The tears fell from my eyes even harder.
Once again, I had been bested by Duke Carrington.
At least for now.
Cheaper to Keep Her Unique
Chapter 28—A Diamond Is Forever
After the call I had a pounding headache.
Understandably I felt like shit. I had let my best friend down. I could only hope and pray Duke didn’t kill her. Of course that was a stupid thought on my part. All the shit he had done and I was blind to how ruthless Duke Carrington really was. I loved a relentless, ruthless fool who was more criminal than businessman. And now, that fact finally hit me and didn’t escape me. He had the acumen of a crude businessman coupled with the undying coldness of a ruthless criminal. A deadly damn combination.
I was truly lost for a solution. Waiting was all I could do and it was absolutely killing me inside. I had been up almost twenty-four hours waiting to hear back from Duke and his little goons that had kidnapped Diamond. I had cried until I was literally out of tears. I had also tried to call Diamond’s phone back several times but it was going straight to voicemail, which left me with an ominous feeling in the pit of my stomach. I figured maybe reasoning with Duke was what I needed to do. If he had agreed to just let Diamond go, I would give him his shit back and call it fair. That was a big fucking pipe dream. I knew Duke didn’t want to hear anything from me at this point.
I had fucked up. I couldn’t let sleeping dogs die . . . now my best friend was going to die for my selfishness and pride.
As I waited to hear back from them, Brian showed up at the apartment. He came in with a key and scared the shit out of me. He didn’t speak because that’s just how things were between him and me. He headed straight for Diamond’s room.
“She’s not in there,” I called out to him. I had no choice but to put my differences aside and speak to Brian. I busted out crying. Brian came back in the living room and looked at me strangely.
“What’s up?” he asked, his face in a scowl.
Inside, I was scared as shit. As much as I despise this man, he was the love of Diamond’s life and I was the reason they may not ever be together again. But I had to woman up.
“Somebody got Diamond!” I blurted out. It felt real good to tell somebody about what was going on. I needed to get it off my chest. I was very happy to see Brian for the first time since we’d met.
“What the fuck you mean somebody got Diamond?” he asked with much attitude. He disliked me just as much I did him. I swallowed hard when he yelled at me.
“Me and Diamond was gonna . . . well . . . I was gonna,” I tried to get the words out but they were stuck. I couldn’t speak or look at Brian. He grabbed me by my shoulders and shook me hard. That made me cry even harder.
“What the fuck is you trying to say Lynise? What the fuck you talking ’bout right now?” he urged, shaking my shoulders frantically. I was crying so hard I was hyperventilating. Brian pushed me down on the couch so I could try to calm down.
“Yo, I’m fucking listening!” he growled, standing over me as he waited for an answer.
I inhaled deeply and steadied my voice. “They took Diamond because . . . because . . . I was going to blackmail my ex. He killed this girl and I have proof, so me and Diamond was gonna pick up some money tonight and I was gonna give Diamond some of it. But I told her not to stay here by herself last night. I just don’t know what happened! I don’t know how they got her! I’m sorry!” I was rambling like a fool and I knew Brian couldn’t make heads nor tails about what I was talking about.
Between my tears, I told Brian more about what was going on. Afterwards, I cried some more. The tears wouldn’t stop.
“Yo, who is it? I will murder a nigga right now!” Brian gritted, moving around the room as if he could kill somebody right then and there.
“No! You can’t go after them or go to the cops or they said they will kill her!” I pleaded frantically.
“How they gon’ know? I’m saying they got my girl, what the fuck I’m supposed to do, just sit around here and do shit,” he huffed.
I was shaking my head left to right. I had to make Brian understand just how serious this was. He couldn’t play tough guy in this situation.
“I have to wait until they call me and tell me what to do next. I’m sure they want the pictures and the paperwork back. I think once I give it back they will let Diamond go. Fuck the money.” Honestly, I didn’t know if they even wanted the pictures back or if they were just going to kill Diamond to teach me a lesson.
