The Genesis Group

by Mike Dagons

  “I got something I can do while you’re handling that. I’ll meet you back at your place in a few days.”

  “That’s all I’m talkin’ ‘bout. Preciate ya making the effort, bruh,” Roc shouted.

  When Severe and Ceylon left the bedroom, Choc turned to Roc. “Boy, you got issues. You riding her kinda hard about the personals, ain’t you?”

  “You tryna tell me that you trust that muthafucka?”

  “Nah, but she does, and he did come to our rescue last summer…kept the fact that she killed Mark Basin under wraps when by all accounts, he shouldn’t have.”

  “Severe is my heart. Y’all know I practically raised her,” he boasted like they weren’t the same age. “She is good at what she do, but she is a white girl, and the simple truth is, old boy done turned her out. She ain’t thinking straight when it comes to him.”

  Rayce got up in his face. “Roc that is the most racist, sexist, chauvinistic bullshit I ever heard. There ain’t no naïve white girl gene that they all get at birth, and even if it was, Severe grew up in Englewood next door to your ass. She ain’t no suburban Barbie. She got street smarts, and as for the other. Ceylon ain’t the first black man that she’s dated, and there ain’t no stallion dick gene that all niggas get at birth that gives y’all special powers. You of all people should know that!” she shoved him in his chest, and then walked out the room.

  “Why she so pissed?” he looked confused.

  “Boy, you ain’t the sharpest tool in the shed. Evidently, you wasn’t in line when they handed out that how to handle women gene the rest of us niggas got either,” he laughed.

  “Fuck you, man!”

  Choc cracked up laughing, and Roc stormed out the door. He glanced at Ceylon and Severe in the living area having a discussion with the kid’s parents.

  He knew Severe was mad with him, so he didn’t stop to say goodbye. It didn’t matter how angry he made her. She knew he’d always have her back.

  Severe saw Roc leave, but she was too angry with him to stop him.

  Although she was sometimes frustrated by his methods, there was no doubt that he had her at heart. And just like she could depend on the sun to rise every morning in the east, she could depend on him to be there whenever she needed him. He’d been doing it since they were four, and that shit wasn’t going to ever change.

  She made a mental note to call him later so they could sit down and talk about his concerns.

  Chapter 16

  “You can go if you want, but leave the boys,” Desmond told Vectra when she complained about him asking Severe if they could wait until the boys finished playing their game.

  “She said they were going to take us someplace we could be more comfortable. We’ve only had a few hours of sleep, and I’d like to go to sleep.”

  “Then find a spot and go to sleep like mom did,” he smiled when he looked at his mother-in-law sleeping soundly on the chaise. She was a quiet, agreeable lady who was always kind to him and the children. He often wished her daughter was more like her.

  “Why you want to stay, because she’s here?”

  He took Vectra’s arm and pulled her further away from the rest of them. “This is not the place to discuss it. You want to leave. Then leave.”

  “Where is the place we should discuss it, Desmond? We’re only involved in…whatever this is, because you couldn’t stay away from her. Now you want to let us go off on our own, so you can what? Sneak and talk to her when her husband isn’t looking?”

  “You’re the only one in a hurry to leave. Everyone else is content with waiting. And why do you care about why I want to stay?”

  “I’m your wife, I’m supposed to care.”

  “You didn’t care when you was out all night fucking Reggie.”

  “That was a one time mistake. It will never happen again.”

  “If it had been the first time, then maybe I could forgive it, but we both know that’s not the case. Your cheating, like your disrespect, became commonplace in our marriage years ago.”

  “Most men would love to see two women together, but not you. Maybe if you weren’t so fucking boring, I never would have cheated. You don’t even believe there’s anything serious between me and Regina. You’re just using it as an excuse to chase after that bitch like a dog in heat. You could be man enough to be honest about it.”

