I went to Neeko’s office and knocked on the door. He yelled come in before he knew who it was at the door. When Neeko looked up from his desk and saw that it was me, his facial expression went cold. He squinted his eyes and twisted his mouth. Not a good sign.
“What’s up, Neeko? How you been?” I said, plastering a fake smile on my face. It was phony but I knew I had to try to get on his good side. I had essentially left the club high and dry without a good bartender. Duke had me so convinced I wouldn’t ever need to work that I didn’t even give Neeko the courtesy to call and quit.
“What the fuck you want?the fuck Neeko grumbled, puffing on his stink ass cigar. I fanned my hand in front of my face to swipe away the stink smoke.
“Um . . . I was wondering if I could just go back to work. I know what happened was kind of fucked up and all but you know I’m good at what I do . . . I really, really need this Neeko,” I said, begging without shame.
“Naw, I don’t need nobody else. I got a new bartender and she’s fine as shit and she don’t gimme no lip,” Neeko said dismissively.
“C’mon Neeko, I’m willing to share shifts. I’m willing to stay all the way until the last customer leaves. Anything, I just need a job,” I begged some more. I was on the brink of tears and I was fighting hard not to cry.
“Naw, Lynise. I can’t fuck with you right now,” Neeko said with finality.
I stood there in shock for a minute. I guess I always thought I could just keep getting my way in life. I never thought I’d be on the desperate side of shit.
“You can be one of my strippers if you want. I always wanted to see that apple ass without clothes,” Neeko said, blowing more cigar smoke in my direction.
I started coughing and gagging. “Fuck you Neeko! I ain’t never taking off my clothes for a bastard like you!” I spat. As I turned to leave, Neeko called after me.
“Lynise! You might as well strip ‘cause ain’t much else you can do in these parts. Somebody done seen to that.”
I flipped him the bird and stomped out of his office. I had no idea what the fuck he was talking about.
I peeled out of the parking lot in Diamond’s car. “Fuck Neeko! There’s more than one club in the Tidewater area! I’m gonna be alright! I’m a damned good bartender.” I drove to the next strip club.
When I got inside, the owner also dismissed me. He said some shit like he couldn’t work with me even if he wanted to. I didn’t know what the fuck he meant by that bullshit. I told him to kiss my ass and I headed to the next club. Same shit. The owner would hear nothing of hiring me. This shit was starting to really make me suspicious. When I got to the last club on my list I just knew I would get a job. It was owned by a guy named Drew and he and I had gone out way back in the day. I was really embarrassed when I walked into his club and saw his fine ass sitting inside with his iced out chain and pinky ring. I immediately felt small. I fought the feeling because I needed a job badly.
“What’s up, Drew?” I said, flashing a smile. In my desperation, I tried using my strategy. While I was still in the car, I opened the top buttons on my shirt all the way down to my cleavage. I really was in desperation mode. It is what was is. If I had to show some breasts to get a job, then that’s what I had to do.
“Ayyy, Lynise. Long time, no see, girl,” Drew said. His enthusiastic reaction was a good sign. I was excited already.
“Well, you know I must be here for a reason, so let me just get right to it. Drew, I need a job like nobody’s business right now,” I said trying to make myself as seductive as possible. I knew Drew and he was always a little on the perverted side. I probably would’ve even rubbed up on him for a job at this point. Anything except suck his dick.
“Yeah, baby girl. I heard around town you was kind of down on your luck and shit,” Drew said. When he said that a sharp pain immediately shot through my stomach. That meant all of my business was already getting around the Tidewater area. I was probably the fucking laughing stock.
“You know shit happens,” I replied, trying to play the shit off. “But I’m also sure you’ve heard I’m the best female bartender around and I bring in the crowds. That’s how good and strong my drinks are.”
“I heard that but I can’t help you baby girl,” Drew said. He looked kind of hesitant though.
“Ugh!” I grunted, throwing my hands up. “Why is everybody dismissing me? So what, I had a falling out with my boyfriend, what does that has to do with me mixing fucking drinks!” I barked in frustration.
