"Hello?"
"I'm here," I said.
"In what names do I need to make the plane tickets?"
"I'm sorry, La'Renz. Kirbie isn't for sale. You wouldn't want that lazy girl anyway. Bye."
"Hold on. We can work something—"
I hung up and put my phone back in my purse.
CHAPTER 15
Kirbie Amor Capelton
"I can drive back if you want me to," I offered to Archie. "I know you're leg still hurts."
"Oh no," he said, shaking his head in an over exaggerated way. "Absolutely not. Last time I let you drive we got pulled over."
"I've learned my lesson since then. No speeding."
"I got this."
"You sure?"
"You don't wanna drive anyway. You're too busy on your phone."
He was right. I was doing just fine sitting here in the passenger seat surfing The Site. The only reason I drove last time was because I knew that Archie wouldn't have driven fast enough to get me to the studio on time.
But I didn't want him to know he was right about my internet sweet tooth so I stuffed my phone in my pocket and decided to give him a couple minutes of talk time ... even though I still had some statuses to read.
"Thank you, Archie," I said to him.
He looked over at me, then back at the highway. "For what? For driving?"
"No, for making this trip sooner than we normally do and for agreeing to buy more pills this time. I'm really-really gonna need the extra money for Coras's mixtape tour and for big-name features on my own mixtape. I know you think I'm wasting my money, but thanks for giving me the chance to try."
He shrugged. "I waste my money gambling, so who am I to say no?"
"You really love me, don't you?"
"Of course I do. I’m been thinking about this whole thing. I realized that you're just chasing your dream. My dream is to be the biggest hustler ever, and I've seen some major progress in the last four years. You've helped me get to where I am now. So I need to return the favor. I guess I just wanted yo dream to be my dream but that's just not what it is. You have yo own aspirations and I gotta respect that. I'm here to help now. Whatever you need to make yo dream happen, I got you. I just don't wanna lose you."
I took my seatbelt off and reached over and gave him a hug. It was awkward because he still had one hand on the steering wheel, but I still squeezed him tight as ever. I tried to give him a kiss too but he pushed me away.
"You better stay in yo seat," he warned. "They'll pull us over for anything."
I strapped my seatbelt back on, then dug my cell back out of my pocket.
"Couldn't wait to get back on The Site, could you?" he remarked.
I barely heard him. I was too focused on a status update that was at the very top of my timeline. Ashleigh Hegdman had just posted a snippet of her little evil thoughts.
Ashleigh Hedgman: Some people don't deserve success.
I stared at each word. I wondered if the "some people" was really meant for me. I knew Ashleigh hated me. I knew she only tolerated me out of respect for Coras, and this stat summed up the vibe I repeatedly got from her. There was a chance her stat wasn't about me, though. She had plenty of people contacting her, wanting her to manage them, and her post could have something to do with that. But this wasn't the first time I thought she was talking about me on The Site. I brought it up to Coras once and he just said I was being insecure.
I started reading Ashleigh's comments:
Rita RealSpit Gibson: True, some people don’t deserve success, but who are we to judge?
Alexa Leonard: I can name plenty of people I see on TV that don’t deserve what they have! That shit pisses me off!
NorthEastRapGod: Ashleigh I posted my newest song off of my mixtape to yo page yesterday Did you see it? Let me know what you think and if you’ll be my manager
Rebecca Flynn: I’m in agreeance with you Ashleigh. I have an uncle that’s rich and he only gives me money on holidays. If I had money I’d give it to everybody.
Michaela McDonnell: And I hope that the ones that don’t deserve it never get it. Especially my brother’s wife.
I wanted to comment too, but what I had to say wasn't appropriate so I did the next best thing—I Liked her status. So if it was in fact directed toward me, she now knew I was fully aware of—
"Get out the fucking car!"
My door was thrust open and I was yanked out of our Toyota rental car. I caught a glimpse of Archie being snatched out on the other side, before I was slammed to the concrete by a brown-skinned man with gold teeth.
We were being robbed!
