by L. E. Newell
Sparkle felt himself being drawn back into her magnetism, but he fought off the feeling. He started caressing her arms for a brief moment and gently pushed her away. Reluctantly, he stepped away, but not before he placed a gentle kiss on her forehead and whispered in her ear, “Just got to make sure whoever that was is gone,” in a reassuring tone.
She had inched a little closer, smiling warmly into his eyes hoping to persuade him back to the bed when Rainbow yelled from the kitchen, “Yo, ace, come check this here out!”
It was extremely hard to break away from her intoxicating eyes, but he headed for the kitchen. “Yeah, partner, whatcha got?”
Rainbow, now minus the robe, was squatting at the kitchen door, staring intently at an object laying just inside the threshold. Something shiny was stuck in a dark puddle of what appeared to be blood. Since they dared not cut the lights on, neither of them could be sure. Sparkle reached up for the light switch but thought better of it. Those creeping niggas might be on the rebound. He knelt down beside his boy to get a better view. “Damn, looks like a bracelet, huh?”
Rainbow cocked a brow and peered at him. “Yeah, uh-huh.”
As their eyes adjusted to the dark, they could see that it was indeed blood. There was a trail of it that dribbled over the sill and along the sparsely grassed dirt path beside the house, disappearing at the edge of the lawn. Rainbow traced the dribble around the corner of the house, figuring that it led all the way to the street. He squatted back down and took a ink pen out of his pocket of his pajamas and lifted the bracelet out of the puddle of blood. He held it up to the moonlight and under closer inspection could see the initial “J” engraved with gold letters etched inside the silver-plait woven jewelry.
Sparkle hunched his shoulders. “Got any idea who da fuck it belongs to?”
Rainbow tilted his head to the side, his expression bewildered. “Shit, dog, your guess is as good as mine.”
Sparkle grumbled. “All bullshit aside, we got to get on this like yesterday.”
Rainbow’s eyes grew serious and he looked down the hall for a second before he stood up out of his crouch, grabbed Sparkle by the elbow and pulled him outside. He cleared his throat. “Hey dog, chill for a second. We haven’t known these hoes dat long to be airing our biz out in the open like that.” He nodded toward the house suspiciously.
Sparkle looked back toward the house and groaned, “Hey, whatcha trying to say, man?”
Rainbow cocked his ear to the door, his eyes squinting into a stare so cold that it would have chilled the blood of most regular niggas, especially those that didn’t really know him. His chest heaved broadly and he menacing said, “Man, I done told you over a hundred times, don’t be trusting none of these hoes, man.” He poked him in the chest.
Knowing his boy was right, Sparkle nodded in understanding. He reached into his pocket to extract a crumbled pack of Kools, lit one up, took a long drag and exhaled slowly as he leaned against the wall. Being more inquisitive than he was at calming his nerves, he plucked it into the yard. “Okay, dog, I see whatcha saying. By the way, who da fuck you got up in there anyways? Hell, how long you been here? I thought I had the house to myself, for real yo.”
Rainbow didn’t respond immediately, but he cocked his head to the side; a habit whenever he was puzzled about something. Even after Sparkle repeated what he had said, he was still stuck with the same blank expression on his face for about thirty seconds before he finally turned to face him. “Huh, uhhhh, oh yeah, uh, I got one of the twins up in there since you got to know.” His mouth turned down in disgust and he continued to stare off into space.
“Shit, man, which twin?” Sparkle said seriously.
Rainbow hunched his shoulders. “Hell, Spark, I don’t know them bitches apart when I’m all highed up and shit.” He twisted his neck in a circle like he was getting annoyed. “Man, what the fuck difference does it make which one it is anyways?” The corners of his eyes wrinkled in frustration.
Sparkle decided to ease off with the interrogation. “Naw, Bow, you right, man. It don’t make no difference, yo.”
Rainbow finally smiled, punched him playfully on the shoulder and then in his side. “Check it out, dog, fuck dese hoes. We got to get on the trail of who dis here bracelet belongs to.” His tone turned more menacing with each word.
