Heist 2

by Kiki Swinson

  Bobby Knight wasn’t no slouch. I had really started to fall for him. He was a well-spoken, well-read, wealthy man that I could’ve gotten used to living with. Before I could really fall for Bobby, he was growing suspicious of me. He wasn’t no slouch when it came to picking up on clues and when it came to protecting his shit. So, when shit started to go south because of Satanya’s big-ass mouth, Bobby was on my ass like stink on shit. I remember him picking me up one night and taking me to a place where I thought for sure he was going to kill my ass. Even when I was scared shitless for my life, ride-or-die-ass Shannon Marshall was not giving up. Nope, instead of running and cowering, I called in the team I had wrangled up to rob Bobby and we got it on. I felt dreamy just thinking now about how it went down . . .

  “Get to the first room and grab everything you can. There is a truck outside behind the last room on the left. There is an exit. We need to be out of here in five minutes,” Bam yelled at me over the sound of small explosions erupting all around Bobby Knight’s mansion.

  “Okay, okay,” I wolfed out, putting the gun Bobby had given me a few minutes earlier into the back of my jeans. My chest was heaving in and out. I made a mad dash for the hallway as Bam went along door by door shooting off the locks and taking out the cameras. Although all of the power had been shut down, Bam didn’t want to take a chance that Bobby had a backup generator on those cameras. I really felt like a renegade bitch. I wasn’t leaving the fucking house without enough money to set me straight. The first room was filled with boxes. I tried to grab more than one but they were fucking heavy as hell. I started dragging one toward the door so I could get outside. Bam and the two dudes that were still alive grabbed boxes too. I couldn’t even think to ask where Black was. I just figured when I didn’t see him he was a casualty of war. “Wait!” I heard Bam scream out. He stopped and used a knife to strip off the tape on one of the boxes. Sure enough, the shit was filled with neatly rubber-banded stacks of cash. He wanted to make sure we weren’t wasting our fucking time.

  “Go!!!” Bam screamed and we raced outside toward the truck. I kept dragging my one box. As soon as we made it toward the front, more gunshots rang out. My legs buckled from the sound and fear gripped me, but I kept moving. Two more of Bam’s dudes dropped. Now it was just Bam and me. I was too fucking scared to cry or scream. I just kept ducking and running for the truck. I had a warrior mindset going on and I was going to get the fuck out of there alive. I had a baby boy to pick up and start a new life with. There was a dude in the driver seat of a black van. He got out and hoisted my box into the van. Bam was still struggling to get out with his boxes. The driver helped him and Bam turned around like he was going back in.

  “Where are you going?!” I screamed at the top of my lungs.

  “Yo, that ain’t enough,” Bam said greedily, and soon as he turned around, one last security guard was there. Bam and the guard both shot at each other at the same time and they both dropped. I saw Bam’s brains leaking onto the pavement and piss trickled from my bladder.

  “Ahhhhh!” I screamed, jumping into the van. The sight of Bam’s brains was forever etched in my brain. The driver sped out and the van was swerving all over the road leading out of the estate.

  “Oh God!!” I screamed and cried.

  “Shut up!” the driver barked. “You fucking making me nervous!” He looked to be no older than eighteen years old. He was shaking and could barely drive. He finally got the van to go straight and slowed up a bit so that we wouldn’t bring attention to ourselves. My nose was running, my heart was thumping, and the tears just flowed and flowed. I appeared to be crying for all the dead soldiers I had left at that mansion, but nah, I was crying for other reasons. I had done it. I had carried out the ultimate heist and I was the only one left standing. Or so I thought.

  A searing pain crashed through my skull like I had been hit by lightning, violently jolting me out of my daydream.

  “Aggh!” I screamed out as I quickly realized what was happening. Another powerful blow caused blue streaks to flash behind my eyelids and I felt the bone in my nose shatter. Blood leaked over my lips and, since I had my mouth open into a silent scream, I could taste the salty, metallic taste of my own blood. I tried to put my hands on my head to protect my skull, but being that my guard had been down while I relived the robbery memories, my reflexes were slow now. I was too late. I was under attack and there was nothing I could do to protect myself now. I was dragged down to the floor where I took a swift blow to my ribs.

