Bam! Bam! Bam!
As I descended the basement stairs I could hear the distinct sound of a .38 being fired, and I knew exactly who was shooting before my feet hit the ground. I touched the cold steel of my nine, heading toward the gunfire. I probably should have gone back upstairs to get Sasha, but it had been a long time since I’d had an opportunity like this, and I wasn’t about to let her outshine me.
Bam! Bam! Bam!
As I turned the corner, I watched my father take aim and then place three rounds dead center. LC Duncan wasn’t one to go into the field anymore, but he was no joke with that .38 he always carried. I slipped in beside him, taking out the target next to his with three rounds of my own.
Bam! Bam! Bam!
He glanced over at me and smiled. We used to do this type of thing down in our basement shooting range all the time, before my son Jordan was born and I was still considered his baby girl. You can’t even imagine how much I loved my daddy.
He took off his protective ear covers.
“What you doing down here shooting, Daddy?” I asked.
“With everything going on, I figured I better make sure I keep my skills sharp. You never know.”
“True that,” I replied. “Orlando said you wanted to see me?”
“Yeah, where’s Sasha? I wanted to see you both.”
“She’ll be down in a minute.”
“Good. That’ll give us a little time to talk.” He put his headphones back on and started to shoot, taking out his target’s head.
Bam! Bam! Bam!
“Talk about what?” I asked, though I wasn’t sure if he’d heard me through the gunfire.
Lowering his gun, he turned to me and pulled the ear covers behind his head. “I’m worried about you, Paris.”
“Why? What’d I do now? I got my shit together.” He shot me a disapproving look. “I mean, I got my stuff together. I’m taking care of Jordan, being responsible, doing my job.”
He placed an arm around me. “I know that, but you don’t have to do anything for me to be worried, little girl.” I loved it when he called me his little girl. “Sometimes a father just worries.”
“You really worried about this mess with Junior, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, but not in the same way I’m worried about you.”
I looked at him, confused. “Huh?”
“Rio told me what LaSalle said about Niles,” he said.
Just the mention of Niles’ name still caused my stomach to flip, but I couldn’t let Daddy know that. “Fuck LaSalle,” I shot back. “Niles is dead. I killed him myself, Daddy. Just like I killed LaSalle’s fat, lying ass.” Suddenly, I was on the verge of tears, and I wasn’t doing a very good job of hiding it. Daddy pulled me in close, wrapping his arms around me.
“It’s okay, little girl. Let it out. I know how you felt about him. I’m sorry it had to come to that.”
Usually I prided myself on being one ultra-tough bitch, but it felt good to be held in my daddy’s strong arms for a minute, just like I was a little girl again. I pulled back in a hurry, though, when I heard footsteps approaching and then my brother’s voice as he came into the room.
“I just got word that Vegas’s plane landed, Pop. Oh, and you were right. Junior’s gone,” Orlando said. He glanced in my direction, but if he had noticed me wiping away the last of my tears, he didn’t react.
My father’s face was grim.
“Where the fuck did Junior go?” I asked, not happy that I’d been kept out of the loop.
“Where do you think?” Orlando said.
I shook my head in disbelief. I knew Junior was head over heels for this chick Sonya, but I couldn’t believe he’d be stupid enough to go see her when she was the cause of all this drama in the first place.
“That bitch gets my brother killed and there won’t be a rock she can hide under,” I seethed.