by Kiki Leach
"It reminds me of cookies. Maybe I'll bake some when I get back to Nikko's place."
"You mean your 'home' with that muthafucka now, correct?"
"Don't be cute, or I walk like I said." I folded my arms as he sneered at my choice of words. "Why the hell did you want me out here? Because I don't remember anything about this place in the least."
"Your mother lived upstairs for a bit with Taz's before officially checking out on Rox."
"She lived here with Deborah?!"
"You never knew about that shit?"
"She never brought me here; I only heard about it in passing and never knew the name."
He absorbed the air around us before taking another drag of his joint, then lowered his eyes and flicked a thumb out behind himself. "Snow White Pussy's inside this room here."
"For a particular reason or what?" I peeked over his shoulder and frowned. "Does she have anymore information that we can work with or is she still on a high from being rejected by Snake yet again?"
"She was attacked last night, Chey."
"How?"
"Some muthafucka smashed a vodka bottle in her face right outside the club. Cut her up to the point of needing to get stitches around her eyes, nose and mouth."
"My God. Why?"
He lifted his shoulder and rattled his head. "She won't say."
I stepped forward and glared. "Why the hell not?" He inhaled more of his joint before pinching the lit tip and flicking it to the ground. He blew out another wad of smoke and furrowed his brows. "Oh, I see." Realization struck me as he remained quiet. "She won't say because she's protecting this person. She knows who the hell attacked her and most likely knows why."
"Chey--"
"Move." I shoved past him to rush inside the apartment, but stopped to plug my nose as a whiff of what smelled like bleach and rotten chicken filled my nostrils. "What the hell is that smell?!" I clamped my lips together to keep from gagging.
Nix shuffled in behind me and made a face. "She's not sure, but it's why the door's gotta remain open."
"I can see that," I replied through a nasally mutter. "I can smell it."
"She said the place has been like this for a few days now."
"And she hasn't bothered to call anyone about it?!"
"Who the fuck is she gonna call in this place, Cheyenne?"
I whipped my head around to him and bugged my eyes while doing my best to remain upright and alert despite wanting to faint. "Maybe she should start with the local crime scene unit because this smell is equal to a corpse rotting beneath the sun. Where the hell is she right now?"
He pointed. "Kitchen."
I traipsed past a pair of rotted pleather couches with Nix's toes on my heels, pausing at the doorway of the kitchen as Marleena hovered over the sink in her ratty, silk white robe. She turned half-way after realizing I was there, allowing me to see a railroad of stitches in her face, then reached for a wet towel along the faucet and draped it across her forehead.
"I wasn't exactly sure that you would show up in spite of what he said," she mumbled in a low, scratchy voice.
"I don't actually know why the hell I'm here," I replied. "And didn't know that it was to see you until he told me."
"Is that your way of saying you wouldn't have come in knowing?"
"Yes."
She looked me the face with as much of a glare as her green eyes could manage while keeping the towel pressed against the most significant parts of her skin, and leaned against the counter. "You still remind me of your mother with that slick tongue."
"And you still remind me of someone she never needed as a friend."
"I was the best one that woman ever had--"
"You were far from it in general; right along with Deborah."
"Chey," Nix snapped. He raised a hand and shook his head. "Don't start in with that shit--"
"I'm ending it." Turning back to Marleena, I stepped further into the kitchen and pointed. "Who the hell stitched up your face?"
"Does it matter?"
I shrugged. "I guess not as much as what the hell happened to it in the first place. So what did?"
Her jaw tightened as she anxiously wagged her foot against the floor and balled her right hand into a fist. "I was hit with a bottle last night, Cheyenne."
"I heard that part -- By who? is the actual question I'm asking here."
She tossed a blond wave of loose curls behind her heavily sunburned back and quietly sighed while taking a seat behind her table, which seemed to be missing one of its legs. She rolled her eyes back to mine in apparent aggravation, then carelessly shifted them to Nix and swallowed hard. "His face wasn't all that clear to me--"
"Bullshit," I blurted.
