***
Monday had made the fourth or fifth day in a row that Neeci hadn’t seen her daughter. She sat in her apartment at the dining room table. Just like yesterday and Saturday night when the Chicago detectives had come to her door to ask her questions, Neeci had her phone out. She waited on Ayana to return one of her one hundred phone calls.
Just as Neeci was growing tired of the quiet that consumed her apartment and walked over to the television, her phone vibrated. She quickly turned back around to answer it. She was surprised, yet felt some sort of relief when she saw that the person calling was Sharli. She almost hated herself for not thinking to call Sharli because the girls had always been so close.
“Sharli?” Neeci answered. “Is Ayana with you?”
“Hey, Aunt Neeci,” Sharli said, her voice somewhat flat and sad. “No, she’s not. I was callin’ to see if you’d seen her.”
“If I’d seen her?” Neeci asked. “Hell naw, I ain’t seen her. I don’t know if you’ve heard or what, but Tramar and his buddy Jackson or whatever his name is out there robbin’ banks and shit. I just pray to God that Ayana ain’t do nothin’ stupid and take part in no shit like that. I been callin’ her for the last couple days, since some detectives came to my door with questions. You ain’t heard from her?”
“No,” Sharli said. “I ain’t heard from her. And I really am getting worried.”
“Oh,” Neeci said. “So, did you know they was goin’ around and robbin’ banks and stuff? The detectives said that they got one downtown and two over in Indiana or something like that. I just don’t know why they’d be doin’ such a thing. And I told Ayana about that nigga, Tramar. I mean, he’s a nice young man and stuff, but he stay out in them streets and always has been. I swear to God I used to warn Ayana about that nigga. I really did.”
“Neeci,” Sharli said. “What you doin’ right now?”
“Shit, nothin’ girl,” Neeci answered. “I been sittin’ here just waitin’ on Ayana to call me back or somethin’. I just wanna know what the fuck is goin’ on.”
“Aunt Neeci,” Sharli said, hesitantly. “Do you mind if I hop on the train and come over and talk to you? I got some things I should probably tell you.”
Neeci, now even more worried, told Sharli to come over as soon as she could. Just before Sharli had hung up, she said that she’d be over in less than thirty minutes. She would come over and chill for a while before she had to go back home to do a friend’s hair.
Neeci waited for Sharli’s knock at the door in the living room. Once she heard it, she jumped up and pulled the front door open. Without a second thought, she and Sharli hugged. Neeci insisted she come in and sit on the couch.
“Sharli, you want anything to drink?” Neeci asked.
Sharli shrugged. “Sure, I’ll take whatever you got,” she answered.
Neeci poured a glass of sweet tea for Sharli and handed it to her as she plopped down onto the couch next to her. “So, what is going on Sharli?” she asked. “I mean, I really need to know. Is this worse than it seems? Don’t tell me that Ayana could have really been the getaway driver like the detectives was sayin’.”
“Well, I don’t know about all that,” Sharli said. “But I did see them a couple days ago when they was try’na get in touch with Byron.”
“Byron?” Neeci asked, scanning her memory and trying to see if she even knew anyone with that name. The name was somewhat familiar, as if it were someone she’d known back when she was younger. However, she just couldn’t pull up a face to connect the dots. “Who the fuck is Byron?”
“It’s this dude that they had to give money to,” Sharli explained. She hated that she had to go against the promise she’d made to Ayana, Tramar, and Jackson . However, with how deep things were getting right now, she knew that Ayana’s mother would need to know. “Byron is his name. And he kidnapped Tramar’s father and stepmother.”
“Kidnapped?” Neeci asked, putting her hand over her chest. “What you mean kidnapped? Why in the hell did this Byron kidnap Tramar’s father and stepmother like that? I mean, what do his daddy and stuff even have to do with anything?”
“Apparently,” Sharli said, taking a deep breath to explain, “they ran up in Byron’s house, Tramar and Jackson, to get some money that Byron owned Jackson. But, they took way more or somethin’ like that then what this Byron dude owed Jackson. So, this Byron dude found out where Tramar’s family live and went and snatched them up.”