  He could see now that she knew nothing about love and respect, but she was right. He was making excuses when he really didn’t need to defend his feelings for Kenyah to her. “I’m not leaving here until I’ve had a chance to talk to her, and I’m sure that she’s okay. Now, you can do whatever the fuck you want, but I’m staying. Is that honest enough for you?”

  “You’re pathetic. She’s in there with her husband. She doesn’t need you.”

  “And I don’t need you! I realize that old habits die hard, Vectra, but the days of me taking bullshit from you are over. Now, get the fuck outtá my face, and stay outtá my way,” he shoved her aside.

  “You ready to leave?” Severe asked, when he came back into the living area.

  “I want to talk to Kenyah first. You can go ahead and take my family now if Vectra’s ready to leave.”

  “We’re not leaving without you,” Vectra objected.

  “She wants to see you, Desmond,” Trent walked up behind them.

  Desmond turned to him. “Where is she?” he studied his face, trying to read how he really felt about it.

  “She’s sitting in the bathroom in the back,” his face was unreadable.

  “Really, Desmond?” Vectra whined when he started to walk away.

  He ignored her feeble protest and hurried out of the room. “And you’re okay with this?” she turned to Trent.

  “She asked to speak with him privately. She says they’re not romantically involved,” he added when she screwed her face up in a scowl that said he was crazy.

  “I don’t care what they’re saying. You know he’s fucking her, right?” she was incensed.

  “What was I supposed to do? Punch him out in front of your mother and the kids?” he shot a glance at her family sitting less than ten feet away. Her mother was sound asleep, and the boys were playing some violent onscreen game. It had their full attention, and they were unconcerned about anything else that was going on. He wanted to keep it that way.

  “We have got to do something,” she whispered.

  “Kenyah has been through a lot tonight. She just wants to talk to a friend.”

  “Ain’t you her friend?”

  “It’s complicated…let’s just give them a few minutes to sort things out,” he walked away from her.

  Trent was making a show of understanding, but the truth was, he was as jealous as Vectra, but he was not going to let her provoke him to do something stupid again.

  Trent knew Desmond had feelings for Kenyah. He could tell by the way the man looked at her. Maybe she had feelings for him, too. Unfortunately, the things she had learned about him tonight put him in the unique position of not being able to say too much about it.

  Rayce saw Trent standing alone looking bewildered. She grabbed Severe, and they eased up beside him. “Trent, this is Severe Payne, another friend of your brother’s.”

  “Trent Real, nice to meet you, and thanks for everything,” he extended his hand to shake. “Desmond will be ready to leave soon,” he said.

  “No problem, they can take their time,” Severe answered.

  “Where are you taking them exactly?”

  “We have a few safe houses in the area that are more family friendly. You and your wife can come too if you’d like.”

  “No, I’d rather not,” he admitted.

  “Then we’ll arrange for you to go someplace else, or you and Kenyah can stay here with your brother. He’s pretty safe,” Rayce smiled.

  “How long have you known him, or can you say?”

  “We’ve all been a team a little over two years,” Rayce answered.

  “And y’all didn’t know he had a
brother, did you?”

  “No, but Choc is not an open person,” Severe said.

  “No, he’s not,” he smiled thoughtfully. “Lincoln is going to comeback on us hard when he finds out his sister is dead. I know what I did seemed harsh, but I didn’t feel like I had any other choice,” he explained.

  “No need to explain to me,” Rayce said. “I understand completely. Trent, I don’t know how much you know about what Choc does for a living, but Genesis is the best. Our boss, Melvin Ryan, is real thorough. He informed us a little while ago that he has already implemented a plan to permanently take care of your Lincoln Scott problem.”

  “I’ve heard of the Genesis Group, and I know you people don’t come cheap. I don’t think I can afford anymore of your service than I’ve already contracted. I’m not even sure I can pay for tonight’s operation.”

  “You’re Choc’s brother, so you don’t have to pay,” she answered.

  “I can’t let you do this without a fee,” he protested.

