The Awakening (29 page)

My twilight zone moment finally came to a halt when I saw Dom's cell phone number finally appear on my cell phone screen. I swear it was the best thing I could have seen all night.

“I'm okay, baby. I'm okay,” I heard him say over and over on the other end.

“I know…now.”

37
NEFERTERRI

Time stood still until I got to the hospital.

It didn't take long to find the boys at Piedmont Fayette Medical. By the time we got there, my husband pretty much looked close to his old self. I saw he was still a little shaken up, as was Jay, probably because it's not every day you watch people die in front of you. They were both joking while Ramesses was being attended to. That was his defense mechanism, one that he picked up from his father. Jay was really focused on staying cool for the most part. I understood, because I don't know what I would have done if someone I cared about died in the manner that Jasmine did.

Dominic was filling out paperwork with the nurses and flirting with them at the same time. I laughed to myself, shaking my head. They'd survived a gunfight an hour ago and the only thing he could think of was the lovely young nurse fawning over the “big, strong officer.” He finally saw the two of us and motioned for us to head into the room, turning his attention back to the nurse, who wrote down her number as ordered.

Candy didn't know whether to hug Jay or slap him silly. She really was never good at these types of situations. The closer we got to them, the more she shed tears of relief and joy they were both okay, and the “bytch” I was used to finally succumbed to being a woman relieved to seeing her man in one piece.

“You scared the hell out of us both, damn it. Do you realize you could've died? Do you hear me, Jay?” Candy scolded before giving him the tightest hug that I'd ever seen her give
any
man. She turned her attention to Ramesses. “Kane, are you okay?”

Ramesses lifted up in the bed and patted the spot next to him for me to sit. “I feel like shit for letting myself get jacked like that. This was not the way I thought this was going to go down.”

Dom walked in and replied jokingly to Ramesses' statement, “That's what you get for choosing to be a shutterbug and not a detective, knucklehead. Not my fault your instincts are getting rusty.”

Ramesses laughed off the chide and began to explain he and Amenhotep were in the bank when he saw Jasmine waving at them like she was in trouble and needed their help. When he approached her as they were walking toward his car, she couldn't stop crying, which kept him distracted long enough for three of her thugs to take the back of a gun to his head, knocking him cold.

That was consistent with what Amenhotep explained when we were at his house.

When he woke out of it, he could only hear Jasmine around him, and he was tied down completely with no chance of getting loose.

“She kept mocking me,” he said.

At first, Jasmine wanted to have him call me, for dramatic effect, but then she realized I knew his patterns better than anyone. Once she realized I hadn't heard from him, her threats would be taken more seriously. He heard her end of one of the conversations she'd had with us, but he couldn't say anything because she'd gagged him with a towel to keep him from trying to warn us of where he was. Of course it didn't stop him from trying to scream as loud as he could each time she was on the phone.

Jasmine had popped him with the gun again until he'd blacked out. The next time he woke up, Jay was on the ground, face-down
with a gun to his head and he heard the faint noise of sirens in the background. By then his head was throbbing and he could feel blood dripping off his forehead. The sirens got louder, and there were distinct noises of the police officers loading weapons.

After that, Dominic took over and gave his account of things from that point, because he had just gotten into the house.

“Things took off quick,” he said.

Lee and the stocky dude broke out the windows in the front of the house while the tall dude took a spot in the back. Dom said the guys I called to help out only identified themselves as “J-Roc and Boney-T,” names Ramesses recognized as Dominic continued his account.

“J-Roc took out one of the guys in the back of the house and gave me cover while we cleared the rooms, in case there were more than we originally thought,” he recalled. “Boney-T popped the third guy that was in another room. No guns, he just manhandled the guy and damn near twisted his head off his shoulders.”

Ramesses was still holding the ice pack on his head as Dominic kept rattling off the details. “Jasmine answered her cell phone and talked to the police negotiator to find out what they could do to diffuse the situation. While she was on the phone, Jay saw us trying to make a move on Lee and got up from his spot on the floor. I guess Lee forgot to bind his hands and feet before the cops showed up. Jay lunged at where Lee was posted up at the window. Lee fired a shot off, which triggered the shots from Boney-T and J-Roc. But Lee didn't hit the target he intended to hit.”

“What are you talking about, D? Jay took a bullet in the shoulder,” Ramesses pointed out.

“You were already on the floor, K. Remember?” Dom pointed out to him. “And Jay never got hit, either.”

“He's right, Kane. You must be imagining things,” Jay added.

Dominic calmly reminded Ramesses he'd tipped Ramesses' chair to avoid the gunfire coming from Lee's random firing. Lee tried to fire off another shot, but then realized who he hit with the first bullet: Jasmine.

Lee began freaking out as he watched Jasmine bleeding from the wound she suffered in her chest, which tipped the officers at the front door that he was distracted, and they came in blazing. Lee got hit several times in the chest. Jasmine was still on the floor struggling to breathe, and Jay rushed to her side to try and keep her breathing. She died before the paramedics could rush in to administer CPR to get her stabilized.

“The negotiator said she sounded like she was hopped up on drugs, but he wasn't sure,” Jay finally chimed in. “She looked so wild-eyed when I came through the door. It was like she'd never seen me before in her life. I couldn't reason with her. She just kept saying, ‘I want my husband back,' over and over again.”

