by N'Tyse
As I waited for Mr. Rockwall at the pizza parlor, I went ahead and ordered a meet lover’s pizza with a couple of slices of garlic toast and a strawberry soda. I was hungry as hell. I hadn’t eaten anything all day, and it was going on seven thirty. The sun had gone down, and the restaurant was unusually crowded for a Wednesday night. I was wearing some of Shun’s old rags, so I hoped Detective Rockwall would recognize me. I had on some ugly green tights that sagged on me and a long T-shirt that covered me like a nightgown.
I spotted the detective the moment he stepped foot inside the place. He was carrying a black briefcase at his side. He started in my direction. I was in the very back, seated near a window.
“I was hoping you hadn’t gotten lost.” I moved the pizza box over to the booth directly behind me since no one was sitting there. He sat down across from me, checking out his surroundings.
“Hey there. Let’s make this quick,” he said. I noticed that he seemed extremely nervous, and every time someone passed by, he would look in another direction, like he was paranoid that they would hear us. He flipped open his briefcase. “We got us a situation.” He took another glance around. “We have some dirty uniforms, and from what I’ve heard, it’s not just a handful that I can pick out. The department is flooded with them. Right now the only person who I can trust, and who knows that I’m here with you right now, is my partner, Detective Lochardt.” He removed a small ziplock bag from his briefcase, along with records and folders. “You see this earring?”
I looked at it closely. It was the same gold hoop earring I remembered Detective Lochardt asking me about. I nodded my head.
“This earring belonged to Jasmine Keshawn Turner, the victim in a homicide a few days ago. This earring was found in your apartment. Now, from the way it looks, Jasmine was murdered in her home.” He looked up to make sure I was following him, and so far I was. “Uh-uh. She was not murdered in her home. She was murdered in yours.” He paused, and I almost fell off my chair.
“What!”
“I know it may sound crazy, but someone murdered her in your home, cleaned the scene, then took her body back to her apartment, and staged the scene to make it look as if she had been murdered there. Jasmine’s autopsy report also confirms that the cause of death was not what was reported. She died from a fatal blow to the back of the head, and not from suffocation or strangulation. The police report said that there was forced entry and that they found her with a pillowcase over her head. Although that is what’s in all the reports, my gut tells me that’s not what happened. Someone is protecting the real killer.”
Now I was lost, and he could tell by the look on my face. “What the hell was she doing in my apartment?” I asked him.
“Apparently, she and Cassandra were quite an item, according to Spliff. You do know Spliff, don’t you?”
I shook my head. Lying through my teeth. I placed a hand on my temple. This was a lot to take in.
“So, now the question remains, if Sand didn’t kill Jasmine, who did?”
“I don’t know. But I know Sand didn’t have anything to do with it.” That was my cue to get the hell up out of there. “I’m sorry, Detective, but I have to get going.” I pushed my chair back, grabbed my purse, and practically hopped out of my seat.
“Rene!”
I stopped in my tracks and turned back in his direction.
“Be careful!”
* * *
I was back at Shun’s house, watching her shampoo her hair in the kitchen sink. “Did you hear what I said, Shun?”
“I hear you. Pass me that towel.”
“So what you think? I mean, there’s just no way.”
“Let them figure the shit out. That’s their job,” she hollered. She towel dried her hair and watched me as I sat in one of her dining room chairs, puzzled, picking my brain.
“Something just ain’t adding up,” I told her.
I grabbed the cordless receiver and punched in Sand’s cell phone number. Still no answer. I had been unsuccessful at trying to reach her by phone. Maybe she had tried calling me. I entered in my own missing cell phone number to check for messages of any kind. It rang, and a woman’s voice completely caught me off guard.
“Sand can’t talk right now. She’s a little tied up.” Click!
Sand
Chyna walked around the room, holding a bat that sort of looked like the one I owned. In fact, it was exactly like mine. “So, you wanna be stubborn? Sand, I can make your life a living hell. Don’t you know that by now? The police are already looking for you. Do you know how much power I have and what the fuck I can do to you? I make muthafuckas disappear off the face of the earth without a trace. I make niggas and hoes lay it down. I’m the bitch running this show. Now, if you don’t wanna get down, I’m gonna have to gon’ and knock ya down.”
I spit out the blood that had filled my mouth. They had already raped me. Now she wanted to torture and beat me to death. She took another home-run swing at my face.
“Owww!”Iyelled. I felt like my jaw had been crushed.
“Aw, did I hurt the poor baby?” This bitch was psychotic. She lifted the bat again, for the third time. I closed my eyes and tightened my body, bracing myself for the pain I knew was sure to come.
Splat! She slammed the bat hard across my belly. I tried to break away, but I was still tied down. She laughed at herself and the marks she had made.
“Damn, my nigga. You fucked up.” She walked around the room, tapping the bat on the floor, watching me howl in pain. “You know, that girlfriend of yours is a sneaky bitch, huh?” She stopped in her tracks to look back down at me.
What the fuck is she talking about?
“If only she had been home that day, I wouldn’t have had to try to cover my tracks,” she said, nearly out of breath.
