The two laughed.
Harlem and Sana met with Cartier at a café in Downtown Brooklyn. Cartier was already seated at the sidewalk table enjoying an afternoon martini and some shrimp, while looking fabulous in her turquoise sundress. When the girls sat, she smiled at them and shifted into her big-sister mode.
“Where are y’all coming from?” Cartier asked them.
“Her school,” Harlem answered.
“It’s good that you’re in school, Sana. That means something. It means you’re going in the right direction. Definitely don’t make the mistake Harlem and I made,” Cartier advised the young girl.
“I’m trying.”
“That’s all we can do is try—to keep bettering ourselves,” Cartier returned.
She wanted something different for these girls and she wanted Sana to convince Harlem to go back to school too. But when the subject would come up, Harlem didn’t want any part of it.
“I’m a street girl, Cartier. It’s what I know,” Harlem had told her.
“It doesn’t have to be all you know.”
“I love it, though. I love the fast life, the partying, the men, the sex, and looking cute out here wit’ these niggas sweating me,” Harlem explained.
Once again, she reminded Cartier of Monya. It was scary. Harlem believed that she was the prettiest bitch that ever walked the earth. She had it going on, making great tips at the club and meeting new and important people. She didn’t want to give that up for an education. Her education was the streets. It was survival.
Harlem believed she was a tough girl. Cartier gave her inspiration to become a no-nonsense bitch on the streets. But the reality was, she wasn’t like Cartier. She wasn’t that tough, and she could easily get her ass beaten to a pulp by mostly anyone. Harlem was more bark than bite.
16
Are you serious? You tellin’ me you think Prince was better than Michael Jackson?” Majestic exclaimed.
“He was. Prince had more hits, and his songs were much more meaningful,” Scooter argued.
“Yo, you must be smoking crack if you believe Prince got more hits than Michael Jackson. Thriller alone sold more albums than all of Prince’s albums combined. Michael is a fuckin’ legend.”
“And Prince isn’t?”
The two continued to debate the topic while heading toward the Brooklyn trap house with fifteen kilos of cocaine in the trunk of their SUV. They had just picked up a shipment from the Mingo Cartel and were on their way to process it. So far, business with the Mingo Cartel was going well and there hadn’t been any hiccups. Majestic and Scooter planned on keeping it that way.
It was a warm and quiet evening as their Durango arrived in Canarsie, a working–and middle-class residential and commercial neighborhood in the southeastern part of Brooklyn. They soon pulled into the driveway of a single-family home and cut the engine off. Scooter got on his cell phone to make a call to someone inside the trap house. When the man answered, he instructed them, “Yo, come out back and unload this shit.”
Scooter and Majestic exited the vehicle with their pistols tucked snugly in their waistbands and their attention on a constant spin. The trap house and surrounding area was tightly secured with cameras strategically positioned and watching every movement, steel doors in the front and back that were so strong it would take the Hulk to bring them down, iron bars on the windows, and several armed goons inside.
Scooter opened the trunk and removed the black bag that carried the fifteen kilos. He closed it and went toward the rear entrance of the house. The back door opened for them and one of their workers, CC, appeared.
“Majestic, Scooter, what’s up?” he greeted them with dap.
The two killers entered the house and everything appeared to be normal, but Majestic and Scooter had a sharp eye for spotting anomalies. The moment they stepped into the kitchen, they both sensed that something was wrong. The look on their workers’ faces was the first thing that gave it away. They were trying to stay cool, but they were displaying some minor apprehension, as if they were under some kind of duress.
Majestic and Scooter simultaneously reached for their guns, but it was too late. All of a sudden they were swarmed and attacked by several masked gunmen that appeared to come out of nowhere. One of them struck Majestic with a pistol and shouted, “Get the fuck on ya knees!”
The masked men were armed with assault rifles and .50 cal Desert Eagles, weapons meant to cause severe damage to the human body.
“Don’t die tonight, muthafuckas!” one of the gunmen shouted.
Majestic and Scooter stood there in silence, but their body language showed some rebelliousness. Majestic was bleeding from the back of his head from the whack, but he stood strong and defiant. It was going to take more than one blow to the head to bring him down and make him a bitch.
It was hard for them to submit to the goons’ commands. They counted five of them. They couldn’t see their faces, nor did they recognize any of their voices.
“Y’all muthafuckas think this shit is smart?” Majestic said through clenched teeth.
“Nigga, who told you to say any-fuckin’-thing?”
“Fuck you!” Majestic cursed.
Two gunmen rushed him and attacked while the other three continued to hold the others at gunpoint. The pistol whipping finally made Majestic drop to his knees. Everyone in the room was certain that the intruders were going to kill him. It looked like they weren’t going to stop.
“Fuck you, nigga!” one of the gunmen cried out as he slammed the butt of his gun against Majestic’s head.
When they were done, Majestic was sprawled against the floor badly beaten. Scooter scowled. He was helpless in defending his brother. The .50 cal aimed at his face was quite the deterrent. One bullet could easily take his entire face off.
