by Roy Glenn
“Always,” Sherman said, and I explained what I wanted from him. When I finished, Sherman drained his cup and poured himself another.
“Let’s say I’m interested—”
“Let’s.”
“Instead of you having to stay on everybody about André’s money, you wanna work this so they kick up to me and I kick up to you.”
“You’d be a captain,” Wanda said.
Sherman nodded his head. “Like them white boys do it.”
“Exactly,” Wanda said.
“You make money, I make money, and André makes money.”
“It’s just that simple,” Wanda added.
“And you back me with whatever muscle I need to keep guys in line?”
“All you gotta do is ask for my help.”
“Okay, Black, as long as you have my back, I’m in. And I think that you should talk to Howard Owens,” Sherman suggested, but that was already part of our plan. “He’s got influence with the loan sharks and the guys running protection rackets. With the move you’re making, you’re gonna need all the muscle you can get.”
“I plan to.”
“Good.” Sherman sat back in his chair and took another sip of his scotch. “You been to see Bodie?”
“Not yet.”
Bodie Ringling was one of the people that was on my list that I knew I might have to kill, but hoped I wouldn’t because he was a good earner. He had his hands in everything; gambling, numbers, extortion, prostitution and he had the muscle to back him, a lot of it. Even with Whitey and Drew’s people, I had a bigger crew, I really had no desire to fight him.
“They tell me that when he heard about Emmet and Henderson, he said that he ain’t paying you shit and he wish you would try that shit with him. Something about lining all of you up in body bags for everyone to see.”
“You let me worry about Bodie,” I said.
Chapter Eight
When we left Sherman’s, me and Wanda hung out until that afternoon until she said that she was tired. She dropped me off at my place and she went home to sleep. I had been there long enough to sit down and think about going to bed and getting some sleep, before a key hit the lock and Bobby came in with three women. So, I didn’t get any sleep right then, but I did go to bed.
When I woke up, I was alone in bed. I got out of bed and went in the living room. The women were gone and Bobby was lying on the couch watching TV.
“What time is it?”
He looked at his watch. “It’s after six.”
“What happened to the women?”
“I dropped them off and came back.”
I turned around and went back in my room. “Where you going?”
“I’m gonna take a quick shower and then I wanna go by the cleaners to see Howard before he closes.”
Once I had showered and put some clothes on, I left with Bobby and we went to talk to Howard.
Howard Owens was a bookie and loan shark, who dabbled in powder when there was enough money and no risk involved. He ran a numbers bank too, his wasn’t as big as Sherman’s, but Howard was a good earner. I needed Howard because he had influence with the loan sharks and the leg breakers. Like Sherman said, with the move that I was making, I was gonna need all the muscle I could get.
When I walked in the Howard’s dry-cleaners, I didn’t see him so I went up to the counter. Since Freeze had been bringing my clothes up here to be dry-cleaned and pressed, I haven’t been there in a while.
“Is Howard here?” I asked the cutie who was running the register.
“He’s in the back,” she said, and smiled her cute smile at me. “Who should I say is looking for him?”
I leaned on the counter. “Mike Black and Bobby Ray.”
The mere mention of our names changed the look on her cute face. The smile on her face had been replaced with one of fear and apprehension. She took a step back.
“I’ll tell him y’all are here,” she said, and backed away from the counter. As she walked back to the office, she kept looking back at us until she got to the office.
Bobby leaned close to me. “See what happens when people hear your name.”
“Me, I thought it was you. Women usually have a different response when they hear my name.”
When Howard came out of his office, two of his men, Bull Harris and Skip Skinner were with him. They both had their guns in hand. Bobby was about to reach for his, but I grabbed his hand and then I raised mine.
“I just came to talk, Howard.”
“Lock the door on your way out Gladys, we’re closed,” Howard said. Gladys rushed past me and Bobby, hit the door and locked it.
Once she was gone, I reached in my coat pocket, took out both of my guns and laid them on the counter.
“What about you, Bobby?” Howard asked.
“What about them two gruesome looking mutha fuckas?” Bobby took his gun out and held it up. “When the gruesome twosome puts down theirs, I’ll put down mine.”
When Howard nodded his head, Bull and Skip held up theirs and they each laid their guns on the counter.
“You wanna talk Mike, let’s talk.” When me and Bobby started to go behind the counter, Howard said, “Just you, Mike. Bobby can stay out here and make sure everybody behaves themselves.”
“Like the perfect gentlemen we all are. Right, Bull?”
“Yeah, like perfect gentlemen,” Bull said as I went behind the counter and I went in the office with Howard.
Howard sat down. “What can I do for you, Mike?”
“I came to talk about what I can do for you, Howard,” I said and began to run down my program. I made him the same offer that I made Sherman.
“Captain of my own crew, huh?” Howard asked and laughed a little. “And they all kick up to me instead of André?”
Howard frowned because he didn’t particularly like André and André felt the same way about Howard. Something about a woman they were both fuckin’. It turned out that she dumped both of them and ran off with a pimp and a gambler named Lloyd Brill before he went to jail.
