by Carver Pike
“The guy you moved up here with,” Gabe answered.
He didn’t know why he said it. It just came out. He was going through the motions, trying to figure out where to lead this conversation. Trying to talk to someone who looked exactly like the person she wasn’t, who thought he was someone he wasn’t, but looked exactly like he was, was pretty damned confusing.
“You mean Chuck? Belgrave’s brother?” Alleycat asked.
“Yeah,” Gabe said, happy that this seemed to make some sort of sense to her. “I thought you guys were together.”
Alleycat stared at Gabe as if he’d lost his mind. She stood with her hands on her hips, watching him like a hawk. He could tell she was becoming suspicious. She wagged her finger at him in a threatening gesture as she spoke.
“Are you doing that Coral shit again? You’re fucked up, aren’t you?”
“No, I…”
“You know Belgrave slit Chuck’s throat. That’s what it is, isn’t it? You’re scared of Belgrave. He killed Chuck so that he could have me and you’re afraid that he’ll do the same to you if he catches you.”
Gabe was losing this battle. He needed to dig deep within himself and find the strength and anger that Cutter would have, because he sensed that he was starting to come across as a puss.
“Hell, no! Fuck Belgrave! You’re my woman and I’ll tell him that shit to his face if you want me to!” Gabe yelled.
He turned and headed towards the door. He yanked it open, but Alleycat was quickly on him. She threw her body against the door, slamming it closed.
“Cutter, no! He’ll kill you. Don’t be crazy.”
She laughed, leaning her head back while she licked her bottom lip and pulled him close.
“You would do it though, wouldn’t you? For me. I like that jealous rage in you. It’s sexy.” She kissed him and shoved him backwards onto the bed.
***
Downstairs in one of the back offices, Belgrave sat with his fedora tilted to one side on top of his head, exposing a large pink scar where he’d once been hit with a tire iron in a fight. He was Italian and tough and had the scars to prove it.
Belgrave, a large, muscular man, was in his early forties. He always wore a black, sleeveless cargo vest to show off his tattooed arms and black cargo pants tucked into his combat boots. A cigar hung from his mouth. He pulled the cigar out to blow smoke.
Sitting across from Belgrave was a younger, timid-looking Hispanic man named Ellio. He grinned nervously at Belgrave.
“Not bad, right? I got them from Cuba when I was on the other side of the mirror,” Ellio said, still waiting for Belgrave’s approval.
Belgrave merely raised a corner of his mouth in a grin.
“Did you gut that pig while you were over there?”
“Of course, man. Right in front of his family,” Ellio said proudly. “I told him. You don’t fuck with Belgrave and then disappear through the mirror. You fuck with Belgrave and you just disappear, forever, like this, and then stick, stick, stick.”
He sat back in his chair and laughed as he pretended to stab someone.
There was a knock at the door and Belgrave sat up in his chair. It wasn’t often that someone had the nerve to interrupt him when he was in the middle of a meeting.
“Come in,” Belgrave growled.
Riker, a tough and mean Irishman with spiked red hair and a freckled face, entered the room wearing his shoulder harness and two pistols. He was holding on to the young prostitute’s neck.
“This girl said she needs to talk to you,” he said. “I tried to tell the bitch you were in a meeting, but she swore you’d want to know what she has to say.”
Belgrave gestured for the girl to step closer to his desk. “Ellio,” he said as he then shoed the man away.
“Rana. You look lovely. What is it, doll?”
“I thought you might want to know that…that Cutter is here,” Rana told him.
Belgrave threw his chair back and stood up. He reached out and grabbed Rana by her throat.
“Cutter’s here? In my house?” he asked.
“Upstairs, with Mrs. Alleycat,” Rana said, her face turning purple.
Belgrave let go and threw her to the floor. He reached down to his desk, picked up his gun, and cocked it.
***
In Alleycat’s room, she had Gabe’s hands pinned above him on the bed. She was straddling him, fully clothed, but obviously not planning to stay that way for long. She kissed his lips and then slid down to his neck where she lightly nipped at his flesh.
Gabe’s eyes were closed. He was enjoying the moment, too much, he realized. What was he doing? Well, what any man would of course, but he was there for a reason…whatever that reason was.
More importantly, his mind kept going back to Lisa, sweet Lisa. Lisa, who held his hand as they traveled through all of the dangerous places on the dark side. Lisa, who knew so much about him and cared so much for him. Lisa, whom he’d started to care so much about.
He had started to notice everything about Lisa, and he realized as Alleycat was preparing to devour him that he needed to do the honorable thing, if he felt as strongly as he thought he did about Lisa.
Alleycat reached down to tug on Gabe’s zipper.
“What’s wrong with you?” she asked, when he stared off into space.
“I don’t think I can do this right now,” Gabe said.
