“That's okay, Papi. I'll be seeing you in a few,” she said out loud to herself.
Nina looked around the neighborhood they were in and had to admit it was nice. She wondered exactly what Coco did or if she lived off Zeek’s money.
“We're here,” the cab driver said as he pulled up to a house in a cul-de-sac.
Nina paid him before making her way up to the door. She knocked and waited a few seconds before someone answered.
“Can I help you?” Ishmael asked, looking at her oddly.
“Yes, I'm looking for my husband,” Nina said.
“Umm, okay. Does he have a name?” he asked her like she was stupid.
“Ezekiel Clay.”
Ishmael looked at her funny before allowing her to come in. Zeek was definitely here. In fact, he couldn't wait to see this shit hit the ceiling fan. As he tried to lead Nina into the house, they were stopped by Coco.
“Why is this bitch in my house?” she said, trying not to get loud because she had her son in her arms.
“She's looking for her husband,” Ishmael told Coco.
If looks could kill, Ishmael would be six feet under right now. Coco was standing there with an ice grill that was so cold she could've made it snow. “So you let this bitch in my house?!” Coco went off, scaring her son.
“I'm not going to be too many more of those,” Nina told Coco.
Hearing his son’s cries, Zeek rushed down the stairs and damn near dropped dead when he did.
“Fuck is you doing here?” he asked Nina, shocked and confused.
“¿Por qué no contestas el teléfono?” Nina questioned as she cut her eyes at Coco. (Why are you not answering your phone)
“Uhn uhn, bitch. Don’t try that gitchy gitchy goo shit up in here!” Coco said. “You in America now, hoe. Speak fucking English.”
“Estoy pasendo tiempo con mi hijo, no necesito contester el teléfono. ¡Por qué coño estás aqui!” (I’m spending time with my son, I don’t need to answer the phone. Why the fuck are you here)
Coco stood there looking at Zeek upside his head. She had no idea that he could speak Spanish until now. “Ezekiel, escort that bitch outside my front door and handle her while I lay our son down. Ishmael, I need to talk to you, now,” Coco said.
While Zeek grabbed Nina by her arm and lead her outside, Ishmael followed behind Coco as she went upstairs to Zeeky’s room. After laying her son down, Coco shut the door and went to her bedroom where she wasted no time going off.
“What the fuck would make you think it was okay to let that bitch in my house?”
“Whoa, Jacole, you need to calm down. Shit is not that deep. The one you need to be mad at is Zeek.”
“Do you know how the fuck you sound? I’m not about to calm down because you got me hype as fuck right now! If she wanted her nigga, you should have left her ass right there on the other side of that front door and got him or came and got me. That shit you did is disrespectful as hell. Did you ever stop to ask yourself how the hell she knows where I live?” Coco went off.
“No, I didn’t because I thought Zeek gave her the address or some shit. She wanted her husband so she came to get him.”
Coco stood there looking at him upside his head. She really wanted to slap the shit out of him but she wasn’t about to go there. Instead, she walked up on him so she was sure that he heard what she was about to say loud and clear.
“Whatever issues you have with Zeek, take that up with him. Leave me and my son out of y’all bullshit, and I mean that, Ishmael. If you can’t do that then I don’t have anything for you,” she told him while jabbing her finger in his chest.
“That’s how you feel?” he asked.
“Take a few days to think on that shit. I’ll call you when I’m ready to see you,” Coco said as she walked out of her room, not even waiting to hear what he had to say. She was so over these niggas in her life that she didn’t know what to do. She had a baby daddy that got on her nerves so bad that sometimes she just wanted to kill him but she knew she would never be able to get rid of him and now Ishmael was on some other shit, pissing her off. Instead of having one son, she felt like she had three because the two grown ass men were childish as fuck.
As Ishmael left the house, Zeek was coming back in with a scowl on his face. Coco cut her eyes at him.
