Fast Life

by Cassandra Carter

  That was when she first discovered that her value had decreased in Makai’s eyes. She glanced at the breathtaking girl whose name she didn’t know and saw how she had a hawk’s eye on her and Makai. She tried to put a name to the face out of the list she’d heard back when she’d listened to Makai’s cell messages.

  Makai held out his hand to help Kyra onto the platform, diverting her attention from the nameless girl. She gave him an ice-cold stare and took his hand, stepping onto the platform with the rest of the dancers. She wanted to prove that she wasn’t scared of him and that his tricky actions wouldn’t embarrass her the way she assumed he wanted. She was going to flip the script and put it down.

  Kyra started to dance. She danced harder and with more sexuality than any other girl up there. Any male around had to take notice of her movements, and many of them did, but slyly, so as to not offend their boss. Kyra moved her hips and shook her butt so fast and with such a passion that even she was shocked. Makai appeared pleased and watched her rhythm from his seat on the couch next to one of his many mistresses with a look of lust. All eyes were on her.

  She stayed on the platform and let her body sway slowly to the music. She didn’t want to look out of place while she was trying to solve the mystery of who this person was. Then she saw his face. She was sure her heart stopped when they made eye contact. She could have sworn she had died and gone to heaven. There beneath her on the club’s dance floor stood the person she had ached for, for so long. Chills ran through her body. It had been too long since she had been in his presence.

  Justin and Kyra locked eyes for mere seconds as she mouthed his name and stopped moving. Everything felt like it was moving in slow motion. She was fixated on his face when she felt another pair of eyes on her. She forced herself to tear her eyes from his and look at Makai. His eyes were on her with a look of curiosity as she hustled off the dance platform to offer him an explanation before he had the opportunity to question her abnormal actions.

  “Baby, I don’t feel so good,” she lied. Her talent for deception was improving.

  “What’s wrong? You look like you just saw a ghost.”

  “I dunno. I’m about to go to the bathroom, okay?” she said, fixing up her voice so that she would sound ill.

  Kyra made her way down the curved flight of stairs and past the specially decorated white and black velvet ropes onto the crowded dance floor. As she nudged her way through the crowd, she spotted Justin near the DJ booth and quickly nodded for him to follow her. She couldn’t risk anyone seeing them talking.

  She pushed and shoved through ocean of sweating bodies on the dance floor and made her way down a short corridor to the women’s bathroom. Justin kept his distance while tracking her movements and eventually caught up to her. Kyra pulled him into the bathroom and occupied a stall just in time, before anyone had a chance to catch a glimpse of them.

  As soon as the lock on the door clicked, assuring their privacy, her lips instantly found his with a renewed passion. As they stood in the cramped stall, their lips reacquainting themselves with each other, Kyra even felt a warm tear drop from her eye and glide down her cheek. She was overwhelmed with happiness.

  Justin broke their kiss to admire her bright smile he had missed so much. Whenever Kyra smiled, her entire face lit up with happiness and her eyes sparkled. However, a small bruise under her eye also caught his attention, and he was automatically concerned.

  “I missed you so much,” she breathed.

  “I missed you, too…. What happened right there?”

  “Nothin’…. I, uh, fell….” Kyra lied, realizing that her fading black eye must have been showing. The hot show she’d put on had caused some of her makeup to sweat off.

  “Who did that to you?”

  She wasn’t as good at telling lies as she thought.

  Kyra put her hand on the spot Justin had caressed feeling his touch again for the first time in what seemed like forever. She shut her eyes to savor the moment and then let them slowly reopen. She knew that as worried as he was for her, he was powerless against Makai and his people.

  “Listen to me. You have to lay low. I can’t tell you why right now, but I’ll get in touch with you, okay? Just watch what you do in public. If you see me, act like you don’t know me…” she whispered. He opened his mouth to speak but her protest interrupted him. “Trust me. Whatever you do, be careful.”

  “I’m staying at the Sutton Place Hotel, suite seven.”

