“Shorty? You’re calling me a shorty?”
“Yeah, well, I thought I’d speak your language. Besides, calling you a ‘sweet young lass’ is likely to bring me a whole lot of grief.”
“You call me a sweet young lass, I might puke. More to the point, what do you think you’re up to doing with this shorty, Mr. Lawyerman?”
“I’m thinking it’s a good thing neither of us needs much sleep, since proving yourself will probably take most of the night,” he teased. “I’m not totally convinced yet. You still need to prove you’re as good as you think you are.”
“I don’t need to prove anything that hasn’t already been proven in a spectacular way. You’re the one who should be worried about proving something.”
Turned out, both of them were as good as they said they were—even better. More than amazing sex, something else had happened: Trevon touched her soul. Did it feel this way because, for the first time ever, she allowed herself to go there, or was Trevon really and truly special?
She first met Trevon at a critical time. During a backlash of anticlimactic relief for ending a three‑year quest, mixed with the joy of finally killing her brother’s murderer, overlaid with the regret she always experienced for taking a life, her emotions had crashed down into a low, confused tangle. Then Trevon stepped in, representing something solid and normal. Things with him were fun, and she needed that, both then and now.
Michelle suspected his story consisted of more than just a young lawyer with a nose for business; he had more money than seemed reasonable, even for a successful lawyer. Clearly, he had a lot of street smarts and anyone who paid attention could tell something else lay just below the surface. Trevon had a streak of quiet, understated, yet absolutely ruthless strength, the same type she recognized in herself. This strength, as much as anything else, drew her to him. He was much more than he let other people see. She liked that about him.
“So far, you haven’t failed to meet expectations,” Michelle said, “but there’s always a first time. Are you up for the test?”
“Well, I recently read how a man’s performance is greatly influenced by the woman he’s with. So how about you? Will your influence be adequate to entice my best?”
“Are you sure you’re a brother?” she asked, laughing. “You talk funny. Don’t you worry about my influence or my performance. You get yourself over to my place this afternoon and we’ll see about performance. Right now, I’m headed to the gym for a match. I have an appointment in the Muay Thai ring to kick a tough Korean woman’s butt. You want to come watch?”
“How long will you be at the gym?”
“With the whole workout and a match, at least a couple of hours, closer to three.”
“Sounds good. I’m taking care of some business at the courthouse and I should be finished up in about an hour. After that, I’m free. Are you at Rock Hard Gym?”
“Yup.”
“What makes you so sure you can kick this poor little woman’s butt? I hear some of those Asian chicks can be deadly.”
“You just bring your fancy‑pants lawyer self over to the gym and check it out. And remember, your invitation is open and waiting. Any time you’re up to getting your butt kicked in the ring, I’ll be happy to oblige.”
“You kicking my butt might create a negative impression. We wouldn’t want to negatively influence the evening’s joy, now would we?”
“Here’s a lawyer term for you,” she said. “Past is prologue. It means: ‘what once was, will be again,’ or something like that. I think you’re good for it. You did good before, so you ought to be able to make the grade this time. So, no, I guess you don’t need to worry. Just don’t go getting complacent or lazy. Turn into a lousy lover, and the past will go from prologue to ancient history.” Hanging up, Michelle pulled into the Rock Hard parking lot, cut off the radio but left the motor and air‑conditioning running.
She’d sparred with this woman several times, enough to begin missing details that might count. Michelle pushed back the seat and, with her hands in her lap, head against the headrest, and her eyes closed, she went through a progressive muscle relaxation and deep breathing exercise. She opened her eyes to carefully examine the details of her surroundings as a way of putting the familiar into the perspective of the unfamiliar.
Michelle spotted some crumbs that had dropped onto the shifter in the center console and smudges on the dash of her beloved Pearl. That’s no way to treat a lady. First thing in the morning, I’ll take you in for a deluxe wash, wax, and detail.
Of all the gyms in L.A., she enjoyed Rock Hard the most. With high spirits, Michelle grabbed her gym bag out of the trunk and headed into her home away from home. She loved working out, training, and combat matches almost as much as she loved good sex. Today promised to be an absolutely perfect day and, if possible, an even better night.
