“You can be sure about one thing, Ooh la, la, mais oui, it's good to be the King!”
Bobby stood up. “To the new king, Mike Black.”
Everybody stood up and raised their glasses. “All hail the new King,” Nick said.
“Long live the King,” Freeze said and everybody but me drank to it.
I stood up. I raised my glass. “I’m not the King. We’re a family. Long live this family, and death to anyone that tries to come between us.”
Bobby nodded his head. “To the family.”
“I’ll drink to that,” I said, and joined my family in a toast to us. But that night, our family wasn’t complete because Vickie wasn’t there to celebrate with us.
When our private party broke up in the office, we came out into the club, and I saw that Michaella was there. Even though she had to get up in the morning to go to her job at the bank, Michaella was becoming a regular at The Late Night. She had the appearance of a woman that was trying to establish herself in the spot that used to belong to Carmen. But I wasn’t feeling that. What I was feeling was her sex. That shit was good.
I left The Late Night with her, spent the night dicking her down and Michaella dropped me off at the crib on her way to the bank. I took a shower and went to bed. I don’t know how long I had been asleep when my phone started ringing. My phone never rings, and I like it like that. People have a tendency to say all kinds of shit on the p
hone without thinking about who else is listening.
“Who is this and how did you get this number.”
“It’s Veneshia.”
“Who?”
“Your bottom girl, daddy.”
“How’d you get this number?”
“I got it from Drew,” Veneshia said, and I wondered how he got my number.
“What you want?” I asked, and made a mental note to get my number changed.
“I know where that nigga you’re looking for is, daddy.”
I sat up. “Where are you?”
“I’m at the Super8 on Southern Boulevard.”
“Stay there. I’m coming to you.”
I hung up the phone and called Bobby.
“Who the fuck is this?” Bobby answered.
“It’s Mike.”
“Can’t be. Mike Black never calls anybody.” Bobby laughed. “So who the fuck is this?”
“Stop fuckin’ around, Bobby. I need you to come get me now.”
“Why, what’s up?”
“I’ll tell you when you get here.”
I hung up, got dressed, armed myself and was standing outside when Bobby got there.
Chapter Eighteen