He looked up at her and almost reconsidered. She was so erotic and so gorgeous. Why did his mind keep drifting back to Lisa?
“What do you mean, you can’t?” she asked angrily.
Suddenly there was a banging on the door and a woman’s voice.
“Mrs. Alleycat! Belgrave’s on his way up here! He looks mad!”
“Shit!” Alleycat stood and straightened out her dress. “We can’t do this right now. Go out the window. I’ll send a message to your friends.”
Gabe made his way over to the window, lifted it up, and looked nervously down at the dark alleyway below.
“What? You act like you’ve never climbed out of this window before,” Alleycat said with a laugh.
“When can I see you again?” he asked.
“At the Vulkner Theater, tomorrow night, before my show. Meet me in my dressing room at eight.”
“What about Belgrave?”
“He hates my shows. He wouldn’t be caught dead watching me sing.”
She snatched her cape off the back of a chair and wrapped it over her shoulders.
“It’s not my singing he’s interested in.”
Loud banging on the door signaled that it was time for Gabe to climb out the window. Any nervousness he’d felt before was overridden by his lack of wanting to die at the hands of the maniac beating the door down.
“Tomorrow,” Alleycat said once more as Gabe climbed through the window.
***
“Alleycat! Open this fuckin’ door before I blow it off its fuckin’ hinges,” Belgrave yelled from the other side.
Alleycat ran to the door and yanked it open, throwing her arms around the man’s thick neck.
“Well ain’t you the big bad wolf tonight. Big bad wolf came to play with his woman?” she teased.
Belgrave practically tossed her into the wall as he shoved his huge frame into the room. Riker was right behind him with his gun out and waving around the room.
“Where is he?” Belgrave asked.
“I haven’t had a customer all night,” Alleycat lied. “I have a headache and haven’t been in the mood to entertain. If you’re wantin’ a little somethin’ somethin’ maybe I can put the headache aside.”
Belgrave raised a hand, preparing to backhand her.
“I told you once before. You fuckin’ lie to me and they’ll have to wire your fuckin’ jaw back together. Now I’m gonna ask you once more. Where’s Cutter?”
Alleycat was a great liar. She knew her shocked expression was priceless. She practically fell back onto the bed.
“Cutter’s here?” she asked.
“You better tell me right now if that son of a bitch is in this building!” Alleycat yelled.
“Calm down,” Belgrave warned her.
“You know what that fucker did to me! Is he here in this building?”
She could tell Belgrave believed her. There was hardly a man alive that could remain angry with her, especially when she showed a little cleavage. Alleycat did just that, adjusting her top so that her boobs were practically right in Belgrave’s face.
“If you see that son of a bitch you better kill him,” she told Belgrave as she started to walk out of the room.
“I think that Rana girl was full of shit,” Riker said. “I think maybe she was just lookin’ to take Mrs. Alleycat’s position here as head mistress if and when Mrs. Alleycat might have been retired.”
“Rana?” Alleycat said under her breath.
Alleycat walked out of the room and Belgrave followed. She stopped and looked back at Riker, who seemed to be investigating the room. He looked down at her bed and then over at the window. When he started to peek out the window, she let him have it.
“Hey, get the fuck out of my room,” she ordered.
Riker shrugged his shoulders and did as he was told. Belgrave laughed under his breath.
“You better do as the lady says,” he warned.
Alleycat waited for Riker to exit before she followed them out. She wanted to laugh out loud at the stupidity of men. She knew Belgrave was satisfied that his woman wouldn’t be caught dead in the arms of Cutter.
She was pleased with her act, even if she had to allow him to speak to her the way he did. She stood at the banister and watched as Belgrave and Riker made their way back down to the office.
She might have remained calm and collected on the outside, but inside, she was fuming. It had taken every ounce of humility within her to allow Belgrave to talk to her the way he did. She’d considered spilling her guts and letting the Guido know how she really felt about him.
She’d never been in love with Chuck. She wasn’t even sure that she knew what love was. Chuck was simply the vehicle that drove her to the opera house. She had to admit that there was something interesting about Belgrave at first. She enjoyed watching the tough guy knock his little brother around.
Chuck never was good at defending himself, and the first time he’d tried was when he caught Belgrave groping her in the bathroom. Chuck had only punched Belgrave once in the back of the head when Belgrave turned around and stuck his knife into Chuck’s throat. That had ended their relationship, and begun hers with the Italian macho man downstairs.
Alleycat stood at the top of the landing and watched as a huge black man dressed in women’s clothing drank with his friends. They didn’t seem like the type she was used to seeing Cutter with. In fact, she wasn’t used to seeing him with anyone.
