Red Hot Liar (9781617738654)

by Noire

  Wally’s head jerked back and Selah heard his breath catch in his throat.

  “Wally?” she said, her eyes searching his face. “Are you okay? Oh my God. I’m so sorry for hitting you. I didn’t mean to hurt you, I just lost my temper and—Wally?”

  Selah jumped back as Wally’s eyes rolled to the back of his head and a trickle of white foam ran from his mouth.

  “Wally!” she shrieked as his eyeballs fell back into place and the machine beside his bed began emitting a series of blaring beeps.

  Two nurses rushed into the room and began examining him and checking his vital signs. Trembling, Selah stepped away and began anxiously running her hands up and down her arms, suddenly chilled in the midst of the suffocating heat.

  “He’s gone,” one of the nurses finally said. She was an older, heavyset white woman with turned-over shoes and massive sweat stains under her armpits. She glanced down at her watch. “I’m pronouncing him. I’ll notify his family and you two get him prepped for the freezer before he melts right into that bed.”

  Selah stood there in shock as the other nurse, a pretty young Latina who couldn’t have been more than twenty-five, motioned for her to come closer and help.

  “Yank some of these tubes out, mami, why don’tcha,” she said, chewing on a big wad of gum.

  “But I-I-I’m not a—”

  “You’re not an LPN? What, you’re an RN?” She glanced up at Selah giving her a dirty look. “Well, none of that crap matters around here,” she said, yanking back the sheet and stripping the adult diaper from Wally’s still body. She lifted his shriveled penis between two fingers and pulled out his catheter, then tossed the sheet back over him. “We’ve got so many dropping like flies around here that everybody pitches in to tag ’em and bag ’em. Come on, mamacita. Take his IV out while I call somebody to bring the meat wagon. Hurry up, too. This old boy is about to get nice and stiff.”

  CHAPTER 29

  When Bunni got a wild hair up her ass there was no pulling that shit out. She had finally accepted the fact that GiGi had played her for a sucker, and now she had it set in her mind that she was gonna get her some backsies.

  “That bitch is a red hot liar,” she told me as she sat cross-legged at the foot of my bed staring at her laptop. A yellow notepad sat beside her and a stubby pencil was stuck behind her ear.

  “Which bitch is a liar?” I looked up as a thousand names flew through my mind in a flash. Me, her, Peaches, Selah, Jude . . . “Which bitch you talking about, B?”

  “GiGi!” she spit. “She’s a damn liar. I don’t believe shit she said. Matter fact, I don’t think that heffah even works on TV!”

  “Why you say that? I mean I don’t think we was ever in the runnings for no damn show, but damn. Why would she come up in here from the jump if she’s not on a job?”

  “Oh, she’s on a job,” Bunni smirked. “The same type’a job we was on when we first came down here.”

  I bucked my eyes. “A flimflam? That bitch is tryna catch us in a flimflam?”

  “Hell yeah.” Bunni nodded. “Check this out.” She crawled up to the head of my bed with her laptop and thrust the screen under my nose.

  “Look at this shit!”

  My eyes ran down the page as I saw mug shot after mug shot and read charge after criminal charge. “What the hell!”

  “Yeah, I been investigating that ass! Mizz GiGi is in the game, Mink. That heffa is runnin’ a racket!”

  I couldn’t believe all the shit I was seeing, but it was her for sure. Mami had aliases out the ass and at least a trillion different mug shots, and they were all different too. In some pictures she was a blonde, in others she was sporting the brunette look. Sometimes her hair was short and sometimes it was real long, she had gone for the jet-black goth style in a few, and in a couple she even had a stud-chick buzz cut that didn’t look cute on her at all.

  “Girl, where’d you find this website?” I said, impressed like a mutha. “Put my name in the box and see what comes up.”

  Bunni smirked and waved me off. “I already did. You in there, girl. All up in that shit. Me and P, too. But look at all these charges they got on GiGi!”

  “Yep,” I said, still reading. “And GiGi ain’t even her real name.”

  “Nope,” Bunni said. “That shit is Georgia! Georgia Mullins.”