  “You just said you can’t afford the fee, and unless you got a few million stashed away somewhere, you’re right, you can’t,” Severe interjected. “Now stop looking in your gift horse’s mouth, and ride his ass.” She chastised him good naturedly, and he had to laugh.

  “And don’t worry, soon your life will be back to normal,” Rayce added.

  Trent looked down the hall at the door that Desmond was behind with his wife, and he couldn’t help wondering if things would ever be normal between him and Kenyah again.

  Chapter 17

  Desmond opened the bathroom door, stepped inside quietly, and then locked it behind him.

  It was an enormous room with lots of floor space, and it sparkled with polished marble and satin nickel fixtures. A lion paw tub sat in the middle of the room like a stylish centerpiece, and Kenyah sat on a beautiful Elizabethan dressing bench on the other side of it against a far wall.

  Desmond could tell that whatever had happened to her had been bad. She was sitting there staring down at the floor, as still as a piece of the elegant furnishings.

  “Kenyah,” he called her name softly, because she hadn’t even heard him come in. “Are you alright?” he asked when she looked up at him.

  She leaped off the bench and ran to him, arms outstretched, and tears flowing freely.

  Desmond wrapped her in a warm embrace, holding her body close to his. He didn’t know what to say to console, so he just held her, and let her cry.

  When her soft sobs turned to sniffles, he lifted her face and looked into her sad eyes. Before he could speak, she pressed her lips to his, and he opened his mouth to her tongue.

  Kenyah wanted him to make love to her. She wanted to feel the mind numbing ecstasy she felt whenever he was inside her. She wanted to feel alive…needed it, and she didn’t care that Trent was in the next room.

  Tonight, she had learned that he wasn’t the kind, even tempered, man that she married. He was a monster who killed pregnant women. He was a man who killed his own children. She wanted to forget him and the things he’d done, and she wanted Desmond to help her to do it.

  Desmond moved his hands inside her robe, and felt her body tremble from his touch. He knew what they were doing was brazen and stupid, but he could feel her desperation in her kiss. And when urgent fingers released him, and guided him to her treasure, all of the reasons why he shouldn’t love her the way she wanted him to, drowned in a pool of burning desire.

  They didn’t exchange words, but he understood what she needed from him. And he gave, hard, fast, and agonizingly sweet until they shared a groan of pure satisfaction. “Thank you,” she murmured while his body was still pressed to hers.

  “You want to talk about what happened to you?” he panted.

  “No, I can’t, not yet,” she whispered, knowing that she was too ashamed to ever tell anyone what had been done to her, or how deadly callous her husband’s response to his lover’s part in it had been.

  “Who were the people who took you?” he stepped back and fastened his pants.

  “They worked for Trent’s girlfriend.”

  “The man who came up to the job and knocked you around because he thought we might be involved has a girlfriend? Ain’t that a bitch!” he laughed without humor.

  “He’s a hypocrite, but it doesn’t’ excuse what we did,” she closed her robe, and then tied the sash.

  “I beg to differ. Actions produce reactions. He cheated, and what goes around comes back around—circles, baby. It’s not by choice. It’s by design. I want to leave here with you, and I got no apologies for it.”

  “I’m not going to deny that I like you a lot, but I’m not going to try to justify it either. What Vectra did, and what Trent did, was wrong, period. But two wrongs don’t make a right, Desmond.”

  “Circles,” he slowly rotated his pointer finger in the air. “Karma, you reap what you sow, and all those other sayings that mean if you do somebody wrong. You’ll pay further on up the road.”

  She laughed, and it did his heart good to hear it. “Seriously, your family needs you. I was told they may still be in danger. You need to go with them and keep them safe, and I need to stay here with my husband and try to figure out where we go from here.”

  “You’re right, no arguments. I need to go with them for now, but only for my boys, not Vectra. When this thing blows over, we’re going to have a serious talk about what we really mean to each other.” He pulled her into another tight embrace. “So, promise we’ll talk when this is over.”

