Coulda then put them all in an off-da-meter lair with every convenience, but built like Fort Knox. Wouldn't have turned nobody but Rider, all Guardian souls would have been intact, minimal losses. Everybody happy. There were a lot of things he used to be able to do without breaking a vein. The Light would have lost the only weary soul in the transactions, Rider's, one that's quickly slipping from their grasp any ol' way, if they didn't give the man a break and some immediate relief.
"He's only human," Carlos said, his voice tight from anger, going down the steps to retrieve a garden hose. Who knows, since it would have been done for love, maybe the Light coulda worked a deal for Rider, too? Shoulda. Maybe they wouldn't have been too salty with him for doing it, since it woulda been a mercy nick? Moot point. He no longer owned the equipment to do anything like that.
Regardless, in his old nighttime splendor and under his protective seal, within his heavily fortified lairs, they would have all lived like the royalty they were, and not been fugitives livin' on the run. Carlos sprayed off the mop and then shot water across the porch, lost in darkening thoughts.
What good was money when you couldn't spend it to the max? Screw the police inquiries about where he might have gotten phat-paid, and f**k the feds, whoever, his shit would have been all vamp. Untraceable. Situation smooth.
That would have chilled out Marj, therefore Berkfield - cool people who deserved some respite from worry, like everybody else. Fam. He woulda taken care of his peeps, all of them. That's what he'd tried to do before he'd been turned. It was still in his DNA. Serve and protect, but he preferred to do the shit with style.
Carlos laughed quietly. "Yeah, but don't worry, I would have also given a healthy tithe on the down low to you, Father Pat梬ild as that sounds. I would have been discreet for both of us to stay politically correct."
He had to get out of his own head before he lost his mind like Rider. Because, if he'd had it his way, after all that, then he woulda stepped to the Chairman mano-a-mano in Hell, like it should have been done... handled his business for both himself and Damali梥natched a bone out of that old bastard's ass, then come home to his woman, righteous, and laid down V-point so hard she woulda walked away with twins. Carlos smiled. One day. Maybe one night.
Then all would be right in the world, and nothin' would have dared to slither up into his domain topside to make any of the teams ever have to go to war again. Shit, after that, he mighta even been so bold to have taken the Chairman's throne, fair exchange, almost, given the blues the sonofabitch had levied on him... but there would never be enough to repay what he'd done to Damali.
However, the shit woulda been cool, until he said it wasn't. That was power. Being able to protect his family with unquestioned authority and to make their world sweet. Paradise. No static. Plush environs. To know what they wanted before they even had to ask. Ultimate provider. Stone-cold soldier that nobody f**ked with, thus no one dared f**k with his people. That was how a man was supposed to handle his bizness.
He, as the man, was supposed to have that burden solely on his shoulders; his family was supposed to live, laugh, relax, be taken care of, all needs met. Bam. Consider it done. Every man's secret dream was to be able to do that.
Carlos dropped the hose and stared at his palms. "Is that so wrong?" he whispered.
His woman wasn't supposed to have to do shit, unless she wanted to... and he was supposed to hook her up so lovely that she didn't wanna necessarily do jack but chill. His baby could just sing and leave her blade at home. Talk about a dream come true...
She wasn't supposed to have to go to Hell and back and be worried about being attacked all the time... too scared even to think about carrying their next child, too stressed to sleep at night, too nervous to make love to make another one. Wasn't supposed to be buggin' about being his wife or tying the knot legal... talking crazy shit about living by herself to have space to think. Think about what, after all they'd been through? If he was on the job, there'd be no decision. Be no arguments. The word no about everything lately would be banished.
The shine had gone out of her gorgeous eyes under the strain. No wonder her silver never lit; the girl was exhausted. Beyond fatigued. He'd allow that to happen to her on his watch, was off the job, so she had to pick up the damned slack. Isn't that how his mother grew old fast, dealing with his father's pitiful bullshit? God, don't let that happen to him.
Carlos took his time walking up the steps. Coffee was calling his name.
Naw, this was not supposed to be the way it was. Damali deserved the world, and at one point, he'd been able to give her that. His state of affairs had become a travesty, and yet his woman tried her best to make it all seem like it was okay. It wasn't. He knew it; she knew it. That's what she had to think about, most likely. But that she'd made the attempt only made him love her more... and made him equally more determined than ever to fix this bull fast.
