by Ashley
The Last Chapter
Ashley
Jaquavis
The Cartel has come full circle with this fast-paced, groundbreaking novel, the finale to the hit series by New York Times bestsellers Ashley JaQuavis. Miamor is fighting for her life in the belly of the beast. She's been kidnapped, and she's staring death in the eye. Is the reign over for the head of the Murda Mamas? Carter is in federal custody and leaves the Diamond Empire to Zyir and Mecca. When the past comes back to haunt Mecca and the truth finally comes to light, will The Cartel rise or fall? Breeze is in the clutches of the crazed Ma'tee, and she desperately searches for a way out. Will she escape, or die his love slave? The answers to these questions lie inside the pages of Cartel 3: The Final Chapter. Open it to discover the shocking truth, and prepare yourself for the unpredictable conclusion of one of the best street series of all time.
Ashley, JaQuavis
The Last Chapter
The third book in the The Cartel series, 2010
Prologue
“We are gathered here today to celebrate the lives of three of God’s children.”
The preacher stood before the many people who attended the funeral of street royalty. It was a sad day in Miami, and on this day, the streets were like a ghost town. It seemed as if the entire underworld had stopped to commemorate those they had lost. Everyone within the city limits felt this grief. The lives of three street legends had been destroyed, and grief overflowed in the ceremony as three silver-plated coffins sat side by side with an array of flower arrangements around them. It was a bright, sunny day, and it seemed as if God shone his light down from the heavens above to make that hard day seem a tad bit better for the mourning attendees. It was a triple funeral to bury the last of the Diamond family-Breeze, Carter, and Mecca.
The Cartel was no more, and it was the last chapter to what was to be named one of the biggest legacies in Miami’s underworld history. Their story was legendary, ruthless… and most of all, classic.
Many people were in attendance, but the most important guests were not there to pay their final respects. They were there to confirm that the last of The Cartel was deceased and about to be buried into the ground.
Robin and Aries were in attendance, draped in all-black dresses with big shades on to keep a low profile. Murder also sat beside them. The demise of The Cartel was bittersweet for him, and he gritted his teeth tightly as he thought about Mecca and the missed opportunity to personally kill him on Miamor’s behalf. Nevertheless, Mecca was dead, and that would have to be enough for him.
Emilio Estes, Leena, and Monroe Jr. were also in attendance, mourning the loss. They were the only people left alive who could sit in the front pew reserved for family. Although far removed from the Diamond legacy, they were the last of a dying bloodline.
There was an eerie feeling in the air, and everyone there could sense it. As the preacher held the Holy Bible tightly in his hand and read from the book of Psalms, a stretch limo with tinted windows rolled up slowly about fifty yards away from the service. Many people didn’t notice it, but the trained eyes were glued to the approaching vehicle.
Emilio Estes looked back and saw the limo pull up, and he watched as it came to a slow stop. Estes knew exactly who it was; it was the crew responsible for the very funeral he was at. Emilio, being in his mid-sixties and not willing to step back into the streets, conceded defeat and pulled his white handkerchief from the top pocket of his suit.
To many, it looked as if Emilio was just removing a hanky, but veterans of the street game knew what that small gesture meant. Emilio wanted the bloodshed to stop, and signaled that he would not retaliate. The war was finally over and The Cartel was no more. Literally, he was waving a white flag. It was officially The Cartel’s last chapter.
Chapter One
“Bad girls die slow.”
– Fabian
The blood in Miamor’s eyes blocked out the image of Fabian standing over her, and her shallow, desperate breaths drowned out all sounds in the room. Death loomed over her. She knew it was near. The chill in her lovely bones was every indication that her life was slipping away.
