The Glamorous Life 2: All That Glitters Isn't Gold

by Nikki Turner

  As they ambled along, Calliope realized that entry to all the rooms were gained from the outside, similar to the motel that Rusty had usually arranged her to be in. But this place was much nicer and it was on the bay.

  If Mikile had been staying in a traditional hotel where the rooms were inside, she didn’t know what she’d do. She hadn’t thought of that until now.

  Suddenly, Mikile stopped in front of a turquoise door: room 326.

  He asked, “You okay?”

  “As cool as a fan,” she lied right through her teeth.

  He pulled out a card key. “Good,” he said, sliding the magnetic card into the slot. “I only bite if you want me to.”

  When the light on the lock switched from red to green, Mikile opened the door. “After you, my lady.”

  “Why thank you, my lord.”

  The room was awkward. A king-sized bed was the first thing Calliope saw. How convenient, she thought. But there was more than just a bed. The bedroom opened into a full-sized luxury condo with a spacious kitchen and living room with a double-sided fireplace with a view of the bay.

  Mikile got comfortable, slipping off his suit jacket and pouring himself a drink of vodka and ice.

  He offered her something to drink. “I got orange juice. No Coke,” he said. “None that you can drink anyway.” He laughed.

  She hadn’t noticed how muscular and buff Mikile was until that moment. His tailored suit shirt clung to a lean muscular body.

  “Juice would be fine.” She copped a seat on the sofa. Mikile turned the AC on high, then flipped the gas fireplace on for symmetry and ambience.

  “One orange juice, coming up now.”

  She had her game face on. “Cool. You mind if I use the restroom?”

  With his face in the refrigerator. “It’s next to the bedroom.”

  The bathroom was equipped with a Jacuzzi and a glass-encased shower. It was like a water park, Calliope mused. Then she locked the door behind her and quickly plucked the phone from her purse. She texted Rusty the name of the place along with the room number.

  As an afterthought she texted: “Don’t trip … had to make an audible.”

  Her phone vibrated immediately.

  “Be right there!”

  For the first time since being inside of Mikile’s suite, she exhaled. Waited a few more minutes, she flushed the toilet, washed her hands, gathered her composure, and unlocked the door.

  Mikile was waiting for her. “I thought you’d fallen in,” he said.

  She casually said with a smile, flashing her pearly whites, “A girl has to freshen up, don’t she? And where’s my orange ju—”

  It felt like a hammer slamming into her side. He rocked her so hard all the air evacuated her lungs like it was running from a burning building.

  Crack!

  Mikile punched her again, this one may have fractured a rib. She tried to scream for help; there wasn’t enough air in her lungs to push the words out. On wobbly legs she fell to the floor. curling up into a human ball.

  Why is he doing that to me? Instead of an answer, she got kicked hard. She was so caught off guard and could never pull it together to really fight back. All she could do at that moment was pray to God for help and for strength.

  Mikile bent down and yanked the bottom of her dress up until it caught under her armpits.

  God must’ve been busy, because it only got worse for her.

  Next, he ripped her panties away and the sight of Calliope’s copious, bare ass turned him on. His tongue hung out his mouth like a dog.

  Her body a magnum opus in its own right—got his dick rock hard. He undid his zipper; Mikile liked his girls young.

  He straddled her like she was a horse and he was about to give her the ride of her life.

  God knows this wasn’t the way she wanted to lose her virginity. This wasn’t how she had pictured it at all. All those times she’d imagined how it would go down and this was what it was coming to. Karma had a funny and ironic sense of humor.

  The strong smell of vodka jumped off his breath and pores, so close to Calliope’s nose, acting like a smelling salt. Mikile was so busy admiring her body; he didn’t notice her hand easing into her purse. She found what she’d been searching for.

  This might be my only chance, she thought, and make no mistake about it she was going to give it all she had. She lit Mikile’s ass up with fifty thousand volts from her personal taser.