“Oh no,” Neeci said, shaking her head. “You can’t be serious, Sharli? So, he went after his family like that? Hold up… Who is this Byron dude, anyway? How he got the people or whatever to be kidnapping people and hidin’ them? Have they even found the daddy and stepmother yet or what?”
“See, that’s the thing,” Sharli said. “I don’t know. I been callin’ Ayana ever since I gave them this one dude’s number… this dude who know Juan, named Damon. And the only reason I know him is because of the Facebook post of Tramar’s stepmother that Juan put up... The picture…”
“Facebook post?” Neeci asked, trying to make some sense out of that. “Girl, what is you talkin’ about?”
Sharli took another deep breath before explaining how this guy she knew, Juan, had uploaded a photo of Tramar’s stepmother looking completely terrorized. Because of that, they were able to essentially follow the trail to her friend Damon, because Damon was mutual friends between Sharli and Byron’s boy, Juan.
“That is some crazy shit,” Neeci said. “So, they was supposed to be tracking this Byron dude down, and they ain’t talked to you since?”
“Nope,” Sharli said. “I know you Ayana’s mother, but I been over there thinkin’ the worse. I mean, it ain’t like Ayana to not call me like this. I was already surprised that she didn’t tell me what was going on to begin with. Last I talked to them, they was stayin’ in some hotel out by the airport, O’Hare I mean, or something like that.”
“God,” Neeci said, standing up. She planted her hands on her hips. “I really hope that she ain’t try’na be one of them ride or die chicks who think they can stand by their man’s side and be on the run from the law with his ass. I hope to God that she done seen enough movies and shows to know how those stories tend to end.”
Before Sharli could respond, there was a knock at the door. The knock caused both Sharli and Neeci to pause and look at the door. Once their eyes broke away from it and looked at one another, Neeci whispered, “I ain’t expectin’ nobody today.”
Neeci rushed over to the door. When she stepped up to the door and looked out the peephole, she could see it was the same two detectives who had come to her door on Saturday night.
With curse words nearly slipping out of her mouth, she almost fell back when the detectives knocked at the door again. She quickly rushed over to Sharli and pointed at the bedrooms. “Go hide in Ayana’s room or something,” she said. “It’s them detectives. They probably here again to ask questions, and I don’t want them to see you.”
Not having to be told twice, Sharli jumped up and rushed into Ayana’s bedroom. Once inside, she pushed the door closed and stood behind it, pressed against Ayana’s closed door. As soon as she was completely out of sight, Neeci walked up to her front door and confidently opened it.
Neeci purposely looked surprised when she looked into the eyes of Detective Sloan and Rodgers. She knew they were not there to really be on her side, as that was never the case when dealing with the police.
“Miss Stone?” Detective Sloan said. “Do you mind if we come in for a moment? We have a couple more questions we’d like to ask you, and we’d like to follow up on a few other things as well.”
Remembering to not glance back at Ayana’s bedroom door, Neeci kindly moved out of the way. She welcomed the detectives into her apartment where the three of them stood just inside of the door, the detectives facing Neeci as she pushed the door shut. “Yes, what is it?” she asked, trying to sound professional.
“First, we wanted to know, Miss Stone ,
if your daughter has any family out of town where she may go with Tramar and Jackson?” Detective Rodgers asked.
“Well,” Neeci said, shrugging her shoulders. “We do have family who live out of town, but she doesn’t really know them like that. I mean, she’s met a few of them at family reunions and whatnot, but I can’t say that she really knows them or anything.”
Both detectives looked at one another. While they didn’t think that Ayana’s mother had anything to do with the bank robberies, they did feel that she was withholding information. Something about her demeanor told them that she wasn’t as comfortable as she’d been last time.
“Are you sure about that?” one of the detectives asked.
“I mean…” Neeci said, trying to think clearly. “She has cousins, like I told you. But, to my knowledge, they don’t know one another all that well. I mean, they might know each other on social media or somethin’, but I wouldn’t know anything about that.”
