Girls from Da Hood 12

by Treasure Hernandez

  “She would have killed me?”

  Honey thought about it for a second and then shook her head.

  “No, not if you would have started talking like you did. You would have reminded her of me . . . just like you remind me of her. She’s the one who put me on when I didn’t have shit and nowhere to go. Now I have everything and can go wherever I want. I learned that money is everything, but at the same time, it ain’t shit, because I can’t take it with me when I’m gone. And right now, I have a lot of it, so I don’t mind spending it on you. Look at it as your payment.”

  “I thought my mother’s treatment was my payment,” Tari said, alarmed, hoping that Honey wasn’t backing out.

  “DeAngelo is paying for that.” Honey gave her a wicked smile. “This little shopping spree is from me. Truth be told, you saved my ass.” Tari didn’t look anything like Lanai, but the vibe she gave off made Honey comfortable with her. She was saying more than she should, but not regretting it either. “The man I work for—”

  “El-Jihad,” Tari said, remembering the name.

  “Yeah,” Honey nodded. “He’s king where I’m from in LA. Think of the devil but 100 times worse. The shit we did to DeAngelo is light work compared to the things I’ve seen him do to his enemies.”

  “Damn,” Tari said, thinking about DeAngelo’s bloody, bludgeoned body. She couldn’t imagine what other horrors could be done to a person—or she didn’t want to. “So I overheard you talking to your boyfriend last night.”

  “Dank?” Honey scoffed. “He is not my boyfriend.”

  “I couldn’t tell,” Tari giggled and dropped it before Honey tried to hit her. “Anyway, I heard you say something about a third strike. What does that mean?”

  “You’re nosy as hell.”

  “Our walls are just thin.” Tari gave a fake smile, forcing her eyes to be chinky, and Honey rolled her eyes. Tari watched her face, and it was obvious that she was having an inward battle with herself on whether she should spill the beans. “I already saw more than what I would like to know last night. Some words ain’t gon’ hurt.”

  She was right, and Honey knew it. She sighed and sucked her teeth trying to formulate the right words to say. The Hispanic woman chose that moment to bring back the shoes that she was sent off to find and set them in front of Tari’s feet. Honey used the time that Tari was trying on the shoes to make the choice to tell her some, but not all, of what the three strikes meant.

  “When El-Jihad opened the doors to his operation to me years ago, he told me I had a three fuck-up limit. I already fucked up twice, once a few months after that. I let my heart overpower my head like the silly young girl I was. Our team was El-Jihad’s most thorough, and we handled distribution to the runners. Whenever they got more product, they paid what they owed, and at the same time, re-upped their work. One night I was laid up, and I had one of my other team members take my place in handling a drop.” Honey shook her head thinking about how dumb she’d been back then. “I thought everything had gone smoothly . . . until Lanai called me and told me that she pulled up to the drop house and found all the little niggas in there dead. The money and the work was gone. Snow turned on us.”

  “Snow?”

  “Yeah, the dyke bitch. In the beginning, there was seven of us. Me, Lanai, Dank, Ron Ron, Mo, Willie, and Snow. Snow was always the iffy one out of all of us. She never liked me, but I didn’t think it would get between the money. But as it turned out, she had been plotting on El-Jihad way before I came in the picture. I just gave her the perfect opportunity. She and her people literally painted the wall in those youngins’ blood. It was a massacre.”

  “What happened to her?” Tari asked, standing up, admiring her foot in the shoe.

  “El-Jihad found her,” Honey said and slightly winced, thinking about what he did to her. “He put two hooks in her back and hung her naked in a butcher’s freezer until she told him where to find what she stole.”

  “T-then he let her go?” Tari asked sitting back down.

  “Nah.” Honey turned her nose up like something stank. “He hacked her body apart . . . limb by limb.”

  “Ooo-kay.” Tari’s eyes were wide, and she tried to erase the visual from her mind. “That was strike one. What about strike two?”

