𝐟𝐚𝐦𝐢𝐥𝐲 𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠, 𝐞𝐦𝐩𝐢𝐫𝐞 ²

sixteen.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN
real handy

Lucious

Lucious was pissed the hell off right now. Andre was just there, and he had shown Lucious a picture of Blake talking to one of his security guards he had hired to protect his damn house. So Hakeem was right; they did have some snakes in their circle.

Well, not anymore. Lucious had fired every last one of those damn guards because he didn't know who to trust. Now they had no protection, but that was fine because he already knew who he'd hire.

Warren Hall.

Warren ran Club Nirvana, and Lucious believed he was acquainted with the kids, so that was a plus. He also had experience with guarding, so he had agreed to watch the house.

Lucious needed to tell Cookie the news. "I just got done firing the security, Cookie."

Cookie couldn't believe her ears. "You did what?"

"Exactly what I said. I fired every last one of them."

"Are you out of your mind, Lucious? I told you to amp up security! Not fire them!"

"I fired them because I can't trust any of them. Blake already got to them."

Cookie was confused. "What do you mean?"

He took out his phone and showed her the picture Andre had sent to him. Cookie couldn't believe her eyes. "That's-"

"One of my security guards? Yeah. Looks like I hired a snake."

"Yeah, it makes sense. He let Blake in. But I still don't understand how we didn't see him on the cameras," Cookie replied.

Lucious didn't understand either. "I don't know, but I need to figure that out asap."

Cookie nodded. "Now we have no protection, so what are we gonna do?"

"Don't worry about that. I already hired Warren."

"Warren? The guy from the club?" Cookie asked.

"Yeah. He has experience with guarding."

"But that's one guy, Lucious."

"One real guard is better than twenty fake ones, Cookie," he stated. "But Warren told me he has some buddies we can trust too."

"I sure hope so. My princess needs to stay safe."

Just as she said that, Ro came running into the house out of breath. It was as if she was running from someone.

Lucious rushed up to her. "Ro! What happened to you?!"

"I had a run in with Blake!"

"What the hell do you mean?!"

Ro panted some more before explaining. "I went for a walk, and Blake called me because he was stalking me. He said he wants me back, but I rejected him. He got angry and said if he can't have me, no one can, and then someone got shot!"

"Who?!"

"I don't know! I didn't see anything, but I heard the gunshot. I think it was Blake hinting that he was going to shoot me."

Cookie was fed up. "Alright, that's it!"

She startled dialing someone's number and Lucious questioned her. "Who you calling?"

"The damn police! We're getting them involved!"

Lucious snatched her phone. "No the hell we ain't! We don't run to no cops!"

"The boy is having some sort of fatal attraction moment, Lucious. He's trying to hurt our daughter, so the cops need to find his ass."

"Cookie-"

But Royalty pleaded with him. "Please let her call, dad. I'm scared." Royalty wrapped her arms around him, and buried her head in his chest. She was shaking a little bit, so Lucious knew she was frightened. Therefore, he let Cookie call the cops to ease his baby girl's mind.

The police better find Blake before he did. That was all he was gonna say.

Gram

Gram wasn't in the studio anymore. It got boring arguing with Hakeem because his bitch ass wasn't going to put his hands on Gram. He knew better, because all of Gram's followers would kill his ass, just like how all of Hakeem's followers were going to kill Jamal.

Who puts a hit out on their own brother? That was why Hakeem was a lame to Gram. And he had no swag. He dressed like an undercover cop, like Blake had said in that diss. His bars were weak as shit as well. Gram didn't understand how he had fans.

Hakeem was only popular because of who his daddy was, honestly. That was why Gram was about to hop in Tiana's DMs because she needed to upgrade. Hakeem ain't good enough for her.

But he couldn't DM her right now because someone was knocking on his damn door. He opened it and saw his former best friend.

"Blake?" he said in disbelief. Then he looked at his hand. "Why do you have a gun?"

"You gonna let me in or not?"

"Sure? I'm surprised you're here because you and I haven't talked in a hot minute."

Blake walked in. "Yeah we haven't, but I still know about you. You signed with Empire?"

Gram crossed his arms. "Yeah. I heard you're tryna sign with my old record label."

"Trying and not succeeding. Those Lyons got me fucking blacklisted."

Gram believed it. "That's why I'm trying not to get on Lucious' bad side. I don't like Hakeem though."

Blake agreed. "Me either. I like his sister though, but she's acting up."

"Weren't y'all dating?"

"Exactly. But she doesn't want me anymore and it pisses me off."

"You must've done something horrible," Gram commented.

"All I did was kiss another girl."

"So you cheated."

Blake shook his head. "No, it was payback for Royalty making a diss song about me."

"You cheated," Gram said once again.

Blake sucked his teeth. "Whatever, man. You don't know the story."

Then he went into Gram's fridge to get a can of soda. Gram questioned him some more. "Blake, what the hell happened? Why did you get fired?"

"That's a story for another time, old friend." Blake faced him. "Look, I need to crash here for a while."

"Why?"

"Because the cops are after me."

Gram's eyes widened. "And you wanna stay here? Are you tryna get me in trouble?"

"They won't find me. I'm not leaving this house."

"Why are they even after you? Does it have something to do with that gun?" Gram asked.

Blake sighed. "It's a long story."

"We got time."

"No, I don't think we do."

"Blake-"

He cut Gram off. "Listen, I'm fucking tired, okay? Can I take a nap?"

Gram huffed. "Fine. You can sleep on the couch."

"Thank you. And hey, when you're at Empire, can you keep an eye on Royalty for me? Make sure she's not talking to another dude."

"If she is?"

Blake just said, "Then this gun is gonna come in real handy."