The Reign of Rain Robinson

by Roy Glenn

  “No,” she said, shaking her head quickly, while scooting into the corner. “I didn’t see nothing.”

  Chapter Twenty-one

  The Booming System, a nightclub which, as the name indicated, had a booming sound system. It was one of the legal businesses that was controlled by Rona and operated by AD. It was one of the spots that he liked to hang out; for that reason, they did not move any product and hosted no gambling out of there.

  When AD came to The Booming System, he came to be the big man. The Booming System was a club like many others with a long bar, booths that lined the walls, a few tables and chairs, and of course there was that booming sound system that everybody talked about.

  Being frustrated with Rona specifically, and the war in general, AD went to The System to get a drink, relax and enjoy the company of some women for the evening.

  “What up, AD?” Calvin, the front door security asked when he entered the club.

  “Sup?” he said and kept walking straight for the bar. “Double shot of Templeton Rye, neat.”

  “Coming up,” Shenise said and put a glass and a bar napkin down for him and poured the drink.

  He shot that one and then she poured him another before he dropped a couple of twenties on the bar and headed in the direction of the VIP room. It was a house rule that the women admitted to the VIP must outnumber the men by at least four to one at all times.

  On his way to the room, AD was captivated by a woman on the dance floor dancing by herself. So captivated that he had to stop and watch her. She was wearing a Monique Lhuillier, lace-sleeved dress with a plunging neckline that struggled to contain her breasts and a split that left little to the imagination. It was obvious to him from the way she was moving that she danced somewhere and if she didn’t, she could. The longer AD stood there watching her, the more certain he became that he had to have her.

  “She’s bad, ain’t she?” Kyle, one of the managers said when he walked up on AD and stood beside him.

  “You ever seen her before?”

  “Naw. Fine ass mutha fucka like that, I’d remember if she was a regular.”

  When the woman noticed that they were watching her, she waved, shook her titties for them and then she turned around and made it bounce for them.

  “Bring her to the VIP for me,” AD said and after watching for a while longer, he went to the VIP room to await his prey for the evening.

  It was a good twenty minutes later when Kyle came in the VIP room with the woman on his arm and he led her straight to AD’s table. When he saw them coming, he quickly dismissed the women who were hanging around. His eyes got big when the beauty stood before him.

  “Ahottie, this is the owner of the club, AD.”

  “Nice to meet you,” she said.

  “Believe me, the pleasure is truly mine,” AD said enthusiastically. “Would you like to join me?”

  “I’d like that very much, thank you,” she said and slid delicately into the booth next to AD.

  “Can I get you something to drink? Tell me your name again?”

  “It’s Ahottie.”

  “What?” In the club with the booming system, AD couldn’t make out what she was saying.

  “Ahottie.” She got closer and whispered in his ear. “My name is Ahottie.” He looked confused. “You know, a hottie,” she said, pointing to herself. “Ahottie.”

  “Oh, Ahottie,” he chuckled. “I get it now. That’s a very interesting name.”

  “No more interesting than AD,” she giggled, gently touched his hand and caressed it. “I know that your mother didn’t name you that.”

  “No,” he chuckled. “My name is Andrew Davian.”

  She held out her hand. “It’s very nice to meet you Andrew.”

  “Nice to meet you, Ahottie,” AD said taking her hand to his lips and kissing it. “I know with a name like Ahottie, there must be a story?”

  She eased her hand away gently. “Oh, there most definitely is a story,” she said and leaned back. “I just don’t know you well enough to tell you,” she said, leaning quickly toward him.

  Her lips were so close that AD thought about kissing those sexy red lips.

  “Then I’ll just have to get to know you, because I have to know that story.”

  She leaned back and smiled playfully. “Maybe you’ll get to know me, maybe you won’t.”

  “Anything that I could do to increase my chances?”

  “You could be good to me,” She said with her lips once again close to his.

  “Oh, I could be good to you, baby.”

  “Let’s go find out if you have what it takes to be good to me. I’m hard to handle,” she said and slid slowly out of the booth.

  When Ahottie began walking away, AD damn near turned over the table getting up to go after her. When she got out of the VIP room and began heading for the door, she looked back and saw AD pushing his way through the crowd to catch up.

  “Gamma to Omega,” she said.

  “Go ahead.”

  “Moving toward the door with one.”

  “Acknowledged. Alpha and Delta are in position.”

  “Acknowledged,” she said as AD caught up and grabbed her by the arm.

  “You aren’t trying to get away from me, are you?”

  “Oh no, never that,” she said and looped her arm in his. “Not until you show me what you have, and I find out if you can give me what I need.”

  “I got what you need,” AD said as they passed the front door security station.

  “You out, AD?” Calvin asked as he passed, but AD didn’t answer.

  He stepped outside of The Booming System and before he could take another step, Monika shot him in the head.

