“Chill baby, it's all right,” Pilar said as she crammed herself in between the two men. “He's with me, Barron, so step the fuck off. I saw you bump into him and start talking shit. You're such a fucking troublemaker!”
“Yo, Pilar,” Barron said, looking even more confused that his prissy-ass cousin was actually flouncing around with this cut-throat Harlem killer. “You need to watch yourself, a'ight? You don't even know who this fuckin' dude is . . .”
“He's none of your damn business, that's who he is,” Pilar said as she grilled Barron with hateful eyes. “Just be lucky I saved your life,” she said, smirking as she grabbed Gutta by his arm and walked away leaving Barron standing there looking worried as fuck.
Gutta turned back around and grinned at Barron over Pilar's head and then winked. He knew Barron wasn't in a position to say shit because a coward like him would never expose himself by telling the truth about his own dirty deeds.
Barron walked off and Gutta kept right on grinning. So far this was a dope-ass barbeque. He moseyed around and drank free beer and ate free ribs, and entertained the hell outta Pilar, while at the same time he kept his radar up and bleeping as he stayed on the lookout for Mink.
After awhile he ditched Pilar and struck up some casual convo with some loose-lipped white folks and found out that the Big Daddy of the clan was running for some dumb shit and they were counting down the days to election night. Yeah, election night, Gutta stroked his chin and plotted on that ass. He didn't know where the fuck Mink was hiding at, but come election night he was gonna make his move.
Pilar saw him grinning to himself and thought it was all about her. She ran over and grabbed his hand and swung their arms like she was loving life. Gutta's thoughts mighta moved on, but Pilar was still high off that little dust-up she had caused with Barron, and as she laughed and joked with her strong, muscular hood nigga, her mind started thinking of all the ways Gutta could be useful to her. In the streets and in the sheets.
Â
“Nope, I ain't fuckin' with her crazy ass no more,” Suge barked into his cell phone and told Selah. Miyoko had been waiting outside his house when he came out that morning, and when he tried to leave she had scampered like a crab up on the front of his truck and stretched her arms and legs out crying and screeching all over the hood. Without a word, Suge had reached up and snatched her by the ankle and dragged her off his shit. She wiggled like a muthafucka as he clamped her down in his strong arms and carried her kicking and screaming across the street. Suge had dumped her frail ass on top of some real prickly bushes, and then walked back to his truck and got in, fuming. He had revved up the engine and was pushing that baby damn near thirty miles over the speed limit as he drew the line for his sister-in-law.
“Look, if you want her father smoked, I'll take his ass out. If you want me to bust up in that county office and set it on fire, I'll burn that bitch down to the ground. I love my brother and I'll do whatever he needs me to do. But Miyoko?” He shook his head and grunted. “No more of her ass. I don't give a fuck what it costs us. I'm not dealing with that crazy chick no more. Not for love and not for money neither.”
Selah sighed, then cleared her throat. Suge had given up his entire life in the service of his family, and if he was done with the matter then she knew better than to push him.
“Don't worry,” she said. “Nobody could have handled this any better than you did. We'll just have to hit this from another angle. Maybe I'll pay Wally a visit and see if I can reason with him. We were pretty good friends at one time. I helped him a lot when his wife was dying. Perhaps I can talk some sense into him. If not we'll just have to find anothâ”
“Fuck all that talking,” Suge cut her off. “You can go see him if you want to, but if that fool don't wanna act right before next Tuesday then I'ma have to roll up on him and choke his ass out.”
Â
GiGi was lounging in the hot tub on the roof of a penthouse looking up at the Texas stars. She had on nothing but a bikini bottom as she tilted her head back and exhaled some Purple Haze through her nostrils. She was a wild girl at heart and loved working under the table. When she zoomed in on a mark she named her own price, picked her own jobs, and moved to the beat of her own damn drum. Her beauty and her brains were a lethal combination for anybody who was unlucky enough to get caught in her crosshairs, and right now she was watching her latest target as he stood near the edge of the roof drinking Hennessey and looking down at the city.