  “Strike two . . .” Honey’s expression became cold. “We were in North Carolina handling some business. A new customer that Lanai had been plugged to named Charles Bentley. He was legit and moved well in his state. She trusted that it would be a good business venture between our two states. He said that he wanted to buy fifteen from our camp, and Lanai told him she would throw in twice as much if he let our people set up shop there. He agreed . . . or so we thought. We got to the warehouse and began conducting the business meeting, but suddenly, I started hearing gunshots, I knew right then we’d been set up. He never planned to buy shit from us, or accept our business in Charlotte.”

  “Is that when she . . .”

  “Yeah, they disarmed us, and then he aimed his gun, a 9-mm Luger, if I can remember right, and shot directly at my chest. The bullet never found me, though. Lanai jumped right in front of it.”

  “I love you, Honey. Blood didn’t make you my sister. Life did.”

  Honey looked away from Tari as she remembered Lanai’s dying words to her. She shook her head, trying to will the guilt pains to remove themselves from her chest. When the sadness subsided, she continued the story.

  “How did you get out?”

  “We had a few niggas stay back, just in case. They saved the day just in time, but I made sure I was the one to kill Charles. I emptied an entire clip into his face, and then another in his heart.”

  “I’m sorry about your friend, Honey,” Tari said sincerely.

  “Me too,” Honey said standing up. “But enough of this sad shit. Go try these jumpsuits on so we can go. Do the medium first. Your ass is almost as big as mine. I don’t think it will fit in a small.”

  Tari gladly took the clothing and went to the dressing room. It took her about five minutes to come out and hand the lady the size small and large. Honey smiled smugly because she knew she was spot-on about Tari’s size. The two women walked side by side to the register, and Honey couldn’t help but to smile inwardly at the giddy expression on Tari’s face.

  “You don’t have any friends?” Honey asked after they were back on the sidewalk.

  “I don’t have time for friends,” Tari answered. “Plus, the bitches here are the kind who will fuck your man behind your back and listen to you tell them how good he is to you.”

  “The type that will steal your money and help you look for it,” Honey added, laughing.

  “Bitch! The kind that will pop the tags off your shit and front on Instagram like it’s theirs!”

  The two went back and forth just like that all the way to where the car was parked on the street. They were laughing together like they’d known each other for years. Once there, Honey checked her phone and saw that they had a few more hours to kill.

  “Your bank said the money will be available at five o’clock,” she said taking Tari’s bag from her and tossing it in the backseat. She opened the driver’s side door, but instead of getting in, she leaned on the black paint and talked to Tari over the hood. “It’s only three. Did you want to go look at bags?”

  “Hell, ye—Honey, look out!” Tari had started her statement with a smile, but it quickly turned to a look of shock. She pointed her finger to warn Honey of something behind her.

  Honey tried to turn around to see what Tari was so afraid of, but before she could, she felt a big body pressing forcefully on her back. She tried to scream, but a white cloth covered her mouth and prevented that. She inhaled deeply—and instantly felt herself losing consciousness. The last thing she remembered hearing were Tari’s screams.... Then everything went black.

  Chapter 7

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  “Mmmm!”

  The sound of dripping water stirred Honey from the deep sleep that she
was in. She tried to open her eyes and focus them, but the pain in her head caused her to keep clenching her eyes shut. She felt something cold on her cheek, and wherever she was, it was lit up brightly.

  “Honey!”

  Honey heard the frantic whisper but didn’t know where it was coming from. It sounded close. She tried again to open her eyes and keep them open. Figuring that rubbing them might clear her vision, she tried to bring her hands to her eyes, only to find out that she was bound to something.

  “Honey! It’s me, Tari!”

  She heard the voice again, and that time, she sat up.

  “Tari?” she said to herself and looked around. She was in a bathroom, a nasty one at that. Everything in it was filthy, including the stained tile floors. The dripping sound was coming from the tub’s faucet as it dripped into a filled tub. Honey’s wrists and ankles were tied together under the toilet bowl, and her head had been resting on the cold seat. Her head throbbed again, and all of the memories came flooding back in. She remembered the robbery and going shopping with Tari. The last thing in her mind was of somebody’s hand over her mouth, and then nothing. “Chloroform. Shit! Where are we?”