  “Damn!” I cursed and then whistled as my finger swept down the screen. “That heffa been knocked for all types of shit,” I said and read out loud. “Shoplifting, embezzlement, forgery, extortion—”

  “Pickpocketing!” Bunni cut in as she scrolled to a new page. “Prostitution, burglary, blackmail—”

  “Identity theft! Insurance fraud! Larceny! Wire fraud!”

  I shook my head. “This chick is a professional,” I said with mad admiration. “She got all kinds of levels to her game and she still managed to stay outta the joint most of the time.”

  “Yeah, and it looks like she mighta took shit to the ultimate level too,” Bunni said with a chill in her voice.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “Murder!” she said, stabbing her finger at the screen.

  “Stop playing!” I snapped. “We been in the life for years jacking mad niggas too, but that don’t make us no murderers!”

  “I’m serious,” Bunni insisted. “It says right here that three men she was known to date came up missing. The last person them rich cats were seen with was her, and now all three of them are gone!”

  I looked at Bunni and she looked at me. Her eyes got all big and mine did too.

  “Ooooh,” Bunni made the somebody’s in trouble sound. “Is you thinking what I’m thinking?” my day one girl asked me.

  I nodded like a mutha and then both of us bust outta our mouths with the same damn word at the same damn time.

  “Barron!”

  CHAPTER 30

  Selah’s hands shook like crazy as she put on a pair of rubber gloves and peeled the tape away from Wally’s cooling skin. She squeezed her eyes closed and yanked the IV needle from his arm, then wiped her hands on her pants and turned toward the Hispanic nurse.

  “Uh-uh,” the young thang said. “Don’t be looking at me. You’re the RN so you should know how this goes.” She waved Selah on. “Let’s go now. Get him naked and let’s do the last offices and then we can wrap him on up.”

  By the time they were finished preparing Su’s body for the morgue Selah’s nerves were completely wrecked. She was dripping sweat from head to toe and she needed a drink like nobody’s business. At every stage of the process she had opened her mouth multiple times to confess to the young girl that she wasn’t a goddamn nurse, but the thought of getting arrested at Wally’s deathbed, and how that would really fuck Viceroy’s campaign completely up, just kept making her shut her mouth again and again.

  She stood by quietly as an elderly black man came into the room pushing a metal trolley, and him and the Hispanic nurse loaded Wally’s washed and wrapped body on it and strapped him down.

  “That’s that,” the nurse said as the gray-haired man pushed the trolley out of the room and she followed him toward the door. She looked over her shoulder at Selah and said, “We’ve got another one who’s about to go in room one oh five. Hurry up and strip those sheets off the bed and spray it down with Lysol, and make sure you flip the mattress over and clean the other side too. You got it?”

  Selah nodded mutely as the young woman walked away shaking her head. “Dumb-ass temps,” Selah heard her huff under her breath. “She don’t act like nobody’s RN to me!”

  Moments after the young nurse walked out of the room Selah attempted to make her escape. She crept over to the door and stuck her head out, only to have the chick holler loudly from down the hall, “Hey! Get back in there! There’s no way you scrubbed that bed that fast!”

  Selah was too damn through. Biting her lip, she rushed back into the room and grabbed the cleanser from the bathroom and yanked the sheets off the bed. She squirted some lemon-scented disinfectant
all over the plastic-covered mattress and wiped it down and dried it with a bunch of disposable chux pads.

  Grabbing the edge to flip it over, Selah braced her feet and heaved until she held it high in the air, and when she looked down underneath it she damn near screamed at what she saw.

  DOMINION OIL, INC.

  Well I’ll be motherfucking damned!

  It was a brown envelope. A big one. The words Dominion Oil, Inc. were printed on the outside in bold capital letters.

  Selah snatched it with one hand and let the mattress fall back on the frame with the other. She ran into the bathroom and fought her way out of her rubber gloves, then with sweat-dampened hands she tore at the seal on the envelope and pulled out the white sheets of paper that were inside.