  “Bitch, I heard you thought this hit was a joke? A fake?” a brawly, flat-chested butch hissed in my ear as she wound her gorilla fists up into my hair. I swung my arms and tried in vain to fight back. My hair was my weakness. I guess Todd had told the goon bitches he hired to make sure they grabbed my hair. My attacker hoisted me up by my hair so I could meet her eye to eye. Chaos had broken out in the chow hall and I could hear cheers from some of the other inmates . . . a few of whom I knew was rooting for me to get my ass kicked. My eyes darted around helplessly and I noticed the butch’s crew was holding my crew at bay. I also quickly peeped the COs acting like they ain’t see what the fuck was going down. The Hispanic lesbian gang that ran the weed trade in the jail surrounded me, and everybody knew these bitches were built like men and loved to see blood on their hands.

  “Nah, mamita, this ain’t fake. This shit right here real. We got paid to take you down and we plan to do that, puta,” the butch said, her Puerto Rican twang accenting her words as she increased the grasp and pressure on the fistful of my hair she was holding hostage. There was no use in being in denial: I was about to get my ass whipped or worse.

  “Fuck you!” I growled, hocking a wad of spit into her ugly, scarred-up face. Even with the pain throbbing through my scalp, my nose bleeding like a faucet, and the possibility that these Spanish chicks was about to slash me open like a gutted pig, I couldn’t back down now. Not only did I have a reputation to uphold in the prison, but I was just not going to let Todd win all the way. I figured if this pussy bitch-ass nigga Todd’s hit was going to take me out, I surely wasn’t going out like no sucker. I wanted to make sure he got the word that Shannon Marshall didn’t go out without a fight.

  CRACK! CRUNCH! WHAM! The next thing I knew punches, kicks, and stomps rained down on my body from every direction. I was conscious for a while and enduring the pain, but that didn’t last long. Finally, blackness engulfed me.

  2

  Todd

  I was still locked up like a fucking animal, but today I felt a little better about it. Not because I was getting out or anything like that. Nah, nothing good, but I was feeling good because I was waiting for word that my bitch wife Shannon was dead. Yeah, that’s right, I was wishing death on that bitch ten times over. She was a snake bitch that didn’t deserve to live.

  I used the last of the bullshit commissary money Shannon had put on my books to send a kite to the women’s prison and pay some Latinas to take Shannon’s ass out. In my eyes, any bitch that could fuck your best friend, have the next nigga playing house with your seed, and steal all your money didn’t deserve to fucking live. That was Shannon . . . a straight ghetto bird bitch. I must say I was real shocked when I received her letter telling me that she had been fucking my friend Jock for years from when I was locked up the first time. When I had gotten home from that bid, both Jock and Shannon had picked me up and smiled all in my face like shit was all good. I had put Jock on to my new gun business and all that; meanwhile, this nigga was fucking my wife all along. He and I had grown up together, got locked up together, built a business together, and I guess he thought that meant he could have everything that I had. Just like I did Shannon, I was planning to see Jock one of these days. Either in person or by way of messenger; he wasn’t getting away with what he did to me.

  I hadn’t gotten the word back yet, but I was sure I would be hearing about Shannon’s demise sooner or later. I just hoped that expensive-ass insurance policy I had taken out on that bitch was still in ful
l effect. I had paid up the premiums six months in advance when I was out, so I knew that would give me some time before the shit lapsed. Locked up or not, collecting a cool million off Shannon’s dead body would be a major fucking score for me.

  The plan to set Shannon up came just as easily as the Bobby Knight set-up had come. My new bunk mate Hector told me his wife was locked up in the same place as Shannon and that was all I needed to hear. I had seen pictures of this butch Hector called a wife . . . shit, she looked harder than some dudes I knew, so I don’t know how he thought he was wifing that bitch.

  Hector’s wife, Maria, rolled with a deep group of Latina lesbians that ran the drug trade in the women’s jail. Yeah, that’s right . . . I said lesbians. This nigga Hector was in denial, but that was none of my business. The Latina chicks were the perfect ones to hire: ruthless, desperate, and got off on violence. I set that shit up easy breezy and with the quickness.