  “I-I don’t know!” Tari said. “I woke up when they were dragging us out of the car, but I was too scared to open my eyes. I-I didn’t want them to know I was awake. All I saw was the vehicle we were in. They just left for a second. I heard a door open and close. Honey, they took all our stuff.”

  “OK,” Honey said. “Are you in the hallway?”

  “Yes,” Tari said. “Right outside the bathroom. My legs and arms are tied together. I can’t even roll if I wanted to.”

  “Tari,” Honey tried to even her voice out because Tari sounded terrified. “I need you to relax. We’re going to be OK.”

  “Do you really believe that?” When Honey was quiet, Tari let out a soft sob. “They want the money we took from DeAngelo. They said they would let me leave if I give them my bank information. But I know they’re lying. My God, now I know how DeAngelo felt knowing that no matter what, he was going to die.”

  “We aren’t going to die!” Honey replied. “You said you saw the car we were in. What was it?”

  “It wasn’t a car, it was a truck. A black truck. It had a rental tag in the window.”

  “A black truck?” Honey said.

  Her mind was moving so fast and so many dots were connecting, but she didn’t want to believe it. But nobody else could know about the bank transaction. Nobody. A little ways away she heard a door shut, and Tari became frantic.

  “Oh my God, they’re back,” she sobbed. “They’re going to torture me! Please, Honey, don’t let them kill me!”

  “I won’t, I promise,” Honey said although she had no clue how she was going to keep that promise.

  She listened as the footsteps got closer and was angry that she couldn’t even turn her head enough to look at the doorway.

  “No!” she heard Tari scream. It sounded like she’d been hoisted off of the ground and was trying to fight. “Nooooo!! Honeyyy! Noooo!”

  “Good job, my niggas,” a voice Honey knew all too well was saying. “Y’all can take her to the back room and do whatever y’all want with her while I finish up in here.”

  Honey fought against her restraints, but they didn’t budge.

  “Tari!” she screamed over and over until eventually she couldn’t hear Tari’s cries anymore. “No!”

  “Tsk tsk tsk!” the deep voice said. “You’ve probably thought about how you would die a million times, but I bet it was never like this, huh?”

  “What do you want, Breezy?” Honey’s voice was malicious.

  “At first, it was about money,” Breezy sat on the toilet seat so that the crotch of his grey sweatpants was in Honey’s face. “Now, it’s about respect. You talk to me crazy, Honey. Like I won’t turn up on ya ass. Now look at you.”

  “You got your money,” Honey said. “Now let me go.”

  “So you can tell El-Jihad about my little stunt? Nope.” Breezy shook his head and chuckled. He waved a finger in front of Honey’s face before punching her in the eye with a closed fist. “Stupid bitch. Fuck you mean let you go? You ain’t shit but El-Jihad’s pet, but after this, I’m going to be the one moving up in the rankings.”

  Honey tried to rest her forehead down on the toilet seat, but Breezy yanked her head back up by her hair. She could feel the pain around her eye that already started to swell and was forced to look up into his gleeful face.

  “At first, I was just going to get the money and start fresh, but now, I’m thinking, why not make myself look like a hero? Listen to this. You and Dank got the money from DeAngelo and planned to skip town with it, but I was here to stop the two of you and bring the boss back his money. Yeah . . . and guess what? Either way—you die!”

  “Stupid young-ass nigga.” It was Honey’s turn to laugh and shake her head. “El-Jihad knows I would never turn on him. Especially not for three hundred bands.”

  Breezy got close to Honey’s face, and she wondered why she ever thought he was handsome. Right then, he looked like an evil little troll, and his demeanor matched.

  “Well, he’s going to believe it today.”

  He still had her hair gripped in his hand when he proceeded to beat her face with his free fist. He then stood up and began kicking and stomping her body. He knocked her wits out of her and didn’t stop until she was coughing up blood. Breezy reached in the pocket of his grey hoodie and pulled out a knife. Using it, he cut the ties on Honey’s wrists and ankles, causing her to fall weakly to the side.

