The Grind Don't Stop (36 page)

Minutes later, after leaving the Holiday Inn and Motel 6 on Wesley Chapel, they were rolling toward the Red Roof Inn. For a reason that he couldn't understand, Sparkle started getting a tingling sensation at the nape of his neck. He quickly chalked it up to the usual déjà vu he experienced every time he passed this way, recalling that first day out of the joint when he had watched that drug raid. There was something about that place that never set right with him. He tapped ‘B' on the shoulder as they turned off of Candler into the driveway that led to the inn. “Yo, dog, let me out here at the Citgo. I'm gonna pick us up some cigarettes and a couple of bottles of Ole E. Y'all ain't got to wait on me. I'll walk on up to the room.”

As Sparkle was standing at the counter to pay for his items, he could've sworn that he saw Lt. Woo going into the donut spot across the lot. He shrugged at the likelihood of it being her because
all Asian chicks seemed to look alike to him. Perhaps he was being jittery because of all the recent events and circumstances that had them all hyped up.

He paid at the register, then exited the store from the door opposite of the donut shop. It was likely because subconsciously visions of Woo were playing in his head. He walked down the dark, tree-lined walkway behind the United Bank and leaped over the short concrete wall that encircled the bank.

Beyond the wall, there was a sharp inclined embankment that made it difficult to keep his footing. He kept his head down to try to avoid the many broken branches that cluttered the small terrain. As Sparkle made his way, he slipped a couple of times as he fought to maintain his balance. He paused to examine his hands for cuts and bruises and looked over the wall when he heard and then saw ‘B' and Rainbow as they were getting out of the car.

He opened his mouth to shout out to them but froze when he saw three ominous figures getting out of an SUV. He squinted his eyes to get a clearer look, as a tingling sensation of pending danger began to pound along the back of his neck.

The flickering shadows caused by the dimly lit moon rays, fighting through the wind-blown leaves of the surrounding foliage of trees, made the scene appear surreal. Their movements were herky- jerky, like they were moving in slow motion.

At first glance it seemed like one of them was holding a cane or thick fishing rod, but his heart told him better; his instincts sharpening. So he followed his instincts, that had saved him so many times in the past, and bent down to car hood level after he crawled over the wall. He started creeping along the cars. In case his eyes and mind weren't playing tricks on him, he laid the bag beside one of the cars and pulled out his gun. When he carefully chambered a round, the sound seemed to be so loud that it caused
him to cringe, but it was only in his own mind. It didn't appear that ‘B' or Rainbow was aware of any of it by the way they headed toward the hotel without even turning around. The trio of stalkers split up and started creeping between different cars silently. His adrenaline rush went into overdrive when the stalkers picked up speed and then one of them called out to his boys.

When they had first picked up speed, Sparkle raised his gun over the hood of the car and had actually started to squeeze the trigger, when they slowed down. Because they had yet to raise their own weapons, he waited anxiously as ‘B' and Rainbow turned around to the sound of the voices calling out to them.

Even in the dim lighting, he could read the shocked look on their faces as they spun to face the menacing sound. Sparkle blinked a couple of times in shock himself when he recognized the voice of the guy who had called out to them. The familiarity of the voice was probably the only thing that kept his boys from opening up fire themselves. ‘B' choked out in a hoarse voice, “Joker, what the fuck you doing, man?”

He was followed immediately by Rainbow's sneering grit. “Baby boy, I know damn well that you ain't behind this shit.”

Stackadime and Chopper joined Joker's side with their guns hanging loosely but anxiously at their hips. Stack bit down on his lower lip and smiled before he spat, “Looka here, soldier, y'all know what the deal is.” He cocked the sawed-off, double-barrel shotgun to emphasize his deadly intent. “Y'all ripped off my main man and the only deal is that you give up your spots to reimburse the Black Don or you die, right here, right now. It's as simple as that, dog.”

Rainbow, showing no signs of fear, ignored Stack totally and directed his full attention toward Joker. “Baby boy, we've been looking out for your ass since snot was bubbling out of your nose. You've
got to be bullshitting me on this one here, for sure.”

