by BlaQue
“Hey, roomie!” I heard Paige call behind me.
I tried to walk faster and pretend I hadn’t heard her.
“Hey, YaSheema. Where are you going so fast?” Paige asked.
I whirled around and instead of looking at her, I homed in on Lamont. “I’m going to take out some trash. You know you should be careful of the company you keep. Everyone you think is nice, ain’t. There are all kinds of rapist and crazy folks running around this city. I even heard there’s a killer on the loose and they may even be right here on campus,” I said, mean muggin’ Lamont.
Paige looked at me strangely and her eyes followed my gaze. “Oh, I ain’t mean to be rude. Lamont this is my roomie, YaSheema Nicole; YaSheema, this is my boyfriend Lamont. He’s on the football team and some say my baby is gonna go pro after he graduates this year,” Paige said making the awkward introductions. Clearly she didn’t know that Lamont and I had met before and no introductions were needed.
Lamont stuck his hand out to shake mine and I refused to shake it. Instead, I coughed in my hand. “Sorry, I think I’m coming down with a cold. Maybe shaking your hand isn’t a good idea,” I said smugly.
“Maybe not. It’s nice meeting you anyway, YaSheema. I’ll see you around,” Lamont said with a slight smile on his face.
“Yeah…maybe you will,” I said and walked off. I dumped the clothes down the chute and headed back inside and wondered if I could trust Paige. I wondered what she would think of her All-Star boyfriend if I told her that he had raped me not even twenty-four hours ago.
When I walked back toward the dorm, I saw Lamont headed toward his car and I don’t know what came over me, but I followed him. I was careful to make sure he didn’t know I was shadowing him. Luckily for me, I had my keys. When he hopped in his car, I walked a row down to mine and got inside my own vehicle. I watched as he pulled out of the parking lot around all of the police and reporters and I slowly followed behind him, careful not to let him see that I was behind him.
I don’t know why I was following him and I didn’t know what I was going to do when he got to his destination. I followed him for about five blocks before he pulled up in front of a block of row houses. I parked a few cars behind him and killed my engine as Lamont got out of his car and walked up some steps and fumbled with a set of keys before eventually letting himself inside the house.
I picked the Club up off the floor and separated the interlocking pieces and put the sharp part on the seat next to me. I didn’t know what I was going to do with it, but I felt better having it just in case. After waiting for more than an hour, Lamont re-emerged from the house followed by a young woman who was dressed in a pair of ripped jeans and a light jacket. I perked up and got out of the car with the sharp end of the club in my hands and quietly walked to where they had just gotten into the car that I had been raped in the night before. Luckily for me, it was almost dusk and there was no one on the streets. I crept around to the driver’s side door of Lamont’s car, put the Club behind my back and knocked on the window.
“Excuse me. I hate to bother you kind folks, but my car ran out of gas and I was wondering if you all would be so kind as to give me a lift to a gas station,” I yelled through the glass. Lamont looked up and he was startled to see it was me standing there.
The young woman in the passenger seat motioned for him to roll down the window and his punk ass shook his head no. So I took it upon myself to bring the Club up from behind my back and smashed the window in with it. The woman started to yell and Lamont tried to start his car up. Before he could get his keys in the ignition, I took the sharp part of the Club and put all the strength I could behind it and jabbed it in the side of Lamont’s neck with absolutely no remorse.
As I roughly yanked the Club out of Lamont’s neck, the young broad tried to hop out of the car. I raced around to the passenger side and stopped her before she could fully get her seatbelt off. I held the bloody Club up to her neck and looked her dead in her eyes.
“Your lil’ boyfriend...that dead piece of shit over there raped me last night and all I wanted was someone here to like me. Then I found out he was screwing my roommate. And I guess by the looks of that happy look on your face when you walked out arm in arm with his sorry ass, you’re fuckin’ him too! Well, let me tell you something. You better forget you saw me or I’m coming back for you too. Play with us…I mean…me, if you want to and you’re gonna wind up dead just like him,” I said, pushing the sharp object into the fleshy spot between her neck and shoulder. “Do you understand what I said to you, bitch?” I growled.
