Get Somebody New

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Get Somebody New Page 25

by Lewis, Michael


  Randall was a fast worker I had to give him that. He came back within 2 days with all kinds of information.

  “I can pretty much knock this out real quick.”

  “What did you find?”

  “Well I got the electronic key card log report for your building and it shows the time you swiped the card to go into the building and when you left the next day. The police confirmed that Marlena couldn’t have been killed before 10 P.M. because she made an outgoing call from her cell phone to her personal assistant. They spoke with her assistant, who confirmed the call time and duration. Your alibi is solid. I spoke to the doorman who recalled seeing you come home. I’ve checked him out backward and forward and he has no credibility issues. Actually, he is a decorated war hero, which is even better.”

  I did a bit of digging into Marlena’s past to see what kind of person she was. Nobody I talked to had a kind word to say about her at all. I spoke to Shay and a few of Marlena’s other employees. Everyone seemed to have an axe to grind with her. They accused her of cheating them out of commissions, neglecting to pay bonuses that were overdue, coming on to women’s husbands’ right in their faces, and threatening employees with termination for refusing to do personal favors outside of their job descriptions. She was a hell cat!”

  “The Police finally questioned me. I gave them the silent treatment. Jamal was trying to scare me, saying they had evidence and I needed to confess. He was really agitated.”

  “Jamal? He’s not a detective, nor is he on this case. He shouldn’t have been questioning you about anything. I’m glad you didn’t say anything. I’ll take care of him. One more thing Jazz, when you slept with her did you use protection?”

  “I used a condom and it wasn’t torn or broken. I know because I inspected it myself. I knew better than to trust her. I wrapped it up in some paper towels and took it home to throw it in my own trash too. I also didn’t ejaculate.”

  “The police did find semen evidence. That’s doesn’t prove anything because it’s been established that she did have another male visitor after you left. You haven’t given them a DNA sample have you?”

  “Hell no. They tried to trick one out of me by offering me a cigarette and a soda. I know how they try to use that trick to get your DNA on it then swab it after you’re done.”

  “Damn Good! If they get a DNA sample, I need to be present to oversee the collection.”

  “Thanks for all you’re doing, I appreciate it.”

  “Like I said, I owe you.”

  “Yeah you do!”

  Nadiah

  I realized immediately that I’d made a mistake with my new man. He would have had to actually come up a notch to be crazy. I was waiting for him with fire in my eyes. He was going to learn just whom he was dealing with. Finally I heard his key in the front door. I stood right there waiting for him because it was about to be on.

  “Here you are! I don’t know who in the hell you think I am but I am about to show you. First of all, where the hell do you get off going in my purse and following me? I can play just as crazy as you can. Trust me, I am not afraid of you.”

  “Are you done?”

  “What? I might be done, I might not be. If I have something to say, I’m gonna say it and you’re gonna listen. What the hell do you mean am I done?”

  “I was just asking so I’d have an idea of when you’re gonna shut the fuck up!”

  I was speechless because I wasn’t used to any man being bold enough to say something like that to me.”

  “I know you didn’t just tell me to shut the fuck up did you?”

  “I’m not sure if you are hard of hearing, or just a dumb ass who can’t comprehend. Let me get a bit closer so you can hear me. I’ve said what I had to say and I’m done. You can save your ‘I am woman hear me roar’ bullshit for someone who gives a damn because I don’t. I’m tired of listening to you so I am telling you so you can understand. Shut the hell up, bitch!”

  Whenever I hear the word bitch directed at me my hand automatically goes up and swings. I slapped him across the right side of his face. He reached out with his right hand and grabbed me by my neck.

  “Bitch I will kill you! Do you hear me? Don’t you ever put your hands on me again.” He said before he released his tight grip on my neck.

  I slapped him again for grabbing me. He slapped me back so hard I fell to the ground. I brought my fist straight up between his legs and punched him in the balls as hard as I could. He was momentarily stunned and looked at me with a menacing glare, which I returned with equal intensity. He looked like he’d snapped but something clicked in his brain and he simply turned around and began walking away. Of course I was mad and riled up by then so I followed him and spoke my peace.

  Suddenly in the middle of a sentence he turned around and slapped me in my mouth. I felt my lip when it split and the blood begin to seep into my mouth. I knew I was going to have to kill that bastard so it was best if I just left.

  I went into the closet and got the largest suitcase there.

  “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “I’m leaving before I have to kill you.”

  “Girl you’re not going anywhere. Put that suitcase back in the closet.”

  I paid him no attention as I packed my belongings.

  “Bitch did you hear me? I said you’re not going anywhere now put the suitcase back!”

  When he called me a bitch that time, I didn’t hit him. I knew if I hit him he was going to hit me back and I wasn’t going to back down. I was also convinced he was much crazier than I was. I kept packing my belongings through my tears.

  “So you’re not going to do what I told you and put the suitcase back?”

  “NO! I’m not! You can’t make me either!” I shouted.

  He grabbed the suitcase and threw it and all the clothes into the closet. Without missing a beat I went into the closet and put everything back in and put it back on the bed and continued packing.

  “I’m only gonna tell you one more time to put the suitcase back and sit down because you are not going anywhere woman!”