How is Rene in this? I continued to lie there, helpless and in so much damn pain.
“If she had been there that night,” she continued, “we could have leveled things out, and this shit would have been over by now. And that other bitch wouldn’t be six feet under right now.”
My eyes popped open, because I knew she was referring to Jasmine.
She threw the bat in my direction, barely missing my head, and pulled out a sharp-ass blade.
“Chyna, you ain’t gotta do this shit, man,” I pleaded. “That girl didn’t mean shit to me,” I admitted.
I didn’t know what Chyna was about to do to me. She climbed back onto the bed and ran her fingers up and down my blistered arms. I flinched with every shaky move. Her eyes were staring at the picture on my arm. She appeared to be admiring the mini-portrait of Rene. She brought the blade near my arms and pretended to be outlining the tattoo.
“No, no, no. Don’t do this, man.”
She chuckled. “I’m not gonna cut your punk ass. I was just picturing your bitch with that same smile on her face after I rip her ass apart.”
“Come on, Chyna. All the work I pushed for you. Come on. Please leave Rene out of this,” I begged. Although I was still mad at Rene for everything she had done, I couldn’t allow her to pay for my mistakes. I still loved her; that other shit could be dealt with later. I finally gave in. “Whatever you need me to do, I’ll do it. Just don’t fuck with my girl.”
Saying that brought me relief. She smiled a wicked smile. “That’s what I’m talking about. Now, you see, that’s all you had to do from the start.” She hopped off the bed and walked out the door, slamming it behind her. “Fletch,” I heard her say. “Untie the bitch. She finally givin’ me some act right.”
Moments later, the door slowly crept back open. I thought maybe it was Fletch coming in to finish me off. I thought maybe the offer, my life in exchange for Rene’s, was no longer on the table. But it wasn’t Fletch creeping in; it was Peaches. What the hell is she doing here? But then I remembered she worked for Chyna. Therefore, this was her home.
She ran in, watching her back. “Shhh . . . shhh.” She had a towel in one hand and a bottle of water in the other. She
poured a little water on the towel and proceeded to wipe the bloody areas of my face. I moaned. “Shhh. I know it hurts.” Tears sneaked from my eyes. “Come on, Sand. Don’t break, baby. Don’t break. They’re just testing you.”
“What do they want from me?” I asked.
She looked behind her once again, checking to be sure no one could hear us. She whispered, “If I tell you that, they’ll kill me.” She looked sincere.
“Please,” I begged. “Tell me.”
“You know Chyna got hoes out the ass working for her, right?”
I nodded my head.
“Well, it ain’t what ya think. Forget all that shit you think you know. Those hoes working the corners are just cover-ups for what really goes down. The real bitches out working, they ain’t prostituting and tricking her pussy on the streets. There’s a separate clientele that they serve—the rich and the famous.”
I didn’t understand.
Peaches went on. “Yeah, that’s right. Filthy rich white folks. And ain’t nothing like some black pussy with white stuff all on her.”
She stood up, propped her left leg on the bed for balance, and stuffed her fingers inside her vagina. She pulled out what looked like a long, thick glass test tube. It was filled with white powder. “Chyna goes to the extreme with the shit,” she said. “You get the bitch and the high for a nice price. The finer the bitch, the more she has to offer, and the more she costs.”
I was in shock. I wondered if Peaches was telling me the truth, but she had the evidence right in front of me.
“I know you probably wondering how I got down with all this, but I’m gon’ tell you now. You don’t find Chyna. Chyna finds you.” She shoved the glass test tube back in her womanhood like it was a tampon and pulled her skirt back down.
“Well, what category do you fall in?” I asked, still aching from the pain.
“Pttt, there isn’t one for me. I’m just on the payroll.”
When she said that, my doubts about Peaches resurfaced. It was still possible that she was a part of this mess. I just couldn’t figure out how. Right now, I couldn’t trust anyone, including her ass.
“Sand, this ain’t about you. It was never about you. You just kinda got caught in the middle.” That was too hard to believe. She smiled, wiped my face once again, and left the room.
I was dealing with devils here. And if they wanted to dance, they picked the wrong nigga.
Rene
It has been three months and two days since I had been raped. I still had not been able to get Sand off my mind or Vincent. On top of that, Detective Rockwall, who had been trying to help me find Sand, had been found shot to death in a motel room, and all of his case files were missing. I had tried calling his partner, but she no longer worked there. To make matters worse, the new detective who had replaced her acted like she had no idea what I was even talking about. I had asked her about the girl Jasmine who was found dead in her townhome three months ago, and she had told me that the name Jasmine Turner didn’t even ring a bell. I had gone down to the police station to try to get some information in person, and they’d thought I was going crazy.
Obviously, the police would be no help, so I did a little research on my own. There was no death certificate for Jasmine Keshawn Turner. And when I tried to pull up something on her, I got the screen messages no match found and unable to locate. It was like her entire identity had disappeared, like the shit had never even happened.
Next, I tried pulling up Sand’s name in the phone book, and nothing came up. I searched through every public record book I could find, and still there was nothing that would lead me to her. It was like she had vanished, ceased to exist.