"Archie!" I yelled.
"Just do what they say!" he yelled back.
The gold-teethed man put his boot on my head, flattening my cheek into the concrete. My face was being painfully pricked by the loose little rocks on the ground. My eyes were jumping around searching for an escape and I saw that we were on the lot of one of our storage units. There were orange garage doors up and down this aisle. I hadn't even realized we had gotten here already.
And that posed a question—how the fuck did these niggas know to hit us here?!
Me and Archie were always discreet and aware when coming to or leaving one of our storage units. Yeah, I was just looking down at my phone for an hour not paying attention but Archie should have been! We had another unit on the northside of town. We used these units to store pills. They acted as stash houses for us—easier and safer access than riding around the whole city with drugs in the car. If we had sales on the northside, we used our northside unit to pick up pills. If we had sales on the southside, we used this unit.
"Hurry up!" my attacker yelled at his friends.
I heard the Toyota's trunk pop and someone rummaged through our bullshit. We had luggage with clothes and California souvenirs in there just in case we got pulled over on the way back and had to explain that our trip was just pleasure. One of the robbers threw the luggage out, and then I heard the prying sound of someone tampering with the spare tire with a crowbar.
They're gonna find the pills! I panicked.
"Do you know who the fuck we are?!" I shouted. "We will hunt you down and kill you!"
"Kirbie, shut the fuck up," my attacker said, pressing harder with his boot.
The robber knows my name!
"Why are yall doing this?" I said.
"It's business, not personal, baby girl. I like yo music."
"Who are you?"
"Kirbie, just shut up!" I heard Archie shout.
Then I heard the crinkling of cellophane. "Got it!" someone exclaimed.
They found our packaged pills. I tried to push off of the ground, and I immediately wished I wouldn't have—my attacker stomped on my head, made me scream.
"Kirbie!" Archie yelled.
"She's okay," said gold teeth. He bent down far enough to put his gun to my head. I could smell the alcohol on his breath. "If you want to live to sing again, you'll stay on the ground a full ten minutes after we leave. Okay?"
"Let's go!" another one yelled.
My head was released suddenly, and I heard the whole jack team running away. They were laughing as they fled. I got up in a flash and saw them jumping inside of a black BMW. Under my passenger seat in the Toyota rental I had my .380 handgun. I was inside grabbing it when I looked across the car and saw Archie still facedown on the ground with his arms out obediently. It was a sad thing to see.
I spun around with the gun, hoping to get a good shot at the BMW. It was too far away. But I still fired five shots.
Now Archie was on his feet. "Kirbie, what the fuck are you doing?!"
I looked at him like he was crazy. "They stole our pills!"
"We'll get more," he said.
"When?"
"When we sell what we already have in the northside unit. Just get in the car."
"Archie, I needed that new batch of pills. I have things I need to do with my music!"
"Put that shit on hold." He got in the car a
nd started it up. He looked over at me. I was still standing outside the car with the gun in my hand, looking across the lot at the robbers who had long disappeared. "They're gone! You comin'?"
Hesitantly, I started to get in the car but then I saw something on the ground. The wind blew it against one of the storage units and I chased it down and picked it up. It was a flyer representing a rap performance at a nearby club taking place this weekend. One of the robbers had dropped it.
"What is it?" Archie asked.
While stuffing the flyer in my bra, I looked over my shoulder at him. "Nothing," I lied.
CHAPTER 16
Kirbie Amor Capelton
"Let it go for now," Coras said to me, then handed me the flyer back.
I couldn't believe he just said that. "Let it go?" I repeated. "One of those niggas just put a boot on my face. Look at my face!"
"What did yo boyfriend say?"
Coras said it as if it wasn't his problem. That hurt. I thought he cared about me.
"Archie told me to leave it alone."
"You need to listen to yo man then."
"But Archie is just being a pussy. He doesn't care about the loss but I do! I was gonna use those pills to get the money that'll help us on our tour and pay bigger artists for my mixtape. It would've benefited all of us. You too, Gee."
