“You mutha-fuckin’ bitch!” He foamed at the mouth while attempting to get up and reach for Tan, but his movements were slow as his circulation weakened. Loon rolled off the side of the bed and went into convulsions as the deadly combination sent him into immediate cardiac arrest.
Tan watched as he took his last exasperated breath. “I told you in the beginning, fat muthafucka . . . fuck with my money and you’d have to leave the country or leave this world. You had a choice to take a journey or take a gurney! Guess you chose the gurney, bitch!”
Just then, Honey came out the bathroom and saw Loon’s body lying on the floor with his eyes rolled into the back of his head and foam oozing out the side of his mouth. She let out a shrill scream that was quickly muffled by Tan’s hand.
“Bitch, be the fuck quiet!” Tan snapped. “You just as much a part of this shit as I am.”
Honey’s eyes were wide in disbelief as Tan’s hand slowly eased from her mouth. Honey was slowly shaking her head from side to side as if in shock. She mumbled, “You didn’t say nothing about killin’ nobody. I thought we was robbin’ him.”
Tan looked her square in the eyes and calmly replied, “We did rob him . . . for his life.” She knew she couldn’t let Honey leave the room after witnessing this.
Honey was still in shock as Tan walked behind her and coughed into her hand once, spitting out her signature razor. She reached around and promptly sliced Honey’s throat with the precision of a surgeon just the way she had done Monk.
***
Satisfied that her crew had cleaned the hotel room in record time and properly disposed of Loon’s and Honey’s bodies and Loon’s car, Tan called it a night and decided to go home.
When she walked in her house, she saw To’Wanda sitting on the couch reading a novel. She leaned over her and kissed her on the lips.
“How was your day?” To’Wanda asked, picking up a bookmark to hold her place.
“I feel so much better, like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders.” Tan exhaled as she thought of Loon’s last moments and was convinced that she had made the right decision. “And in two days, I’mma be able to sleep like a fuckin’ baby.”
“I just want you to be careful,” To’Wanda said cautiously.
Tan looked at her like she was crazy. “What?
Me be careful?
Chile please!”
“I’m serious.”
“That bitch a lightweight just like her brother was.”
To’Wanda exhaled, as she knew that arguing with Tan would be useless. She saw how happy Tan was when she walked in the house and decided not to mess up the mood. She knew that Tan wanted nothing else in the world than to be rid of Justice, and the sooner that happened, the happier they both would be.
CHAPTER TWENTY
When Lil’ Joe walked into BobCutz to meet with Carlos. His uniform was dirty from helping with a few tows that he had made in the area and he was tired as hell. He made his way to the back where the fellas were sitting down. He walked past Preme’s chair, observed that he still hadn’t cut the locs, but he was just hogging another seat and Lil’ Joe shook his head. He noticed Preme grilling him and squinting his eyes real low.
Lil’ Joe kept it moving because he wanted to catch Carlos in his office so he could handle his business and be out. Truthfully, even though he had asked Carlos to put him on, he only trusted Carlos as far as he could see him.
Lil’ Joe knocked on the door and didn’t get an answer. He looked at his watch and noticed that he was on time so he decided to knock again. He turned around when he heard Face rolling past him and then Preme hobbled by as he opened the door without knocking and saw that Carlos was on the phone. “You still a bitch nigga,” Preme hissed as he walked past Lil’ Joe and took a seat across from Carlos at his desk. Lil’ Joe walked in behind Preme.
“Fuck you say, nigga?” Joe wanted Preme to repeat himself. He walked in and took the next available seat across from Carlos’s desk. “I don’t like you and I don’t trust you. That’s what the fuck I said, nigga. Straighten it.”
“Fuck you, clown,” Lil’ Joe said in a voice no higher than a murmur as he leaned forward in the seat. Lil Joe knew Preme never really liked him. Moreover, it all stemmed from a no good ass bitch who they were both fucking back in the day. Sabrina, the bitch who had initially gotten the war started between them and Monk when she had told Carlos that she had seen Cross at the park with Monk and D.C. Throughout the years, that animosity just seemed to grow like the snowball effect. Preme had been more than happy once Lil’ Joe had called himself getting out of the game. Now that he was back on the team, Preme was salty because his paper was growing like grass.
