by Carl Weber
I hopped into the back seat. “Now, do you both mind telling me why you’re sitting out in front of a warehouse that Mr. Mahogany just happens to be inside of?”
“We’ve been following these cats that kidnapped this white dude named Dwayne McCarty,” Larry said.
“When Mahogany showed up, we almost lost our minds. Why the fuck are you here?” Lou asked. “We left you to take care of the body.”
“That’s been taken care of, but save that story for another time. I been following Mr. Mahogany all day. I’m pretty sure he’s got something to do with Momma,” I said, fuming. “And if he does, I’m gonna kill him.”
“I knew that motherfucker was shady!” Lou said. “I ain’t never trusted that cat from day one.”
Larry looked over the seat at me. “You really think he’s involved?”
I hated to even say it. I simply nodded my head.
“Well, we’re gonna find out for sure.” Lou turned back around, and we all kept our eyes glued on the building.
“Momma’s in this building,” I said after a couple minutes.
“Why you say that?” Larry asked.
“I been following this guy all day, and everywhere he went, he’s gone in and come right back out.” I stared at the building. “It doesn’t look like he’s coming out.”
“Then you know what that means,” Lou said, opening his door. “We’re going in.”
On that note, Larry popped the trunk. One by one, we got out of the car, each retrieving a gun, then headed to the warehouse to get answers.
Bettie
52
“Where is it?” Belinda slapped me so hard blood flew from my mouth. “Where the fuck is the gold?”
No sooner than I had sat back, the door flew open, and I snapped forward again. I was somewhat shocked, but at the same time, I knew it was only a matter of time before a guest appearance would be made by the person behind it all. The circus surely couldn’t continue without the ringmaster.
“Humph. I was wondering when you were going to show up,” I said.
Unlike me, Belinda looked somewhat surprised to see her husband standing there.
It had been almost twelve years, but he was still a handsome specimen of a man whose presence demanded respect from everyone. He was dressed to play tennis, not to go knock some old lady around.
“Honey, what are you doing here?” Belinda ran to his side, but her body language was no longer dominant. She was being submissive as hell, especially when Mahogany seemed to ignore her as he looked over at Dwayne, then at me.
“What the fuck is going on here?”
He eased into the room, his companion closing the door behind him. They all parted, giving him space as he approached me. The words that came out of his mouth stunned me.
“I’m sorry,” he said with sincerity in his eyes. I’d never heard of someone apologizing to a person prior to killing them, but I supposed there was a first time for everything.
“You’re sorry?” Belinda screeched.
Mr. Mahogany’s face fell, like he was totally disappointed by his wife’s outburst. He turned to her and asked, “What have you done?”
“I’ve done what you and your so-called Council couldn’t do.” There wasn’t an ounce of submissiveness in Belinda’s acid tone now as she seethed with anger at her husband. She walked up on Mahogany, leaving very little space between them. “You promised me that woman was going away forever, but you let her out. My son works his ass off, and you give Sam’s seat to this bitch’s son.” She pointed a finger at me while she glared at her husband. “What kind of father are you?”
“Better than the one who raised you,” I said with a laugh.
“You know just as well as I do that EJ wasn’t ready for that seat,” Mahogany shot back at his wife. “Which makes me a damn good father by not placing my son in a situation that he couldn’t handle.”
“He was just as ready as LC,” she said. “We both know the real reason EJ isn’t sitting on that Council is because he was that man’s lover.”
I didn’t understand all the details of what they were talking about, but that woman had just aired her son’s sexual preferences in front of everyone in the room. I couldn’t believe the husband and wife were discussing their family business publicly like that.
“So what if he and Sam were lovers?” Mr. Mahogany answered her. “I didn’t approve of it, but that has nothing to do with him being immature. Too immature to sit on the Council.”
“He’s only immature because you made him that way.”