“Don’t say shit,” he told her.
“Oh, you’re going to hear my mouth. Fuck that,” Coco let him know. “Why does that bitch know where I live, Zeek?” she asked as she followed him throughout the house.
“Crazy bitch tracked my phone with that app shit.”
“Seriously, Zeek, like I’m not even playing with you right now but you have to go,” Coco told him.
“WHAT?” he yelled.
“I said you have to go! As in take your ass back home…to Detroit. Take that bitch with you,” she said as she looked him in his eyes to let him know she wasn’t playing.
Zeek looked at Coco as if she was talking a language he couldn’t understand. First Nina pissed him off now here she was adding fuel to the fire. He should have expected it, though. She always started acting crazy whenever it had to do with Nina. They could be doing good but the moment Nina called or her name was brought up, Coco turned into Zeek’s number one enemy.
Just as Zeek was about to curse her out, his phone started ringing. He took his phone out of his pocket and saw that it was José calling him. “I don’t need this shit right now!” Zeek exclaimed. He had a mind to ignore it because he figured Nina went crying to her bitch ass daddy like that was supposed to do something to him or move him but he went ahead and answered it anyways. “Yea?” he answered, letting José know he wasn’t interested in hearing anything he had to say.
“Well Zeek, what seems to be the problem on your end?” José asked.
“I’m not following you, José.”
“From my understanding, you are back in the States now and you’re a free man but yet Tariq is still running your operation. Actually, he’s not even doing it, his brother is. Do you care to tell me why this is going on?” José questioned.
Zeek was quiet for a minute because he had no knowledge that Marco was running things now. He actually hadn’t spoken to Tariq or Marco since he had been in California because he was sure that Tariq had everything under control and he would never question his moves but now he was having doubts. Tariq knew as well as he did that Marco really didn’t want to get too deep in this drug shit so he couldn’t understand why he would leave him to run shit.
“I’ve been out in California taking care of some personal business so I had Tariq handle things for me a little longer,” Zeek said, not feeling as if he should have to explain himself.
“Ahh, the child you didn’t inform my daughter of, huh?”
“How could I tell her about a baby I didn’t even know about myself, José?” Zeek asked as he cut his eyes at Coco. “None of that matters, though.”
“I want you back in your rightful place, Zeek. I would hate to cut business ties with you because let your empire fall,” José said before disconnecting the call.
Zeek stood there biting his lip to help keep himself calm. His mind had been so one track lately that he was oblivious to the shit that was going on back home. Even though he didn’t want to, he knew he had to get his ass back to Detroit as soon as possible to see what the fuck had been going on without him. The first thing he was going to do when he touched down was see what the fuck was going on with Tariq.
Chapter Fifteen
Jayliah walked into Dave and Buster’s with an eager Quaid. She was in search of someone when he damn near bruised her arm from tapping it so hard just to get her attention.
“There they go, ma!” he yelled.
Jayliah was slightly embarrassed by his yelling but she knew he was just excited and couldn’t wait to let loose so he could play on the games.
“Alright, hyper, come on,” she said.
“Jayyyy!” Tanae yelled as she took off for Jayliah.
Jayliah was so happy to see Tanae, she hadn’t seen her since she and Tariq broke up and that was going on a month now.
“Hey Jayliah how are you?” Shanae asked Jayliah.
Jayliah was shocked as hell when Shanae called her and suggested that they meet up to talk somewhere and to bring the kids since they hadn’t seen each other in a while. The ladies had long ago put their problems behind them and Shanae even forgave Jayliah for shooting her so their relationship was way better than it was when they’d initially met each other.
“I’m good, Nae. How you doing?”
“I’m good.”
“Ma, look at that game over there! Can I play that one?” Quaid asked excitedly.
“Hold on, Quaid. I have to get you some tokens,” Jayliah told him.
“It’s cool, Jay. I already got them some,” Shanae said as she handed him a cup of coins.
