by Niecy P
“Hi, Mommy.” I smiled at her.
“Hi, baby,” she gave me an identical smile. “I think that you can bring out the best in Truth. He is going through a hard time right now, and he needs you to bring him through all that bullshit in his life. But he is also good for you too. You both can learn from each other in so many ways. That is what a relationship is about. Learn and grow with each other. There are going be sometimes when he gets on your fucking nerves, and you are going to want to smother his ass in his sleep, but understand that what may seem simple to you, may not be simple to him. Don’t disagree with him if he tells you that he feels some type of way because you can’t attest to his feelings. Be silent at times; your opinion is not always needed. Be his peace, because the world is already against him. He doesn’t need to be at war in his home,” Mommy went in.
“Hold up, Ma. We are only dating. Where all this coming from?” I asked her.
“I know how you are, Madison. You are just like me, and I had to learn that being with your father. Consider this as the prerequisite for the real course ahead,” she answered.
I groaned, thinking that she was going too far too early. “We just started dating, Ma,” I told her again.
“Hmm. Well, the conversation that we had this morning with Truth was different,” she hinted. I sat up in my seat, and my mouth fell open.
“Shut up. Are you serious, Ma?” I asked with excitement in my voice. I heard her laugh, but she didn’t answer my question. My mommy was the best. She couldn’t hold a secret from her children for nothing, but the one that was pertaining to her and her family kind of pissed me off. We were too close for her to withhold shit like that. I waited until her laughing calmed down to address the conversation that was held last night.
“Ma, why didn’t you tell me about the phone call?” I asked her. Mom got serious and shook her head.
“I didn’t want you guys to worry, and it is nothing. Your father and I are handling it. I don’t want you to think about that right now. I need you to get focused and hurry up back so that we can prepare for them,” she finished with her bouncing eyebrows. I smiled and shook my head.
“Ok, Momma. Love you,” I said.
“I love you too, baby,” she said and disconnected the phone. I sat back in my seat and couldn’t erase the smile on my face. He was going to propose to me. I found myself singing that Kelly Price song. I knew that I was going to finish that job in a millisecond. With that news, I couldn’t wait to talk to Truth. I picked up the phone and made the call.
“Hey, baby,” his voice had me melting in my seat.
“Hey. What are you doing?” I asked him.
“Chilling right now. We have a couple of meetings later on,” he responded.
“Nigga, you ain’t chilling. You are nursing them wounds that we put on your ass. And that betta be my sister on that phone nigga.” I heard Mason in the background. I hung up the phone and Facetime him. Truth declined it and called me back.
“Chill out, man,” he said.
“Hell no. Don’t tell me to chill out. What the fuck happened?” I was yelling.
“Madison. Calm down. It is what it is,” he said.
“Oh uh-uh,” I said and hung up the phone. I called Mason’s phone, and he answered like I didn’t hear his ass in the background bragging.
“What’s up, sis?” he answered.
“Don’t what’s up sis me. What the hell is going on down there?” I asked him.
“Stop babying the nigga. It was a welcome to the family type of shit. He alright,” his stupid ass replied.
“How many?” I asked him.
“Five. Occasionally six or seven. He held his own though,” I heard him dapping someone off.
“Are you serious, fool?” I said too calm for him.
“You already knew what was going to happen, stop playing. Where are you anyway?” he asked me. I closed my eyes and tried to regain my sanity. I knew that Mason, JoJo, and Marley were involved. My Dad was probably the occasional one, but the rest of them was going to be in some serious pain.
“I am on my way to Portugal on a job,” I answered. Mason sighed with frustration.
“Look, Maddie. Be safe aight. Please,” he begged.
“I will Mace. Oh, Jeremiah wanted you guys to go with him to a meeting. Help him gain a voice.” I told him.
“Aight,” he said and passed the phone to Truth.
“First, don’t hang up on me like that again. Second, where are you?” he asked the same question. I told him where I was, and he got angry.
