Heartless

by Al-Saadiq Banks

  Storm paces around the table a few times before stopping short right behind the girl. Storm stares over her head for seconds without saying a word. Distrust forces the girl to look over her shoulder, up at Storm.

  Storm leans closer and plants her hand on the girl’s shoulder. She places her mouth onto the girl’s earlobe as she braces the girl, so she can’t move. She whispers into the girl’s ear. “You know what? You are absolutely right. I’m all about being fair, so you tell me what you think would be fair to you.”

  The girl attempts to wiggle out of Storm’s tight grip but to no avail. This makes her even more angry. “Y’all scored forty-six. Break me off like a third. Shit. Fifteen would be cool. Hands down.”

  Storm stands up quickly. She leans her head back with hearty laughter. “That’s not fair. That’s insanity.” She walks over to the window and lifts her leg, putting her foot onto the window sill. She leans back as she digs underneath her army field jacket and grabs the gun. She stares at her gun in the air, studying it from every angle. Both Man-Man and the girl watch with suspense.

  “I tell you what… I got four more thousand for you. That’s my final offer. Take that or take nothing at all. The choice is yours,” she says, still looking at the gun.

  She walks over to the girl, who sits there with her lips puckered up with attitude. Man-Man looks over to the girl and shakes his head, gesturing for her to take it and not press her luck any further. She pouts like a child before lowering her gaze onto the table. Storm places her finger under the girl’s chin before slamming the gun onto the table. The girl’s eyes are locked on the gun until Storm lifts her head gently by her chin. Storm stares into the girl’s eyes until her pouting melts away. Her face now shows discomfort. “So we got a deal or what?”

  The girl stares at the gun one last time before nodding her head in a frightened state. “Deal,” she whispers.

  Storm reaches over the girl’s shoulder and grabs a few piles and slides them next to the other piles.

  “I hate greed with a passion, but I had no real problem giving her another four grand because I knew I had a bigger plan.”

  Minutes later, the halogen lights of Storm’s triple black Mercedes CL coupe are the only source of light on the dark and secluded block. Storm sits comfortably in the driver’s seat as Man-Man stands at the window.

  “Listen. We ain’t got no room for no bullshit,” Storm says. She looks into Man-Man’s eyes. “You sure you don’t want me to handle it? I don’t trust that lil bitch. She run her mouth and we finished.”

  “I know, I know. I got you,” he says hastily, in an attempt to shut her up.

  “Remember, if she asks why you going that way to take her home tell her some bullshit like, just in case the heat following y’all. Pull over at the graveyard, do what you gotta do, burn the car, and hit me when you get to your sister’s house.”

  Man-Man nods his head with aggravation as if he’s tired of hearing the details. He reaches out to fist bump her hand, but she doesn’t reciprocate it. “Solid. I got you,” he says as he bangs her shoulder.

  Storm looks over Man-Man’s shoulder where a small, American economy car is parked. The girl is seated in the passenger’s seat watching them nosily. Storm waves a fake, overly friendly wave at her before sliding the gear-shift into drive.

  Storm slowly cruises off, leaving Man-Man standing there watching. She peeks her head out of the window with a solemn look on her face. “Oh, and make sure that ten comes back to the table.”

  The Mercedes speeds off, burning rubber.

  14

  The Next Night

  Storm paces back and forth around the kitchen area of Man-Man’s raggedy studio apartment. Rage is on her face and fury is in her eyes. She stops short. “It was simple,” she says while banging her fist into the palm of her hand after each word. “All you had to do was stick to the fucking plan but no! You had a plan of your own!”

  Man-Man leans over the countertop with his head hanging low in defeat. Storm walks over to him. He backs away, not trusting her rage. She points in his face, nudging him with blatant disrespect. “Now we got a situation on our hands all because you was thinking with your little head, instead of thinking with your big ass head,” she says before knocking him against his head.

  “My bad,” he mumbles sadly.

  Outrage takes over her body. Before she realizes it, both of her hands are wrapped around his neck. She chokes him out and he gasps with desperation. “Your bad? Your bad ain’t gonna get us outta this! What was the fucking plan?” She loosens the grip to allow him to speak. Man-Man lowers his head in shame. “What was the fucking plan?”

  “Slump her and leave her,” he mumbles almost under his breath.

  “What did you do, though?” she questions with sarcasm.

  Man-Man stares into her eyes with sympathy. “Come on, Storm. I know I fucked up.”

  With lightning speed, she snatches her gun from her waistband. She quickly jams it into his mouth. An evil grin spreads across her face. “I asked you a fucking question. What did you do? I’ll tell you what you did. You let a piece of hoe-ass pussy control you. Your dumb ass took her to the hotel and fucked her! I was waiting and waiting for you to call while you was in the hotel fucking!”

  She hauls off and slaps him across the face with the gun. He stumbles backward. She leaps at him and strikes him again. She doesn’t stop at one lick. She slaps him repeatedly as he puts his hands up to shield his face. The man in him wants to fight back, but he’s witnessed her wrath on several occasions and wants no parts of that.