Her pale skin blushed as her teeth clinched.
"Christ, Cheyenne." Nix looked to me again and groaned. "What the fuck--?"
"She's full of it." I turned back to her and sneered. "You didn't have to see his face to know who the hell it was, and you know why the hell they did it. Start talking before the rest of you ends up with more than just a few stitches in your face."
"Is that a threat?"
"Not one made by me and we both know that to be the truth."
"What the fuck is the deal here, Cheyenne?" asked Nix.
"You know what it is, and so does she."
Marleena turned her attention back to Nix and glowered. "Is she high?"
"I've been sober since leaving for college, thanks. I'm also the one you can talk to directly. He's only here to keep me from fully losing my shit."
"He's not doing a very good job of it--"
"He's doing just fine. You're the one bound to have a much bigger problem than the one we've got already. So start talking or we walk and take the information that we do have with us."
"Where?"
"In your own words 'does it matter'?" I retorted.
She dropped back in her chair and chortled, though her eyes remained cold. "You are such a bitch."
I rolled my eyes to the corner and tipped my head aside. "Well."
"You come into my complex with an attitude the size of Texas while expecting answers on my own goddamn attack?"
"We both know that the person who did this to your face will most likely try to kill you next for either what you know or refuse to admit," I said. "It doesn't take a Nancy Drew to figure this out, so what on God's green earth are you protecting them from?"
"Maybe I'm protecting myself from what else could happen -- did you ever think about that, Cheyenne?"
"No, because it's not the truth."
"Bitch."
"I've heard that one already -- hang up and try again."
"Goddammit, Cheyenne," said Nix.
"She's lying," I said again, "and I'm not backing off until she starts admitting the reasons behind why."
"Fuck off, Cheyenne," she snapped.
"Force me out of here," I replied. "Or at least try, and we'll see about it."
"Jesus. Christ." Nix grunted.
Marleena took in a breath and gulped before responding. "Refusing to admit what I know could keep me alive. Admitting it aloud is what's liable to get me killed."
"By who?!" She remained quiet. "Fine, you know what?" I threw my hands up to Nix, and glowered. "This... calling me out here was a complete waste of time--"
"It wasn't Snake," she interjected.
I turned back to her and pinched my brows. "Really."
"I know that you're thinking he might have had something to do with this--"
"I actually wasn't thinking that at all until now."
Her mouth dropped as if she had just seen a ghost. "What?"
"I said that I wasn't thinking that at all," I told her. "I wasn't thinking about him in the least outside of wondering how pissed he'll be in knowing we were here to begin with, but you bringing up his name with regard to what happened now gives me pause for why it's possible. That said, why the hell would he or anyone else do this to you? He got what he needed in information on Chino's mone
y and he's not looking for you to continue sucking his dick--"
"It wasn't him," she reiterated.
"Okay. Then who the hell was it and why the hell would they attack you outside of the club last night? Surely someone saw something even if you didn't?! What about the cameras outside?"
"He was wearing a helmet," said Nix. "And the rest of him was covered from neck to ankle in his clothes."
"Great."
"Only shit cameras got was the plate for his bike, but it traced back to a dummy; he was smart as shit."
"Or he knows the club and was fully aware of what the hell you would do in order to find out who he was." I refocused on Marleena, dropping my hands to the edge of the table and bending forward. "When the hell did you start working side gigs as a PI?"
"Officially eight weeks ago. Unofficially, toward the end of last year."
"What was 'unofficial' about it before now?" I asked. "How the hell did you get mixed up with it at all?"
"A former client from my old strip joint needed the favor when his other girl quit after he requested sex only in favor of funds because she wasn't good enough at her position." I rolled my eyes and swallowed back a gag as she continued. "He wanted to know if I would be willing to take a few pictures of people screwing around for a few hundred dollars, on top of maybe sucking his dick every now and then for extra dough."