No sooner had the last syllable rolled off of his tongue than Stack fired a shot, re-cocked and fired another shot at their feet, digging up globs of pavement. The resounding boom was so loud and sudden that it even stunned Sparkle and shockwaves ran down his spine.

But he knew his boy Rainbow, and true to form, he didn't even flinch; instead, he pushed ‘B' to the side, drew his piece and started blazing lead at the trio. His first shot caught a startled Chopper in the shoulder, actually through the shoulder, as blood and cloth splashed from his back. The force of the impact caused him to ram, with a loud thud, into the nearest car. The second shot hit him in the stomach and he clutched his midsection as he bounced off of the car, grunting to the pavement.

In the same moment Rainbow had opened fire on them, Sparkle drilled a couple of rounds into Stack's back and legs, lifting him off of the ground. He flopped down into an awkward position like a pretzel.

Joker seemed to get hit from both angles almost simultaneously as he spun one way and then the other like a top. Miraculously, he didn't go down at first, as he staggered around with a shocked look on his face at being caught in a deadly crossfire.

When he looked down at his wounds and then back up undereyed at Sparkle, his face had suddenly changed to the whimpering little kid that they had pampered as a snotty-nosed runt. Sparkle froze and lowered his piece. The battle appeared to be over before it had even started. He took a step closer to help the little Joker he remembered. Before he realized it, he had tripped and fallen on an unseen object on the pavement. Grimacing as he rubbed his knee after the gritty contact, Sparkle looked up to see Joker's deadly firearm aiming at his head. He was no longer the
little Joker that his mind had momentarily deceived him with. Instead, there were the cold eyes of a killer—his killer. He blinked his eyes and prepared to welcome death. Everything seemed to be moving in slow motion, from the blinking in Joker's eyes, to the snarl that had formed on his lips, to his finger slowly pressing on the trigger. There was a loud boom and he closed his eyes and mind to the inevitable. But for some reason he didn't feel any pain. Was this the way that heaven or hell welcomed him? Then Sparkle blinked a couple of times before his eyes set on the horrifying sight of Joker still standing there, but with a hole in his forehead, before he tumbled to the ground.

When Sparkle got up off of the pavement and crawled over to kneel over the fallen Joker, he saw both of his buddies scampering for the staircase to avoid the still pouring of hot lead that was ricocheting off of metal and concrete. Somehow Chopper had regained his composure and was alternating shots at him and his boys.

As he dove for cover, he saw out of the corner of his eyes, two figures running toward the fray, guns blazing. His first thoughts were that their hunters had back-up. But then he remembered the Asian girl going in the donut shop and thinking that she made him think of Lt. Woo. But now he recognized her as indeed being the evil little bitch.

Sparkle's heart skipped another beat when he recognized Beverly as the other threat that was rapidly approaching. His thought immediately shot to the conversation they had discussed in the hotel room. But this time it was a lot more than a conversation between lovers. This time it was a reality, she was a cop and he was a bandit caught red-handed in the act. He had to get those thoughts out of his mind with the quickness because both women were coming at them with guns blazing and shouting in no-nonsense explicit terms.

In his mind and heart he knew that he couldn't fire at Beverly. They went too far back for that. Yet on the other hand, he knew that he wasn't about to go to nobodies jail, either. So he did the next best thing. He screamed, “Five-o, five-o.” He got to his feet and crouched behind the car nearest to the building. Then he looked over to his boys and tried to whisper, “Yo, man, it's Beverly and that crazy-ass Woo. We got to get out of here.”

He knew that they had heard him because their eyes budged out, obviously feeling the same dilemma that he had when he recognized her. He heard them curse as they both stared through the gaps in the stairs and saw what he saw.

Quick to respond, Rainbow shouted, “Yo, dog, 1012, 1012!!!!” It was their personal signal to fire warning shots in the air before hightailing it. Immediately all three of them laid a round of fire over the heads of the fast-closing policewomen. When they dodged for cover behind the parked cars, Rainbow and ‘B' turned with the swiftness and sprinted around the corner of the hotel. Sparkle knew that they would hit the wooded embankment and scale their way to I-20 toward the woods behind the nightclub, on their way to his sister Debra's house in Candler East Apartments.