“Don’t let the third leg fool ya, nigga. I’ll still wipe this floor wit’ yo’ ass.” Preme kept the beef going.
Lil’ Joe got up and stood over Preme, looking down on him. He wanted to punch the nigga in his grill, but instead, he kicked Preme’s cane across the room. Not satisfied, Lil’ Joe picked Preme up from his seat and tried to body slam him on Carlos’s desk, but Face was holding on to Preme’s leg. Carlos reached over his desk to break the two of them up.
“Both of y’all chill the fuck out!” Carlos bellowed, not caring if the customers in the lobby could hear him. He’d gotten between Preme and Lil’ Joe, pushing both of them to opposite ends of the room. War had entered the room and quickly rushed to hold Lil’ Joe back while Carlos maintained a grip on Preme. “Just chill the fuck out.”
Carlos was frustrated because Lil’ Joe, Preme, and Face weren’t the same obedient niggas he knew two years ago, and even though he knew he couldn’t make the three of them like one another, he hated to see his old crew fall apart. He needed all three of them to be cohesive and bond like glue in order for his team to coexist.
Preme laughed after Carlos loosened up his grip. He reached in his pocket and tossed something to Lil’ Joe. Lil’ Joe caught it and looked down at it. It was a .45 caliber bullet. “The next one ain’t comin’ outta my hand, nigga. Trust that,” Preme taunted.
Carlos sent Preme out the office with War and closed the door. Preme was still talking loud in the hallway. “I’mma end up sendin’ that nigga to hell just like his partna.”
“Yo, shut the fuck up!” Carlos yelled, realizing that Preme had just confirmed Lil’ Joe’s suspicion. He looked at Joe and tried to read any expression indicating that he was listening to what Preme was saying. Joe acted like he hadn’t heard him because his expression hadn’t changed and Carlos was hoping that was the case. Joe was sarcastically smirking while looking at the bullet Preme had tossed him.
“I brought y’all niggas back together ‘cause I thought we could go back to gettin’ money like we used to. But if y’all wanna go to war with each other, do that shit in the streets and not in my muthafuckin’ office. Stupid ass niggas.”
Lil’ Joe reached in both of his pockets, slammed two knot-fulls of money on the desk, and reached in his waist for the paper bag full of money he’d stuffed in his pants. “Here go yo’ muthafuckin’ money, nigga. Y’all niggas ain’t shit.” He nodded his head slowly with fire in his eyes.
Seeing the look in Lil’ Joe’s eyes, Carlos knew without a doubt that he had heard Preme’s statement. Now it was no secret that they had been the ones that had bodied Dave. Lil’ Joe slammed the bag on the desk as well. He took a step back and glared at Carlos. “Yeah, I’ll see you,” Lil’ Joe said sarcastically while still nodding his head and biting his bottom lip in anger. He calmly walked out of the office and out into the hall where War stood in front of Preme, blocking him from Lil’ Joe. Lil’ Joe tossed the bullet back at Preme and stated, “I’ll see you in the streets, nigga.” He exited the barbershop.
“Aye Unc,” War spoke up from the hallway. “You want me to let this nigga go?” He was referring to Preme. War knew if Carlos said yes, Preme was going to slump Lil Joe immediately. Carlos thought about it for a moment, then told War, “Nah, let him calm down for a minute. Preme, you need anger management, nigga,” Carlos joked. “But straight up, you know that nigga already feelin’ some kinda way about Dave. Now, he
know
we did that shit. Keep an eye out for that nigga. I doubt if he’d test a nigga’s gangsta, but don’t put nothin’ past that nigga right now.”
“Fuck dat nigga! You need to let me eliminate that problem so a nigga ain’t even gotta worry about it,” Preme stated as he limped back into the office.
“Nah, we gotta chill wit’ the bodies. That nigga, Chief Monroe on his game right now because the crackas from
First 48
down here filming. They ain’t slippin’ right now. Shit is tighter than mosquito pussy.”
They all nodded in agreement. It was true, ever since the hit TV show
First 48
had been filming in Charlotte; homicide detectives had been solving murders in record time. They all agreed they would chill with the violence unless they felt it was absolutely necessary.
CHAPTER TWENTY- ONE
I can’t believe you talked me into coming to Chicago with your ass,” Sapphire said as she put her carry-on bag in the overhead compartment and sat next to Justice. “And you got me in the back of the plane. You are wrong for that.”
