Black Queen, Dark Knight II Read online

  “Yes, My Queen. Not all of them left the country in the belief that you were incapable.” Her gaze twinkles. “They were merely fed up. Your land is virtually free of his followers, sympathizers, and anyone who showed a kindness to Qaaim after your parents died. I am your servant!”

  Clutching a hand over my chest, the words begin to sink in. Chumi’s theory is vastly different than the statement she just made. So, perhaps it wasn’t social unrest that caused two hundred clansmen to leave. “You murdered people?”

  “Not I, My Queen. I am your servant for life. There are others who have swept up the liars and the scum. Nivean is a beautiful nation. You may not recall how it was while ruled under your parents. There was certainly strife with those against King Bannan, but not I, My Queen.”

  “Then who?”

  “Your true followers, who loved—who mourned—the deaths of your mother and your father are not ready to bow to your feet just yet. We will continue to serve you behind the scenes, Queen Mikayla, until you’re seasoned and have learned the desires of your people.”

  “Who?” I grab her collar. “Who the fuck is playing with my head?”

  She smiles affectionately. “You marry Prince Fari, and you’ll know.”

  The back of my hand goes sailing across her face.

  Chinwa grits. “Your parents weren’t given half a chance. Qaaim’s traitors sunk their teeth into the beloved King Bannan and Queen Makuachukwa. They left this world too soon. We will continue to keep you safe, Mikayla, and intervene when necessary.”

  I stare at Denso. The stoic face he had while hurting her arms has faded into a palpable shock.

  “Intervene when necessary.” These fucks plan on sending me off into Prince Fari’s homeland. They aren’t aware of what Jagger would do if I caved to these crazy mind games.

  “Chinwa.” My voice softens. “You have shown your loyalty to my parents. My mother married a man who was born and raised on an island just off the Eastern African Coast. So you understand—”

  “That you are in love with the white man. I do,” she purrs. “Were it not for the needs of our nation, your loyal servants would not be so demanding. We do not have the time to entertain this relationship. It’s best to rid yourself of him. He is the enemy of Nivean.”

  Hands in fists, I stifle a sob as the nightmare where my father forced Abayomi and I to leave along the riverbank rears its head in my mind. I witnessed a hate crime prior to understanding such atrocities.

  Denso uses a soothing brotherly tone. “I will take her to the dungeon, Queen Mikayla. We’ll have every name of who is behind this in no time.”

  Dungeon? Where is this dungeon? I stare into Chinwa’s eyes, still not wishing ill upon her. Though an intense silence permeates the air, my mind begins to focus on MamLalumi. “I am your queen, and I am begging you. Where is the diviner?” My breath hitches. “Where is MamLalumi? She can undo this blunder. I will forgive you.”

  Chinwa smiles.

  I jump on her now, a thousand memories of myself and Lalumi when she cared for me while my parents went to galas and dined with the Queen of England. I slap, scratching and biting my nails into her neck while squeezing. “You’ve done something to MamLalumi! What have you done?”

  “Stop now, or the next time we are with Prince Fari, we will proceed to love him further than you can ever imagine.”

  I stop hitting her instantly, scrambling away as the voice speaks inside of my head.

  “Oh, don’t seem so afraid, Mikayla. We have been told he is a rather giving lover.”

  I can’t! I can’t cheat on Jagger.

  “We grow stronger, Mikayla. For you. In you.”

  In me?

  “Yes. It means that the longer we inhabit you, those quick movements, that stubborn tenacity you had last night not to kiss the Prince, it will all fail you. Cooperate or you will bed the prince prior to the wedding. And there will be a wedding!”

  Denso is at my side. Chinwa is being carried out by Eadric and three other guards. He touches my cheek. “My Queen, please, please respond to me.”

  I’m seated on the ground, legs against my chest, arms wrapped around me like a crackhead coming down from the worst high. “How long?”

  “You were unresponsive for almost five minutes.”

  Pursing my lips in thought, I determine it’s similar in length and time to my internal discussion. Holding out his hand, Denso assists me with claiming a seat.