“You really think it’s gon’ be that easy? If they real niggas, they ain’t just gon’ let her go like that!” Brian screamed on me. “I’ma call her phone,” he said defiantly.
“No, please Brian! Give them a chance to call me because if they think I told you they might hurt her,” I begged him.
I could see him thinking. That was a good thing.
“Fuck!” Brian screamed, throwing his own cell phone against the wall. That was exactly how I felt as well. Brian and I sat in silence for the next two hours. He would get up, peep out the window and come back and sit down again. I was so tired my insides hurt, but I refused to go to sleep for fear that I’d miss their call or Brian would call and make things worse.
I got up to use the bathroom and that was when I noticed something sticking under the door. I walked over, picked it up and examined it. It was a manila envelope. The handwriting was horrible but readable:
A DIAMOND IS FOREVER.
I clutched it tightly. Somebody had come right to the fucking apartment door, which caused a chill to shoot down my spine. “Brian,” I said quietly, barely audible. I waved the envelope in my trembling hands.
He rushed over to me and snatched the envelope from me. I pointed to the door to alert him where it had come from. Brian pulled a pistol out of his waistband and rushed to the door. He snatched it open and peeped outside. Then he stepped out and whirled around with his gun in his hands.
“Fucking cowards!” he hollered and came back into the apartment. He ripped open the envelope and slid out the contents.
“Awww!” Brian cried out when he examined the contents. I put my hands over my mouth and the tears flowed in buckets once again. I could see it was pictures in Brian’s hand. I could tell by his face it wasn’t good. I snatched the pictures and looked at them. No lie, I swear I felt my heart seize. A tight feeling came over my entire body and I imagined that’s what people who had heart attacks felt like.
“Aggghhhh!” I screamed, dropping the pictures onto the floor as if they had burned me or something. I looked down at them again through tear-filled eyes. Diamond was naked and tied to a chair. Her face was completely covered with blood and I could tell her hair had been haphazardly cut. One of the pictures was a close up of the blood on her face and the cuts and bruises on her body. It looked as if they had been beating her for days, instead of hours. I knew I had to act fast. From the looks of it, there was no way Diamond could withstand much more of what they had already done to her.
“Ohhhh, Diamond!” I cried out. “I’m so sorry I got you into this.”
Before I could say another word, my cell phone rang. It was Diamond’s cell. I showed the screen to Brian and told him to be quiet by putting my finger up against my lips.
“Hello?” I gulped, swallowing back tears and snot.
“I guess you and your company know we’re serious now, huh?” the computer-generated voice stated.
“Please! Take me. She has nothing to do with this,” I pleaded.
“It’s too late to think about that now. You have twenty minutes to get to the women’s homeless shelter. I’m sure you know which one, since you seem to know a lot. You need to be alone. There will be two pregnant girls in the front. They have something for you. Pick it up and wait for further instructions.” The line went dead.
I looked at Brian, my eyes filled with tears. I didn’t even think about the fact they knew he was there.
I was fully focused on following their
instructions to get Diamond out of this.
Cheaper to Keep Her Unique
Chapter 29—If I Should Die
I practically argued with Brian convincing him he couldn’t go to the woman’s homeless shelter. He didn’t want to listen to reason. He was ready to go wherever with guns blazing.
“Do you want her to die without even letting me try to get her released?” I screamed at him.
Finally, after about ten minutes of arguing I was able to get through to his stubborn ass. I was confident if they saw him with me they would do something even crazier to Diamond. Brian told me I could use his car to go to the shelter. He told he was going to have one of his boys pick him up and he would meet me back at the apartment later. All the time I spent hating him, I was now happy to have his ass around. Brian was like a man apart when he found out about what was going on with Diamond.
Maybe he did actually love her.
I took his keys and we left the apartment together. He walked me to his car and told me to call him as soon I could.
