Trade

Chapter 2. Love Lost.

Aaron Turner

"I wanna thank you for agreeing to be my best man. There was too much fighting going on and I couldn't deal with choosing between your brother and my best friend" My cousin Angelo said as he stood in front of a mirror and allowed the tailor to adjust his tux.

"I appreciate the offer even if it's last minute. Can't believe you're getting married in a few days, you of all people" I reminded and he laughed out loud as the tailor excused himself. Angelo began to remove the jacket and then neatly sat it aside.

"Guess I'm proving everyone wrong who said I could never make it work with a stripper. We already had a baby together, we might as well tie the knot" Angelo said and I nodded and looked at the time on my watch.

"Am I holding you up from other activities?" He questioned catching my off guard. I chuckled and shook my head as I stood up from my chair and looked at my tux that was hanging in the room.

"There's some stuff I wanna talk to you about. You're the only one that might understand and not just judge me right away" I said as Angelo sat down and lit up a cigar. He nodded his head like he was silently telling me he was all ears.

"You know how much I owe to Ajani and Kaine for everything they did for me. I could never pay them back and even though I don't have to do it, I feel like I should do it. So I begged Amaru to put me on and you know he's a stickup kid and now I feel like it was a mistake" I ranted as I walked around the room.

Angelo puffed on his cigar before he looked me over with an unreadable face but even then I could tell that he was disappointed. He held the cigar in his hand moving it away from his mouth and I looked down.

"Damn Ron. You haven't killed anybody right?" He questioned and I shook my head no. "Kaine made it clear you don't owe him anything, sometimes you just gotta let people take care of you. Focus on your education before you get in too deep" Angelo explained taking the news better than I thought.

"Lo I just wanna pay for my own education and give Kaine his money back" I said and my cousin took another puff of the cigar.

"And how do you plan to do this shit while being a stickup kid? You don't have a job and if you just give him all his money back he's obviously going to wonder how or know you're doing some illegal shit" He pointed out and I shrugged.

"By then I'll be done and on the day I'm graduating from college I'll give it all back. There isn't much he can do then except be mad but he'll get over it" I responded and Angelo was silent for awhile.

He looked at me and then he looked off into space like he was thinking about something and was unsure of if he should say it or not. I waited expectantly for advice but was caught off guard when he stood up and so I took a step back wondering if he was about to swing on me.

"I can't stop you from doing this because you're hardheaded and will probably do it anyway. But Amaru has been helping me out indirectly by stalling the competition. Every time he robs an organization they run low on supplies so maybe you can keep doing what you're doing with rules of course" my cousin said shocking me.

"You mean you'll have people looking out for us in exchange for what?" I questioned and Angelo smirked to himself.

"I mean we're family I can't have you out here dying, but I also want to help my business. So let's compromise, you keep robbing my competition and I'll give you and whoever you're working with free reign to rob and steal from whomever as long as you don't kill anybody. You kill someone and I'm telling Kaine because then the cops are going to get involved. But as long as you're doing street crime then there's really nothing the police can do" Angelo explained.