After they were done manhandling and beating Majestic, they bound everyone inside with duct tape around their wrists and ankles and across their mouths. Then they snatched the bag with the fifteen kilos and rummaged through the house collecting a few thousand of dollars in cash. The five masked gunmen fled the trap house laughing and excited about their come-up.
Meanwhile, everyone left inside was shocked that they hadn’t been murdered.
“If I could do it all over again, I would go to school and get an education,” Cartier told Harlem.
“Like I keep telling you, Cartier, I don’t think school is for me. I can get money out here without it—like I’m doin’ right now,” Harlem replied.
“Yeah, but this lifestyle can become transient and dangerous. I survived it not only by being smart, but being lucky too,” said Cartier.
“Well, you have your way, and I have mine.”
Cartier wasn’t getting through to the girl, but she was going to keep trying. Their lunch at the café downtown had extended into two hours. As Cartier ordered herself another martini, her cell phone chimed and vibrated on the table, doing a small dance. It was Scooter calling her and she answered at once, knowing they were to pick up a shipment of fifteen kilos from the cartel.
The moment she answered the call, Scooter cried out, “We got hit!”
Cartier heard him say it, but she kept her cool in front of Harlem and Sana. She looked at the two girls, saying, “I need to take this. It’s important,” and she excused herself from the table and trotted somewhere private to talk.
“What the fuck you mean we got hit? What happened?” Cartier shouted into the phone. “In fact, don’t say shit. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”
Cartier hurried back to the table.
“Yo, I’m out. I gotta go and handle some business.” She tossed a few twenties onto the table to pay for everything and rushed to the trap house in Canarsie.
The scene inside the house was disturbing. Majestic’s bruised face was coated with blood, but he refused to go to the hospital or get any medical treatm
ent. The robbers had ransacked the place and taken money and drugs from her. The only good news was that everyone was still alive to tell their story.
“I’m fine,” Majestic said. “I just wanna find these muthafuckas and kill ’em all.”
“We gonna find ’em—real talk,” Scooter assured him.
“What the fuck happened?” Cartier wanted to know.
“It was a setup,” Scooter answered. “They were already waiting inside for me and Majestic.”
“And how is that possible when this place is supposed to be locked down tighter than fuckin’ Fort Knox?”
“I asked myself the same thing. We need to question every-fuckin’-body in here,” said Scooter.
Cartier fumed. She had just gotten back in the game, and already she was taking a loss. She, Majestic, and Scooter were puzzled by the surprise attack. It didn’t add up.
She looked at Majestic and asked him again, “You sure you don’t need to go to the hospital?”
“I’m good, Cartier. I just want to handle this shit. They fuckin’ come at me—at us—I’m gonna kill every last one of them,” he growled.
“Good,” she replied. “I want every worker we have interrogated. If this was an inside job, I’m gonna soon find out.”
In total, four of her workers were lined up in the living room to be questioned about the robbery. Cartier felt that if they had nothing to do with the theft then they would be fine. But if they did, she was going to kill them right there on the spot. She approached every last one of them and grilled them. But each worker was adamant that they had nothing to do with the home invasion.
Majestic, however, was angry and wanted to torture them. His ego was bruised more than his face. He had convinced himself that one of his childhood friends was behind the jux. He planned on paying that friend a visit. Kendu had a serious gambling problem and he owed a lot of people a lot of money. Plus, Kendu was the only person besides them who knew the whereabouts of the trap house in Canarsie. Majestic deduced that Kendu had staked out the place, gotten some men together, and waited for the payload to arrive.
Once again, the dice didn’t roll in his favor. Kendu cursed loudly and stomped his feet, throwing a mini temper tantrum at the craps table. He had lost ten thousand dollars. He was having a really bad night. He left the gambling spot a broke and upset man, but his night was about to become a lot worse.
The second Kendu exited the building, he saw Majestic’s SUV parked across the street. Majestic was in the driver’s seat staring at him. His look was menacing and it gave Kendu a deep chill. They were childhood friends, but Kendu was also aware of Majestic’s deadly reputation on the streets. He wondered if he had done something wrong.
“Kendu, let me holla at you fo’ a minute,” Majestic called out to him.
“About what, Majestic?” he asked.
“About some business,” Majestic replied.
Kendu had a bad feeling. There was no business with Majestic to talk about. He didn’t want to approach the SUV. His instincts were on high alert, and they told him to flee—flee now.
“About what?” Kendu reiterated.
“Kendu, don’t have me come out this truck,” Majestic warned.
The two men stared at each other from across the street. Childhood friends or not, Kendu felt that he was in grave danger and he instantly took flight.
“Muthafucka!” Majestic cursed.
Out of nowhere a half-dozen men started to chase after Kendu. Kendu made a sharp left and cut down an alleyway with several goons right behind him. He scaled a short fence and continued to run. Majestic’s men continued to give chase. From the alleyway, Kendu ran into the public street into open traffic and narrowly escaped being struck by a passing car. He started to sweat profusely. He glanced behind him and saw the thugs were still after him. He tried to run faster, but he stumbled on something on the ground and hit the pavement like a plane crash-landing. He quickly tried to get up and continue to run, but it was too late. His fall gave the goons enough time to catch up to him and rough him up with their fists and pistols. A car pulled up and he was thrown into the trunk.