“Brian, if I should d-d-d-die,” I paused. Just the thought sent chills through my body. “What they want is in my room. It’s hidden real good. You’ll find it eventually if you look.”
He nodded and I got into his car. I began backing out of the parking spot and left Brian standing on the curb waiting for his friend to pick him up. I looked down at the stick shift to put the car into drive when suddenly I heard a BOOM BOOM! Two loud cannon sounding shots explored in the parking lot. I jumped fiercely.
I grew up in the hook. I knew the sound of guns. This was the real deal. These shots sounded close. My eyes went as wide as marbles when I saw Brian’s body shrink to the ground. He was laid out in front of his car on the concrete.
“Oh my God!” I screamed. I started shaking all over again. Barely able to catch my breath, I wheeled the car around and the tires started screeching. I was trying to get the fuck out of there. I sped out of the parking lot like a mad woman and as I eased onto the highway my phone started ringing again. I was scared as hell to answer it. But I was also scared of what might happen if I didn’t answer it. I reached down and picked it up, keeping my other hand on the steering wheel.
“You just had an innocent person killed,” the same computerized voice said. “Matter of fact, you were the one to kill him. Now I guess you will listen to the instructions you are given.”
I just sobbed into the phone. I couldn’t speak. I was damaged. I was a bitch. I was a complete fuck up. If I could rewind back to the day I met Duke, I would just walk away and don’t fall for the hokey doke. It was the same hokey doke that had gotten my best friend’s beaten and possibly killed and her boyfriend shot.
I had gotten myself and Diamond into this shit. It was up to me to get us out of this shit.
I drove like a bat out of hell to the shelter as I was instructed to do. When I got there, I saw the two pregnant girls the voice said would be there standing outside. Then the phone rang again. I answered right away.
“Put them both in the car and drive them around the block two times and then bring them back,” the irritating computer-generated voice commanded me. “No matter what you have to do to get them in the car, you better do it. Diamond’s life depends on it.”
Even though the voice was disguised, it still came across as pure evil. What the fuck kind of crazy demands is this bastard giving me now! I thought to myself. I put the car in park and got out. I walked up to the girls and told them they needed to come with me. One girl handed me an envelope and looked as if she was scared to death because when she extended her hand with the envelope it was very unsteady from shaking so badly.
Both girls were very big and obviously far gone in their pregnancies. “Ya’ll have to come with me in the car,” I said to them. One girl started to cry as if on cue. I looked at this bitch as if she was crazy.
“I’m not going! No . . . please! I can’t go through that again! Please just leave me alone!” she cried out.
I was shocked by her reaction, but I had a mission to complete and if I had to fuck this little girl up, I was prepared to do it.
“Look, I’m not trying to hurt you, but if you don’t get in this fucking car, something is going to happen to my friend. I’m not about to let that shit happen so I’m asking you to just get your ass in the car!” I told the girl forcefully.
She wouldn’t budge. I grabbed that bitch by arm and started pulling her.
“No! Please!” she screamed at the top of her lungs.
“Why the fuck are you acting crazy?” I screamed, dragging her forward.
She was resisting as if she thought I was taking her to a slaughterhouse. Maybe she did think that, judging by what Duke and Dr. Gavin had going on. The other girl started crying too but she was going towards the car on her own, although reluctantly.
“Why are ya’ll crying? I don’t know what they told you about me but I’m not down with them! Now, just make this shit easy and get the fuck in the car!” I gritted on these bitches.
I was sweating now. I began pulling that bitch with all my might. Finally, she started dragging her feet towards the car. She got in. Once I was back behind the steering wheel, I drove around the block twice like I had been instructed to do. Then I got another call telling me to drop both of the girls back off at the shelter, but this time at the back door. When I pulled back up, two big strapping men came and grabbed the girls out of the car. The girls were screaming again, even worse than before. I felt horrible inside. One of the men came over to the window and handed me another envelope that looked similar to the one that was slid under the door.
