California Connection 2 (Califronia Connection)

by Chunichi

  “Then I got word that his boys were after me. Niggas was calling my phone, threatening me and shit, but I was like, ‘Fuck it! Y’all niggas know where to find me. I ain’t hiding. So days had passed, and I ain’t never see none of these niggas, that is until tonight.”

  “Tonight? You ran into these niggas before you came to pick me up?” Now I was really interested in what Poppo had to say.

  “Yeah, man. I was at the fucking gas station, and these niggas rolled up on me. They started busting shots and shit, even hit the cute little cashier bitch. Anyway, I catch up with these niggas about a mile from the gas station. They had flipped the truck and shit, so when the nigga come crawling out the truck, I hit him with a couple of shots.”

  “So that nigga dead?”

  Totally ignoring my question, Poppo called out in a panic, “Yo, I can’t move my legs.”

  That was my queue. It didn’t even take ten minutes before that shit I put in his drink started to work.

  “Pretty soon you won’t be able to move your arms either.” I gave him a devious grin.

  “What did you do to me?”

  “Shut the fuck up!” I yelled and punched him in the mouth. Afterwards, my hand hurt like hell.

  Shortly after, we arrived at an abandoned warehouse. I came across it on our last visit to Atlanta. The only things there were spiders and rats. I pulled Poppo’s still paralyzed body from the car and dumped it on the dirty warehouse floor. Then I placed duct tape around his arms and legs. I’d had him purchase all the equipment prior to picking me up, so we would be prepared for Sasha. Little did this punk know it was for him.

  In the warehouse, I started cutting him on his arms, legs, face, fingers, and neck. Finally, I took off his shirt and cut his chest and stomach open. For a while, I let him bleed out. That nigga looked petrified. I took my time torturing him before I began to speak.

  “What? You thought you would get away at trying to duck me and play with my fucking money? Not to mention, you violated me by putting your hands on my baby moms. That alone is a death sentence, bitch nigga! Did you forget where you came from nigga? You were nobody. I made you, Poppo. When we met, you were on the corner selling nicks and dimes, nigga. I opened the doors for you.” I kicked him in the head. I couldn’t believe this ungrateful-ass nigga.

  “Fuck you, Calico! I ain’t your bitch. I just ain’t have the chance to prove it to your ass. You suppose to be dead right now, nigga. I had plans for you. You never was suppose to leave Bankhead. If that stupid-ass crackhead hadn’t fucked up, you wouldn’t be here right now!”

  “So what the fuck you saying, Poppo? You tried to fucking set me up?” Furious, I kicked him two more times.

  Poppo began to laugh. Then he coughed up blood. “Why you think your gun jammed?” he forced out the words then spat out blood. “I had given the crackhead a gun to pull on you and force you in the house, then from there, I was gonna take over. I made sure the gun would jam because I knew you would pull it out on him. But like a typical fucking crackhead, this nigga sold the gun and decided to try and rob you at knifepoint instead.”

  “Fuck you, nigga!”

  I’d heard enough, so with gloves on and his own gun, I shot him twice in the head and left him as a nice snack for the rats.

  Now that I had one task down, it was time to move on to the other. I needed to holla at Diablo. According to Poppo, Sasha was working for Diablo, so I knew as long as I was fucking with him, I was guaranteed to run into that bitch.

  “What up, Diablo?” I shouted out the window to him as I pulled up in front of the club.

  He spoke to me through the window. “What’s up, man?”

  “Hop in, so I can holla at you.”

  Diablo walked over to the passenger side and hopped in. I wanted to waste no time getting right down to business. I knew I would have to come at this nigga right, so I would be able to get the information I needed. But before I could begin to speak, Diablo started talking.

  “Yo, nigga, I need you bad right now. I just took a major loss.”

  “For real? Damn, man! That’s how the game go. What you looking for?”

  “Well, I was hoping I could give you something, and you match what I buy. You dig?”

  “A’ight, I can work with that. But I need to ask you about this chick you work with . . . Sasha.”