“Are you going to get in the hot tub with me?” GiGi asked as she stood up inside the hot tub. “Or are you thinking about jumping?” she giggled sexily. “I know you're fly and all, but I don't wanna find out if you can actually
fly
.”
Barron laughed as he made his way over to the tub swigging Hen-dog straight from the bottle.
“Naw, I'm not that fly,” he said. “I was just looking out there and thinking about how cool it must be for those who live a simple life. People tend to think that just because you have a lot of money life is sweet. They don't understand the pressures of having to live up to a family name.”
“That's very true,” GiGi said as she detected the stress in his voice. She passed him her weed nonchalantly, unsure if he would hit it, but happy when he did. “You're the son of Viceroy Dominion and whether you like it or not, you're going to have to carry the kind of weight that most people don't understand. But that's okay,” she said, her cool hands finding the tight muscles in his neck and pressing into them deeply. “I believe your shoulders are strong enough to endure it.”
GiGi stroked Barron's neck, shoulders, and his ego as they drank and smoked together. And when she thought he was nice and loose she reached a little bit lower and let her fingers play all over his rock hard chocolate chest.
“Tell me a little bit more about your father, Barron,” she urged him in a sweet voice that sounded like warm vanilla syrup. “I mean, I'm so intrigued because you can't help but admire a man as accomplished as he is, but for some reason I sense you have some issues with him.”
Barron took a big hit of the good weed and then let his head fall back into her lap as he exhaled the hot smoke. “I'm not that close to my father right now. Yeah, I love him and everything, but that dude's got some real shifty ways about him.” He shrugged. “I know it's the accident that has him acting so damn ill these days, but some of the stuff he says . . . I just can't get past that shit. To be honest, I don't even wanna work on this political campaign with him. I'm not sure he's fit for office.”
Behind him, GiGi grinned as she gobbled that info up. “Yes, I read about his accident. It was just horrible. But in what way has it made him act differently? What is he doing that bothers you so much?” she asked lightly. “I don't mean to probe,” she bullshitted, because probing was exactly what she was trying to do, “I just really want to understand where you're coming from.”
Barron took a deep breath and shrugged. “It's not one or two specific things. It's damn-near everything. His ass was real ungrateful when he woke up. Disrepectful too. He started treating me like I was his bitch-ass flunky instead of his favorite son,” Barron confessed as he downed another shot of cognac. “Actually, for the first time ever he started treating me like I was actually adopted. As if I wasn't good enough to handle the tasks that he had been grooming me for my whole fuckin' life. I used to wanna be just like him, but now I don't. I wanna be better than he is. In every fuckin' way. I'm ready to blow this bitch be my own man.”
GiGi listened intently as Barron passed her back the roach of the weed. She took one last pull then flicked the burning ember into the pool and looked up into the night sky, pleased with where the conversation was going.
“He's still your father, Barron.” She exhaled and tried to keep him going. “I know he loves you and cares for you, but with everything going on I'm sure things are confusing for him too right now.”
“Confused my ass,” Barron said as he glanced over his shoulder at GiGi. “He's crazy, and I'm not gonna be used anymore by him or anybody else. One minute he wants me to be down on his team, and the next minute he's talking to me like I'm some two-bit dick-boy instead of the son he raised and sent to college and law school. Like I said, I still love him and there was a time I would've walked through fire for him. But I think it's time for me to do my own thing. And that's gotta be separate from his thing.”
Barron tossed back the rest of the Henny in one gulp. He had drained the bottle and he was good and fucked up.
“Well,” GiGi said, stretching as she stood up in the hot tub, “I'm pretty sure whatever you decide to do baby, you will be the
man
at it!” She leaned forward and kissed his bare chest. “You're an amazing person and I believe in you.”
“Yeah, thanks for hearing me out,” Barron said as he eyed her sexy-ass body. “But I'm done talking about Viceroy. Fuck him. Let's go inside and see what we can fall into. I'm ready to make a splash, but not in that pool.”