“Well, we’re asking because we feel like they may be on the run now,” the detective said. “We went to a hotel room that Ayana had been renting under her name. The hotel staff suspected that someone else may have been staying with Ayana, but they never said. A couple guests in the hotel said that they saw Ayana standing on the side of the hotel pool with two men, who we assume are Tramar and Jackson, and a little boy, who we found out upon talking to the child’s mother is Tramar’s son.”
“Yeah, I knew he had a child,” Neeci said. “But I’ve never met him. Where do you all think they’re on the run to? Maybe that Jackson or Tramar have family or friends in some other part of the country. If Ayana does keep in contact with anybody who lives in another part of the country, I swear I don’t know who it could be.”
The detectives looked at one another again. “We hate to have to ask you this,” Detective Sloan said, “because I’m sure you’ve been worried sick about your daughter and her whereabouts, but we’d like to know if you’ve heard from her or anybody else that might have heard from her?”
Neeci could feel the palms of her hands sweating. She already hated talking to the police to begin with. Now, having to lie to their faces, especially only moments after talking to Sharli, was too much to handle. She pulled herself together, however, and looked the detectives straight in their eyes – their stone cold eyes. She shook her head. “Naw, I ain’t seen her,” she responded. “I been over here worried sick about her too. You two ain’t really thinkin’ that she was the possible getaway driver or something in the bank robberies, are you Detectives?”
“We don’t really know,” one answered. “That is just the theory we have to go with right now. However, we do have another theory when it comes to Ayana.”
Neeci could sense the hesitation in the detectives’ voices. It caused her to be anxious as well. “What you mean you have another theory?” she asked. “What are you talking about?”
This time, Detective Rodgers stepped forward. In a calm, soothing voice, he explained to Neeci, “We have a theory going at this point that they may be holding her against her will.”
“Against her will?” Neeci exclaimed, putting her hand over her mouth. “Huh? What? Why? Why do you think that Tramar and Jackson are holding her against her will?”
“Well,” Sloan said, “we think that because those are the two options that we have to go with. Either she is taking part, which would be several federal crimes, especially since she had a hotel room at the Holiday Inn Hotel, located close to O’Hare. We think that if she is helping, that she was keeping them there with the hopes that we wouldn’t know because the hotel room was not under either of the men’s names. However, we also have seen in some cases like this where the woman is being forced to help because she’s scared or she feels like she has nowhere else to go.”
Neeci picked up on the tone in Detective Sloan’s voice. Right away, she knew that he was referring to her home situation with her daughter. “Naw, don’t try to say that,” Neeci said, pointing her finger at him. “Don’t you try to even take it there. I didn’t just put that girl outta my house for nothin’. She was talkin’ like she was ready to be grown, so I let her leave. It’s as simple as that.”
“Okay, okay,” the detective said. “Okay, Miss Stone.” He then looked up and around the apartment. “We didn’t disturb you, did we? Did you have company when we knocked at the door?”
“No, you didn’t disturb me,” Neeci responded, rather quickly. Now, she simply wanted the detectives out of her face. She needed to finish talking to Sharli, who seemed to be the only person in the world right now who knew anything about what was going on with Ayana. At all costs, Neeci was not going to let the detectives get to her. Right now, the authorities seemed to have two ideas as to what could have happened with Ayana. Either she took part, or she was being forced to help. Neeci hoped that it was the latter rather than the former. “Is there anything else, Detectives? I need to calm down a bit, and my family has been calling because of what they’ve seen on the news. I gotta call some people back and stuff.”
Sloan wanted to have a look around the apartment. However, he knew that since he and his partner had done such the last time they visited Neeci, they would probably need a search warrant. Something about this lady made them think that she knew more than she was letting on. Going about things the right way would get the information out of her.
“Okay,” Detective Stone said. “You still have our card, right?”
