Damn. She deserved to be happy; Bugsy only wished that it could have been with him.
“Let’s go,” he told Pluto.
Pluto nodded and started up the vehicle. Bugsy took one long and final look at Alicia’s home. As if on cue, she appeared in her front window dressed for bed in a long T-shirt and sipping on tea. Bugsy’s eyes fixed on her from the tinted windows of the truck and his heart melted with nostalgia. Did she sense that he was nearby? Her eyes gawked at the Range parked across the street, and Bugsy managed to smile.
So beautiful, he said to himself.
Pluto slowly moved the truck away from the curb. Bugsy took his final look at Alicia standing in her window, glowing like the angel she was. He would bother her no more. She was moving on, and so would he.
13
Maxine stood in the hallway frozen like a human popsicle, her feet rooted to the floor. Wacka looked like a choir boy in his suit and pea coat.
At a snail’s pace, he started to walk toward Maxine and locked on to her nervousness. The look on Maxine’s face was priceless. She was shitting bricks. He saw that fear inside her, and it exhilarated him. It reconnected him to something dark inside him that he never realized he missed. His ego yearned to be feared.
Coolly, Wacka walked by Maxine and smirked. He didn’t say one word to her. He didn’t need to. He wanted to generate fear by simply being there, and it was working. He strolled in the hallway like he was looking for a patient’s room. In passing Scott’s room, he quickly spied inside and observed the armed agents inside and outside the room.
It was definitely true. Scott was in trouble with the feds, and Maxine’s safety net was collapsing.
He went to the elevator on the south side of the building and got on with several patients and doctors, and it descended. He exited the hospital lobby and climbed into the front seat of an idling car parked around the corner where Tarsha was waiting.
Wacka smiled and nodded.
“You’re on the money, babe,” he said. “That bitch saw me, and the look on her face was pure panic.” He laughed.
“I knew it,” Tarsha said. “We ’bout to get our fuckin’ money from that bitch.”
“I’m ready.”
They were tired of the ignored phone calls and the games. Now it was time to make good on their threats. As they gloated, Wacka’s cell phone started to ring. It was Maxine calling. Wacka and Tarsha grinned and Wacka uttered, “Oh, now this bitch wanna fuckin’ call back?”
He answered his phone with, “You better be calling me wit’ some good news, bitch!”
***
Seeing Wacka walk by and not say a word to her made her furious. He was toying with her. He was making it known to her that she couldn’t run or hide anywhere. He was going to be everywhere. It was too close for her comfort. Maxine wondered if he was there to speak with Scott. Was he ready to tell him everything? Was he tired of her jerking him around? But still, it would be suicide on Wacka’s end.
Fuck!
She needed to handle Wacka and the situation—either by death or payment somehow. Her time was winding down.
She found some privacy in the nearby stairwell. She turned on the burner phone he’d given her and dialed his number, her hands trembling with nervousness. His phone rang and she waited, not knowing exactly what to say to him.
“You better be calling me wit’ some good news, bitch!”
“I’m gonna get you your fuckin’ money,” she cursed. “But don’t you ever show up here again!”
“You’re fuckin’ me around. No more games! I want my payday, now!”
“Real talk, I don’t have five million.”
“You better shit it out somehow. I’m not fuckin’ around anymore.”
Wacka didn’t want to hear any excuses. He wanted to placate Tarsha and he wanted to be feared again and respected. Maxine continued to tell him that she didn’t have that type of money, but they didn’t care.
“Bitch, I need something right now. If not, I got a story to tell,” he threatened. “Don’t fuck wit’ me!”
Maxine sighed heavily. Her mind was spinning to find a quick solution. She couldn’t afford to have him lingering around the hospital.
“How much you got on you now, bitch?” he asked her.
“I can get my hands on another ninety thousand dollars,” she said.