GiGi giggled, knowing exactly what he meant. She snatched up her things and wiggled her ass seductively toward the entrance of the condo. Before she walked through the sliding glass door she turned around and looked at Barron.
“Are you coming?” she asked in a sexy tone.
“Oh, I'm definitely cumming.” Barron grinned and stumbled to the door to get him a hot slice of GiGi Molinex.
Â
“Yeah, this right here is the real thing,” Ruddman declared with satisfaction as he studied the three sheets of paper that Zeke had slid out of his back pocket. “I had an expert check it out, and the stock transfer that's on file with the county clerk, that one is a forgery.”
“I
knew
that shit!” Zeke exploded as he jumped to his feet. “My pops tried to tell everybody that shit and they called him crazy! He knew what he was talking about and I
always
believed he got cheated!”
“He got more than cheated,” Ruddman agreed as he sat with his arms crossed over his stomach. He had just confirmed what young Zeke had grown up raging about his entire life. That his father's former business partner, Viceroy Dominion, had forged a set of documents and cheated his father out of a shitload of stock options that over time would have made the Washington family filthy rich.
“Your father got
dicked
, Zeke.” Ruddman jumped to his feet and yeasted him up. “He got ripped! He got ass-fucked out of a fortune!”
Zeke nodded, wild-eyed and furious. “I grew up my whole fuckin' life seeing them muthafuckin' Dominion kids
flossin!
That bitch-ass son of his is some kinda high-price lawyer riding around in a Maserati, and the other one ain't nothing but a weed-head tricking off his old man's money! I sold packs to that dude before! Even that lil skinny light-skinned one! Them niggas been living
my
muthafuckin' life! The life my father worked hard so that
I
could live!”
“And don't forget that Dominion's wife has been living your mother's life too,” Ruddman added solemnly. “While your mother works her fingers to the bone cleaning public toilets in Houston for a living, Viceroy Dominion's wife lives a life of luxury. That woman has never worked a job or gotten her hands dirty in her entire life. It just doesn't seem right that she profited from her husband's trickery and greed, yet your dear mother never got to profit from anything at all.”
“Ya damn right it ain't fair, and trust me, that Dominion bastard is gonna pay for that! Word to the mutha, that dirty-ass cheat is gonna get his. He's gonna give up some of that cash or get his wig twisted back! For real. You can bel'ee that!”
“Some of it?” Ruddman questioned. “He's going to give up
some
of it? Why not
all
of it! Look, I called you here so I could help you, Zeke. Viceroy Dominion is a thief. He's a liar and a fraud. But there's a way to go after men like him and take them down. Believe me, I've fought against bigger and richer opponents than him and you don't take them down in the streets, son. You take them down in the
courthouse
! You take your fight to the media. You fall back on the press. You file a lawsuit that exposes all of their slimy, underhanded business deals to the whole damn world. You file an injunction to freeze their assets and make a judge tell them bastards to hand you the keys to their multi-million-dollar mansions!”
“Damn right!” the boy shrieked.
“All you have to do,” Ruddman said smoothly, “is get with my lawyers and let them serve Viceroy with a lawsuit. Remember, the man who actually helped him rob your father has agreed to testify in front of the commission that your father was cheated out of what he was rightfully due. Once that happens, Viceroy definitely won't make it to election day.”
Zeke gave him a side look. “I know, but I still don't understand why the fuck would ya dude do something like that, though? His ass could go to jail too.”
Ruddman shook his head quickly. “Remember, he's dying. He's far more concerned about going to heaven than he is about going to jail. Listen, if you do what I tell you to do, Viceroy Dominion could take an immediate hit. If the commission moves quickly to disqualify him he'll never even see election day. In fact, I guarantee you that once you take the steps I tell you to take, he'll show his guilt by inviting you over to talk. He'll offer you a settlement and try to get you to keep your mouth closed until after the election.”