by Noire
Her knees were weak and shaky, and she was forced to lean against the wall in order to keep from sliding down into the tub.
“Whew!” she said after a few moments. She looked down at Venus, who was reclining in the warm water with a slight smile on her face.
“That was real good, baby,” Chiney praised her, even though Venus’s head game was nowhere near as good as her jump off Lincy’s neck action. Chiney stared down at her woman with mad admiration. She loved the way her girl’s light-brown coconut-shaped breasts looked as they floated in the soapy water. She hoped Venus was soaking the soreness outta her pussy because she was gonna want her another taste of it real soon. “Are you hungry?” Chiney asked.
Venus shook her head. “Nah, but I’m thirsty and I’m starting to come down though.”
Chiney bent down and pulled the stopper from the drain. The sucking sound of water rushing into the plumbing filled the air.
“What you doing?” Venus murmured.
“Letting the cold water out,” Chiney said. “Just relax. I’m gonna fill it up again and make it warmer.”
Venus lay back as the water swirled down the drain near her feet. The candles flickered and glowed around the room, and the rose petals that Chiney had sprinkled in the tub stuck gently to her beautiful brown skin.
Chiney waited until almost all the water was gone, and then she stopped the tub up and began filling it up again. She poured two capfuls of strawberry-scented bubble bath under the rushing tap, and then stepped out of the bathtub and onto the micro-fiber floor mat.
“I’ll be back,” she said. “I’m gonna go fix us a couple of drinks.” She grabbed a clean towel from the shelf and wrapped it around her body. “You good?”
Lounging sexily with the soapy water filling up the tub, Venus nodded yes.
“Wait!” she said as Chiney’s hand hit the doorknob. “Let me get another hit before you go,” she said.
Chiney reached for the vial they’d been smoking out of, but it was empty. She picked up the pants she’d been wearing and dug into her front pocket and pulled out the last of the dope that she had copped from Fitted that morning.
Chiney studied the small vial. It was stamped with a peculiar logo that said, “Strawberry Snake.” A pink snake was on the front, and it was shaped like the letter “S”. The snake’s tail was curled at the end, and two dice were gripped in the tip like they were about to be rolled. Both dice were showing just one dot, which Chiney knew stood for “snake eyes.” This wasn’t the same Divine Nine stuff she usually copped, but hell, half of it had been free so who was she to complain?
She set up the hit for Venus, placing the pipe on a dry washcloth and putting about a quarter of the glistening crystals in the stem. She handed the whole thing off to her girl, then gave her a lighter and told her to spark up whenever she was ready.
“Save me some,” Chiney said over her shoulder, knowing damn well Venus would prolly try to smoke the whole damn thing up in one blast.
Venus laughed. “Yeah, a’ight.”
“You good?” Chiney asked one more time before she walked out the door.
“Yeah, baby,” Venus said sweetly as she prepared to get her head sparked up. “I’m always good when I’m with you.”
$$$$$
Chiney moved around the kitchen still wrapped in her towel. Humming under her breath, she turned on the small flat-panel television that sat on the counter. A crooked Republican politician was on a talk show talking a bunch of yang, and Chiney shook her head as she listed to his twisted bullshit pitch.
She got two crystal wine glasses off the portable bar and set them near the sink. Then she took a fat lemon out of the refrigerator and rolled and kneaded it until it was soft. She washed it off and sliced the tip off one end and squeezed a little bit of juice into each wine glass.
Back at the bar, she chose a bottle of Puerto Rican rum and poured it until each glass was halfway full. She opened a can of Coca-Cola and poured again until the glasses were almost up to the rim. Then she added a few cubes of ice and sliced the lemon and stuck the pieces onto the edge of the glass.
She arranged the glasses on a sterling silver serving tray that one of Trey’s bitches had given him for his birthday, then rummaged through the fridge and found a hunk of cheddar cheese. She put it on a plate with a couple of grapes and then broke off a corner of the cheese and popped it in her mouth.
