Heartless

by Al-Saadiq Banks

  Upon his arrival, with a snap of his hand, he sends his messenger away from the table. He stares at them one by one before speaking. Storm is already disgusted with him. “Why are you over here?”

  Shocked at her response to him, he just looks at her with venom bleeding from his eyes. “Who y’all with?” he asks. “Where y’all representation at? I ain’t into talking to bitches?”

  “What?” Storm asks.

  “I said who y’all with? I been seeing y’all making a lotta moves since y’all been here, and I ain’t been notified of y’all’s presence. Don’t nothing or nobody move without me greenlighting it.”

  “Fuck is you?” Storm barks. Her girls all laugh in his face.

  He’s infuriated, yet he covers it with a fake smile. “Oh, you don’t know? That obviously means you ain’t nobody. I’m Johnny Cash. All the hoes in this spot is mine. We the only thing moving at this event.”

  Storm stands up with rage and her girls follow. “Fuck you calling hoes, first off?” she asks as she makes her way around the table to him. She steps right into his chest. “Second, you ain’t nobody to know in my world. You watch your fucking mouth talking to me,” she says, staring up into his eyes.

  He’s enraged that she stands up to him like this. This is something that he’s not used to. He’s used to women moving at his command. The disrespect he feels shows on his face.

  Toy steps in between Storm and the man, with her back facing Storm. She pushes the man away. He slaps her hands off him. “Hoe, don’t you fucking touch me.”

  Storm tries to get around Toy to get at the man. Wendy restrains her as best she can. He lifts his hand as if he’s thinking of backslapping Storm. “Nigga, I wish the fuck you would,” she says not even flinching. Storm is so mad that she’s now foaming at the mouth. “You fucking with a bitch that will take your fucking life. You better take your ass back over there with them dirty dog ass bitches you got.”

  In seconds, his stable of ten young women have Storm and her crew surrounded. They appear to be ready for war. They step up to his defense and Storm becomes more enraged. “You dirty bitches will die taking up for this goofy ass nigga. Better stay in your fucking lane.” She looks to the pimp. “Better put some muzzles on them ugly ass dogs.”

  Security appears, breaking up the chaos. “Hey! Hey!” the suit-wearing security guard says. “What’s the problem?”

  “He’s the problem,” Toy says, believing the security would be on their side being that they are the victims of this matter. Shockingly, to her, the security is aggressive toward them. Johnny Cash whispers to one of the security guards and he walks over to Storm.

  “Ladies, I’m gonna have to ask y’all to leave the premises.”

  She loses it. “What?”

  “Evacuate the premises, or we will evacuate you.”

  Johnny Cash smiles as if he’s had the last laugh. It’s obvious that he has them in his pocket and they can’t win. Storm hesitantly grabs her belongings from the table, and Toy and Wendy do the same. Before walking away, Storm turns a table over. She looks over at Johnny Cash. “You just fucked up, and you too stupid to even know it.”

  They make their way to the exit, and Storm turns around to give him one more long glare. She nods her head up and down and all he does is smile which makes her angrier.

  11

  New Orleans

  The Next Night

  Storm stands at the foot of the bed while Toy and Wendy stand on opposite sides. Stacks of money are spread out evenly over the bed. Even though they were thrown out of the luxury box last night not able to score a dime there, they still were able to make a few dollars at the after-party. Although they made a profit, Storm is pissed because they made nowhere near what she predicted. She has Johnny Cash to blame and every thought of repaying him for what he’s done. She prays that wasn’t their last time seeing each other.

  Storm takes her cut from both of the girls’ money and gives them the rest. Toy being the biggest earner of the weekend scored close to twelve grand, while Wendy only scored about five. Both giving Storm half of their earnings gives Storm a profit of eighty-five hundred. A hefty score for a woman who had to do nothing for it.

  Storm got wind that a good number of people from the Super Bowl were making their way here to New Orleans for Mardi Gras and decided to make a detour. They had their flights switched and arrived here a couple of hours ago. She figured they lost out on the big money in Indianapolis, so maybe they could even the score here. As they made their way through the city, looking for a hotel, which was almost impossible, they noticed the influx of people. In her mind, all she saw was dollar signs.

  * * *

  Hours later, they are on Bourbon Street. It is packed with people, a great deal of them dressed in costumes. It’s raining but in no way are they allowing the rain to dampen their parade. Drunkards stagger and some lay out, sprawled in the middle of the street while people walk past them as if it’s normal. The drink responsible for the drunken bodies on the street is the infamous Hand Grenade. The Hand Grenade is the most powerful drink in all of New Orleans.

  The smell of the spilled alcohol, mixed with the throw up that covers the streets and sidewalks is stomach turning but faint compared to the smell of horse shit in the air. Police patrol the areas on horses. Every few steps are mounds of horse droppings and beautiful broken beads. The beads seem to hold more value than currency during the Mardi Gras. Storm and the girls watch in awe as women flash their breast in return for beads. They’ve never seen anything like it.

