Page 45 of If I Gave You My Heart
"It's either you're gonna come clean to these kids about what you do or retire, one or the other.
I needed Jolene to see that she couldn't have both. There was no way that I could still be the ruthless murderer that I used to be and still have as much love in my body as I do now.
"Who was Donny with?"
Her random question threw me off.
"Jolene, are you done with this shit or not?"
"Adira, who was your brother with?" she ignored me.
"That's his girlfriend, Nyoka."
"Mmm…"
I knew what kind of mmm that was.
"What, Jolene?" I had to ask.
"I know her."
"What?" I questioned.
"I know her," Jolene repeated.
From what Baby had told me, Nyoka was a good girl from the city.
"How?" I had to ask. I didn't see where in the two lifestyles they would have crossed. Jolene was a ruthless killer, and Nyoka was a sweetheart.
"She's like us, and now whoever looked him up makes sense."
Now that I wasn't expecting. Nyoka seemed like a sweet girl with no edge at all to her. Only I knew how happy Baby was with this woman. In the short amount of months of them being together, I saw that she had brought out the good in him. She had grounded him, and I'd be damned if my daughter got in between that.
"Let him be. He's happy."
"There's a price on her head."
"Jolene, leave it alone."
"She's a Supreme…"
I let what Jolene just said linger because then I knew just how skilled Nyoka was. Not everyone was gifted the necklace I once wore around my neck. The same necklace that Jolene wore around hers. I knew my daughter, and more than the money, she would be chasing the thrill with this one. Just like me when I was her age, I would chase the highest paying or most thrilling contract. Money excited me, and the lifestyle was exhilarating. I could see my daughter's mental knobs churning rapidly, and before she made up a plan in her head to make good on the contract that was out on Nyoka, it was something that I had to try first.
"Let me make a call," I said before walking off.
I knew only one man in the world who could interfere with such a contract. I just hope that he still had love in his heart for me.
Nyoka
I could barely focus while I drove Adonis and me to the hotel to finally check-in. We had spent the greater part of the day at Joy's house. I was enjoying myself until I laid eyes on a blast from my past that caused the bones in my body to quiver. I hadn't seen Onyx since my graduation ceremony. I had tuned Adonis out, but he was talking a mile a minute in the passenger seat.
"How could they do this shit to me?"
Knowing who his mother now was, I knew exactly how she could have. The life I lived was the reason that I was thirty-four with no kids. The type of woman Onyx was, I never could imagine her as a mother. She was a drill sergeant when it came to training classes. She was the reason that my shot was so precise.
"By the time you leave here in twenty-nine weeks, you will be able to make a headshot with your eyes closed."Her raspy voice remained in the back of my mind.
"How could they do this to me, Ny?"