  “Sasha? Man, you don’t want to deal with that conniving bitch.”

  Diablo had just made my job a whole lot easier. I was thinking I was gonna have to act like I wanna use the bitch as a runner or some bullshit, to get info from that nigga, but it looked like Sasha had rubbed this nigga the wrong way.

  “What’s up with her man?” I asked, wanting Diablo to elaborate.

  “She’s the reason I’m fucked up right now. I gives this bitch some weight to take to my niggas in VA, and she calls me, saying, this nigga Touch robbed her. So I goes up there ready for war and roughs this nigga up. I shot after him and everything. On top of that, I still had to straighten these niggas that didn’t get their shit, because they had already given me the money. So a few days later, I get a call from these same niggas, saying, they just bought some cheap shit from some niggas that robbed a bitch. When they described the bitch, I knew it was none other than Sasha. The puzzle just fit together way too perfectly. The bitch had lied. Touch ain’t rob her. That bitch robbed me!”

  “Oh yeah? So now you and this nigga Touch got beef?”

  “Hell yeah. Now that’s some extra shit I gotta deal with, on top of the loss I took.”

  “I know that nigga Touch. Me and him had a little run-in too,” I said, not sharing too much information. “So about this bitch, Sasha . . . have you talked to her?”

  “Nah. I don’t want her to know I know what’s up. I’m trying to get her here so I can deal with her. I’ve been calling her, telling her I got more work for her, but she dragging her feet getting here. She suppose to blow in tomorrow though.”

  “How about this? Get her here, and I’ll deal with her for you.” I offered to take the problem off of Diablo’s hands without telling him my personal beef with her.

  “Done deal. I’ll let you know when she’s at the club, and you get at me about that other thang when you ready. Or you gonna send your boy Poppo? Where that nigga at anyway? I been trying to holla at him since that shit went down.”

  “Poppo? That nigga ain’t breathing,” I said with no emotion at all.

  “Huh? Fuck you talking about Calico?” Diablo laugh nervously.

  “I gutted him.” Again I had a completely blank face.

  Diablo didn’t respond. He wasn’t sure how to take me. He just stared at me speechless, looking totally confused.

  “I’m fucking with you, nigga. He straight,” I said, breaking the ice.

  “Man, you had me fucked up. I’m gone.” Diablo dapped me up and got out of the car.

  I pulled out of the parking lot, pleased that things were falling into place.

  Chapter 29

  “A Day Full of Surprises”

  Jewel

  It had been weeks since I’d seen or heard from Touch. The last time I saw him was the night he left the house, crushing any hopes I had of us reuniting. Although it wasn’t an easy task, I’d managed to stop calling his phone twenty times a day and thinking about him every minute of the hour.

  My days were long and lonely, but I was determined to get over him. I did as many things as I could to stay occupied. The house was spotless, because I’d used cleaning as one of my distractions. I’d gone as far as to even clean out our closets, pantry, and cupboards. When I wasn’t cleaning, I was working out or at the gym taking a swim.

  Weeks earlier, all of my time was wasted planning for my wedding, but since it was pretty obvious no wedding was in my future, I’d stopped all proceedings. I’d even tried to collect refunds on some of my deposits.

  Although Touch wasn’t around, and there was no money coming in, the bills didn’t stop accumulating. Touch and I had accrued quite so
me debt with our ghetto-fabulous lifestyle, and our bank account was getting smaller and smaller each day. I didn’t know what the future had in store. It even crossed my mind to contact my boy from TMF to do a little business transaction of my own.

  I checked the mail to see what new bills had come through. As I sat at the breakfast bar and flipped through the bills, my stomach turned. I literally became nauseous. I jumped from the barstool and rushed to the downstairs bathroom.

  “Blaugh!” I began to vomit in the toilet.

  I’d been experiencing nausea and fatigue for the past couple of days. At first, I thought I was coming down with a stomach virus, but it was too sporadic. I’d even tried calling Misty to get her medical advice, but I had not even talked to her that much since the night Touch left. I’d left numerous messages, but she hadn’t returned any of them. She hadn’t even returned my text messages. I wondered if I’d done something wrong or if she was mad at me. It was like she and Touch both walked out my life at the same time.