  Storm, with her trained eye, can spot the prostitutes throughout the crowd, even though they are camouflaged. Dressed in their revealing outfits and the excessive amount of make-up painted on their faces, they almost look like the women dressed in costume. They may have the many police that are patrolling the area fooled, but she knows a working girl when she sees one. She finds the prostitutes to be quite tacky and cheap. They also seem to be high off of drugs, or drunk, or both.

  Up ahead, a huge group of people are lined up along the curb, all staring up at the balcony of a row house. The people are yelling and cheering. Storm leads the way over to see what all the hype is about. When they get there, three women are flashing their boobs at the onlookers.

  They put on a show as they dance seductively and tongue kiss each other. They are staggering, obviously drunk. Even police are in the crowd, enjoying the show. It’s not long before the women are completely naked and humping each other sexily. They put on a ten-minute show before they end it. The crowd screams in disappointment, wanting more.

  Storm and the girls wander until they end up in a small rundown bar in the French Quarter. In observance of the bar, they notice nothing but drunk trailer trash and hillbillies. They also see a few prostitutes sprinkled throughout, getting very little attention. Surprisingly to them, the attention is on the many homo-thugs that prance around. They are half-dressed, some have their shirts tied up in a knot, showing their stomachs, and others are dressed in miniskirts. They are in disbelief at how the men are receiving them. They are touching and kissing and doing everything except actual man-on-man penetration.

  Storm quickly realizes that they are obviously fighting a losing battle here. “Ain’t no money in here for us. We ain’t what they in the mood for.” Her phone rings, interrupting her. She looks at the display, and her heart beats with anticipation. She answers it immediately. “Yo?”

  “Storm,” the man yells with excitement. “It’s time. Everything lined up and ready to go. Where you at?”

  “I’m on the road right now.”

  “Well, you need to get here ASAP!”

  This call is the perfect antidote for such a waste of a trip. Something that she has been working on for months has obviously manifested itself. “I will hit you soon as I touch!” she says before ending the call. She looks to the girls. “We out!” she says before scurrying o
ut of the bar. She’s on to better things.

  12

  Newark

  Days Later

  Three men sit at a kitchen table, packing cocaine into tiny vials. In front of them at the center of the table is a kilo, which barely has been touched, a digital scale, and plates with mounds of cocaine and razor blades.

  “It was the perfect setup. In my later teenage years, the only way I knew how to get what I wanted was by using my body and my beauty. By this time, I had learned to use my brains. I put together a master-plan. With the help of two accomplices, the plan was executed flawlessly. I was always used as the eye candy to reel the men in, so I knew enough of about that game to coach someone else through it. Like a ventriloquist, I told this young woman all the right things to say and do to catch our mark. Our mark was the lieutenant of one of the biggest drug dealers in the city.”

  In no way is Storm pressed for cash. Her business with the girls keeps her pockets lined, coupled with the fact that the old man gives her more than she could possibly ask for. Her being involved with robbery isn’t about business. It’s about the rush.

  She could easily sit back and let the old man take care of her, but that would be too easy and boring. Storm tried that for a while, and she was miserable. It’s the allure of a criminal lifestyle that keeps her alive. She can’t even make sense of why she always has to be in the middle of the action, but she does.

  She could’ve easily let this vick go, but the rush wouldn’t allow her to. She’s been working on this for weeks. In no way could Storm let all her weeks of work go in vain. It was show time.

  The occupants of the kitchen all lie face down with their hands on the back of their heads. Storm stands over them with a ski-mask covering her face. A gunman stands next to a woman sitting on the floor in the corner, holding an infant in her arms. It’s evident that the baby senses something because he’s been crying for minutes.

  “You better shut that baby up,” the gunman commands. He places the gun onto the top of the woman’s head. Her mouth is gagged by a T-shirt so she can’t say a word to soothe her baby. Instead she holds the infant tightly as she rocks back and forth with nervousness. Tears of fear trickle down her face.

  “We had the work and all the valuables that we could find, but for some reason that wasn’t enough for me. I could feel the fear in the room, and that only urged me to instill more of it. It turned me on.”

  The man in the center of the room looks up into Storm’s eyes. His rage is intensified because he knows it’s a woman under the mask, yet he knows she means business “Please, please don’t put my lady through this. I gave y’all everything already.”

  “But it wasn’t just about money. It was enjoyment.”

  Storm kneels over the man and starts to pistol whipping him until he’s a bloody mess.

  “And then came my favorite part… the torture.”

  The three men, now completely naked, all face the wall, in squatting positions. Their backs are soaking wet, dripping with water. Storm whips them one by one with an extension cord. She doesn’t stop until thick, red bruises cover their entire backs. When she stops, there is a look of satisfaction on her face.

  Storm’s accomplice, Man-Man steps in front of her, holding a carton of eggs in his hands. He looks over at her as she ignores his words. “Come on now. This some sick type shit you on. I ain’t puttin’ no eggs up a nigga ass. We got the money and the work. Let’s just go.”

