by Brick
Lucky tilted his head to the side, looking disinterested. “Oh, is that what this is? You tell me to fuck my mother, then throw in the racial cleansing bullshit as icing?”
Cold as ice, Lucky leaned in toward Frankie. He spoke low against Frankie’s ear. “No mi interessa un cazzo, puttana. My blood comes from survivors and adapters. My family will always come back and each time erase you bastards. So thank you for exposing yourselves. That’s all I wanted, figa. Light him up.”
A smirk spread across my face. I dropped into a squat near my brother as he muttered, “That ninja is crazy as shit.”
I gave a nod and pressed my hands together, watching. “Just like us, huh?”
“Every bit as crazy as us, kuya. But check it. What did he say?”
Cory had humor behind his eyes, I guessed to stave off the intensity of this situation. He calmly looked Frankie in his eyes, then tapped the charges together before pressing them against the man’s flesh.
Screams rent the room. Behind me Uncle Snap sat watching with a dazed look in his eyes. It was as if he wasn’t here, but when he said, “He said that he didn’t give a fuck, nephew, and called the bastard a whore and a pussy,” I realized that he was here. And I realized something else.
“You can speak Italian?”
Uncle Snap glanced at Lucky for a moment, then pushed off against the wall. “Consigned myself to learnin’ after meeting Luciano. Wasn’t ’bout to have my woman talked about and me not know. Though she knew the lingo as well.”
When the screaming stopped, I looked at Uncle Snap with new regard and respect.
“Clamp the nigga’s balls, nephew,” Uncle Snap suggested with a casual flick of his wrist, pointing. He had his flask of moonshine again and took it to the head. “Ah . . .” He wiped his mouth, then signed, “He’ll talk quicker if his nuts pop.”
Cory chuckled. “Ooh wee. Unc got lessons. All right, Frankie man, say good-bye to your manhood, homie.”
Lucky moved out of the way, annoyed. He haphazardly slashed his butcher knife against the man’s back. “You got this mook fucked up.”
When Lucky bent down to pick up a big white jug, then threw the liquid in it on him, Frankie let out screams, his body pulling at the chains, until he gave. “I lied,” he screamed in agony. “I didn’t do it. B-but I know some people who may know something. Old Parish. Where Five Points began. There’s a church there. . . .”
“Uh-huh, you just gotta keep fucking with me. But that’s all good, my friend. I got something real nice for your racist ass.” Lucky gave a quick nod. “Finish his people.”
When Lucky said that, Cory clamped the cords and hit the power. We watched quietly as Frankie screamed and gyrated. Foam gathered around his mouth; then his eyes became red as liquid spilled from him. We watched the force of the charge make him bite down so hard that his teeth broke. It was then that I remembered the old man’s request. I motioned for the power to stop; then I pulled out his tongue and sliced it off, for Cavriel.
“It’s always a good day to watch a cracker fry,” Uncle Snap said in cold malice.
As for the rest of Frankie’s people, they all were wiped out as Frankie watched and then was fried alive.
Chapter 11
Claudette
“Cece. Come here! Toya almost here.”
This little town was gonna be my death or the cause of the rest of my insanity, I swear ta God. Hearing that my godchild Toya was on her way here had set a pit in my stomach. Not of fear, but of the desire to off the man who had dared put his hands on that child. I didn’t need to see her right now, but I needed to get to her home and put a nice talking to her mother, my old friend Betsy, on why she wasn’t keeping Toya off the streets while I was here. I didn’t need Toya seeing what I had in store for Lonnie.
Which made me think of my husband. God, it was good to hear his smooth, velvety voice. He always knew how to calm the wave of rage that was ready to come toward me. It was like he knew what was in my mind. Not what I was thinking, but what was actually in my mind before I could even birth it into a thought. That was something he had always been able to do, and it was sexy as hell. It was his voice and ways of soothing me, with a bottle of moonshine and Prince on the radio, that had me pregnant with his child a year ago. It was the sweetest memory and later the saddest.