  Not knowing what else to do, I decided to try the obvious and take a pregnancy test. I unwrapped the wrapper and placed the tip of the test under a stream of my urine, as the instructions stated. I recapped the tip and washed my hands and waited.

  Two minutes seemed like two hours, but when it was over, I rushed over to read the results. I glanced down and read the results. Unsure if what I was seeing was correct, I picked the test up and read it a little closer.

  “Oh, God!” I screamed then burst into tears.

  I dropped the test on the floor then slid down in a corner of the bathroom. I sat there with my knees bent to my chest and buried my head in my arms and sobbed uncontrollably. I couldn’t understand what I had done so bad that God was punishing me like this. In a matter of weeks, I’d lost my future husband, become distant with my new best friend, and now I was going to be forced to raise a child alone. There was no way I was prepared to raise a child. I had neither security nor the slightest idea how to even raise a damn child.

  I gathered myself and tried to call Misty again. I really hated to bother her, because I’d called so many times already, but I really needed someone to talk to. I felt like I was literally on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

  “Hey, girl,” Misty answered right away.

  I was relieved to hear her voice. “Hey, Misty. I really need to talk. I’ve been trying to reach you for some time now.”

  “I know, I know. I’m so sorry, boo. I’ve been working overtime at the hospital, so I’ve been so exhausted. In fact, I’m on my way in right now. I’ll call you when I get off.”

  “Okay,” I said, although I was quite disappointed that I hadn’t a chance to tell her what was going on with me.

  Stressed, exhausted, and just plain old depressed, I drank a cup of Sleepytime tea and laid down for a nap.

  Bang! Bang! Bang!

  I was wakened by a hard, constant banging on the front door.

  Three Virginia Beach police officers were at the door.

  “Yes,” I answered.

  “Are you California Jewel Diaz?” one of the police officers asked.

  “Who? No, you have the wrong house.” I backed up and slammed and locked the door in their faces.

  It was a dead bolt, so they were going to have to break the door down. I ran upstairs to grab my purse and raided the sock drawer to see what cash I had in there. I didn’t have much time.

  While the cops were desperately trying to get my front door open, I quickly ran downstairs and headed out of the back kitchen door.

  A police officer greeted me with a 9 millimeter gun in my face. “Get down on the ground!” he ordered.

  Another one cuffed me. “You’re under arrest for conspiracy to distribute narcotics. Where is Trayvon Davis?”

  The third police officer started reading me my Miranda rights, as the other officers rushed through the house looking for Touch.

  I was speechless. I couldn’t believe what was going on. I sat silent as a mouse as those pigs threw me in the police car to take me down to the station.

  Chapter 30

  “On a Mission”

  Touch

  Days had passed since I’d fucked Misty, but something about her just didn’t sit well with me. I couldn’t understand how this bitch was supposed to be Jewel’s girl, yet she gave the pussy up so easily. I couldn’t help but think about Sasha when I thought about Misty. Those two bitches were one and the same.

  I actually started to feel sorry for Jewel. She had the worst luck, when it came to females.

  As I pulled into the driveway, I decided to give her a call. Her cell phone went straight to voicemail, so I tried calling the house. When I called the house, the phone rang out until voicemail picked up. It had been a couple days since I’d last received a call from Jewel. I’d originally figured she had finally gotten some pride and decided to stop calling, but when I called her and wasn’t able to reach her, something came over me. Deep inside, I felt something was wrong. I got out of my car and headed to my front door.

  “Yo, Touch,” my neighbor called out to me.

  I stopped in the driveway to speak to him. “What’s up, man?”

  “The police was at your crib today, man. They was out here asking niggas when the last time you been here and shit.”

  I didn’t know what the fuck was up, but I wasn’t taking no chances in finding out. I’d already planned to take a trip to the A to deal with this nigga Diablo, but the information my neighbor shared with me had instantly put those plans into motion.