Neeci nodded, leading the detectives toward the door. “I do,” she answered. “And I’ll be sure to let you know when and if I do find out anything about Ayana, Tramar, and Jackson. I just can’t believe that my daughter would have anything to do with any of this. I just know that is something she wouldn’t do. I mean, it’s so scary, helping someone to rob a bank and stuff when you really don’t have to. I’m even surprised that they robbed a bank.”
“Okay,” Detective Sloan said as he and his partner stepped out into the hallway. They turned around and looked into Neeci’s eyes. “Well, just so you know, the various area authorities are working together to find them. It’s only a matter of time before they are caught. On behalf of the Chicago Police Department and the State of Indiana as well, I strongly urge you to tell her to turn herself in should you hear from her. Jackson and Tramar are going down no matter what once they are found. However, Ayana may still have a chance to clear her name if she is simply being forced to help them.”
“Okay,” Neeci said, “I’ll be sure to let you know.”
When Neeci pushed the front door closed, all she could do was lean against it and take a deep breath. As her eyes gazed out across her apartment, she couldn’t help but realize how grave the situation had become. Quite frankly, this was quickly becoming the scariest situation of her life. She could only imagine what her neighbors thought of her having two detectives come to her door twice. There was no doubt in her mind that the apartment building would be talking. It was only a matter of time.
Neeci finally stepped away from the door and looked out of the peephole. “Fuck,” she whispered. The detectives were still standing outside of her door in the hallway. They chatted as they looked down at their cell phones. “Why don’t y’all just go the fuck on somewhere already? Shit.”
Sharli came walking out of the bedroom hallway and into the living room. “They gone?” she asked.
Quickly, Neeci turned around and darted across the room. “Quiet, quiet,” she explained, as she pushed Sharli back to her bedroom and pushed the door closed.
“What happened, Neeci?” Sharli asked, seeing that Neeci was very concerned. “What did they say?”
“They basically said they gon’ be huntin’ them down,” Neeci answered. She glanced back at the door. “Make sure we don’t talk real loud ‘cause they still standing out in the hallway, probably trying to listen to whatever is going on in here. I told them that I ain’t have nobody over when they asked me. But, Sharli, it look like Ayana is in big trouble. Are you sure that you can’t get in touch
with her? Maybe she’ll answer your phone calls since you was talkin’ to them yesterday or whenever.”
Sharli shook her head. “Naw,” she answered. “I can’t get in touch with her. The phone just ring a couple times then it goes to voicemail and stuff. But what did the police say?”
“They said that either Ayana is helping them,” Neeci said, “which is what it sounds like based on how you described what all was goin’ on, or she is bein’ held against her will and being forced to go along with their plan. Fuck. I just wish I could get in touch with the girl and tell her. This is the second time in like two days that the detectives have been to my damn door. I can tell they are really serious about this one, and I just hope whenever they do catch up to the three of them and stuff, Ayana ain’t caught in the line of fire ‘cause you know how they shootin’ niggas left and right nowadays.”
Sharli nodded her head. “I was just thinkin’ the same thing,” she said. “They really done got in deep, and I can only wonder if the dude that they was after is after them now or what.”
“I didn’t even think about that,” Neeci said. “Fuck, that just makes everything worse. And what did you say his name was again? Maybe I can call some chicks I know around the hood and see what they know about this nigga since you know I used to run with the best of them back when I was younger.”
“His name is Juan,” Sharli said, pulling her phone out. “Let me see if I can get on his Facebook page so you can see what he looks like and stuff. He be havin’ photos up with him and his boys, out at some nice house, somewhere far out it look like to me.”
***
Byron’s brother, Ryan, was chilling in his downtown apartment on Monday and beginning to get worried. Normally the thirty-year-old would talk to his brother every day of the week in some fashion. If they didn’t literally talk on the phone, they kept in contact through text messaging. However, today was different. Today was so different that Ryan was beginning to have a feeling that something bad had happened.
When It All Falls Down 4 - It Just Ain't Over Yet: A Chicago Hood Drama (A Hustler's Lady) Page 3