Giggling under her breath, Chiney let her towel fall and stood in the kitchen butt naked. Picking up the chocolate colored vibrating dildo she had retrieved from her closet after leaving the bathroom, she positioned it around her pelvis and strapped it on tight with the leather belts and buckles coming to a close on her right hip. Flexing her ass-cheeks in and out, she pretended she was stroking Venus down, getting deep up in that pussy. Nodding in satisfaction at the ten erect inches that stuck out at an angle from her body, Chiney felt more like a man than ever before. She had just picked up the sterling tray to take it to the sexy chick who was waiting for her in the bathroom, when she heard a voice on the television say:
“Breaking news coming to you live from Channel 7, Eyewitness News. Our top story this half hour…a two-year-old child has died after ingesting crystal meth left on a table by her mother. Eyewitness news reporter Martin Solter joins us live from Harlem, New York. Good afternoon, Martin.
“Good morning, Gloria. Yes, a twenty-year-old Harlem mother has just been taken into custody in connection with the suspected drug overdose death of her two-year-old daughter. Earlier today the emergency call center received a 911 call about a woman convulsing and a baby not breathing in an apartment on Eighth Avenue. Officers responded and found the mother overdosing on methamphetamines, and the child in full cardiac arrest. At this hour it’s being reported that the mother’s condition has been stabilized, however, the child was transported to Harlem Hospital where she was pronounced dead. An autopsy will be conducted, but according to authorities the mother admitted the baby may have ingested some crystal methamphetamine that was mistakenly left near her Sippy cup.
As you know, Gloria, the rise in meth usage in Harlem has become a concerning trend, and this is not the first case of an accidental overdose that has been reported after the use of the fashionable pink crystals that seem to be popping up all over the city. And sadly, this particular drug may have attracted the baby because it looks and smells like Strawberry Quik. However, I must add that the two-year-old was also reported to have several burns on her body and at least one broken bone, and child abuse charges may also be filed. We’re live at Harlem Hospital, Martin Solter, Channel 7, Eyewitness News…Back to you, Gloria.”
“Venus!” Chiney screamed as a picture of a meth vial with a Strawberry Snake logo flashed across the television screen. The sterling silver tray she was holding hit the floor and the wine glasses shattered in a thousand tiny pieces.
“Don’t smoke that shit!” Chiney screeched, jetting toward the bathroom with her stiff dildo waving from side to side in front of her. “Don’t smoke no more, Vee! Don’t smoke it!”
Chiney reached the bathroom and flung open the door. The running water had overflowed from the tub and thousands of frothy bubbles were spilling out on the floor. Venus was lounging with her eyes closed and her head propped against the wall. Chiney was already halfway to the tub when she noticed the meth pipe and the empty glass vial floating in the bath water.
“Venus?” Chiney blurted, panic in her voice.
Her feet splashed in warm water as she ran the rest of the way over and placed two fingers on Venus’s face. The girl’s head lolled to the side, and then her chin dropped to her chest like her neck was just a limp spaghetti noodle.
“Venus!!” Chiney screamed. “Venus, Venus, Venus!” Chiney cried as she jumped into the warm tub of overflowing water and cradled her lover in her arms. “Oh baby…baby…my baby…” Chiney wailed at the top of her lungs. Grief and desperation made Chiney’s cries grow even louder, but still Venus could not answer. Venus could not
hear her. Because Venus was no more.
CHAPTER 25
Leaving Mrs. Washington standing in the street, Trey peeled outta his parking spot and left remnants of burnt rubber on the pavement. He ignored Juicy’s questions as he reached behind him and grabbed a bag from the backseat. He had just retrieved it from his safe at the Crossover Center, and there were three loaded gats inside. Two Glocks and a lightweight Ruger five-shooter revolver. Trey had a concealed handgun permit to carry them and his burners were all clean, but if he so much as smelled that little niggah Flex, that fool was gonna be a dead man.
Trey drove down the streets of Harlem passing by tons of corner boys working the drug sectors of Harlem. Some scrambled meth and yay for the G-Spot, others were small factions holding it down for low-level dealers, but the vast majority were young cats just like Maleek had been, out there on the street peddling product for Flex.
