Page 46 of Widow Mayker

Heir was unaware that her rejection felt like divine purpose to a nigga like me. She was destined to be mine, and I was destined to be hers. Only we knew of the betrayal we’d faced from the people we loved most. Our joining was happenstance, and regardless of my misgivings or hers, I wasn’t going to let her run from me.

“Aight,” I acquiesced. Bending down, I kissed her forehead. “Answer when I call you.”

“I won’t,” she replied to my back.

I stepped into the waiting sun and inhaled a deep breath. It was a beautiful August Saturday, one that deserved a nice stroll down along the water or through the park. It was a nice day for a man to take his woman shopping or fly kites with his kids or some shit.

Roy pulled up, and I slipped inside the backseat.

“Mornin’,” he spoke. “Where to?”

“Mornin’. Let’s ride to Mama’s house.”

As Roy approached the gate exiting Bell Estates, I rolled down my window and threw my head up at security. Shit, if Adir could step on my property, I had the right to step on his. We could go crazy for crazy, and I wouldn’t get the least bit tired.

***

I walked into my mama’s house and immediately went into the kitchen. That was where I found her, making breakfast. Kim sat at the table, pretending like she didn’t see me enter the kitchen. She thought I forgot about her sliding in that whole date situation. I was simply holding off to give her time to tell me the truth about who the nigga was. I kissed my mama’s forehead and hugged her tightly. She smiled at me and laid her head on my chest for a second before continuing to manipulate some pancake batter.

For the past ten years, I’d watched the light die in my mama’s green eyes that mirrored mine. Once thriving and social, she barely left the house anymore. Her circle of friends dwindled down to one person, Katrice, her best friend she met while on vacation with my father. Throughout the ten years since my father’s death, Katrice held my mama up, wiped her tears, and spent nights with her when my mama went through her worst bout of depression.

Charnice met my father when she was in college. My father wasn’t in college but was sure to be on campus every day just to lay his eyes on my mama. At first, Charnice wanted nothing to do with Dub McAroy. She was pursuing her master’s degree in chemistry while my father was busy fucking off in the streets. Although Dub was the heir to a dynasty, his ass couldn’t stay out of trouble long enough to be of any significance to the empire his grandfather and father built.

All that shit changed when Charnice was introduced to my great-grandfather. Dubose McAroy fell in love with Charnice and her love of chemistry. The two had a lot in common as my great-grandfather owned a doctorate degree in chemistry. One day, over a glass of wine, my mama talked my great-grandfather into adding vodka to his wine collection. She even offered him a formula that he couldn’t refuse. To this day, Char Vodka was K. M. Liquors and Wine’s highest seller next to our ‘84 Special red wine.

After seeing the value my mama added to his life, my father had no choice but to take her off the market. They married, and a few years later, my mama gave birth to me and Kim. Shortly after we were born, my great-grandfather passed. He left everything to my grandfather, Dubose Junior. It was then that the McAroy family joined the drug game. It was like they all knew that they couldn’t do that shit while my great-grandfather was alive.

That was all my father needed to jump headfirst back into the streets. For a while, shit went well. Then, my grandfather died, only to leave everything to me. For a time, it seemed as if the other McAroy men wouldn’t accept the power shift. I was young, but I was truly my great-grandfather’s only great-grandson, and I was every bit of the gangster he was. I kept shit in line, making sure the McAroy name stayed feared in these streets.

In recent years, I moved away from the drugs and held fast to K. M. Liquors and Wine. Wealth wasn’t a problem for my family now. It never would be. It was too bad none of the elder McAroys were here to see the empire flourish beyond their wildest dreams. It was even more fucked-up that my father wasn’t here to put a genuine smile back on my mother’s face.

As kids, Charnice loved telling us stories of her and my father’s love. Now, I couldn’t get her to speak my father’s name or any of the McAroy men’s names for that matter. Initially, I thought she would hate me for what I did. However, she accepted my decision and even offered me some encouraging words.

“Your great-grandfather would be proud,” she’d said.

Up until the day my father betrayed me, I would’ve never thought he would do some shit like that. Loyalty was in the McAroy blood. I wasn’t sure how the fuck it skipped my father and his brothers. It was cool. Everything started with me now, and I was for damn sure going to see to it that my bloodline never dealt with any shit like that again.

Which brought me to Kim.

“So, who was this date with?” I asked her.

She rolled her eyes hard as hell. “Here you go. Can I have some privacy?”

“Hell, naw. Now drop a name.”

Here I was, being that brother. Kim was my baby, though, and I’d be damned if a nigga hurt my sister. Then again, I taught Kim how to defend herself. There was a reason she was my right-hand woman.

“Sorry, bro. You can control a lot of things. The one thing I won’t let you control, is the person I choose to date.”

Oh, this is serious, I thought. In the past, she had never been hesitant at divulging who she was talking to. This was more than serious.

“I agree with your sister,” Mama chimed in and added. “How do you expect her to find a husband if you’re always breathing down her back?”

Kim agreed. “Exactly. Now, leave me alone and worry about Heir.”

“Heir?” Mama’s head whipped around. “Heir Bell? Kody, please no.”

I smoothed out the frown on her fair-skinned face. “You and Heir worry too much. All is well, Ma. I promise you.”