Black Widow

by Nikki Turner

  “And neither should you.” Isis smiled.

  “You are my exclusive jeweler for now on,” he said.

  “Good. Then I can give you this as my gift.” She pulled a fifteen-carat bracelet of black and yellow diamonds from her pocketbook and handed it to him.

  “Ice. I mean, Black Widow…you outdone yourself. It’s a good look. The glare from these bad boys might crack the damn TV camera lenses at the news conference.”

  “That’s the idea.”

  “When can you have something for my boys?”

  “I thought you would never ask. I’m going to leave these pictures.” Isis laid down a rhinestone photo album containing photos of jewelry designs. “Just have someone give me a call and let me know what they like,” she said. “And good luck at the news conference. Now I have to be leaving.”

  Breeze went to his press conference, which turned out quite successfully. He was later cleared of all allegations concerning the incident with the alleged victim, but a new controversy arose over why he would wear a necklace that described women in such a degrading manner. Breeze told the press that the necklace didn’t have anything to do with women. Women never did anything but show him love. He said his beef was strictly with bitches, and he would appreciate it if the bitches would stop putting real women in their fight. “And for the women,” he said, “you know who you are. Shout-out to my jewelry designer, Ms. Ice, icing me out with an exclusive Black Widow original. If it ain’t got the spider stamp, it ain’t original—ya heard!”

  That was the jump start that Black Widow Jewels needed. Isis got a lot of calls about her jewelry, and the media went bananas wanting to know why she’d named herself and her work after a deadly spider. The press wanted to talk. But as it always does, the fame came before the fortune.

  Chapter 24

  A Sister’s Cry

  Phoebe and Randy Vanz had met while she was trying out for the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders. They had gone out a couple of times, but it was nothing serious. Cheerleaders weren’t supposed to date the players anyway. But after Phoebe got cut from the team, it was a different story altogether. Her self-esteem was bruised, and she needed a man’s attention to soothe the pain.

  Randy was supposed to have been the number-one pick when he came out of the draft, but he broke his leg during the last game of his college career. He ended up being picked in the fourth round and was the third-string running back. What should have been a multimillion-dollar contract ended up being a $600,000 a year blow to his ego. He was mad. And he took his frustrations out on his new girlfriend.

  Phoebe and Randy had had dinner earlier that evening. They were back at home, and Randy watched as Phoebe undressed in front of the mirror. He was always watching. Phoebe noticed that she had put on a few pounds over the past few months. How could she not? Randy’s controlling behavior kept her cooped up in a four-million-dollar house that he couldn’t afford but had to have. There was nothing for her to do all day except watch movies and eat. Her only opportunity to get out alone was during the day while he was at practice. Even then, she knew he had people watching her. Whenever she did something outside of the perimeters he had set for her, he corrected her in that good old Ike Turner way. And recently the beatings had gotten so bad that she didn’t want to go out anyway, because she could barely hide the bruises that she was constantly nursing.

  “Why did you order that cake tonight at dinner for dessert?” Randy asked.

  She knew that he was looking for a reason to hit her, as if the verbal abuse wasn’t enough. She chose her words carefully. “I only did what you asked me to do. You insisted that I have something.”

  Before she knew it, her face met his hand, and once again he was using her as his personal punching bag. She tried to fight back. She always tried to fight back, but that seemed only to make him more hyped. Somehow in his twisted rationalization, it justified his fucked-up actions.

  “Oh. You want to fight, huh?” he taunted, hitting her so hard with one blow that she stumbled and fell on her back on the cold, hardwood floor. He got on top of her and continued to hit her as if she was some practice toy. She reached for the ceramic cat that sat by the fireplace in the bedroom and managed to get hold of it. She cracked him upside of the head as hard as she could. It did the trick. He let her go and grabbed his head. But the effect lasted about as long as a two-dollar watered-down drink in an after-hours spot.

