Rise of the Street King

Chapter 72 — The Sting That Wasn’t

The night after the wiretap kept replaying in Jayden’s head, he couldn’t rest. Mama Nuru’s voice, calm and hushed, still clung to his mind like smoke. “Favor in exchange for a body.” He had heard enough to know the council wasn’t just fractured they were bleeding him from inside. He couldn’t call her out, not yet. If he accused without proof, the Council would close ranks around her, and he’d look paranoid. But if he let it slide, the knife would find his ribs before he ever saw the hand holding it.

So he built a trap.

Jayden gathered his closest crew Malikah, the Burned Boy, and two lieutenants he’d tested in blood and fire and laid a stack of papers across the table. Each was false intelligence, crafted with care. Some hinted at hidden caches of weapons, others described secret meetings with police informants. Each one was unique, marked in his mind like a signature.

“Each of these stories goes to a different Council ear,” Jayden said. “Big Sef will hear about a laundering route through the warehouses. Kola will be told of guns stashed in the old clinic. Mama Nuru gets word I’m courting a police sergeant. If any of these rumors show up on the street, I’ll know exactly who let it leak.”

The Burned Boy’s mouth curved into a sharp grin. “You’re baiting them. Nice.”

Malikah leaned forward, scanning the papers. She had always been sharp, steady. Her loyalty had never been in question, not once. But there was something in her eyes now concern, maybe fear that made Jayden pause. “And when we catch the rat?” she asked.

Jayden’s voice was iron. “Then we cut them out.”

The papers went out quietly, slipped through whispers, passed in smoke-filled rooms where lies blended with truths. Then came the waiting. The streets carried on as they always did screams swallowed by night, laughter in gambling dens, the stench of poverty clinging to every corner. But beneath it all, Jayden felt the tension, a storm building unseen.

Days passed. No word from Razor. No sudden sweeps from the police. No indication the trap had even been touched. It was almost worse than a strike it meant the silence was intentional. A silence meant to draw him deeper into paranoia.

On the sixth night, Malikah burst into the warehouse, her face pale, her breath ragged. “Jayden you need to come. Now.”

She led him down a narrow alley where two of his men lay slumped against a wall, their throats cut clean, their blood dried in black trails across their chests. Between them, nailed into the brick with a rusted blade, was a sheet of paper.

Jayden ripped it free, his heart sinking as his eyes scanned the text.

It wasn’t one of the reports given to the Council. It wasn’t the story fed to Mama Nuru, or to Big Sef, or even twitchy little Kola.

It was something else.

A page torn from Malikah’s own ledger, written in faint red ink, a ghost entry Jayden had planted himself as a test buried where only she would find it.

Malikah’s eyes widened as she recognized it. “That’s… that’s from my book.”

The Burned Boy froze, staring hard at her, suspicion flickering in his gaze.

Jayden crushed the paper in his fist, fury boiling in his veins. “No. Someone planted this. This wasn’t supposed to move.”

But already, the damage was done. The whispers would spread faster than fire. Malikah’s name would be on every tongue before dawn.

Back in the warehouse, the atmosphere was poisoned. Men exchanged looks when Malikah walked past. Orders she gave were met with hesitation. Even the Burned Boy, who had once owed his life to her, faltered.

Jayden slammed his hand against the table so hard the wood cracked. “Enough! No one touches her. No one accuses her without proof. You think I built this empire on gossip? You think I’d gut my own people because Razor slipped a rumor into our walls?” His voice shook with anger, but even as he spoke, he saw it—the doubt, the hesitation, the small seed of suspicion taking root in their eyes.

Later that night, Malikah sat across from him, her face tight with fury and fear. “Jayden, you can’t let this stand. They’re turning the crew against me.”

“I know,” he said quietly.

“Do you?” Her voice cracked. “Because that was my ledger, my book. They wanted it to point at me, and it worked. Someone wants me gone, Jayden. And if you don’t shut this down” She stopped, swallowed hard. “they’ll make you choose between me and the rest.”

He wanted to tell her it would never come to that, that he’d burn the whole Council to ash before he doubted her. But the photograph, the planted paper, the dead men everything lined up too perfectly. He couldn’t promise her what his gut already knew might not be true.

Two nights later, the message arrived.

An envelope slid under the warehouse door, plain and unmarked. Inside was a single photograph, grainy and dark. Malikah stood in the frame, caught mid-motion in a shadowed alley, her hand stretched forward as though passing something. The figure opposite her was blurred, indistinct, but the posture suggested a deal, an exchange.

Across the bottom of the photo, scrawled in red ink, were the words:

“Your right hand feeds the enemy.”

Jayden stared at it until his knuckles went white around the edges. His chest felt hollow, his mind spinning.

The Burned Boy hovered near the door, eyes flicking nervously between Jayden and Malikah. “What now, boss?”

Jayden didn’t answer. He couldn’t. For the first time since he had risen from the slums, the ground beneath his feet no longer felt solid. He had trusted Malikah with his life, with his future. Now, in the quiet of that room, he wasn’t sure if he could trust her with the next breath.

The trap he had set to expose his enemies had snapped shut around him instead.

And someone, somewhere, was laughing in the dark.