Page 20 of Captured By A Reckless Soul

“You need to get over to the house as soon as possible. Pops is not doing good at all. God forbid he doesn’t make it through the night, and you haven’t seen him to say your last goodbyes. I think he is holding on for you.” Clutching the phone tight, she hung up. I went through my email and found the number I was looking for and dialed it.

“Speak.” His deep baritone voice reminded me of my grandfather’s once strong voice. Right to the point sounding very assertive. You could tell by how he answered the phone, he was a force to be reckoned with.

“How are you sir? I’m calling to-”

“Save the bullshit, I don’t know who the fuck you are so don’t waste my fuckin time asking how I’m doing. I got three kids missing in action, so if you not calling about one of them then get the fuck off my line.” He barked.

“Beast! That’s not how you talk to people!” I could hear a woman scolding him in the background.

“This my muhfuckin’ phone Kayori, don’t tell a nigga how the fuck to talk.” He fussed back.

“I got your daughter Re…umm Mattea, she seems to be having an episode.” I didn’t know what else to say, I could hear him breathing hard into the phone. I hated that I almost slipped up and called her by her nickname. I wasn’t sure if her dad knew her by Reaper.

“Is this Hakeem, her best friend?” he questioned acting as if he didn’t just hear what the hell, I just told him.

“No, this is Christian Powers.” Silence, for a couple of seconds. I put my focus on Reaper she was starting to move slow into my arms.

“Powers huh? It’s only one person I know with that name, so I wonder what the fuck my daughter doing with you, nigga? Don’t even answer that shit, if she was with Hakeem, he knows what to do in a situation like this. You can’t bring her to my house lil nigga, take her hard-headed ass to Torrance memorial. I’ll get with her there.”

“Beast!” I heard the female voice yell. He had already hung the phone up in my face. I see just where she got her personality from, and it wasn’t her mother. I should’ve called Hakeem, but I thought I would give her family the courtesy of knowing what was going on with her.

I stood up with her in my arms and made my way to the exit of the warehouse. I would love to stay with her and make sure she was straight, but I had family issues myself that I needed to tend to asap. Solo opened the back door, I put her in and placed her seat belt on. Kissing her forehead, I stared at her for a while and placed a gentle kiss to her lips. It bothered me, for the first time in my life I wanted to heel her and make her feel better. She needed someone to stay on top of her when it came to her health.

I dropped her off at Torrance memorial and felt bad having to leave. I made it to my parent’s home in record time since I was the one driving today. Usually, my driver went the speed limit only going fast if I demanded. My nerves had been so bad since leaving the Dominican Republic that I wanted to drive myself. For years everything ran smoothly with no hiccups. Now it was someone in my team that had become a fuckin’ leak. When Hector made me aware that the boat had been hit, it took everything inside of me to stay calm. I wanted to go on a killing spree but had to play things smart.

Before the meeting, I told Solo that he would be in charge while I sorted out everything with my family. Right now, everyone was suspect. I was committed to playing the background watching everyone moves in the shadows to spot out who had been fucking with the enemy. My parents always taught me from a youngin’ how to control my emotions and not show what I was thinking. I drove up the long pathway onto my parent’s estate and parked right in the front. Before stepping out of my vehicle, Crystal was calling.

“Hey Ream, I made dinner tonight. I wanted to know what time was you coming back home?” She talked timidly because she knew she was doing too much. Crystal was supposed to be out my house a week ago and here she was on my line talking about some nasty ass food she had made. Pinching the bridge of my nose, I calmed myself.

“Crystal, I’ve been being very nice to you. You’re smart as fuck, in school, so I know you comprehend the things I say and do. It’s Thursday, I’ll be at my parent’s estate until Sunday. If you don’t get all of your things out of my home, by Sunday, you’re going to force me into doing some shit I don’t want to do to you baby.” I didn’t understand why she didn’t take the keys and all the money I gave her and bounced. She was forcing my hand to cut her off, people like her that knew a little too much about my personal business ended up getting killed when I did decide to cut them off. Crystal had a bright future, and I didn’t want to ruin her potential, she was starting to become a thorn in my side.

