She looked at me for a long moment. Her eyes were searching my face, reading something. "You really care about her, huh?"

"Yeah. I do."

Nene nodded once, slow. "Good. Cos she deserves that."

"Let's go see your girl."

We went up the stairs. I unlocked the door and Nene walked through it.

I stayed in the hallway and let them have the moment. Through the open door Asha's voice cracked, then Nene's went low and soft. Two women holding each other, scared, relieved, furious all at once.