Jordyn's life in Chicago is turned upside down when she receives a call from her estranged mother, Pauline, who’s been arrested by the feds in Miami. Torn between her past and her new life, Jordyn must decide whether to return to a city that holds painful memories and danger, or stay and protect the future she’s worked so hard to build.
“This is a prepaid call from a Dade County correctional facility. If you would like to accept this call, press 1. If you do not wish to accept this call, hang up.”
Jordyn’s heart sank in her chest. It had been four years since she’d seen or spoken to Mega, so when the jail call came through, she was afraid to accept in fear of hearing his voice again. But something in her gut told her to answer, and when she did, the last person she expected to hear on the other end was her mother.
“Hey, Baby Girl.”
“Ma!?” Jordyn frowned in confusion. “Why the hell are you calling me from jail?”
“It’s a long story that I can’t get into over the phone, but I need your help.”
Pauline sounded fragile and defeated. After her come up with Mega and his crew, she started putting in crazy work. She made the most money out of all of his workers and rounded up more clientele in different states than any of his men.
She loved the game of money. She loved the freedom that came with it, and she loved being able to take care of herself the way she used to. So when she had to call Jordyn and ask for help again, Pauline felt like she had failed her daughter for the umpteenth time.
“Are you able to come to Miami?” she asked. “The detectives that picked me up from bingo don’t look like no regular detectives. I been around the yard a few times, so I know the feds when I see them.”
“Ma,” Jordyn sighed, “I told you I was never coming back. And this is exactly why I wanted you out of Miami and away from all that shit.”
“I know. Trust me, I know. I’m sorry to call you, but I got a bad feeling about this.”
The fear Jordyn felt before the call began turned into anger before it ended. She had built a brand new life in Chicago, started her own consulting company, and thought she put the reckless city of Miami in her rearview for good. So it pissed her off when Pauline called, asking for her help again. It seemed like no matter how far Jordyn tried to distance herself from the life of crime, it always followed.
“You have one minute remaining,” the operator’s voice alerted.
“Can I call you tomorrow?” Pauline asked. “I’m not sure what they’re holding me on, so maybe I’ll be released. But if not.”
“Yeah,” Jordyn cut her off to avoid a truth she knew all too well. “Call me tomorrow and let me know what’s going on. I’ll see what I can do about getting down there.”
The call ended before either of them got to say their goodbyes and even though Jordyn was upset with her mother for turning to the streets again, she felt odd not being able to say I love you.
From what she knew about jail, doing time felt like dying a slow death. And since Pauline had already declined from her cancer, Jordyn’s feelings of obligation crept into her bones and made her want to run to her mother’s rescue.
Every time I try to live my best life, here comes some bullshit, she thought to herself. I left Miami, Mega, and all their toxic bullshit behind four years ago. Why the hell would I wanna go back? She knows how triggering it is for me. Especially after my miscarriage.
Jordyn’s mind was all over the place, but the one thought that was constant was her miscarriage. When she found out that Mega slept with Mila while they were in New York, she got so sick and stressed out that the pregnancy was too much for her body to bear. Not to mention the dozens of times he called, wanting to know where she was and if she was keeping the baby.
The truth was, Mega was the reason she was able to leave Miami in the first place. He was the reason she was able to start her company and build a new life. But he was also the reason she never wanted to step foot on Florida soil again.
After the way he played her with Mila and thought $200,000 would buy him time to figure out his love life, Jordyn grew tired of waiting and turned into a woman with a chip on her shoulder.
“Knock-knock.” Adrian, Jordyn’s assistant, walked into her office without a care in the world. She was bold, loud, and boisterous. The perfect candidate for JX Consulting. Jordyn had actually hired her by accident, but over time, they grew to love each other and were able to put their differences aside to build an empire.
“What if I was in here getting my freak on or something?” Jordyn teased. “You never wait for me to actually say, ‘Come in. You just come in.”
“Oh, I know Miss Conservative ain’t doing none of that!” Adrian laughed. “You probably ain’t let a nigga smell the coochie the whole time you been in Chicago.”
She was right. No man had touched Jordyn since Mega. She was so messed up over him, Mila, and the miscarriage that she wouldn’t even look at a man too hard.
“Everything that needed to be signed, sealed, and delivered has been signed, sealed, and delivered. So I’ma take off on this good Friday night. I got myself a hot date.”
Adrian admired herself in the full body mirror in Jordyn’s office as if she were wearing her favorite freak-um dress and red heels.
She was a thick and curvy woman with a small waist and the perfect ratios. No man to call her own, but she had a lot of admirers. You know, men she used to get what she wanted.
“Did I overhear you ask your mama why she was calling you from jail?” She took a seat and made herself comfortable.
“Girl! Why are you listening to my phone calls?” Jordyn asked. “That’s not what I pay you for.”
“You said it as I was walking back from the fax room,” Adrian playfully rolled her eyes. “What’s up with Miss Pauline? She whooped somebody’s ass at bingo?”
As bad as it sounded, Jordyn wished that was all that had happened. She wished her mother would’ve given up her dream of being the queen of Philly. She wished she had never introduced her to Mega and most of all, she wished Adrian wasn’t so damn nosy.
“Not this time,” Jordyn replied. “I might have to go down to Florida for a while, though.”
For the first time since they’d met, Adrian looked intimidated. She’d always talked about starting her own business and how much freedom came with it, and even though Jordyn didn’t want to leave her franchise behind for a trip to Florida, she knew Adrian was the perfect person to stand in her place.