A breathless Fabian stood over her. Her tormentor, her grim reaper leered at her menacingly. The smug grin on his face sickened her as her heart filled with hate for him. It pleased him to watch her die. It was vindication for the hell that she had once put him through, and she knew that the lifestyle she led had ultimately determined the cruel way in which she was about to die. It was the law of nature. She had taken more lives than she could count, had destroyed too many families to remember, and her heart had turned cold so long ago that she did not even care. Now it was her turn. This was her fate, her karma, and because she had pushed away everyone who had ever cared for her, no one would even know that she had disappeared from the face of the earth.
Most people in her position would repent. They would beg for their lives, or feel regret for all of the events that had led up to this torturous moment, but Miamor was not most people. Her hard shell had not cracked, and even under the most gruesome pressure, she still had to maintain some form of control.
Fabian wanted to see her break down. He had done everything that was physically possible to get her to give in. Her face was badly disfigured, her fingernails pulled from their nail beds, and her bones crushed and broken, but still not one tear had fallen. She had passed out many times, but that was a physical response to the pain. Crying was controlled by her mental state, and that was one resolve that was too strong for anyone to conquer.
“Bitch, you’re going to beg me for your life,” he seethed as he circled her, sweaty from his ruthless assault on her. He lifted his hand and backhanded her with the butt of his gun, causing her neck to snap violently to the right.
Miamor bit her tongue to avoid screaming out in agony. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing her so weak. Blood poured from her mouth, but it only mixed in with the rest of the blood that soaked her battered body.
He had been in the basement for a full twenty-four hours, killing her slowly, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t feel the satisfaction of revenge that he sought. There was something about the look in her eyes that said “fuck you,” and even in her most fragile state, her mentality never failed her.
Murder was bred deep within her. Fabian was committing the act of murder, but Miamor was a killer. She breathed murder. It was all she knew, the only thing that she had ever been good at. It was her profession. So, even as she sat in the damp basement, her soul slowly abandoning her, her dainty wrists tightly bound to a wooden chair, her eyes still told the story of the greatest bitch who had ever done it. She was merciless, and even death couldn’t wipe her off the map.
There was no escaping this. Her time had come, and Miamor had no regrets. She was on her way to hell, but it was worth the legacy she was leaving behind. Yes, her lifestyle had led her to nothing but loneliness and misery. She had loved two men in her lifetime, but never truly had room in her world for either of them. They would have never understood how she lived or the things that she had been through, and because of this, she had never fully given her heart to another. She had given up so much in order to reign terror in the streets, and to her, it was worth it. If she had chosen to play wifey to men like Murder or Carter, people would have forgotten an ordinary young woman named Miamor; she would have been lost in their shadows. So, she had chosen something much greater. She had chosen the life of murder-for-hire, and now, even after her death, her name would resound loudly in the streets. Her small feet would leave huge shoes to fill in the game. Legend of her notorious wrecking crew, the Murder Mamas, would ring true for years to come. She had made sure that no one would ever forget. Every new hustler coming up in the gam
e would eventually hear the story of Miamor, and now she would forever be notorious.
The sound of the basement door opening and the heavy thud of boots descending the staircase announced a new presence in the room, causing Miamor to lift her head weakly. Anxiety made her heart gallop as she watched a cool, calm, and freshly dressed Mecca saunter down the stairs. A machete hung from his hand.
“Damn, nigga, you ain’t done killing this bitch yet? This shit make your dick hard?” Mecca cracked, knowing that an erection would never be possible for Fabian again, thanks to Miamor.
“I wanted this bitch to hurt like I hurt. Bad girls die slow,” Fabian stated. “I just want to hear this bitch scream before I kill her.”
Mecca’s eyes opened wide in surprise as he looked around the room at the carnage that Fabian’s torture had produced. “You done used every trick in the book and you still can’t make the bitch holler?”
“Bitch ain’t human, fam,” Fabian replied.
Mecca chuckled mockingly as he shook his head. “You really are a bitch-ass nigga,” he mumbled as he approached Miamor, the blade of the machete screeching across the floor as he dragged it.
