Page 94 of Quasim III: King Inferno

She scoffed. “Do you see how the men stare at you in court? How they would give anything to just smell your panties?”

“I’m there to work, not look at who wants to fuck me.” I replied.

She gestured to the chair that was sitting outside of the kitchen. More than likely, that was where she had Irie sitting. “Hmph. I was there to work and had plenty of entanglements with colleagues.”

I watched as she took another pull and snorted to herself. “Yeah…well.”

What the fuck did she want me to say? She fucked her way through her squad, that wasn’t my story. I already let a nigga that wasn’t worthy not only sniff around me but marry me and played me like I was stupid.

My confidence these days was higher, and that was because I knew I was pressure. “You know I know that you are an Inferno.”

“Kind of guessed that already, Lucia.”

“Could use you as my way out.”

It was my turn to laugh. “Your way out of what? What has the Infernos done to be even implicated in any of this? Your name is being dropped, and you’re scared… serves you right.”

“I did what the fuck I had to do.”

“Tricking them women into being live cattle? Robbing them of their decency and rights? As a woman, you were alrightcollecting the money as long as it wasn’t you. See, Detective Parker, you are the kind of woman we call apick me. As long as you’re great with the men, fuck the rest of us… then allowing Mercer to abuse a child.”

Tears slid down her face as she continued to pull on the cigarette. “Do you think I had an option? I had the choice to say no?”

She laughed while tears continued to slide down her face. “Thea Armstrong? You tricked her to come here, then had her having a baby with your husband.”

“That bitch owes me… I allowed her to live when they wanted to kill her. Did she think it was a free ride? She didn’t get to pick up and just go on with her life.”

“Why not?”

“Cause she knew too much.”

I leaned back and crossed my legs. “What did she know?”

“She just knew too much. You judging me like I allowed Mercer into that room with that boy… he was a bastard anyway.”

My heart broke with the way she spoke about my nephew. As if his life and feelings didn’t matter to her. Of course, it wouldn’t matter to her because she felt he was disposable. His life didn’t matter, just like all those women that were found at that clinic.

My foot shook as I stared at her. Disgusting was too nice of a word to use on her. She was the bottom of the bottom and deserved everything that came to her.

“He was a fucking child! You both failed him for your own selfish gain.”

“Mercer did those things, not me. I played my part because that was all I could do. Blame his precious mother… she failed him the minute she got pregnant with him by my husband.”

“Oh, so you mad because Rich fucked another woman? Make the child pay because you’re too weak to leave? Too weak to choose yourself?”

The tears were pouring down her face as she stared at me. “You don’t know what the fuck I went through with that man. He would never leave her alone. He was always going to pick her as long as she was alive. Cherie deserved to die because she was so fucking nice. Always being nice to turn him down and he would never fucking leave her alone!” She screamed out, and I paused.

Did this bitch just admit to killing Cherie because of Rich? The way I had been told, the story has always been that Rich called the hit on Cherie.

“So, you killed her. Took a mother from her child because your nigga didn’t want you? Let me tell you something, Lucia. Had I sat on Rich’s desk, opened my legs, and told him to eat my pussy while on a conference call, he would have done it. Your husband was a fucking munch, a nigga looking for something better than you, and instead of collecting whatever self-worth you had and leaving, you decided to kill a woman and traumatize a fucking child. Worthless.”

She stared at me, not even surprised by my disgust. Mostly because she was used to it. Lucia had sat with the decisions she had made within her life. She loved a man, continued to build him up while he broke her down. She never loved herself enough to walk away.

To choose her.

I could relate with her loosely when it came to loving a man so much that you changed who you were, broke your own heart to make things right for him.

My sympathies stopped when I saw what she did. What her weakness and low confidence had caused. It was one thing to self-destruct, but that wasn’t what Lucia did.

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