Lonzo flinched.
His eyes glittered dangerously. He cut a nick in Dre's throat, drawing blood while never taking his eyes from hers.
Michael glanced over at Dre to see if he was okay. He waited for his neck to be nicked next. But Lonzo left him alone for the time being. Michael was glad that Tracie was focusing.
Although she hadn't said his name, he knew she was focusing on Jesus. He was glad because he knew this was the man who could help them. He had already helped him once.
Maybe more than once, now that Michael thought about it.
Lonzo yelled out to Tracie, his tone almost musical, “It's time for atonement.”
Tracie tilted her head. Her eyes flashed an incredibly haunting gold at Lonzo.
Nastily he said, “You know what atonement is. It's the shedding of blood. It's the payment for sin. But no Savior is going to pay for yours. I'm going to see that you pay for your own.
“You and you alone must atone for what you've done, Tracie. You and nobody else.”
Tracie stepped to Lonzo. Sweat dripped down her face. Her eyes were glazed. Her entire posture and demeanor were different. Her sons were staring at a stranger. Tracie was locked in an immortal battle with Lonzo.
Dre struggled against his bonds. Michael started to struggle against his as well, but it was to no avail. Lonzo was an expert. They could not free themselves to help their mother.
Lonzo removed three vials from his inner jacket pocket. Each of them was labeled. There was blood in each of the vials. The names of Tracie's sons and of one other person glistened brightly from the labels. Lonzo lifted one of the stoppers.
It popped loudly. He lifted it to his lips. He had acquired a taste for the red, slippery substance long ago.
Rashod scrambled for a better view through Me's eyes. Me had had a serious clamp on the spirits for all the time they had been here but Rashod finally managed to break through. He had heard his mother's voice.
Like a guiding beacon he had latched on to it, until he could rise to the surface.
The scene that loomed up before him was terrifying. His mother and his brothers were at the mercy of the maniac who had murdered him, and he was stuck in the vacuum of the monster that had swallowed his spirit whole.
All the players were here, or so he thought. There was little he could do, but he tried with all his might. His voice finally reached the recesses of Tracie's mind.
“Fight, Mommy. You can win. Fight.”
That was all he could manage. Maybe it would be enough. He had a small victory, though, because for the first time Me had not noticed what he had done. Rashod had passed through him without notice.
Tracie turned around in startled amazement.
She had heard Rashod's voice. She'd actually felt his breath near her ear. “Fight, Mommy. You can win. Fight,” he'd said.
Her dead, misunderstood son wanted her to win. He was rising from the grave to help her. Tracie drew strength and comfort from the contact.
Then she had a very crazy thought.
She decided to see if she could talk back to Rashod. “I love you, Ra. I love you,” she whispered back through the recesses of her mind, using the nickname she had called him when he was a little boy.
Rashod had heard her. “I love you too, Mommy. I love you, too.”
Tracie could have fainted with relief, but now was not the time. It was enough to know he was somehow there in spirit.
Tracie brought her attention back to Lonzo. She bit her lower lip and found herself hyperventilating. This monster was drinking her son's blood right in front of her eyes. He was disgusting.
Lonzo's eyes glowed like dark coals in the midst of the shadows on the roof.
Dre watched, mesmerized, as blood trickled down his neck. He clung tightly to Souljah Boy's words:
“Your family is under the protection of Jesus Christ, Dre.”
Lonzo took another drink from the vial. He took a long swallow this time. He licked his lips. “Ah. That must be Randi, the Shooter. He made his last shot from this roof. Just like his daddy, Raymond.
“Remember, Tracie?”
Tracie remembered Raymond's broken body. The image of him loomed up large in front of her eyes at Lonzo's words. Lonzo stuck the knife in Dre's neck again, a little bit deeper and longer this time.
Disgusted, he threw the vial at Tracie. “Payment for your sins. All the sins of the world have been paid for with blood. It was the blood of the innocent. You said so yourself.”
Tracie flinched. Her breathing slowed. She locked eyes with Dre. Michael was safe for the time being. Lonzo, for some reason, didn't seem to be concentrating too hard on him except to make sure that he stayed bound.
Lonzo tipped the other vial to his mouth. “Hmmmmmmm, Raymond.” He licked his lips after sucking down the fifteen-year-old blood.
“Dark taste. Just like his life. He was an NBA contender, too, wasn't he, Tracie?”
Lonzo was enjoying torturing Tracie. “His rebound skills were good, Caramel. I threw him a shot. He leaped like a gazelle right off the side over there.” Lonzo pointed to one side of the roof.
Tracie had had enough.
Not only had Lonzo killed Raymond, but he was also trying to destroy his memory in front of his remaining sons. Making him out to be some punk.
Tracie lunged. Lonzo plunged the knife deeper in Dre's throat. Dre winced in pain. Tracie landed on her knees, directly in front of Lonzo's feet.
“I wouldn't, slut. We're not done yet.”
Lonzo rubbed the knife scar on his neck slowly. “Raymond gave me this scar. Now his son will have one just like it, because of you, Tracie. You and your fantasies and your dreams of legends.”
“Please. Stop it.”
Lonzo tilted another vial.
He poured the blood on Tracie's hair. “I told you before. I detest whining, Li'l Caramel. Oh, this is Rashod. You know, your son, the crackhead. Some legend. He's not worth drinking,” Lonzo said as he continued to pour Rashod's blood over Tracie's head.
Tracie gazed up slowly at him, her son's blood dripping down her face. She had a crazed look on her face. It was one step away from insanity. Livid hatred spewed from her eyes. She licked her lips to taste Rashod's blood.
Souljah Boy, the doppelganger, had arrived. He hovered just above Tracie and Dre.
