12 Day's In December

by Roy Glenn

  When I said nothing and made no move toward the case, he kept talking. “It’s all there, a hundred thousand dollars, plus another fifty, you know, for what do you call it; points or something, but whatever it’s called, I’m sorry, Mr. Black, for making you wait for your money.”

  “Thank you.” I leaned forward and closed the case, and then motioned with my hand for Nick to get it. I sat back and had to think for a minute.

  Now the rules of the game say that money or not, Parrish needed to feel some pain for making me wait for my money. I know that, he knows that, and that is why he is practically shaking. But if I wanted to be honest, if I had a multi-million-dollar deal about to fall apart, I wouldn’t be worrying about the hundred grand I owed some gangster. Multi-million-dollar deal, huh? I was intrigued.

  “You said that you were a venture capitalist.”

  “Yes, that’s right.”

  “Just what does a venture capitalist do?”

  “The short version is that a venture capitalist is an investor who provides capital to startup ventures or provides capital support to small companies that wish to expand but don’t always have access to equity markets.”

  “So you loan them money?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “Venture capitalists are willing to invest in such companies because they can earn a massive return on their investments if these companies are a success.”

  “But what if they aren’t?”

  “Venture capitalists experience major losses when investments we make fail, but these investors are typically wealthy enough that they can afford to take the risks associated with funding young, unproven companies.”

  “So you have a group of investors, or how does that work?”

  “Can I offer you a drink, Mr. Black?”

  “Whatever you’re having is fine.”

  “Johnny Walker Black all right?” he asked.

  “And one for my friend there.” It’s what Nick drinks.

  Parrish got up and went to the bar. “The structure varies, but generally the fund can be made up of wealthy individuals, but it could be insurance companies, pension funds, foundations, and corporate pension funds that pool their money together into a fund to be controlled by a VC firm.” He handed Nick a drink, handed me mine and then went to sit down. “All partners have part ownership over the fund, but it’s the VC firm that controls where the fund is invested.”

  Right.

  “Nick, go get Wanda for me,” I said and turned to Parrish. “There’s somebody I’d like you to meet.”

  When Nick came back with Wanda, I made introductions while Parrish made her a drink and repeated what he told me in much more detail and Wanda asked a lot of questions.

  “So what types of businesses do venture capital firms invest in?” Wanda asked,

  “VC firms usually invest in businesses or ventures that most banks or capital markets would consider too risky,” Parrish explained.

  “If these are risky companies that banks won’t invest in, how does a VC firm select what to invest in?” Wanda asked.

  “Venture capitalists look for a strong management team, a large potential market and a unique product or service with a strong competitive advantage.”

  I looked at Wanda, she nodded her head and stood up. She extended her hand. “Thank you for taking the time to talk to me.”

  He stood and shook her hand and then gave her a card. “If you have any questions, please, don’t hesitate.”

  “I’m sure I’ll be in touch,” Wanda said and turned to leave.

  After shaking hands with Parrish, I told him that he was welcome to gamble with us anytime and warned him that this should never happen again and left his house.

  After we left Parrish, Wanda called Bobby to let him know what happened. He said that he was almost home and Wanda said that we would meet him there. Wanda closed her phone. “We need to be careful of what we say over these things,” she said and held up the phone.

  “I think that’s a good idea. I don’t think we need to be fuckin’ with them at all, but they do come in handy. So, make sure that nobody talks business. They are to make arrangements to meet face to face.”

  “There’s something else that I think we need to do.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You only need to give certain orders to one person.”

  “You’re right,” I said, and my mind shot to the RICO case that they could build against me for the things I’ve done in the last few months. “Anything else you can think of that we need to do smarter?”

  “Not right now, but I’ll let you know as I think of them.” Wanda paused. “This is getting serious.”

  “Yeah, playtime is over,” I said, and wondered if this new Mike Black I keep talking about would actually show up and would he be up to the task.

  We got to Bobby’s apartment about the same time that he did. The three of us stayed outside for a while and talked about Parrish and our need to tighten up on the way we did things.

  “It’s cold out here. I need to roll by The Blue Room and pick up some papers,” Wanda said, and started for her car. “I’ll see y’all later.”

  “What you getting ready to do?” I asked Bobby.

  “Nothing. Absolutely nothing,” he said.

  “You want me to drive you home?” Wanda asked.

  “I’ll walk,” I said, and turned to leave as her phone rang.

  “Hello,” Wanda said and me and Bobby stood quietly and watched the expression on her face change. “Thank you for calling.” Wanda turned to me and Bobby. “The police arrested O.”

  “He’ll probably be murdered a week after he gets inside,” Bobby said.

  “No, Bobby, I’m gonna be the one to kill him. I promise you that,” I pledged.

  Chapter Twelve

  December 24

  It was just after midnight when there was a knock at the door and Nick came in.

  “What can we do for you, Nick?” Wanda asked.

  “I just talked to Carter. He said that Barrett is at his spot now playing poker.”

  “Is Gun with him?” Bobby asked.

  “No,” Nick said. “You want Carter to keep Barrett there until me and Freeze get there and bring him here?” Nick asked eagerly because that’s how we usually did things around here.

