A few minutes later, his voice interrupted the busyness happening in her brain.
“Nina?” His tone was low.
She looked up but her lips didn’t move to speak. She honestly didn’t think she could if she wanted to.
“You alright?” he asked, sounding just as defeated as she felt.
Jio opened the door further, it creaked as he stepped in. For a split second, his brain didn’t process the scene before him, but it was his baby sitting up in bed. She was looking too still for his liking. It didn’t even seem like shorty was mentally present.
He noticed the gun and wondered how did she even know where his gun was.
“This girl is so damn nosey,” he thought.
His entire body locked up, instincts firing all at once, but his feet were rooted to the floor like moving too fast might trigger her to do some shit that she couldn’t take back.
“…Baby?”
She blinked slowly, dragging her gaze toward him. Jio was staring at her deeply. He looked past the puffiness of her face and redness in her eyes. The way her body looked… deflated. Like whatever made herherhad been drained out overnight.
“I wasn’t gonna use it,” she said hoarsely. Jio wasn’t greeted with a smile. In fact, he didn’t know the last time she freely offered him one of those. She didn’t bother to explain how she’d found the gun and why she had it so close. Jio was a smart man and could easily put two and two together.
He didn’t care that she didn’t plan on pulling the trigger, his concern was that it was in the bed with her to begin with.
Jio exhaled through his nose as he took steps to the bed.
“So why is it out?”
Nina looked back up at the ceiling.
“I just wanted it close…I NEEDED IT!” she admitted in that whiny voice that he liked only when she wanted some dick. Any other time it made his ass itch.
“Can you tell me why though?” His voice remained calm since hers was not.
Jio walked over slowly, eyes never leaving her hand as he reached down and picked the gun up in one smooth motion. He checked it out of habit. It was loaded as if it should’ve been off safety because in the line of business that he was in, he had to always be prepared for whatever, whenever.
He clicked the safety on before placing the gun on the dresser across the room. It was now far enough away and out of reach and away from her tempting hands.
He pulled a blunt from his ear and lit it with a lighter that was nearby on the nightstand. Jio pulled a few tokes with his eyes closed. He needed that as bad as truck drivers itched for a cigarette.
She was comfortable with the silence and it was another thing that he loved about her. They could bask in each other’s presence and not have to mumble a word. But when miss mamas got in yap mode, there was no stopping her. Nina could talk his ear off anytime. He pulled her out of troubled thoughts when he asked, “Can you tell me what happened?”
If money could buy whatever he needed, Jio would gladly spend his last dollar on being able to read Nina’s mind since so much happened up there.
She sighed, moving her hair out of her face.
“They know.”
Her voice was riddled with fear yet relief.
It didn’t take a rocket scientist for him to understand the severity of the situation.
“How did they find out?”
Nina growled and the guttural noise that started in her gut scared the shit out of him.
She reached over and tried to claw his eyes out as she roared angrily, “BECAUSE YOUUUUUU TOLD YOUR LITTLE FUCKIN’ HOODLUMS NOT TO GIVE HER DRUGS! WHY COULDN’T YOU JUST MIND YOUR FUCKIN’ BUSINESS? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?” The dam had finally broken. Her voice was cold and it startled him because he’d never seen her act this way or talk so reckless.
Her lips trembled. “They know about you, Jio.”