“I made him that way? You stood over him, watching everything he did, every move he made, like he was a baby. Look at the mess he made with the Young Bloods.” Mr. Mahogany was shouting, and Belinda took a step back. “You didn’t think I knew about that, did you?”
“Guess who bailed our asses out of that one?” He asked and then answered his own question. “That’s right, LC.”
I smiled proudly. I didn’t know how I felt about LC being wrapped up with the Council yet, but I knew that anything my college boy got involved in, he was going to do it right.
“LC this and LC that!” Belinda yelled. “I’m sick of this motherfucker LC! What about your son?”
“What about him? Is he so important that you’ve got this woman locked up and tied to a chair?” he asked.
Belinda looked at me as if she was imagining the most violent way she could kill me. Then she turned back to her husband and asked, “How did you know anyway? How did you find us?”
I was interested in that answer myself, since he didn’t seem to have a part in this.
“I knew you were involved the minute I saw Leroy’s body. James was driving me around all day searching for you before I found your car parked over here.” He looked at me and shook his head. “I still can’t believe this. I still can’t believe you went this far over EJ.”
“This wasn’t just about EJ. This was for you, too. We both know she has those records. We don’t want them to get in the wrong hands.”
“She doesn’t have those records,” he said.
“What?” Belinda said, her tone low and menacing. “How do you know that to be true?”
Mr. Mahogany answered matter-of-factly. “Because I have the records. That was part of the deal of letting her out of jail.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“You were too hot-headed for me to share anything about it. That’s how you are whenever it comes to your father.”
Her face turned red with rage. “What does my father have to do with this?”
“Those records don’t show the Council complicit in anything. They show this was all your father’s doing. His business was the one that would have been affected the most by the end of Jim Crow, not ours. He talked the Council into stealing the gold so he could steal it from us. That’s why he killed Duncan. He just never expected Bettie to seek revenge.”
Belinda was quiet for a moment, as if she was trying to find a reason for all of her efforts to not have been in vain. “What about the gold?”
“That gold has nothing to do with this.”
“The hell it doesn’t!” she protested. “That’s my father’s gold. It’s his legacy.”
“That gold belongs to Bettie and her family. The Council made that decision”
“My father got killed over that gold. That gold belongs to me.” Belinda was screaming at this point.
“Your father got killed because he was an ass, plain and simple.”
Belinda slapped Mr. Mahogany across his face so hard that I think my head snapped.
“How dare you say that about my father? How dare you!” Belinda cried, her voice cracking. “That man loved you.”
Mr. Mahogany looked at his wife in total disbelief. “This was a mistake, Belinda. The Duncans are on to you. The same way I figured this all out, they are going to. You’re only but a step ahead of them—a small step, at that. You don’t know the depth of what you’ve done, and now I have to clean this u
p.” He turned away from his wife and walked over to me. “Again, Bettie, I’m so sorry.” He walked behind me and began untying me just as gunfire rang out.
LC
53
I went to the side of the building where I had seen Mr. Mahogany enter. Lou and Larry went on the other side. The second I turned the corner, I recognized one of Mahogany’s guys standing near the door, smoking a cigarette. I gripped my piece tightly, hiding it behind my back.
“Mr. Duncan. What are you doing here?” he asked when he saw me approaching.
“Meeting with Mr. Mahogany,” I answered, trying to act as natural and as calm as I could. Maybe, just maybe, I could bluff my way in.
He gave me a strange look then, after a few seconds, shook his head. “Naw, he ain’t here.”
“You sure?” I asked. “I seen his car in the parking lot.”
“Uh, yeah.” He looked nervous. He lifted his arm to reach inside his jacket, and I pulled out my pistol before he could get his weapon.
He raised his hands, and I walked over, reached in his inside pocket, and retrieved his gun. I turned him around and pressed the gun to his back.
“I’m telling you he ain’t here,” he said.
“Bitch, I saw him come in the side door. And if he ain’t here, then why the fuck are you here?” I whispered. Lou and Larry came from the other side, giving me a thumbs up. “Now, I’m gonna ask you one more time: Is Mahogany in there?”