  “Bitch,” he screamed, and before she could escape, he had grabbed her by the leg. She kicked him in the face, which bought her just enough time to slip her foot out of his grip and run for the bathroom. She would lock herself in until he cooled off. But before she could get the latch on the door, he came charging toward her. He was still a little drunk from the liquor he had at dinner and disoriented from the blow upside of his head, so she managed to make him trip over her vanity table, and she slipped out of his grasp. While running out of the bedroom, she picked up the chair to the dressing-room table and then scooped up the remote that worked every lock and appliance in the house.

  She closed the bedroom door and slid the back of the chair underneath the doorknob, and then ran down the hall, hitting buttons on the controller. One was to get into the laundry room to grab some sweats and sneakers. Luckily for her, she kept her pocketbook downstairs. She grabbed it, got the keys to the Lexus LS 400 that Randy usually let her drive, and burned rubber.

  She pulled the car into a gas station down the street from the house. She went to use the restroom to clean herself up a little. When she looked into the mirror at herself, she started to cry. She had had enough. She looked a mess. She no longer had that soft, beautiful glow; she was beginning to look hard from all the beatings. She knew she had to get out. This time she wasn’t going back.

  She called Isis. “Sister, I need help.”

  “Phoebe? Where are you?” Isis said, relieved to finally hear from her sister.

  “I’m at a gas station around the block from my house. I can’t take it anymore; that nigga been puttin’ his hands on me. I got to get outta here before somebody ends up dead.”

  Isis was furious. “Just tell me what you want me to do right now, sister. You need money? You need me to book you a flight? Do you have your ID on you? You want me to come get you? Just let me know.”

  “I have ID. Just get me a flight, but I don’t want to go home to Momma. I want to come with you,” she said, crying.

  “No problem. Will you be okay while I make the arrangements? I promise I’ll call you right back as soon as I get off the phone with the airline. If there’s nothing leaving out tonight, I’ll get you a hotel until morning.” Isis heard a banging sound coming through the phone, followed by a male voice yelling her sister’s name.

  Phoebe panicked. “Sister, it’s him. He’s at the door.”

  “Don’t let him in,” Isis warned her sister. “I’m going to call the police.”

  “No—no police. I don’t want his business to be in the media like that. He already got enough issues as it is.”

  “Fuck him! I’m only worried about you.”

  Isis could hear Randy’s screaming through the phone. “Fee, open up the door. I don’t want to have to kick this motherfucker in,” he threatened.

  “Randy, go away. Just leave me alone,” Phoebe pleaded.

  As Isis listened, she couldn’t believe that this was the type of thing her sister had been dealing with. How had she hidden it so well?

  “I’m not leaving without you, baby.” This time he sounded calm and sweet like a pussycat.

  “Don’t fall for his bullshit,” Isis yelled into the phone. “Don’t open the door.”

  “Don’t worry, I’m not.” Phoebe wasn’t crying as much as she was before.

  A man walked up to Randy and tapped him on the shoulder. “Mr. Vanz?” the man ventured to ask. “Is that you?” The man had a strong Texas accent. “You’re my son’s hero. He’s over there in the car and wants your autograph. Please, let’s not disappoint him by letting h
im see you out here banging on the ladies’ room door.”

  Knowing that he was drawing attention to himself, Randy got a grip. “Where’s the kid at?”

  “Right there in that there truck,” the stranger said. “Won’t you slide on over and say howdy to him? It’ll mean the world to ’im.”

  Once Phoebe heard Randy leave to speak to his little fan, she slowly opened up the bathroom door and made a dash for her car, making her second escape from him in that night.

  Isis screamed in the phone, “Sister, you there?” She was frantic. “What’s happening?”

  “I’m in my car, heading toward the airport,” Phoebe said. “There’s a Western Union there, but I want to go back and get my clothes. I look a mess. They’ll think I’m some crazy maniac trying to board the plane, looking like this and with no luggage. I look like a suicide bomber with nothing to lose.”

  “Fuck your clothes! We’ll get you more when you get here,” she told her. “And fuck what other people think. You need to get out of there.”