“Deedee,” I screamed at the top of my lungs. “Tell me why this little girl is coming here to your home, where this pedophile lays his head, huh?”
“That child neva comes this way, not until, I guess, she got wind that you here.”
Deedee was in the kitchen. I could smell something frying. I glanced in and saw sliced green tomatoes and a brown paper bag with flour handprints on it. I guessed she was craving chicken.
My ignorant-ass sister stepped from the kitchen, wiping her hands on the apron that was wrapped around her swelling belly, and she looked at me, confused. “Which got me worried, Cece. She looks like a broken doll. Lonnie hurt that girl badly. She might not be the same little gal that called ya Auntie.”
What she said was true, and that worried me. It also pissed me off. When the light banging of a fist on the porch screen came, I exhaled.
“I need you to follow what I said to a T, Deedee,” I said with melancholy in my heart.
“Why? What you finna do, huh? That gal needs you, not me. She hates me.”
“That’s your own fault, and you know it. I need you to go make sure your simple-ass husband is still at the bar.”
Deedee gave me a confused look. “I kicked him out the house, baby sis. I don’t wanna see his disgusting face.”
“His face wasn’t so disgusting when you married that bitch, then allowed him to touch you with his sick ass,” I spat out at her.
I could be very petty, especially when pissed.
“I told you—” she began, but I held my hand up and shook my head.
“You told me that you were hiding and keeping a baby from one man, only to stupidly marry a rapist and known child molester and, looking at you, a wife beater.” Anger had me feeling light-headed. “For a change, can you accept your foulness, huh? I’m here to clean it up, but accept ya shit, sis. Anyway. Let me get this baby.”
As I walked away, I saw Snap watching from the top of the stairways. “Snap, can you walk with my sister and keep her protected? I’ll be safe and fine here.”
“You sure?” he asked, slowly coming downstairs.
From my peripheral, I could see Deedee taking off her apron and turning off the stove.
“Yes, I’m very sure.”
“Then I’ll protect her, as you asked.” Like that, he bounded down the stairs and headed to the back. I heard him say, “Ms. Deedee, come on with me.”
After I watched them exit, I gave a deep sigh and whispered, “Jesus, help me.”
I quickly moved to the kitchen, poured two glasses of ice water, grabbed some cookies and the fresh tomatoes my sister had sliced, and put everything on a tray. Then I walked out on the porch. Toya sat on the front step, with her face pressed against her knees. She looked so tiny, so fragile, so unprotected, and it hurt my heart.
Quietly, I sat down next to her and laid the tray down behind us. I rested my hands on my knees. I had long since removed my gloves and changed out of my travel clothes. Currently, I wore jeans and a cropped MJ’s “Bad” T-shirt. I had no shoes on, which was a childhood habit while I was home, and my hair was up in a bun.
“Baby girl, tell me what you want me to do,” I said gently.
When a woman, let alone a child, was raped, oftentimes she couldn’t compartmentalize what had happened to her, let alone why it had happened. And oftentimes, she—we—had no one to act as our voice for when we couldn’t talk.
I knew the feeling well. Lonnie had taught me that lesson, and I had been too afraid to tell even my own father, because of how innocent I had been. I didn’t want my daddy taken away from us or Mama for killing that monster.
So, in order to protect him instead of myself, I h
ad kept my ten-year-old mouth shut, and I still kept it shut, until now. My sister knew the truth. And despite that truth, she had still married that bastard. My heart was heavy, and the disloyalty was like a bleeding open wound.
Light sniffling was all that could be heard, and I sat in the stifling silence. I had learned long ago that silence could be healing when it came to therapy. It could also be suffocating.
“I wanna go with you, Auntie. I wanna leave this place,” she eventually whispered.
Fifteen years old and no one had protected her.
“What does your mother have to say to that? Have you asked her?” I gingerly questioned.
Small shoulders shrugged, and I wanted to pull her to me.
“All right. I’ll talk with her. I think it’s beyond time to get you out of here, and as I have always told you, baby girl, if eva you need me, I’ll come.”