  Yeah, it may sound fucked up that I would do something like that to my wife . . . someone I had once loved and contemplated giving my life for. But what she had done to me was way worse because she might as well had killed me. You know what it is like for a nigga locked up to find out his wife had betrayed him and on top of it all was fucking one of his soldiers. Man, listen, she might as well had stabbed me full of holes and shot me in the cranium. I can’t stop thinking about how sick Shannon left a nigga with his dick in the dust, all the while making me believe she was going to come through for me. She played a good game coming up here in her short skirts, fucking me by the vending machines, and making lip service promises.

  I held my head in my hands now as I suddenly remembered the day that I got Shannon’s letter telling me that she had been fucking my right-hand man, Jock. I ripped up the letter, but trust me, I memorized those fucking words and they still ring in my ears to this day.

  I just want you to know. I knew about the whole plan all along. I knew where Jock was—he was waiting for me so he could give me the dick he has been giving me for the last two years while you chased bitches around Virginia. Me and Jock are together raising your son. Your son who calls Jock Daddy.

  “Grrr!” I growled as I punched the heavy bag in the prison gym harder and harder with every passing thought. The more I thought about Shannon and Jock’s betrayal, the harder I hit the bag, wishing that it was both of their faces that I was hitting. Finally, my knuckles split open and pain shot up my arms.

  “Fucking bitch,” I huffed and puffed as I slid down to the floor in a heap of sweat, bleeding from my knuckles. I closed my eyes for a few minutes to collect my thoughts. And, trust me, there were many thoughts swirling around in my head. Most of the thoughts were about killing those traitorous muthafuckas.

  “Marshall!” Broadbent, the CO I hated the most, yelled out my name like he was losing his fucking mind. This nigga had a hard-on for harassing me on the daily. You would’ve thought he had something personal against me, but I didn’t even know his fake ass.

  “Marshall! I know you fucking hear me, you piece of shit!” Broadbent hollered, trying to play me as usual.

  I slowly lifted my head, my face drawn into a tight scowl. This nigga just didn’t know how lucky he was that I was locked up and trying to keep my nose clean so I would have a better chance at appeal later on. If that wasn’t the case, I would’ve already fucked his ass up and caught an additional charge.

  “Get up! Somebody here to see you . . . fucking dirt bag,” Broadbent said through gritted teeth. If I wasn’t looking forward to finally getting a good behavior streak I would’ve punched that fucking faggot-ass nigga in his face. I was sure that Broadbent wasn’t shit outside on the street. He used his uniform to act like a thug behind the walls, but I had it in my head that whenever I got out, I would see his ass for sure. Once I put a hit on a nigga in my mind, I wasn’t going to rest until it was carried through. Broadbent was on that list, along with Jock, Zack, and Billy—all those niggas that were supposed to be in my crew that shitted on me because they thought I was down and out forever.

  Broadbent manhandled me as usual. He led me past the visit room, which caused me to raise my brows.

  “Where the fuck is you—” I started to ask, but my words were cut short when I saw what was happening. I saw that white, shiny, bald head before I could protest. My stomach immediately knotted and my heart started thumping. I thought I would never have to deal with this white devil again.

  “Aww shit,” I sighed, shaking my head from side to side. “Yo, just take me back to my fucking cell. I don’t wanna talk to this nigga here,” I grumbled as I got closer to the source of my discomfort.

  “Marshall . . . Marshall . . . Todd . . . fucking Marshall,” Sergeant LaBeckie of the Norfolk Police Department sang, smiling like a goofy fucking kid as he made a song out of my name.

  “Fuck you, LaBeckie. I don’t want to see your ugly ass,” I hissed. LaBeckie started laughing raucously like I had told his white ass a joke.

  “Well, damn, I thought you would always be happy to see my handsome fucking face,” LaBeckie said sarcastically. “I mean we got so much history together, ol’ Toddy boy.” LaBeckie smiled wickedly.

  “I ain’t none of ya fucking boy!” I spat just before I was forced down into a chair.