  As Monika packed up her rifle, Fantasy kept walking toward the street where Zavier had just pulled up in a car. Fantasy got in and they drove off leaving AD’s body lying dead on the concrete outside The Booming System.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Garon sat patiently in the living room of Rona’s apartment waiting for her to get off the phone and come out of her office. Not that it was going to be any surprise to her since she predicted it, but he was there to tell her that AD was dead. He also hoped that it would lead to a discussion about his future. It hadn’t gone unnoticed by him that Rona had been grooming him to take AD’s position.

  “Sorry to keep you waiting, Garon,” Rona said when she came out of her office. “I am in the middle of two different market research studies for clients, one involving the effectiveness of internet advertising in the Middle East and the other related to real estate preferences. Both are due end of week and both are online surveys. So, I had to check the quantity of responses and their demographic breakdown to make sure we have achieved the right quantity and then mix for the two surveys.” She looked at Garon. “But you don't care about any of that, do you?”

  “Always interested,” he said, and Rona rolled her eyes. “But, I do have something that I need to make you aware of.”

  “AD is dead.”

  “How did you know?”

  “I know my adversary. Never go to war unless you know your adversary.” It was something that she heard her father say a very long time ago. Rona sat down. “And the swiftness of it tells me that Mike Black is now firmly in control of the situation.”

  And that was important to her.

  The last few days had been a bit of a reality check for Rona. She understood clearly that she could and probably should still be in jail, being held without bail and awaiting trial. If Eisenbraun hadn’t gotten himself out, that’s exactly where she’d be.

  She got lucky.

  And that caused her to think.

  Rona now realized that it was an ill-advised move to go all out against The Family, not just poorly executed by Barnes, Hawkins and Mobley. Although it had accomplished one of her objectives – Black losing confidence in Rain – her proxy war was largely unsuccessful.

  So they lost a few men and it cost them some money.

  They were
still standing and were now poised to come after her and everything that she had patiently spent years rebuilding. But Rona was committed, and she had no intention of turning back now.

  Rain Robinson has to pay.

  Although she wanted revenge against both Black and Rain for the deaths of her father and brother, her anger was always focused squarely on Rain. She didn’t like to admit it, but Robert was responsible for the death of Black’s son’s mother. That was family and for that reason and for that reason alone, Rona had accepted it.

  But not Rain.

  She didn’t care if killing Ronnie was business or not, Rain had to pay for his death. She wanted her to pay with her life, but Rona wanted to destroy it first. Black losing confidence in Rain and taking control of his business was a good first step. Now she had something else in mind.

  “Garon, there is something that I want you to do for me,” Rona smiled and said.

  “Just tell me what you need.”

  Detective Bautista was still stinging over the release of Baby Chris. She just knew that she had him for four murders and if she put enough pressure on him, he would flip on Rain. Dickerson, on the other hand, knew that wasn’t going to happen. They had learned from an informant that Rain was at Shooters that night and she had killed at least two of the men. And if that were the case, it meant that Baby Chris had shown his loyalty to Rain by saying that it was him who killed those men and Rain wasn’t there.

  They needed something to break their way. That break came when Bug, one of Bautista’s least favorite snitches, walked into the precinct.

  “What can I do for you?” the desk sergeant asked.

  “I need to see Detective Bautista.”

  “She’s busy right now. Why don’t you have a seat over there.”

  He knew who Bug was and he also knew that Bautista had cut Bug loose because his information rarely panned out.

  As instructed, Bug took a seat where he could see the clock and he waited. It was exactly fifty-seven minutes later when Bautista came in the precinct with Dickerson. Bug sprang to his feet.

  “It’s about time. I’ve been waiting here for damn near an hour,” he got in Bautista’s face to say.

  Dickerson backed him off. “I think you better watch your tone,” he said with his hand in Bug’s chest.

  “Alright, alright,” he said with his hands up.

  “What do you want, Bug?” Bautista asked as she walked away from him.

  “I heard you’re interested in information about Rain Robinson.”

  Bautista stopped and got in Bug’s face.

  “What do you know about Rain Robinson?”

  “I know her, and Ronnie King killed somebody.”

  Bautista’s eyes narrowed. “You better not be wasting my time,” she said, grabbing his arm and practically dragging him to an interrogation room.

  “Okay, let’s hear it.”

  Over the next ten minutes, Bug laid out the story of Afra Dean. She was an old girlfriend of Ronnie’s. Bug said that she was going to snitch on them about the drug operation they were running, and they killed her before she had the chance.

  Both Bautista and Dickerson were skeptical about the source of the information and especially the timing of the tip, but they decided to pursue it anyway and opened an investigation.

  “The report says that skeletal remains that had been found in a dry creek bed, were positively identified from dental records as Afra Dean,” Dickerson began.

  “At least that part was true,” Bautista commented.

  “She was last seen a year before at a restaurant called Bones.”

  “That’s one of the King’s places.”

  “She was arrested for failure to pay the bill and marijuana possession. The first officer on the scene was Officer Henry Jones. He said that the restaurant staff said that she’d been acting strangely. But he added that he did not believe that behavior was caused by alcohol or drugs.”

  “That jives with Bug’s story. He said that Rain and Ronnie were waiting outside for her.”

  “The coroner has said her death did not appear to be a homicide, but the body was too decayed to determine the exact cause of death.” He put down the file and looked at Bautista. “What do you think?”

