by K'wan
He watched Lady Monet move around the room and work it like the budding superstar that she was. Hanging with her in the strip club was a totally different experience than seeing her in her element. The way she held the attention of everyone she chatted with, Shai could understand why Don B. signed her; she was beautiful and had a magnetic presence about her. A few times Shai caught her looking in his direction, but she refused to make eye contact. She was toying with him, and it started irritating Shai. Usually he was the one pulling those kinds of stunts on women, and he wasn’t used to having the tables turned on him.
“So, I thought you guys had some live performances set up for the night?” Shai changed the subject, hoping to get some insight as to what was going on with Lady Monet.
“Yeah, but we had to switch some shit around. This dizzy broad,” Don B. thumbed in Lady Monet’s direction, “decided it was a good idea to hang out drinking and smoking blunts on the night before her performance, so now her voice is shot.” He shook his head in disappointment. “Of all my artists, she’s the hardest to work because she still got that street shit in her. I could make a big star out of Monet, if she’d only get out of her own fucking way. It’s like this shit is all a game to her, smell me?”
“Yeah, I can definitely dig that,” Shai said, thinking of her treatment of him that night.
“But enough about her; what do you think of my idea?” Don B. got back to business.
“Well, I think it has potential, but ultimately I’d have to bounce it off my lawyers and my business partner before I could commit,” Shai told him. His eyes drifted over Don B.’s shoulder to Lady Monet. She was in the middle of the room, drinking Hennessy out of the bottle and twerking. When she went to drop it low, she lost her balance and crashed into the lap of one of Don B.’s minions.
Don B. looked over his shoulder and frowned. “This drunk bitch,” he mumbled. “Excuse me for a second, Shai. I need to handle this.” He got up and went over to Monet.
Shai watched as Don B. grabbed her roughly by the arm and snatched her to her feet. He barked something at her, to which she responded by laughing in his face. This only angered him further, which was evident by the way he began shaking her. Monet tried to pull away, but Don B. held fast. The situation was going south quickly, and Shai could smell the threat of violence lingering. Before he had even realized it, he was on his feet. He’d have gone over and intervened, had it not been for Swann appearing and cutting his path off.
“Looks like you could use a drink,” Swann said, brandishing a glass of Hennessey.
“I ain’t thirsty,” Shai told him, trying to peer around Swann to see what was going on between Don B. and Monet.
“Drink it anyway.” Swann forced the glass into his hand. “That ain’t for you, Slim.”
“What you talking about, Swann?” Shai faked ignorance.
“I’m talking about that look in your eye that says you’re ready to do something stupid over a bitch who don’t belong to you,” Swann told him.
“Whatever, man.” Shai handed Swann the drink back and turned for the exit.
“Where you going, Shai?”
“To take a leak, if that’s okay with you?”
“Hold on, I’ll walk with you,” Swann offered. “Swann, right now I don’t need a shadow, I need to piss this alcohol out. Now unless you plan on holding my dick, fall back and give me a little space.” Shai walked out before giving him a chance to argue.
*
Shai bumped his way through the crowd downstairs, trying to get control of the drunken rage that was trying to settle over him. He found himself at the bar in the main level. It wasn’t that he needed another drink, but he was trying to put some distance between himself and the temptress. He had come dangerously close to playing himself by intervening in what was going on between Don B. and Lady Monet, and he had a sneaking suspicion that it was her intention to goad him into getting involved. She had been fucking with his head all night, and his dumb ass was letting her.
Shai ordered a bottle of water, which he proceeded to guzzle. The cool drink was helping to clear some of the cobwebs from his head. By his second bottle, he had begun to sober up and was seeing things slightly clearer. He was no longer feeling the scene at Code Red and was about ready to go. He was in the middle of ordering a third bottle of water when he felt a presence behind him. He turned and found himself confronted with the object of his anger, Lady Monet.
“Who drinks water in a club?” Monet squeezed next to him at the bar. “Give him a shot of Henny,” she told the bartender.