  He screamed like a little girl, his wail probably resembled one of the little jailbait girls he had violated in the past, when those volts got a hold of him and he jumped back off her before collapsing in a heap.

  “Police! Don’t move,” she heard, just in the nick of time.

  Rusty had finally made it in with his gun drawn. Better late than never.

  Rusty quickly surveyed the surroundings, eyes flitting from Calliope’s back to Mikile, back to Calliope.

  “Fuck!” Rusty footed Mikile in the face with all his might, causing a tooth to fly out of his mouth and carom off the wall. He cuffed Mikile’s hands behind his back and then kicked him again. Again and again, then all of a sudden the dynamics changed.

  Phut!

  To everyone’s surprise, Mikile wasn’t the only Russian in the room. He had a friend hiding in the closet, with a gun.

  The silencer shot Rusty in the back of the head, the bullet exiting between his eyes. The dirty cop never knew what hit him.

  The Russian, this one shorter and rounder, sauntered toward Calliope with the smoking Desert Eagle still in hand. Her very last thought was her brother. Then the Russian popped her.

  11

  Pork and Beans Projects—or Cocaine City to some—was an apartment assigned for the abundant accessibility of the moneymaking narcotic, which was readily available, hard or soft, wholesale or retail, weight or pieces, 24/7.

  Pipers stood in an orderly line to score. Compton took the bread from their anxious mitts while Moo-Moo forked over the work, chopped and bagged in mini ziplock bags twenty feet away, by the end of one of the housing units. This was a method of hand-to-hand trapping that was most common on the street, primarily implemented to reduce the odds of either person from wearing a direct sale charge if they got pinched for selling to an informer.

  Having a fat pocket full of wrinkled, sweaty, balled-up dough, Compton was beginning to think maybe this wasn’t a bad idea after all. He and Moo-Moo had been posted up barely more than two hours and already had made their money back ten times over and were still batting a thousand.

  Jean-Claude, Moo-Moo’s brother, an already made man, had given the boys a good price, his blessings, and protection. It was no secret that not too many people (in their right mind) wanted to be on Jean’s bad side. The word had been put out loud and clear: fuck with Moo-Moo and Compton (his baby Gs), and one’s days aboveground are at their end.

  Everybody knew that Jean didn’t bluster with idle threats, only promises.

  Compton paused to answer the phone on his hip. “Yo?” The piper next in line bit down on his lip, annoyed that he had to wait. He wanted to cop, satisfy his jonesing, and go, make it back to the grocery store to lift some more steaks.

  Five seconds dragged by before the voice on the other end of the cell said anything.

  “Comp … t?”

  Was all that was said, so low, the single word almost wasn’t audible. But the voice on the other end of the phone was unmistakable.

  “Calliope?” he questioned. “What’s up, sis?” She sounded like death.

  ROOM 326

  Calliope, in a state of delirium, managed to convey the name of the inn and the room number. “I need your help,” was the rest of the message, then nothing. A panicked Compton shut down shop immediately and though he had no real details he hipped his friend to the life-or-death business at hand.

  Moo-Moo said, “You ain’t going to go anywhere without me.” He was clueless of exactly what they were running into, but knowing they needed to get there yesterday. Moo-Moo wasn’
t anybody’s fool by a long shot and got his brother Jean on board.

  The door to room 326 was slightly ajar when Jean, Moo-Moo, and Compton arrived. The hotel was damn near a ghost town, except for a doting couple in the pool below doing naughty things, not wanting to be seen themselves.

  Inside the room was a far different atmosphere. Everything was quiet and the picture was still. Jean wasn’t deceived by the stillness, he was getting prepared for whatever was waiting for them there, and he had already slipped his gat from his waist and cocked it.

  Compton called out his sister’s name, “Calliope!”

  Just on the other side of the bedroom, with his top popped and stretched out, was a roller, in full uniform. He was beyond help. Then Compton laid eyes on his sister. She was just a few feet away from the police officer. Scared shitless, he ran over to her, not sure if she was dead or alive.

