Page 13 of Blind Spot
“I cannot and will not put my baby out of his room,” I replied, walking to Tunisia, where she was adjusting her gown so that she could feed Karter. I rubbed his little warm, soft cheek and then stepped back.
“He hardly ever sleeps in there anyway,” Karter stated.
I sighed. “I’ll figure something out. Just promise that you won’t tell Dom.”
“I won’t tell him what happened,” Karter replied with a sigh and returned to their bedroom.
“Why are you protecting Ramon’s ass?” Tunisia demanded after Karter closed the door.
“I’m not. I’m protecting Dom. We both know that Dom will go insane if he knows what his brother did to me.”
“Has been doing to you,” Tunisia corrected me.
“It’s never gotten this bad before. I always had it under control.”
“Or so you thought. There’s no way things like this are ever under control. It’s just wrong on every level for both of you. Heshould never put his hands on you, and you should never have to put yours back on him. The moment that you felt you needed to was the moment you should’ve walked and never looked back.”
“Don’t worry. Payback’s a mutha.”
“What’re you going to do?”
“Show up at his office just like this. His big boss is in town today, and he’s supposed to be meeting with him about an upcoming promotion.”
“Oh, . . . don’t you think you’re only muddying the waters? How is any of this going to make it better?”
“Because I believe in revenge.”
“I won’t let you do that, Charly. You’re going to stay here, and we’re going to plan how you turn your life around.”
Chapter 5
Dominic
Tupac blasted in my ear, making the day go by much smoother. I was looking forward to going home for the evening and chilling in front of the TV. The last few days had been bananas between the fight with Chrome and me and the one that jumped off at Black Diamonds. I needed to stay out of trouble and keep a cool head with Chopper’s threat about fines and suspension hanging over my head.
I thought back to Charly and the tension between my brother and her, and I wondered what that was all about. I hated that he’d gotten involved with her while I was locked down. When I first returned home and learned about that, it messed my head up.
Everyone had wanted to tell me before, but I refused any visitors and had already told them that I didn’t want any mail. When my mail arrived, the prison knew to return it to the sender because I wasn’t accepting any. The only person I spoke to while I was there was my ex-girlfriend, Tracy. I wouldn’t even let her visit me. But she kept money on my books, so I figured it was no biggie to stay in touch with her. It wasn’t like I was expecting her faithfulness. I couldn’t count on that when I was out, letalone while I was locked down. Besides, we weren’t even a thing anymore when I went inside, just friends with benefits.
My parents held a big dinner for me when I got out, and that was when I learned that my brother was kicking it with my best friend. What could I say? I’d told her that I didn’t want her like that, and I had told him that I would never get with her like that.
It wasn’t that I didn’t have feelings for Charly though. I loved that girl with my whole being, but I would sacrifice for her every time just to keep her heart, mind, and life safe. Rocking with a nigga like me, who trouble followed wherever he went, wasn’t good for a girl like her.
Charly was tough, but I knew that I lived life on the edge, and I never wanted her to get caught up in that. She was bright, beautiful, and witty. She had too much potential to get caught up with the likes of me.
I had always been the bad seed of the family, always getting in fights, getting suspended, mouthing off to the authorities, and barely staying out of juvenile as a kid. My father had made a name for himself in the streets, and that name carried weight. He had cops on his payroll.
And while he didn’t want any of us to follow in his footsteps, because he had better plans for us, I wanted to be exactly like him, from securing and selling personal protection for clients in need of defending themselves to street pharmaceuticals, to procuring unsecured vehicles and distributing their parts to willing buyers. I did it all, just at a much lower level than he did.
I aimed to persuade my father that I could do what he did and that he needed to groom me to take over his business. But he wanted all his sons to be legit. He’d long ago declared that the only reason he’d done what he had was because he dropped out of school to take care of his mother and siblings after his father died.
I had built up a lucrative little business for myself before I went down. Luckily for me, I didn’t go down over that, but instead over my knuckleheaded brother’s simple-minded crime. The day that I went down, I had just dropped off a large package. Thankfully, it hadn’t been on me when the fight jumped off between him and his ex’s supposed lover. That would’ve sat me down for a long time. I only had some weed on me.
Since I had been out, I still had some of the things going on that I had before, but it was not my primary focus. I had been trying to give my father what he wanted from me all along by going legit. If I could get this street racing to take me to another level, I swear that I would let it all go. But I didn’t want Charly sitting around waiting for me. That wasn’t fair to her.
I sprayed the wall with a heaping dose of the disinfectant solution to cleanse it of the blood. When I got out, I had to get a job. While it wasn’t easy just getting any job, I didn’t want to work in a fast-food restaurant or anything like that.
When nothing else panned out, I had hooked up with my father’s brother, Uncle Chris, for a job at his company, Strong Restoration. He knew my background, so there was no need to go through a background check or drug screening. It had been my father’s money that had created the opportunity for Chris to have his own business. Chris had been in the streets for a while, but he wasn’t cut out for it.
