Fortune & Fame: A Novel

by Murray, Victoria Christopher

  Nathan didn’t say a word as he opened the door, stepped out onto the porch, and picked up the phone. “Rev. Adams, how are you today?” he asked as he walked back into the kitchen. “Yes, I understand that, but in the future, if you have any correspondence whatsoever, you need to talk to our attorney. And if you can’t get our attorney, you need to talk to me. What you won’t be doing is talking to my wife. Got that? You have a blessed day.” He hung up the phone and turned and glared at Mary, who had followed him back inside.

  “I-I’m sorry. H-he just call—” Before she could get the word out, she felt the sting of the back of Nathan’s hand across the same cheek where Rachel had just cold-cocked her.

  “You’re going to stand in my house and talk to another man?” he bellowed. “Have you lost your mind?”

  Mary grabbed her face and slid to the floor. “I’m sorry,” she cried.

  “I don’t want to hear your tired apologies.” He kicked her. As his wingtipped shoe connected with her side, she let out an agonizing scream. “Don’t you ever disrespect me in my own house.”

  “Y-you said you wouldn’t ever put your hands on me again,” she sobbed.

  “That’s before I knew you’d be talking to your ex in my kitchen.” He paced back and forth across the kitchen, his fury on full blaze.

  “I’m doing all of this for you, and this is how you repay me?” Nathan reached down, picked her up by her collar, and slammed her against the wall. “I should’ve left you on the dirty jailhouse steps where I found your trailer-park ass. The next time I come in here and find you talking to another man, will be your last time.” He pushed his forearm against her throat. Mary thought she was going to black out. “Don’t let the bible talk fool you. In my former life, I was a thug and I will fu—” He caught himself, then slowly lowered her as he adjusted her blouse. “See how you make me act. Whew!” He blew a tight breath. “Disrespect me again and see what happens.” He tossed Mary to the floor like she was a rag doll. She lay there weeping as she heard those awful wingtipped shoes click away. She was in a lot of pain, but she knew she needed to get up. She had to get dinner started before he acted an even bigger fool.

  Mary reached up to grab the counter and pull herself up. That’s when she noticed the figure at the screen door. Staring at her from the other side, her mouth hanging open in shock, was Rachel Jackson Adams.

  Chapter

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Jasmine

  Darlin’, are you still sure about this?” Hosea asked her.

  With the phone pressed to her ear, Jasmine rolled her eyes. Maybe she shouldn’t have told Hosea what was going on. “Definitely; the majority of the show has been good.” That’s what she said aloud. But inside, scenes where she and Rachel or Rachel and Mary had gotten into it scrolled through her mind. If this show wasn’t edited right, First Ladies could end up looking as ratchet as any of the other reality shows. But she kept on trying to convince Hosea. “And you can’t blame the show for what Mary and that SOB did to Rachel and Lester.”

  “Jasmine!”

  “What?”

  “Even though I don’t approve of what Reverend Frazier did, that language . . .”

  “What? All I said was SOB. That stands for . . . son of a butcher. Yeah, that’s what it stands for. I heard somewhere that Reverend Frazier’s father was a butcher.”

  “Yeah, okay. But I have to agree with you; what the Fraziers did was foul. I’ll give Lester a call after this meeting this afternoon.”

  “I know he’ll be glad to hear from you. Anyway, enough about the show. I miss you. And so do Jacquie and Zaya.”

  He chuckled. “I just left this morning.”

  “I know, but it’s been hours already.”

  “Well, you may miss me, but I don’t think our children do. Are they going to be out all day?”

  Even though Hosea couldn’t see her, she nodded. “Mrs. Sloss said that she’ll have them back from the CNN Center around six or so. We’ll call you as soon as they get home, okay?”

  “Okay, darlin’. Well, don’t worry about Rachel and Lester. Just pray. God’s gonna work it out.”

  With a final “I love you,” Jasmine hung up and thought about Hosea’s last words. God’s gonna work it out.

  Jasmine had no doubt about that; she was going to make sure that God worked it out exactly the way she wanted.

