𝐟𝐚𝐦𝐢𝐥𝐲 𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠, 𝐞𝐦𝐩𝐢𝐫𝐞 ²

six.

CHAPTER SIX
jakeem superiority

Lucious

next day

Lucious was sitting on the couch, sipping some coffee as Cookie walked in. "Hey, baby."

Cookie ignored his greeting. "We need to talk, Lucious."

"About what?"

"Andre."

"Doesn't ring a bell."

"Now you sound like Jamal," Cookie commented.

"Jamal has sense then. Andre messed up big time."

"He's sorry for that. He regrets letting the competition get to his head."

Lucious looked at her curiously. "How you know? You talked to him or something?"

"I did."

He wasn't even surprised. "Of course you did. You always were the sympathetic one."

She rolled her eyes. "I did it because he's my son, Lucious. As his mother, I want to make sure he keeps his job."

"That's not happening. I already told you he's getting fired."

"You can't do him dirty like that."

"He did his brothers dirty, so why not?" he countered.

"Because he's still your son, Lucious. He made a mistake."

He raised his voice at her. "It was not a mistake. It was intentional, and you need to stop babying him because he's a grown man. He knows right from wrong."

"How is he going to pay his bills if you fire him? Think about that!"

"He can get another job."

Cookie sighed. "Yes he can, but isn't Andre an important asset to Empire? He's very skillful."

"I don't care about that. He can have all the skills in the world, but if he can't be trusted, I don't want him at my company."

"Well, as Co-CEO, I'm saying that he's staying."

That made him laugh. "You and Ro are not Co-CEO's yet. And what ever you want to do, you have to pass it by Ro first. I'm pretty sure she hates Andre like the rest of us."

"I don't, because Andre knows he did wrong and he wants to make it right. We should give him the chance to redeem himself. That's what family is supposed to do."

"What family isn't supposed to do is backstab each other. Which is what Andre did," Lucious retorted.

"I said what I said, Lucious! If you fire Andre, we're gonna have problems!"

"What kind of problems?!"

"Broken home problems! As in, we're over!"

Now he was angry. "You'd really do that?"

"I'd do it for my baby."

"He's not a baby; he's a grown man! That's what you're not understanding! He needs to be treated like one!" Lucious argued.

"I said what I said! Don't fire him!"

Lucious opened his mouth to respond, but she walked away. Now he was irritated because he and Cookie had just gotten back together. It'd be a shame if all of that disappeared because of Andre and his snake ass behavior. So you know what? Fine, Lucious wouldn't fire him. But one wrong move, and he was out.

Andre

Andre was at Empire doing his work, but he kept looking around because it felt like everyone was judging him. That was crazy because no one knew about what he had done except for his family, but he was getting negative vibes there.

Maybe he was the negative vibe...

Andre tried to find Becky because they needed to discuss some things, but Lucious walked up to him instead. Andre was shocked as hell. So shocked that he thought he was dreaming.

"Andre."

Andre stuttered. "P-Pop? You're actually talking to me right now?"

"You work here, do you not?"

"Yeah, but I'm getting the feeling you're about to fire me."

"Give me one reason why I shouldn't."

"Honestly, if you fire me, you have every right. What I did was completely unacceptable, and I knew from the start that you didn't like snakes, but I still tried to pull a fast one over you. That wasn't cool," Andre said. "But Pop, I promise it will never happen again. I know better now."

"I appreciate your honesty, but I'm not firing you, Andre. Your mother will kill me if I do, and her and I just got back together, so-

Andre was shocked. "Wait, you and Ma are together?"

He nodded. "Yeah. You would know that if you hadn't done what you did."

Andre frowned. "I'm sorry."

Lucious shrugged. "Honestly, I'm not the one you need to say sorry to." Then he looked behind himself at Jamal. "You almost ruined his life, Dre."

"Yeah. I need to apologize."

"Go ahead. But if you do one thing I don't like, you're out of here."

"That's fair."

Andre was about to walk up to Jamal, but Lucious said one final thing. "Oh. And stop by the house tomorrow. I gotta talk to you about something." Then he left, and Andre was shocked all over again. He was invited to the mansion? Maybe Lucious wasn't that mad anymore. But Jamal was, and Andre needed to fix it.

He walked up to his baby brother, who had his bodyguards behind him. "Jamal. Hey. How are you?"

Jamal really hated him. "I'm gonna need you to get out of my face."

"I'm not here to cause problems."

"You already caused all the problems in the world, Dre. So get out of my face."

Andre felt so bad. "Jamal-"

"Yo, you deaf?! He said get your snake ass away from him!" Hakeem yelled viciously as he approached.

Andre huffed. "Jamal doesn't need you protecting him, Hakeem. He already has bodyguards."

"I'm his other bodyguard when it comes to you, so get your ass on somewhere!"

"Are you gonna make me leave?" Andre challenged.

"Here you go starting drama again," Jamal said angrily.

"I'm not trying to start anything. I'm here to apologize. What I did was wrong, and I know that now," Andre exclaimed. "Come on, you guys have known me your whole lives. I'm not evil."

"Yeah, you're not evil. You're just fake," Hakeem dissed. "I don't keep fakes in my circle, so bounce."

Andre refused. "I'm not going anywhere until you guys forgive me."

"Well, I guess you're gonna be standing there all day because that ain't happening," Jamal told him.

Hakeem spoke to Jamal. "Man, come on, Mal. We got a song to make."

They walked off together and Andre was in disbelief. "So now you two are inseparable? You just hated each other!"

Jamal swiveled around hastily. "We hated each other because of you, Andre! How me and Hakeem are right now is how it should've always been."

"And this is how it's going to stay because we're not falling for your tricks no more," Hakeem added. They went to the studio, and Andre stared at them with hurt in his eyes because he really fucked up. He should've never tried to tear them apart because all it did was bring them closer.

In conclusion, Cookie forgave him, and he and Lucious were on speaking terms, but his brothers would never forgive him and that was what pained him the most.