FREDDY PRINCE

chapter eleven

After a long day of work, Freddy was finally ready to go home for the night. It was around midnight when Mo gave him the heads-up about Kalani being enraged about something. She barged her way into the lobby like a mad woman and was on her way upstairs to him. Mo couldn't say what Kalani was mad at, but she figured whatever it was had to be something important.

When Kalani made it to the top floor, Freddy was already waiting for her at the elevator door. He was eager to know what was going on, though he felt he already knew another one of those demons Fantasia summoned was on its way to him.

"You knew!"

Kalani lashed out as soon as she saw him.

"You knew all this time! You watched my father dump my mother's body like she was trash and you never said anything!"

She slapped and punched at him, trying to claw his eyes out it seemed. But Freddy didn't retaliate. He felt like he earned it.

"Kalani, stop! Listen. Let me explain."

He tried to calm her down but she wouldn't hear him. She couldn't hear him. All she could hear was the sound of her own voice, drowning in sorrow, anger, and pain. She couldn't believe she trusted Freddy. The guy who got praised for being such a great humanitarian, a great friend, and a loving member of the community. But after what she saw on those video files, she saw him as a fraud.

Kalani slid to the floor and cried. It was all she could do. When she saw Freddy on video watching everything her father did that night, she felt betrayed by him. She thought that if he had gone forward and told the police what he saw, her mother's case might've been solved a long time ago.

"Why didn't you say anything?" she asked. "Even if it wasn't what it looked like, why wouldn't say anything?"

He was stuck. Something inside wanted him to tell her the truth; he wanted to tell her the truth, but the mayor. Mack. His career. All of those things played a factor in what could affect him for the rest of his life.

"Look," he said, lifting Kalani to her feet. "I should've said something. I should've told you a long time ago what I saw that night."

He thought about Mack and his threats. Montgomery and the NDA too. Freddy wasn't an easy kill or a man who ran from danger, but he didn't want to go back to his old way of life. He wanted to make a genuine change and stick to it.

"I didn't know what I saw that night," Freddy said, feeling chills all over his body. "At the time, I thought it was a bad fucking dream or Montgomery was getting rid of some mothafucka who fucked with his campaign or something. I didn't know it could've been Naomi until the news hit. When he came to my office the next day with some macho-looking mothafucka offering me money and handing me this NDA to sign, I knew something wasn't right. I just didn't know what. I still don't know what."

Kalani stared at him, trying to find a reason to blame him. She wanted every single person who had anything to do with what happened to her mother to pay, but she couldn't find a reason to hate Freddy. He was a genuine man who got caught up in the devil's work.

"My mother knew who killed your mom," Kalani said.

Freddy's eyes fluttered after her words. They were words that nearly crippled him as he tried to digest what she said.

"What did you say?" he asked, his voice almost a whisper.

"I got some video footage from a woman who worked with my mom. She held onto it all these years because she was afraid the same thing would happen to her if she said what she knew. Someone who works with my dad killed your mom. My mom found out about it and was gonna go to the police. Unfortunately, she was silenced before she made it."