“What you mean for a while?” Adrian raised one of her brows. “Like, a few days?”
“It may be longer than that,” Jordyn answered. “Anyway, it don’t matter how long I’ll be gone. I have you to take care of things for me.”
“Wait, wait, wait. Now, hold on. I applied as an assistant. Not CEO. Assistant. That means I take the calls, get the coffee, schedule appointments, give tours, you know? Stuff like that. Not run the entire company.”
Adrian’s emphasis made Jordyn laugh uncontrollably.
She felt like there was no time for laughing, though. Her mother was in jail, and she had to stop her entire life again to save her.
“I need you on this, Adrian. You’re the only one I trust enough to make sure we’re still standing when I get back. And plus, you been killing it with ideas this week! Shit, your vision might be better than mine right about now.”
“Well, you know!” Adrian tooted her lips and flipped her hair to one side.
“Exactlyyy!” Jordyn cheered. “I know my girl will take care of things if I decide to go.”
That moment of bliss, happiness and sisterhood made Jordyn forget about the problems she knew would come if she went to Miami. But Pauline was her mother. Her sick mother. And if the feds had her, it was for a reason. Not something small, like jaywalking or fighting at bingo.
“Hey, do your parents still take clients?”
Jordyn remembered Adrian’s parents were both lawyers. She remembered it so well because she was surprised that someone so loud and ratchet could have parents with respectable careers. She was ashamed to admit that she had judged Adrian prematurely, but she was thankful that she stuck around.
“For twenty-eight years,” Adrian smiled proudly. “I don’t think either one of them is giving that up no time soon. Why? You think your mama might need a lawyer?”
“Do they handle fed cases?”
“Fed cases?” Adrian’s eyebrows raised. “What the hell Miss Pauline been doing in Miami? Hanging out with Rick Ross and Gunplay?”
The laughter that erupted inside Jordyn’s office brought Roman, her security guard, down the hall for a wellness check. Roman was a guy she met when she first moved to Chicago. He had a huge crush on her, but because he reminded her so much of Mega, she thought they were better off as friends.
She hired him as security because she was afraid Bossy might come back around, and so he’d look the part for the judge and his parole officer, and surprisingly, Roman took that as an opportunity to leave the streets and better himself. In turn, he started his own security firm and still looked out for Jordyn on the side.
“I thought a muhfucka broke in and started snatching wigs or something,” Roman said as he entered her office. “What y’all loud asses talking bout in here?”
“Shut up, Roman!” Jordyn laughed. “What are you still doing here anyway? It’s after six o’clock.”
“I was getting ready to leave until I heard y’all asses. I had to make sure everything was copacetic.”
“Everything is copacetic. Except Jordyn getting ready to go back to Miami to bail Miss Pauline out of jail.”
Adrian couldn’t hold water to save herself from a burning building and as much as Jordyn loved her girl and wanted to be her friend for life, there were a lot of things she didn’t tell Adrian because she talked too much.
“Miami?” Roman looked concerned. “What’s going on out there?”
In the four years Jordyn had known him, she confided in him a lot. She told him so much because he was a great listener, he was gentle with her, and even though he was rough around the edges, he gave good advice.
As the years passed, and he grew into the man they both knew he was destined to be, Jordyn sometimes thought about circling back to see where the universe might take them. But that old fear of falling in love again always held her back.
“I don’t know,” Jordyn sighed. “That’s what I need to figure out.”
“You need backup?”
Adrian took the serious expression on Roman’s face as a hint to leave. She knew bits and pieces about Jordyn’s time in Miami and her relationship with Mega, and she also knew how overprotective Roman was over her. Anytime he thought she was talking to another man, he acted like he was body guarding the queen of the night.
“Alright y’all, I’m gone,” Adrian said as she headed for the door. “Jordyn, call me and let me know what’s what about me filling in. And Roman,” she paused to think of something slick to say. “You need to take a chill pill before you have a heart attack.”
When she was gone and an uncomfortable silence filled the room, Roman sat down in the chair in front of Jordyn’s desk. He didn’t say anything about her thoughts of going to Miami, and he didn’t need to. She already knew what he was concerned about.
“Is this really about Pauline?”
“What else would it be about?” Jordyn scoffed. “After four years, you think I’m running back to the arms of the man who broke me?”
Roman shrugged. He didn’t know what Jordyn had in mind, and he had no reason not to trust her, but he remembered how torn apart she was about the lover she left in Miami.
“You know this is dangerous, right? What if Bossy still out there gunning for y’all? A lot of shit needs to be thought about before you just up and go to Miami.”
“What am I supposed to do about my mom, Roman? Just let her sit in jail?” Jordyn got up and walked away from her desk to avoid looking at him. “She said these weren’t regular detectives who picked her up. They were the feds.”
Roman’s eyes widened in disbelief. He knew all about Pauline being the queen of Philly back in her day and even about her moving work for Mega, but he didn’t think it was enough to alert the feds.
If there was one thing he learned while doing ten years in a max facility, it was that the feds wanted the big fish, and they didn’t stop until they caught them.
“Call a lawyer before you get there.” His voice was deep and serious as he approached her, standing at her window overlooking the beauty of Hyde Park. “You need to have all your ducks in a row before you push back at the feds. Your new life is entangled in this, too. So, if they already got Pauline, I’m willing to bet they want her plug and anybody who knows anything about him.”
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