  I thought for a minute. “No.” I paused and sat back in my chair. “Have Carter tell Barrett that it’s important that I see him, and then ask him nicely if he can come now.”

  The puzzled look on Nick’s face was comical. “Okay,” he said.

  “Let me know what Barrett says.”

  “And tell Carter to let him win a big pot before he asks him,” Wanda suggested, I nodded in agreement.

  “That will make him more willing to get his ass up and come talk to us,” Bobby said, and Nick left to carry out his orders. It was a half an hour later when Nick came back in to tell us that Barrett was on his way.

  “When he gets here, you bring him back here personally, Nick. Just him.” I looked at Bobby and Wanda. “I’m gonna talk to him alone.”

  “I think that’s a good idea,” Wanda said. “If the two of you are in here he’ll feel like he needs to have someone in here too.”

  It was after two when Kenny came to the office and said that Barrett was here and three of his men are with him.

  “One of them ain’t Gun, is it?”

  “No, Bobby, The Gunner ain’t with him,” Kenny said. “Nick’s on his way back with Barrett.”

  Wanda and Bobby stood up and left the office with Kenny and a few minutes later, Nick knocked on the door and escorted Barrett in. I stood up, came around the desk to shake his hand and offered him a seat.

  “How did things get to this point?” Barrett asked when I sat down.

  “You and I should have done this that night,” I said. “Moved to squash this whole thing. But we’re here now.”

  “How do we squash this, Black?”

  “We don’t.
”

  He looked surprised.

  “You know I gotta kill him, right?”

  Barrett dropped his head.

  “He tried to kill me twice. If I let him live, how is that gonna make me look? It’s a matter of honor.”

  “I know, Black, but damn, me and Gun came up together.” He shook his head. “All this shit over Kendra’s ho ass. I don’t understand what he sees in her.”

  “Well, let’s be honest, she is kinda fine and I keep hearing how insane the pussy is.”

  “I heard that too.” Barrett laughed. “We might be the only two mugs that haven’t fucked her.”

  I laughed. “So where does that leave us?”

  “I don’t know, Black?”

  “I’ll tell you what I do know. I know that Andre is not happy about this,” I lied because I hadn’t mentioned it to him, but the mention of his name got Barrett’s attention because I had just made it about money — his.

  “Andre? What Andre got to do with this?”

  “He says war ain’t good for business.”

  “War? Who’s talking about war?”

  “I am.”

  Barrett sat back.

  “I got no problem with you, but I will wipe out his whole set and it will cost you money, because like Andre said, war is bad for business.”

  “Nobody wants that. I’m in this shit to make money.”

  “Where is he, Barrett?”

  “You asking me to give up my nigga, Black.”

  “No, Barrett, I’m asking you to end this so we both can get back to doing what’s important.”

  “Making this money,” Barrett agreed and told me where The Gunner was hiding, and we worked out some details. Then I lied again and told him that Andre would appreciate his sacrifice and he won’t forget it next time they did business. We shook hands and Barrett left my office. Bobby and Wanda came back in.

  “How’d it go?” she asked.

  “It went exactly the way it needed to go.”

  “What happened?”

  “He told me where Gun was hiding.”

  “Where?”

  “Where do all mutha fuckas with money go when they’re hiding from us, Bob?”

  “Atlantic City.” He laughed a little and I told him where the Gunner was holed up. “Let’s go get him.”

  I stood up. “Not now. Now I’m going to Cynt’s to pick up Anya and Lo-Lo and then I’m going home to bed. You and me will ride down to AC and kill this bastard in the morning.”

  “Okay. But I’m gonna send Nick and Freeze down there now to sit on him until we get there.”

  “Sounds like a real plan to me.

  I said good night to Wanda and Bobby drove us to Cynt’s. As soon as I got there, Anya and Lo-Lo said they were ready to go, so we went home to bed and eventually, we went to sleep.

  Lo-Lo’s elbow and Bobby yelling, “Mike! Mike!” from my living room was the first thing I heard the next morning.

  “Go away!” Anya yelled and covered her head with the pillow. “What time is it anyway?”

  “Seven forty-five,” Lo-Lo said and elbowed me again.

  “Mike! Mike!”

  “What!” I shouted.

  “Let’s go get this nigga!”

  “He must want this nigga bad,” Anya mumbled in her pillow as I got out of bed and headed for the bathroom.

  “Real bad,” Lo-Lo said and curled into the fetal position. I showered and dressed, got my guns and some extra clips and went out in the living room.

  “Took you long enough,” Bobby said and bounced up from the couch.

  “Would have been longer if I had stopped to fuck them. And don’t think it didn’t cross my mind,” I said as we left the apartment.

  “What’s it like living with two women?” Bobby asked when we got outside and headed toward his car.

  “They are women and there’s two of them, so they do girly shit and get on each other’s nerves,” I said as we walked down the block. “Other than the fact that I got a bunch of girly shit in my bathroom, it ain’t bad.”

  “That’s because it’s Lo-Lo and Anya and they’re mad cool, right?”