Miamor knew that the time for games was over. Mecca had not come back for nothing. He was there to end this, and there was no doubt in her mind that he would. He was the only nigga she had ever met whose murder game matched her own. Mecca would not hesitate. He would kill her without second guessing it. She knew this because if the shoe were on the other foot, he would already be a distant memory.
The faces of everyone she had ever loved flashed before her eyes. She closed them and welcomed the images: Murder, Anisa, Robyn, and Aries. They were all a part of her final fleeting thoughts, but the face the stuck out the most, the last person she thought of, was Carter Jones, the love of her life. He was the man who had showed her a love so strong, one that she knew she would have never been able to fully return. As much as she loved him, she did not deserve him, and he did not deserve the tyranny that she had brought into his life.
She had played a cat and mouse game with Mecca for too long; now it was time for the charade to end. The scent of Mecca’s Issey Miyake cologne invaded her senses as he bent down near her ear.
Miamor’s eyes remained closed as Mecca took in the image of her. Seeing her this way was poetic for him, a beautiful demise for an ugly situation. The two of them could never co-exist. Her day of reckoning had come.
“My man here feels like you owe him something. Now, I have a proposition for you. I think you’ve learned your lesson. I’m not usually a forgiving man, but if you apologize to Fabian here and you admit that you can’t fuck with me, then I won’t kill you. I’ll let you go, as long as you leave Miami… my city,” Mecca whispered in her ear. He wasn’t a nice guy and didn’t even imitate one well. He knew that he would never let Miamor live, but he wanted to hear her apologize, and he wanted to hear her admit that that she was beneath him… that he held the power… that only he could determine whether she lived or died.
Miamor bit into her inner jaw because she had never hated anyone more than she hated Mecca Diamond, and there were so many emotions pulsing through her body that she could not stop the hot tears from falling down her face.
“See, the bitch does cry,” Mecca pointed out to Fabian, who stood baffled behind him. “Now, tell me I’m the best, bitch. Let me hear you say it.”
Miamor’s body shook with rage as Mecca waited impatiently for her response. Blood poured out of her mouth as she hung in the balance between life and death. She was barely strong enough to hold her head up. As she opened her mouth, she whispered, “Come closer so you can hear me.” Barely audible, she waited until Mecca leaned close to her ear. She didn’t want him to miss a single word of what she was about to say.
“Say it, bitch. Give up your pride to save your life,” Mecca proposed as she breathed in his ear.
“You’ll never be the best, Mecca, because I’m the best. You can kill me, but it’ll never change the fact that I took everybody you ever loved away from you. You made a mistake when you killed my sister. You take one from me, I take two from you, and the rest of my people are in the wind. They’re untouchable. I did that. I made sure of that. If you were the best, you would have done the same. Every day for the rest of your life, you’ll think of Miamor, nigga. I promise you,” she whispered.
She kissed his cheek, instantly turning his skin cold and running shivers down his spine. It felt like the kiss of death, and Mecca stood to his feet with fire in his eyes. There was nothing he hated more than a slick-talking-ass bitch, but Miamor was like a pit bull; she never let go. Once she put her beam on somebody, nothing could stop her-nothing short of death.
Miamor closed her eyes as she allowed the last tear to fall, then she inhaled deeply before focusing on Mecca, staring him in the eyes. Although he hated her to his core, he knew that they were more alike than either of them had ever cared to admit, and he silently respected her and hated her all in the same moment. They both knew that she had just taken her last breath.
Miamor glared unflinchingly at him and waited for what she knew was to come. It was over, and in that instant, everything went black.
Candles laced the entire basement as the smooth sounds of Bob Marley’s “Redemption Song” danced through the airwaves. Marley had a way of speaking to a person’s soul and conveying his words on point and full of passion. Ma’tee felt this song more than ever as he closed his eyes and absorbed the powerful lyrics of the legend.
Plush velvet carpet, smells of relaxing lavender incense, and flickering candles all set the mood for what was to be Ma’tee’s grand finale. He stared at Breeze, who was lying in the bed dressed in a red lingerie set that he had picked up for her for their special day. He smiled as he looked at Breeze, who was in a dazed-like state, trying to raise her head from the pillow.