  He gently cupped her head with his hand. “Wake up, Cal, please, I’m begging you,” he said with tears welling up, in his eyes.

  She was bleeding from the head, bruised up, and half-naked, a sight that no brother should ever have to see.

  While Compton held his sister’s battered body close to him, Jean methodically searched the rest of the suite. Whoever was there was gone now and had made away with a fast getaway. He made his way back to the two siblings. Though Compton always talked about his sister, Jean had never met Calliope before. Even in her severe condition Jean could tell that she was a looker. He felt for a pulse and it was faint.

  “She’s alive,” Jean said with relief, and acted fast. He picked her up and said to Moo-Moo and Compton, “Wipe down everything you think you might have touched. We outta here.”

  Neither Jean, Compton, nor Moo-Moo knew what had taken place there but they all were in agreement on one thing: a room with a half-lifeless juvenile girl and a fully smoked pig isn’t the place anyone—especially any of them—wanted to be found in.

  12

  The glass tower was the nicest residential area in Brickell. And apartment 4118—forty-eight floors up—had been designed by professional decorators with high-end swanky ultra-modern furniture, rugs, and paintings and was one of the nicest in the building.

  Inside of one of the four bedrooms, resting on top of a Thomasville queen-sized bed, Calliope coached her eyes open. She couldn’t shake the dizzy feeling and the brightness of the room didn’t help her shake the cobwebs on her head. It jabbed her like a sharp cue stick … then the sudden assault on her senses subsided.

  A dark-skinned dude with wavy eyes stood beside the bed. “How are you feeling?” he asked in a soft melodic voice. He must’ve peeped her confusion by her expression. “Sorry. My name is Jean. My lil’ brother and your lil’ brother are good friends—in fact comrades, partners in crime.” He tried to lighten the mood mentioning those two together.

  Compton didn’t have many friends. In fact, she only knew of one. “So you are Moo-Moo’s brother?” she softly and slowly said to him.

  “Since the day he was born,” Jean said with a warm smile. “Now”—changing the subject—“back to my original question. How do you feel?”

  Her body felt like she had been run over like a Mack truck and she had a monster headache. And her mouth was so dry that it felt like she had been sucking on cotton balls.

  “Awful. Like cobwebs on my head or something—can’t really explain,” she said, trying. Trying to explain her aches and pains was just too much energy, energy that she simply didn’t have.

  The smile on Jean’s face stretched wider.

  “Why does me feeling awful bring joy to you?” Calliope demanded to know. “And where is my brother?” She tried to rise up but the muscles in her body didn’t cooperate.

  “Calm down,” Jean coaxed, and he moved the pillows, helping her get comfortable. “You are going to hurt yourself more than you already are.” He explained. “I didn’t smile because you aren’t feeling well, but because awful is an upgrade from the condition we found you in.”

  He told her how, along with the plethora of scrapes and bruises, she suffered a fractured rib and a major concussion. Jean had paid a nurse to watch over her 24/7, pumping her with painkillers, tenderness, and care.

  Absorbing the details of her injuries, she placed a hand on the bandage wrapped around her head and remembered the Russian, the one that slithered from the closet, Rusty’s head exploding—blood and brains splattering the wall like a gory abstract painting—right in front of her very eyes. She was next. It was all coming back to her.

  Calliope said, “I was shot in the head.”

  “No. Not shot, but hit hard with a butt of the gun, but thankfully not shot,” he said, looking up to the ceiling as if he was giving thanks to the man above. “You were definitely spared.”

  Jean passed her a cup of water from the glass night table on the side of the bed. He placed the straw in her mouth as his hands rested on hers because he was unsure of her grip.

  Room temperature, the water washed the dryness away. The liquid felt cool and refreshing going down. “They killed Rusty,” she said, letting go and handing the glass back to Jean. “Why was I so lucky?”

  “Being lucky had nothing to do with it. From what I could discern, somebody with very deep pockets put a green light on the head of the cop Rusty. The Russian you encountered took the contract. And in a clever way they used you to catch Rusty slipping at his own game.”