  “I wish I could stay here with you, but I know Bryce and Rick are probably gonna come lookin’ for me at any moment….”

  “Who are—”

  “My bodyguards.”

  “Bodyguards? If you got bodyguards, how do you expect to come see me?”

  “Shh, don’t worry. I’ll find a way to get to you. I promise you. I’ll find a way.” She gently pressed her forehead against his and he held her in his arms as she weakly sobbed. She was in over her head and she knew it.

  A few days later Kyra managed to carry out the plan she conjured up to see Justin at his hotel. Her bodyguards were around less and less so she figured the task would be an easy one. They were more than likely Asiah’s watchmen now, and for that she was appreciative. She didn’t like having eyes on her day in and day out. They were nothing but a nuisance that she was sick and tired of dealing with on a daily basis.

  Kyra’s first glimpse of him had a smile wider than the Grand Canyon spreading across her face. He immediately pulled her to him and greeted her with a kiss, picking up where they had left off.

  “Hello to you, too,” She let out a giggle as she slipped off her sunglasses and dropped them on the table in the living area of the suite. She wrapped her arms around his neck and reintroduced her lips and tongue to his, the kiss quickly getting emotionally deeper. “I missed you so much, you just dunno.”

  She pulled back from the kiss and embraced him, resting her head on his chest.

  He ran his hands over her hair as he held her in that blissful moment. The silence of the room was perfect. He had come all the way from Prince Paul for a moment like this.

  “Hey, J, we’re about to go….” Michael interrupted the cherished moment and invaded the living area with no other than Natasha by his side.

  “Uh-uh! What is she doin’ here?”

  Justin and Michael exchanged looks of confusion at Kyra’s odd reaction, but Natasha was well aware of what was going on.

  “Mike, let’s go.” She pulled on his arm, trying to make her way out the door.

  “Goin’ to spend your new-found fortune?”

  “Shut that shit up, Kyra!”

  “Fuck you!”

  “Whoa, whoa, hold up.” Michael didn’t understand.

  “Naw, tell this bitch to hold up,” Kyra argued.

  “Look, just because we aren’t friends anymore doesn’t mean you’re about to be disrespecting me.”

  “Whateva. I’ll do as I damn well please. What are you gonna do? Beat my ass?”

  “Look, I said sorry. That’s all I can do. Why can’t you understand that I made a mistake?”

  The girls’ eyes made contact, but Kyra was close-mouthed. Natasha had a certain longing in her eyes that said she wanted to speak to her old friend, but Kyra was too stubborn to participate.

  “Mike, I need to use the bathroom real quick and then we can leave.”

  “Okay.”

  Natasha excused herself to go to the bathroom. Her eyes were glossy with tears as Kyra maintained her cold attitude in the living room.

  “You should go talk to her.”

  “There ain’t shit to talk about, Justin.”

  “You two were tight. What happened that could be that bad?” He was clueless to the secret cash deal Natasha had made with Makai to get Kyra away from the island.

  “Fuck her, she ain’t shit. J, I’m tellin’ you, she’s just a greedy, selfish, sneaky—”

  “Kyra…”

  “What?”

  “Please go talk to her baby? Do
it for me?”

  Kyra shot him a mean look, but his puppy-dog eyes made her weak. How could she say no to something he asked of her that was so simple? After he’d made a trip all the way to the U.S. just to find her, she couldn’t refuse.

  “Fine. I’ll do it.”

  “Thank you.” He showed his appreciation with a kiss on her cheek.

  “What was that all about?” Michael whispered his puzzlement as he watched Kyra walk off in the direction of the bathroom.

  “I don’t even know,” Justin whispered back.

  Kyra rapped on the door a few times and then walked in to find Natasha sitting on the swirled blue and green marble sink top.

  “It’s you,” Natasha said, trying to build up an attitude.

  “Yeah, it’s me,” she sighed as she shut the door behind her.

  A thick feeling of awkward tension fell on the room.

  Another awkward moment halted their conversation. In all their twelve years of friendship, neither one of them could remember getting so mad at the other that they’d stopped speaking.