My heart skipped a beat. The last time I opened an envelope I saw pictures of Diamond. What the fuck is it now? I thought to myself. I ripped it open and pulled out more pictures. I stared at the images and banged my fists on the steering wheel. I was finally able to figure out what they were trying to do now. The tables had been turned.
This time the finger was pointing directly at me.
The phone rang again. I wanted to take that shit and throw it out of the window. Instead, I thought about Diamond and I hesitantly picked up the phone.
“How do you like seeing yourself kidnapping young, homeless pregnant girls?” the computerized voice asked. I just closed my eyes. These muthafuckas were playing hardball now.
“Two can play your game. So I guess we have to arrange for you to turn over the pictures and documents back to us. When you do that, you can have the images of yourself, you can get your best friend back, and you can be cleared of murdering her boyfriend.”
“When can we do this meeting? I just want out of this,” I cried into the phone.
The computerized voice laughed. The computer device made the laugh sound shrilled in my soul and it unnerved me. “I find that funny. Now you don’t want to play the blackmail game anymore?”
I bit down into my jaw and put my head down on the steering wheel. I just wanted my life back, the life of a low paid bartender trying to get ahead. The simple life I had before I ever met Duke Carrington. A life I would never complain about again.
“No, I just want to move on . . . everybody just move on and forget this ever happened,” I croaked out.
“That will never happen. It’s time for new beginnings. Go back to the apartment and wait to hear from us again,” the voice instructed.
“Let me speak to Diamond,” I demanded, I wanted to know she was still alive before I did anymore of their bullshit biddings. But the phone line went dead. I slammed my fists on the steering wheel again.
This was the first time in a while I had to admit I was in way over my head.
Cheaper to Keep Her Unique
Chapter 30—Regrets
I was both physically and emotionally drained as I drove back to my apartment complex as I had been instructed.
When I pulled into the complex, I could barely maneuver the car to a parking spot because of the police and emergency vehicles haphazardly parked all over the area. There wa
s a crowd standing behind a cordoned off area. The crime scene was because of Brian’s shooting. I hadn’t forgotten about Brian but I was somewhat surprised by the scene. I was so scared to get out of the damn car for fear that whoever shot Brian would shoot my ass too.
“Fuck!” I cursed as I looked around. Here I was pulling the fuck up in a dead man’s ride. When I went to get out of the car I noticed a couple of guys I remembered seeing Brian with standing behind the crime scene tape. As soon as they spotted his car, I could see them squinting to see who was pulling up and getting out of Brian’s car. They eyed me evilly but didn’t say anything or bring any attention to me.
I wanted to tell the police what happened so desperately but I couldn’t chance it. I was almost one hundred percent sure that Duke would have somebody out there ready to snipe my ass if I even tried. The cops weren’t letting anybody go up the staircase closest to my apartment door. I had to go all the way on the other side of the complex, walk up the far side staircase and walk across the little tiers outside of the apartments in order to get back to my place.
I went inside, bolted my door and went straight to my bedroom. I flopped on my bed and just balled out crying some more. Duke had made me shed some fucking tears over these past few months for sure. I was thinking of all kinds of ways I was going to get revenge on his ass. I just had to get Diamond free first. I lay on my bed waiting for the next call to come.
Every now and then I would get up to see if the police had cleared the crime scene yet. One of the times I was looking out the window, I suddenly heard knocking on the apartment door. I swallowed a lump of fear that had lodged in my throat from the banging. I wasn’t trying to answer the damn door. By now, not only was Duke going to be after me, Brian’s friends were now wondering for sure what role I played in his murder. It wasn’t a secret in Virginia Beach that I despised Brian. But I don’t know how they could think I would just murk the nigga for no reason. I’m sure his people didn’t want to go to the police on me, because the ’hood had its own set of laws and number one on the list was no snitching. They’d rather take care of my ass themselves. They would have to join the growing list of people after me.
Cheaper to Keep Her (part 1) Page 16