  Now that she’d checked in with Hosea, it was time to put the plan into action. First up, Mae Frances—she had to get her friend on board.

  But just as Jasmine put her foot on the first step to go upstairs, there was a pounding on her front door.

  Then, “Jasmine!” More pounding. “Jasmine!”

  “What in the world?” Jasmine whispered as she turned around and rushed to the door.

  She pulled it open and Rachel stumbled inside, breathing hard as if she had run all the way to Jasmine’s house. But when Jasmine peeked over Rachel’s shoulder, she saw her car. So it wasn’t physical exertion that had Rachel hyperventilating.

  “Rachel! What happened?”

  “Oh, my God! Oh, my God!” she exclaimed, her hand pressed to her chest. “You’re not going to believe what just happened.”

  “Come in here. Sit down,” Jasmine said, leading her to the living room. It took a few seconds for Rachel’s breathing to slow down so that she could speak. “Do you want some water or something?”

  Still heaving, Rachel shook her head.

  “What in the world is going on?”

  “I just saw . . . Mary . . .”

  Jasmine frowned. “She came to your house?”

  “No . . . at her house . . . and . . .”

  Jasmine groaned. “Don’t tell me you went over there. I told you to go home.”

  “I know . . . I know . . . I did and I was going to stay at my place, but I got to thinking . . . and so, I went over there and . . .”

  “You hit her again?” Jasmine moaned. She could imagine it. Rachel had probably given Mary a ghetto-girl beat down. If Mary was still alive, she might not ever be able to walk or talk again.

  Rachel shook her head. “I didn’t hit her.”

  “Good!” Jasmine breathed.

  “But that punk-preacher that she calls her husband did.”

  An extra moment passed and Jasmine said, “What?”

  Rachel nodded. “I was just going to go over there to reason with her. Talk to her face-to-face. But you should see her face now.”

  “You saw him beating her? What happened?”

  “Well . . . wait.” Rachel paused and looked around. “Where’s Mae Frances? I might as well tell both of you at the same time.”

  “She’s up in her room. I haven’t even had a chance to tell her that we need to talk to her. I came home, changed my clothes, called Hosea, and I was just going to see Mae Frances now. ’Cause you weren’t supposed to be here for another”—Jasmine glanced at her watch—“six hours, remember?”

  “I know, I know. But after I saw Nathan beating Mary down like that . . .” Rachel shook her head and shuddered. “I got out of there quick. Mary saw me, but . . .” Rachel shuddered.

  Jasmine grabbed her hand and pulled her up from the sofa. “Come on,” she said.

  With Jasmine leading the way, they dashed up the stairs and without even knocking, Jasmine burst into Mae Frances’s bedroom.

  “Mae Frances,” Jasmine shouted.

  Like most times when Jasmine had entered her room in the past weeks, the blinds were closed, darkening the room, and Mae Frances was hidden beneath a boatload of blankets.

  “Is she asleep?” Rachel asked as she tiptoed behind Jasmine.

  Jasmine stood at the side of Mae Frances’s bed, peeked down at her, then did what she always did . . . she shook her.

  “Mae Frances, are you awake?” She paused for a moment, then shook her and called out her name again. “Are you awake?”

  This time, the woman stirred, lifted her head, and opened her eyes slowly. She focused first on Jasmine, then on Ra
chel standing right behind her. And with a groan that filled the silence in the room, she dropped her head back onto the pillow.

  “I’m so glad you’re awake,” Jasmine said as she opened the blinds, then bounced onto the edge of the bed.

  “I’m not awake!” Mae Frances growled.

  “Yes, you are. And you have to hear what’s going on.”

  “I’m sick, Jasmine Larson.” Mae Frances covered her head with her pillow.

  “Stop claiming that! The doctor said you’re getting better. And you have to hear this, ’cause if you find out about this when you get better, you’re gonna be mad at me for not having told you now.”

  “I don’t want to hear nothin’! I want to sleep.”

  “Maybe we should go,” Rachel whispered to Jasmine. “She’s sick. And what did you say was wrong with her?” Rachel rubbed her hands over her arms as if she was suddenly cold. “She doesn’t have some kind of infectious, third-world disease, does she?” she asked as she looked around the room.