"This ain't me by a long shot." Carlos sighed heavily and looked at his hands, then snapped hard once. "Power used to jump off with a pop, just like that," he whispered, enraged as he stared at the flimsy screen door. "So, if I'm the male Neteru, where's the serious juice that comes with the new title? I got a woman and a family to take care of. Y'all listening? How am I gonna take care of my kids when we have 'em?"
By any man's standards, especially his, if the truth be told, his old throne was something hellacious to be reckoned with by comparison to what he was dealing with now. It was about resources and the broad definition thereof. Always had been, he'd told Father Pat that from night one. Rider said talk to the old priest - about what? It might not be what the Covenant wanted to hear, but he was being honest in the silent morning hour.
Facts mentally dissected in the cold light of day weren't always pretty. He had his reasons for doubt, issues that had not been addressed, a legitimate argument, and nobody was giving up answers that made sense, to his mind. All of it tumbled in on him like a ton of loose pyramid bricks.
To him, his soul was tethered by steel cable to his understanding of manhood. Period. It felt like C4 had been rigged to that definition, then exploded, and his soul had caught the shrapnel, took the impact as the blast whipped up the tie line; it had snapped and was strangling him.
He knew he'd been tripping since Philly, but couldn't help it or stop himself as his tortured soul began working on his embattled mind, unraveling it as what was left of his soul clawed to survive, until his body had gotten involved and simply malfunctioned. All aspects of the dilemma were unacceptable to him. The Light needed to get with that.
This new life had disintegrated everything he believed a man should be. At this juncture, he wasn't sure if he cared if the Light took his thoughts the wrong way. So what that they had issues, he did, too. Yeah, he'd work for them from either side, as he did before - if it ever came down to that, again. He knew the deal in spades by now, aces wild. His woman and her family needed the table slanted to the good just to grant them peace. No problem. But not being able to do that for them the way he felt it efficiently needed to be done was torture. Was it wrong for a man to dream? Was ambition with good intent a sin? Not hardly. Not where he was from.
Carlos opened the door the old-fashioned way, walked into the house, and let the screen door slam shut behind him.
CHAPTER SIX
The moment it dawned on her that she was a sitting duck for a family-inspired home invasion, Damali dashed away from the front screen, hit the bathroom, and was in and out of the shower in less than five minutes. Jose's fall-by was just a precursor. She could feel it, and needed a few hours to sort out the tangle of thoughts in her brain.
"Oooohhhh, nooooo," she said loudly while ripping through her bureau drawers to find her underwear, red camisole T, and her earrings. She was out.
Damali flung open the long walk-in bedroom closet, snatched her black leather pants down and yanked on a pair of boots. Her baby Isis blade went on her hip, and her black sunglasses got hooked to the cle**age section of her T-shirt. "No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no no," she repeated as she hurriedly stuffed money and I.D. into her pants pockets.
They must think she was born yesterday. She knew how family could be, and how this was all gonna go. Now that there'd been a demon sighting and all this other madness in the equation, freedom was gone. She hadn't even really had her own place for twenty-four hours!
Before they'd all been alerted that anything in the universe had gone awry, it was bad enough. She knew the family's initial strategy; the first weekend, everybody was being cool to allow Carlos operating room. Then, once they figured brotherman was tight-ened up, they'd start falling by one by one with rental requests. Not that she could blame them, but that was not the point. They knew, just like she did, that there was no way in the world she could be so cold as to deny a family member sanctuary, a hot shower, chill time on her deck, access to her music room, whatever. How could she tell the people she loved, people who had taken bullets for her and had almost died many times in battles too crazy to mention, No, you can't use my place to get your head right? Yeah, right, like she wouldn't share hot water with them after all they'd been through together. But that still was not the point!
She could hear it in her mind, playing out like a horror movie. "Yo, D, uh, you gonna be home all afternoon?" Or, better yet, "Yo, baby girl, uh, the shower situation is kinda tight over at the house, and I was wondering..." Now it was gonna be, "Hey, D, we were thinking, two-by-two detail is in order over here. So, uh, me and my lady are just gonna crash here with you to be sure you can get forty-winks, then when you wake up, we'll go to bed - cool?" She knew her brothers.