The girl shook violently with fear.
“Did you fuckin’ hear what I said?” I asked her again, applying more pressure with the Club and drawing blood at the spot where I pressed the weapon.
“Yes! Yes! I heard what you said. I swear I won’t fuckin’ tell. I was just fuckin’ him! That’s all! It ain’t anything serious!” the woman said, shaking and crying with fear.
“Well, it ain’t nothin’ serious for real now, unless you have a thing for dead niggas,” I spat back.
“Please just don’t kill me!” the woman cried hysterically.
“Today is your lucky day, bitch. You ain’t the one I wanted. Now shut the fuck up before you make me kill you!” I said, backing up cautiously. I knew as soon as I turned my back, the bitch was going to either scream or run and I didn’t want her to do either until I was in my car and long gone. I never took my eyes off of her until I had backed all the way down the sidewalk and got in my car. Just like I knew her stupid ass would, the girl screamed, breaking the silence on the quiet block. I started the car and sped out off of the street like a bat in hell and never looked back. I don’t think I breathed the entire ride back to campus.
Chapter Twenty-Five
For Old Time Sake
Pinky York
After getting Neko the information he needed on his niece and getting the info I needed on Dread, I took my ass home. I was exhausted from playing super sleuth. When I pulled up in front of my house, there was an unfamiliar car parked in my reserved spot and that pissed me off. I was sick of the other residents taking the liberty of parking their cars in my space. I found an empty visitor’s spot, parked my car and went inside my building. I waited on the elevator and that’s when I saw him.
“You look surprised to see me,” Neko chuckled.
“I thought you weren’t gonna be here until Monday or Tuesday. Wait, how did you find me? I didn’t tell you where I lived and I know I ain’t listed,” I said, eyeing Neko from head to toe.
“I have my ways of finding who and what I want,” he smiled. “Now am I gonna get an invite upstairs or are we gonna stand here in the lobby staring at one another?”
I shook my head and got inside the elevator with Neko right behind me. I don’t know why his being so close to me made me so insanely nervous. We got off on my floor and walked down the long corridor to my apartment at the end of the hallway. I could feel Neko’s eyes on my backside the entire walk.
Because he was watching me, I put an extra little twist in my hips so he could see exactly what he was missing. He’s on my turf now. I opened my door and threw my bag on the coffee table and Neko took a seat on the couch.
“I see things really haven’t changed with you. You still love all this pink stuff,” he said, taking note of all of my pink décor.
“Yeah…I guess some things never change,” I said, lowering my eyes.
Neko patted on the empty space next to him, motioning for me to join him on the couch. I took a seat and got right to the point. “What are you really doing here? I know you ain’t track me down to talk about my decorating choices.”
“I’ma keep it one hundred with you, Pinky. After seeing you in Georgia, it brought up a lot of old feelings. Old feelings that I thought were dead and buried. I never knew how much I loved you until I lost you. It took a long time for me to get over you. Even after I married Rhina, I still thought of you. You were like the one I let get away. Then
you showed up in Atlanta. I didn’t know how to feel and if I was harsh, I’m sorry. Seeing your dead girlfriend is a blow to the system. I guess all this craziness with my niece, Rhina and Dread just has me confused on what’s real,” he said, taking my hand in his.
Did he just say Dread? I thought to myself.
“Well, were you able to find out any more information on your niece other than what I gave you? And what about Dread?” I asked him hoping he wouldn’t see my eagerness to get as much info on Dread as I possibly could. Neko had motives and so did I.
“I went to meet Dread. I needed him to step up and be a father to his daughter. If YaSheema is going through even half the shit I think she may be going through, she is gonna need all the love and support she can get.”
“Neko, I don’t get it. I ain’t following you. I know about the police back in Georgia, but what else is wrong?” I asked curiously. Neko shifted around on the couch uncomfortably and I don’t know why, but I regretted asking him anything.
