by Roy Glenn
"How’d you find out about it?" Bobby asked.
"Victor’s fuckin’ Sabrina," Nick said and laughed.
"That pillow talk will fuck up a nigga’s program every time," Bobby commented. And he was absolutely right.
"The only time she can get away from Bo is when he got something goin’. She tells Victor, he tells me."
"What you gonna do about Bo?" Black asked. He knew the minute he told Bo that Nick was in charge that this was coming.
"Don’t worry, Black, I can handle Bo. He can’t make a stray nickel with me knowing about it."
"That ain’t what I mean. There are some people whose respect you’ll never earn, Nick. You can’t have a mutha fucka like that in your house. Sooner or later you’ll have to deal with him before he comes after you."
"Mike’s right, Nick," Bobby added. "Just him tryin’ some shit like this, it gives other niggas the idea that they can do it too."
Black thought about Freeze. "You know what Freeze would do?"
Nick laughed. "He would go over there right now and kill Bo."
"I ain’t sayin’ that’s what you should do. You handle Bo any way you want. All I’m sayin’ is sooner or later you’re gonna have to deal with him."
"I understand," Nick said and got up. "I’m gonna go have a talk with Bo."
"You do that. And then I want you to see what you can find out about Kenny."
"I’m on it," Nick said, and Black watched him as he left Cuisine.
"Who do you think’s gonna move first?" Bobby asked.
"My money’s on Bo."
"Word I get is that Bo thinks he should be running things, and he blames Nick for Freeze bein’ dead," Bobby said.
"I heard that too. That’s why I told Nick he’s gonna have to kill Bo. But he needs to decide that for himself."
"You’re right," Bobby said and sipped his drink. "Where you goin’?" Bobby asked as Black got up.
"Goin’ to see if I can find out anything about what happened to Kenny."
"Didn’t you just send Nick to do that?" Bobby said and followed Black toward the door.
"So I wanna ask a few questions myself," Black said. "What else you got to do?"
CHAPTER SIX
When Black and Bobby got outside, they got in Bobby’s car. They had driven for a while and Black noticed that Bobby was uncharacteristically quiet. Since he had a lot on his mind, Black didn’t mind, but there was a question he had to know the answer to.
"What’s bothering you?"
"Nothing," Bobby replied as he drove.
"Nothing, huh? Well, let me ask you this then; what was up with you last night?"
"What you mean?"
"I mean you chopped the guy’s toes off with an ax."
Bobby laughed. "The shit worked, didn’t it?"
"That’s not the point."
"Well, what’s the point then?" Bobby asked angrily.
"I just never saw you like that before, that’s all," Black said and decided it was best to back off.
They had driven for a while in silence when Bobby looked at Black and said, "Pam wants a divorce."
"That’s what’s bothering you."
"And she’s talking about moving to South Carolina with the kids."
"That’s fucked up. What did you do this time?"
"I got home one night and the house was fucked up. I mean, shit was thrown everywhere. I looked around for the kids, but they were gone. I finally found Pam sitting in the basement. She said some woman called the house asking for me."
"Same old Bobby. Didn’t you learn shit from fuckin’ around with Cat?" Black asked referring to the last woman Bobby had an affair with.
Cat decided it was a good idea to call Pam and tell her that she had just gotten finished fucking Bobby, and he would still be there if Black hadn’t called and asked Bobby to pick him up. That forced Pam to have to deal with the situation in a way that nobody ever thought she was capable of.
After that, Pam had a nervous breakdown. When she got out of the hospital, she told Bobby that even after what he put her through, she could be a good mother to the children and a good wife to Bobby, but she couldn’t bring herself to have sex with him.
After that, they came to an understanding. Pam understood that if she wasn’t gonna give Bobby any pussy, somebody else would. "Just keep it away from me and the kids. I won’t go through what I went through again," Pam told Bobby. And that was fine with him. So it was settled. Bobby did his thing and kept it away from his family. Until now.
