Page 118 of Omar

"That's what I been sitting here trying to figure out." Kadeem leaned forward, his good arm on the table. "The Canarsie location was in the operational brief I put together after the Associates meeting. Five people had that brief. You, me, Devon, James, and Stone."

The name landed in the room like a stone dropped into water. Shanay's arms crossed tighter in the doorway. I sat there looking at my brother.

"You, me, Devon, and James were all accounted for," Kadeem continued. "Devon was at APEX on comms. James was with me. You were at APEX too." He paused. "That leaves one person."

"Deem."

"I don't want to say it either. But I need you to think about this with me."

The front door opened downstairs. Footsteps on the stairs, fast. Rashid came into the kitchen breathing hard, still in his studio clothes, a jacket thrown on over whatever he'd been recording in.

"I just heard." He looked at Kadeem's bandaged arm, the vest on the floor. "You good?"

"I'm good."

"What happened?"

"Ambush. They were waiting at the Canarsie location."

Rashid pulled out a chair and sat down. His face was working through something, his eyes going between me and Kadeem. Then he said, "I need to tell you something."

The kitchen went quiet.

"I been sitting on this for a few days cos I wasn't sure if it meant anything. But after what just happened..." Rashid looked at Kadeem. "I seen Stone coming out of a building on Sutter Avenue in East New York. Late at night. The building with the green awning, the one past the laundromat."

"Sutter Avenue is TK's block," Kadeem said slowly.

"Yeah. Stone was coming out the side entrance, got in his car, drove off. This was the same week TK got tipped off and bounced before we could get to him."

Kadeem looked at me. I looked back.

"There was only one person who knew about the Canarsie location today who ain't family," Rashid said quietly. "I think we got our guy."

The kitchen was silent. Ma's clock ticked on the wall above the stove. Outside, a car passed on the street, its headlights sweeping across the ceiling.

I sat there and let everything fall into place. Every breadcrumb Stone had mentioned first then dismissed as coincidence. The Greyline registration timing he'd waved away as infrastructure recycling. The account number in his cross-reference document that matched Pops' dormant files. Leonard Pryce at the Hampton Royal three days before Pops disappeared. Stone suggesting which location to hit first on night one. Stone offering to stay with Asha and Nene during the operation while everyone else was in the field. Stone always having the right advice at the right time, always steering us in a direction that looked smart until you realized what it was steering us away from.

Twenty years of trust. Gone in sixty seconds of Rashid talking.

Close. Real close.

The brother of the man wearing Pops' watch had said that. The money behind TK was connected to Pops' disappearance and the person behind it was close. Real close.

I stood up from the table.

Kadeem looked at me. His face was tired, bandaged, furious. Underneath the fury was something I recognized because I was carrying it too.

"You already knew," Kadeem said. It wasn't a question.

"I've been putting it together for weeks." I pushed my chair in. "The financial documents, the account numbers, Devon's data. It all points the same direction. I just didn't want to believe it."

"None of us did."

"But now we know."

Kadeem stood up from the table, wincing as the movement pulled at his injured arm. Shanay moved toward him but he waved her off gently.

"What do you want to do?" Kadeem asked me.