The three of us were in the studio—me, Coras, and Gee Beats. Gee took a sip from his Hennessey bottle when I called him out on his obligation to help me get the niggas that jacked me. I didn't think I would need to do any convincing. A few months ago we all collaborated on a song called "My Turn" that was basically a revenge song for anybody that crossed us. Now I was starting to wonder if it was just a song. At the time we recorded it I really thought Coras and Gee had my back.
"Throw that flyer away," Coras said. "You don't even know if the nigga who dropped it will be at that party."
"I'm gonna find out."
"You need to chill, Kirbie. If you go on another Rambo mission now and get locked up again, that'll throw all of our progress out the window. We're close to getting our big break. I sent my mixtape everywhere, including Mount Eliyah ENT. We could be getting a call from a major label any day now."
"If it was you," I said, "and somebody jacked you for a brick of OG Tahoe, would you let it go?"
He sighed, crossing his arms in front of his chest.
"I know you wouldn't," I said. "But since I'm a female, you want me to let it go."
"Kirbie, you're one of the most thorough females I ever met. I know you're not scared to pull the trigger. You've proved that one too many times. But you're also a better singer. And this music needs to come first if you wanna get out of this life. We'll take care of you financially on the tour. We'll help fund yo mixtape."
"I don't want a hand-out! I've been making my own money since I was fourteen!"
Gee Beats swigged his bottle, then said, "That's that Scorpio in her."
"Shut up, Gee!" I shouted.
"Let the situation play itself out," Coras said to me. "The streets talk. We'll find out who's behind it soon. Kansas City ain't that big. But don't go chasing clues and making hotheaded decisions. Be smart. Be patient. Be calculating. At least wait until after we do the Sprint Center."
"It'll be too late. This flyer says the party is the day before we perform." I held the flyer up so he could see the date.
He snatched it out of my hand, then ripped it in half once, twice, three times. He let the pieces fall to the floor. "I'm not gon' let you fuck off yo life. I invested too much in you. Let it go, Kirbie. Take the loss, keep it moving. God has a plan for you. For all of us."
I snatched my jacket off the back of Gee's chair—well, I tried to snatch it but his back was pressed against it so he had to lean up a little before I could pull it away. It was embarrassing.
But I still stormed out of that studio with my head held high.
And I didn't need the flyer. I had already memorized everything on it.
Kirbie Amor: Who can you depend on but yourself? You may think you have people in your corner, but when the time comes will they really ride for you? I'm the type that don't care no more. I ride for myself.
CHAPTER 17
La'Renz "Buddy Rough" Taylor
Saturday night in New York City was the best time to hit the club to find new talent. New York DJs were renowned for spinning records by up-and-coming artists. Or at least they were before I went to prison.
The New York night life was bustling tonight. Tourists crowded the sidewalks and I was almost lost among them. The tall buildings, the simple neon lights to the explosive and iconic LED high-definition displays, the sour smell of harmful emissions of nitrogen and sulfur oxides blind to the eye—it was all still enthralling to me.
I missed being home.
On West 25th Street, I stumbled upon a new hotspot and tried to walk to the front of the line. I expected the bouncer to unhook the red rope for me. But he just pointed to the back of the line like I was an average person.
"Starts back there," he said.
"I can see where it starts," I replied. "But I don't wait in lines."
The big man squinted at me. "Who are you?"
"Buddy Rough," I said.
I never used to introduce myself as Buddy Rough. But the name had been forced upon me by the media. I preferred La'Renz. However, the bouncer looked young and probably wouldn't have made the connection if I had used my government name.
"Never heard of you," the bouncer said.
"Really?"
"Back of the line, nigga."
Nigga?
I politely said, "Young man, will you please undo the rope so I can enter? Or do I have to do it myself?"
He dropped his hands and took a committed step toward me. Either he suddenly seemed larger or I had suddenly seemed shrunken. Yet and still, when he put his hand on the chest of my Balenciaga suit to give me a hard shove off the curb, I diverted the attack, then snatched his fingers and bent them backwards. He dropped to both knees and wailed in torment.