It was a small chunk of money from the sale of the jewelry. It was painful to think that she would have to give it away to a lowlife thug like Wacka. Maxine gritted her teeth at the thought of it. She wanted to smash the phone against the wall. She wanted to scream. She needed to kill this nigga. She took a seat on the stairs and held back the angry tears she felt about to pour out from her eyes.
“I’m tired of your fuckin’ peanuts,” he said.
“Peanuts? You ain’t ever made this kind of money in your life, so spare me the ‘you get money’ act. We both know this is your come-up,” she said.
“Bitch, then come up off of it then.”
“Wacka, I’m not going to keep being too many of your bitches! You push me too far and we’re done! You can go and tell Scott everything. Fuck it, we can go together! Now I said I’m trying to put together some paper for your greedy ass! And for the record, you’re a nothing nigga. You’re a triggerman who was out of his league. You took on a family that you couldn’t beat, and somehow that’s my fault? You’re weak and stupid, and your family paid the price. Keep fucking with the West family and see if we all don’t end up dead.”
Maxine had to vent. She could feel that he was too cocky. He continued to hold her secret over her head, and it pissed her off. She gave this wounded goon a half a million dollars, and he wanted more?
She heard the phone being jostled and then, “We want that now,” Wacka said.
Of course they did. Maxine could tell that she was on speaker phone. There was an echo and she could hear someone else speaking quietly in the background. It appeared that this individual was telling him what to say. She figured it had to be the same bitch that she crossed paths with at One Police Plaza.
“We know about everything—the famous real estate tycoon wit’ his multi-million dollar businesses and a drug kingpin on the side. The nigga is worth hundreds of millions, so five million ain’t shit to him. That shit is a drop in the bucket for the dirt we have on you.”
“Right now I have ninety large,” said Maxine.
“That ninety K may give you an additional week or two . . . maybe.”
“What the fuck do you want from me? I’m tryin’ to work wit’ you, but what you’re asking, it’s ridiculous.”
Her comment angered Wacka. “You had me kill that man’s kids! His fuckin’ kids! And you calling this ridiculous and wanna negotiate wit’ me? There ain’t no fuckin’ negotiating! You come off that ninety K, plus our five million.”
The harder Maxine tried to deescalate the situation, the worse it got.
She then heard him say, “In fact, meet me right now on the east side of the building and bring me that engagement ring on your finger. We want that.”
Maxine was stunned. She couldn’t give him her ring.
“I-I can’t!” she protested.
“You can and you will. I know that rock is worth a pretty penny, so you dead on that ring.”
“Just take the ninety thousand for now.”
He was back to calling her outside of her name. “Bitch, you’re pissin’ me the fuck off! What I tell you? There is no negotiating to this shit. And it won’t take me but a minute to go upstairs and leave a simple note for Scott to read. You got that, bitch? Maybe I’ll even leave a note for the feds! Yeah, maybe I will! Let them dig into this shit too. I keep telling you I don’t have shit to lose! My muthafuckin’ moms was murdered right in front my face, bitch! You had my sister chopped up in the shower!”
The tears started to pour fro
m Maxine’s eyes as she looked down at the engagement ring Scott had given her. She didn’t want to give it up, but what choice did she have? The walls were collapsing in on her, and she couldn’t dig herself out of this hole. What was she going to tell Scott when he noticed that her ring was missing? What explanation could there possibly be? And how had she put herself into this situation? It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. She wished Miguel was still around. He was her triggerman and he was sprung on her. Miguel would have killed Wacka and his bitch for her. He would have done anything she said.
Despondently, she replied, “I’ll be down in five minutes.”
“I’m glad you see things my way. And bitch, don’t have me waiting long,” Wacka said before ending the call.
Maxine felt sick to her stomach. She wanted to throw up. For now, Wacka and his wicked bitch had her dead to rights.
***
“I got this, baby. I’ll go meet that bitch,” Tarsha said to him. “You did good on the phone. That’s the nigga I miss and who I fell in love wit’. I love you.”