“Yes! Thank you, Ms. Nae,” he said as he took off.
“Wait for me, Q!” Tanae yelled in her little voice as she tried to catch up with him.
“Watch her, Quaid!” Jayliah yelled after him. “He didn’t hear a damn word I just said,” she laughed.
“At all,” Shanae laughed with her.
“Anyways, come on, girl. Let’s sit down so we can talk.”
When they found a seat, Shanae asked her what was going on with her and Tariq and if she had heard from him lately. Jayliah informed her on all the madness that had been going on between the two of them. She started from the beginning and ended with her giving him his ring back.
“Damn, how do you feel?” Shanae asked when she was done.
“Honestly, Nae, I’m hurt. I’m not even going to lie about it. Sometimes I just wonder if what we had was ever real. Did we jump into things too fast? I don’t know what it is,” Jayliah told her.
“I know my word may not mean shit to you, but take it from me, Jay. That nigga loves you. I was his first girlfriend so I’ve seen them all but I have never seen Tariq act the way he does with you. He wasn’t even this way with me. The last time I saw him that fucked up was when we lost our son. That man needs you, Jay,” Shanae said.
“He doesn’t act like it, though. Every time we hit a rough patch, he runs. Like the first time he left me and I found out about you, he didn’t even give me a chance to explain myself. He just said I’m done and that was it. The only reason he came back was because Quaid was kidnapped. Even now, it’s like why is it so easy for you to give up on me but yet you refuse to fight for me…for us, for this relationship?”
Jayliah was so perplexed about the situation that whenever she tried to figure it out, it gave her a damn headache. She had never been through these motions with a man, not even when she was with Quadir. All she wanted was some understanding in where they went wrong but Tariq refused to give her answers.
“Okay, so I’m going to keep it real with you, he’s just scared, Jay. Tariq has been like that since I’ve known him. He’s scared that love will change him or make him too vulnerable. I really don’t know how to explain it because he should be the one explaining it to you but you should know he loves you. He never would have gave you a ring if he didn’t. I bet when you took it off he wouldn’t even take it,” Shanae said.
Jayliah nodded her head.
“Exactly, he wants you to do all the fighting in the relationship because he feels like he can’t because it will make him soft or less of a man. I don’t know. It’s some other things you have to talk to him about but I just wanted to help ease your mind a little. I really want you two to work it out because not only does he love you but Tanae does too and she’ll have no understanding if her daddy and Jay don’t end up together. That’s one person who’s going to be pretty upset.”
After talking with Shanae, Jayliah had a lot on her mind. She didn’t know what the future held for her and Tariq but she knew they both needed to evaluate if this relationship was what they really wanted.
___
“That little nigga is definitely a Clay. Coco hated your black ass because he came out looking just like you,” Tariq laughed as he went through the many pictures and videos of Zeeky that Zeek had on his phone.
“Hated? Her ass still can’t stand me but you know I don’t give a fuck,” Zeek shrugged. “But enough about me, please tell me why the fuck you got Marco running shit? What you got going on?”
“I had my own shit going on and I fell off for a minute but I’m back now,” Tariq said as he rubbed his head.
“Nigga, Jay had your ass out here like that? I walked in this bitch and you looked like a fucking zombie. I almost shot you,” Zeek said.
Tariq had to laugh because he knew it was true. He had never been this fucked up behind a female so he couldn’t understand what was wrong with him now. “Yea, it’s whatever though.” He shrugged.
“Save that shit, Riq. This is me you’re talking to. You love that girl dirty thongs. What I’m trying to understand is why y’all acting like this? Y’all are better than that. You two was giving a nigga like me hope.”
“Nigga, I asked this girl to marry me thinking we were going to spend the rest of our lives together and shit. She hit my ass with that ‘I’m not having any more kids’ bullshit then turned around and tried to get her tubes tied without me finding out,” Tariq explained to Zeek since he had been out of the loop for damn near a year.
