ꨄThe Debutanteꨄ

86.

...

One Month Later

...

Over the past cold months, Cookie had been spending time working on Anika getting her strength back. They would walk constantly, and make sure that Anika moved her legs as much as possible. It seemed as if within a few more weeks, she was just about back to normal.

...

The rumors regarding the women and Empire didn't subside, though, and word was spreading like wildfire. Tabloids, articles, and videos. Empire was only getting worse and the women that it needed most were nowhere seen.

Cookie was torn between what she should do, but she didn't tell Anika about how much went on in her head about it.

...

Andre grabbed the phone off of the hook quickly, rubbing his face before raising it up to his ear. "This is Andre Lyon speaking- Sir please relax, your investment will be taken cared of- What? I'm sorry, what do you mean?" He asked. The mans reply on the other end made Andrea face fall to a frozen expression.

He opened his fathers office doors quickly, walking inside with a frown on his face. There was a stack of papers on the desk, and some fallen onto the floor. Lucious tilted his head up at him in confusion. "Where is their money, pop?" He asked. "Man, what are you talking about?" He asked. "The investors. Where is their money?" He asked. Lucious fanned his head away. "Look, I'm working on it, alright- Working on it? Pop, we have investors in line waiting for their money to cash out, they invested thousands....millions!- Well look dammit, I ain't got the funds to give them what they got!" Lucious shouted.

"Pop, our stocks we're losing our value! If we don't pay them now, they won't have any money to claim. They'll never invest with us again and they might try to make reissue claims- Well what the hell can I do- We're running out of artists for them to invest in. Blake's gone, Tianna and Treasure said that they're on the verge of leaving as well! You only have Hakeem and Jamal but there's too much pressure on them being the only people keeping the company afloat- What do you want me to do?!" Lucious shouted.

"Don't you see me up in here working my ass off trying to make sure everything is good for the damn company I built?!" He shouted. Andre stared at him. He crossed his arms. "Things didn't start getting bad until you fired Anika and mom left." He said. "Anika was a threat to the reputation of this company as a whole, and as for your mama who followed out right behind her, that's what she does. She leaves." Lucious said.

Andre wanted to say something. Wanted to say how he and his brothers knew about what happened me did to Anika. About how he shot her and left her to die. About how he thinks she's dead but in reality she was in a coma for six months. He could have exposed him right then and there, throw him under the bus and let him get charged for attempted murder. But his mother held the green light for this. And it would probably be better for now if Lucious didn't know that Anika was still alive.

"What happened to the other people you interviewed to become the head of A&R?" Andre asked. "Weren't qualified." Lucious replied. He was beginning to reap what he sowed without acknowledging it. He didn't start to struggle with the company until he got rid of the people who actually kept it running. The ones who did the jobs while he was too busy collecting the benefits. And now that they're gone, he's failing. But yet he's too bitter to even accept the fact that his two ex-wives are a couple. It's understandable if he's scorn, but what happened to him always wanting to put everyone else's emotions aside to focus on the company? Now he's putting his first and it's causing everyone else to sink.

Andre only turned away and exited out of the room, in search for his brothers.

...

"No, it doesn't sound right. Can you slow down the tempo?" Tianna asked from inside of the recording booth. The man looked confused for a moment, then doing something with a knob. Once the sons started to play again, it was way too slow for Tianna to make the lyrics connect the way she wanted. She smacked her lips, then getting up and exiting out of the room. "Hey T!" Hakeem called, walking after her as she headed out of the studio.