Seven: Surprise Attack
WITH A CLEAR VIEW in all directions, BamBam met his crew in the center of the park where it joined up with an empty lot. Up until four years ago, the park had been an active, if not particularly well‑maintained, neighborhood outdoor gathering spot. That changed when the lieutenant, Lewis, set up his drug business operations there. Ever since, no mother in her right mind would let her kids play in the now‑dead park.
The pounding of a basketball on cement and clatter of it hitting the backboard from the six preteen boys playing half‑court hoops drifted over to where BamBam’s crew met.
BamBam sat in a lone, green plastic lawn chair while others stood or squatted in a semi‑circle around him. “Hey, Flaco, you seen Willie and Terrance?” he asked.
“Naw, haven’t seen them,” Flaco answered.
“Fuck! I’m gonna jack their asses for leaving their corner open like this. Jimmy—you and Flaco take their spot.”
“What about my regular customers?” Jimmy asked.
“Kojo—you and Marcus cover for Jimmy today,” BamBam said. “Damn. Willie’s gonna pay for this shit.”
BamBam hung out with the guys on the leftover cement floor of a demolished apartment building. Between them and the street, the partial skeletons of the swings, a slide, and a merry‑go‑round quietly decayed. The dead equipment served as dysfunctional reminders of the defunct playground. Several half‑buried big‑truck tires, looking like arches or perhaps the back of an industrial serpent swimming in the weeds, stood between the rusted hulks and the morning meeting.
Marcus shaded his eyes with his hand. “Hey”—he pointed at two cars coming up the street,—“isn’t that D’andre’s Explorer and Levon’s Three Hundred? What are they doing over here now?”
“Man, I don’t like the look of this,” Flaco said.
“Is there some kind of big meet happening here today?” Jimmy asked no one in particular, gripping the butt of his 9mm tucked in his waistband.
The dark green Explorer and the black Chrysler 300 pulled up, stopped, and D’andre and six others climbed out.
BamBam did a mental inventory: Darius and Cheese were already at their corner, working. He had six guys, plus himself. Flaco, Kojo, and Jimmy were strapped and showing their guns. Marcus and Pooky were only runners; they never carried heat. That left Willie’s cousin, Ty, from back East. New in the hood and unproven.
Christ. Four guns. They have seven.
Ty pulled out a 9mm, upping the odds to five to seven.
Without a word, everybody jumped for cover before the first shot rang out. Then, as if God had reached down and hit the “on” switch, twelve guns started shooting at the same moment in an explosion of violence.
BLAM BLAM BLAM!
The boys playing hoops scattered before the ball landed on the second bounce.
“Fuck!” BamBam scrambled away, half‑falling, half‑diving behind a partially buried truck tire. The rubber serpent’s back wasn’t much cover.
Everyone knew BamBam was deadly with a gun, so a volley of bullets zeroed in on him. One hit; the bullet shatter
ed BamBam’s shinbone.
Pooky screamed, “I don’t got no gun! I don’t got no gun! I can’t stay here. I’ll be killed.”
“Shut up, Pooky!” Jimmy yelled. “Stay down.”
“I’ll die here.” Pooky took off running across the play area. Six shooters responded. Six guns.
BLAM BLAM! BLAM!
Eighteen, nineteen, twenty bullets with deadly intent sought to kill him.
One slug hit his leg, spinning Pooky to face the men shooting at him. A second hit him in the gut and he folded over as if giving an awkward bow to the man who’d shot him. The last bullet went through the top of his head. He died on the way to the ground.
Pooky’s slaughter pulled everyone’s attention. They watched as he crumpled and died. It took less than four seconds.
While they hesitated, Flaco shot one of D’andre’s men in the chest—BLAM!—and immediately jumped for better cover.
At the sound of Flaco’s gun, everyone snapped back from the grisly scene with Pooky.