"Yeah, I did, but I swear, Mike, it ain’t like that this time."
"What’s her name?"
"Ivillisa Ortiz. Little Puerto Rican ho I fucked a couple of times. I don’t even know how she got my number."
"What she say to Pam?"
"Nothing; just asked to speak to me, and if she saw me to tell me that she’ll be at home waitin’ for me."
"That’s a little more than nothing, Bob. It was enough to set Pam off and make her tear up the house and ask for a divorce."
"No shit."
"What you gonna do now?" Black asked as Bobby pulled the car over.
"I don’t know," Bobby said and put the car in park.
"Your choices are simple. Either you’re gonna be what Pam wants or you’re not."
"No shit," Bobby said and started to get out of the car. "You coming?" he asked and got out of the car.
They went inside the convenience store and walked up to the young woman at the counter. "He here?" Black asked.
"He’s in the back," she said and pointed.
"Thanks," Black said and headed for the back.
"Hey, Bobby," the woman said flirtatiously.
"Hey, Debra," Bobby winked and followed Black.
"What? You fuck her too?"
"Prettiest titties I ever saw, but she couldn’t fuck her way out of a paper bag," Bobby said.
Black shook his head and opened the office door. Bobby followed him in.
"Black; Bobby," Sherman Williams said and stood up to shake hands. He had been running numbers out of that store for years. Sherman also had a reputation for keeping his mouth shut and his ears opened.
"What’s goin’ on, Sherman?" Bobby asked.
"Money. Lots of fun and lots of money. Same as every other day. What brings you two high-rollers up here?"
"You heard about Kenny?" Black asked.
"Yeah, I heard about it. Shame, too-dirty shame. Kenny was good people. Honest as far as that goes in this business."
"You heard anything about who killed him?" Bobby asked him.
"I ain’t heard shit about Kenny. But I tell you what I have been hearin’. And I can’t say that it had anything to do with Kenny, but I keep hearin’ it from a lot of people-people who know what’s up-that something big is gettin’ ready to go down around here," Sherman told Black and Bobby.
"That does us a lot of fuckin’ good," Black said. "Something’s gonna happen, something big, but you don’t know what."
"Sorry, Black, that’s all I got, but I’ll let you know if I hear anything else."
"You do that."
"Have you talked to Luke?"
"No."
"I did hear that he was with Kenny last night when it happened."
"Why didn’t you tell us that shit before?"
"Sorry," Sherman said as he watched Black and Bobby walk out.
CHAPTER SEVEN
When Nick got to JR’s, Rain was more than ready for him. She was all over him as soon as he walked in her office. Once she had gotten her fill, Rain got dressed and ready to go. "You don’t mind if I ride, do you?"
"No, come on," Nick said and turned around. Rain followed him out of the club and to his car; neither had much to say to the other while they drove. Rain sat and stared out the window, thinking about what Blue had said to her. I know he must be rollin’ over in his grave ’bout the shit you doin’.
When Rain was young, JR took her everywhere with him. That’s why she was so much like him. Back
then she was daddy’s little girl and there was nothing more important to Rain than pleasing her father. But as she got older things began to change. Rain was always in trouble and her brother Miles, the straight-A student, became JR’s favorite. No matter what Rain did to impress him it was always wrong. "No, Lorraine, do it this way," she remembered JR telling her so many times in her life.
She knew her father wouldn’t approve of what she was doing. It was always like that. If it wasn’t exactly what JR wanted it was wrong. But JR was dead and Rain had to do what she knew how to do; what she’d always done. Having money and power behind her just made things easier, and her association with Nick gave her that power. It was the perfect arrangement except for one thing.
Wanda Moore.
Whenever Rain would get a little too comfortable with Nick, Wanda would always come along to jerk her back to reality. It didn’t bother her when they first got together. But every time Nick would get out of her bed to go be with another woman, it would remind her that Nick was Wanda’s man and she was just the bitch he was fuckin’ behind her back.