  “That was the sweetest score anyone could dream of. It would have been the perfect getaway if he hadn’t blown it. He went against the plan of murdering her; instead he took her to the hotel and dropped her off at home the next morning.

  I knew I should’ve handled the job myself but I was testing his loyalty. I’ve learned that people are quicker to roll over and tell when they have very little dirt on their hands. When they have more fault, they are more likely to keep their mouths shut. With me having three murders to his none, I figured that one would be enough to keep his mouth shut.

  She snatches him by the collar and pulls him closer. “Now the bitch gonna tell everything that she knows.” She spits rage in his face as she speaks. “And we are going to prison for the rest of our lives.”

  “Nah,” he denies. “The bitch gangster, I swear! I know she won’t roll over on us like that. Especially if we bail her out. I just need to talk to her to reassure her that we got her.” Storm shakes her head negatively with frustration building on her face.

  “The longer I stood there, the more I thought about spending the rest of my life in jail because he went against the plan, the more furious I got. By coincidence, after he dropped her off this morning, not even a couple of hours after the robbery, homicide detectives kicked her door in. That little voice in my head kept telling me that she was gonna give us up.”

  Storm unloosens the grip on Man-Man’s collar and pushes him. Her forearm is pressed into his chest. She grabs him by the back of his neck and turns him around. Fear has him putting up very little fight. She bangs his face onto the countertop over and over until he’s dizzy.

  “I knew I should’ve killed the bitch myself, but you insisted that you had it. You knew all the fucking while that you had no plans of ever getting rid of that bitch.”

  “That ain’t true!” he says with his voice muffled. “I did plan to off her. It just didn’t go like that.”

  “I didn’t go like that because you didn’t want it to go like that. You wanted to spare the bitch. Do you think she gonna spare us?”

  She bangs his head onto the countertop one last time before letting him go. His knees buckle from the blows. She raises her gun in the air. Just as he’s falling onto his knees, she places the gun on the back of his head.

  He feels the weight of the g
un on his head and his fear of her vanishes. All he can think of at this moment is his own survival. He turns around and bear hugs her, forcing her backwards. They stumble as they tussle with the gun. He grips her hand and forces the gun away from his face.

  Having her overpowered, he feels as if he has a chance. He buries his face into her chest, still gripping her wrist. Rage gives her a boost of strength. She knees him in the testicles, and he so fears his life that he doesn’t feel the pain. She knees him repeatedly until she feels him loosen the grip from her wrist.

  She snatches away and pushes him back. His eyes stretch wide open, staring into the barrel. He leaps at her with his arms wide open.

  Boc!

  The bullet catches his body in mid-air. His body drops to the floor. She leans over, gun aimed at the top of his dome.

  Boc! Boc!

  He falls over, head in between her feet. She dumps three consecutive rounds into the back of his head.

  Boc! Boc! Boc!

  “You murdered him in cold blood, executioner style. Did you feel any remorse at all?”

  “Not the least bit,” Angelica replies. “By that time in my life, I was no stranger to cold-blooded murder. There were some along the way that I kind of felt sorry about because they didn’t do anything to me. But Man-Man, I felt he rightfully deserved every bit of it. If I had to do it all again, I would do him the same.”

  The man watches speechlessly. The look in her eyes is that of no other killer that he’s ever spoken to. It’s like he’s watched her transform from a sweet and innocent-looking girl into the cold-blooded monster that her criminal file describes, right before his eyes.

  15

  Days Later

  Valentine’s Day

  It’s after business hours and all the employees at the Mercedes Benz dealership have clocked out. The only people present here are the owner, Mr. Antonelli and Storm. Mr. Antonelli leads her into the service area by hand.

  He has promised her a dinner date for Valentine’s Day. She hates that it’s the biggest day for lovers and the closest thing she has to a lover is a seventy-eight year old trick, but she will take that over nothing.

  Today she’s dressed for the occasion. For the first time ever, she’s in a beautiful black dress and four-inch stilettos. Even with this being one of the few times she’s been in heels, she handles them gracefully. She’s amazed at how the formfitting dress accents her curves and makes her appear thicker. She feels so much different outside of her normal casual appearance.

  She’s even discarded her wig and replaced it with a wet and wavy twenty-eight inch weave that looks like it could be her natural hair. She’s so confident with the weave that she’s told herself the cap and the wig will now be a thing of the past. She’s also found that a simple layer of makeup rids her of her freckle problem. Today is the first day that she actually feels sexy. That’s not a word that she has used to describe herself.

  “Can we just go already? I’m starving,” she whines like a spoiled brat.

  “Wait. Not yet. Not until I show you the other part of my surprise. Close your eyes,” he says as he covers her eyes with his hand. He guides her a few steps. “You can open them now.”

  She opens her eyes and is speechless as she stares at the grill of the candy apple red convertible SL550. A huge red ribbon is plastered onto the windshield. “Wait,” she says. “Don’t play with me. Are you serious?”

  “As a heart attack,” he replies. “And you know how serious a heart attack is to a seventy-eight-year-old man,” he says with a huge smile.