“You should have told me, Madison. I would have went with you,” he told me.
“Truth, I am fine. I will be back sooner than you think. I will call you as soon as I get back on the plane. Promise,” I told him. He was quiet for a minute, and I held my breath for the words to escape his lips.
“Nigga you know that you want to tell my sister you love her. Stop all that playing.” I heard Marley say. The men in the background started laughing. I imagined the look he gave Marley.
“When you get back,” he said and hung up the phone. I felt jitters all up my spine. It was nice that he wanted to tell me face to face. Oh my God, I thought all the way to my destination.
“Wait it is not what you think. We are trying to help these girls. You don’t know what you are doing.” Carl Bean explained. I had my rigged knife out. It was dripping with the blood of his wife that he used as a shield. I gutted her and threw her aside. Carl picked up a board and swung it at me. I blocked it with my arm and kicked him in the chest. He fell and started crawling. I had no words for his sick ass.
I stood over him and slammed the knife in his head. I pulled out another and peeled his face off. I took that back with me to Papa. He liked when I did shit like that. Daddy hated when they encouraged me to do the evil shit I did. I pulled my knife out his head and walked towards the car. The girls that they were trying to take was sitting on the ground cradling each other.
“Guh back to yuh families. Yuh wi be safe now.” I told them and pointed back to their homes. The girls got up and went into that direction. One of the girls stopped and looked back at me.
“Obrigado,” she said, thank you in her native language.
“Nao ha de que,” I told her. She ran off after the other girls. I turned and walked back to my car. As I was approaching the trunk, I felt another presence near. I pulled my gun out to the right and saw a man staring at me. He didn’t look homeless nor did he look like he had anything to do with what was going on. He held his hand up and asked me not to shoot. He was lucky that I wasn’t my brother or cousins. They didn’t like leaving loose ends.
I waved the gun for him to keep it moving. He darted off into the opposite direction. I placed my items in the trunk and closed it. I walked to the driver’s side and pulled out my phone. That was when I felt a sharp pain in my back. The impact of it had me hitting the driver’s door. I pulled my gun out and started shooting behind me. I fell in the car and scrambled for my keys that fell on the floor bed of the car. Another shot was heard from the right and shattered my passenger side window. That time I felt the burning in my shoulder. I lifted my left arm up that held the gun and shot the guy on my right, just for another shot to hit me in my leg and another in my side. I fought through the pain and got the key in the ignition. I pressed on the gas and went forward. My vision was blurry, and I started coughing up blood.
I heard more shots but also voices in the quiet neighborhood. It sounded like it was someone talking over the phone. I tried to concentrate on that and driving but lost control of the car and ran into a tree. The airbag bust in my face, but I couldn’t linger on that pain. I heard the men running up to the car to finish me off, but they didn’t know. I pulled a gun from underneath my seat and concentrated on the steps. When they were close enough, I ignored the pain and shot the two men in the head. I searched for more threats, but I felt my body giving out on me. No. I can’t. Not like this. I leaned on the steering wheel and felt blood l
eaking from all parts of my body. I turned my head and saw the little girl that thanked me. She reached in and grabbed my body out the car. I was being dragged somewhere and didn’t have the will to fight. It was over. Madison was no more.
Eight
JoJo
I knew that the meeting with Jeremiah was going to be shit. They canceled on him and rescheduled with us the next day. Mason was telling me that I needed to give him a chance, but I didn’t feel like that nigga earned it. I was his biggest critic because that nigga was a reflection of Pops and me. If he was half-stepping, they were going to look at me, not Mason. I had to make sure that all his ducks were in a row before I brought anything to the table. We arrived at the meeting at five, in a boardroom in one of Jeremiah’s buildings. Everything was set up the way it should have been. I let Jeremiah sit at the head of the table since it was his deal.