  Sergeant LaBeckie was right, though. He and I had a lot of history, which wasn’t a benefit to me at all. LaBeckie had pursued me for years while I was living large on the streets. He would grow angrier and angrier each year because he could never get at me since I ran my operations virgin-pussy tight. I remember seeing LaBeckie and taunting him on the streets because he would be following me or my boys and we would always be clean. He would look so defeated when me and my boys would roll past him and laugh at his ass, giving him the finger and shit. It was like LaBeckie woke up and went to bed thinking about catching me. I would’ve never suspected that day would come one day and this bastard would have his full revenge on me.

  Finally, LaBeckie got the break he needed—a snitch—in the form of my best friend, Jock. Now, I’m thinking Shannon also had something to do with the shit too. She might’ve played the shocked roll but maybe it was all an act so shit looked more realistic to me. Maybe not. Who knows? All I know is that it was the worst day of my life so far, aside from the day I found my mother dead from a drug overdose. My life changed on both days, but LaBeckie getting his revenge was one that stuck out more.

  The day LaBeckie and this unit raided my house, LaBeckie took full advantage of my helpless position. I squinted at him now, my mind drawn backwards to that horrible day . . .

  “Get on the floor! Get the fuck on the floor!” Those commands were very familiar. I put my hands up, folded them behind my head, and assumed the position. I was pushed down to the floor roughly and about five of those bastard cops dropped knees in my back. My arms were yanked behind my back roughly and I was cuffed and made to lay face down on my own goddamn floor. Those fucking pigs were swarming my crib like flies around a pile of freshly dropped shit. It seemed like it was a million of them. All of them against just me.

  “Punk bitches,” I grumbled under my breath. I recognized one of them—a big-head white boy that thought he was the shit. A snake muthafucka named LaBeckie. He was the sergeant of the Norfolk Police Department’s narcotics and gun unit and he hated my ass.

  “Take out that wall! Tear this fucking place up until we find some shit!” I heard that bastard yell, as he looked down at me and smiled.

  I closed my eyes when I heard them axing down walls and cabinets.

  “Fuck you want, LaBeckie?” I snarled as I was roughly thrown into a hard, metal chair by that stupid ass Broadbent.

  “Todd, my friend, you break my little heart.” LaBeckie chuckled evilly, tapping the left side of his chest for emphasis. I bit down into my jaw and swung my legs in and out furiously. “Can’t I come visit an old friend? I mean, you do know you’re the reason I made lieutenant, right? Oh maybe you didn’t know that I got promoted and I owe it all to you.” LaBeckie l
aughed and I felt all of the hairs on my body stand up.

  I wanted to spit in his fucking eye because I knew what he meant by saying it was me and my case that had helped him climb the ranks. LaBeckie had been working with Andre Burkett aka Dray, my former bunk mate, who also happened to be a fucking snitch-ass fed. I couldn’t even control my rapid breathing right now just picturing Dray’s traitorous face and thinking about how he had fucked me royally.

  Man, I was so torn up and desperate when I first got locked up that I had my street guard all the way down, which led to me trusting that nigga Dray way too easily. Me, a nigga that usually don’t trust a soul, let Dray into my world fast as hell, so when Dray proposed that I use my outside connections, namely my fucking wife, to set up Bobby Knight, a big hustler and wealthy businessman that had the Tidewater area on lock, I didn’t think twice about it. I had tunnel vision at that time: get Knight set up, get some paper for a lawyer, and get the fuck out of prison. I wouldn’t say the shit was foolproof, but it could’ve possibly worked if it wasn’t the fucking feds all along.

  When I proposed the set-up to Shannon, it didn’t take that much convincing. I should’ve suspected that shit wasn’t right, just judging from her quick enthusiasm to do it.

  Shit, Shannon was down from the jump; little did I know she would set up Bobby Knight and take flight with all of the money that she got from the heist. She ain’t even try to get the high-priced defense attorney I usually used to help me out . . . Nah, Shannon was too busy running with the dirty money and fucking Jock along with it. Wow, that shit blows my mind every time I think about it.

  “Yo, go find your snitching-ass fed flunky Andre Burkett,” I spat at LaBeckie, squinting at that bitch-ass pig, and if eyes could kill he would’ve dropped fucking dead.