Concrete Ties - Smith

Three years clean. One favor away from losing it all.

Kashawn "Kash" Walker did his eight years upstate and walked out with one thing left to lose - the East Baltimore barbershop his grandfather built before him. Fade to Black is more than wood floors and worn-down clippers. It's the only proof Kash has that he made it out.

Then his little brother Trey gets in too deep with the kind of people who don't let go.

Forty thousand dollars. That's what Trey owes a man named Quan, and Quan don't do payment plans. He does examples. The clock is ticking, the cousins are circling, and the only way Kash sees out runs straight back through the life he swore he was done with.

One last move. Forty minutes of dirt. Then back to clean.

That's the lie every man on the corner has told himself.

From the cracked sidewalks of Edmondson Avenue to the back room of a North Avenue lounge where ghosts don't stay buried, Concrete Ties is a heart-pounding urban fiction novel about brothers, blood debts, and the impossible math of trying to stay out of a life that's never really finished with you.

If you love the gritty realism of K'wan, the family loyalty of Ashley Antoinette, the street code of Wahida Clark, or the slow-burn tension of Coffee and Nikki Turner - pull up a chair. Kash is in his shop, he's pouring something brown, and he's got a story to tell.

Inside the pages:

A reformed hustler protagonist you'll root for from page one. An East Baltimore setting drawn block by block. A love interest with her own backbone and her own line in the sand. A villain whose patience is scarier than his temper. A finale that earns every bullet it fires.

One night that changes everything.