Sparkle twisted his head to the side and matched his stare for a few seconds before he ran his hand down his face. After feeling the tension of their stare-off abate, he took the bracelet off of the pen, twisted it around several times, examining it more closely. “Man, the only ‘J’ I know is my baby sister’s boyfriend, well, used to be old man. You think that nigga got the nerve to try something like this because I don’t.”
Rainbow turned his mouth down and stated matter-of-factly, “Dude, I think everybody got the nerve, except you, me and “B.” He realized that he wasn’t about to get a response and threw his hands in the air. “Where ya wanna start?”
Sparkle leaned back and twisted his neck in circles, moaning at the crinkling sounds that helped to ease some of the tension from his hyped-up body. Seeing that his boy was sorta struggling with his decision, he wrapped his arm around his shoulder as he led him back into the house. “Tell ya what, let’s get dressed and take a ride downtown. Dem niggas on Auburn can’t hold water. Hell, somebody’s gotta have heard something about this bullshit.”
The air was shimmering in the parking lot of Turner Field. The occupant at the steering wheel in the purple-lensed aviator glasses wiped the sweat off his face with the damp dingy handkerchief he had only moments earlier wrung out. Sighing heavily, he looked undereyed across the seat at his partner and wheezed. “Damn, man, you sure they in there? Shit, we been out here way before the game started and I ain’t seen no movement at all.”
The passenger flicked the ashes off of the El Producto cigar out of the window, then waited until the deafening roar of the crowd eased down from the stadium across the way before he straightened up in the seat and sneered. “Man, it’s damn sure hard trying to keep up with these fools. The part I can’t figure out is why we can’t just take their asses out and be done with it, you feel me.” He didn’t wait on a response and pulled his heavy pistol out of his waistband and aimed it at brick house across the street. The sadistic look on his face was quite menacing. “Like right muthafucking now, shit.”
The driver eyed him up and down as he played with his bushy mustache. He was becoming leery of the psychotic emotions his partner was displaying. “Because folks said so. Face it, man, we Indians in this war, my man. That means that we sit back and do what the boss says, period.”
“Why, man, we gotta kill them muthafuckas anyway, whaddafuck.”
“Chill out, dude, they must see a much bigger picture than you do; hell, than we do,” the driver said grimly. Why I got to get stuck with this sick knuckleheaded dumb-ass nigga anyways? He took a deep breath and lowered the mini-binoculars so he could wipe another stream of the sweat off of his forehead.
The passenger grunted. “Fuck dat, I’m gonna…” He sneered as he reached for the doorknob and nudged the door open with his knee. With one leg stretched out of the car, he froze in midsentence when a menacing rod of cold steel pressed hard behind the back of his ear.
He heard a menancing voice behind him. “You gonna do what, muthafucka?”
The voice of death was so chilling that he damn near shit himself. That, along with the garlicky spittle splattering the side of his face, nauseated him to the point of spewing the entire contents of his body.
“Muthafucka, it don’t matter what the fuck you think. If I even think about your stupid ass jeopardizing me, I’ll...”
“Agggghhhh!” he screamed when the gun pressed deep into his ear bone.
Beverly sipped the rest of her cappuccino as she lounged against her pillow watching the news with Katie Couric in her apartment in College Park. She had fought through a restless night of sleep wondering about the shooting in Jonesboro. Her gut instincts tol
d her that her boys were involved with it in some way. Call it woman’s intuition or whatever you wanted to. She knew that Johnny had some girls working out that way, but she couldn’t recognize the picture that kept popping up on the screen. What the hell; her boy tossed women in and out of his web like plucking feathers off a chicken. On top of that, he hadn’t answered his phone when she reached out to contact him. This caused her to worry that much more, for he usually got right back to her whenever she tried.
Even though there had been no suspects announced, she couldn’t shake the feeling that Black Don was somehow connected to all the robberies and shootings. No matter how deep into her network of snitches she dug, she couldn’t gather enough to tie him into the obvious drug area takeovers either.