“I wish you coulda have just come an’ got me instead of visited.” Toya’s small face finally turned toward me.
Her tiny oval-shaped face was a battleground. She had broken, swollen lips. Her left eye was black and blue, and the whole right side of her face had a fist imprint. It took all my spiritual knowledge, all the training I had, to keep a poker face, all my strength to keep me where I was and to sit by this child’s side.
This goddamn town was trash. They let this child walk around like this and didn’t make that nigga Lonnie disappear in the night? Oh, hell to the naw. I realized just how deeply changed this town had become. The real heavy hitters, the real old elders had passed on, leaving this once feared town crippled, and it was a shame. Toya’s attack was testament to that.
“Auntie is here for you now.” Carefully, like holding fragile china, I held Toya’s chin in my hand and gently tilted it up so that she could look me in the eyes. “I know it feels like you’re alone, but I’m here for you, and I will keep you safe as best as I can, okay? Do you trust me?”
“Yes, ma’am. That’s why I came here. ’Cus I knew you were here.” Toya had a tiny voice, like a blue jay’s. It hurt that the light in her had been broken.
“Tell me of Betsy. Did she try to shoot him?” I asked, thinking of my old friend.
“Yes, ma’am, but I stopped her.”
I knew why too. Because her mother was all she had, and that broke my heart. “Why don’t you let me take you home?” I looked at the sky and watched the darkness overtake the fading orange light. “I’ll bring dinner with me, and you and Betsy can eat and start packing.”
For the first time since she had sat down by my side, I saw hope shine in Toya’s eyes. “Yes, ma’am. You’re really gonna take us to Atlanta?”
“Yes, I am. I promise you.” I made sure to let her know that I always stood by my word by looking into her moist eyes. Oftentimes it was up to us women to show our young daughters or girls that they were not alone when wronged. It was these delicate moments that could forever break a young girl. I knew that well. So, I tried to give Toya my strength through my words and by being here with her in the moment. I had nothing to hide from her or lie about and I knew she understood that when she looked into my eyes.
Toya’s arms wrapped around me. “Thank you, Auntie.”
I wrapped my arms around her and held her to me. “You’re welcome, baby girl.”
Afterward, I walked Toya to her home, where I had a long talk with her mother as Toya slept in her room, with her bags packed around her. Snap called Betsy’s house from the juke joint and told me that Deedee was back at the house and that he was watching Lonnie as we spoke. I told him to continue watching him while I handled business.
“He hurt my baby girl, sister. He hurt her.” Betsy stood in the middle of the room, crying and filled with brittle rage. “That nasty bastard followed my baby from school, then snatched her up when she tried to run.”
Betsy was still a beauty. Five-six, slim, and the color of clay, with a short hair style like Anita Baker. I had learned that my old friend was a schoolteacher and that she had stayed in Creek Town to keep watch over her mother, who’d passed two months prior. When I offered to set her up in Atlanta, she happily took it. I figure, she could be a good asset to the neighborhood, especially to the children whom me and King mentored.
But for now, our minds were on Toya. Betsy was pacing, with a mason glass of brown liquor in her hand, while I had moonshine in mine. B.B. King played in the background just to drown out our conversation so Toya could rest without reliving what we spoke about.
“Tell me the rest,” I said quietly.
“He choked her, beat her until she couldn’t move, and then he . . . he . . . he hurt my baby, sis. My only baby girl . . . hurt her and changed her. I want him dead, Claudette. I want him strung up in the town to cook in the sun as the birds eat his eyes and foul dick. Told her she was a special, sweet thang . . . ,” Betsy said as tears ran down her face.
It was the same thing he had told me. I was sure it was the same thing he told all his victims. And it was those words that had me leaving Betsy’s house in the middle of the night with purpose and heading toward the juke joint. My feet moved with purpose, kicking up gravel. In my right hand was a closed glass full of clear liquid; against my back, my pistol; and in my left hand, my engraved switchblade.