  Her eyes roamed over the documents and a big smile of relief and satisfaction broke out on her face. She had it! She had the original document that Viceroy had signed over thirty years ago! All these weeks they had been searching high and low and ol’ Wally had been sitting on this shit the whole time!

  Despite the specter of death that permeated the room Selah was floating on cloud nine. She couldn’t wait to show Viceroy. She couldn’t wait for him to see that she had pulled some weight and done her part to help the family out. If this didn’t convince him that she was down for him and steady in his corner then nothing would. She could see it now: Viceroy would win the election and get the chairmanship position, and as a reward for all her hard work he’d take her on a vacation to Acapulco or maybe to Belize . . . They’d swim in the ocean every morning and sip Petrus Pomeral at three grand a pop under the bright moonlight every night, and then they’d shower together and slide into a nice plush bed and she’d slurp his big black dick in her mouth and lick all up under his balls and . . .

  A banging sound rattled the bathroom door and yanked her straight out of her fantasy.

  “I’m using it!” she snapped and flushed the toilet with the toe of her shoe. She didn’t give a damn what Lil Mama was yakking about out there! The only thing on her mind was getting back to that locker room and getting her clothes and her purse, then climbing in Fallon’s raggedy putt-putt and hauling ass over to Dominion Oil so she could slap some very precious paperwork down on Viceroy’s desk!

  CHAPTER 31

  Gigi was decked out in designer traveling clothes as she stood in her stripped-down apartment with the last of her personal items strewn over the bed. It was giddy-up time again, and she was ready to climb on her big black stallion and ride off into the sunset. The state of Texas was no longer wide enough to hold her and all the rip-offs she had perpetrated within its lovely borders, and instinct told her that it was time to make a quick move. Larry Dawkins was furious with her and was threatening to wring her neck, but like all the other men she had swindled over the years, he’d have to catch her first, and even then he’d have to take a number and stand in line.

  She glanced around the ritzy furnished condo that she’d lived in scot-free, courtesy of Stewie Baker’s dime. Three designer suitcases stood open nearby; one was empty while the other two were packed nice and full. She’d accumulated way more than she could carry this time, and her hands moved quickly and methodically as she sorted through the mounds of expensive gifts, trinkets, and jewels, deciding in a flash what to take and what to toss. As usual her decisions were based on leverage and liquidity. Anything that could be bartered, traded, or ditched off and sold for a quick dollar made the cut, and everything else got left behind.

  She felt a brief twinge of something and she realized it was satisfaction. She had racked up royally during her stay in Dallas, and she had to admit she’d had a blast stepping on backs, tripping folks down steps, taking candy from babies, and swindling old ladies for their church shoes during this super-lucrative misadventure. But of all the wicked tools of the trade she had employed, it was her uncanny ability to spot a willing victim that had really paid off for her this time.

  GiGi glanced out the window. She’d kept her car running and it wouldn’t be long now. She’d snuck out of countless cities and towns under the dark of night before, but this time instead of traveling light she was taking a hostage with her. An ace-in-the-hole, a captive audience, and best of all . . . a human ATM. Yes, for the first time ever Georgia Mullins aka GiGi Molinex, was running from something and to something at the same time. Because this time instead of riding solo, when she hit the highway and watched the city of Dallas fade in her rearview mirror, her latest victim, her delicious chocolate sugar daddy, would be riding shotgun right beside her.

  CHAPTER 32

  It was election night and everybody was off somewhere doing some last minute shit before heading to the hotel to watch the results come in with Daddy Viceroy. Me and Bunni had been steady blowing up Barron’s phone tryna contact him so we could give him the heads up about GiGi’s mining ass. That chick was a grifter to her heart, and both of us had a feeling she was scheming to get at Barron’s throat, so we had been calling him and leaving messages left and right.

  While we waited for Bump to call us back I told Bunni I was going to my room to pick out something tight to wear, but instead I snuck into my walk-in closet and started tossing a few things in a travel bag on the sly.