“Baby girl, I thought you knew the deal. Listen, I’ma tell you this for ya own good,” Drew said, leaning in closer and whispering. I looked at him strangely, confused. “That nigga Duke Carrington holds a lot of weight in these here streets. He went around everywhere to all the bars across the city telling niggas not to fuck with you. Said you was a thief and couldn’t be trusted. That nigga even threatened that if any of us put you on to a job, he was gon’ have our liquor licenses revoked.
“You know he got peoples on the fucking board down there at the ABC. That’s how the nigga found out you tried to get his liquor license fucked up. Word is, if so many people didn’t know about you fucking up his business shit, he was gon’ body you.”
This shit made my ears start to ring. I wanted to just scream. Duke was the fucking reason I couldn’t get a job. How dare this bastard. He was trying to play me at my own game. I tried to undo his life so now he was fucking up mine. If I had any kind of fucking sense, I should have been upset that Duke would have me killed if everyone didn’t know how I tried to fuck him up.
“Ya’ll don’t know the half of it. But thanks for the heads up. I understand all ya’ll little scary ass so-called men let Duke run ya’ll . . . it’s all good,” I snapped at Drew.
“Hey, don’t shoot the messenger. I can’t fuck with you,” Drew said flatly. “It took me a arm and leg to get my liquor license. I ain’t about to risk that to hire no troublemaking bartender.”
“Yeah, a’ight. You mark my fucking words. You, the rest of these sucka ass club owners and Duke Carrington ain’t heard the last of Lynise! That nigga should’ve learned it was cheaper to keep my ass!” I screamed at Drew.
“You can go now with all that rah rah bullshit, Lynise. At least I told you the truth,” Drew said, sounding frustrated with me. I couldn’t blame him. I was taking out my anger for Duke on him.
I turned around and hurried my ass out of Drew’s club. I couldn’t wait to get outside. As soon as I stepped foot out of Drew’s club, I picked up my cell, blocked my phone number and called Duke’s ass. Surprisingly, he picked up. I couldn’t control myself I was so angry.
“Duke! You sorry muthafucking excuse for a man!” I screamed into the phone. “Why the fuck are you going around to the clubs blackballing me?” I screamed into the receiver. I wouldn’t even give him a minute to speak. I kept on with my tirade. “You ain’t got shit else to do? You worrying about me? You so fucking weak that you threatened every club owner in the area not to hire me? Wow, it took a real man to do that! So how am I going to make money to take care of myself when you was the muthafucking reason I quit my job in the first place?”
I screamed so much and so loud my throat hurt. I was emotional and hurt and pissed off I ever got involved with this asshole.
The asshole finally opened his mouth and started talking. He was screaming as well, which meant maybe I got to him. “Listen, you two bit classless whore! I don’t give a fuck how you support yourself. Bitch, you thought you was gonna use the money you stole from me, but you had another thing coming! Chris found that shit when he was throwing your shit out of the condo! You dumb bitch!”
I was trying to scream back at him but his deep voice was overpowering mine. “I’m telling you, Lynise, if you ever call me, come near any of my businesses or homes again, your crack head mama and your crack head, dick sucking, pussy selling, best friend is gon’ find ya muthafucking head in one place and they gon’ have to go on a fucking scavenger hunt to find the rest
of your body parts. I done told you more than once, I ain’t nothing to be fucked with,” Duke said menacingly.
Then the phone went dead.
That bastard had hung up on me.
I started banging my fists on the car’s steering wheel. I banged until my hands throbbed. I was so angry that if I had a gun I would’ve found Duke and shot him right in his head.
He had gotten this one, but I was going to find a way to get his ass back.
Cheaper To Keep Her Unique
Chapter 22—Trouble
I was depressed and I knew it.
