“G, your temper—” He began, but I turned to face him. The rage that I was barely holding on to was beating at my soul to be let free. Mac turned to look down at the floor breaking eye contact with me. I hated when he did that. It made me feel like an animal. It’s what one is trained to do when dealing with an enraged gorilla or bear.
I wanted to hit him.
I wanted to break him.
“Gabe, you got to fight it bruh!” He said bravely.
I didn’t want to fight it. I wanted to let go and destroy, so much so that I was beginning to see red.
I needed to let go of some of the rage I felt flowing though my veins at this moment. This night should have been so simple.
It should have been so damn simple!
I turned around and grabbed the nearest thing to me that was not my best friend of twenty-nine years. An ugly a$$ stone statue of some kind of European art that my interior decorator insisted needed to occupy this space. I picked it up and broke it in two. The satisfaction of feeling the stone crumble in my hands almost made me high.
“Gabe,” Mac spoke low and calm. “Remember your pops. Remember what will happen if you let go again. The man warned you. He will kill you.”
Mac, my self-appointed conscience… I don’t know why but he had taken it upon himself to be the voice in my head, always trying to tell me to do the right thing. He was my guardian angel, dead set on protecting me from myself.
“Think about your pops.” He repeated.
My Pops?
I looked down at my hands that were covered in dust from the stone. But that night, the night my Pops was murdered, they had been covered in blood.
To hell with that!
My Pops was the damn devil. He deserved to die!
Just like whomever this was that had not done their research before they had decided to rob me. To break into the home of The Beast—for that mistake they will pay with their life. I shot up the last flight of stairs, moving at a speed that it was impossible for Mac to keep up with me.
Flint and his team was coming up the back way, entering the third level. When he saw me he silently signaled toward my bedroom.
* * * * *
Yasmin
His jewelry was still in its boxes. Most of it came from the same place. The boxes were all black with a fancy gold script on them that was no doubt the name of some expensive jewelry store. I didn’t waste my time trying to open and look in them. I just picked up six of the cases and shoved them in my bag. I didn’t want to take them all. I just prayed Shanice was right and he wouldn’t notice these few missing.
As I arranged them in my bag I kind of wish I would have left some of my belongings at Shanice's. My things already pushed my bag to the limits. I had to wrestle with the straps to get them to close with the added boxes.
I exhaled when I was done. It was time to go!
As I headed back toward the door of the closet going into the bedroom, I got a strange feeling. Like the room on the other side of the door had changed. My steps faltered. I stopped breathing, listening for even the slightest sound of movement. I didn’t hear anything.
Come on Yasmin! You need to get out of here!
My heart was pounding in a way that made me feel as if maybe I was going to have a stroke, or a heart attack. Something was wrong.
I needed to get out of here!
I needed to get out of here, now! I put my other backpack strap on my arm and ran as fast as I could out the closet. My plan was to keep running till I ran through Shanice’s apartment door.
However, the sight that greeted me when I came out the closet caused my steps to come to a screeching halt. Standing justinside the door looking like an approaching tempest, was Gabriel. The anger that poured from him was crippling. I had never felt such rage before. Not even in the Mayor as he beat and tried to rape me. Gabe’s frown was so fierce that it literally made my knees knock.
This man was so vicious looking that he made the eight or nine big security guards standing next to him look like Red Cross volunteers. I knew the moment he recognized me. At first his gaze was shocked, but then it turned into a boiling pot of anger. It felt like a hot laser shooting at me.
I put my hand on my lips, I don’t know why. Maybe to stop the scream that wanted to rip from my throat. Too afraid that the slightest movement would make this beast of a man pounce on me, and destroy me. For the second time in my life, I was struck with crippling fear.
“Damn Mac, it looks like I’ve been set up.” Gabriel’s voice was so deep and deadly that it seemed to vibrate through the floor and up through the soles of my feet. I wanted to shake my head denying it, but his dark intense gaze was holding mine prisoner and the only thing that I could do was stare back at him with pleading eyes.
And then he began to walk toward me, and my feet out of pure instincts to survive at whatever cost, snapped out of paralysis before my mind did. Cause they began to run toward the door. It was like they knew that freedom was on the other side, but somehow the eight or nine giant men standing there didn’t seem to matter when the other side of that door meant survival.
I was so focused on the hallway that when the strong