  “Okay. I’m going to call you once I’m pulling into the airport parking lot.”

  Isis hopped online to send her sister money through Western Union and an airline ticket. About twenty minutes had passed since Isis had last spoken to her sister. Then the phone rang.

  It was Phoebe. “Sister, a nice police officer was kind enough to let me call you before he took me in. He’s taking me to jail for grand theft auto and a few other charges. Randy reported the car stolen. Please come out here and get me. I got to go.”

  “I’m on my way” was all Isis said as she prepared to make it happen.

  Isis needed to get her sister a lawyer, a bond hearing, and a bond to get her out of jail, but she didn’t have those types of resources in Texas. She wished she could talk to Logic, but she had to move now. She didn’t want her sister to stay in jail one minute longer than she had to. Whom could she call?

  Then she ran to the front room of the condo to get her pocketbook. She held it upside down, emptying it, looking for a piece of paper. If he was anything remotely close to what he claimed to be, surely he would be able to help her. There it was. She found it: It was a small piece of paper randomly torn in the shape of a trapezoid, and above the number, it read: The King of Texas.

  She didn’t waste any time before dialing his number. Someone answered on the second ring. “Talk to me.”

  “Is this how the king of Texas answers the telephone?” Isis asked.

  “Who is this?” the same voice asked.

  “It’s the lady you met at the Gucci store,” Isis said. “I never got your name.”

  “Larry Love,” he joked. “And yours?”

  “Isis.”

  “Pardon me, Ms. Isis. I didn’t mean to answer the phone so rudely, but I know a few people from the 804 area code.”

  “Oh. Who might that be?”

  “Just some folks,” he said. “Where do you live—St. Petersburg or Richmond?”

  “I’m actually from Richmond, but I live in Miami.”

  “MIA, huh?”

  “Yup.”

  “So when are you coming back to my kingdom?”

  “Well, actually that’s why I was calling you. My sister lives down there, and her man beat her up. When she tried to leave him, he reported the car stolen, so now she’s locked up. I’m going down there tomorrow to get her a lawyer and hopefully get her out, but I know nothing about Texas. So I’m going to need some advice. I figured who better to call than the Emperor of the South.”

  “No doubt, darling, I got you covered. When does your flight land?”

  “Tomorrow,” she said, “at eight in the morning.”

  “Then I’ll pick you up from the airport.”

  She graciously thanked him and then added, “While I’m there, I also want to talk to you about possibly doing business together.”

  “What type of business?” he asked. “What do you do?”

  “I design the hottest jewelry that money can buy.”

  “What a coincidence.”

  Larry “Lootchee” Fonzworth

  “Make no mistake about it, I always gets whatever I wants.”

  Chapter 25

  The Man

  Larry “Lootchee” Fonzworth returned from Texas approximately six months ago after an extended stay in South America. Initially, Lootchee had fled to the border against his will. He was tricked by his then girlfriend into believing that the Feds had been asking questions and were hot on his trail, leaving him no choice but to take flight. However, he later found out it was a lie. After finding out that Lootchee had been using her name to ship illegal goods through the mail, his girlfriend, Bambi, concocted the entire story about the F.B.I., stole all of the merchandise and money he had stored at her house, and went back home to Richmond, Virginia. Lootchee stayed in South America for more than three years. Sure, he could have come back to his home state of Texas sooner, but opportunity smiled upon him and Lootchee never could say no to a pretty face, and he never let a pretty face say no to him.

  He made money hand over fist in South America, shipping drugs and laundering money for his associates in the States, and he found a new hustle in the jungle: the untampered, high-profit, and low-risk business of the phone cards.

  But he couldn’t live off of money alone. He needed something more that the jungle couldn’t provide; there was unfinished business in the States that was keeping him awake at night. He had to teach his ex-girlfriend a lesson. He didn’t get to where he was in life by allowing anyone to steal from him and live to tell, write, or laugh about it. But in order to get away with it, he knew he had to calculate and bide his time. Lootchee always got what he wanted: money, revenge, power, respect, women. Always. And by any means necessary.