All I wanted to do was eat and sleep and in between I would have bouts where I just cried my eyes out for hours. I thought about Duke a lot. Sometimes I would drift into the good times we had. I would find myself smiling as I often went into the deep recesses of my mind to replay how Duke spared no expense when it came to spending time with me and making me happy. I sometimes still didn’t believe shit had gone so wrong so fast. The shit Duke had done to me was just straight foul. I would never forget it either. He had made me turn on him, it was my defense mechanism.
My life had definitely gone from charmed to hell, from sugar to shit. I laid around the apartment for days and weeks, most of the time listening to Diamond and Brian either fucking or fighting. I went from my bedroom to the living room and back again. Diamond was starting to act a little funny because she was footing all of the bills. Although she said she understood my situation after what Duke had done to me, she still acted funny. Sometimes she would come in all drunk and shit and she wouldn’t even speak to me. Sometimes I even heard her whispering on the phone about me not helping her.
I was lying on the couch feeling sorry for myself watching TV, which had become my usual routine. I was flipping channels and there were commercials on all of the local channels. I was so frustrated with that bullshit. It was crazy that we paid for cable every month and there wasn’t ever shit on TV that I wanted to watch. I settled on Channel 4. Just in time to catch the news coming on. I decided to find out what was going on in the world since I had become a recluse. I was staring at the TV in a daze when I saw the headline flash the words Breaking News.
I didn’t budge and it didn’t make me sit up or alarm me at all because in the Tidewater area there was always breaking news. I watched as a female reporter flashed on the screen and started speaking.
I’m Carolyn Thomas and we have breaking news today. The police report that the body of a sixteen-year-old female teenager was found today in the woods near Highway 3. Investigators report that the girl’s body had been severely mutilated and confirmed that it is evident the girl was pregnant prior to her death. Police say it looks like the girl suffered a botched cesarean section prior to her death. Police are not releasing any information about the fetus or whether or not a fetus was recovered with the girl’s body. Sources also report the girl may have been homeless or a runaway. They are trying to identify the girl and determine if anyone had reported her missing. Police are asking that if anyone has any information about this girl or any information that could lead to her killer or the whereabouts of her baby, please call 1-800-CRIMESTOPPERS.”
I was sitting on the edge of the sofa when I heard the story. But when I saw the police sketch of the missing girl, for some reason her face was familiar to me that my heart started racing like I knew the girl personally. I swallowed hard and jumped up off the sofa. It had struck me like lightning. I just knew I had seen her before. I raced into my bedroom to find my pocketbook. Something told me the dead girl was in some way connected to that fucking shelter where Dr. Gavin and Duke were running that baby scam.
“The fucking pictures I took from the condo,” I whispered as I frantically turned my pocketbook upside down and let everything fall on my bed. I started sifting through the stuff on the bed as if I was crack fiend trying to find the smallest amount of crack to keep the high going.
“Finally,” I whispered. I grabbed the papers and pictures I had taken out of Duke’s desk at the condo. With my hands shaking, I shuffled through them one by one. My heart was throbbing rapidly. I looked at the first picture. It wasn’t the girl that was shown on the news. For some reason, I felt kind of relieved. I flipped to the next picture. No luck. The second picture wasn’t the girl either. I let out a long sigh, but my heart was still beating as if I had run around a track.
Ok, I was starting to think I was just crazy and wrong. I kept flipping through the pictures though. When I got to the third picture, my eyes popped open wide and I dropped the entire stack of pictures as if I had been bitten by a snake. A cold chill shot down my spine and an eerie feeling overcame my entire body. My stomach knotted up. I put my hand over my mouth to keep myself from screaming.
I knew I had seen the girl shown on the news before and I was right. I had to be sure. I bent down and slowly picked the picture back up. I could hardly look at it good my hands were trembling so badly. I stared at the picture a good long while. There was no mistaking it. I was positive the sketch of the girl on the news was identical to the picture I had in my hand. I turned it over and read the back.
“Bastard,” I gritted. Dr. Gavin had listed the girl’s height, weight, eye color, hair color, nationality, expected due date and the sex of the baby she was carrying.