The intel that Jeremiah had on them gave a little piece of their background, and that fucked me up. The family name was Costa and there were four of them. Nick was the oldest and he sat across from me with sneaky eyes. There were eyes that held a lot of lies. It was the same for his siblings, Javier Camila, and Juan Costa. For some reason, Javier, the second oldest of the bunch had to bring Juan’s attention to the papers that were in front of him. Juan’s focus was on the man that sat in front of him, which was Mason. Mason didn’t bother to waiver his stare. He pushed his papers to the middle of the table and folded his arms to get his point across. And that was, he wasn't shaken by the dirty looks that Juan was giving him.
Camila was a dime, though. She had long chestnut hair with her face softly made up. She was sitting there in a business suit that gave her that hourglass figure. Camila had a slim face with a pointy nose and soft eyes. She sat at the table like she was the princess. Times like that, I wished Madison ass was there to bring her down a notch. The other piece of evidence and I do mean piece, was that they were from Portugal. It also had that they were from Portugal and that their family used to be in with the trading business before their father died. That was it. We needed to know who we were associating ourselves with at all times. And that showed how not ready Jeremiah ass was.
When I asked who their father was, Jeremiah held his hand up and told me that it didn’t matter. They weren’t doing business with their father, just like Costa wasn’t doing business with ours. Mason shook his head with Truth. Those fools were done with the meeting when they saw the information. But I wanted to give him a chance to fix the shit. Everything that I asked, the nigga waved me off like I was a servant. The last straw was when I asked what type of shit that his family used to trade. Jeremiah stood and told them that they didn’t have to answer. I looked at his ass and felt rage creeping up the side of my neck.
“Sit the fuck down, Jeremiah!” I spoke deadly. That nigga found his seat, especially when he saw Ghost. I cleared my throat and rested my arms on the table. “I’m sorry that you came all this way for nothing. But, without the answer to any of our questions, we won’t be able to do business with your family. Now, who was your family and what is it that you traded before,” I asked.
Nick leaned forward as well. “As your brother said, our past or fathers doesn’t have anything to do with our current situation. If that was the case, your father’s reputation would have scared all of your clients away,” he was cocky with it.
“I am not my father,” I answered.
“And neither am I. We want a fresh start and in order for us to do that, we had to cut ties with our family. You have to understand that,” the bitch said. I was a minute from saying fuck it and shooting them all. The other brother was staring into Ghost’s eyes.
“I guess you are the guard dog that your father was. How history repeats itself?” Juan told Ghost. Truth stepped back to block the door. He pulled out his gun and waited for the direct order to shoot. Ghost looked at the dude and smirked. Deadly.
“Mi mi Mada's pickney at di moment,” he said. Nick pulled his little brother back from the fire.
“You are right, Jordan. There is no way that we will be able to do business with our history. Maybe another time,” he motioned for his brother and sister to get up. They walked to the door and Truth didn’t move.
“You know we don’t have to let them go. We can easily beat the information out of them,” he said. The woman snorted and placed her hand on her hip.
“You would hit a girl,” she asked that unorthodox ass nigga. Truth shrugged his shoulders.
“I beat pussies up, ma,” he told her. Nick and Javier pulled their sister Camila back, and she stood in front of Juan.
“You will not go at my sister that way,” Nick grilled Truth.
“I was talking to all y’all niggas,” Truth wasn’t going to back down.
“Hey, let them go, Truth. I’m pretty sure that we are going to see them again,” I said. Truth stepped aside reluctantly and opened the door. Nick pushed his sister forward and let his brother go before him. He looked back at us and walked out the door.
“That is what I was talking about, bruh.” Jeremiah jumped up and said. I yoked his ass out his chair and slammed his ass on the table. I grabbed the tie that he had and tightened it around his neck.
“What were you talking about nigga?” I growled in his face. Ghost and Truth stood next to me as I handled his ass up. “You brought unknown muthafuckers in our house. Clearly, those niggas did they research on us, but you didn’t get shit but their names and where they were from if that was true. And you wonder why I don’t give you shit to do. You fucked up again.” I yelled in his face. Jeremiah started swinging on me. I deepened my elbow in his chest to cut that shit short. The door opened behind us and Pops walked through with Uncle JJ. He ran over to the table and peeled me off Jeremiah. He pushed me to the wall and told me to calm down.