“The last thing I need is another shot. I might end up doing something I’ll regret,” Shai told her.
“What’s eating you?” she asked, as if she didn’t already know.
“Are you fucking serious?” Shai gave her a disbelieving look. “Listen, shorty, I don’t know what kind of games you’re playing in here tonight, but I’m not the one for them.” He attempted to leave, but she grabbed him by the hand.
“Don’t be like that, Slim,” she said as she attempted to touch his face, but he grabbed her by the wrist.
“Knock it off.”
“What? You upset about that little show with Don B.? Let me find out you’re jealous,” Monet said as she gave him a sly smile. “That is so cute.”
“I’m glad you think fucking with niggas emotions is funny, because I don’t.”
“I’m not playing with your emotions, Shai. It’s just that…” her words trailed off. “Look, can we go somewhere where I don’t have to scream over the music for you to hear me? It’s loud as hell in here.”
“I’m cool. I’m actually about to call it a night,” he told her.
“C’mon, Shai. Let’s go talk outside. Give me five minutes to explain.” She took him by the hand and began leading him toward one of the exits.
“Hold on, let me tell my people.”
“Do you need to clear everything you do with your entourage?” she teased him. “I’ll have you back before they even notice you’re gone.” She pushed open the side door and walked outside. Shai reluctantly followed.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” he asked once they were outside in the alley.
“I’m just having a bad night,” she told him with a sigh.
“I kinda get the impression you brought it on yourself. You were up there showing your ass in front of Don B.”
“Fuck him!” Monet spat. “That arrogant bastard thinks the fact that he’s invested in my career gives him ownership papers over me. The only reason he was even acting like that is because he knows I’m feeling you.”
“Well you’ve got a funny way of showing it. First you slide off without so much as saying goodbye, and then you spend half the night acting like you don’t know me. You’ve got a funny way of showing a guy you like them.”
“Because I usually don’t,” she said honestly. “Understand something, Shai; I came up different. All the shit with my dad kinda fucked me up, so I try not to get too attached to guys. When you came along that changed.”
“Because I’m just that special, huh?” Shai asked sarcastically.
When Monet looked up at him, he was surprised to find her eyes rimmed with tears. “Here I am trying to keep it real with you and you’re making fun of me? You know what? Fuck you!” She started back for the door.
“Wait, don’t go!” Shai grabbed her arm. “Look, I’m sorry. It’s just kinda hard to tell when you’re serious and when you’re playing games.”
“This isn’t a game for me, Shai…at least not with you.” Monet wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “I didn’t intend to fall for you, Shai Clark. I know you got a girl, and in the beginning I was just flirting with you to see how far I could get you to go, but after spending last night getting to know the man behind the myth, I realized that there was more to you. I felt myself slipping and it scared me. The reason I left while you were in the car sleeping is because I felt like I was about to cross a line that we wouldn’t be able to co
me back from. When I saw you again tonight, it just stirred up old feelings, and that’s why I got so drunk. I feel guilty because I’m falling for another woman’s man,” she said, lowering her head in shame.
Shai nudged her chin with his finger, so that she had to look at him. He was lost in her moist hazel eyes.
“Would you believe me if I said I was falling for you too?” He kissed her. He knew it was wrong, but it felt so right.
“Shai, don’t start something you can’t finish.” She ran her hand down his chest and let it come to rest on his dick, which was damn near bursting through his pants.
“I never do,” he whispered as he slipped his hand under her dress and began playing with her wet pussy.
Shai pressed Monet against the wall of the alley, and kissed her deeper. His tongue tasted like spearmint and Hennessey. “From the moment I saw you, I felt like I had been looking for you all my life,” she said between kisses. “I need you inside me. Please give it to me, baby.” She began undoing his belt.