  “Fuck you. I’m leaving.”

  If I wasn’t convinced he was beyond crazy, what he did next confirmed it.

  “Come here bitch!” He said as he charged toward me.

  “No, Stop! Get off me. Let me go! What are you doing? Stop!” I screamed while hitting him everywhere I could.

  “I’m gonna give you what you want.”

  That insane bastard picked me up and sat me in the suitcase and proceeded to bend my legs and maneuver my body into it. I kicked and screamed but he laid on my upper body while he folded my legs into the suitcase and then did the same for my top half. He then closed the top and zipped me inside the suitcase. I tried to get out but I was too tightly bound by the suitcase to move.

  “Since you want to pack your shit and leave, I’m gonna do you a favor and pack your ass up and put you out.”

  “You crazy bastard let me out of here! Let me out of here!”

  “Shut the hell up!”

  “No! No! No! No! No! No! Nooooooooooooooo!” I screamed since it was all I could do.”

  I felt him hit the suitcase. Luckily, he hit where my leg was.

  “If you were looking for my mouth, that wasn’t it! Ha ha!”

  “Damn you still won’t shut up!”

  I heard him unzipping the suitcase and tried to lift myself up but he was prepared and pushed me back in. He quickly reached down and placed a piece of tape over my mouth and closed the case back. I knew I had been defeated but I wasn’t about to give in.

  That crazy man left me in that suitcase for almost 24 hours. When he came in from work the next day I heard him come in and run some bath water. Just as I thought he was going to take a bath I felt him pick the suitcase up. I couldn’t ask where he was taking me because my mouth was taped shut. All of a sudden I felt water. He put the suitcase in the bathtub and was dunking it in and out of the water. He placed the case on its side and I co
uldn’t take anymore. I started crying because I figured he was about to drown me. I didn’t want to go out like that. He unzipped the corner of the suitcase and took the tape off of my mouth.

  “What do you have to say to me?”

  “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I won’t talk to her anymore.”

  “What else?”

  “I’m gonna obey you.” I said as the bitterness of the words made me cringe.

  “And you’re gonna shut up when I tell you to?”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes what?”

  “Yes period.”

  “Wrong answer!” He said.

  “Yes Sir! Yes Sir!” I said shamefully.

  I hated it but I was going to say anything I had to in order to get out of that suitcase. He pulled me out of the suitcase carefully.

  “I ran you a nice hot bath because I knew you’d need it after being folded up in there.”

  The fact that he was so calm and nice as if nothing had happened made me want to punch him in his smiling face. He’d successfully gained my compliance at least temporarily. Ingrid was the last thing on my mind at the moment. I was trying to figure out a way to get away from him and he was intent on making me stay. I felt like I was in prison. He wouldn’t let me get a job and he started working from home in order to keep an eye on me.

  He watched my every move. I could be in the kitchen and I would look around and see an eye looking at me from behind a wall. I woke up in the middle of the night with him staring at me. For the first time in my life I was actually afraid of a man. I was constantly on pins and needles because his moods and quirks were so erratic I didn’t know what he would do next.

  He effectively cut off all communication with the outside world. He took my cell phone. I had no money or access to any and he kept me in the house like I was fucking Rapunzel! I wasn’t free at all and I was going absolutely crazy. One day he had to leave to meet a client I used the time to do some snooping. I directed my search at his office. My eye caught something of interest. A brown envelope stood out among the white papers so I picked it up. It contained a police report and some other papers along with photos. As I read the police report, I learned some very interesting things about my new husband that he’d neglected to mention to me.

  As I read, I understood why he was so adamant about us not discussing our exes. The police report detailed how he’d beat his previous wife so badly she had to be hospitalized. If it wasn’t for the intervention of a man who came to her aid he could have very well killed her. Of course he had enough money to avoid jail and ended up only having to attend anger management classes. On the report I saw his whole name listed as Anthony Elias Richards. I knew him as Anthony and he’d told me he didn’t have a middle name.

  My eyes shifted to the photos of him with various injuries to his head and face. His eyes were blackened, his nose bloody, his lip split, various bruises on his face and neck. I returned to the police report and flipped it over. What I read shocked me beyond belief. The good Samaritan stranger that had come into the house and saved his wife was none other than Alton Eugene Allen, my ex-husband. Alton beat Anthony so severely he had to have medical attention before the police took him to jail.

  This new information was just too much for me to believe. It was hard for me to believe that calm, sweet, harmless Alton could do that much damage to someone. This was the same man that I used to push around and he never did anything back to me. He had beaten big, muscle bound Anthony to a pulp. I could attest from experience that Anthony had the strength of 2 men. Alton is tall and slim but managed to do all that damage and didn’t have a scratch on him. I would have seen it if he’d been bruised or banged up.

  Alton didn’t hit me because he couldn’t bring himself to hurt me. It obviously wasn’t because he couldn’t defend himself against me, he just chose not to. When he saw a woman in trouble being beaten by her husband, this was his reaction. In that moment I realized how blind I’d been. I was with someone who wanted to love me and give me the world, and I threw it all away. Now I was with someone who wouldn’t think twice about beating the crap out of me if I as much as spoke to him in the wrong tone. God was definitely punishing me because he’d given me a blessing and I took it for granted. Alton told me I needed to go to God, maybe he was right.