  Lootchee was having breakfast with two of his bodyguards in one of his favorite diners when his cell phone rang. He had been waiting for this call since last night, so he answered quickly. “Hello.”

  “I just landed,” Isis said. “Where are you?”

  “Be there in fifteen minutes. I’ll meet you at baggage claim.”

  “Okay. Thanks,” she said.

  Exactly fifteen minutes later Lootchee called Isis back to tell her that he had been caught in traffic but he was only ten minutes away and to meet him at the departures gate instead of the baggage claim. Isis stood on the curb beside the cart with her luggage in it looking divalicious. She was wearing a velour, all-white Juicy Couture sweatsuit with white Juicy sunglasses when Lootchee pulled up in a black 1995 Impala. Two large men hopped out. One put her bags in the trunk while the other watched.

  After Lootchee felt like everything was good, he got out of the car and gave Isis a hug. “Let’s bounce, Sweets,” he said. “We got a lot of things to do.”

  Isis wasn’t expecting Lootchee to be traveling with two 300-pound bodyguards, which made her a little nervous. “Did you set up the meeting with a lawyer for me?” she asked. She planned to get out of dodge as soon as she got Phoebe out of jail.

  Lootchee pulled out his cell phone and made a call. “What is your sister’s name?”

  “Phoebe Cross. It’s spelled P-H-O-E-B-E.”

  Lootchee told the person on the other end of the line Phoebe’s name and then said, “By all means, get her out of there. I want to be having dinner with her at six o’clock, so you got until five to have her out.” He hung up and then told Isis, “It’s done.”

  Isis wasn’t impressed. She wasn’t going to be satisfied until her sister was standing right in front of her, free and in the flesh!

  The first stop that they made was at a car wash, the kind where everything was done by hand. Every fly car in the city must have been dirty that day because it looked like a car show was in progress. There was everything from old-school pimped-out 6-4’s to fresh-off-the-showroom-floor Mercedes Benz’s. But the automobile that stood out, hands down, was a triple white Phantom. Lootchee drove the Impala to the side of the building and got out with the car still running. “St
ay in the car,” he instructed her.

  Isis sighed. She was starting to dislike this dude more and more, and she didn’t really like him that much in the first place. She just needed a contact in Texas. And now this fool was playing around at the car wash.

  When Lootchee got out the car people crowded around him like he was a rock star. Everybody wanted to talk to him, shake his hand, or embrace him in some way. When he looked back to see if Isis was okay, she was admiring the Phantom that was parked in the corner.

  Man, I could really use one of those in my life. I gotta get my hustle turned up to the tenth notch so I can make it happen, Isis thought.

  Taking a better look at what was going down—it was more than just a car convention—these brothers were straight up balling. And there were a few sisters in attendance as well, not just on groupie status, but doing the damn thang, too.

  A few of the fellas made eye contact with Isis. There were plenty of Black Widow potential customers that had already given her the eye, but Isis ignored them. She didn’t want to seem disrespectful to Lootchee by acknowledging them. Regardless of how macho a man acted on the outside, Isis knew that deep down most of them were as insecure as a hooker in a room full of nuns. And right now, for her sister’s sake, she needed this man’s help.

  No more than five minutes had passed, when one of the two goons that were riding with Lootchee popped the trunk and removed her bags. Lootchee walked back over to the car and opened the door to the Impala for her, held his elbow out to her and said, “Right this way, Sweets.” He then escorted her, arm in arm, to the Phantom.

  “Where to, Lootchee?” the driver called out.

  “The Ritz,” Isis answered for him.

  “The Boat Showplace,” Lootchee corrected.

  “What? Why are we going to a boat place?” Isis asked. Lootchee seemed cool and all, but she wasn’t feeling all the stops, nor did he at any time ask her what she wanted, which was to get her sister out of jail and get the fuck out of Texas.