Shaking those thoughts out of her mind, she got up and looked at herself in the full-length mirror on the bathroom door, feeling like she was definitely caught between a rock and a harder rock. She stared intently into the eyes of her image knowing she had to swallow the realization that she was on her own. No way that she could take the chance that someone could or would make the connection between her and her boys. Talking about skeletons in the closet, boy oh boy, did she ever have hers and they were sure rattling now. But as always she couldn’t turn her back on her boys. Without a doubt her political enemies would have a field day if they had the slightest hint that it was her three amigos that used illegal funds to put her through college; studies that had led her into law enforcement. The rest is history. Hell, she could easily get suspended if they knew about her years on foot patrol when she practically guided the rise in the criminal lives of all three and the girls that worked so diligently for them.
Her mind was filled with these thoughts when she left the bathroom to go to her closet to pick through her wardrobe. There was a full-length mirror on that door as well. As she looked at her full figure, clad in yellow lacy bra and panties, she started to get a tingly feeling in her pussy as she thought about her recent booty call with Sparkle. She imagined that it was his hands that was rubbing her crotch instead of her own. The more she thought about it and him the further her hand slid into her panties.
Damn, why does that nigga have to be a damn crook? she thought as she felt her nipples getting hard. When she eased her fingers under the frilly fabric and into the folds of her pussy lips, she wasn’t the least surprised that she was gushy. The aroma of her excited pussy caused her to close her eyes as she imagined his face closing in on her. His lips were slightly parted to touch hers ever so gently. Talking about deja vu.
She had felt her a nut building in her loins when the jangling of the telephone snapped her out of her lust-filled state of mind. Was this some kind of deja vu or what? Sighing heavily, she walked wobbly-legged to the nightstand and took some Kleenex out to wipe her fingers off before she picked up the phone. “Ugh nasty.” There it was, damn nearly the same thing that had happened the last time.
The hairs on her neck started tingling before she even put the phone to her ear. She wasn’t able to hold the tension from her voice. “Hello, Beverly Johnson speaking.” Damn, the very same background of traffic noise. And as before when she started to repeat herself, the voice over the phone caused butterflies to flutter in her stomach. It was Sparkle.
“What’s up, girl? How ya doing?”
She took a few seconds to gather herself. Dayum, she really despised the weak feelings she got in her knees whenever she heard his voice. Why couldn’t he be a normal guy? Then again that was the part of him that attracted her so strongly.
“Damn, girl, you gonna answer me or what?”
“Yeah, I’m here. Whatcha got on your mind?”
“Needed to hear your voice, that’s all.”
“What, you called just to hear my voice?”
“Yeah, you got a problem with that?”
She smiled inwardly, knowing he had to have something other than that on his mind. He was stalling; she’d known him too long not to know that much. And as usual she took the lead. “Okay, since it’s evident you want to play games again, were you involved in that shooting?”
“What shooting?”
“What shooting?”
“Yeah, what shooting, and why you asking me something like that, again?” He waited a full thirty seconds for her to continue in her super-cop mode but she remained mute. “Damn, and here I am trying to figure out how to get some more of that super pussy of yours. And again you come off on me all crazy and shit again.”
“Ugh!!” she growled but she couldn’t deny the fire he’d set off in her stuff with his nasty talk.
“Ugh?”
“Yeah, ugh, you one nasty man, you know that. Looka here, I’ve got to get to the station. Something has come up.”
“Whew! Why you in...hello, hello, damn.” She had hung up on him. All he could do was hold the phone away from his face and stare at it.
“Hung up on your ass, huh?” Rainbow said from the other side of the table as he made a final shuffle before passing the deck for him to cut.
They were on their third game of Rummy 5000, idling away the time while waiting for Stacy to show up.
For the past couple of days they had traveled the hoods of DeKalb and Fulton counties in search of anybody who might’ve heard about a nigga being shot in the arm whose name started with a J. The forty-eight consecutive hours of non-sleep venturing had all been in vain.