Cutter didn’t have many friends. Anyone he liked he seemed to eventually kill. His relationships were weird that way. “Softness is weakness,” he’d once told her just before he killed a man she was about to sleep with. Cutter never seemed to understand that she was a prostitute. She’d been one when they dated in Darkar, she was still one when she accompanied her boss, Chuck, to the Slums. And she remained one to this day.
As she watched the party going on down below, one of Alleycat’s girls passed, and she reached out and grabbed the girl by her arm.
“Laci, do me a favor. Go tell the black man in drag that they should meet our mutual friend in the alley out back.”
Laci didn’t argue. No one argued with Mrs. Alleycat. Even Alleycat wasn’t sure when her reputation began, but it seemed to start right around the time she choked a fellow prostitute with razor wire. The girl had cheated her out of a sale and Alleycat simply wasn’t having that go on in her house.
She watched as Laci approached Haylay and whispered in his ear. Haylay quickly gathered the Hispanic man, the bald white man, his female companion, and the strange skinny man with the beard. They exited the opera house with a purpose.
She laughed as she realized that even this group of people who traveled with Cutter seemed to be afraid of him. They practically ran out the door when they found out he was waiting for them. Ha.
As she giggled to herself, fate seemed to intervene. Having no idea that she’d been ratted out by Riker, Rana walked behind Alleycat. She didn’t say a word. She didn’t have to. Alleycat sensed her approach and nonchalantly removed the cape from her shoulders.
“Hey Rana,” she said.
Rana stopped and walked over to Alleycat. She passed Alleycat a fake smile, but Alleycat wasn’t smiling.
“You know you fucked up, right?” Alleycat asked.
Rana pretended she had no idea what she was talking about.
“Excuse me? What do you mean, Mrs. Alleycat?”
“Never mind,” Alleycat said with a smile.
As Rana walked away, Alleycat wrapped her cape around the other woman’s neck and yanked. Rana was moving too fast to grab hold of anything. Alleycat swung her over the edge of the railing and tossed her out over the crowd gathered below.
Rana screamed and fell onto one of the poker tables. Her body smashed through the wood, but it was the chair pushed under it that did the most damage. Rana’s neck hit the chair and snapped. Her lifeless body rolled onto the floor.
Everyone around watched, interested for a moment. They looked up at Alleycat and then their short attention span got the best of them and they continued with their party. No one moved Rana. They stepped over her and continued on.
Alleycat sneered and laughed a little under her breath. Finally, the bouncers dragged Rana’s body away. She watched as Belgrave stepped out of his office, stared over at Rana’s body and then looked up at her.
She flashed him a smile and a gentle wave. He shook his head, laughed and returned to his office. She could almost hear him swearing under his breath about the money they’d lose with one less girl.
Chapter 7 – The After Party
Gabe was hunkered down in the shadows when Haylay led the others around the alleyway corner. They were all a bit tipsy from their short stint at the bar, and seemed to be in better spirits, all except Lisa. She kicked at a puddle like a sad little girl who hadn’t gotten her way.
As soon as he saw her, Gabe walked right over to her. She was still looking down when he wrapped his arms around her, grabbed her and kissed her passionately. All of their handholding and flirtatious glances had built up and he knew now that nothing in the world, not even Allie, could stop him from being with her. She was surprised by the erratic change in his behavior.
“Wha…” she tried to get out from in between his lips, but he silenced her with another kiss.
Finally, Gabe pulled away and grabbed the belt loop on her pants to pull her body close to his.
“I missed you,” he told her. “It’s you now. It’s just you.”
“Wow,” was all she could get out. “What happened in there?”
“Allie tried to seduce me,” Gabe admitted.
“Oh,” she said, disappointed. She stared down at her feet again. “Was it all you hoped it would be?”
“All I could think about was you,” he said.
“You were with Allie and all you could think of was me? Yeah, right,” she said.
For a second the old Lisa seeped through. He saw the goofiness that he missed, the kid sister in her. She backed away from him, but he pulled the belt loop again, pulling her body into his.
“Really. You’re it,” he said.
The confused look on her face told him she needed more convincing.
“Okay, I hate to interrupt, but this ain’t exactly the best place to be smoochin’ and shit,” Haylay said.
Gabe and Lisa parted, and when they did, Lisa had a hard time making eye contact with him. He could sense that she didn’t believe him about the way things went down with Alleycat. Her confidence level as it pertained to winning his affections had always been low, and he coul
d tell that it still was.
Gabe followed Haylay out of the alley and onto the street, with the others hot on his heels. He wanted to get as far away from the opera house as possible. They hadn’t gotten far when Haylay turned and glowered at Gabe.
“I think we’re far enough now for me to say this. Darlin’, whatever’s goin’ on between you and Mrs. Alleycat needs to stop. Fuckin’ with Belgrave will get us all killed.”
Gabe threw his hands up in defense and backed away from Haylay.