One of D’andre’s men was a fraction of a second faster than the others. He fired a reaction shot at Flaco’s movement—BLAM!
Gut‑shot, Flaco went down. Mostly hidden, his legs still stuck out and a dozen or more shots slammed into the dirt around his feet.
BamBam loaded his only extra magazine and yelled to his crew, “Shoot these muthafuckas! Make every shot count.”
The gun battle was not yet a minute old.
Slot‑B and Darnell, two of D’andre’s men, crouched together in a bad position with little cover.
BamBam saw Slot‑B and Darnell run off in different directions. Slot‑B headed toward a short, cement wall.
“Fuck, he’ll have a clear shot at Kojo,” BamBam said to himself and swung to shoot at Slot‑B.
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!
“Muthafucka, you’re mine,” Robert yelled as he rose up to shoot at BamBam.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!” BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! Ty repeatedly pulled the trigger in time with his words.
BamBam had recently brought the kid into his crew on Willie’s word that Ty could hold his own in a fight. Today, Ty showed both his courage and his fear. One of the shots hit Robert in the neck, killing him, then Ty ducked back down and froze. He didn’t shoot again.
Several sirens wailed in the distance.
BLAM! BLAM!
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!
When Robert fell, Zion ran over to him and BamBam shot his last two rounds at Zion—BLAM! BLAM!
Jimmy fired four or five times at Zion.
More sirens approached from the opposite direction.
Only Jimmy was still shooting. It was enough to keep D’andre’s crew behind cover until the first police cars came screaming up.
Almost enough.
The slide on BamBam’s 9mm locked back. He was out of bullets. “Marcos! I’m outta ammo. Throw me a clip,” he yelled.
“I’m out, too!” Marcos yelled back.
“Bam’s out of ammo! Everybody take him out!” D’andre shouted, pointing at BamBam over behind the tires, and his crew all shot at BamBam.
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!
BLAM! BLAM!
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!
Shots upon shots flew, but none hit their mark.
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!
Marcos jumped up and ran for the corner of the closest building, and all of D’andre’s men except D’andre shot at him—
BLAM BLAM BLAM!
—but no one hit him as Marcos ran faster than any pro at a track meet.
Close, the sirens’ wail grew louder.
D’andre ran in the opposite direction of where Marcos headed.
The first police cars poured in down the same street Marcos had fled. A moment later, cruisers intruded from several other directions. They all missed D’andre.
For a second, the battlefield froze. No one seemed to breathe amid the chirp‑chirp of sirens shutting down. Then, a new chaos erupted as the heavily armed police broke the stillness.
BamBam’s awareness widened and he gradually focused on his men around him. Pooky lay crumpled in a heap, dead. Robert didn’t move, and BamBam guessed he was also dead. Several men groaned while the pain in his own leg flared in stunning brilliance.
“I’ll get you D’andre. You hear me? I’ll kill you!” BamBam shouted.
No one answered.
The wail of different‑sounding sirens announced that the first ambulances were on the way.
*
Darius’ casual lean against the wall spoke of his familiarity with the scene. Cheese stood a few feet away by the curb, taking in the sights and the feel of the day. Business as usual—
—until the sound of shots drifted to the corner.
“What do you think?” Cheese asked.
“Don’t know,” Darius replied. “Can’t tell where it is. It’s big, though. That’s a war, not no drive‑by.”
A black, tricked‑out Toyota Camry rolled up, slow like a customer, but not quite.
Darius had seen the car around, but not on his corner and it was too tricked‑out to belong to a lop. A couple of homies sat in the front, yet no sounds bumped. These guys were in the life. What were they doing here?
“Yo, dog! Hold back,” Darius called over to Cheese. “Something’s not right.”
Standing at the curb, ready to handle customers, Cheese looked up. With a lifetime of reflexes built on the streets, he stepped back, catching eyes with the guy riding shotgun. It was Ghost from D’andre’s crew—Snake drove. Between the two, Ghost was the known killer.
Darius reached for his gun in his shoulder rig.
“Gun!” yelled Cheese. He dropped back on his butt, pulling a 9mm from his waistband.