  Quickly I put everything back in its place. Anthony was so anal about every single item in that house and would have a fit if anything was out of place. As I ran around the room like a chicken with my damned head cut off I thought about what I was doing.

  “Why am I running around like a scared puppy about to get scolded by my master? This is not me.” I said to myself.

  I took everything out of the envelope and spread it all over the sofa in the living room so he would see it when he got home. I had some questions and he was going to answer them.

  Alton

  Rachel and I settled in to married life well. We each considered ourselves lucky and showed it in the way we treated each other. I don’t ever remember smiling as much in my life as I did after Rachel came into my life. After Jazz flipped out and left Zeke I wanted to really do damage to him for hurting my cousin like that. I took his showing up at just the right time as a sign. When he mentioned Zeke I saw the misery in his face.

  The look on Zeke’s face when Jazz called his name at the airport was priceless. Anyone who saw the chemistry between them could see they were meant to be together. I knew Zeke was in a living hell even though he didn’t say anything. Zeke turned around just as a heard of lawmen rushed forward to arrest Jazz. Jazz didn’t have a single weapon on him nor did he resist them, so all those officers were unnecessary. As they dragged him away, Jazz looked so sad as he repeatedly looked back at Zeke. I’m sure he felt like he’d let Zeke down.

  I was listening to the radio on my way back home when the broadcast was interrupted with a news bulletin. The producer Marlena Dalton had been found beaten and murdered in her home. I think everyone in town either knew who she was or had at least heard her name. They immediately added that Jazz A. Hardaway aka Slade had been named as a suspect and arrested at an Atlanta Airport in connection with the murder. It had only been about 15 minutes since I’d left the airport. I was surprised the information traveled as fast as it did. I knew Zeke was gonna lose his mind when he finally heard why Jazz was arrested.

  I consider myself a pretty good judge of character and I don’t think that Jazz could rape or murder someone. Sure he is a thug, but I think it is out of necessity because of the type of life that he has lived. He couldn’t afford to be soft or show any type of vulnerability, especially being a drug dealer and being in the streets. I also think that had he not met Zeke no one would have ever seen that softer, more caring side of him. The way he cares for Zeke says a lot.

  At first I didn’t like Jazz because I looked at him as nothing more than a common hood, full of shit, and looking for the next gullible person to take advantage of. He turned out to be the best thing for Zeke. Once I saw that Jazz was a man of pretty good character then I warmed up to him.

  Zeke called me when he got to L.A. to let me know he made it. He had also heard about Jazz. A couple of minutes after I got off the phone with Zeke, Randall called me. He said that he had Zeke’s phone and there was a message on it that he thought Zeke needed to hear. He didn’t tell me anything else about the message and I didn’t ask. I did find it odd that he would fly all the way out to California just to deliver a cell phone. By that point I had learned not to ask questions. There was so much going on with those two that it was probably better if I didn’t ask and I didn’t know.

  When Randall came back from California and told me that he was representing Jazz, I was confused as hell. If I didn’t know anything else, I knew that those two hated each other. I knew Randall like I knew myself. I also knew that Randall had too much of a conscious to agree to represent Jazz so he could lose the case on purpose and have him sent to prison.

  “Randall did I hear you correctly? You are going to re
present Jazz?”

  “Yeah, I owe it to him and Zeke. I was wrong for what I did and I need to get my Karma right. I can’t live knowing I lied to him like I did, especially now that I know how much Zeke cares about him. I met with Jazz and actually got a chance to sit down and talk to him. He -is a pretty good dude actually.”

  “That’s a nice gesture to bury the hatchet.”

  “I just hate that they have announced this shit all in the media about his arrest. Instantly everybody already thinks he is guilty regardless of whether he is or isn’t.”

  “I’ve been looking into Marlena’s background. Quite frankly, she was a bitch. Nobody’s had a nice word to say about her yet!”

  “Zeke was concerned when Jazz first mentioned he was working with her. He was aware of her reputation for using promises of money and stardom to lure young guys into her web, use them for sex, and drop them from the label.” I informed Randall.

  “Well, I’m gonna go to the hotel and turn in. I have an early day tomorrow. ”

  “Keep me posted and let me know if I can be of any help.”

  “Alright, will do.”

  Rachel was coming home just as Randall was leaving. As I was kissing her to welcome her home, my cell phone rang. The ringing of the phone was not out of the ordinary it was the number that was odd. I didn’t recognize the number so I showed it to Rachel.

  “Honey do you recognize this number?”

  “Yes, that’s Elias’s number.”

  “Elias? Your Ex-Husband Elias?”

  “Yep.”

  “Why in the hell would he be calling me? How would he even know my number?”

  “Now that is a mystery.”

  The phone stopped ringing. Rachel and I were both still dumbfounded. I was not about to call back since I certainly had no desire to talk to Elias. About 2 minutes later my phone rang again and it was a number I recognized. I didn’t want to see that number either. It was Nadiah’s cell phone.

 

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