The Beautifully Damned and the Eternally Blessed (SAMPLE)

Prologue: The Shot in the Dark

Spring 2019, New York City.

"What a day," Derrick Ra'Keem Booker sighed heavily as he crossed the threshold of his loft-styled apartment located in the Hell's Kitchen district of New York City. "I can't believe that the preliminary show was a total success."

Tossing his jacket onto the sofa as he walked into the living room, he suddenly felt the strange and ominous chill that's been haunting him for the past five years. Inhaling sharply, he was relieved to hear the familiar buzz of his cell phone. He pulled it out of his pocket to see the caller ID of his closest college ally. "What's up, Khalil?" he said.

"Man, just got off from my job at Telfair Advertising," the voice of Khalil Everett said tiredly over the speaker. "Sorry that I wasn't able to attend your fashion show today, but all hands were on deck to finish this campaign for Wynter Cosmetics. I still can't believe that it's been only 17 years since you came here to start your fashion line after everything you've been through."

"Tell me about it," Derrick commented, setting the phone down on the kitchen countertop as he made a beeline for the sub-zero refrigerator and began finding everything he needed for a small charcuterie board. "I'm only 35 years old and I'm already known as one of the youngest designers to make a giant mark in the fashion world. It's a shame that I'm going to be calling it in this summer at Fashion Week."

"Why give it up, then?"

Derrick took a deep breath. "Well, it's more classier to leave before you're asked to," he began, not sounding convincing to his majordomo and confidante since their time at the Art Institutes.

"Uh-uh," Khalil warned, tone sounding parental. "I know that tone already, man. It's those chills you've been getting for a while, isn't it?"

"Damn it," Derrick hissed, knowing that he couldn't get past Khalil even if he tried. The Alabama-based advertising designer was known to sense a lie from a person without missing a beat, so Derrick knew that he had to keep it real. "They've been more and more concurrent lately, even more so since-"

"Fuck, today's the anniversary of you breaking ties with your parents and older sister back in Atlanta, isn't it?"

"Yeah, man. And something tells me that they're going to make sure that they keep their promise of making me regret not falling in line with their American dream," Derrick breathed. "Melina's always been their favorite since was as beautiful yet wicked as our parents are."

"Any word from the other sister, the one you've been talking to from your emails and social media?" Khalil wanted to know.

"Yeah," Derrick noted, satisfied with his small board of mini-cheese slices and deli meats with crackers before grabbing a bottle of wine. "Dad's been pressuring Jana to finally make it official with her sleazebag of a fiance. Like that'll work with her. If anything, she's like me since they've been emotionally and verbally abusive towards her. Thank God that they haven't done anything physical towards her, or I might've shot the old bastard myself."

"Nah, man. You're too fly as hell to go to prison," Khalil said. "Marcel and his wife Antonia aren't worth shit for you to risk your freedom and fame over. Neither is Melina. You had to leave that home if you didn't want to end up dead."

"Tell me about it," Derrick noted, grabbing his glass of wine and charcuterie board before walking to his living room. "But still, my family is known to prey upon the weak yet didn't allow any form of weakness in any way, shape, or form. They wanted to snuff me out for the longest since I failed to marry Yvonne or be like Jamal, both of them being twice as worse as my folks are. And now that things are starting to get more real, I know that my time is coming up."