Page 48 of Surrogate For My Best Friend’s Man 2

“Rell.”

He turned around. “Yeah?”

“Don’t come back telling me you couldn’t find her.”

He nodded once. “I won’t.”

The guard walked him out. I sat there staring at the empty chair. The money situation was bad and the product situation was worse. The judge had me stuck in the county. But now my wife was somewhere out there, not answering my calls, not coming to court, and apparently not even staying at home. I didn’t know where the hell she was. And that shit had my mind going a mile a minute. Because Alisha wasn’t the type to just disappear. Something had changed and I needed to know what it was.

I walked back to my cell with my hands shoved in my pockets, my mind going a hundred miles an hour. Every time I thought I was getting close to figuring this shit out, something else got thrown on my plate. The feds were digging deeper and now Alisha was gone somewhere I couldn’t even find her.

I sat down on that hard ass bunk and leaned my head against the wall. I should’ve never fucked with Kim. That thought had been eating at me since the agents put them cuffs on me. If Kim’s daddy wasn't the FBI, I probably would’ve had a whole different situation on my hands. I would’ve been fighting whatever charges they had and moving on with my life.

Instead, that man had apparently decided to make my ass his personal project. Now the government wasn’t just looking at one thing. They were trying to build some RICO type shit. That meant they weren’t just coming after me. They were trying to connect everybody around me to whatever the hell they thought I was running. I rubbed my face. “Fuck.”

I had gotten too comfortable, that's what happened. I thought I could control everything. My business, my side shit, my family, my money. I thought I could keep everything separated. Now all that shit was crashing into each other.

Kim was at the center of damn near all of it. I closed my eyes. I didn’t even want to think about her, but somehow, I couldn’t stop. Then I heard the deputy. “Carter.”

I looked up.

“Visitation.” He yelled.

I frowned. Visitation again? For a second, my heart jumped. Maybe Alisha finally came. Maybe she’d gotten tired of ignoring me. I stood up and followed the deputy down the hallway. But when I walked into the visitation room my whole mood changed. Kim was sitting there, I stopped in the doorway.

She stood up slowly. “Deuce…”

I shook my head. “Nah.”

She looked hurt. “I just wanted to see you.”

“You need to leave me the fuck alone.” I spat.

Her face dropped. “Deuce.”

“I said leave me alone, Kim.”

She sat back down, I stayed standing. I wasn’t sitting across from her. I didn’t trust myself to be that close. She looked at me with tears in her eyes. “You won’t even talk to me?”

“I have nothing to say to you.”

“But—”

“Kim, look around.”

I motioned toward the walls. “I’m sitting in the county because this shit got way bigger than it ever should’ve been.”

She wiped her face. “I never wanted this to happen.”

I laughed. “That’s all you ever say. You didn’t want this or You didn’t want that. You didn’t mean this. But somehow I’m the one sitting in here.”

She looked down, I took a breath. “I’m done.”

Her head snapped up. “What?”

“I’m done with you.”

“Deuce…”