“Do you remember the last time we spoke before we got separated? You were supposed to come see me. Well, that night I was almost killed holding YaSheema Nicole in my arms. Her mother tried to blow our heads off. NiQue let a bunch of cats out the bag that night. She told me that she was really my sister. She told me that my pops was her father too. NiQue told me that Darnell had kept her a secret because she wasn’t up to his standards.”
My mouth fell open. I knew Darnell was grimy and an ass chaser; hell, I had even given my former boss some pussy before, but I never figured that NiQue was his daughter too. Sure she was always around, but I would have never suspected that she was more than YaYa’s best friend.
“What do you mean not up to his standards?” I asked.
“NiQue had multiple personality disorder. She was so far gone that she was listening to the voice or voices –since I don’t know how many were really there – in her head. She went on a killing rampage and any and every one she thought could get in her way or found out her secret, she was after them. That included me. She was knocking niggas off in an attempt to keep Dread from finding out that she was a nutcase. She would rather go on killing than getting the help she needed because she feared being locked up in an institution. That night you were supposed to come over, NiQue showed up and she tried to kill me. She didn’t look like herself and you could tell she was struggling with something stronger than herself. Her voice was different and she called herself another name. She called herself Pajay.”
“Wait you mean the sister that killed YaYa? So you mean to tell me that NiQue was Pajay?” I interrupted. I couldn’t help it. I was trying to piece it all together.
“Yes. She was one and the same. My father didn’t want anything to do with NiQue…or Pajay because she was dangerous. He saw her as a liability, but he couldn’t completely rid himself of her. That wasn’t his style. He kept her around, but hoped she would never find out the truth about who she really was. NiQue was really Darnell’s first born child that he had with my aunt. Apparently, there was something wrong with their DNA makeup and it made NiQue crazy as fuck, and now I think that nasty trait has been passed along to my niece,” Neko said, putting his hands in his head.
I inched closer to him and rubbed my hand along his leg for reassurance. “Well, why don’t you contact the authorities so they can lock her up? She might be a danger to someone or herself,” I suggested. I thought it was all very simple.
“What if she is just as gone as her mother was? She ain’t gonna be nothin’ nice if she is. Actually, I think she’s already on her way off the deep end. I still ain’t heard anything from my wife and it’s been a whole week. That ain’t like Rhina, so I know YaSheema Nicole has something to do with my wife’s disappearance.”
I sat there dumbfounded. The young woman I had seen earlier today didn’t seem like she could hurt anyone. She seemed aggravated that I had knocked on her door, but I didn’t think she would be capable of murdering anyone. But who was I to judge? I had off’ed many a nigga and no one ever suspected shit. I learned to never judge a book by its cover.
“Pinky, I don’t expect you to believe or understand what I’m telling you, but I do want you to hear me out. I ain’t dealing with a teenager with an attitude. I came here to tell you these things so that if something happens to me, at least one person knows the truth and can get her the help she needs.”
“Neko, you don’t think she would hurt you, do you?” I asked, growing concerned. I had just come face to face with her only a little while ago. Had I put my life in danger trying to help Neko?
“I honestly don’t know, Pink. I could be worried about nothing, but I got that sinking feeling I’m not.” Neko looked deeply in my eyes and I saw how afraid he really was and I was actually afraid for him.
“So, what’s next?” I asked, looking away. I didn’t want to get caught up in Neko’s world only to be dropped off the side of a cliff when his wife returned; if she ever returned.
Neko let go of my hand and held my face cupped in his strong hands.
“Whatever happens from here, Pinky, I wanted you to know I love you. I never stopped loving you.”
Then Neko kissed me. I didn’t pull away from him like I knew I should; instead, I hungrily kissed him back. His hands roamed underneath the cotton shirt I was wearing and he gently pinched my nipples. I let out a moan and relished in Neko’s familiar touch. It had been seventeen long years since Neko had touched me like the way he was touching me now and my body greatly missed him.