I felt the fieriness of vengeance in my spirit. In this world, where women were becoming less protected by the day, sometimes only sisterhood could get shit corrected. My Kingston understood that in me, which was why he had made me his right hand in the Syndicate. I didn’t fucking play. I intended to show that to Creek Town by holding Lonnie’s esophagus in my hands while a dog ate his dick.
Chapter 12
Shanelle
Justice and Honor were in their baby rockers, pacifiers in their mouths, fast asleep. Worry had my head hurting. Anytime Javon, or any of my family, stepped out to handle Syndicate-related business, I worried. I often pondered what I would do if Javon never made it back home. How would I go on? How would I raise Honor alone? How would I keep the family going? All that shit constantly bombarded my mind. It was a natural process, I knew, but sometimes it just got to me more than other times.
I walked back into the kitchen to check on the shrimp and grits I had cooking. Dinner was going for the family and Ms. Lily, our next-door neighbor. She had been a little sick the past few months, but like clockwork, every morning she showed up to have breakfast and to sit with the babies. This morning had been no different. She’d gone home only to nap. She’d be back soon, I was sure.
The kitchen door opened, and with a gust of wind, Inez came in. “Hey, sis. How’s Jojo?” she asked.
“He got up, got dressed, and headed to school like normal. After he spent time with Justice, of course,” I answered her.
She hugged me, then kissed my cheek. She smelled of lemon verbena and honey. I smiled at her. It was just a year ago that we thought she and Cory had died. Finding out she and Cory had been addicted to drugs and in a mutually abusive relationship—none of us had even known they were in a relationship—had caused Javon to snap. Once Javon found out his brother had been laying hands on Inez and had been on drugs, he and Cory had fought. More like Javon had given Cory some tough love, then had tossed him and Inez out on their asses.
Soon after, Cory and Inez were attacked by the Irish, leaving us to believe they’d been killed. However, we found out they’d survived with the help of Ms. Lily, who also happened to be one of Mama’s friends. The injuries they’d sustained were severe. Both had been scarred up and down their bodies. Skin had been ripped from their faces because of the accident caused by the Irish attacking them. The skin grafts Inez had had done to her face had healed nicely. While Cory had decided against getting reconstructive surgery for his injuries, I was happy Inez had gotten hers. She would always be beautiful, no matter what, but I knew the injuries to her face had bothered her.
Inez pulled her trench coat off. I smiled at the white scrubs she had on. She was back in med school. I was proud of her, to say the least.
“So, you want me to stab that bitch or not?” she asked, attitude clearly in her voice as she went into the dining room.
I knew she was checking on the babies. The plan had been to kick Dani out, move her next door with Jojo and Justice. But Javon had decided against that once he saw the problems they were having. He wanted to keep Jojo close for fear Dani would push him over the edge.
“No, don’t do that, Inez. Especially since I don’t know Jojo’s mental state right now. I mean, I figure he’s pretty broken up about that shit, but I need him to actually talk to us and tell us.”
“Tell us what?” Navy asked as he breezed through the kitchen door.
I took him in. His silky auburn hair was down. He had on gray sweats, a hoodie, and a pair of fresh white Nike Air Max shoes.
“Where the fuck have you been?” I snapped at him.
He stopped abruptly, then gawked at me. “Was at the office. Javon gave me a list of shit to do, and I had to cover Jojo’s shift.”
“All night and half the damn day?”
“Yeah. All night and half the damn day.”
I gave him a side eye. Since he had broken up with his girl last year, he had kind of turned into a workaholic. Even still, he knew he should have at least checked in before now.
“I’m sure you know Javon had to leave on emergency business, so I need to know where you are at all times. Understood?” I asked.
Navy tilted his head to the side, then looked at me. My paranoia mixed with my overprotectiveness was showing.
“I’m aware, Shanelle. I’m aware. Again, a nigga was at the office. Feel me?”
I gave him a stern look, then nodded. He knew how I got anytime Javon left. They all did. So, I was grateful that he didn’t give me any lip.
“I heard about what happened with Dani and Jojo,” he said, snatching up a hot shrimp to put in his mouth.
I swung the tongs at him. He chuckled but rushed out of my swinging range.