After firing another round in their general direction, Sparkle set off running in a low crouch through the other cars. Destination: the other end of the hotel. When he started his escape, he made eye contact with Stack, who was leaning against one of the cars holding his leg and arching his back. There was a mixture of fear and panic written all over his face. He also noticed that Stack's gun was way out of his reach, so he paused just enough to smile at him. “That's the way it goes, youngun.” He chanced one more look over the cars for the women's pursuit. “You chose the wrong side, kid, but don't worry. I'll read or hear about that nigga of yours Don from the DeKalb County Jail, see ya.”

The only thing that Stack could do was grimace in his
discomfort and stretch his fingers unsuccessfully for his piece. To make matters worse, Sparkle kicked the gun up under the car, winked at him and continued with his crouched exit away from the scene. He knew that he couldn't reach the gun in time to do him any harm. But in the back of his mind, he was sorta hoping that the fool did get to it and have a shootout with Bevy and Woo and get his stupid ass killed. That way he wouldn't have to worry about him possibly snitching on them.

“Aw fuck,” he screamed when he got to the next to last car before the corner of the building and more shots came in his direction.
Damn, I should have put that fool down, shit,
he thought as he dove to the pavement and rolled to the far side of the car. Sparkle looked over the edge of the hood and saw Chopper leaning against a car firing at him. He opened up on him. His aim proved to be good but he could tell by the way that his body jerked, that it wasn't his bullets that impacted his now lifeless form first.

A bullet was fast but there was no way that it was that fast as his body was lifted backward into the air before it fell to the pavement. It could only mean that one of the policewomen had blazed him first. With that brand-new terror entering his mind, he broke into a full sprint to the corner. He barely made it as the boom came a mere fraction of a second before a sprinkling of concrete from the side of the building dusted the side of his neck. Man, did that ever put some more pep in his stride and he sprinted to the edge of the embankment. He looked to his left and saw Rainbow and ‘B' struggling to get to the top about a half a football field away.

He jumped over the ditch, slipped on the muddy edge and dove into the bushes. Boy, did those guerilla tactics from military training ever come in handy, as he belly-crawled and maneuvered his way up the steep incline. After nearly a minute, that seemed
more like minutes, of getting slapped and snagged all over his body by the twigs, bushes and whatever else was assaulting his face, arms and legs, he finally made it up the slippery embankment to I-20. With sweat, blood and mud seemingly everywhere, he struggled to the railing and had lifted his aching leg to straddle it when his heart took another tumble. His weary eyes didn't want to believe it, but there they were. Flashing lights of the police, rapidly approaching from both directions on I-20 and Candler Road, had him diving back into the bushes. He laid low until all of the cars had turned toward the direction of the hotel.

Feeling a lot more comfortable, he struggled back out of the bushes and hobbled across the interstate. It didn't surprise him that he ran into an identical batch of foliage behind the club. He dreaded going through the same type of deep woods again, only this time it was going downhill. But he didn't have a choice. So he sighed heavily and started the downward trek.

Since he could see the huge club sign high above the tree line, he knew that he had to veer wide to the right to avoid the long parking lot, that was most likely full with eyewitnesses. With the excitement of the chase bumping hard in his chest, he stopped several times on the way down to gather his bearings and equilibrium. He constantly was tortured by snagging vines, thorns and branches, occasionally getting tripped and one time sliding head-first into some bushes but he finally made it to the East Lake apartments. He was now in familiar territory, but that certainly didn't mean that he could get wide open. So he kept low as he crept along the rolls of razor wire fence. He reached a gap in the fence that had been previous clipped with what looked like wire cutters.

He quickly scaled to the top. When he reached for the top rail, his hand slipped away and along with it was a piece of rag that,
on closer inspection, he saw was a piece of ‘B'‘s shirt. He smiled at the thought of the old geezer getting snagged and struggling to pull away, cursing like a sailor.

He muscled himself over the top and was about to descend down the other side when he saw a line full of clothes between adjacent buildings. A light bulb flashed through his tired brain and he crept over and grabbed a windbreaker and a pair of jeans close to his size. He scampered to the other end of the building and pulled the jeans on top of the ones he was wearing and slipped into the jacket.