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“You ain’t answered any of my calls or texts, but I bet yo’ ass done talked to that corny ass nigga, Lloyd.”

I turned around and started walking back towards the door. Shameek ran behind me and grabbed me by the waist, spilling some liquor on his marble floors.

“Meek, I didn’t come here to hear about Lloyd. You asked me to come over because you wanted to talk, and here I am.”

“My bad. I’m just a lil’ jealous, Ky. I just kno’ the closer that nigga gets to you, the more he’s gonna fall for you like me. I want you to myself.”

“Meek, you’re drunk.” I pushed him off me. “What is going on? You don’t usually drink like this.” I snatched the glass from his hand.

“It’s Nikki.”

“What about her?”

I figured that she wasn’t going to let him go, which is why I wasn’t taking anything he was saying serious. What woman in her right mind would let a King man go? Shameek probably took good care of her. She wasn’t going to go out without a fight.

“She’s dead,” he blurted.

“What? Are you okay? I know how you felt about her.”

“I killed her,” he said lowly.

“Excuse me?”

“She found out about us. We got into it. She had some shit on me she should’ve never had, started threatening to blow everything up, and I lost it. I shot her.”

I swallowed hard. Shameek killing her for me was not what I wanted. If he would do that to her, this jealous shit he had with Lloyd was making me look at him differently.

“What kind of shit did she have on you that you had to shoot her?”

“Old family business that no one should know about.”

“You killed her because she threatened to expose you?”

“I’m a King. You don’t hold somethin’ over my head that can fuck my entire world up. She knew who I was, but to dig and find some shit because her feelings were hurt was goin’ too far.”

I just stood there in silence.

“Say something.”

“What do you want me to say, Meek? I wasn’t expecting you to break this type of news to me. Like, why the fuck would you not walk away? Killing her was extreme. Do you know how many bitches have gotten disrespectful? Shit, Raya is the perfect example.”

“Things transpired so fast. She was calm, and then things changed. I didn’t have time to think.”

I didn’t have anything else to say. I was ready to go home so I could process what he had just laid on me.

“Now that she’s gone, it can be me and you. You said that if I got rid of her, you would stop giving Lloyd so much of your time.”

“Shameek, you killed that girl. You’re standing here trying to move forward with you and me. We still got to deal with your family. This is not some shit that just happens. We have a lot to consider, and now you have this hanging over your head. Don’t stand here with that girl barely cold and turn her death into a relationship opening for us. And what the fuck, do you expect her family to just be okay that she’s possibly missing?”

“They can think what they want. There are no traces of me in the vicinity.”

“This is crazy. You need to grieve what the fuck you’ve done. You haven’t slept and need to get some rest. When your head is clear, we will talk about it. When you come down off the liquor, the shit is going to hit you hard. Then you’ve got to perform when they come and ask whether you seen her. If you think that is not going to fuck with your head, then I don’t know you very well,” I told him.

“You’re right. I just had to tell someone, and you’re the only one I can trust now that my brother is gone.”

“Your secret is safe with me. Get some rest, Meek.”

I left him standing there as I headed out the door. Did I think Meek would ever hurt me? Probably not. I was sure Nikki’s ass thought the same thing. I made the short drive back to my house, replaying everything Shameek had said. The situation was heavy because I knew he loved that girl. Maybe not enough to give her what she wanted, but there was love there—years of it. For him to pull a gun and end all of that over an argument told me there was a side of Shameek I still hadn't fully seen.