Page 16 of A King’s Obsession

“Come on, bro. You know me. You know I wouldn't intentionally—”

“Get the fuck out, Tone.” My voice hardened, and whatever argument he'd been preparing died on his tongue.

He stared at me another second before slowly reaching for the door handle.

Ten minutes later, I walked back outside alone.

The night air hit my face as I crossed the gravel toward my truck. I pulled my phone from my pocket and called E, listening to it ring while I glanced back toward the warehouse.

He answered on the second ring.

“Yeah?”

“Handled,” I told him, opening my driver's door.

There was a brief pause on the other end before he responded. “Aight.”

The call disconnected.

That was how me and E had always worked. He made the call, and I handled whatever came after. It had been that way since we were young, back when neither one of us had enough money to imagine we'd eventually have more of it than we knew what to do with.

E had always been the head of our organization. I was the muscle. He knew how to see a problem coming before it ever reached the front door, and I knew what to do when it got there. That combination had built everything we owned.

But lately, I'd noticed my brother pulling further away from the street side of things.

He hadn't announced it, and I hadn't asked him about it either. I knew E well enough to recognize when something was changing. The older we got, the less interested he seemed in the parts of this life that used to consume damn near every hour of our day. The legitimate side of our business was becoming more than something we'd built to protect ourselves.

It was becoming the life he actually wanted.

And I understood why.

We weren't twenty anymore. E was forty-one, and I was thirty-nine. There came a point when a man had to decide whether he was still doing something because he needed to or because it was the only thing he knew.

E was getting closer to making that decision.

Me? I wasn't there yet.

Truthfully, I didn't know if I wanted to be.

The streets weren't some love story to me. I knew exactly what came with them. I'd buried people because of this shit, watched men I once trusted turn into men I wouldn't leave alone in a room with my wallet, and made decisions I knew I'd have to answer to Allah for one day.

I understood all of that.

Still, this was mine. Ours.

And whenever E decided he was ready to let those reins go, he wouldn't have to wonder who was taking them.

I already had my hands out.

My phone vibrated before I could climb into the truck. I glanced down at the screen and saw a message from Ashlynn.

**Ashlynn:** So you just wasn't gon text me back??? 😂

A smile tugged at the corner of my mouth.

This damn woman.

**Me:** You still coming? Plane ticket already bought.