  “Yes,” a smile flirted with the corner of her mouth.

  Desmond held her gaze as he backed away from her, and when he opened the door to leave, Trent was standing there blocking his exit. “Have you finished talking?” his nostrils flared, and his voice was like sandpaper.

  Desmond could see that he was fighting to control his temper, and wondered if he’d heard their lovemaking session. “Have you been standing here the whole time?” he asked, because he wanted to know his state of mind before he left Kenyah there with him.

  “Why? Are you afraid that I overheard something that I shouldn’t have?”

  Desmond didn’t shy away from his stabbing gaze. “I don’t give a fuck about what you heard, or how you feel about it. I just want to make sure you don’t let your ill feelings make you hurt Kenyah more than you already have. Do we have an understanding?”

  “If you understand that the only reason I don’t blow your fucking brains out right now is because those two little boys have seen enough violence for one night. I’m giving you a pass because maybe your sons would suffer without you, not because I give a fuck about you, or how you feel about how I treat my wife. When you leave here tonight, you think long and hard before you contact my wife again, because if you don’t, I promise you that CIRCLE is going to be a bitch when it comes back around.”

  “Trent, please let him leave,” Kenyah interrupted them. “Goodnight, Desmond,” she said.

  “Goodnight,” he answered without looking back at her, and then pushed pass Trent.

  Chapter 18

  Trent lay next to Kenyah in his brother’s bed. He had called his Captain and explained why he needed to disappear until after Lincoln’s trial. Of course, he left out the part about the killing spree last night.

  Genesis had cleaned it up, and Choc had convinced him that relying on Lincoln to be convicted in a court of law was a mistake. He didn’t like going outside the law, but he knew Choc was right. He couldn’t risk Lincoln taking Kenyah again.

  He looked over at her. Her back was turned to him, and if she got any closer to the edge, she’d fall out the bed.

  “Kenyah, I know you’re awake,” he put a hand on her shoulder and pulled her over onto her back. “Baby, talk to me.”

  “We’ve said everything that there is to say, Trent,” she stared up at the ceiling.

  “I know I was wrong for putting the job first.”

  “You got a woman pregnant, and then you killed her.”

&n
bsp; “She was going to kill you if I hadn’t.”

  “It was brutal and wrong for you to kill her.”

  “Are you saying I should have let them kill you?”

  “You killed your own baby,” she hissed.

  He couldn’t believe that she was more upset about him killing that bitch than she was about what had happened to her. “She was only eight weeks pregnant. Women have abortions at twelve. Besides, there was no way she was going to keep the baby after she found out I was in love with you. She was going to have an abortion.”

  “How do you know that, Trent?”

  “It was my job to know how she thinks.”

  “Yeah, like it was your job to live with her like she was your fucking wife instead of me?”

  “Kenyah, I’ve apologized for that, baby. I’m so sorry that I hurt you. I heard what you and Desmond talked about in the bathroom. He wants a relationship with you. Is that what you want, too?”

  “No, maybe, I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know,” he repeated.

  “Don’t push me, Trent! I’m angry, scared, and confused. You have to give me time to sort things out in my head,” she rolled out of bed, and then hurried out of the bedroom.

  Trent sat up on the side of the bed, and tried to soothe the pounding in his head by pinching the bridge of his nose. He had fucked up, and maybe he deserved to be punished for it, but not this way. Desmond Fox’s involvement in his marriage was not something he was prepared to live with, and he hoped they both understood that.

  Chapter 19

  Melvin Ryan decided the best way to handle the Lincoln Scott problem was to eliminate him. It had to be clean and done quickly. Because he was a high profile prisoner in federal custody, it was going to require a special skillset to get inside and get the job done undetected. The best that he knew was his father, Ethan Cole, but he was retired. He consulted some, but he rarely took a contract anymore.