  “What?” Jasmine scrunched up her face. “Don’t be so dramatic. It’s nothing like that.” Then, Jasmine mouthed, “Watch this.” She cleared her throat and said, “Okay, Mae Frances, we’ll leave you alone. Sorry to bother you. Just thought that you’d want to hear how Nathan Frazier is beating the crap out of his wife.”

  Mae Frances’s head popped right up. “Nathan Frazier?” she asked. “You mean Mary’s husband?”

  Jasmine nodded slowly.

  It took some effort, but Mae Frances rolled over, pushed herself up, then, as she leaned back against the headboard, she looked from Jasmine to Rachel with bleary eyes. “Start talking.”

  “Okay,” Jasmine began, then she filled in Mae Frances on the earlier events of the day, from the Women’s Day service, to Rachel being served with the papers, and how Rachel had knocked Mary to the floor with a single punch.

  Mae Frances turned her eyes to Rachel and with just a little bit of a smile, told her that she was impressed.

  Rachel smiled a little, too, as she began her story, “I was just so mad that I went right over there after we left that church. I wasn’t going to do anything. I was just going to tell her that she and her gorilla-husband didn’t want this fight. I was just gonna let her know that Lester and I were not giving up Lewis, and—”

  Mae Frances released a long sigh. “Can you just get to the part where she got beat up?”

  “I’m getting there,” she snapped. When Mae Frances raised one eyebrow, Rachel softened, suddenly remembering that she needed this woman’s help. “Anyway, when I got there, I didn’t know what to do. I thought about walking up to the front door, but then I was thinking that her husband might answer and then I wouldn’t get anywhere. So, I snuck around to the back—”

  “Oh, lawd,” Jasmine said, shaking her head.

  “I was just trying to figure it out. I was thinking that if they were anything like me and Lester, Mary would be in the kitchen getting dinner ready and that phony preacher would be in his bedroom changing his clothes or in the family room watching baseball or something.”

  Motioning with her hands, Mae Frances asked, as if she was trying to rush the story along, “Is that when you saw her getting beat down?”

  “No. At first, he was just screaming about her talking to another man while she was in his house.”

  “What?” Jasmine and Mae Frances said at the same time.

  “She’s cheating on him?” Jasmine asked.

  “I guess so, ’cause he went in on her. He knocked her to the ground, then kicked her while she was down.”

  “Dang!” Jasmine and Mae Frances sang together.

  “Then he picked her up and choked her.”

  “Really?” Jasmine said with a smirk. She wondered if Rachel was telling the truth as the story got more outrageous.

  “Yes, really. You saw how I was when I first got here. It was something. He cursed her and told her that if she ever disrespected him again, she’d come up missing!” Rachel embellished.

  “Wow!” Jasmine said.

  “Yeah, wow! But the good news is that I can use this against Mary,” Rachel said.

  “Use it for what?” Mae Frances asked.

  “That’s why we needed to talk to you,” Jasmine told her. “We need a plan to stop Mary and Nathan from going to court and getting Lewis . . . and at the same time, we need to stop Natasia, too.”

  “Natasia?” Mae Frances frowned and crossed her arms. “What does she have to do with this?”

  “You know she set this whole thing up,” Rachel said.

  “And she’s still after Hosea,” Jasmine said.

  Mae Frances pointed her finger in the air. “You know, while I was lying here, I kept having a dream about her. She’s not a problem, Jasmine Larson. I don’t know why, but she can’t get Preacher Man.”

  “What? You’re having visions now?”

  “I don’t know what you call it, but you know that I know everything. She’s not going to get him,” Mae Frances said sternly.

  “Well, that’s not gonna stop her from trying,” Rachel piped in. When Jasmine and Mae Frances turned to her, Rachel kept on, “ ’Cause she came to me looking for my help to get to Hosea.”

  “What? What did she say and why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I was going to, but then all this happened.”

  “So, she told you that she was going after Hosea?”

  “Not in those exact words.”

  “Well, what did she say? What did she want you to do?”

