I told him I was picking up extra shifts. That it was hard. That I’d survive.
Andre pulled out his wallet and slid two crisp hundred-dollar bills across the table.
“Please,” he said. “Take it. I feel awful.”
I took it.
Not because I needed it.
Because I wanted him to feel the shape of what his silence had cost.
His eyes watered. “I should’ve done more.”
“Yes,” I said. “You should have.”
He flinched again.
But he didn’t argue.
Then, like the universe shifting its weight, the Washington empire started to wobble.
Howard’s real estate projects hit delays. A bad market. Tenants falling behind. Lawsuits bleeding cash. “Liquidity issues,” rich people called it—like drowning with a silk scarf around your neck.
They needed an investor for a new development: luxury waterfront condos. Ten million dollars to keep it alive.
Desperation makes proud people flexible.
And I, quietly, became their option.
Through my attorney, I set up a shell company with a name so bland it could’ve been a stapler brand. My lawyer made the calls, sent the emails. They didn’t ask many questions—because questions take time, and time was the one thing they didn’t have.
We set the meeting at the city’s fanciest restaurant.