I just didn’t understand how my life had got shattered in the blink of an eye. I had been staying with Shun since everything had happened. I knew I was getting on her nerves, pestering her with my problems and worries.
A few days later, my prayers were answered when I received a package in the mail addressed to my eyes only. I hoped it was something from Sand, letting me know she was okay and that she forgave me. I tore at the box, ripping it open as quickly as I could with my bare hands. I dumped everything onto the floor. I picked up an envelope, which had fallen out first. Inside was a letter. I didn’t understand it. It was the exact same letter I had written to Sand. Why would she send me a letter I had written? I flipped it over to look at the back.
Rene,
If you’re reading this, that means you’re okay and in a safe place and I am in trouble somewhere. I will not go into details, because I’m not sure this package has reached you. Call the phone number on the box, and she will tell you everything you need to know. Please trust me.
Still love you,
Sand
I looked on the box, and there was no phone number or return address. There was no postage tracking or anything. I flipped the box over, examining it carefully. What number was she talking about? I looked closer. The fake UPC code was the telephone number. I dashed for the telephone, then dialed the number as quick as I could. A woman answered on the first ring.
“So you received my package?”
“Hello. This is Rene, Sand’s girlfriend. Is something wrong? Where is she?” I asked, crying.
“Hello, Rene. I’ve been anticipating your call. I assure you your girlfriend is fine, just out putting in a little work for me, you could say. But let me just cut to the chase. You know something very valuable and helpful that could keep you and your girlfriend alive.”
What is she talking about?
“All I’m gonna say is this. Meet me tonight, and we can discuss the details.”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t know what you’re talking about. And who are you? You must have me confused with someone else.”
“Oh, no I don’t. I’ll give you a little background about yourself. Let’s see. You worked for Albery Johnson at Johnson and Johnson law firm. You were the receptionist and an underpaid accountant there, although you may have thought that chump change he was paying you was something compared to the other underpaid legal team. I know that you were also in charge of bank deposits, transfers, and withdrawals.”
My face lit up, and my mouth fell open in shock. Where is this bitch going with this?
“I also know that before you left, you snuck a piece of the action. Or do you prefer ‘borrowed it from petty cash’? Hell, I would have done the same thing too, particularly knowing what we both know he was doing to the poor black folk—overcharging us and selling our cases. Now, is that enough research on somebody to say you know them?”
I was quiet and was feeling as though she had too much info on me. Where the hell did she come from, and what problem did she have with me? I had no idea that what I had done so long ago would catch up with me now, especially like this, and from some stranger.
“Now, Rene, I know you are a smart girl, and I know you love Sand. So give me the information I need, and you both can go on with your precious little lives.”
“What if I don’t have what you’re looking for?”
“Don’t worry. You do. Call me when you’re ready to talk about a meeting place.” Click! She hung up just like that.
Oh, my God. Who is that bitch, and what does she want from me? I racked my brain, trying to figure it out. Then I came up with only one reason—the Wilson case. It was the only case that Albery had ever lost in his career as a defense attorney. That case had stirred up more mess in Dallas than CNN could ever broadcast. According to rumors, Albery was paid millions of dollars to lose that case, but I had tried not to get involved in any of that. I had done what I was paid to do—answer phones, make deposits, withdrawals, and transfers. I might have sneaked a little under the table, but it was one time and one time only. Shit. What was ten grand to someone who made triple that amount in his sleep?
Epilogue
“Yeah, I have to up the price a little tonight,” Sand said. The caller on the line didn’t give a damn. He had bought products from Chyna before, and he was what
you called a satisfied customer. He always came back for more. Money was no object for him. “How many you want in there?”
“Uh, surprise me, damn it. My plane just touched down, and I’m horny as fuck. I need to show my man Jermaine here a real good time here in Dallas tonight.”
“I see, I see. Well, you know I’ll make your stay here in the D well worth it. I’ll put you down for the duo special. What color you like tonight? White on black or white on white?”
“I’m feeling a little naughty tonight. Let us have both.”
“All right. That’ll be five grand apiece.”
“No problem. I’m wiring the money as we speak.”
Sand hit the disconnect button and jotted down quick notes in code on her laptop.
G-man arrival 2:00 a.m. Duo special, 5k per girl, buddy come along + pleasure pkg. 6911.
She clicked on the Internet icon to see if the money had reached the account before she sent the e-mail to both Sabrina’s and Angel’s cell. The money was there. Everything was set. She looked over her shoulder and into the other room, where Chyna was fidgeting with her clothes.
For the past couple of months, they had had to lay low. They were sleeping in and operating out of a hotel suite until Chyna received word that the detective who had been following them around had been handled and all his documents confiscated and brought to her.
Chyna felt someone’s eyes on her, and she quickly looked back at Sand. “Can you zip this for me?”
Sand knew that she was a major asset to Chyna. With her handling the front line and James handling the dope, Chyna’s job was that much easier, and she still got the largest and sweetest piece of the pie.
Sand walked into her office and zipped up the back of Chyna’s dress.