  “I need to make a quick call, and then we can continue into town.”

  Like before, his face reveals his shock. This time it warms over with the worry that a big brother would offer his sister. Unfortunately, I was never lucky in that regard. “We can tell the people that you’re still ill.”

  “No. This transference that I’m having,” I gesture to myself in confusion, “it might be the most frightening feeling—not being able to have control of my own body—but I have to assure Nivean that I am a competent leader. Canceling is another mixed signal and indicator that I’m,” my voice breaks, “inadequate.”

  A flood of my ancestral spirits breeze through me, filling my body with assurance. Where were they when that thing stole the thoughts inside of my head? Tuning them out in anger, I grab my cellphone from my pocket to dial Jagger.

  “Couldn’t get enough of me? Need me to sneak into your private stateroom, paint your tits, face, and crown with my—”

  “Hey.” My body warms to the sound of his voice. Hearing something that sounds like heavy machinery in the background, I ask, “Where are you?”

  “My truck’s being loaded onto a cargo plane as we speak, Mikayla. I took an assignment, sweetheart. Your good friend Solarin advised that I have my fun elsewhere.”

  “Sounds ominous, Jag,” I groan. “We owe a great deal to Zane. You abide by his—wait not even his rules—I believe the lack of committing murder can be considered the niceties of society. How about that?”

  He chuckles softly. “They made me do it.”

  “Hmmmm. So, I take it not just one person pissed you off in the course of a few days?” I bite my lip. I’d called to ask his assistance with finding MamLalumi. What if Chinwa was just capitalizing on MamLalumi truly leaving the area to visit with a kindred spirit? They could be throwing me off, and then Jagger’s gone and . . . Shit, Jagger’s already bound to an assignment. C’mon Kayla, this is your nation, rule it. “So, where is this assignment taking you?”

  “Damn, Kayla. Don’t you know what happened to me the last time I let you in on the organization’s affairs?”

  “Anarchy. Literal anarchy and,” I almost chuckle, lowering my voice though Denso has made himself busy near the door, “kill-heads.”

  “Yeah.”

  A bitter sweet grin tugs at the corners of my lips. “But I can only assume you were living the life, bullets blazing past that golden, muscular ass—”

  “Kayla, objectify my ass, and you will be punished the next time I see you.”

  “Alright,” I murmur. “Albeit, I have my own stipulations. I assume you recall?”

  “Only sniper work,” his baritone voice ends in a grumble. “Listen, uthando, I’ll be very, very far away. Somewhere cold if you get my drift, Mikayla. Do you need me?”

  Jagger’s offer seeps into my bones. Do I need him? More than my next breath of air. I focus on being a good girlfriend and supporting him. “How long do you have to complete the assignment?”

  “Sounds like you need me.”

  “Want and need are two different things.” I counter. Yes! I need you. Don’t go, don’t go, don’t go!

  “In that case, I’ll try to complete this one in record time. Three weeks, Kayla.”

  The pit of my stomach sinks. Three weeks. A revolution is bound to occur prior to that timeframe elapsing. “Can you call me?”

  One of those good, long chuckles rolls through the phone. “For someone who just wants to use me, you’re asking a lot of questions. So, I’ll ask you a question for a question. Mikayla Bryant-Mthemb
u, do you need me to stay, sweetheart?”

  Tears blur my gaze.

  Zane Solarin wants Jagger to stay out of trouble, which is totally impossible. The next best thing is for Jagger to stay far away from . . . me.

  And if I tell him that I need him like my next breath of air, which is the epitome of truth, then he stays. He potentially does bad things. I laugh at myself internally. Potentially my black ass. He does bad things. And the man who helped restore my rightful place on the throne goes after him.

  And what if having him search for MamLalumi is for naught? She might be helping others in need, especially in a country that does not have the same level of safety as my own. Or she was taken by my so-called supporters, and she’s stuck in a realm of . . .

  Though it seems like ages since he offered to stay, my brain runs rampant in seconds. I speak up. “I’d love for you to stay, Jag. But I understand the consequences of you taking an assignment and not following through in a timely manner. While your away, I’ll just miss you like crazy. But you’ll pay when you get back.”