"You took pictures of infidelity."
"His clients needed proof of cheating in order to win their cases and more money. I did as asked each time, took clear enough pictures and he turned me onto more gigs. Everything was under the table until I decided that I wanted to be paid more. He expanded my role after I topped him before and after blowing his cock, and it went from there."
"Is this why you were so easily able to look into Chino's finances? Skill?"
"That information is public for anyone who knows what they're looking for," she said.
"Is it?" I dragged my eyes across the kitchen and wrinkled my nose. "If you're being paid so much now, what the hell is that smell? And why don't you pay someone else to get rid of it?"
"This isn't where I'm living full-time, Cheyenne. It's temporary."
"For what reason?"
"Not exactly your business."
"Maybe not, but it still smells like a giant toilet in here, Marleena -- from room to room. If you make enough to stay somewhere else part-time, maybe think about doing that instead."
"Stop being a bitch about where I'm living or not--"
"I'm only being myself," I told her. "As always."
"Try doing less of that."
I smirked and dropped my hands from the table as Nix stepped forward, wagging his head. "What does the muthafucka that turned you onto this shit do for a goddamn living, Snow White?" he asked.
"I'd rather not discuss it."
"You should!" I blurted. "Because if you're still involved with him, and if he's the one that attacked you last night, it can make all the difference; and if he has clients, that would make him an attorney."
"Regardless," she started, "he has no reason to attack me anymore than Snake."
"You're only guessing that part because you don't know it for sure." She looked aside without another word and dropped her towel to the table. I shook my head. "This person could've been attempting to send a message beyond you to the club -- to Snake, Nix, the rest of us and you're choosing to remain silent--"
"I know that Chino worked with the Gambiano's to get your man released from Rikers."
"Wha--?" I jerked my head back in shock. "How the hell would you know about that? And what the hell does it have to do with what we're talking about right now? Unless Chino or the Gambiano’s or both had something to do with what happened to you?"
"And if they did?"
"Why the hell would they have done this to you last night, Marleena?"
A wave of broken glass suddenly ripped across her face before she could speak, slicing the stitches in her cheek from one end to the other. I fell back into Nix's chest as pieces whizzed past my own face before crashing into the walls and skidding across the table.
As her chair tipped to the side, she fell straight to the floor. Blood poured from her mouth as a spray of bullets clouded the kitchen.
"BABY GIRL!" Nix threw his arms around my head and pushed me beneath the table. "You alright?!" he hollered. "Were you hit?!"
I shook my head, too shaken to respond.
When the bullets finally stopped, he scanned my face in a rush and pushed my hair behind my neck. I turned to a tear stained Marleena, who hollered out between a clinched jaw and dropped a hand on top of a fresh hole in her right cheek.
"Oh my GOD!" I reached for the towel and pressed it against her to lessen the bleeding.
Nix yanked the .45 from his holster and slammed it into my free hand. "Another wave comes through here," he said, "don't muthafuckin' hesitate. Remember the shit I taught you." I nodded as he ran from the kitchen while reaching for his second .45.
Marleena hollered out again as clots of blood seeped from the corner her mouth, staining her robe and the floor; it was then I realized that a bullet had not only hit her in the face, but hadn't gone through to the other side.
When Nix finally returned to the kitchen out of breath, he reclaimed both .45s and reached into his back pocket for another burner. "We gotta be damn lucky this place is too fucked up and far out for muthafuckas to call the pigs. Now we gotta get her the fuck outta here," he spat while dialing.
"And take her where if not the hospital?"
"She's gotta get back to the club; bitch has got too much shit to be taken anywhere else and not a goddamn piece of insurance to keep her ass there. It's why one of the girls had to stich her up last night."
"A pre-med student looking for bike dick on the side, no doubt?! But these aren't just a few cuts that will go away overtime."
"I fuckin' know that shit, Cheyenne."