Dude finally gave up. “Yeah, he’s here.”
“What about my momma? Is she here?” He turned to look at me over his shoulder, slowly nodding his head.
I struck him upside the head with the butt of my gun, and he fell to the ground. Without hesitating, I stepped over him and hurried inside with my brothers.
As soon as we entered the building, Larry and Lou took out two dudes. There was no trying to stop it, because they were about to do to us what Larry and Lou had done to them. Larry pointed at a door, and we burst in. I’m sure there were other people in the room, but the only people I could see were Mr. Mahogany, standing next to Momma. She was sitting in a chair, untying the ropes around her ankles. My heart leaped with joy seeing her alive, but I had to take care of Mr. Mahogany before I could get her out of there.
“You motherfucker,” I said, pointing my gun right at him. “You’ve had my mother this entire time. You son of a bitch.”
Some big black dude rushed toward me, but before he could take two steps, Larry blasted him in the stomach with his shotgun.
“Nooooooo!” a young girl, who had been standing in a corner, rushed over and fell to the big man’s side. Some scared-looking white guy I could only assume was Dwayne McCarty ducked and ran to the other side of the room. I kept my gun on Mr. Mahogany, preparing to murder his ass without a second thought. Tension filled the room.
“LC,” Mr. Mahogany said. His voice was eerily calm as he raised his hands.
“Don’t,” I told him. “The only words out of your fucking mouth should be you telling your fucking wife good-bye. They’re going to be your final words.”
“Son, I need for you to understand that I had nothing to do with this. I didn’t know anything about this, I swear.”
“I’m not your fucking son,” I told him, cocking the gun. “Now, this is your last chance to say good-bye to your wife.”
“LC, if you don’t shoot that motherfucker, I will,” Larry said.
“No! Ain’t none of y’all gonna shoot him. Do you hear me?” Momma said.
Those were the first words I had heard my mother speak since she disappeared. It was beautiful to hear her voice, but she confused the hell out of me.
“LC, put the gun down.”
“But, Ma—”
“I said put it down!” She was as stern as I remembered.
“Yes, ma’am.” I felt like a little boy, but I followed her orders and lowered the gun.
“I know y’all think he had something to do with this, but he didn’t. Believe it or not, he was untying me before y’all busted in,” she explained.
“But if he didn’t do it, who did?”
My mother pointed at Belinda. “This bitch over here.”
All eyes turned to Belinda, who was looking disheveled and angry. She held a gun by her side as her eyes darted around the room like she couldn’t decide who to aim it at.
“So, you mean to tell me she orchestrated all this behind Mr. Mahogany’s back?” Larry asked, sounding dumbfounded.
“Yes,” Momma and Mr. Mahogany said in unison. You could see the embarrassment all over his face.
“Well, I’ll be damned. You can’t trust nobody these days,” Lou added.
“Mr. Mahogany!” James came rushing into the room with guns in each hand. He froze when he saw what was going on. It was a miracle he didn’t get shot or shoot one of us.
“Put the gun down, James,” Mahogany ordered.
“I . . . I need to talk to you, Mr. Mahogany. It’s important,” James said.
“Now’s not the time, James. In case you can’t tell, we’re a little busy figuring things out,” he replied to his man. In spite of everything, I was pretty damn impressed with how calm Mr. Mahogany remained.
“I’m sorry, but I think you need to hear this right now.” Ignoring all the guns, James walked over to his boss. He lowered his head and sighed. “I don’t know how to tell you this, boss, but . . .” He hesitated before finally saying, “EJ is dead.”
Belinda screamed.
“What! How?” Mr. Mahogany looked heartbroken.
I locked eyes with my mother, who shook her head at me.
“They found his body on the beach, not far from the house, sir.”
“See what you’ve done, Belinda? You caused this.” Tears filled Mr. Mahogany’s eyes.