  Storm looks at the Man-Man with fury in her eyes as she bites down on her bottom lip. She lifts her gun in the air. “You don’t have to. They will. But for the record, you will do anything that I tell you to do.”

  She grabs an egg from the carton with the first sign of gentleness since they’ve been here. She leans over the man and hands him the egg. He looks at her in a confused state. A demonic smile covers her face. “Between your cheeks,” she says as she aims the gun at his head. He’s hesitant to move until she shoves the gun up his nose. Slowly he does as he’s instructed. Shamefully, he tucks the egg in between his cheeks with a look on his face that clearly states that he feels violated.

  “Whatever you do, don’t let that egg break. Your life depends on it. This is a fragile situation,” she says with a smirk.

  She hands the extension cord over to Man-Man and gives him a head nod to go on. She steps back and watches from across the room with joy in her eyes as the man is whipped like a slave. He bites down on his lip in order not to scream. The sound of the man whimpering gives Storm not only an adrenaline rush, but it gives her a sexual rush as well.

  The walls of her interior rumble ferociously. Her temperature rises as her whole body heats up. Her panties moisten more with each lash. His grunting turns her on even more.

  She backs up against the wall to brace herself as her insides contract violently. She tries to retain her composure, but it’s too much to bear. The attention of the people in the room is not on her but on the man who is receiving the whipping. That gives her the freedom of enjoying her guilty pleasure.

  He howls after the biggest lash of them all. The pain so unbearable, he can’t deny it. With no surprise at all a water as impactful as Niagara Falls spills over in her panties. She fights back the trembling as her pussy squirts like a garden hose. She closes her eyes as her spraying session fulfills her.

  Her euphoria is broken when her eyes pop open and land into the eyes of the woman holding the baby. Shame spreads across Storm‘s face as they stare at each other for seconds. She pastes an intimidating face on to scare the woman. All the while, her pussy still sprays uncontrollably. The woman looks away just as the water gushes from the bottom of her pants leg, making a puddle on the wooden floor. She stands there fighting back the tremble as another lash sounds off. Just as she’s coming down off of her orgasmic high, another splash sounds off.

  A bright smile spreads across Storm’ face. She walks over with her wet Dickie carpenter pants clinging to her leg with each step. In seconds she’s standing over the man. He looks up with terror in his eyes. Beads of sweat cover his face. He slowly looks downward in between his legs. A puddle of raw egg and broken eggshells lay in between his bare feet. Slowly he looks back up at Storm who wears a demonic grin.

  She places the gun onto the man’s forehead and with no words she squeezes the trigger.

  Boom!

  “We left all three of them dead. The girl and the baby were left to live. I couldn’t bring myself to do that.”

  13

  Later that night

  Storm sits at the kitchen table in a tiny, cramped studio apartment. She’s still dressed in her all black. Her ski mask is rolled up on the top of her head. She’s quite cool and calm for a person who has just executed three men.

  Piles of money from the robbery are piled on the table. She sifts through the bills with suspense as Man-Man sits close enough to sit on her lap. He watches her closely as if he expects her to do a magic trick and make the money disappear. On the opposite end of the table is another female. The coldness in between Storm and the young woman can be felt from across the table.

  Storm and this woman are strangers to each other. Any contact that they’ve had has been through Man-Man. Storm passed the instructions of the job down to him, and he passed the information down to her. The first time the women ever met was thirty minutes before the robbery.

  Storm finally finishes her counting. She separates a few piles and slides them over to Man-Man. She then slides two smaller piles across the table to the girl. The girl looks down her nose at the money with disgust. “How much is this?” she asks with her neck popping with each syllable. Her lips are puckered up high enough to kiss the ceiling.

  “Six thousand,” Storm replies, staring at the girl with venom bleeding from her eyes. She hates that the girl has the audacity to even question her.

  “Oh, hell no!” the girl shouts. “Y’all come up with forty-six s
tacks and y’all think y’all gonna get away with breaking me off a lousy-ass six? Y’all done bumped y’all fucking heads!”

  “Shh,” Man-Man whispers. “Hold up, Kirah. Take it down.”

  “Take it down… my ass!” the girl continues on. “Fuck that! If it wasn’t for me, none of this shit would’ve went down. Let me eat, too.”

  Storm stares at her with fury. The girl has no fear at all. The only thing on her mind is more money. She doesn’t know Storm well enough to understand that he shouldn’t be speaking to her in this manner, but Man-Man does.

  “As pissed off as she was making me, she was right. Without her, we would have had nothing. We used her as bait for our victim. She dated him for three weeks and got all the information needed to get what we wanted. She led us right into his living room. Couldn’t get no easier than that, but still I couldn’t let her think she was in control.”

  Storm prepares herself to speak in the most non-confrontational voice that she can muster up. “We did all the dirty work. You put us on the sting, and you got your cut,” she says as she points to the money. “Usually the finder’s fee for a situation like this only calls for ten percent, so I think this is generous.”

  “But I put my fucking life on the line, too!” she says rather animated. “I walked y’all all the way through the situation. Without me, y’all would’ve never got the fuck in!”