“You rob me! Me?”
“C’mon, Majestic, I ain’t had nothing to do with a robbery! I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Kendu shouted in fear for his life.
Kendu found himself in a concrete basement. He was badly beaten, and now he was a few feet away from two vicious pit bulls that were snarling and barking at him, their fangs ready to tear into his flesh. The only thing preventing them from attacking him were the large chains around their necks, which one of Majestic’s men gripped tightly. But he would periodically give the dogs enough slack to inch toward Kendu.
“Majestic, please don’t do this, man.”
“Where’s my shit?”
“I don’t know!”
Majestic nodded to the man holding the dogs back, indicating to set them free. Immediately the dogs leaped onto Kendu and tore into his legs, their sharp fangs ripping apart skin and drawing blood. Kendu screamed out in agony while he tried to kick them off.
“Get ’em off me! Get ’em off me!”
Majestic nodded to the handler, and he pulled the dogs back.
“Where’s my shit, Kendu?” Majestic asked again.
Whimpering and in pain, once again Kendu said, “I don’t know, Majestic. I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t steal anything from you.”
Majestic gave the order again, and the dogs brutally started to attack Kendu. This time it was longer. They went for several body parts and soon his face. His blood started to pool against the ground as his fingers and toes were being ripped from him. His screams echoed through the basement as Majestic and his men gazed at the brutality with stoic faces. Once again, Majestic gave the order to stop the attack and the dogs were pulled back, their jaws soaked with their victim’s blood. They barked loudly and lunged at Kendu to finish the job, but their owner kept them at bay for the moment.
“Look at you. You had enough? Just tell me what I need to know and this will end, Kendu.”
“I was your friend. Aaaah, I don’t know anything! Please. I don’t know anything! Aaaah!” he cried out in anguish.
Maybe he was telling the truth, or maybe he wasn’t. Either way, Majestic knew it was too late. He had come this far and Kendu was in too bad of shape. He nodded to the dog handler. “Let them finish what they started.”
With that being said, the man released the growling dogs.
17
Cartier had to come out her pockets to pay for the stolen kilos. She felt embarrassed to do so, but the last thing she needed was any static with Caesar and the cartel. She had told Manolo, Caesar’s right hand, about the theft and explained that she wanted to fall back from business with them until she could secure things on her end. She strongly felt that it was an inside job and she wanted to get her house back in order and find out who the source and culprits were.
She was shocked when Manolo said, “Caesar wants to see you again.”
“Why?” she asked.
“I don’t ask why. I only pass on the message. You go.”
Cartier couldn’t help but to be nervous about meeting with Caesar a second time. Her mind spun around with so many worries and concerns that she started to feel like a human fidget spinner. She tried to hold it together, but inside she felt like she was falling apart. She didn’t want to worry herself, but Caesar sending for her so soon was unusual.
“When and where?” she asked Manolo.
He handed her a burner phone and said, “He’ll call you soon with the location and time.”
Cartier took the burner phone and Manolo walked away and climbed back into the passenger seat of an idling Tahoe, leaving Cartier pondering.
She made some changes to her business structure and changed up her stash houses and trap houses. She sent Majestic
and Scooter on the hunt, and they were bloodthirsty dogs chasing scent after scent to bring back a bone for Cartier. She was transitioning back to her old self. The loss was a wakeup call, and Cartier knew she couldn’t afford to take any more.
When Head heard about the robbery, he immediately went to see Cartier to lend his support. He asked if he could help her out in any way, but she declined. She wasn’t looking for pity, and she didn’t need anyone to hold her hand. She made it clear to Head that she was capable of holding shit down on her own like she had been doing and not to get in her way.
“I was just trying to help,” he said.
“Do I look like I need your fuckin’ help?” she barked at him.
“Hold up,” he coolly began. “You not gonna keep talkin’ to me any kind of fuckin’ way. I’m a man. Not your bitch.”
She exhaled. “I know. I just got a lot on my shoulders and wanna handle it on my own.”
“You’re stubborn, Cartier. You know that, right?” he said before leaving the apartment.
She knew. She had a lot on her plate—a lot of things to fix, and she didn’t want anyone controlling her or telling her, “I told you so.”
Cartier steered her Bugatti to the valet parking outside the Midtown lounge. The valet approached her car as she opened the door and climbed out looking red-carpet ready in her navy Alice + Olivia dress and silver red bottom heels. She was oozing confidence although she was nervous. She handed the valet her car keys and strutted toward the lounge.
It was a beautiful and warm night with a full moon glimmering in the sky. The Midtown traffic was thick, but surprisingly, the lounge was empty of customers. She was the only one there, besides a handful of staff. The moment she stepped inside, Cartier felt awkward as all eyes were on her. She wondered if she was in the right place.
The maitre d’ approached her with a wide smile. “Cartier, right?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Caesar has been expecting you. Follow me,” she said.
Cartier Cartel--Part 4 Page 12