“My son Rashod was a better man than you'll ever be, Detective. No matter how many of my sons you kill, you'll never taste me, Pee Wee, because you can't.”
Lonzo sliced with the knife down Dre's throat, a seamless stream, leaving a trail of blood. Dre looked ready to faint from the pain.
Lonzo leaned down. He hit a button on the boom box he had saved for just this occasion. Slow music filled the roof of Lenox Terrace.
Lonzo looked at her. He pushed the knife ever deeper in Dre's throat. “How about that dance, now? Did you save the last dance for me, Tracie?”
Tracie glanced at Dre. She saw his incredible pain. She floated to her feet and into Lonzo's arms, even though Dre begged her not to with his eyes. Lonzo took the knife away from Dre's neck as Tracie floated into his arms.
He held her tightly, mesmerized, lovingly, but cautious and at the ready as they danced precariously close to the edge of the roof. Lonzo sniffed, loving the smell of her.
Rashod's blood was dripping down Tracie's neck; the knife was now to her throat, and as Lonzo dipped Tracie low, the street whizzed far below them.
Lonzo whispered in Tracie's ear, “I saved myself for you, Tracie. A virgin. I'm pure. I should do you right here in front of your sons, where there's plenty of blood to purify our union. Don't you think?”
Revulsion rose in Tracie's stomach, but she only smiled. She'd see him in hell first.
Lonzo suddenly released Tracie.
The music came to a halt. All the unseen parties were at a standstill. None of them knew what to expect. Dizzy, Tracie whirled a little distance away from Lonzo. She dropped to her knees.
Something dark and black rose up inside her. She looked up at Lonzo, then hissed at him. She bowed her head for a moment, lifted it, and looked for a long time at her sons. Her gaze lingered on Dre, bleeding and bound. Then her eyes found Lonzo.
Raw hatred welled up inside her as she thought of Randi and Rashod. She bellowed out, “This is the final chapter!”
Lonzo looked confused. He was calling the shots. He hadn't called the final curtain.
“Let me introduce you to âexpired.' Drink this, Pee Wee!” Like a blur her hand dipped to her waist. In slow motion she glided to her feet, smooth as silk, and in one swift, sensual motion, with the blade in her hand, she sliced Lonzo's face, knocking him off balance and over the roof.
Lonzo's surprised screams ripped through the night air. Tracie raced to look over the side as Lonzo hung from the ledge. The traffic lights glittered far below him on 135
th
Street as he hung over the same deadly grave that had claimed Tracie's son, Randi.
He was barely hanging on. Lonzo began to taunt her. “Come on, Li'l Caramel, finish the job. Push me over like I did your sons. Like I did Raymond. Get some guts. Come on. Finish the job, Tracie.”
Lonzo heard Tracie's friends hooting, mocking, and laughing at him all those long years ago.
He screamed at her, “Do it, Tracie Burlingame! Get some guts!” Tracie's knife swung in an arc through the air to deliver the final blow.
Suddenly Souljah Boy loomed in front of her eyes. He was hovering at the edge of the roof. “Tracie. Tracie, don't,” he told her calmly.
“The only way you'll win is if you rise above him. To live in the past is to have no future. Have faith, Tracie. Have faith. You're going to need it now. Redemption must be given if it is ever to be received.”
Tracie hesitated.
She tried to blink the black from her eyes. Suddenly she reached down, and with all her might, she grabbed Lonzo and hauled him back onto the roof.
Lonzo stared into Tracie's eyes as he balanced himself on his feet. He took a silver heart locket from his jacket pocket. He threw it to her.
“I left you two sons, Tracie. I could have taken them, too. Checkmate, Li'l Caramel.”
Then he jumped from the roof, airborne.
Me still stood in the shadows, observing the strange chain of events. There would be no reason to meet with Lonzo now.
Souljah Boy released the bonds that held Dre and Michael. He put a hand to Dre's throat to stanch the flow of blood. The blood stopped instantly.
Dre stared at him.
Tracie ran to the edge of the roof just as Lonzo's body hit the ground.
Monica and her crew arrived on the street just in time to view the broken body of Alonzo Morgan as he lay twisted on the sidewalk, a silver locket clutched in his hand, broken open, with a picture of Tracie Burlingame inside it.
As Monica looked down, she noticed that Lonzo didn't have any shoes on his feet.
What she didn't notice was Legion dumping Lonzo's body of his spirit, deciding he didn't want to use it anymore.
And what she didn't see was the little boy behind the broken shell of Lonzo. The little boy with the life story that had been written in pain and heartache since his birth.
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The dim streetlights cast shadowy, blurry streaks of light in the small room of the decaying Harlem building. The air was tight, humid, sweltering. It smelled like old mildew mingled with the smell of feces.
A strangled, gurgling sound caused the small child to cover its ears. The sight and smell of death layered itself over the room, a thick coating of it.
The beaten, withered man in the corner coughed. He looked at the child he could not help. He beheld the child for a last time as the light of life drained from his eyes. All over a horse and a dollar bill.
The men who had been sent to administer the beating laughed. They were small-time street hoodlums. The dying man was a notorious gambler who owed and ducked out on one debt too many.
Grayson Mounds who controlled all the gambling activities in Harlem had ordered the hit after discovering he was not to be paid once again.
When he spoke it was word. So Joe had played his last horse. They kicked him a last time for good measure. Briefly, they considered the child. Then they discarded any idea of dealing with the child themselves.
They left the room. There was no threat. The child was too young to tell anybody a thing.
The whimpering child crawled over to the leftover carnage of the human being on the floor. The child put out a small hand to touch Joe's face.