  “I guess. Why you ask?”

  “Katrina been talkin’ up moving in with me, that’s all.”

  “That ain’t for you, Bob.”

  “I know. And I ain’t tryin’ to hear that either,” Bobby said and pointed to a car coming down the street slowly. Me and Bobby took out our guns.

  “What’s up with that?” I asked.

  “I have no idea,” Bobby said as the car with three men in it rolled slowly toward us. Each man pointed to us as they passed. “Those are Smitty’s people,” Bobby said.

  “I know.”

  On the way to AC, this time, I was the one that was quiet. Bobby talked, of course, but I was all in my head, and for a change it wasn’t about Vickie, but it was a familiar theme, or at least it was becoming one. I was thinking about what just went down with Smitty’s people and I was thinking about how I should have handled Smitty.

  “They’re gonna keep coming,” Bobby said.

  “What?”

  “Smitty’s people. You know they’re gonna keep coming,” Bobby said, as if he were reading my mind. “And the next time they won’t just be pointing fingers.”

  “I know.”

  When Andre sent us to kill Smitty, I knew that he was fuckin’ Sandra and since Andre doesn’t hide what he’s doing, Smitty probably knew it too. But despite that, me and Bobby rolled up in Jimmy’s by ourselves. What did I think was going to happen? Point is we should have never gone up there without numbers.

  But what’s done is done.

  “We need to find all the rest of Smitty’s people and kill them.”

  “I’ll make that happen.” Bobby laughed. “Andre ain’t gonna like that. He’s probably looking for Niles to step into Smitty’s position.”

  “Fuck Andre. We need to kill Niles first. He’s probably who sent those niggas.”

  Outside my fuckin’ building.

  Niles was sending me a message and I heard it loud and clear. I know where you live, nigga.

  I thought about Lo-Lo and Anya and the idea of moving became a little more important. And the idea of having a little muscle to watch over them did too.

  “We need to kill all of them.”

  We arrived in Atlantic City to meet Nick and Freeze. Bobby sent them down there to babysit Gun and two of his men, Duval and Kasim until we got there. As I got out of the car, I wondered why I didn’t just tell Nick and Freeze to kill them and save myself the drive. Here again, the result of not thinking things through. But I understood why Bobby needed to do this himself. His honor demanded it.

  Instead of going all out at one of the big hotels, Gun and his cowboys were holed up in a cheap motel. Nick and Freeze checked into the motel across the street and got a room on the front of the building, so they could monitor their coming and going. I knocked on the door and it opened. “What’s up, Nick?” I walked in.

  “They’re in three rooms on the second level,” he said standing in front of the window with binoculars. “The three benzos parked next to each other.” He handed me the binoculars and pointed. “Those are their cars. Early this morning I made a little slice in all of their tires. If they try to get away in those cars, they won’t get far.”

  “How are they set up?” Bobby asked and began checking his weapons.

  “Right now, all three of them are in the corner room.”

  “Where’s Freeze?”

  “He’s across the street in a car,” Nick said.

  “They alone?”

  “Nope, they’ve had a steady flow of working girls in and out of there since we got here. There are four in there now.”

  “I’d rather not go in there shooting with the women in there.”

  “We need to get them out of that room,” Bobby said.

  “Other than going room to room, them niggas ain’t been nowhere,” Nick said.

  “How do we get t
hem out?” I asked and here again, the need to think things through and have a plan came to mind.

  So without one, we waited. For over an hour, and then … “Door’s opening, Black,” Nick said, and we all rushed to the window in time to see the women come out and then the door closed. We were all about to sit down when the door opened again, and Duval walked out and leaned over the rail.

  “Nigga look halfway decent. Maybe they’re leaving,” Nick said looking through the binoculars. Then he said, “There’s Kasim.”

  “Let’s go,” I said, and we left the room. By the time we had made it across the street, Gun, Duval and Kasim had made it downstairs and were heading toward their cars. Nick moved around to the other side to get closer to where Freeze was parked, and we could get them in a crossfire. But that was when a car pulled into the parking lot and stopped. All of a sudden two men jumped out of the car.

  “Gun!” Bobby yelled when the shooters raised their weapons and opened fire. Me and Bobby dropped to the ground and crawled for cover behind some cars, took out our weapons and returned fire. There were two shooters, both blasting away with semiautomatics.

  From where we were, I could see that Nick and Freeze were shooting it out with Gun, Duval and Kasim.

  We stayed put, knowing the one true fact about firearms. Eventually they run out of bullets, the semis just take longer.

  We readied our weapons, knowing that the second they stop to reload, that we would have them, or at least, that’s what I hoped would happen. It seemed like forever, but when the shooting stopped, me and Bobby raised up, took aim, fired and took the shooters down. But that was when I saw Gun’s coward ass running.

  Again!

  “He’s getting away!” Bobby shouted and went after him. I fired a couple of shots in Duval and Kasim’s direction and went after Bobby.

  Gun turned quickly and fired at Bobby, and he returned fire as he ran. Gun fired a few shots, and then he ducked around the building. But when we came around the building after him, he was nowhere in sight.