“Fuck that shit , Pops. That nigga is foul and attracting people that can cause us more harm than good,” I was furious.
“If there was no deal made, JoJo, then everything should be good. From now on, Jeremiah is not to set up no other meetings,” he said like that shit was enough.
“Man, that is bullshit. That nigga is going to do that shit again because the ass whippings from us ain’t working. It’s in that nigga blood to be foul. He is acting just like you, only caring for his self. I am tired of babysitting that nigga. If you want him to learn the game teach him that shit yourself. I’m done with him,” I said and stormed out of the room.
I knew I hit below the belt with that statement. I saw the look of disappointment on Uncle JJ’s face. I was for real, though. I got tired of people throwing my Pops’ mistakes in my face. I got into Mason’s car since his car was parked closer. I was about to pull off until the other doors in my car opened up. Mason and Truth jumped in the car and I sped off. I got to the end of the street and received a text from Uncle JJ to come back. I turned my phone off and kept rolling. We had to rearrange our meetings around the shit Jeremiah set up.
I drove off and thought of how the nigga was acting. Jeremiah was on that same shit Pops was on. My thoughts were everywhere, but in the end, it came up to one solution. I pulled up to our building and got out. We had another meeting within ten minutes. Mason and Truth were dressed in suits with me ready to pick up my slack. They knew that I wasn’t in the right frame of mind to handle shit at that moment. Mace patted my shoulder and walked ahead of me. Mina greeted us and told us that our guests were waiting on the floor below us. We got on the elevator and went up. Before it could open, I told my brothers what I came up with in the car.
“I know that Jeremiah is on some real fucked up shit, bruh. And if the time comes, I want to be the one to take care of him.” I said looking forward. I saw Mason nodding his head. Truth stared at me and wanted to ask me was I sure. I nodded and walked out of the elevator. We walked into the room with Clay’s and Octavius’ crew. We had the monitors up for the Nickersons. We were going to explain the new route for the shipments and the two crews that were in the room had the resources that
the Nickersons needed to make that happened. I took a seat while Mason stood and greeted them. He pulled out the map that Marley made for us and was ready to explain it to them. Mason’s mouth opened and shut. His body went forward, but his hands stopped him from falling face first on the table.
“Shit,” he hissed. Mason’s head dropped, and he looked like he was in pain. I got up and grabbed his arm.
“What’s up bruh?” I asked him. Mason’s breathing was erratic.
“I don’t know,” he mumbled and yelled out. He grabbed his shoulder, leg, and side. Truth called security to check the niggas in the room. Mason's head was dropped. I didn’t know what to fucking do.
“No, man,” he mumbled. He sat up and Ghost was in our presence. “Fuck,” he yelled and ran out of the room. Truth and I ran behind him. That nigga ran up the hall like a true Jamaican. Mason hit the stairway not wanting to wait for the elevator. We hit the first floor and busted through the door two minutes after Ghost. He jumped in his car that was parked on the curb. I popped the hood of the vehicle and slid across it. I got in the car with Truth in the back. Ghost pulled out his phone and made a call.
“Mason. You need to bring yo ass to the house. Your uncles and father are ganging up on me and Marley ain’t shit,” Callum joked.
“Weh di fuck a mi sista,” Ghost said with tears running down his face. Aww shit. Truth pulled out his phone and started calling Madison. Her phone went straight to voicemail. He tried over and over and got the same results.
“Waah wrong, Duppy?” Callum asked, on guard now that he heard the emotions in his grandson's voice.
“Tell mi dat yuh ave eye pan mi fucking sista?” Ghost was driving towards our private airstrip. Callum didn’t answer and that was going to get his ass whipped. Ghost hung up and made another phone call.