  She’s speechless. All she can do is reach out and hug him, damn near knocking him onto the floor. “Thank you,” she utters. “It’s beautiful.”

  “No, you’re beautiful. This is merely a car, transportation. You in the driver’s seat will make it beautiful,” he says as he pushes her toward the driver’s side. He opens the door for her and helps her inside like the gentleman that he is.

  Words can’t explain how she feels right now. She was astounded when he gave her the used car, but this brand spanking new hundred-thousand dollar car is something she never imagined experiencing.

  “What about the old one?” she asks, having no more use for it. So typical for a young girl who gets a new toy and loses interest in her old one.

  “I’ve already had your license plates taken off of it. I’ll be sending it to my used car lot. We have no more use for it. It’s old and you deserve more.”

  Truly, she knows she deserves less, but his words sound very convincing. It’s obvious that he sees something in her that she doesn’t even see in herself. She’s sure he’s the only one who must see whatever it is he sees because no one has ever treated her in the manner that he does. He’s the only one in the whole world who has ever made her feel special. He also makes her feel something that no one else has, and that feeling is beautiful. Whenever she’s around him, she feels like the beautiful woman he claims to see and not the ugly duckling she believes the rest of the world sees.

  She has no words to reply with, but the smile on her face says it all. He loves nothing more then to see her happy. It makes him feel happy and rejuvenated. He’s an old man, but he lives through her, draining her for her youth. That is what keeps him feeling alive. In the five years they have been involved, he appears to be looking younger instead of older which means she’s doing her job.

  * * *

  Hours later in Manhattan, Storm yawns through Guiseppe Verdi’s La Traviata, which she finds quite boring. She looks around in disbelief, wondering how the people could really be enjoying themselves. Her and the old man have the best seats here in the Metropolitan Opera House, front and center of the balcony. After dinner he insisted that they come here.

  He constantly attempts to expose her to the finer things in life, thinking she will be impressed, but the truth; she finds no enthusiasm in most of them. She’s content and happy with the minimum, and he can’t understand it. Instead of giving up on her, he continues to try harder. He graces her with expensive gifts, big steaks and the opera, when all she really loves are designer purses, Chinese food, and hip hop music.

  Her level of comfort and satisfaction, he will never understand. Their worlds don’t even entwine, yet he still enjoys her company. She, on the other hand, finds his level of entertainment to be a drag. As much as she hated to accompany him here, she couldn’t tell him no.

  He does everything in his power to help her obtain happiness so she can’t deny him any happiness that he seeks. Keeping the big picture in mind helps her through his boring endeavors. He gives her anything he believes she may want, not realizing that she has everything she wants at the moment. He’s made her life complete at this level.

  He’s her ace in the hole, and she has no worries while he’s here. Her fear is the day that he’s not here because she’s gotten quite used to the security. With him being damn near eighty, she can’t help but think that one day soon she may not have that security blanket. In the five years that they’ve had an arrangement, she’s gotten used to her lifestyle and can’t imagine it being any other way.

  To secure her future, he has to do one simple thing; sign her into his will. They’ve touched on the subject a few times. He’s the one who always brings it up. She never brings it up because she doesn’t want him to think that is her ultimate goal. He’s promised that he will one day sign her into the will and stabilize her future even without his presence. For some reason, he hasn’t found that level of comfort yet, but she tries her hardest to help him.

  Mr. Antonelli looks over to her in the middle of her yawning. “Is this boring you?” he asks. “If so, we can leave.”

  “No, not at all. This is beautiful,” she says as she grabs his hand. She puts on a great big smile, staring into his eyes. The look in her eyes makes him believe she could be enjoying herself. What he doesn’t know is that look is not enjoyment. That look is her
having her eyes on the prize.

  The second he turns away to look at the stage, she yawns again. That yawn evolves into a deep nod. He’s enjoying the show so much that he doesn’t notice her sleeping away.

  * * *

  Meanwhile, at the Newark Police-Homicide and Major Crimes Division, the young woman, Kirah sits at the table surrounded by three detectives. The two male detectives pace the room while the female detective interrogates. They’ve chosen to let the woman do the job, hoping that she can gain a level of comfort with the girl.

  “Listen, sweetheart, you are in big trouble. I’m just trying to help you as best I can. I’m a woman like you, so I sympathize with you. My partners don’t believe your story, but I do,” she lies.

  The female detective continues on. “Something about your eyes tells me that you are innocent. I believe that you had nothing to do with the carjacking.”

  Kirah’s face shows how surprised she is. From the time the detectives showed up at her doorstep, she was under the impression that she was being snatched for the murders. The carjacking the detective speaks of she was an accessory to a few months ago. She was used by an ex-boyfriend of hers to reel a man in. No murder was involved, just an assault and a carjacking. She thought that was done and over with, but apparently the man went to the police.

  The detective continues on. “I believe that you were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I’ve been there. I’m from Newark and I used to be in love with the bad guys, until I almost lost my freedom when my boyfriend of three years threw a gun under my seat without me knowing, after we go pulled over. Left me to take the weight for it. But you know what I did?”