“You kick up to me and I pay André.” I didn’t see any point in telling either Howard or Sherman that I was partners in this deal with André.
“Can I think about it?”
“Sure.” I stood up. “My offer expires the second I walk out that door.”
Howard laughed. “What happens then?”
“Unfortunately my friend, I would have no choice but to consider you my enemy.”
“And you would have to act accordingly,” Howard said, and then he stood up.
“Afraid so.”
“Then you’d have to pay your dry-cleaning tab and I don’t feel like going to all the trouble of totaling it up.” He extended his hand. “So I’m with you, Mike,” Howard said, and we shook on it.
With that taken care of, we rolled by The Late Night. We weren’t opened yet, but I told Nick, Jamaica and Freeze to meet me and Bobby there. At André’s request, our target for the evening was Jerome Ennis. He was a drug dealer who was moving up in the game, and that meant that he was a problem for André.
When me and Bobby got to The Late Night, not only were Nick, Jamaica and Freeze there, but so was Wanda. Since what we were doing that night was for André, you know, our job, and it had nothing to do with our plan, I didn’t see any reason to tell Wanda about it. But there she was and from the angry look on her face, one of them told her about it. Wanda is as big a control freak as I am, so you know she wasn’t happy, but fuck it. Fact was, we still worked for André and like I said, handling his problems was what me and Bobby did.
Everybody got quiet. “Y’all ready?”
Everybody stood up.
“Can I talk to you for a minute before you go, Mike?”
“Wait for me outside.”
Me and Wanda stared each other down as everybody else filed out of The Late Night.
“What is it, Wanda?”
“Wasn’t there anybody else André could send to handle this for him.”
“No.”
“I just think that we need to stay focused on what we’re doing. I mean really, André is the one who is gonna benefit the most from what we’re doing.”
“You’re right. He is. But what do you expect me to do, huh? We still work for him and this is what we do.”
“I know that, Mike, I’m just saying—”
I held up my hand to stop her. “I gotta go.”
Wanda let out a deep breath. “Be careful,” she said, and I turned to leave.
When I got outside, I walked over to Nick. “What you got for us Nick?”
Nick led us around the corner and pointed at the two cars that I had him steal. “Crown Victoria and a Volvo,” he said, and tossed Bobby the keys to the Volvo.
To be honest with you, I actually agreed with Wanda. I didn’t see what the big deal was. Ennis was little more than a corner boy that had recently stepped up his game. She was right, he could have sent somebody else, but like I said, we worked for him, so fuck it.
Ennis and his crew ran their program out of a second floor apartment in a building with controlled access. That way, if the cops showed up, they’d have a few seconds to run before they broke down the door. Getting in wasn’t gonna be a problem for us, because Jamaica knew a woman that lived in the building and he made a copy of her key.
As soon as we stepped inside, two men armed with Uzis stepped out of the shadows. Nick raised his weapon and shot one in the head. Then Jamaica took out the other.
Just as I predicted, when the shooting started, two more men came to the top of the stairs and opened fire on us with automatic weapons. While Nick, Jamaica and Freeze took cover, me and Bobby stepped to the front and returned fire on them and then we took cover. Once we were out of their line of fire, Nick, Jamaica and Freeze began firing so me and Bobby could make it to the back staircase.
Me and Bobby made our way up the stairs as more of Ennis’s people seemed to come out of nowhere like roaches when the lights come on. We were firing shots and killing men, as we got closer to the second floor. When we got to the top of the stairs, two men came out of an apartment armed with Mac 10s. They began firing. I shot one as I moved for cover while the other one continued firing. Me and Bobby ducked around a corner, he kicked in a door and we ran in as he blanketed the hallway with bullets.
“You niggas don’t want none of this right here!” he yelled, as he came around the corner. Then the shooting stopped. I looked out and saw that he was about to put another clip in when Nick walked up behind him and put one in the back of his head. I came out of the apartment.
“Thanks,” I said.
“Ready?” Bobby said when he came out.
“Let’s go get this mutha fucka,” I replied.
Just then, I saw Ennis come running out of an apartment at the end of the hall, firing. Good thing for us that he wasn’t a very good shot, because he missed every shot and then he went out the window.
“I got him!” I yelled, and went after him with Bobby and Nick right behind me.
By the time I got down the hall, made it out the window and onto the fire escape, Ennis had made it down the ladder and was running down the street. I took aim and fired one shot. It hit him in the back and he went down.
“Go check on Jamaica and The Kid. Me and Bobby got Ennis,” I said, and we went down the fire escape. When we walked up on his body, he was still moving.
He looked up at us. “Who the fuck are you niggas?”
“I’m Mike Black, and this is Bobby Ray.”
“Pleased to meet you,” Bobby said, and we both raised our weapons and fired.
Chapter Nine
Since André liked his shit to be public, we didn’t bother moving any of the bodies. We just got in our cars and drove away to the sound of police sirens.