Justice looked up from the Nook she had just purchased. She was reading
Shiesty 3 by T.N. Baker
. “Girl, stop complainin’. I had to kidnap yo’ ass to take you to Greensboro just so you could get outta town for a little while.” Justice pushed her hair back and took a deep breath. “You wasn’t complainin’ when we was at Four Seasons Mall spending up Carlos’s money or when we went to the Maxwell and Jill Scott concert.”
Sapphire smiled as she looked down at her Red Bottom boots, courtesy of the two stacks Carlos had laced her with earlier. If one didn’t know any better they would have thought that Sapphire was Carlos’s bitch. Sapphire looked at the black business-style blouse and slacks Justice had on, courtesy of the trip as well.
“So you really are startin’ to feel Carlos again?” Sapphire asked.
Before Justice could answer, the flight attendants were doing a song and dance on how to put on the seat belt and how to conduct oneself in the event of an emergency. A few of the passengers were seen pulling out their smart phones so they could put the routine on YouTube.
After the routine, everyone clapped and Sapphire noted, “Lemme find out we stepped on
Soul Plane.
”
“You would think we did.” Justice looked up momentarily. If Sapphire hadn’t been the chick talking her ear off, she would’ve regretted not bringing her headphones to tune out the distraction. She hated to be talked to during flights.
“But back to what I was saying. Things gettin’ serious with you and Carlos again?”
“We’ll see,” Justice said, looking up from her electronic book again. “It’s not like I let the nigga fuck—we just talked a few times and I hung out with him one more time after Amélie’s. When he gave me the money, it wasn’t like I asked for it. If that nigga think he gonna get some because he was financing that cheap ass trip to Greensboro to get shit I could’ve got in Charlotte or better yet, Chicago, then he got a long way to go.”
Those were the words she told Sapphire but in reality, her and Carlos hung out more than just one time after they all had dinner. In fact, they saw each other four times while she was in Charlotte. The first three times were movies, dinner, and deep conversation, getting to know one another again. It was the fourth date when Carlos made his move. Justice almost fell weak, and as much as she wanted to give in, she stuck to her guns and it didn’t happen. She had forgiven him for the most part and was actually starting to lose her reserve but deep down inside, she could not help but to reflect on how his anger had caused so much turmoil in her life. And for that very reason, she felt as though she was at a crossroad and didn’t know which path to follow.
“Aw, go easy on the brother,” Sapphire teased. She wished she had brought a book to read and was frustrated that she couldn’t see the words on the Nook from where she was sitting. “You done forgave yet?”
Justice nodded her head. Sapphire’s persistence and Carlos’s remorse had paid off. She had forgiven Carlos but she could never foget. However, nothing would change the fact that Monk was still in the ground. And somebody was answering for that.
***
Given the drama that had taken place not too long ago, Justice almost didn’t take Sapphire to the club; but since Sapphire had never been there before, Justice figured she could take the risk.
“Oh shit, this is nice!” Sapphire shouted when she saw the Phire & Ice insignia on the building. A prideful tear almost escaped her eyes. Although she had heard about the club and had seen countless pictures, Sapphire was still in awe. “I still can’t believe you did this.”
Without having to be told, she knew that she was the
Phire
and that Justice was the
Ice.
“I had to do something with that money I got from J.T.” Justice confirmed as she took out her key and proceeded to open the door. “We earned that money and I needed a legal hustle, so this is what it is.”
“Sistah, I ain’t mad.” Sapphire followed her in and proceeded to walk down the hallway. “I know you don’t have this long hallway for the niggas to come through. What happens if a fight or fire breaks out or shit get outta control?”
“Girl, this
the back
of the club.” Justice looked at Sapphire as if she were crazy. Then it dawned on her that her girl hadn’t been in a strip club before. “Let’s go to my office, I need to change and you can take your nosey ass and snoop around a lil’ bit,” Justice teased.
Justice led Sapphire to the office and allowed her to marvel at the décor. Justice reached into her closet and grabbed a bag containing more casual wear and some sneakers and rushed into her private bathroom and did a quick change. When she came out, she was wearing sneakers and some tight-fitting Robin jeans that showed off her curves.