  * * *

  I was told by my father that the Nivean Hall was constructed in the 1970s. Bannan explained that it made it easier for the citizens to make their claims without traveling up the hill to the palace. At first, I thought it was all a bunch of talking, like a round table, with myself casting the final decision.

  That’s not it.

  I almost need a Fitbit for the process. Often, people will ask me outside to assess a flock of cattle or a lone goat. The people show their supporting evidence. In a short amount of time, my personal woes have passed away, and I listen intently to two men bicker about said lone goat, who is rather fat and has been sneaking from one man’s land to another, eating his crop.

  “Your Highness, if it were just a few morsels of grains, then okay, let the goat eat, but look at him. I can’t feed my family, and he is clearly another mouth!” the plaintiff exclaims, looking the gray spotted goat up and down.

  “He came out of his mother fat.” The defendant folds his arms.

  “Lies! How about you slaughter him and give me half, or gift him to MamLalumi.” He glares. “You can feed an entire village. Queen, I say you take the goat.”

  “Alan, do you have a photo of Tink Tink,” I mention the goat by name, “to prove your claim that he was born fat and perhaps is not consuming a lot of your neighbor’s garden?”

  Alan’s eyes slip to the ground momentarily. Though this rather comical argument is easily rectified by installing a fence between their properties, I disregard my Western ways. It’s not their way. In Nivean, our community’s largest food supply comes from each individual homes.

  “That is true, for now. Once the crop yields from Prince Fari’s kind gesture, those statistics will change.” The creepy utterance worms through my cognition in an attempt to garner more gratitude from myself for Fari.

  “Alan lies to you, My Queen.” The accuser scoffs, easing my desire to ignore the possession. “Tink Tink was skin and bones before he got ahold of my—”

  While he’s speaking, an old Toyota slams up onto the curb. Every guard member places a hand on the gun in his holster. The driver’s door opens, and a man in muddy jeans and shirt jumps out, unaware that he’s now a threat. A few people murmur his name in bewilderment. He runs to the passenger side, opens it, and pulls out a toddler with short cropped hair in a dingy dress.

  “MamLalumi is gone! The doctor is . . . I don’t know where the doctor is! Help, help!” With her father running up to us, her head lulls to the side, tiny mouth pooling with blood. The girl’s limbs lie lifeless at her sides. “My baby, she-she jumped from the roof, playing with her big brothers and—”

  “She needs an emergency trach,” I command. The medical knowledge that I set aside to come here, rears itself full force. I pull out of my silk coat and place it on the ground. We don’t have time to run into the hall and place her on the table. “Lay her down!”

  “But your robe,” someone whispers.

  The father lays his child down on top of the robe. He sits cross-legged style, her head in his lap. Fingers trembling, he murmurs while holding her.

  “I need a knife, a straw, and alcohol, now!”

  In the background, half the crowd is questioning my order while the other begin to search their purses and pockets. Denso hands over a combat knife from his utility belt. Alan pulls out a flask from his back pocket, and the pungent liquid flows over the blade as I hold it. People are yelling to each other, “Does anyone have a straw?’

  “A straw?”

  “What type of straw?”

  I shove out the nervous responses, clutching at my hair! The jade like straws I used for my updo. As my hand clasps and yanks one from my hair, an idea flashes in my mind. Alan pours the rest of his alcohol onto the edge. In less than a minute, I’ve made a small incision at the toddler’s throat, plunging the tip of the jade straw into her cricothyroid membrane to create an airway, bypassing the blood in her throat.

  The father’s eyes gloss. He mumbles thank you, while staring at his child, hands still tremoring slightly.

  Light returns to the toddler’s skin, her tiny chest gains equilibrium, and with an even swoosh life issues from the jade straw. I assess her limbs for broken bones during her fall. Pulling up her dress as discreetly as possible, my hands feel over her ribs. “Please see to it that your daughter is evaluated by the doctor. She needs a chest X-rays at the very least.”