For the first time ever Harlem looked like a wasteland to Trey. It was a great big cemetery filled with walking skeletons. When you got right down to it, it was all about the drugs and guns in this town, and every young Black kid walking the streets could expect to die from one or even both of those things.
Ten minutes later Trey pulled into a parking spot down the block from the Three Brothers Funeral Home. He nosed up close behind a FedEx truck and killed his engine, leaving the keys in the ignition. His face was harder than stone as he reached into his gun bag and retrieved the three firearms. He set them on his lap and briefly examined them, then pushed the two semi-automatic pistols down into the waistband of his pants and slid the revolver beneath his seat. And then, for the first time since Mrs. Washington had dropped her bomb on his head, Trey turned and looked at Juicy.
“Stay right here,” he barked on her. “Lock the doors and don’t get out, you hear me?”
Her eyes were wide and solemn as she nodded, and Trey felt his gut clench. He had never taken anybody with him to put in work, especially a female he was digging on so hard, but Trey was way past thinking straight and reasoning right now. He was operating in a blind rage, and the only thing he could see stretched out in front of him was a childhood promise unfulfilled, a racketeering funeral home, and the cold certainty of death.
$$$$$
Shit was getting critical in Flex’s world.
With Maleek dead and Ace and Pluto’s bitch-asses acting flaky with the connect, it was looking like he was gonna have to blast the info he needed outta them fools. Salida’s Grand Re-Opening of the G-Spot was about to be up on them in a minute, and Flex had put in an emergency call to the white boy who was brokering his arms deal, and they had arranged to meet at a pizza shop in Harlem to finalize the details.
This muthafucka better be ready to deliver my tools, Flex fumed inside. It had taken a whole lotta hard scheming, but he had finally constructed a deadly plan that would not only allow him to gain control of the G-Spot, he would also gain a major share of Harlem’s drug trade and finally take his rivals and enemies all the way down to the mat.
“Push this bitch,” Flex told his dun dun Dabu as he climbed into the passenger seat of the white Rolls Royce that sat idling in the funeral home’s parking lot.
Following orders, Dabu backed away from the building and then drove toward the parking lot’s entrance. Both men looked left and saw the FedEx truck that was parked at the curb, and then Dabu whipped the wheel to the right and pulled out into traffic.
Neither man noticed when the FedEx truck pulled out behind them and made an illegal U-turn as the driver rushed to make his next delivery. And they damn sure didn’t notice the mid-sized car as that had been parked behind it, or the tall, beastly-lookin’ dude who had jumped outta the driver’s seat and was now striding purposely through the parking lot and over toward the funeral home’s doors.
CHAPTER 26
Salida was sick as a dog, Monique realized gleefully as she watched her boss-lady vomit up blood in the sink by the bar. Yeah! Hurl, bitch! Hurl! I hope you puke up a whole fuckin’ lung!
Bizzie rushed his swishy-ass over and patted Salida on the shoulder, and then he pressed the back of his hand to her forehead, tryna act like he was some fuckin’ kinda night nurse.
“Ace!” Bizzie’s bitch-ass screeched at the top of his lungs. He looked like a dollar-store RuPaul but not half as cute. “Ace! Salida is sick! I think you better come see about her!”
Monique giggled like a mothafucka as Salida slumped over the sink making nasty sour-stomach-all-up-in-ya-throat noises.
That’s what her ass gets for eating all that cake! Monique rejoiced as she remembered how good it had felt to take a nice long piss in the gooey pink cake batter that she’d sprinkled with a vial of Strawberry Snake.
Salida’s body heaved and trembled as her system fought off the same venom that she had been pushing into the bodies of kids all over New York City for months on end.
“I wonder was it the rat poison or the pee-pee?” Monique muttered under her breath as Salida hit her knees and pressed her cheek to the floor as she moaned and slobbered in pain.
Oh, Monique thought. This bitch was sick all right and she wasn’t fakin’ neither! Anytime a prissy chick like Salida got her uppity ass on the floor in a three-thousand dollar dress then you just knew it was time to call a damn doctor!
