Chapter 4 The Only Two Keys
King POV
I find myself thinking about the woman from yesterday more than I care to admit.
Mostly wondering if she was okay. If she went back to whoever put those marks around her wrists. I told myself it wasn’t my business more than once, but apparently my mind didn’t give a fuck.
So when I hear the bell over the door and look up, and see her looking worse than she did yesterday with two toddlers and Yana, every thought in my head stops.
I see red.
Her face is bruised and bleeding, she’s holding her side while trying to balance her son.
The other little boy is holding Yana’s hand, and both of them look like they’ve been crying.
Yesterday she was covered in makeup and long sleeves. Today there isn’t enough makeup in the world to hide what somebody did to her.
I stand and walk straight over.
Her eyes jump to me immediately, and I slow down before I get too close.
I hold my hands out toward the little boy in her arms.
“May I?” I ask.
She freezes.
Her arms tighten around him instead of letting go.
“You can trust him, Milly. I swear,” Yana says softly to her.
She looks at Yana, then back at me.
After a second, she loosens her grip and lets me take him.
“Wassup, little man?” I say.
He stares at me for a second before his lips spread into a grin.
I smile.
“Aight. We cool then.”
He pats one of the tattoos on my neck like he’s trying to figure out what the hell it is.
I look at Yana.
“What do you need?” I ask.
“A doctor and a place to stay. A safe place, King,” she says.
“Say no more.”
“No, wait.”
I look back at the woman.
“You can’t get involved,” she says, her voice low.
My eyes land on her.
“I want to.”
She studies my face.
“Why?” she asks, her voice cracking on the word.
Like she genuinely can’t understand why somebody who doesn’t know her would give a damn.
“Men who beat on their woman don’t deserve to breathe,” I say.
Her eyes drop to the floor.
I don’t push her for anything else.
I walk over to my table and grab my phone before calling Saint.
The moment the call connects, I speak, my eyes going back to the woman standing in the middle of my shop.
“I need two things. I need Louis at the shop ASAP. Then I need Lafayette set up.
"Already done. It’s her?” he asks.
I hear movement on his end immediately. Saint don’t need everything explained before he starts moving. That’s why I call him first.
“Yeah, and she with Yana,” I say low.
“Oh, so Yana know how deep it is.”
“Yeah. Later though. For now, get Lafayette set up and stocked. Baby stuff. Toddlers look like they two or three. Two boys.”
“Fuck, and she got kids. Okay, I’m on it.”
The call ends.
The little boy in my arms settles against my chest like he been knowing me longer than thirty seconds. I shift him higher while he plays with the chain around my neck.
“Okay. Doctor is on the way, and I got a place being set up right now. It’s safe,” I say.
“If it’s in this state, it’s not safe,” she murmurs.
That gets my attention.
I look at her and then at Yana.
Yana gives me a look but doesn’t explain.
“It’s safe. I promise.”
Her eyes cut to me.
“Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” she says.
There’s something in the way she says it that tells me she’s heard enough promises already.
“I don’t.”
Her eyes widen slightly.
I hold her stare because I need her to understand I’m not saying shit just to make her feel better.
“King can keep you safe, Milan,” Yana says.
Milan.
So that’s her name.
It fits her.
“Okay,” she says quietly. “They’re all going to be looking for me.”
“Who is they?” I ask.
“My family.” She hesitates. “I’m Milan Bellamy.”
My ears perk up at the name.
“Bellamy as in Franklin Bellamy?”
“Yes. That is my father,” she says quietly.
Well, fuck.
I know that name.
Everybody who does business in certain circles in this city knows that name.
“He’s a shark,” I say.
“He’s an emotionless bastard,” she says.
The words come out quick enough that I look at her again. No hesitation. No daughter defending her father because of his name.
Whatever is happening here is bigger than a husband who likes putting his hands on his wife.
I don’t ask.
Not yet.
The bell over the door rings again, and Milan jumps.
Her whole body stiffens, and her head snaps toward the entrance.
“It’s okay,” I say immediately. “That’s just my brother and the doctor.”
Her eyes find mine before they go to the two men walking inside.
She watches me for another second, like she’s checking whether I mean it, before some of the tension leaves her shoulders.
Saint walks in first, Louis right behind him.
Saint’s eyes move from me to Milan, then down to the little boy in my arms.
His face changes for half a second when he gets a good look at Milan, but he knows better than to say shit right now.
“Louis, this is Milan. Can you look her over for me?” I ask.
“Got it, boss.”
He walks toward her.
Milan takes half a step back.
“Milan,” I say.
Her eyes come to me.
“He’s just going to check your face and your ribs. Is that okay?”
