Page 69 of Stay Dangerous

I glanced behind me, and saw PC grilling us while Trippy spoke into the phone. When I turned back around, Rico was grilling him right back.

“Stop. They’ve really taken me under their wing. Your girl is finna be a whole rapper out here.”

“They know you got a nigga?”

I snorted. “Trust me, I’m like their little sister.”

Rico shook his head. “Ain’t none of these niggas in this city think of you as they kin, Snow. But I’ll let you make it. Go on to ya session.”

Feeling dismissed, I grunted and got out of the car.

“Ay.”

I took one step before I rolled my eyes. Trippy got off his phone, snickering at me like the jokester he was.

When I turned around, the passenger window was down. Rico leaned over, his fake smile in place. He hooded his eyes and drunk me in.

“Stay dangerous, Lady Luney.”

He glanced behind me before rolling his window up and pulling off.

“That nigga basically just pissed on you like a damn fire hydrant,” Trippy guffawed.

I flipped him off and went back inside.

The studio was quiet, and the lights were dim.

It was the last weekend before my junior year started. The Native Sons’ album was done, and my interlude was included as a track, with writer’s credit on two more songs.

I’d decided on my rap moniker officially; Wynter Snow, not Ice Princess, like PC suggested.

It had been the best summer of my entire life. I was on cloud nine. Sheisty had me on contract as a songwriter, and we planned for two weekends a month during school. Sean and Shad impressed them enough for them to have an invitation to come back the following summer.

Surprisingly, school was important to G$. Part of the reason the Native Sons were taking a hiatus–besides vocal cord damage on PC’s end–was so that they could go back to school. Sheisty conveniently told them they had three more albums left in their contract, but it was in the plans.

Trippy said it lined up with me finishing high school anyway. We could perfect my sound, and I could have platinum plaques before I hit twenty-one.

For the first time, I felt like I didn’t have to leave the city to make something of myself.

I still had the bulk of that money left. As soon as I turned eighteen, I could get an apartment in East Kenton with Auty, or at least by the border. We could live frugally, and I could pay for her to take college classes until I blew up. Rico and Fredo would be in the Navy or the Marines by then, so it would be good. We would have been good.

So instead of working hard, I sat in the darkened studio, doodling in a notebook, on the side where I wrote out the next two years of my life. Rico, all of a sudden, didn’t like the Get Money crew, but he supported me, even before hearing one of the songs Sean and I recorded that summer. After he heard it, he was for sure all for it, including it in new mix CDs for his car.

The door to the room opened, bringing loud laughter. I looked up, just in time for a toddler to come barrelling in.

I turned up the lights on the dash, and a smile broke onto my face, just as the toddler noticed me.

He was tall, with the cutest, chubbiest cheeks and big brown eyes. His hair was in plaits, and he didn’t have on any pants or shoes.

“Trell! Where you go?” I heard Grimey yell, before he stumbled into the room like a dear in headlights.

Trell turned to him, before running toward me, and climbed into my lap like he was related to me.

Grimey sighed, before closing the door and locking it behind him. “My bad, Wynter. His ass fasho gonna be running track, on crip.”

“It’s cool. Right?” I smiled and looked down.

He grinned at me. “Pwetty.”