And that’s exactly what Ace did as he rushed over and found Salida with her ass tooted up and her face on the ground. By now her body was jerking and shuddering, her nose was dripping blood, and the gut-twisting sounds coming outta her mouth were straight-up pitiful.
It won’t be much longer, Monique thought as she peered around Ace’s fat shoulder and watched Salida wiggle like a dying cockroach. Her face was drenched in sweat and her skin looked gray and soggy.
“Oh, shit!!!” Ace shrieked as he dropped to his knees and cradled Salida’s twitching body in his arms. “Call a fuckin’ ambulance!” he bellowed. “She’s fuckin’ dying over here! Some fuckin’ body dial nine-one-one!”
$$$$$
I couldn’t even find the words that would comfort Trey at a time like this, and something told me it would be useless to even try. The look on his face when Mrs. Washington explained to him how Maleek’s frozen body had fallen out of that casket and hit the ground was simply fuckin’ heart-breaking. I had wanted to reach out and hold him and let the womanly part of my arms bring him some type of relief, but Trey wouldn’t even look at me, and he damn sure wouldn’t answer me when I tried to talk to him.
Matter fact, he had tried to make me get out of his car right there at the Crossover Center, but I had decided on the spot that I wasn’t going no damn where. I knew a lot about grief and rage, and I knew both could make you do some crazy-ass things. So when Trey pulled out into traffic and took off speeding down the streets, I braced myself and made a commitment to stand by his side through whatever was gonna happen next. I didn’t have a clue about where he was going, or what the hell he was planning to do when he got there, but whatever went down I was gonna be his ride-or-die, and my head and my heart were both good with that.
Trey was scary-silent as we drove down the crowded streets. His foot was heavy on the gas and light on the brakes, and I could feel the rage from his soul humming in the vibrations of his whip.
I knew Harlem well, and it didn’t take me too long to figure out what direction we were heading in, but no matter what I said or how much I tried to caution Trey not to rush off into anything, there wasn’t a damn thing I could do as we pulled up behind a FedEx truck just a few feet down from the Three Brothers Funeral Home.
Just thinking about how bad Flex had scared me in that basement apartment underneath all those dead bodies had me shaking in my seat, but I didn’t have time to get too shook because as soon as Trey cut off the engine he turned to me and told me not to get outta the ride.
“Stay here, Juicy,” he said. His voice sounded cold and scary. Every bit of emotion in it was gone. “Lock the doors and don’t get out the car. You hear me?”
I nodded and h
eld my breath as he jumped out the ride and slammed the door, and it was that cold closing sound, like a lid slamming on a casket, that brought out the absolute worst fear in me.
You know Flex is gonna kill him down there, a little voice screamed inside my head as I watched Trey walk into the gated parking lot and head toward the side door where they brought the dead bodies in. Go ’head. Get you one last look at him Juicy ’cause just like Gino, you ain’t never gonna see that man again.
I sat there with my whole body stiff with fear as I watched Trey slip through the doors that I knew led down those steep basement steps. I started counting the seconds that he was gone, and at some point I decided that if he didn’t come back out by the time I counted up to five hundred then I was gonna have to find a way to call his boy Rain, or maybe even call the cops to bust up in there and see what was going on.
In the midst of all the madness five hundred seconds seemed pretty reasonable to me, and I would have counted all the way up that high if I would’ve gotten the chance. But when I saw a small black hatchback pull into the funeral home’s parking lot, and a fly gangsta-sister wearing a short-short mini-skirt got out with a small pistol strapped to each of her thighs, I sat up real straight and watched her like a hawk.
And when she rested her palms lightly on her guns and switched her ghetto booty over to the funeral home doors, then I knew damn well I had to do something and I had to do it real quick.
So I did.
$$$$$
Ordinarily there would be no way in hell that Trey would let a cat sneak up and get the drop on him, but deep in the belly of the home of the dead, these were no ordinary times and this was no ordinary gangsta.
“Sup, Trey. You looking for something?” a familiar voice cooed from behind him as Trey was examining the mega locks on the outer doors of the basement fortress where the leader of the Divine Nine rested.