  “I think that it is worth looking into,” she said, knowing that if it involved Rain Robinson, she was all in. “I’ll get started on the process of getting the remains exhumed.”

  “I’ll talk to the family,” Dickerson said because he too knew that if it involved Rain Robinson, Bautista was all in.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  It had been a long time since Rain ditched her security, but that was exactly what she was thinking about doing. Their used to be days, when she first became underboss of The Family, that she would be bored and simply wanted to get away from the weighted responsibility that she had to carry, even if it was just for a little while.

  In those days, Rain would call up Analisa Chivas, who was always down to hit the clubs and they’d hang out. She didn’t even have to be Rain Robinson; she was Lucy. A wide open party girl that loved to drink good liquor, smoke big weed, dance and fuck all night. It used to drive Alwan, the head of her security detail, crazy every time Rain would pull her disappearing act.

  Rain used to laugh at Shy for the lengths that she would go to when she wanted to get away from her bodyguard, Napoleon. It was funny until she found herself employing some of Shy’s old tactics to make her escape.

  But that night, Rain wasn’t thinking about ditching her detail to go and hang out with Analisa Chivas. That night, she was thinking about doing it just for the sake of doing it. You can read whatever you want into that, but the bottom line was that Rain was bored.

  The war was over. After being caught off guard for a number of reasons, and taking heavy losses, Rain turned things around and was able to kill Mobley and then Barnes and nobody had seen Hawkins in days. As far as she was concerned, he was dead to her.

  Along with Carter, Jackie and Baby Chris, she had systematically shut down, killed, and in some cases, burned to the ground their operations. So, as far as Rain was concerned, it was time to take the program to the next phase.

  Kill Rona King.

  All that Rain was waiting for was Black to give her the green light and she would end Rona and then she would go about systematically shutting down, killing and burning to the ground her entire operation. So that’s where she was going. Rain picked up her phone and made a call.

  “Hello.” Black answered on the first ring.

  “Where you at?”

  “The house.”

  “I’m on my way.”

  “See you when you get here.”

  Rain stood up and went to the bar to pour herself a drink. Once she shot the drink, she put on her vest, holstered her guns, and left the office.

  Yarrisa looked up from her tablet. “You out?”

  “Naa, I’m just going to talk to Demi,” she said looking at Alwan as he and Byrd stood up. “Now that Mileena is gone, I want to make sure that she’s good.”

  “Okay,” Yarissa said, and she motioned for them to go with her as Rain went down the stairs that led to the club.

  Rain had to laugh as she burst through the doors and walked out into the club. The music was pumping, lights were flashing, and the crowd was thick.

  I lose them out here in the crowd every time. I don’t know why they never see it coming, Rain said and began to put some distance between her and her detail.

  “You see her?” Byrd asked.

  Alwan looked around. “No,” he said and tapped his earpiece. “Latresia.”

  “Go ahead,” she answered. She manned the cameras that covered every inch of J.R.’s.

  “I lost Rain in the crowd.”

  “Again,” Latresia laughed and began scanning all of her screens for any sign of Rain.

  “Yes, again, and it ain’t funny.”

  “Maybe you should call me and ask me to keep her in sight before you break the doors.
”

  “Good idea for next time. Just find her.”

  “I don’t see her on any screen,” Latresia reported. “You know if she wants to get away from you, she’s already gone, right?”

  “If you’re looking for Rain,” Leo, the head of security interrupted. “She just walked out the front door and got in her car.”

  “Why didn’t you stop her?” Alwan shouted.

  “Okay, let’s think for a minute about that, my nigga. You asking me why I didn’t stop Rain Robinson from doing what she wanna do,” Leo said as he waved to Rain as he watched her drive away and Latresia laughed. “Does that even make sense to you?”

  “Doesn’t make any sense to me,” she laughed.

  “All you can do now is decide how long you gonna wait before you call Carter and tell him that you lost Rain,” Leo said chuckling.

  “Again. Tell Carter that you lost Rain again,” Latresia laughed.

  As she drove away from J.R.’s, Rain knew that it wouldn’t be long before Alwan pushed the panic button. Knowing that, Rain called Carter.

  “What’s up?”

  “I’m on my way to Black’s house.”

  “Anything I need to know about?”

  “Keeping him up on where we are with your girl.”

  “You gonna push him to give you the go-ahead to go after Rona, aren’t you?”

  “You know me too well.”

  “I think you’re right. It’s time to put a stop to this shit and move on. Hold on for a second, I’m getting a call.” Carter looked at his display and laughed. “Why is Alwan calling me?”

  “To tell you that he can’t find me.”

  “Lost him in the crowd again?”

  “He falls for it every time.” Rain laughed. “I’ll call you when I leave Black’s house and let you know what he said.”

  “I’m going to go ahead and head down to J.R.’s, settle Alwan’s nerves, and be there when you get back.”

  “That’ll work,” Rain said and ended the call.

  When she arrived at Black’s house and was escorted inside, Rain wasn’t surprised to see that Bobby was there playing chess with Black.