Shai wanted to resist, but he couldn’t. He was like putty in Lady Monet’s hands to do with as she would. He felt the cool night air run over his penis as it was freed from his pants. Lady Monet played with it for a while, getting it hard enough to her liking before slipping him inside her. Her pussy felt like warm silk, and it closed around Shai’s dick as snuggly as a glove.
It was as if they had been made specifically for each other. He started pumping in her slowly at first, but it seemed the deeper he went, the tighter she got. The next thing Shai knew, he was humping and grunting like a dog. Monet’s pussy was so good that Shai felt a tear spring to his eye, but he refused to let it fall. He lasted all of five minutes before he exploded inside her.
“Damn,” he cursed, resting his head on the wall behind her. He was still inside Monet, emptying the last of his juices.
“I kinda expected you to last a little longer than that,” Monet teased him.
“I’m sorry, baby. It was just so good,” Shai said, trying to hide his embarrassment.
“Don’t worry, the next round will be better. Let me get you back to where you need to be,” she said as she pushed his pants down around his ankles and got on her knees.
Shai’s body went rigid when Monet took him in her mouth. Sweat began to pour down his face as she took him in and out of her throat expertly. If he wasn’t sure before, he was absolutely sure then that he was in love.
“Shai,” she said, popping him out of her mouth and running her tongue around the head of his dick, “I left a few things out when I was telling you the story about my father.”
“Tell me later, baby. Just keep going.” Shai grabbed her by the back of her head, but she resisted.
“No, it’s important that you know the truth… the whole truth.” She ran her tongue across his nuts. “My father didn’t die in a car accident. He was murdered.”
“I’m sorry to hear it,” Shai said, only half-listening.
“I promised that if I ever crossed paths with the man responsible that I would set things right. That man was you,” Monet hissed.
Before Shai could even process what she said, he felt a pinprick in his thigh. He looked down and saw a hypodermic needle sticking out of his thigh. “What the fuck?” He pushed her away and stumbled back. He suddenly felt nauseous and the alley began to spin. Through blurred vision, he watched Monet stand up and wipe her mouth. “What are you doing?”
“Settling an old score for my father. I believe you two knew each other very well. His name was Michael Tessio.”
The name hit Shai like a slap in the face. “You rotten bitch!” He stumbled forward trying to grab her, but whatever drug she had stuck him with was starting to kick in and he had trouble keeping his balance. A pair of strong hands grabbed Shai from behind and threw him to the ground. He focused as best he could and was able to make out a man. From the long handle, he first thought it was a baseball bat, until he noticed the steel hammer at the end.
“You!” Shai spat when he was able to make out his cousin Hammer’s grinning face.
“I tried to tell your lady that I had something to talk to you about,” Hammer sneered. “There’s been a bag dropped on your head, and I was contracted to do the job.”
“You double-crossing piece of shit!” Shai spat at his cousin. He knew from the time that Hammer walked into his house that he was snake, but no one would listen. “Where’s Enzo?” Monet asked.
“Around the corner waiting in the car with a few of the boys. They’re going to help me get rid of the body,” Hammer told her, twirling his weapon like a baton.
“Hurry up and finish it. I have to get back inside before anyone gets suspicious, but first I want to watch the man who caused my father’s death bleed,” Monet said wickedly.
“You paid for blood, and I aim to please.” Hammer raised the sledgehammer high above his head.
“Tommy will see you hunted like a dog and killed for this,” Shai promised.
“I highly doubt that,” Hammer said, before swinging his hammer.
Shai’s eyes snapped closed, waiting for the end. There was a rush of wind and them something warm splattered across his face. When he opened his eyes, he saw Monet’s body laying a few feet away from him. Her skull had been crushed like a rotten watermelon. His eyes couldn’t hide his shock. “But I thought…”
“On your feet,” Hammer instructed as he pulled him up. Shai was unable to stand, so Hammer tossed him over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. In a minute, Enzo and the rest of those cock-suckers are gonna realize something isn’t right and come in this alley with guns blazing. We’ll be long gone before that happens.”