  “Kyra…” Natasha was starting in on another round of apologies.

  “Don’t. What’s done is done. I’m here now.”

  “Yeah, but it was still messed up.”

  “I’m not gonna sugarcoat it, ’cause we both know it was, but I can’t be mad at you forever. We’ve been friends too long to let Kai fuck that up. I ain’t sayin’ we cool or anythin’, but I ain’t got no beef with you.”

  “How are things at home?”

  “Better.”

  “Does he still…” Natasha cautiously hinted at her question concerning Makai’s physical abuse.

  “Sometimes. It’s been a while.”

  “You shouldn’t have to put up with that.”

  “I know, but it’s like right now I don’t got a choice but to deal with his bullshit. I hope he’ll get tired of me and let me go. He got other girls anyway. He even has another girlfriend. I don’t know why he’s still draggin’ me along.”

  “Who?”

  “Some model chick…I forgot her name…. Who cares…?”

  The girls just sat there quiet again, each miniconversation coming to an abrupt end. Kyra played with a small hand towel on a nearby rack while Natasha studied the floor.

  “I gave the money back,” she blurted out. Her eyes never left her focus spot on the floor.

  “What?”

  “I gave Makai the money back. All five grand.”

  “Why? You might as well have spent it.”

  “Don’t be like that. I just didn’t realize what I did until you showed up at my house that night. After that, having the money just didn’t seem right. And then to go out and spend it? Uh-uh. Plus, you know I hate that nigga,” Natasha declared with a hint of laughter in her voice.

  “Me, too.”

  “Never thought I would see the day.” She giggled.

  CHAPTER 22

  Once Michael and Natasha left, Kyra and Justin had the suite all to themselves with time to waste. A day of relaxing, talking and lovemaking was a pleasant one, as was every other visit Kyra made following that day. Their casual hook-ups at random hotels around Chicago were considered precious.

  By the end of the month, the undercover couple had seen the inside of almost every hotel in the Chicago area. Kyra had to ensure that if Makai caught her, he wouldn’t be able to track Justin down at the Sutton. To ensure Justin’s safety while he was in Chicago, Kyra was more than ready to sacrifice her body to abuse at the hands of Makai. She was determined not to let anything happen to Justin.

  On an unusual night, Makai stayed at home. He once again occupied himself on Kyra’s side of the bed. Any other night she would have wanted to get it done and over with, but tonight it was different. Tonight she was into it, moaning and screaming, her body wet with sweat as he plunged deep into her. Tonight she fantasized that Makai was Justin.

  It was late the next afternoon when Kyra awoke. She tried to raise her head from where she lay but winced with soreness. Her head was throbbing. What happened last night? She asked herself as she carefully sat up in bed.

  The emotional toll of living under Makai’s rule was affecting her in more ways then one, and if it didn’t stop, she was fearful of where it might lead. That single thought was scary in its own right and was all the more reason to take action. She needed counsel. She needed another opinion. The morbid thoughts of pushing Makai down the stairs to his demise, as well as committing an assortment of other violent acts, were ones she would attempt to pursue if she didn’t receive help, and quickly. She needed Justin.

  Kyra caught two cabs just to make her meeting with Justin at their new destination for the day, the Econo Lodge. It wasn’t one of the nicest places they’d had the luxury of staying in, but it certainly wasn’t one of the worst. Being fussy wasn’t an option. Anything would do.

  Once Kyra stepped in the room, Justin shut all the blinds to hide them from the outside world. She hadn’t even sat down before she started to remove her boots and make herself more comfortable. Justin watched as she unzipped the knee-high boots, and his eyes traveled up her legs to her tan tank dress. He couldn’t resist the urge to run his tongue across his lips. Their location was perfect for the things running through his mind.

  He flicked on the light switch out of his desire to see her body in all its glory. Kyra was just removing the green camouflage hat that shaded her bruised face. Justin’s hormones were meaningless when he caught sight of her assaulted face.

  “He hit you again?” His jaw tightened in anger.