“I'm just glad you're both safe.” I finally opened my mouth. I couldn't stop staring at my husband. It was like we were dating again. “Amenhotep will be pleased that you're in one piece.”

“Yeah, thank God He wasn't harmed in all this craziness.” Ramesses breathed deeply. “This wasn't His fight. I'm glad He was with you both to help keep things calm.”

Candy asked the one question I guess no one wanted to ask. “What happened to J-Roc and Boney-T? Neither of you mentioned what happened to them.”

Ramesses gave a look at Dominic, who stayed tight-lipped and stone-faced. He closed his eyes for a minute and said to Candy, “You're on a need-to-know basis, babe, and right now, you don't need to know. Trust me on this one.”

In the past, I would have been pissed off at that damn statement.
Now I knew exactly why he said it. Some things we didn't need to know about, as long as it didn't come back to haunt us. I guess my husband was right: J-Roc and Boney-T are ghosts for a reason, and that reason needed to stay with those who could keep those reasons from hitting the streets.

“Well, I don't know about you guys, but I don't want to be in this hospital any longer than the rest of you. Can we head home so we can relax and put this whole nightmare behind us?” Ramesses looked at Dominic again, nodding in his direction. “Do you think you could get that pretty little nurse to page the doctor so I can go? I really would like to go home tonight, if possible.”

38
EPILOGUE

Being on the white sand beaches in Dubai in late November was something out of a fairy tale.

Amenhotep spared no expense to fly a small wedding party which consisted of Sinsual and both of her sub bois, which meant Ice was with her; Myself, Neferterri and Kitana; Master Altar and his slave girl chastity; finally, Lord Magnus and his slave girl jewel as well. Come to find out, Magnus is an ordained minister, albeit retired from actually leading a church, but he also fits as the perfect divine facilitator for this most auspicious of occasions.

He put us all up in suites at the Burj Al Arab Hotel for the week, and arranged for all of us to have separate chauffeur-driven SUVs to make sure that we took in all the sights. Of course, the girls all wanted to go shopping and such, which was fine. It wasn't like we would actually be able to come back there without saving up some serious change not only to stay for a few days, but to sightsee and other things. So, they went to the Al Khaleej Shopping Center, the Al Shindagha Market, the Wafi Mall complex and a few other places, which meant for the majority of the husbands and Dominants in the group, that some credit card statements were going to be rather thick the next month.

I'd never seen my Mentor so relaxed, so at peace, in my life. He sipped on drinks with the rest of the Dominants and enjoyed the
luxuries of being in one of the most beautiful places on Earth. Yeah sure, it's my opinion, but I would challenge anyone to find another one without going to a tropical island climate. Every time that he looked at me, he gave me this knowing glance, as if I eventually would be in his shoes one day. I could only hope. But with all the money that he was shelling out for this wedding and festivities, I couldn't help but wonder how much Amenhotep was
actually
worth.

I couldn't help but be overwhelmed by the events of the past few weeks. I had turned my business over to my apprentice, who was more than ready; I'd just been holding him back out of selfishness. For all intents and purposes, “inheriting” a fortune from my Mentor and Father figure to do with as I saw fit, as long as I oversaw his American business interests as well as start a few enterprises of my own. Finally, dealing with the pain and scariness of nearly losing my life and watching someone who was once so close to me, die so senselessly. But it gave me a different perspective on things as well. It was not like I was taking my life for granted to begin with, but I had to be conscious of what reckless decisions can lead to as well. I still have to grow old and see my grandchildren, and live long enough to reminisce on these times that we were living in now.

The night before the wedding, we all sat down as friends for an informal dinner, to enjoy one another more than anything else. No titles. No protocol. And it was good. Amenhotep got a chance to express his love for his soon-to-be wife in a way that re-enforced the bonds that a lot of the other married couples could appreciate and embrace. My wife never looked more radiant, and Kitana never looked more priceless as our submissive princess.

So much so, that I felt that a change was in order.

Once the dinner was over, we went back to our suite, so that we could tell our little one of the news of her new name. Neferterri and I had been discussing it for about a month, since her training had been going along so smoothly and surprisingly quickly. She'd only been ours for a few weeks shy of four months now, but it felt proper to take things up a notch.

Kitana was speechless. She had been waiting patiently for the name change, having submitted the names that she had wanted to be referred by, but also knowing that it would be our ultimate decision. Upon hearing that she would be kneeling for the final time under her old name and rising with her new name, the tears of joy that slowly flowed were the most beautiful things that I had ever seen. It proved to us that she was ready to take the next step.

So, it gave us delicious pleasure to have her rise from her knees to complete her awakening and be recognized as sajira, which is Egyptian, meaning “little one.”

We also informed her that upon the first of the year, only a few weeks away, that we would celebrate her new transformation with a lavish, public collaring ceremony. It would be the perfect way to christen the new and improved Palace, which would be undergoing some expansion and modifications from what my Mentor originally had planned. After all, He did want me to put my mark on the place, since it's now to be under my watch. While we were in Dubai, I'd received an unexpected phone call that further made it a magical occasion for the House of Kemet-Ka. When I informed my Beloved of what had transpired, she couldn't stop smiling, either.