“Relax, G. She cool.” I looked back at the other men and they all wore a look of astonishment that he was taking me inside the building. As I followed him through the halls that were surprisingly very clean, he kept stealing glances at me.
“You look like some kind a case worker.” He said, still fishing for my identity. I smiled at him. I liked the kid.
“Something like that.” I told him.
He nodded. “Jo sent you, didn’t he? To keep an eye on Rome?” I chuckled surprised by how astute he was.
“Something like that.”
There were several children playing in the hall outside one of the apartments on the first floor. It looked as if the building had four levels. I could hear loud rap music playing from another apartment. We walked through a door that led to some stairs.
“I hope you don’t mind taking the stairs. The elevator is broken and Rome’s place is all the way up on the top floor.” I smiled at him, yeah, I liked this kid.
“I don’t mind.”
When we got to the fourth level, there was a keypad on this door that wasn’t on the others. Standing directly in front of it he keyed in a four-number code.
7,9,5,6…Got it.
I noted the fact that the fourth level was not open to the rest of the building. There seemed to be very little activity on this level. In fact, once we walked out of the stairwell, the door locked automatically when it closed behind us; there seemed to be only one other door that I could see. On this door was another keypad, he quickly keyed in the code.
3,2,9,7…Got it.
My eyes widen behind my glasses as we walked through the door. It was a loft, a very spacious loft, a nice very spacious loft. For the third time in a matter of minutes, I was pleasantly surprised. The tall floor-to-ceiling windows ran along the east side of the loft, they looked to be at least twenty feet tall. They were also covered by beautiful golden drapes.
The loft itself had to run along the entire length of the building because like I said, it was roomy. One could play a game of football in its open space or what you American’s call soccer. There wasn’t a lot of furniture, it didn’t look as if Rome invested in that.
However, I now understood why I had been assigned this mission. Along the entire length of the north wall was a state of the art computer system. Secured to the lovely rust colored brick wall had to be at least twenty flat screened monitors. Although they were turned off, one couldn’t help but wonder what appeared on them when they were turned on. In front of the elaborate system was a single plush leather chair on wheels.
It was a chair for a king.
A king whose throne was in front of several very impressive computer screens.
One thing was for certain, this beauty was something you wouldn’t ever expect to find in the heart of the ghetto. My fingers twitched in anticipation of finding out what was stored on that massive hard drive. He spared no expense for it. There were million-dollar corporations that could not afford one such as it.
My guess was the owner of that beautiful system was lying in the bed that wasn’t too far from it. Rob walked to a wall and hit a button, opening the curtains that were closer to the bed just a little. However, it was enough to shine a burst of sunlight into the loft. I came to a stop in front of the bed looking down at the occupants.
The man that I would assume was Rome lay sleeping on his stomach, my eyes traveled over his muscled back to the equally muscled arm that hung out the bed. He had on a pair of black jeans and expensive gym shoes. Asleep next to him completely naked was a very voluptuous young lady. Only the lower half of her body was covered with the sheet.
Rob wore a goofy smile on his face as he too stood looking down at the two. I could tell right off this kid was a rascal. His aim was to shock me with this. I looked at him and lifted an eyebrow, poor baby, it would take more than this to shock me.
“Yo Rome, you got a guest.” He said hitting the man’s shoe.
“Beat it, chump.” The sleeping giant grumbled turning over in the bed without opening his eyes. Rob chuckled hitting his shoe again.
“Get up, nigga.”
“What I tell you about using that word?” Rome mumbled without opening his eyes. He had a very deep voice. The younger man didn’t respond, instead he looked up at me with that devious grin still on his face. He nodded in a way to tell me to watch this.
Rome opened his eyes and turned to look at him, sitting up slightly. “You deaf, punk?! What I tell—” his words stalled as his light brown gaze came to rest on me.
Although I didn’t show it, for the fourth time since coming to this place, I was completely taken off guard.
Rome was gorgeous.
He looked at me through a pair of amber eyes that missed nothing. He’d just woke up from a deep sleep and judging by the empty Hennessy bottles and cups, it had been a drunken sleep, yet his eyes were sharp. They took me in making me feel as if he was reading me like an open book. I shifted on my feet feeling uncomfortable with that. No one has ever looked at me that closely.
He ran his hand over his head.
“What the f*** Rob.” He growled. The grin on Rob’s face grew wider as he blinked his eyes innocently.
“Bruh, you got a guest.” He said gesturing towards me. Now that he mentioned it, I could see the resemblances between the two. Only difference being Rome was clearly older and his eyes were a
