Page 18 of Queen of the Pole

“I can sit here and listen to you talk that shit all day. For the fuck of it, Ima start saying things to you to get you all riled up. I love that shit, baby,” he went on.

I waved him off and continued to smoke the hookah. Kilo continued to sit there, and we vibed together. As we were sitting, I happened to look over, and Lyric was still sitting with Kilo’s boy.

“Your homeboy that my girl is over there talking to. What’s his story?” I wanted to know.

Kilo smiled when I asked that. He smiled and then looked over in the direction where they were. Lyric had to really been enjoying the conversation with him because it wasn’t like her to be in the middle of the club, conversing with men. Lyric was my wild friend. She would get money out of niggas, and get the fuck on, so to see that the conversation was still going strong, that had to be a good thing.

“His name Luke. He’s a cool dude. That’s like my brother. I been knowing him since we were lil niggas. If she looking for a husband though, tell your girl to run. He a dog,” he told me.

“Oh, so like you?” I asked, and he smiled.

“I won’t be a dog with you. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. Put me on a leash and I won’t stray,” he said.

I tuned his ass out. My phone was resting on the table in front of me. The screen lit up, indicating that I had a text message. I grabbed my phone, seeing that it was a text notification from Hitta.

Hitta

Get the fuck out that nigga face! I can hop on a flight right now, and it’ll only take an hour and a half to get over to that side. Tell that nigga to move around, or I’ll move him around. Simple. Bae, you know me. I’ll get nutty in a second.

When I finished reading the message, I paused. I paused, looking around the club. There were so many people here, and who knows who might have recorded Kilo and I talking. People were so messy that they probably sent it to the blogs or something, and that’s how Hitta got a hold of it. Then again, Miami and Atlanta were like cousins to each other, so people in this city knew Hitta too. Maybe one of his homeboys were in the club and sent it. Maybe even one of his hoes sent it, thinking that they were going to get some kind of brownie points out of him. Shit, I don’t know.

It’s almost like Kilo could sense that a message was just sent to my phone that kind of bothered me. This nigga was bold as hell, taking my phone out of my hand, and he looked at the message. Once he finished, he tossed the phone in my lap.

“Tell that nigga to come. Me, and every nigga in this section got a stick on us. He might walk in, but I bet you he won’t walk out,” Kilo threatened.

Right there, when he made that threat, I found my common sense and knew from there that I wasn’t going to fuck with this nigga. Granted, I didn’t plan on fuckin with him anyways, but that statement really sealed the deal. It was going to stir up too much mess. Mess that I wasn’t trying to get in the middle of.

CHAPTER 5

WARREN ‘WOLF’ BENNETT

It was a little after five in the evening, and I was leaving my shop. Business was good for me today. Really fuckin good. Football season just kicked off, and around this time, it was always good for business. I loved this time of the year. Around this time, that’s usually when the rookies get a shot of that NFL money, and because I was the most talked about jeweler in all of South Florida, they would typically pull up on me, spending with me.

Two rookie players walked in first thing this morning. I sold one of them a fat ass 20mm white gold Cuban. That bitch was nice too. It had a little over fifty carats of VVS stones in it. As if that wasn’t good enough, he also copped the matching bracelet. His homeboy that he walked into the shop with, purchased an iced-out AP. In just a matter of five minutes, I made a little over $250,000. Shop was barely opened, and I had already made that kind of money. After that, niggas kept coming in back-to-back, spending large amounts of money with me.

With the amount of jewelry that we pushed out today, my content and marketing team were super busy. If it wasn’t for this business, I swear to God that social media would never see me. That’s never really been my thing. Prior to opening my business, I never had a personal social media page. I’ve always been the kind of nigga where you just had to catch me when you caught me. I wasn’t in the streets, but I’ve always moved like a certified street nigga. Meaning, I was never going to check in anywhere, post on social media where I was headed, or just give a bunch of random strangers a play-by-play of my life. See, when you’re running a business, social media is what was going to put money in your pocket, so I had no choice but to hire people for content, and marketing.

My business page had well over three million followers. If you scroll down my page, you’ll see all the rappers, ball players, and just anyone with some money that’s supported my business over the years. I pushed so much shit out today, and my content team were behind the scenes, capturing videos of the hard work, and the sales. A few posts have already been uploaded for the day too.

Now that the workday was over, I was headed to Range Rover. I had an ongoing problem with the air suspension, so my car had been with them for an entire week. They hit me this afternoon, letting me know that it was ready, so now I was en route to drop this loaner off that they’d given me, so that I could get back in my own whip.

I pushed a beautiful black-on-black Range Rover Sport SV. That bitch was so fuckin pretty, sitting on twenty- three inch rims. My tint on the whip was illegal because of how dark it was. It just depends on the officer that sees me pushing the whip because there are times that some let me get away with it, then there are times when I’ll get pulled over, and handed a fat ass ticket. With the kind of money that I made, plus niggas in Miami knowing who I was, I liked to remain discreet, even if that meant driving around with dark tints.

I drove with my left hand, bobbing my head to the music that was playing. I liked old school rap, so I liked to blast that whenever I was in the car. Master P was one of my favorite rappers, so I drove down Biscayne Boulevard blasting Mr. Ice Cream Man. This song was my mood for the rest of the day. I wasn’t moving the kind of shit that P was talking about in the song, but I damn sure moved enough diamonds today. I played this song so much that I was able to drive and rap it bar for bar.

In the middle of the rap session that I was having, the music stopped. It stopped because my phone started ringing. My phone was connected to the Bluetooth. I saw my mom’s name appear on the screen. I haven’t spoken to her since this morning. Today was her and my dad’s wedding anniversary. They were celebrating 35 years of marriage. Together for a little over 37 but married for 35.

I hit her this morning to wish her a happy anniversary. I was shocked to see that she was calling. I thought that she would be out somewhere, sitting at a five-star steakhouse with my pops, ordering caviar and shit.

I went ahead and answered the facetime call for her. I had an expectation of what her background was going to look like. I thought she would be facetiming me with a big smile on her face, showing me views of the restaurant that she was in. Instead, I could tell that she was home right now. She looked to be sitting outside, under the gazebo.

“What’s up, Emaye? What you doing?” I asked her.

Emaye is what my brothers and I call our mother. Having an Ethiopian mother meant that there were certain parts of her culture that became mine, and my brothers. Emaye was one of them. It was an Amharic term for mother. For as long as I can remember, that’s what I would call her. Every blue moon, I may switch up and call her ma, but it was Emaye all day.

“Hi son. I was just calling. I didn’t want anything. How was your day?” she asked me.

“Where pops at?” I answered her question with a question. I wasn’t trying to answer none of the shit that she just asked me.