  I didn’t have much of a plan in my lil down and out head, but I didn’t need one neither. I had plenty of dough and I could park my ass at one of the ritziest hotels in New York for as long as I needed to until I figured out my next step. The streets of Harlem were where I was from, and my hometown was gonna be a real welcome sight. I was actually looking forward to seeing my scandalous Granny and the rest of them old lying-ass LaRues, but other than that, whatever I did next was gonna have to come off the cuff because Mizz Mink was all out of slick moves.

  I thought about Bunni and I felt kinda bad. I hated just sneaking out and leaving like this but I didn’t have it in me to do no whole lotta explaining. I knew her and Peaches would try real hard to talk me out of going back to New York since they knew Punchie and Gutta were still out there gunning for me and the streets were still hot, but fuck it. After messing up the good thing I had with Suge I just didn’t wanna be around here no more and maybe I deserved whatever I had coming.

  Every time I closed my eyes I could hear the cold disappointment in Suge’s voice when he told me I was too damn childish and insecure to be his woman. That shit had hurt me real bad when he said it, but once I came down off my high horse and wasn’t mad no more, it hurt me even more.

  I waited until I heard Bunni singing her ass off in the shower and then I called downstairs and asked Albert to have one of the drivers bring me a car around. I scribbled a lil note for Bunni and Peaches telling them I was going home and not to worry about me, then I slipped it under Bunni’s door and crept downstairs. It had been hot as hell earlier in the day but it was raining cats and dogs when I got outside, and I jumped my booty in the backseat of the limo and told the young driver named Pedro to put my bag on the floor beside me.

  “Hey, P, do you know where Uncle Suge lives?” I asked him when he climbed back in the front. He was dressed in his little black monkey suit with the starched white shirt and all that. He nodded yes. “Cool, I need a ride to his house real quick and then you can take me to the airport. ’Kay?”

  I sat back and closed my eyes while Pedro whipped through the gate and hit the highway. Listening to the sound of the rain beating a drum on the limo’s roof kept me from thinking about how I was gonna act and what I was gonna say once I got to Suge’s crib.

  Even with the wet roads it didn’t take us long to get there, but by the time we pulled up the clouds had gotten darker and heavier and the rain was making mud outta the hard Texas dirt.

  Pedro rolled to a stop and I cracked my window open a little bit and stared at the front door. The dogs were in the kennel out back just a-barking their asses off, and I sat there looking stupid and staring at the door for a real long time as I tried to decide whether or not I was brave enough to get out and ring his bell.
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br />   But then the door creaked open and I saw him standing there. His muscled-up chocolate body was covered in a white designer bathrobe that used to feel like warm marshmallows against my skin when he draped it over my shoulders after drying me off in the shower. He stood in that doorway staring me down and I sat in the backseat of the whip eyeing him right back. I don’t know if he blinked but I sure as hell didn’t, and the look in his eyes was like nothing I had ever seen before.

  For the longest time my ass just sat there feeling a mess. I was a con-mami. A hustler. A two-bit thief. I had wiggled these hips around the block more times than a lil bit, and if there was one thing I knew how to do it was play a nigga to the left.

  But on the real, to the right was where I really wanted to be as I gazed at my big ol’ gut buster, the gorgeous killer who had rocked my world, the only dude on the face of the earth who had ever gotten through to my tough, ghetto heart.

  And as our eyes locked together across all that space and through all that falling rain, I watched him take a step backwards and slowly . . . close the door.

  A big old sniff came outta me as I dropped my face into the palms of my hands. It was over. Our shit was a wrap. He was done with my ass. He had said his goodbyes with his eyes, and now there wasn’t a damn thing left for my mouth to say.

  “Ga’head,” I told Pedro as mad tears fell from my eyes. I wiped them shits away furiously. Mizz Mink didn’t cry over no nigga! “Ga’head, Pedro,” I repeated. “Fuck this shit! Let’s bounce!”

  “You sure?” Pedro looked over his shoulder. He had mad pity in his eyes as he dug into his pocket and pulled out a clean hankie and passed it back to me.

  “Yeah,” I told him and nodded. “I’m sure.”

  Pedro stepped lightly on the gas and the whip was slowly creeping off as I turned to catch one last peep of what I was leaving behind and that’s when I saw it.