Wacka smiled. “I love you too.”
His adrenaline was pumping and he was so hyped that he didn’t feel handicapped. He felt vibrant and alive. The sound of Maxine’s voice begging and cracking was a high for him. He had that bitch scared. With another ninety thousand on top of that bitch’s engagement ring and five million dollars, he and Tarsha were going to be set for life. And it was the easiest money he’d ever made.
Tarsha kissed her king on the lips and climbed out of the car. She too felt excited and turned on again. She couldn’t wait to have Maxine’s ring in her possession. She strutted to the hospital in a pair of thigh-high leather boots, tight blue jeans, and her auburn leather jacket. She had grimy written all over her, but her dark shades covered her sinister eyes. She didn’t want to create any unwanted attention on herself, so she moved with extra caution, knowing Scott had goons loitering in the area. In her purse, she concealed a .380—just in case it was a setup.
Tarsha went toward the east wing of the hospital. It was a busy area with pedestrians and traffic. The temperature was a modest 40 degrees, one of the better days in late January. Tarsha made it to the east wing lobby and looked around for Maxine. Her head stayed on a swivel and her hand on her purse. She was nervous, but that money made her a vicious bitch.
She spotted Maxine coming toward her. She was mixed in with the lobby mob, and the look in the bitch’s eyes could have slaughtered Tarsha right there. Maxine’s scowl was boiling with rage, but Tarsha wasn’t afraid.
Tarsha felt that if it came to a one-on-one battle, she would wipe the floor with Maxine. She had no idea who Maxine was and what type of life she’d lived for twenty-plus years. She didn’t have a clue how deadly Maxine was and how adept she’d become with hand-to-hand combat. Prison taught her a lot.
Tarsha hated that Maxine was on an entirely different level than she was. Scott, though he was jammed up with the feds, was a baller. He made money—so much of it that he could wipe his ass with hundred-dollar-bills for a month. Wacka had to take it from other drug dealers and peddle his drugs on the side. Tarsha’s jealousy of Maxine’s luxurious lifestyle only amplified her desire to make the bitch pay.
The two females stood in front of each other, and their contempt for one another was evident from their scowls and their threatening body language. Both women were ruthless.
Tarsha started to berate her quietly. “You know what it is, bitch. Come up off that ring if you know what’s best for you. That bitch is mine now.”
Reluctantly and slowly, Maxine started to slide the large diamond ring off her ring finger. The thought of passing it over to a ghetto bitch like Tarsha was sickening. Her eyes burned into the woman. She wanted to tear Wacka’s bitch apart, but she settled for an attitude right now. She grudgingly placed the ring into Tarsha’s hand and sucked her teeth with disdain through her pursed lips. The value of that ring was more than everything Tarsha owned put together. Maxine lingered in front of her, spewing hatred with her eyes and sucking her teeth.
Tarsha said, “Bitch, I know you ain’t suckin’ ya teeth at me. You lucky we in here, cuz I would fuck you up for what you did to my man.”
Maxine’s eyes cut deep into her and she simply replied, “Enjoy the ring for as long as you can. Wear it in good health.”
Maxine’s glaring black eyes spoke loudly. Her mouth said nothing else. In fact, her furious glare was so intense that Tarsha grew a little nervous.
Was she threatening them? Tarsha wondered. A slight tremble developed inside of Tarsha for some reason, but she refused to show it. She felt the urge to get away from Maxine as soon as possible. Not another word was said between them. Tarsha started to backpedal away from Maxine, keeping her eyes closely on her. But before Tarsha could turn away, she observed Maxine raise her index finger to her neck and make a slicing-of-the-neck movement.
Tarsha managed to smirk and mouthed, “Yeah right, bitch. Try it.”
But inside, she was somewhat shaken up. Maxine was that crazy bitch who had Wacka murder her man’s kids. Who knew what else she was capable of?
