Day One
Chapter One
It was Thursday night and Rain Robinson was sitting alone in her office thinking. Even though her official title was underboss, she was the boss of the family now. Rain knew it, and so did everybody else.
Black hadn’t actually been in the city in months and she had only talked to him a few times since he and Shy got back from Italy and even though Bobby still lived in the city, she hadn’t seen or heard from him either. Wanda stopped by every now and then, but she never stayed long and then it’s only when she was on her way to see her secret, that wasn’t such a secret man, or on her way back from seeing him.
Since the day that Black took her to a meeting in Aruba with Bobby and Jada West and Wanda just happened to be on the island, Rain knew that she had a man. It wasn’t so secret because Rain believed that in her position, and for security reasons, she needed to know who Wanda was involved with. Rain put Monika on it, and she found out that his name was James Austin and she worked up a complete dossier on him.
It wasn’t that she felt that they had abandoned her; nothing like that, there was just no need for her to talk to them. For the first time since she became a part of The Family, they were at peace.
It’s not that there weren’t any problems in the house. With the exception of Doc, who had been with Black since the beginning, Rain had a set of new Captain’s and each of them had problems that they had to deal with.
After the death of Cynt, it was decided that nobody in her house was ready for that type of responsibility, so her operation was divided between Doc, Howard Owens, Sherman Williams and newly minted Captain, Jackie Washington.
Then Howard was murdered, and Carter Garrison was eventually made Captain of that crew. But by that time, Lyric Skye and his people had deeply infiltrated Sherman’s crew, which set off a chain of events that included the attempted murder of Bobby Ray.
Once Black and Rain restored order to the chaos their house had become, Sherman Williams took responsibility and announced that he was retiring and named Ed Weather as his successor. A move that Black approved, but pissed off a lot of Sherman’s people.
With Jackie, Carter and Ed Weather all having problems with their people, Rain wanted to get involved and whip everybody back in line, because that’s what she did. She was the hammer, and nobody wanted to see Rain coming. But as Boss of The Family, she had come to accept that she had to give them an opportunity to put their own house in order.
Even though Jackie made a show of Ramello’s execution in front of her entire crew in order to show them the consequences of fucking with her, she still had problems. Flip, who ran the high stakes poker game that Black and Bobby started, and Jackie once ran, was her biggest problem and one that she knew that she had to deal with.
When Black made Carter Garrison Captain of Howard’s crew, it was obvious that Jab Baldwin, who had appointed himself acting Captain, as well as Terrance Jackson; Kenard Turner and Howard’s brother, Richard, and even Ryder were disappointed by the decision. Each thought that they should have gotten the top spot, except for Ryder, since she was the mastermind behind Jab; she wanted him to be made Captain. Carter being made Captain represented a significant loss of power and money for her.
And then there was Ed Weather, damn near everybody in Sherman’s old crew had their knives out for him. The loudest voice of them all was Darius Wilkerson. He was pushing back hard against Ed and would have to be dealt with soon. So there was plenty of shit to do, but she knew it wasn’t her place, because Black told her that it wasn’t.
“If and when you do have to get involved, it means that you need to reevaluate the person that you got sitting in the Captain’s seat.”
So Rain was sitting it out, watching and waiting to see what happened. But for Rain, that wasn’t easy. She was an action junkie and needed to be in the center of things.
Black Threesome was on the flat screen, but she wasn’t really watching the two women taking turns pleasuring a man. Rain picked up the remote and switched the flat screen to display rotating images from each of the security cameras throughout the building. She looked at the empty glass in front of her and for a quick second thought about calling Yarissa Dash to come in to pour her a drink.
“That’s just fuckin’ lazy,” she said and stood up.
Once Rain had poured herself another shot of Patrón, she turned to go and sit down, but then she had a better idea. She turned around, got the bottle, and then she sat down.
“It ain’t like I’m done drinkin’ for the night,” she said aloud and sat down. “This way you ain’t even gotta think about calling Yarissa.”
The longer she sat there, the more Rain knew that she was bored. “No!” She drained the glass and picked up the bottle. “I’m bored out my fuckin’ mind!” Rain shouted and threw the bottle against the wall, shattering it on impact.
She had just gotten up to get another bottle when Yarissa, along with the two men that Black insisted she get, Omari and Nelson, busted through the door, nearly taking it off its hinges.
“Is everything alright?” Yarissa asked while she and the muscle inspected the office.
“Yeah.”
“What happened?” Yarissa asked, but seeing the wet spot on the wall and the broken glass on the floor, she had a pretty good idea.
“I threw the fuckin’ bottle against the fuckin’ wall. Anything wrong with that?”
Omari and Nelson dropped their heads, turned around, left the office and closed the door behind them, knowing better than to answer that question. Yarissa shook her head. She wondered how could they be scared to death of Rain, and protect her at the same time.
More likely, she’ll end up protecting them, Yarissa thought.
“You want me to get you another bottle?”
“No.” Rain sat down.
“You sure?”
Yarissa had been working in the office with Rain for a few months now. With things being so quiet, there were nights when she and Rain just hung out in the office, drank and talked shit. During those times, she had learned to sense Rain’s mood, and knew that she wasn’t in a good one.
“Go ahead and pour me a drink.”
Yarissa felt like they had sorta become something like girlfriends. If your girlfriend were the boss of a criminal organization that most people considered to be a murdering psychopath, Yarissa laughed and went behind the bar.
“What’s funn
y?”
“Nothing?” Yarissa said and got a bottle of Patrón from the cabinet.
“Stop lyin’.” Rain had gotten to know Yarissa just as well, and could tell when she was lying. “So what’s funny?”
“Next time you feel like throwing a bottle at the wall …” Yarissa walked over and pointed at a spot on the wall above the trash can. “Aim for this spot right here,” she said and then put the drink down in front of Rain. “I’ll send up a barback to clean that up.”
“Let it sit where it sits. It will be alright until the club closes,” Rain said as Yarissa picked up the bottle and sat it on the desk on her way to the door.
“Let me know if you need anything,” Yarissa said, and Rain watched her walk out.
Despite the amount of porn she watched, Rain never thought about having sex with a woman. In spite of that, and she wasn’t sure why, but there she was, watching Yarissa walk her fat ass out of the office. Rain had spent enough time with her to know that Yarissa was a sexual opportunist. Man or woman, it didn’t matter, if Yarissa wanted them, she would have them.
When Yarissa closed the door and Rain was alone again. Rain shot her drink, turned the flat screen back to Black Threesome and watched the action for a while and then Rain sat back and closed her eyes.