Chapter 140 – The Blacks Deliver Lip as a "Gift"
Red Light District, the safehouse.
Because Lip had taken the day off, only one vehicle went out today.
With the lighter workload, Svetlana finally had a chance to breathe.
Ever since William disappeared, she'd been living on edge every single day.
Ironically, business had only gotten better.
Which meant more money—but also more stress.
So now, she was sitting on the second-floor balcony, beer iced cold in hand, cigarette between her fingers, enjoying a rare moment of peace.
"Yevgenivna."
A voice from downstairs shattered the calm.
"Who the hell is yelling like that with no manners?"
Svetlana cursed in Russian, annoyed.
She walked to the railing and looked down.
A van was parked outside the safehouse.
A Black man stood beside it.
"Who are you, and what do you want?" she asked in heavily accented English.
"My name's JD," the man said calmly.
"I've got a gift for William Blake."
The moment William's name came up, Svetlana didn't dare brush it off.
She sighed, stubbed out her cigarette, and headed downstairs.
"Alright," she said, arms crossed, cigarette dangling from her lips.
"Let's hear it. What kind of gift?"
JD signaled to someone inside the van.
The side door slid open.
Inside—
Lip.
His mouth was taped shut. Hands and feet bound with thick rope.
The moment he saw Svetlana, he started thrashing violently, muffled sounds pouring out of him.
Svetlana frowned hard.
What the hell is this circus?
"This your idea of a gift?" she asked coldly.
"You kidnap my guy and dump him here?"
Her hand had already moved toward her waistband.
"Whoa—whoa—easy," JD raised both hands.
"Svetlana, relax. This isn't what you think."
He swallowed and continued carefully.
"This guy? He came to us asking to have your boss beaten up.
So we figured we'd help you clean house."
JD's crew wasn't a major gang—just small-time weed dealers trying to survive in the South Side.
They had no interest in picking a fight with a woman who sold military hardware.
"What?" Svetlana narrowed her eyes.
She understood every word.
She just didn't like what they added up to.
"You're saying… he betrayed us?"
JD pointed directly at Lip.
"Exactly."
Svetlana went silent for a moment, piecing it together.
Then she asked the real question.
"So what do you want?"
Guys like this never did favors for free.
She didn't buy the idea that they'd do this out of goodwill.
JD nodded, clearly relieved she was being practical.
"Consider this a meet-and-greet gift for Mr. Blake," he said.
"As for us—we just want a chance to talk."
Hearing that, Svetlana's interest was clearly piqued.
"What exactly do you want to talk about?" she asked.
JD and the heavyset Black man exchanged a glance.
"Exclusive distribution rights for our neighborhood," JD said.
"And bulk pricing on purchases."
Figures.
After all that circling around, it still came back to business.
But once territorial exclusivity entered the picture, Svetlana knew better than to make a snap decision.
She thought for a moment, then pulled out her phone.
"Give me a minute," she said. "I need to make a call."
Right in front of them, she dialed William's number.
---
At the same time, William was still in the parking lot, midway through round two with Theresa.
The phone suddenly rang.
"Fuck—who now?" William muttered. "Amanda?"
Theresa, drenched in sweat, glanced eagerly at the screen—almost hoping it really was Amanda calling.
To be fair, that particular kink of hers was… a little twisted.
William, however, wasn't complaining.
He answered the call.
"Yeah?"
"It's me, boss," Svetlana said, switching to Russian—right in front of the Black guys.
Plenty of people on this street spoke Russian, but none of these guys did. Lip definitely didn't.
"What's going on?" William asked, clearly annoyed at the interruption.
"A group of Black guys came by wanting to talk about distribution rights," Svetlana said calmly.
"And they brought a gift."
William paused.
"A gift?" His interest was instantly piqued. "What kind of gift?"
"You should really come see it yourself," she replied.
"It involves Lip."
She deliberately didn't elaborate.
If she explained it wrong and William got angry afterward, she'd rather not risk disappearing from the world.
"…Fine," William said after a moment. "I'll be there soon. What a pain."
He hung up, visibly irritated—then pulled Theresa back in for the final push.
---
Thirty minutes later.
Theresa wiped the sweat off herself with tissues and started getting dressed.
"I need to head back to the South Side," William said, already seated in the driver's seat, clothes back on.
"Want me to drop you somewhere?"
"Either's fine," Theresa said, tying up her hair.
"It's summer break anyway. Oh—drop me by a pharmacy on the way. I need to grab some birth control."
That made William pause.
Thanks to his regeneration, immunity, and disease-transfer immunity, he'd never bothered with protection.
Pregnancy… honestly hadn't crossed his mind.
But this was America. Birth control was basic common sense.
These women probably handled it themselves.
Realizing that, William briefly acknowledged that—yeah—he might be a bit of an asshole.
Still, the idea of a parade of women showing up with babies was a headache he had no interest in dealing with.
So he started the AMG and headed toward the South Side with Theresa.
They stopped at a pharmacy along the way. Theresa hopped out to buy the pills while William leaned against the car, wondering what kind of stupid shit Lip had managed to stir up this time.
She came back a few minutes later.
---
South Side. Red Light District. Outside the safehouse.
JD and the heavyset guy were already getting impatient.
But impatience didn't matter.
They wanted territory.
Which meant swallowing pride and waiting like grandsons in front of a patriarch.
That rule applied everywhere in the world.
A low engine growl rolled in from a distance.
A black Mercedes-AMG C63 pulled up slowly.
JD and the heavyset guy instinctively straightened their backs.
The car stopped.
William stepped out—Theresa right behind him.
"I'm here," William said flatly.
"So what's going on?"
With outsiders present, he spoke to Svetlana in Russian.
"Inside," she said, opening the door. "We'll talk there."
They all went in.
"I'm JD," one of the Black men said quickly.
"I'm Jamal," the other added.
William barely acknowledged them.
"William Blake."
Just a name.
But to them, it felt like standing in front of a mob boss.