When we got back to The Late Night, I gave Freeze the guns I had used so he could get rid of them and kept heading toward the office. I was surprised when I was told by a member of security that André was in the club and he was waiting for me in the office. It was surprising because in the entire time we’ve been open, André has never been there.
“What’s up with that?” I asked Bobby, as he and I headed toward the office.
“Probably just wants to know what happened with Ennis,” Bobby said.
“Yeah, but he never comes here,” I said, and opened the door. The first thing I saw was a woman’s big naked ass.
Bobby laughed. “Well damn.”
There was André, leaning against my desk with his pants down around his ankles and she was on her knees sucking his dick.
“Is this a private party, or can anybody join in?” Bobby asked.
“You know how me and you do it, Bobby,” André said.
André was the King of the orgy and Bobby was a frequent participant, but I wasn’t. Don’t get me wrong, me and Bobby have freaked a bunch of women together; I just wasn’t in anyway interested in doing that with André.
As Bobby walked up on them, he pulled her up from the floor and then he dropped his pants, I shook my head, turned around and headed for the door.
“Ahh, shit!” I heard her scream.
“Y’all let me know when you’re finished. I’ll be at the bar,” I said, and opened the door to leave.
“Mike!” André breathed out.
“What?”
“How’d it go with Ennis?”
“Like it always goes,” I said as I closed the door and locked it behind me.
I came out in the club, got a drink from the bar and then I went to my table, took off my coat and sat down. I sat there, listening to, but really not hearing the music, thinking about what we were doing, how it was going and what my next move would be.
Although things were going exactly the way we planned it, I still had a feeling that something was wrong. That I was missing something, that I hadn’t covered every base.
I drained my glass. “Probably nothing,” I said, and got up to get another drink. That’s when I saw a magnificent specimen of a woman standing at the bar. She was wearing the shit out of a black sleeveless crewneck dress with a gold floral pattern, which easily made her the best-dressed woman in the joint. Since I’d never seen her before, I wondered who she was here with.
André maybe, I thought as I approached her. But no, even though she was fine as hell, I know André hates Puerto Ricans. He might fuck her, but he would never be seen in public with her.
I stood next to her and signaled for my bartender, Sammy. “Hello.”
She turned to look at me and a little smile crept across her full lips. “Hello,” she said in a sultry voice that I knew I’d enjoy hearing again.
“You know, most men are intimidated by beautiful women, and they’re afraid to talk to them. But I’m not.”
“Since you’re telling me this, then I must be a beautiful woman,” she said.
“You are … very beautiful,” I said as Sammy placed a glass of Rémy in front of me. “But, I get the feeling that I’m not telling you anything that you didn’t know. I mean, I know that I’m not the first person that’s told you that.”
“No, you are not the first man to tell me that.” she picked up her drink. I thought that she was going to finish it and walk off, but she didn’t. She took a sip, and then she faced me. She took a little step closer to me. “In fact, I get tired of hearing it sometimes.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“I don’t think that it’s possible for a man to tell a woman that he admires and appreciates her beauty often enough.”
“True, but only if it comes from the right man. And most times, it is the wrong man saying it to me.” She sipped her drink. “But I like hearing you say it.”
“Then I’ll say it again. You are by far the most beautiful woman that has ever come in this joint,” I lied.
That distinction belongs to Carmen Taylor.
She laughed and finished her drink. “I’m sure I’m not the first woman you said that to.”
“And there you’d be wrong.” I’ve never used that line before, and that’s all it was, a line. “I’ve never said that to anybody, because nobody is as beautiful as you,” I lied again.
Again, she laughed. “I don’t believe you.” She picked up her clutch and then the coat that she had draped over the back of her chair. “But it was nice talking to you.”
“The pleasure was mine.” I paused to admire her body before she covered it up. “My name is Mike Black,” I said as I took the coat from her hands. She turned around and I held it while she placed her toned arms in the sleeves.
“I know who you are. Everybody knows Mike Black.”
“Since you know who I am, tell me, what’s your name?”
“My name is Nianza De La Vega, but you can call me Nina. Nice to meet you,” she said, and then she started to walk away.
“Slow down.” I said quickly and she stopped. “I’d like to see you again, Nina.”
Nina leaned in and kissed me on the cheek. “I’m sure you will, Black,” she said, and walked away.
I watched her as she walked her fine ass out of The Late Night and I seriously thought about getting my coat and going after her, but I quickly dismissed that idea. I signaled for Sammy to bring me another shot of Rémy and drank it down. “Too many other fine ass women up in here to chase that one,” I said, and then I went back to my table, and got my coat.
There was no telling how long Bobby and André were going to be and I didn’t feel like waiting around. Besides, if André wants to know how it went, Bobby could tell him and it would be a much more colorful story.
When I left The Late Night, I decided that I didn’t want to wait for a cab so I walked home. I was almost there, when I saw a police car roll up alongside me. I didn’t think much of it, because cop cars in this neighborhood are an everyday thing. That was until the blue lights came on and the car pulled over in front of me. Both officers got out of the car and came toward me and they both had their hands on their guns. Seeing that, I immediately raised mine.
“Mike Black,” one shouted.