“But I thought…”
“That I’d cross my blood over a few dollars?” Hammer finished the sentence for him. “You’ve got a lot to learn about your cousin Hammer, kid. There’s a war coming to your doorstep and I’m gonna make sure my family is good and ready by the time it arrives,” he told Shai before he lost consciousness.
CHAPTER 29
“Fuck do you mean you lost him?” Tommy raged. The entourage that had set out for Code Red earlier that night had returned, but they were missing a man… his little brother Shai. His right-hand man, Duffy, was at his side. They were in the pool house, so the staff wouldn’t hear what they were talking about.
“T, the kid said he was going to the bathroom. I guess he slipped out with the broad,” Swann said.
Tommy turned his angry eyes to Swann. “And you let him? I’d expect this kinda stupidity from someone else, but not from the man who I raised up.”
“We’ll find him, T,” Swann promised.
“Fucking right you will, or I’m hanging all you niggas out to dry!” Tommy promised.
“Maybe him and the broad slid off and are shacked up in a hotel,” one of the shooters suggested.
Tommy looked at him as if it was the dumbest thing he’d ever heard. “My brother, your boss goes missing in a party full of gangsters and that’s your theory? Duffy, can you tell this nigga what I think of that idea?”
Duffy whipped his pistol out and shot the shooter in the leg. He dropped to the floor howling in pain.
“Anybody else got any dumb theories they wanna share?” Tommy addressed all the men. No one spoke. “That’s what I thought.”
“Well I hate to add insult to injury, but we’ve got another problem,” Angelo spoke up. He had been on his cell phone while Tommy was barking on Swann and the others. “That was Big Doc. The truck got jacked.”
“Of course the truck got jacked. That’s what we sent him down there to do,” Tommy said.
“I know. What I mean is someone jacked it before they could,” Angelo explained. “They were waiting at the usual spot for the shipment. When the truck never showed, Big Doc thought something might have been wrong, so they backtracked the route. They found the driver walking up the side of the highway. Apparently, he stopped for gas in Delaware and somebody stuck him up and took the shipment.”
�
��You have got to be shitting me,” Swann said as he slapped his forehead. He knew Shai needed the money they’d get from the cigarettes to bribe the officials for the building permits. “First Shai and now our truck?”
“I need everybody we got in the streets. Our first priority is to find my brother and our next is to find the truck. Anybody and everybody involved in taking our shit is going to sleep!” Tommy declared. The men nodded in agreement, but nobody moved. “Fuck are you all standing around for, get to it!” he roared. “And somebody get this idiot to a hospital.”
Angelo helped the remaining shooter pick his bleeding friend up off the floor. As they were carrying him to the door, someone was coming in. It was Hammer.
“Is this a private party or can anyone crash?” Hammer joked.
“Fuck are you doing here?” Angelo asked.
“Just came to deliver a bit of news to my family. You can call off the manhunt. I know where Shai is,” Hammer told them.
“You dirty muthafucka. If you’ve done anything to my friend I’ll…” Swann began.
“You’ll thank me,” Hammer cut him off. “Shai is outside in my car. He’s a little doped up, but he’s alive.”
“How did you end up with him?” Angelo asked suspiciously.
“That’s a long story, and it can wait for another time. I suggest you get Shai in the house and maybe call a doctor. I’m not sure what she dosed him with, but he’s out of it,” Hammer told them.
The men scurried off to do as they were told, leaving Hammer, Tommy and Duffy in the pool house.
“What the fuck is going on, Duffy?” Tommy asked.
“You boys have got yourselves a little problem. A while back I was contracted by some white broad, an Italian, to hit somebody in New York. I didn’t know who the mark was going to be until yesterday. It was Shai,” Hammer explained.
“That don’t make no sense. Why would some broad want Shai whacked?” Duffy wondered.
“Apparently, she holds him responsible for the death of her husband.” Hammer went on to tell them how he had been contracted by Constance Tessio to avenge the death of her husband.