  “I don’t know; we didn’t get that far ’cause I told her I wasn’t going to do anything against you. I told her to get her own man,” Rachel said, snaking her neck with each word.

  Jasmine grinned and Mae Frances rolled her eyes.

  “I guess this makes y’all friends again,” the woman said, pointing to the two of them.

  “We were always friends,” Jasmine said.

  “That’s not what you told me,” Mae Frances exclaimed. “When you found out that she was doing this reality show, you called her a—”

  “Never mind, never mind,” Jasmine talked over Mae Frances. “The only thing that matters is what’s going on right now and what’re we gonna do about it.”

  Rachel stared at Jasmine for an extra moment. As if she was trying to decide if she should question Mae Frances more about what Jasmine had said, or if she should just get on with what she’d come to Jasmine’s house to do.

  Her son won out. “Well, like I said,” Rachel began, “I think we can use this against Mary and Nathan. Mary can’t take care of herself, how can she take care of my son? It would be great if we could get Nathan beating her on camera.”

  “No,” Jasmine said. She stood and paced from one end of the bed to the other. “That’ll never happen. That would be too controversial for the show and Natasia ain’t having that. Plus, she’s only interested in making you and me look bad.”

  “Well, if we can’t get it on the show, maybe we can get some pictures of Nathan actually hitting her.”

  “Oh, that would be good,” Jasmine said.

  “What’re y’all gonna do?” Mae Frances jumped in. “Hide out in their bushes?”

  “You say that as if we haven’t done it before,” Jasmine said. “Remember, we handled Chicago.”

  “Ha! Y’all would still be in Chicago if I hadn’t gone there and rescued you,” Mae Frances boasted. “Anyway, y’all are going about this the wrong way. You wanna go after Mary, but she’s the victim. If this comes out, people will feel more sorry for her and they might want to give Mary her child as a consolation prize for losing the husband lottery. You don’t want her to come out looking like the heroine. Just go after her husband.”

  “That’s what I’m saying. If we show how he’s abusing—”

  Mae Frances raised her hand, stopping Rachel. “It will just be your word against his about the abuse. ’Cause Mary ain’t never gonna tell anyone and I’m sure he hits her where he’ll leave very little physical
evidence. What you need to do is set him up in another situation where there are witnesses . . . more than just the two of you,” she said, jutting her chin toward Rachel and then Jasmine.

  Rachel glanced at Jasmine and when she shrugged, Rachel asked, “How are we gonna do that?”

  Mae Frances tilted her head. “I don’t know. I gave you what I got, and now I’m tired,” she said, as she slowly slipped down in her bed. “Just set him up and bring him down.”

  “Wait, Mae Frances, don’t go back to sleep yet . . . what about Natasia? I have to get rid of her, too.”

  Mae Frances just shook her head. “I can’t worry about this right now. I’m too sick.”

  “So, what am I supposed to do?” Jasmine whined.

  “Do the same thing. Set her up, set him up. Bring her down, bring him down. Now, y’all get on out of my room!”

  When Mae Frances closed her eyes, Jasmine knew she was done . . . at least for now. She sighed. They needed Mae Frances, because when she got involved, life got handled.

  “Come on,” Rachel said. This time, she led Jasmine out of the room and they didn’t exchange another word until they were settled once again in the living room.

  “Well, that wasn’t much help,” Rachel pouted.

  “I don’t know,” Jasmine said. “Mae Frances never wastes words or advice. She knows what she’s talking about. We’ve got to set them up.”

  “How?”

  “The first thing we need is information. On Natasia and Nathan. We have to find out something about them. Something they’re hiding. Something they wouldn’t want anyone to know.”

  Rachel nodded. “Yeah, everybody has something in their closet. Especially Nathan. The way he was acting this afternoon . . .” She shook her head as if she was remembering the scene that played out in front of her. “But Natasia, didn’t you already research her?”

  “Yeah, I mean, I didn’t, but Mae Frances did a few years back.”

  “A few years back?” Rachel sucked her teeth. “Girl, please. People’s lives change by the day.” She gave Jasmine a sideways glance. “You must not know nothin’ ’bout snoopin’.”