14
Layla sat in her cell and waited for her day in court. Fitzgerald Spencer had begun to do a 180. His optimistic promises of acquittals and living happily ever after had been placed on pause after he met with the U.S. Attorney. He was working on her case night and day. She desperately needed to get out. She felt swallowed up in a sea of miserable bitches. Life behind bars was fucked up. The only thing she could do was sit around and read and anticipate visitors.
She was a big deal inside the correctional facility. Her name rang out like church bells on a Sunday morning. Her face was in the news, and her husband was notorious in the city and beyond. The last thing Layla had to worry about was somebody messing with her inside. Her pedigree was recognized by everyone—from the hardest gangsters to the wannabes. The corrections officers treated her fairly, and the inmates stayed out of her way or wanted to connect with her. But Layla was in no mood to socialize with people she felt were beneath her—subordinates in her book. She had enough to deal with. She mostly kept to herself.
Today was another court day—a second chance to appeal her bail ruling. It was early morning and it was her time to transfer from the lockup facility to the federal court across the street. The guard called her name and subsequently came the procedure for inmates’ travel to the adjacent building. There was a change of prison dress and a thorough pat-down in all the awkward places.
Layla was presented to federal marshals in the basement of the building. She was shackled at the ankles, chained at the waist, and cuffed at the hands as she marched through a tunnel nearly forty feet below the city street. Security was extremely tight, and cameras were everywhere. During this movement through the corridor with electronic doors at each end remotely controlled by watchful officers, no one would lay eyes on Layla but the marshals and people in the surveillance stations.
Finally, they reached the north end of the tunnel and waited for the prisoner elevator. Inside, there was a locked cage for the prisoner to ride up to the courthouse cells. Layla was quiet and brooding. Her fate with the judge was only moments away. It was hard for her to stay calm, but she didn’t have a choice. She hoped Fitz would make something happen.
Layla stood in the courtroom next to her highly paid and well-dressed attorney. Fitzgerald Spencer stood with prominence in front of the white-haired Caucasian judge swathed in his flowing black robe and hard eyes on the defendant and her legal representative. Judge Harford had seen it all and handed down over ten thousand years of prison sentences in his thirty-eight years on the bench.
The hearing commenced and immediately Fitzgerald went into battle mode and argued to omit the previous bail ruling. His grounds were that Layla was an outstanding citizen with no violent criminal record. She was a mother who had recently buried three children and was in the
process of filing for divorce from her estranged husband. Fitzgerald pointed out that his client and Scott West were living apart when they were arrested and that it was her husband, her codefendant, who had the lengthy criminal past. Fitz did his best to highlight his client’s positive qualities and show that she had strong, long term ties to the community and wouldn’t skip town if granted bail. He even went as far to surrender her passport. Judge Harford was listening.
The prosecution, U.S. Attorney Gloria Sheindlin, argued against him, highlighting Layla’s ties to two violent and murderous drug cartels. She brought up Scott’s criminal charges and dug up theft and loitering charges on Layla from when she was a teenager. Sheindlin said that the streets would not be safe with Layla West out on bail.
In Layla’s eyes, they wanted the judge to see her as a female El Chapo. She wanted to cut that bitch’s head off, but she remained cool, hoping the judge would see things their way. She wished she could throw a bribe at the man—a half a million dollars for her freedom. But he was a stickler for law and order.
It was a pinball game of words between Fitz and the prosecutor. Fitz was convincing with his words and his reasoning, but the prosecutor was fiercer with her fear tactics.
In the end, it was the judge’s decision. His cold, blue eyes looked down at Layla and her attorney. His jaw was clenched so tightly that the veins in his temple bulged. “The defendant will remain remanded into federal custody until her trial date.”
The judge banged his gavel, finalizing his decision.
It was a harsh blow to Layla. She wanted to cry, but she held back her tears. This wasn’t happening to her, but it was. Her attorney was straight-faced. He’d failed her. “This is only a setback, Layla. The odds were stacked against us, but we can—”
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