"Do you also know what the hell we're going to do about it?" He made a face at me while lifting the phone to his ear. "Did you see the person who shot through her windows?"
"Same muthafuckin' plate from the bike last night."
"Was it the same bike?!"
"No." He turned from me after a voice came through the other side of his phone and began mumbling.
I looked to Marleena as blood stained her hair and naturally peach colored lips; as her eyes rolled to the corner of her face, her pale skin withered. "We need to know who the hell keeps doing this to you and why--!"
"We gotta fuckin' go, Chey." Nix threw his burner back into his pocket and moved around the table to reach for Marleena. "The boys'll come back later and pop this shit." After picking her up from the floor and cradling her in his arms, his eyes narrowed toward the towel that had fallen out of my hands. "We gotta take that shit with us too. And get that other burner outta the goddamn trash. Had this shit not happened, it wouldn't have fuckin' mattered."
"Who were you talking to before tossing it?"
"Goddamn pizza delivery asshole."
I wagged my head and got up from the floor to follow him outside, then snatched his cell from the trash and hurried to my car to unlock the doors. "Snake is going to ask what the hell we were doing here after this," I told him. "Are you prepared for his wrath when we tell him why she's going back out there with a bullet lodged into her face this time?"
"We ain't telling him shit outside of what we don't fuckin' know for a goddamn fact, Chey." He eased Marleena into my backseat and closed the door as she kept the towel against her face and fell to her side.
I frowned while dropping the burner into his front right pocket and tilted my head. "You suddenly want to keep him in the dark now -- Why?"
"Let's go." He hopped onto his bike without another word to me and revved the engine before speeding from the lot.
I jumped back into my car and followed him into the street with a frenzy.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Foul Cry
"Jesus Christ!" Snak
e balled his fists upon storming outside the club in a fury as soon as I pulled in behind Nix's bike and got out of my car. "WHAT THE FUCK?!" He stopped near my trunk after getting an eyeful of Marleena bleeding all over my backseat and onto the floor, then turned to a pair of wide-eyed prospects named Thing One and Thing Two, respectively, who had run out behind him and pointed to my windshield. "Get her inside the back room."
"Who the hell stitched her up last night?" I questioned.
Snake looked to me as if I had just spoken to him out of turn; as if I were a no-name clubwhore with no say outside of 'what can I do to please you?', and grimaced. "Cheyenne, what the fuck are you talking about?" he snapped.
"I'm asking a question," I told him, "because she's going to need a hell of a lot more than a few pieces of plastic string in her face with a bullet lodged into her jaw this time."
"Christ." His shoulders dropped; his eyes closed as he gradually shook his head. "The shit didn't go through?"
"Not from what I could see."
"FUCK!" He snapped his fingers at the prospects, forcing them to quickly remove her from my car. "Call that number I had you both memorizing earlier; remember what the fuck I said about it!" They nodded before carrying her inside the club. "FUCK!" Snake slammed his fists on top of my trunk, creating dents near the glass, then lifted his eyes back to mine and grinded his teeth. "YOU and this muthafucka over here!" he spat, blinking toward Nix. "What the fuck were you thinking rolling your asses out there in the first goddamn place?!"
Nix stepped forward. "Prez, I know--"
"She called me," I blurted, "wanting to talk."
"About WHAT?!"
Nix whipped his head over his shoulder to stare directly into my eyes, and gulped. "Cheyenne."
I stepped up next to him and eyed Snake. "She was scared about what happened to her last night and had nobody else to confide in--"
"What the fuck is this bullshit you're spewing at me, Cheyenne?!" he retorted, standing straight. "You two ain't ever been close like that. And now I'm supposed to believe she called your ass up to talk about what the fuck happened to her above anybody else?"
"To talk, seek advice and get some help, yes. Because let's face facts, she can't be protected out here. Which makes me wonder why the hell you didn't have someone watching over her at the complex? It's obvious that whoever the hell keeps attacking her won't stop until she's dead or half-way there."