  I didn’t even bother going into my crib. After talking to my neighbor, I walked right back to my car and got right back in.

  I called up Lisa.

  “Hey, boo.” She sounded excited to hear from me.

  “What’s up, baby?”

  “Nothing. Chilling. What’s up with you?”

  “I need a favor, ma.”

  “Okay. What’s up? You know you can always depend on me, even though you be putting me through hell with all your bitches.”

  “Ah shit! There you go. How many times I gotta apologize?”

  “Mmmm . . . maybe about ten to fifteen more times.” Lisa giggled.

  “Look, on the real, though, I need you to switch cars with me for a few days.”

  “Oh, no problem. I don’t mind pushing the seven forty-five. But the question is, what is your bitches gonna say? I don’t want no beef, Touch.”

  “Everything good, man. I’m on my way over.” I hung up the phone.

  When I got to Lisa’s house, it took about ten minutes for me to bend her over and get a quickie. Then I switched cars with her, and I hopped on the interstate and headed to Atlanta.

  My brain was racing the entire ride there. I tried calling Jewel several times, but I still couldn’t get her. Then I began to think even harder. I started to wonder if this bitch had set me up. I knew bitches had a habit of letting their emotions take over and doing some crazy shit. That would explain why she stopped calling me and wasn’t answering any of my calls.

  My mind ran on Misty. What if that bitch set me up? She knew a little too much about me, and the bitch just came on the scene out of nowhere. At that point everybody was a suspect. I broke my phone in two and threw it out the window onto Interstate 95.

  The longer I drove, the more I was consumed with my thoughts. I tried to listen to the radio and CDs, but nothing could get my mind off this shit. This is what I get for thinking with my dick. I should have never fucked that girl, Misty. I didn’t even know that broad like that. What if Jewel found out we had sex and now she’s out to get me? These bitches had me slipping.

  I was disappointed with myself. I was usually on point with shit, but I had to admit, I’d fucked up a whole lot in those past few weeks. I knew when I got to the A, I would need to get one of those pre-paid cell phones to conduct my business, but first I needed to pay a visit to Diablo.

  It worked out in my favor that I got to Atlanta late that night. I went to a strip club called Bot
toms Up that I frequented. I figured I would catch Diablo there. The last time I ran into him, it was at that same spot.

  Sure enough, just like I figured, he was there. I discreetly sat in the corner of the club and waited patiently for an hour for him to head out.

  I watched him stagger to his car. I pulled out of the parking lot behind him. He was too drunk to realize I was even following him. Plus, I was thankful he didn’t take no bitches home with him. The less witnesses, the better for me. Besides, the only one whose head I wanted to put a bullet in was Diablo’s.

  Diablo pulled up in his garage. Just as he was closing the garage door, I literally rolled my body in underneath it before it shut. When I pressed up on him, his back was turned.

  “Nigga, what the fuck you doing here?” he asked before I put my gun into his back.

  “You don’t get to ask any questions.” Without warning, I shot him in the leg.

  “Man, you shot me!” he whimpered in surprise.

  “Do we understand each other? Next time, I have no problem with shooting you in the throat.”

  “Yeah, I got you.” He nodded, sweat coming from his forehead.

  “Take me to your basement.” I shoved him in the back with my gun.

  I followed a limping Diablo through his house and into his basement. Once there, I tied him up with some rope he had on the counter in his basement and got ready for his execution.

  “Touch, man, please don’t kill me,” he begged. “I got kids.”

  “There you go again with your mouth.” I pistol-whipped him.

  “Please,” he said, blood pouring down the side of his face.

  “Why you think I stole from you, bitch nigga? I run these fucking streets. You really think I need to steal from you?” I asked.

  “Sasha told me you robbed her. That shit was worth eighty grand. But I later found out that bitch kept the shit and tried selling it to some niggas in VA. I guess she set us both up, man. The bitch is sheisty. Maybe she was thinking one of us would be in a six-feet-deep grave right now. Please—”