"What we doin’ here?" Rain asked when Nick pulled up in front of Clay’s Garage.
"Something’s goin’ on and there are people that don’t think I know what’s goin’ on."
"Bo."
"We’re here to show them that I know everything," Nick said and got out of the car. Rain put one in the chamber and followed Nick in the building.
Clay’s Garage was a car cloning operation that’s been run for the last couple of years by Bo Freeman. From Clay’s Garage, Bo runs the operation where a stolen cars’ vehicle identification numbers, or VIN, were replaced with ones that belong to legally obtained vehicles. Bo’s men washed car titles clean by using the internet to get vehicle identification numbers from similar makes and models that had been salvaged, then put new VIN plates on the stolen cars’ dashboards and created matching titles. They then re-registered the cars in North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, where bar codes on New York titles can’t be read.
They were also stealing an average of 25 cars a week and selling the parts through salvage yards in the tri-state area. The dismantling and stolen parts operation was run by Hank Jackson. He would receive orders for specific vehicle parts and give orders to various "steal men" to steal the appropriate vehicle in order to obtain the requested parts. Once the vehicles were stolen, they were taken to Clay’s where they were dismantled. The requested parts were then taken to the various auto body shops that had ordered them.
For Bo and Hank, tonight was a big night. Bo had made a deal to deliver a predetermined list of high-end vehicles to members of the Russian mob. The cars were taken from a storage facility where a number of car dealerships stored their excess inventory and then drove the vehicles to various lay-up locations. If everything worked out, tonight would be a big night.
Bo looked at the clock on the wall in his office and then at Sabrina. "What time is it?" she asked.
"Eight forty-five. Why, where you gotta be?" Bo asked.
"Nowhere," Sabrina lied. There definitely was some-where she had to be, and a certain time that she had to be there. "Nowhere but the bed."
That part was true.
She had a little more than an hour to get where she was going. At ten-thirty she wanted to be between the sheets with Victor Lewis between her thighs. Sabrina knew if Bo didn’t leave there soon that she would be late.
At thirty-seven years old Sabrina Cole was a very beautiful woman. Even when the occasional black eye she’d received from Bo forced her into big sunglasses. She had been with Bo for twelve years since she arrived in New York from Mississippi. In that time she had two years of good and ten years of bad. Sabrina had been sneaking around with Victor for the last six months and for the first time in ten years, she was happy. Sabrina had her a young thug and he was putting it on her.
Victor was twenty-four and made his money running numbers and collecting for Nick. He had been in love with Sabrina since the first time he saw her. To Victor, Sabrina was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. Whenever he would have a chance to be anywhere she was, Victor would watch her from a distance. He loved the way she talked; slow, sexy and just country enough to turn him the fuck on. It took him two years to get up nerve to talk to her when Bo wasn’t looking. Come to find out while Victor was watching Sabrina, Sabrina was watching him.
For the next six months they sniffed around one another; flirted and teased one another until one night Victor caught Sabrina alone at a club. She had just had an argument with Bo because she had the nerve to comment on the fact that she caught him openly flirting with another woman while she was sitting right there, and she thought that was disrespectful. After that Bo left the club. Then she saw Hank walk up to the woman Bo was flirting with. They talked for a few seconds before she got up and followed Hank out of the club. What pissed Sabrina off was that she smiled and waved at her before she left to be with Bo.
Never far away and always on the lookout for any opportunity to be with Sabrina, Victor came and sat down next to her.
Sabrina was so caught up in her anger that she didn’t notice Victor until he leaned in close and said, "Hello."
Sabrina was startled when she heard his voice, but the sound of it made her happy. "Hello, Victor."
"Bo shouldn’t leave you alone like this."
"I think Bo has other things on his mind right now."
"His mistake. That would never happen between you and me."
"And why is that?" Sabrina asked and leaned close to Victor.
"Because you are always on my mind."
"You know, Victor, you always say the nicest things to me," Sabrina said and smiled.