BLAM!
A bullet whizzed by, taking a piece of his ear.
Cheese fired at the car as it rolled by—BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!—shots exploding until his empty gun’s slide locked open.
As fast as Cheese was, Darius was faster; he’d always been the real shooter. Darius delivered multiple double taps—BLAM-BLAM! BLAM-BLAM! BLAM-BLAM!
The Camry picked up speed and almost immediately careened off of a parked car. Swerving out of control, and across the road, it sideswiped another car on the left then accelerated to slam head‑on into yet another parked car. The force of the last collision threw the back end of the Camry around. Now a complete wreck, the car hissed and smoldered like a giant, pissed off Transformer had dropped it sideways into the middle of the street.
The passenger door creaked open, and Ghost half‑fell, half‑climbed out. Shot but mobile, he took off running. Snake slumped over the steering wheel.
Cheese jumped up, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Take that, muthafucka! Jacked yo’ asses! Jacked yo’ asses good!” He turned, shouting to Darius, “Did you see that! We jac—”
Darius sat on the sidewalk, slouched against the wall, a wide streak of blood running down behind him.
Cheese’s eyes widened. “You’re shot? No, you can’t be shot. I’ll kill those muthafuckas.”
Darius caught his stare, nodded, and leaned back. He’d taken two hits: one in the chest, the other in the leg. “Get them,” was all he said.
Cheese dug into Darius’ coat pocket for the extra clip he always carried, slammed it home, and started up the street. Ghost disappeared around the corner at a dead run, but Snake was still in the car.
Darius’ vision narrowed as he watched his friend stride down the street in a straight line toward the smashed car. Snake’s head slowly rolled, but he didn’t look up.
About fifty feet from the car, Cheese started firing—BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!
With each step closer—BLAM!—he shot at Snake—BLAM!—still in the driver’s seat—BLAM!
He stormed right up to the open window—BLAM! One or more of his shots had capped Snake; the man was obviously d
ead.
Cheese fired his last bullets into Snake’s body—BLAM! BLAM! “Take that! You piece o’ shit!”
The wail of sirens came from not too far away.
*
“Down! Everybody down!” When the shots started outside, G‑Baby dropped to the floor.
“Those fools across the street are shooting!” someone shouted.
“Henry, you old fool! Get out of that chair!” G‑Baby yelled. The older man, lathered up for a shave, still sat in the barber chair.
Several of Cheese’s bullets found the front of G‑Baby’s barber shop—POP-POP-CRACK-POP-POP—one made a small hole in the picture window, and a larger hole in G‑Baby’s arm.
Scooting around his barber chair, G‑Baby used his good arm to yank on Henry’s leg. Finally, Henry slid off and onto the floor.
The shooting stopped. No one said anything.
Someone inside the shop moved, and G‑Baby shouted, “Stay down! This isn’t over yet.” His younger years in the gangs told him this was reload time. A few seconds later, a steady‑paced BLAM, BLAM, BLAM reported he was right.
“Somebody call nine‑one‑one for an ambulance,” G‑Baby said with a wince. “Those muthafuckas done shot me.”
The wail of sirens came from not too far away.
*
BLAM BLAM
“Where are those shots coming from?” JJ spun around to find the danger. “Sounds close!” Nothing but a plain white van came up the street.
Taye swiveled her head, searching the street. “It’s close, but I can’t tell for sure. It’s not here, and I’m not moving until I know everything’s over.” She yanked on JJ’s arm, pulling her over to the grass strip between the sidewalk and the curb where they put a large, old tree between them and the sound of the shots.
The white van stopped next to the young women, and the sliding side door burst open. Four men jumped out, grabbed JJ and Taye, and hurled them into the empty cargo space, with a loud thud. One guy slammed the door while another scrambled up into the driver’s seat. The van pulled out quickly, moving fast, but not fast enough to draw attention.
Get Even: A Michelle Angelique Urban Action Adventure Thriller Series Book #2 (Michelle Angelique Avenging Angel Assassin) Page 5