“You’re right,” she said. Then, she took a step back, and before anyone could react, she raised her gun and pulled the trigger.
Mr. Mahogany’s eyes widened as he fell backward. The bullet had struck him in the head. James reached out in an effort to catch him before he hit the floor. At that moment, everything seemed to move at breakneck speed.
“Belinda!” Momma gasped.
“He was right. It was all my fault,” Belinda said, sobbing. She pulled the trigger again; this time, the bullet entered her own head.
Chippy
54
It was late in the afternoon when we finally arrived in Atlanta. Between pregnant Shirley constantly having to pee and Levi’s dogs, we had to stop quite a few times. And then there was Donna and her constant sighing and eye-rolling at the two of them in the back seat. I wasn’t too thrilled to be on the road trip either, and her attitude was just making it worse.
“Where are we going now?” she asked when I turned into the neighborhood where we lived. “I thought we were going to find LC.”
“Why you so worried about LC?” Shirley asked. “He ain’t none of your concern.”
“Well, that’s not what I was told when y’all gave me this.” Donna held up the pistol she had been holding for the entire trip.
“I have to check on my children and see if Nee Nee’s heard from anyone,” I told her.
“And I have to pee anyway,” Shirley added.
“M–m–my p–p–puppies are th–thirsty,” Levi said.
Donna exhaled loudly and shook her head. “None of that surprises me.”
“Keep talking shit and you’re gonna get knocked upside the head with that gun you’re holding,” Shirley threatened.
I ignored the posted speed limit and hauled ass, pulling into Nee Nee’s driveway so fast that I hit the curb, causing everyone in the car to bounce. Before anyone could complain about anything else, I was out of the car and headed up the walkway.
“About time you got back. I was worried,” Nee Nee said when she opened the door. “Did you find—”
She stopped mid-sentence and looked past me at the passengers getting out of my car. I brushed past her and went inside, leaving her confused as he
ll.
“Where are the kids?” I asked, then called out for my son. “Junior?”
“Chippy, what the hell?”
“Mommyyyyyyyyyy!” Junior came running and leaped into my arms. I hugged him tight and kissed him on the top of his head. I was so glad to see him.
“Hey, baby,” I said.
“I’m not a baby. Vegas is!”
“You’re always gonna be my baby,” I said with a laugh. “But where is your baby brother?”
“He’s in the kitchen,” Curtis announced.
“The kitchen?”
“He’s in the swing,” Nee Nee explained. “I was shelling peas for dinner, and the boys were helping. Well, they were really making a mess.”
I walked into the kitchen with Junior and Curtis on my heels, and sure enough, there was Vegas, looking content in his swing. I picked him up and cradled him in my arms as I returned to the living room. Nee Nee was still looking confused as Donna, Shirley, and Levi came in the house.
“Can I use your restroom?” Donna asked.
“You need to wait. I know your ass heard me say I had to pee when we first got here. Move,” Shirley said as she brushed past her.
“J–J–Junior! C-C-Curtis! I have a p-p-puppy f-for you,” Levi announced, holding out one of the small dogs.
The two boys squealed and ran over to their uncle, who began crawling on the floor, playing with the dog. As big as he was, Levi still looked like a kid.
“Thanks, Uncle Levi!” both boys exclaimed.
Shirley came walking in from the hallway and announced, “I need a drink. Where the hell is the liquor?”
“Is it okay if I go to the restroom now?” Donna asked sarcastically.
“Who are you?” Junior asked her. It was a moment I had hoped would never come, but here he was, standing face-to-face with the woman who had birthed him.
She glanced over at me, and I gave her a nod.
Donna knelt down in front of Junior and smiled kindly at him. Her voice was soft as she said, “I’m Aunt Donna.”
“Aunt Donna?”
“Yes, Aunt Donna.” Her eyes sparkled with tears, but thankfully the boys didn’t notice.