"Sir, please-that-shit-hurts-don't-break-it, goddamn!" he uttered in a super-fast wail. "Sir, please!"
"I'm sir now?" I asked.
"You-can-go-in-just-don't-break-my-hand, pleeeease!"
Clubgoers started snapping pictures and stealing video on their smartphones so I kicked the bouncer in his chest, walked over and unhooked the rope, then adjusted my suit jacket as I strolled into the darkness of the club.
***
The music was hard on my ears, but after a few minutes I got accustomed. As I made my way to the bar amidst a teeming crowd of young people, I felt a grab on my jacket.
I turned and pulled away with quick reflexes, thinking the bouncers had found me. But it was a pretty light-skinned girl with a nose ring staring me in the face. Her eyes were dreamy and her peachy lips were parted in an expression of wonderment. She was glistening with sweat, standing so close to me I started to feel an erotic bond with her. She reminded me of my ex-mistress Sundi Ashworth.
"Are you Buddy Rough?" the girl asked.
"What?" I honestly didn't hear her over the music.
"Are you La'Renz 'Buddy Rough' Taylor?"
"Yes, I am."
I didn't have time for groupies so I turned back around to finish my path. That's when she smacked me in the back of my head. I turned back, tried to get to her but the moving bodies became a dam between us.
"That's for killing Jazzmine Short!" she yelled, flipping me off. "She was my idol!"
I reached for her again and didn't come close to grabbing her. Furious, I started heading for the bar. I ordered some Ciroc and Red Bull and slammed it down, did the same with the second shot, then I found me an area off to the side near the stairs where I had breathing room to just stand and collect myself.
I knew this would be my reality. Restoring my image would be an uphill battle against the fans of my late wife Jazzmine Short. She had become a martyr of R&B. The only way to clear my name in the eyes of
the public would be to top the charts through the talent of a new artist. People were often devotedly forgiving of successful rich men, and with my frontpage success I would be in a position to hotpotatoe the burden of Jazzmine's death where it needed to be—and that was in the lap of Eliyah Golomb.
Even if Eliyah didn't get criminally charged, I wanted him to be publically condemned.
Condemned like I was now and had been for the past seven years.
"Fancy seeing you in the club," someone near me said.
I looked to my left and saw a grinning Julian Beltrán, who was a major member in the New York chapter of the Beltrán drug cartel. Julian had gray in his mustache now. Amazing how time flies, I thought. And Julian looked more American than Mexican now. He was in a gray Gucci suit with slim-fit coat and trousers. Wrapped around his neck was a blue scarf that served no other purpose than style. The three Spanish men standing behind him looked just as dapper.
Since when did the Mexican Mafia know anything about high fashion menswear?
I shook Julian's hand. "¿Cómo estás, mi amigo?" I said.
"I couldn't be better, La'Renz. I'm glad to see you survived American prison."
"It's not as bad as one would think."
"I hope I never have to find out. I dodged a bullet after you got arrested. They tried to tie Beltrán to your wife's murder. Media said we threw her off of that Dubai hotel balcony for you. There was a major crackdown on our operation."
"I'm sorry to hear that. Genuinely, I am. I read a little bit about the busts in the papers."
Prior to prison, I had heavy involvement with Julian and the Beltrán cartel. I supplied celebrities of every field—not just hiphop—with nose candy to help ease the pressures of fame and fortune. Cocaine was my "in," my way of garnering favor for my artists and gaining access to Hollywood's elite. Cocaine gave me control over the super-rich. If I wanted to take the coke route to the top again, I could. But the risk would be even greater this time around. Because along with my publicized arrest for allegedly killing my wife came the speculation in the news and blogs that I was tied to and had hired a Mexican drug cartel to carry out the crime. And once it got repeated in mainstream media day after day, month after month, speculation became fact. So if I jumped in the game now, it would be harder to move in the shadows.
God Don't Like Haters Page 7