“These muthafuckas killed this poor girl and stole her fucking baby,” I said to myself.
Duke and Dr. Gavin had probably sold the girl’s baby before the baby was even ready to be born.
I was spooked to say the least. I kept looking at the girl’s picture. She was a pretty little girl and she looked like she was of mixed heritage. I could only imagine how much money Duke must’ve gotten for what must’ve been a very pretty baby from the girl. The news reporter said it looked like the girl had suffered from a botched C-section. I couldn’t even imagine the pain she must have suffered while Dr. Gavin cut on her and took the baby. I prayed he at least knocked her out before he did the procedure.
I couldn’t concentrate or anything. “Damn, I don’t know what to do.” That was slowly becoming my thing, talking aloud to myself. How would I be able to live with myself knowing that I may have information about that poor girl and not turn it in? On the second hand, I had stolen the paperwork from Duke, which meant I would have to turn him in and I might implicate myself since I had spent his illicit money. So much shit was running through my head.
I paced around the apartment trying to wait for Diamond to get home. She would be my voice of reason . . . she always was. She would tell me the truth about whether going to the police with the information was a good idea or not. I knew if I went to the police they would have a lot of questions about how I got the pictures. Then they might try to implicate me for knowing about the illegal adoption shit and not reporting it. But then again, I hadn’t done anything wrong.
These thoughts went back and forth in my mind like a ping pong match. I tried to weigh the pros and cons of turning Duke in, but I was way too nervous to reason. “He would be totally done if I did that.”
Suddenly a light bulb went off in my damn head. This missing girl was going to be exactly what the fuck I needed to get back at Duke for how he treated me. If I could help the police tie the girl to Duke, he really would be done. His little life with his new wife and all of his money would be over. His damn face would be splashed all over the news. He would suffer the humiliation I suffered when he constantly dissed me in public. All of a sudden I felt a mixture of fear and excitement.
I had to call Diamond. I didn’t care what she was doing, I wanted to tell her about this. I needed her to ride with me on this one. If I was going to go to the boys in blue on Duke, I needed a witness just in case something went wrong. Shit, somebody had to live to tell the story. For all I knew Duke might’ve had the entire police department working with him. I mean let’s face it, he had enough money to buy the city, why not pay off a few cops.
I picked up my cell and dialed Diamond’s number. It was ringing. “C’mon girl, pick up the
damn phone . . . pick up dammit. I need you right now,” I mumbled as I paced the floor of my bedroom with my nerves standing on end.
Diamond finally picked up her phone. I was happy for a few seconds. I crinkled my face because my ears were immediately assailed by all of the loud rap music in the background.
“Diamond! Go some place quiet! I need to speak to you about something very important!” I screamed into the phone. I don’t even know why she would try to answer her phone inside the club with the music blaring. Diamond was laughing hysterically like something I was saying was funny. She kept laughing but at least the background noise finally got quieter. I assumed she went outside or downstairs in the club’s dressing room.
“Wassup!” Diamond yelled into the phone. I had to pull the phone from my ear she had screamed so loud. I guess she still couldn’t hear me as clearly as I could hear her.
“Diamond, I need to talk to you about something real important,” I huffed. This bitch started laughing again. “Diamond! I’m not joking! What are you laughing at?” I yelled at her.
“Ok . . . ok. I’m serious now,” Diamond slurred. I was too anxious to tell her what I knew to even pay attention to her slurring words and constant laughing.
“Girl, listen . . . have you heard about a sixteen-year-old girl that went missing?” It probably was a stupid question because Diamond never watched the news, but I figured maybe she heard something on the streets about it.
She told me she hadn’t heard anything. I told her what I had just seen on the news. “Diamond, I swear I think that girl was one of those girls that Duke and that creepy fucking doctor had down at the shelter. Remember what we talked about . . . you know the baby snatching ring,” I explained to Diamond. She was quiet for a minute.
Cheaper to Keep Her (part 1) Page 12