When a car with a booming sound system pull into the driveway, they knew that it was him. Stacy rapped on the door several times before entering without waiting for a response. He swaggered in jacking up his sagging pants by the back pockets, skinning and grinning. He froze when he saw the serious look on their faces. Turning his mouth down into a full grit, he flipped one of the chairs around backward and sat down at the table with his arms folded behind his head. “Whatz up, man? Why y’all looking all glum and shit?”
Rainbow took one last drag on the blunt he had been pulling on and passed it to Stacy. “We’ve got a situation here that has gotten really serious, son, and we needed to know that you were aight, that’s all.”
Stacy scrunched his face up, stood up and flipped the chair back around, sat down again and started rubbing his chin. “Say what?”
Sparkle accepted the blunt from Stacy after he had taken a few draws. “There’s some folk out here that might go after you to get to us.” He leaned back and waited for the explosion he knew was about to come.
And true to form Stacy’s overhyped ass went off. “Whodafuck ah ah, where da bitch at?”
Sparkle leaned forward, wiped his face and sneered. “Little nigga, chill the fuck down for a sec. The way we see it, that nigga Black Don is trying to stretch out his little empire some more.”
The words had barely gotten out of his mouth before Stacy jumped back up. His nose was sprouting fire and he started pacing the floor, jaws clenching, flexing his fingers and growling; like he was ready to kill a brick. “Man, why yall ain’t let me know about this before now? Dayum, unk, that’s that’s fucked up, yo.”
Rainbow braced his hands on the table to get up but Sparkle held his hand up to stop him. He had this. He walked right in his path and stopped. Stacy tried to walk around him. It wasn’t happening, as Sparkle put a hand on his shoulder and looked him straight in the eyes. “Come on, man, you know me.”
Stacy waved his head from side to side. Sparkle paused and moved his head from side to side along with him until Stacy stopped moving. He added briskly, “You know me, right?”
Stacy blinked a couple of times before he pinched his nose and took a deep breath. “I’m gonna handle mine, unk, you know that’s right.” He tried to look away, knowing damn well that his uncle could see right through any bullshit. He certainly wasn’t buying accepting the role of him being some type of pussy nigga.
Sparkle felt the fire was boiling in his gut, clasped his chin and made him face him. He narrowed his eyes, staring intently at Stacy. “Right, I said, right?”
Stacy turned away fo
r a moment to regain his composure, took a deep breath, rotated his neck a few times and then he finally nodded okay.
Sparkle, feeling relieved he’d calmed him down some, continued. “Okay, now put your emotions to the side for a second and listen to me, good ’cause we done thought this thing through carefully. Ya wid me here?”
“Yeah, unk, I’m wid ya but…”
“Naw, partner, ain’t no buts here. How many times I got to tell ya, ya can’t hear what I’m saying if you thinking about what you’re gonna say?”
Stacy took another deep breath. “Okay, okay, go ahead I’m listening.”
Sparkle cleared his throat, gave a short cough. “Good, we need you to hang out with the girls til we get this nigga.”
Stacy frowned. “You want me to play punk. Is that what it is? I ain’t no punk, unk. Naw, fuck that shit there.”
Rainbow had heard enough. “Naw, stud, it ain’t about you playing punk or nothing like that. We know that you got a big heart; hell, the heart of a lion, for sho. That’s why we need a thorough thug to be with the girls in case that bitch-ass nigga send his crew. Ya feel me?”
Stacy dipped into his pocket for his sunglasses, wiped his hand across his face before he put them on. “So y’all gangstas want me to ride shotgun for some hoes.” He cleared his throat. “So I can stay out of the line of fire, right? Shit sounds like playing punk to me.”
Rainbow shook his head and gave him one of his hundred-watt smiles and sniffled. “Hell naw, man, for one, I don’t allow no punks around me period; and two, we need a strong soldier type of nigga, with some muthafucking heart to make sure that don’t nothing happen to the girls. A nigga that ain’t gonna run when it gets hot.”
Knowing that they were mostly referring to Violet and Mercedes, Stacy yanked off his glasses, took a few steps back and cocked his head to the side. “What about your girls then? Who’s gonna be with them?”