  There might as well be a million eyes full of praise on me as I stand from the ground, rubbing my hands over the sides of my dress. That adrenaline rush I lived for, glamourizing my physician-future as a child, inspires me until the voice speaks again. “I was second guessing how deserving of the throne you are, despite your mother and father’s loving, compassionate rule, My Queen. But what you’ve accomplished today is amazing. My apologies for second guessing.”

  Then will you leave me alone? I wait with bated breath.

  “Not possible. I’ll continue to guide you toward the best for Nivean.”

  21

  Jagger

  Two Weeks Later

  Ukraine

  A real, live porcelain doll squats down inches away from my face. The stripper dominates the red, glossy stage where scraped-up wood counters have been constructed at the edge. Her legs snap open, and I place five hundred hryvnia in the mirrored triangle of a thong covering her cunt.

  Rock hard forearms leaning against the ledge of the wood, I tip my drink to her. That’s right lady. I’m giving you all the attention in the world. And she has twirled that little ass in my face the entire time. A few of her girlfriends working the stage shimmied over, but I didn’t have eyes for them. For the umpteenth time, the porcelain doll attempts to stake claim to this section like I’m prime realty.

  “Meni podobayetʹsya yiyi bahato, tilʹky yiyi—I like her a lot, only her,” I say to a curvier brunette who has now chosen a more stealth mode, approaching by crawling on her hands and feet over to us. I chuckle. The mouse-haired girl rolls her eyes away from me as I add, “You know what they say about blondes, doll.”

  Eyes still on the porcelain doll, but most importantly the mirrored chips on her bra, my gaze follows the crowd around us. I’m waiting for my mark to arrive, and all of the corners in this little pussy-sniffing hell hole were full. So, the chick in the mirrored intimates is doing me a service, though she doesn’t know.

  Through the big-breasted reflection, I can only take in shapes. The reflectors on her bra aren’t that accommodating. But my mark is the only one who will enter in white with a crew of his men.

  “Inshyy.” A waitress with flowing red hair and teasing her nipples, purrs in my ear. She holds a bottle of horilka. This shit makes my usual whiskey taste like honey. I nod. A copious amount of vodka splashes into my glass. I hold up a few hryvnia fifties. In most scenarios, I wouldn’t flash around money. My hit, Yakiv, owns this place, and he’s been known to leave the rat hole he hides in to welcome big money s
penders at this shit bar.

  The blond, who unknowingly is assisting me with this operation, begins to fiddle with the clasps at the back of her bra in order to go topless. Again, I pull hryvnia from my pocket, stopping her chilly little fingers.

  “Znimitʹ tse piznishe—no, no, take it off later.” I run a hand through my unruly hair, cocking a grin, “Sweetheart, Tilʹky ya mozhu pobachyty tsi pryvablyvi sysʹky sʹohodni vvecheri—nobody, nobody but me is seeing those perky tits tonight.”

  Her beam brightens up the place. Her hands trail from behind her, over her breasts where her mirrored bra remains intact and over the milky softness of her skin. The blonde moans, “Ya ne mozhu chekaty.” I can’t wait, she says, but I can.

  Almost an hour passes, and I’m beginning to wonder if playing Mr. Money Bags at Yakiv’s bar wasn’t the best idea. I’d high hopes to expire the mark and return home by the end of the week, but it looked like that wasn’t going to happen. I’d told Mikayla three when the profile request offered an entire month. But Yakiv isn’t an easy rat to catch.

  Then it happens. After all the staring at the porcelain doll, only having eyes for her and those helpful assets of hers, the door opens. Men start trailing in. I stare at her breasts, plucking up more money, and she bends her head back, almost ruining my view from her reflectors. I rely on the tiny triangle shape when her legs blossom. When they do, I see a gun pointed in our direction.

  Fuck.

  I yank at her ankle, causing her entire body to fall flat onto the table.

  “Sorry, sweetheart.” I mumble, unsure if she has kids or an old man at home. I turn around, blocking her, when a shotgun slug slams into my blue linen shirt. The force of it sends my hips back, hitting the back of the stage.

  Shit.

  Even with Trick’s modifications, it always hurts like hell.