“Ream baby, please, I love living here with you though and it’s not like I’m in your way. I told you I’m scared of living alone and I-” I hung up in her face and got out of the car. I needed to find a new assistant and figure out other work to give Crystal. My footsteps became heavy as I braced myself and walked up the rest of the driveway. I noticed multiple cars scattered in the front and knew my uncles and the rest of the little family I had left was inside.

Security stepped aside and let me in, when I entered the front room my favorite cousin Angel hopped up fast and ran into my arms hugging me tight. The older we got the more distant we became with one another. It wasn’t because we disliked one another, it simply had to do with the different lifestyles we lived. My uncle Joel, her father, kept her locked into the books like my mom and father had me. Every kid in this family was smart, we just all went on different paths as we got older and hung with different people.

“How you been doing? The school still kicking yo’ ass?” I joked as I let her out of my embrace, she nodded her head and caught me up on everything. She was sad under the circumstances but happy that we would all be under the same roof for a couple of days until she went back to school. Angel stayed in school for something, always looking for ways to move up a step higher in her career.

“Where everybody at?” I asked curious, usually everyone kicked it in the family room.

“Well, your dad ran out to the store, and everybody in the kitchen because uncle Cease is in there eating and auntie wants to keep an eye on her food.” She laughed because her and Cease argued all the time, most of the time the arguments were all about food. No matter where Cease went, he made it a point to raid your kitchen. He’d eat all your food up and complain when there was no food left for him to eat as if was your fault. Cease was the type of nigga to go in your kitchen and eat up all your favorite snacks.

“Bet, let me go in there and fuck with them.” I chuckled before walking away. I started down the long hallway and sighed. I missed living in this house, it was huge as hell and took you a minute to get to the next part. When I moved out, I downsized, a lot of people said my house was huge but to me this house wasn’t just an ordinary house. It was a fucking palace, it was a three-story mini-mansion, with fifteen bedrooms and too many bathrooms to count. Everything you needed was here, an indoor pool, outside pool, theatre room with a fully loaded gym. All the amenities you needed my parents had.

Finally making it into the kitchen the first person I saw was my mom. She was the most beautiful woman I had ever laid eyes on. She had a tight look on her face as her deep-dish dimples sunk deep into her cheeks. Her ocean blue eyes were trained on Cease as he talked shit and ate a bowl of cereal.

“I don’t know why your fat ass needs to add sugar to frosted flakes when they already got sugar laced on the top.” My mom shook her head in disbelief as Cease poured more sugar on top and then added more cereal and milk.

“Every time I come over here, I can never just eat in fuckin’ peace! You love standing over me, watching every bite I take!” He fussed with a mouthful of Frosted Flakes. They could bicker all day long.

“Nigga stop bringing your ass over here then for the sake of my fuckin’ kitchen!”

She placed her hand on her wide hips, I held my laughter back, the older they got the more ridiculous their arguments became.

“I wish you two would just shut the fuck up.” Khaos the third person to their tight trio added.

“I ain’t gotta come over here, I only came to check in on pops! Let me go two weeks without visiting her spoiled ass though, we gone start getting long ass paragraph text messages saying how we don’t care about her and all that other bullshit!” Cease mocked her and I couldn’t hold back my laughter any longer. Over the years Uncle Cease turned into a big, tall ass teddy bear. He loved food and couldn’t put the fork or spoon down. Uncle Khaos was still in shape and stayed serious all the time, hardly ever joking. My mom and the two of them owned and ran multiple lucrative companies but stayed down each other’s throats. They never could separate or stop all the arguing. The only time they were calm and collected is when my dad hung out with them. My dad was close with Conflict, they had their own companies and ran things more professionally.

My mom placed those doe-shaped blue eyes on me and smiled wide. Walking behind Cease she slapped the back of his meaty head causing him to curse under his breath. My mom was chubby and pretty as hell, I swear she was perfect looking. Her face looked like a doll, at the age of forty-six she looked like she was still in her twenties.