  “Last night…” Her voice was a mere whisper.

  “Why? What happened?”

  “Because…I said your name by accident…. Anymore questions?” She didn’t want to dwell on the incident and didn’t want to reveal the details as to when she’d let his name slip out of her mouth.

  He didn’t answer but took a seat on the edge of one of the two queen-sized beds.

  “I swear, if I see him…” His temper was increasing as thoughts of violent payback raced through his mind.

  “No, no. Don’t do nothin’ crazy, please, baby.” The image of what would happen to him or anyone else who hurt Makai greatly disturbed her. Whoever the perpetrator turned out to be, they would surely suffer a slow and painful death at the hands of Makai’s henchmen, after hours of excruciating torture.

  “Why are you so worried about this cat? I can handle him. Any nigga who puts his hands on a female ain’t shit.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talkin’ about. He’s not like you….”

  “So you’re really trying to stick up for him? After how he beats on you? You’re gonna take his side?”

  “No, no. You just don’t understand.”

  “Then make me understand! Make me understand how I have to sneak off just to see you, and how I have to sit by and let another man beat on you and God only knows what else! It’s bullshit!”

  Kyra flopped down on the edge of bed with a sigh. Things were difficult. She hadn’t told Justin much about Makai, especially not what he did for a living. She’d never had the need to discuss him in Prince Paul and never found the time to now. She could never seem to find the right time to mention the subject, but this seemed like it was the best opportunity she’d got. She couldn’t let it slip by. There was a time for everything, and the time for the truth was now.

  “Makai…well…he’s a…he’s a hustler. He’s not like you dad or your brother….. He’s…in the drug business. And he’s been in it for years, long enough that now he has power, and a lot of it. This is his city. We just live in it.” Kyra fumbled over her words.

  “You mean to tell me you been up here all this time when you got an easy way out?” he exclaimed. The whole situation was beginning to frustrate him.

  “An easy way out? What the hell do you mean an easy way out? If there was one, don’t you think I would’ve took it by now? How dumb do you sound right now?” she yelled, offended by his comment. />
  “All you gotta do is call the cops and have them arrest his ass. Tell them what he does and then boom! He’s in jail and you’re free. That’s pretty easy if you ask me.”

  “Are you fuckin’ stupid? Kai has connects with the cops! And God knows who else. They would probably come to the door, see that it’s his place and bounce. And if he did get locked up, hypothetically speaking, and it was my fault, his people would track me down. They wouldn’t stop until they found me, and if they find me, they find you, they find my mom, they wipe all of us out. Do you have any idea what they would do to us? To me? You must be tryin’ to get me killed!” Kyra exploded at his insensitive statement as she got up and began to pace the room. “Look, I’ll figure somethin’ out, okay? I’ll figure somethin’ out!”

  “I’m sorry, baby. I shouldn’t have brought it up.” Justin apologized as he took her in his arms, feeling guilty for the tears that were now streaming down the slopes of her cheeks.

  He pulled back and took her face by her chin to kiss her lips. She winced and pulled back for second, the presence of her cut reaffirmed. Her body then melted into his, their kissing becoming more intense as they gently fell back onto the bed.

  He held himself over her, his lips making a trail down from her face to her neck, and with the removal of her dress, her chest and stomach. Things were getting hotter by the second with the removal of each article of clothing.

  With Kyra’s whimpers and moans coming quicker, Justin reached down into his pants pocket to retrieve protection. He could feel his time to perform approaching.

  Kyra soaked in the deep bathtub, surrounded by bubble bath and warm water. She lit all the unused candles for the first time, and their light vanilla scent calmed her as she soaked and reflected on her still-fresh encounter with her lover. She had returned to the empty and tranquil apartment just as predicted, pulling off yet another visit to see Justin undetected.

  She shut her eyes and was letting the atmosphere relax her when suddenly her eyes popped wide open. A loud crash emanating from the first floor startled her out of her peaceful state. Kyra sat stiff. She heard another thunderous crash. Her heart was racing. Someone had come for her.