“Well, did she?” Zeek questioned.
“Did she what?” Tariq asked.
“Did she get her tubes tied?”
“Nah, she said she didn’t. But I don’t believe her ass. She went MIA for a minute before she popped back up.”
“She didn’t, so stop tripping and go get your wife back.”
“How the hell you know?”
“Dumb ass, I told you she was out there in Cali. She ain’t get her damn tubes tied. So what you should be doing is going to her house to fuck the shit out of her and put one in her ass while y’all have make up sex.” Zeek smiled.
Tariq shook his head while he laughed. The thought sounded wonderful and he would love to but he was scared Jayliah might pop his ass if he popped up at her house.
“You ain’t hearing me.” Zeek waved him off. “On some real shit, though, I need a location on Elias. I’m back now and ready to get my hands dirty. Get your love struck ass together so we can do this shit.”
“You know I’m down for whatever,” Tariq said.
Zeek was back in town and had a score to settle with Elias. He didn’t care what he had to do; as long as he killed Elias, his life would be so much better. He should have been killed years ago when he thought it was okay to take out his own brother but Zeek was about to put him out of his misery.
Chapter Sixteen
Coco was in the process of going back to work. She was feeling as if all those long days of studying and extra-long nights of working had gone down the drain since when she moved out here she was only working for a month before she had to come off her job. Her passion had always been to be a registered nurse and since Zeeky was now six weeks old, she felt as if it was time to get back on her feet.
“Say auntie, auntie,” Payton cooed at Zeeky as he smiled a gummy smile at her and kicked his little legs wildly.
“Thank you so much for watching him for me, Pay. I appreciate it,” Coco told her.
“It's really no problem, Co. I didn't have class today and I don't go into work until later so I didn't have anything to do. How did it go, though?” Payton asked.
Coco had been out all day putting in applications at all the surrounding hospitals. Even though Zeek sent her money every week and had a bank account set up for her and Zeeky that he deposited money into every day, she wanted to make her own money. She had never been the type to depend on a man and she wasn't about to start now.
“It went good, I'm hopeful that I'll at least get one call for an interview.”
“You will, girl. You got the skills for it and your résumé speaks for itself,” Payton told her.
“You're right, girl,” Coco said just as her phone started ringing.
“I'm about to go downstairs. Tell my brother I said I need some money,” Payton said, already knowing it was Zeek.
Coco just laughed as she answered his FaceTime call. When it connected, Zeek was in his car smoking a blunt.
“Where my son?” he asked as soon as Coco popped up.
“Well hello to you, too, baby daddy,” Coco said sarcastically before she put the phone down for a second to pick Zeeky up. “Who that, Zeeky?” Coco asked.
“What's up, dude?” Zeek spoke to his son. “Damn, he look like me,” he smiled.
“Why you sitting in the car?” Coco asked.
“Because I'm minding my business, you should try it,” Zeek told her. “But what's up? Everything good on your end?”
“Yup, we good. Say, ‘We fine, daddy,’” Coco told Zeeky. “He gotta go to the doctor tomorrow for his six week shots. My baby gon be so fussy.”
“Yea, I was looking that shit up. Why he gotta get so many shots at one time, Co? I'm not feeling that shit,” Zeek expressed. Even though his son was in one state and he was in another, that didn't stop Zeek from being in daddy mode. He was constantly looking stuff up or doing research when it came to his son. He wanted to know everything he possibly could about babies so he knew what to expect and what should be going on with his son.
“He has to, Zeek. They help prevent him from getting diseases and stuff,” Coco told him.
“I hear all that but that shit is torture. I don't want my son out here like that.”
Coco just rolled her eyes. She appreciated the fact that Zeek was up on things like this and actually cared about their son’s wellbeing but he got on her nerves to the fullest.
The Wrong Side Of Love 3: A Hood Love Story Page 7