“Are you sure you want to do this, Neko?” I managed to mumble through his frantic kisses. I didn’t want him to leave me again; not because of death and not because of another woman. I needed him to be sure I was what he wanted. He had to be sure because there was no going back once we crossed this line again.
“I’m sure,” Neko moaned in my ear causing my womanhood to throb in anticipation of what it had been missing all this time. That was all I needed to hear before I slid back just a little and pulled my t-shirt over my head and tossed it on the floor.
Neko swooped me up in his arms, laid me down and went to work on body. He kissed each scar I had been ashamed of and so much more. I tried to cover up and he quickly stopped me.
“I want to see all of you. Pink, ain’t no scar or anything else that can make me feel any different about you,” With that, he pulled down my jeans and kissed each scar until he made his way down between my thighs and moved my lacy, pink boy shorts to the side and stuck his fingers in my honeypot. He about drove me insane when he pulled his fingers out, licked them and said, “Yeah…ain’t shit changed.”
After that, we made love until the sun came up over D.C. the next morning.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Bad News is Always Hard to Swallow
Neko
I woke up to the sound of my cell phone chirping to let me know I had a text. I rolled over and saw Pinky lying beside me and this is where a nigga belonged. This is what I had been missing; her. Gently, I eased away from her so I wouldn’t disturb her while she was sleeping and checked my messages. It was Shadow and I had a voicemail message from some strange 804 area code. I checked the message from Shadow which was vague and only told me to call him ASAP. Instead of checking the voicemail, I opted to call Shadow first because the 804 call had to be a wrong number or a sales call. I dialed Shadow’s number and he answered on the first ring.
“What’s up, my nigga? Is everything aight?” I said quietly as soon as he answered.
“I don’t know if everything is aight, but I got news on your folks. I spoke with my niece Paige and you’re never gonna believe this shit. Paige and YaSheema Nicole are roommates,” Shadow explained.
I was glad to hear that YaSheema Nicole was okay, but I knew Shadow wasn’t done giving me the low down yet.
“There’s something else, Neko. There have been two murders linked to the campus in the last two days. There was a murder of some old woman in Upper Marlboro and her car was found on the studen
t parking lot; and there was a murder of a student that occurred last night. The police are saying the two incidents may be related. Apparently from what I was able to get from Paige, the student murdered was killed in his car. The dude was Paige’s boyfriend of the last two years. Man, Paige is fucked up about losing him. They were supposed to get married after he graduated this year. He was a senior and he was a star football player that was rumored to be getting drafted after he finished college. I met him for the first time last year. He was a nice kid. From what Paige could tell me through her hysterical crying, there was a witness. He was with some female a few blocks away from the campus and from what the girl was able to tell the police, she and Lamont were attacked by a young woman with grey eyes.”
That was all I needed to hear. It confirmed my worst fear. My niece was out of control. Sure, I haven’t seen any of it for myself, but I really didn’t need too. The scenario was the same as it was once before. My niece was headed down a path of destruction and I was gonna have to stop her before she hurt anyone else or herself.
“Thanks, Shadow. Look…do me a favor, tell Paige to come home right now. If my niece is up to half of the shit I think she may be up to, then your daughter may not be safe. Tell her to come home and stay as far away from YaSheema Nicole as she possibly can,” I warned.
“What the fuck is going on, Neko? I know you ain’t trying to tell me your shawty did all of that shit,” Shadow asked.
“I ain’t got time to talk about it. Just do what I told you and get your daughter out of there! I’ll swing by your house after I have Pinky take me to the campus. I’ve got to get to YaSheema Nicole before the police get to her.”
“Aight, man and no worries. Paige said she can’t focus. She’s supposed to pack a few things and come home. She says she can’t be on campus right now. She said it’s like a media circus around there and she wanted to come home for a few days. Call me once you make a move, my nigga and Neko…be careful. One,” Shadow said and disconnected the call.