  She thought for a second and it did make good sense to her.

  Rusty had crossed a lot of people for many years. She herself had encountered at least eight of those people who knew about the scam that he was running with Calliope. She never thought it was a real good idea—blackmailing influential men, with the threat of exposing their perverted habits, which could ultimately result in them loosing their families and livelihoods. Calliope was only sixteen—jailbait—and if a successful man was exposed he would be ruined and the effects would be detrimental.

  “But why not kill me too?” Calliope asked, shaking at how close she’d come to being exterminated right alongside Rusty.

  “Oh,” said Jean. “There is a simple answer to that.”

  “All ears.” Calliope waited to hear the reason.

  Jean said, “The Russians, as mean and violent as they are, don’t murder people for free, unless it’s personal. And you weren’t part of the invoice.”

  Miami could be as dangerous as it was glamorous, a known fact among those who lived there. But Jean made the bottom line of why Calliope didn’t die with a bullet to the head sound like a mere business transaction.

  Asshole! Damn, did he have to be so blunt about it?

  “I hope I didn’t come off as an insensitive butthole.”

  Too late, Calliope said to herself, and rolled her eyes.

  As close to an apology as she would get, Jean said, “Sensitivity isn’t one of my strong suits. Sometimes it’s hard to say or show that I care, but I’m a good guy.”

  Before she could think about the words that Jean said, her brother entered the room, and seeing him put a smile on her face. He came over and gave her a hug and a kiss on the cheek and sat on the other side at the foot of the bed.

  That’s when the nurse he’d hired stormed into the room like a hurricane with dreads. Juanita, the fifth-generation healer in her family—yet, the first with formal schooling in the professional sense with a degree—was no-nonsense. She barked, “Chop! Chop!” with two swift hand claps that echoed like a whip being cracked. “Patient needs her rest,” she announced. “No more company.”

  Protesting, Calliope said, “Can I have a few minutes with my brother before you put them out please?”

  “Plenty of time for that, once you are well.” Juanita fluffed the pillows and filled the water cup on the night table all at the same time it seemed. “You need your rest,” she said. Then she fished a bottle of pain medication from her smock pocket.

  Calliope’s eyes dotted toward Jean.

  Help!

  Jean smirked bef
ore coming to her rescue.

  “Ahem.” He cleared his throat after getting Juanita’s attention. He said, “It’s my fault for taking up all the time and she will have a few minutes with her brother.”

  He could feel the daggers from Juanita. Jean ignored them. After all he was the one footing the bill. To be precise, he was the one doling out the cash. Knowing that he just spoke of himself as not having the best bedside manners or sincerity, he tried to clean it up. “She only needs a couple of minutes with her brother. I think it will do them good.”

  Nurse Juanita’s mouth was tight enough to cut glass, but she compromised. “Five minutes. Then you take medication and get rest.” The hurricane left the room and Jean followed, leaving the siblings alone to talk.

  Compton rocked Sean John and a cocky smile. “You look terrible,” he said with the honesty and perspective of a kid brother.

  “Well thank you that, that makes me feel better already,” she said sarcastically. “You are no ray of sunshine yourself.”

  With the sibling banter exchanged and now out of the way, they got serious. Calliope asked, “Who has been taking care of you?” She knew damn well Mabel wouldn’t step up to the plate in her absence. That would have been like asking the pope to run the Nation of Islam.

  If she didn’t know any better, it looked like he poked out his chest. “Been taking care of myself.” Compton dug into his loose-fitting jeans and came out with two palms-full of knots of money. “Doing a’ight too.”

  Calliope knew the implications. “When did you start selling drugs?”

  The very reason she put herself in harm’s way was because she wanted so much more for her brother than being a dope dealer, like graduating high school, college, and a career … his own family and life pleasures.

  Compton sounded too sure of himself when he answered, “Long enough to get my weight up.”

  Not accepting the murky response, Calliope asked again. “How long?”