She looks from Louis to me.
Not asking my permission. Checking him against me because right now I’m the person in the room she knows.
After a second, she nods.
“Okay.”
Louis waits until she’s ready before moving closer.
“Can I touch your face?” he asks.
She hesitates but nods again.
He starts checking the swelling along her cheek while I look at Saint.
“Give me your key for Lafayette.”
Saint reaches into his pocket and pulls it off his key ring.
His attention shifts back to the little boy in my arms.
“Wassup, little man?” he says.
The little boy grins at him.
Saint laughs.
“Aye, he like me.”
“He smiled at me first.”
“Yeah, because you holding him hostage.”
I shake my head.
Saint looks at Milan.
“Can I hold him?”
Milan looks at Saint first, then her eyes move to me.
I give her a small nod, not telling her yes, just letting her know Saint is good.
She nods.
Saint reaches for the little boy, and I hand him over.
The kid studies Saint for a second before grabbing the front of his shirt.
“See?” Saint says. “He know good people.”
“Man, shut up.”
I take my copy of the Lafayette key off my ring, then take Saint’s and hold both of them out to Milan.
“These are the only two copies of this key. Me and him are the only ones who know where it is. My other brothers don’t even know.”
She looks down at the keys before slowly taking them from me.
Her fingers close around them, and she holds them against her chest.
“Both?” she asks quietly.
“Both.”
Her brows pull together.
“Then how will you get in?”
“I won’t.”
She looks up at me.
I nod toward the keys in her hand.
“Not unless you let me.”
For a second she just stares at me.
Something moves across her face, but I can’t tell what it is before she looks back down.
“Thank you,” she says softly.
“You good.”
I grab a piece of paper, write down the address, and hand it to her.
“Yana, take them to the spot and get them settled. Text me when you get in.”
“Got it,” she says.
Louis finishes checking Milan’s face before moving to her ribs.
She sucks in a breath the second his fingers press one side.
“Easy,” Louis says. “I know.”
My jaw tightens.
I turn my attention away before the look on my face makes her more nervous than she already is.
When he finishes, I look back at Milan.
“I need you to give me anything your husband can use to track you,” I say gently.
Her forehead wrinkles for a second before she reaches into her bag.
She hands me her phone and one bank card.
“That’s it,” she says.
I look down at the two things in my hand.
“He didn’t let me have anything. This is it.”
She looks away.
I don’t tell her I’m sorry. Something about the way she keeps looking at the floor tells me she’s heard enough people say things without doing shit.
“He know the password to the phone?”
She nods.
“Okay.”
I set both things on my table.
She watches me do it but doesn’t ask what I’m going to do with them.
I step into the back of the shop and come back out with a phone box.
Her brows pull together when I hold it out.
“Here.”
She looks from the box to me.
For a second, she doesn’t take it.
“This is for me?”
“Yeah.”
She slowly takes the box.
“Thank you.”
“You have kids. People need to be able to contact you.”
And if something happens, she needs a way to call somebody without asking permission first.
Yana looks at me.
“Thank you, cousin.” She turns toward Milan. “Ready, Milly?”
Milan nods.
Saint walks over with the little boy.
The second he starts passing him back to Milan, the little man’s face crumbles.
He starts crying and reaches toward me.
I laugh.
“Aye, what happened? I thought we was cool with Saint too.”
“I’m sorry. He’s usually not like this,” Milan says.
There it is again. An apology when she hasn’t done anything.
“You don’t have to apologize.”
She takes him, but he won’t stop.
He twists in her arms, reaching toward me while she tries to settle him.
“Avian, baby, Mommy has you.”
So his name is Avian.
He keeps crying.
Milan adjusts him, but I see her wince when his weight shifts against her side.
“Hold on.”
I step closer.
I don’t touch either of them until she looks at me.
“You want me to take him?”
She hesitates before nodding.
I take Avian back, and almost immediately the crying starts to die down.
He wraps one little arm around my neck, sniffles twice, then settles against me.
I look at him.
“You dramatic, little man.”
He grins.
Saint laughs.
“That quick?”
“Apparently.”
Milan is staring at us.
Not smiling exactly, but something in her face softens.
She looks down at her side before looking back at me.
“Would you mind coming with us? I can’t really handle fighting with him to calm down right now.”
“Of course.”
The answer comes easy.
I grab my keys from the table before remembering Avian has apparently decided my arms are where he plans to be for the foreseeable future.
Yesterday she ran out of my shop because I asked one question too many.
Today she came back bruised, carrying one of her sons, and trusted me enough to ask me to come with her.
I’m not going to make her regret it.