"You know I’d do anything to see that smile."
"Why don’t you take me home? See how nice you can be to me," Sabrina told Victor that night. It’s been on since then. Any time that Bo had a job to do, Sabrina would make arrangements to meet Victor.
Sabrina looked at Bo. She knew that he would be busy for hours. She allowed her mind to think about Victor taking his time and making love to every inch of her body. All that needed to happen now was for Hank to say they were ready to go.
"What’s wrong with you?" Bo asked.
"Nothing. I’m just tired, that all."
"Why don’t you go on home then?"
"That’s all right," Sabrina said. "I’ll stay with you until it’s time for you to go."
"For what? To sit here and do nothing? Go on and get outta here. I’ll get with you tomorrow."
Sabrina smiled to herself when she heard that. She stood up and tried her best to look mad. "So I’m not gonna see you later?"
"Gonna be hung up with things most of the night. I told you that."
"All right then, call me tomorrow," Sabrina said and picked up her coat. She gave Bo a goodnight kiss on the cheek and left the office.
Just as she was about to open the door to leave, Nick walked in with Rain.
"How you doin’, Sabrina?" Nick asked.
"I’m fine, Nick," Sabrina said and give him a hug. Then she hugged Rain. "I like that outfit, Rain."
Sabrina never liked Wanda since day she called her a country bitch. So the idea that Nick was fucking Rain behind Wanda’s back gave Sabrina some satisfaction.
"Thank you," Rain said to Sabrina. "You lookin’ good, as always."
"Bo here?" Nick asked.
"He’s in the office," Sabrina said and pointed to the office on her way out the door.
When Hank saw Nick he headed for the office to tell Bo. "We got company, Bo."
Bo looked up and saw Nick and Rain walking around watching his men load cars onto cargo carries. "What he doin’ here?" Bo said and got up.
"I don’t know. You think he heard about what we got goin’ tonight."
"Why else would he be here," Bo said and followed Hank out of the office.
"How you think he found out?" Hank asked.
"How you think?" Bo asked and turned to fa
ce Nick. "What’s up, Nick?"
"Bo; Hank," Nick said and looked around the garage. "You hear about Kenny?"
"No, what happened to Kenny?" Hank asked.
"Somebody killed him last night."
"Damn," Bo said and paused. "I saw Kenny last night at The Beat."
"What time was this?"
"Around eleven, eleven thirty," Bo said and looked at Hank for confirmation. Hank nodded.
"You see who he was with?" Nick asked.
"He was with Luke and that other nigga, I forget his name," Bo explained. "We had a few drinks then he left. But on the way out he stopped and talked to Cruz."
"Cruz?"
"Cruz Villanova," Hank said. "You know, Hector’s nephew from Miami. Whatever they talked about, it ended with Kenny shovin’ his pistol in that mutha fucka’s face."
"What happened after that?" Nick asked.
"Kenny left," Bo said.
"What about Cruz, he leave after that?"
"Can’t really say. It wasn’t too long after Kenny left that we left and came back here. You think Cruz killed him?" Bo asked.
"I don’t know. I would like to know what they were talkin’ about. Ask around. See what you can find out."
"You got it."
"By the way, lotta cars in here," Nick said and took a step closer to Bo.
"Yeah," Bo said.
"Lot more than usual."
"Yeah."
"So I guess I’ll see Hank tomorrow sometime?"
"Yeah, Nick, you’ll get yours," Bo said and took a step back.
"Good."
Nick turned and started walking away. Rain stepped up to Bo. "Good to see you niggas," she said and walked away laughing.
"Yeah, mutha fucka. You gonna get yours. Count on that," Bo said.
"How he find out about this shit?" Hank asked.
Bo turned and looked at Hank. "How you think he found out. One of these niggas talkin’." Bo looked around the garage at his men. "Don’t matter," he said as he watched Nick and Rain leave the building.
"What you wanna do?" Hank asked.