Chapter Seven
1256 Words
The hideout went dead silent. Jamal’s hand tightened around his Glock, every muscle on edge. Outside, Rico’s voice floated like smoke through the night air.
“You thought you could run? Thought you could hide? Nah, Jamal. I been letting you breathe, that’s all. But time’s up.”
Keisha’s eyes widened. “He found us?”
Taye cursed under his breath, clutching his bandaged arm. “How the hell he keep knowing where we at? Somebody feeding him.”
Jamal motioned for silence, his jaw clenched tight. He moved slow to the window, peeking through the crack. Shadows shifted in the street—figures, armed, spreading out, cutting off exits. Black SUVs lined the block, engines idling low like growls in the dark.
It wasn’t just Rico. It was an army.
Keisha whispered, “We’re boxed in.”
Jamal’s pulse thundered in his ears. He’d been in shootouts before, traps before, but this felt different. This wasn’t just street muscle—this was precision. Rico’s connections were real. The kind Bishop warned him about.
And now they were here.
---
The first window shattered, bullets spraying the walls. Everyone hit the floor, wood splintering around them. Keisha fired back through the crack, glass exploding onto the street.
“They closing in!” she shouted.
Jamal crawled to the back door, kicking it open—but headlights blinded him instantly. Another SUV sat parked, soldiers piling out, guns raised. He ducked back just as bullets chewed through the frame.
“No way out!” Taye gritted, blood soaking his shirt again. “We pinned, J!”
Jamal’s mind raced. He wasn’t about to die trapped in a room like an animal. His eyes landed on the floorboards. Old. Loose.
“The basement,” he hissed.
They shoved the couch aside, prying up the boards. A narrow set of stairs gaped open into darkness. Jamal led the way, heart pounding, the others close behind. As they pulled the boards back in place above them, heavy boots crashed into the room above.
---
The basement stank of mildew and dust. The single bulb overhead flickered weakly. Jamal pressed his ear to the ceiling, hearing muffled voices, footsteps searching.
Rico’s voice again—calm, steady, too close.
“Find them. Bring Jamal to me breathing. I want him to see the end before it comes.”
The footsteps spread out. Boots stomped overhead. One soldier yanked open a closet upstairs, another overturned furniture.
Keisha gripped her pistol tight, whispering, “We can’t stay down here. They’ll find the hatch.”
Jamal scanned the shadows, spotting a rusted door in the far corner. He rushed to it, shoving it open. A tunnel stretched into darkness, narrow and damp. Maybe an old escape route from when the building was still a speakeasy decades back.
“This way,” he said.
They slipped into the tunnel, footsteps echoing in the tight space. Behind them, faint creaks told them the hatch had been discovered. Shouts followed.
“They in the basement!”
Gunfire cracked through the boards as Jamal, Keisha, and Taye sprinted into the tunnel. Bullets ricocheted off concrete, sparks lighting their path.
---
The tunnel spat them out blocks away, into an alley choked with trash bins and graffiti. They stumbled into the open, gasping for air.
For a moment, relief washed over them—until another SUV screeched around the corner, headlights cutting through the dark.
Rico had predicted even this.
Soldiers poured out again. Jamal fired first, dropping one, but more swarmed. Keisha yanked Taye behind cover, returning fire, her face twisted with fury.
“We can’t keep running!” she screamed. “We gotta make a stand!”
Jamal’s chest burned. She was right—but standing here meant dying here. His eyes darted, landing on a fire escape ladder above.
“Up!” he barked.
They scrambled up the ladder, bullets pinging off the metal rungs. Jamal dragged Taye by the arm, hauling him onto the rooftop as Keisha laid down cover fire. By the time they collapsed on the tar, chests heaving, the street below was crawling with Rico’s men.
They weren’t just being hunted. They were being cornered like prey.
---
Hours later, they regrouped in another safe spot—an abandoned auto garage on the Southside. The adrenaline had faded, leaving nothing but exhaustion.
Taye slumped against a wall, pale, his wound worse than he admitted. Keisha paced the room, furious energy crackling off her.
“This ain’t random, J,” she snapped. “Every move we make, he’s already there. Somebody in your circle feeding him our spots.”
Jamal sat on a crate, silent. The thought had been gnawing at him since Velour. And now, hearing Keisha say it out loud, it cut deep.
“Who?” Taye demanded, wincing. “Ain’t but a handful of us left.”
Keisha stopped pacing, her eyes hard. “Exactly.”
The room went still. Suspicion hung thick, turning friends into possible enemies.
Jamal finally spoke, voice low. “We find the rat, we find how Rico stays ahead. And when we do, they bleed first.”
---
But before they could dig deeper, Jamal’s phone buzzed. Another unknown number. Another text.
Tick tock, Jamal. Your time running out.
Attached was a photo.
His auntie. Tied to a chair. Fear in her eyes.
Jamal’s stomach dropped like stone. Rage blurred his vision, his fists trembling around the phone.
“He touched my family,” Jamal whispered, voice shaking with fury. “He crossed the line.”
Keisha’s face hardened. “Then it’s war for real now.”
Taye struggled to his feet, pain twisting his face. “J… this could be bait. You walk into it blind, he’ll finish you.”
Jamal stared at the photo again, his heart ripping apart. He had played this game long enough to know it was a trap. But family wasn’t negotiable.
“If I don’t move,” he said through clenched teeth, “she’s dead anyway.”
The room fell quiet. They all knew what came next.
---
By midnight, Jamal was standing alone on the corner Rico’s message had marked. The street was empty, too quiet, the city’s hum muted under the weight of the moment.
A black SUV rolled up slow, headlights dim. The back door opened.
Rico stepped out. Clean suit. Cold smile.
And there she was—Jamal’s auntie, shoved forward by two armed men.
“Family’s a weakness, Jamal,” Rico said smoothly, voice slicing the silence. “Always has been. That’s why you’ll never beat me. You fight for people. I fight for power. And power don’t hesitate.”
Jamal’s gun was already drawn, but his auntie’s tear-filled eyes locked him in place. His chest burned with rage and helplessness all at once.
“You let her go, Rico,” Jamal growled. “This between me and you.”
Rico smirked. “You still don’t get it, do you? There is no ‘between me and you.’ There’s me. And there’s dust.”
He nodded at his men. One of them pressed a gun to his auntie’s head.
Jamal’s finger tightened on the trigger—every nerve in his body ready to snap.
And then—
The sound of another gun c*****g behind him.
“Drop it, Jamal.”
Jamal froze. Slowly, he turned his head.
Keisha
.
Her pistol aimed at his back.
Cliffhanger:
The betrayal is revealed—Keisha has turned on Jamal, proving Rico’s mole was beside him all along.
- Writer