  Honey used that moment to try to catch her breath. Her adrenaline was pumping, so right then, she didn’t feel the pain from the ass whooping he’d just unleashed on her. But she hoped there wasn’t another one following behind it. When he cut her loose, she pretended to be weaker than what she really was, hoping to catch him off guard. But he never gave her the opportunity. Breezy hoisted her body up and dropped her instantly. Honey braced for the pain from the tile floor, but instead . . . There was a big splash. Breezy had thrown her in the tub, and the blood from her body was turning the clear water turn pink. She gripped the side of the tub to escape the frigid water, but Breezy palmed her face and threw her head back.

  “I want to feel the life leave your body,” Breezy told her and had a crazed look in his eyes. “You think I’m beneath you? I’m going to put you beneath me, bitch! Do you know it takes the average person thirty seconds to drown?”

  Honey tried to back away from him, but the water slowed her down, plus the tub was tiny. His hands wrapped around her neck tightly and submerged her in the water. Honey fought him and could get her head back out of the water a few times, but in the end, Breezy succeeded in keeping her under. She felt his thumbs press against her throat, and she knew there would only be one way out—she had to play dead like she did so long ago. She forced herself to close her eyes and began counting.

  . . . Twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty!

  Honey put up another fake fight and made her body jerk the way she’d seen in the movies. She was getting light-headed, and she felt that the end was really near. Breezy kept her under water for ten seconds longer than the thirty seconds before he finally let her go and stood to his feet. Naturally, her body rose up, making her face resurface, and her arms floated awkwardly, and her legs were uncomfortably bent in the small tub.

  “Stupid bitch,” he said again and spit in the water, looking down at her lifeless body in the bloody tub.

  He left the bathroom huffing his chest heavily and went down the hallway to where Tari was being held. If Breezy would have stared a little closer at Honey’s chest, he would have been able to tell that she was taking tiny breaths. She waited until she was sure he was gone before she sat up in the tub slowly, leaning over the side of it to inhale deeply. She wished she could rest there forever, but Tari needed her. She struggled out of the tub since her drenched clothes weighed her down, and found her footing.

  Squeak! S
queak!

  The water in her Toms made her shoes squeak, so she kicked them off. Glancing around the bathroom, Honey looked for a weapon, and she found a sharp mirror shard under the sink. When she exited the bathroom, she figured out quickly that she was on the lower level of a two-story home. There was no furniture in the house, and it stunk like garbage throughout it, probably because that’s all there was. Trash everywhere, in bags or just strewn on the floor. Honey could make out mold on every wall she limped by, and she tried not to touch anything. She was on a search to find the clutch she’d come with. She’d almost made it to the living room when she heard a man mumbling to himself. She ducked down as low as she could go. Peeking around the corner, she saw a man, one of the men who’d traveled to Chicago with them from Los Angeles. His name was Pete or something. She never took the time to learn it. He was a black suit, a goon . . . a nigga who was supposed to do what his boss told him to. He let another money-ass nigga talk him into going against the hand that fed him, so he would pay the price too. He didn’t even hear Honey come up behind him until it was too late, and his throat was slit ear to ear. She pinched his nose with her fingers and covered his mouth with her palm until he stopped gurgling and his eyes went blank.

  “Gun,” she said to herself and grabbed the .48 he had on him.

  Not only did she find his gun, she found the car keys and a cell phone too. She opened the phone to call Dank, but a shrill scream cancelled that plan. Dropping the phone, she limped to where the scream had come from. The door to the room Breezy had Tari in was slightly ajar, and when Honey put her face in the slit, she made out Tari on a bed. She was wearing nothing but her bra and her panties, and her arms were bound to the bedposts.

  “What’s your routing and account number?” Breezy was asking her.

  Honey couldn’t see him, but from the sound of his voice, she could tell that he must have been at the foot of the bed. Honey’s head accidently moved the door slightly, but the only one who seemed to notice was Tari. Honey hurried to put her finger to her lips and shake her head when Tari saw her.