It seemed as though a fog had fallen over her. It was as if she were in a hazy dream as she tried to fight the sedation. Ma’tee looked on and smiled at her. “Don’t chu try to fight the drug, baby girl. Relax, me lady,” he instructed softly as he ran his fingers through her long hair. Ma’tee had heavily drugged her, as he did every night just before he made twisted love to her. In Ma’tee’s demented mind, Breeze Diamond was his woman, and he had fallen deeply in love with her over the time she had been in his clutches.
Breeze played the role to the tee as she pretended as if she were off point, but unbeknownst to Ma’tee, Breeze was as clear-headed as she had ever been. Uncharacteristically, Ma’tee had taken his eyes off of Breeze while giving her the drug. Breeze saw an opportunity, and took it by quickly spitting out the pill and pretending as if she had swallowed it. She was just waiting for the right time to make a dash for the stairs that led up to the main floor of Ma’tee’s home. Ma’tee was completely naked and ready to lay down with Breeze for the final time, because he had planned for that night to be their last.
As soon as he turns his back, I’m going for it, Breeze thought as nervousness overwhelmed her and her hands began to tremble. Ma’tee turned his back and walked over to the table where the nickel-plated.45 was placed. He was going to shoot Breeze in the head just before he took his own life. In his mind, it was a sure way for them to be together forever. Nevertheless, Breeze had another plan in mind. She was going to break away from Ma’tee-or die trying.
Breeze waited patiently for the right time to make her move and dart for the steps. As soon as Ma’tee’s back was totally turned, she took off running as fast as her petite legs could go. She hurriedly skipped two steps at a time, trying to climb to the top.
“Breeze!” Ma’tee yelled as he heard the commotion and saw her take off. He quickly took off after her, remembering that he hadn’t locked the door that led to the main floor. “Nooo!” he yelled as he gave chase up the stairs with the gun in his hand.
Breeze sprinted full speed and burst through the door. Her heart began to pound heavily as she was hit by the rays of sunlight shining through the blinds.
It had been so long since she had seen sunlight that it was like a punch to the face. Breeze quickly shook off the initial shock and darted out of the basement door, desperately searching for a door to escape the spacious house.
As she frantically ran through the house, Ma’tee was right on her heels. Breeze knocked over lamps and chairs trying to evade his clutches and buy herself more time.
“Please! Let me go!” Breeze pleaded as she approached Ma’tee’s front door. But it was to no avail. He had two dead-bolts. She tried to unlock the door quickly, but by that time, Ma’tee had caught up with her and grabbed her from the back. Breeze kicked and screamed, but Ma’tee’s strength was too much for her to match. He wrestled her to the floor, and that’s when the tears began to pour from Breeze’s eyes. She knew that she was about to die. At that very moment, she lost all hope, and her soul no longer belonged to her-it was Ma’tee’s.
Ma’tee pointed the gun at Breeze’s head and prepared to pull the trigger. “Chu will forever be me lady,” he said as he pressed the barrel to Breeze’s temple.
Breeze closed her eyes and tried to brace herself for the impact. “God, please have mercy on my soul,” she whispered just before the boom. It wasn’t a boom from the gun, but the sounds of items falling from Ma’tee’s walls and cabinets. The earth began to shake at a magnitude that would be documented in history as one of the worst earthquakes the world had ever seen.
“What the-” Ma’tee tried to stand, but the violent vibrations from the ground knocked him off his feet.
Breeze didn’t know what was going on as she looked around, frantically trying to figure out what was the cause of all the rumbling. The ground shook so intensely that Ma’tee’s windows shattered and his floor began to crack. The sounds of trees crashing against the earth whistled through the air, and before long, Ma’tee’s house began to crumble, as the earth seemed to swallow the house’s foundation. Breeze screamed at the top of her lungs. She was in the middle of the pandemonium.
