He stalks back toward his gym, steps through the window frame. I follow him, and when he opens a narrow closet and takes a broom, I take it from him and start sweeping up the glass.
He watches for a moment, and then stomps toward me, snatches it away. “Naw, man. My gym, I’ll clean it up. Get outta here.”
“Rhino—”
“I ain’t mad at you, kid. But if you step up with Split and them, this is your life. It’ll be you in a car like that, shootin’ up somebody’s house. Know that. You step up with the Bishops, that’s your life.”
“I don’t know where else to go. What else to do.”
He shrugs. “Welcome to the big leagues, dog.”
I leave him sweeping up glass and plaster, head upstairs, shove my clothes and my cash savings into my backpack. I’ve got almost two hundred grand in that backpack, this time. It’s all I’ve got, and it still fits in a backpack.
I unpack a stack of cash, a ten-G stack. I take it with me as I go back down to the gym, where Rhino is ripping the ruined plaster off the walls with his bare hands, tearing it down in angry jerks, hauling off huge sections of drywall and tossing it aside. I watch for a second, feeling a pang. I don’t want to leave here. I liked it here, working out, eating, smoking, just chillin’, safe, away from it all.
I set the cash on the desk, and Rhino sees.
“I don’t want your fuckin’ money, man.”
“But your gym—”
“It ain’t about money. I built this place with my own two hands. I put up the studs, put up the drywall. I hauled every piece of equipment in here. I built the ring. I hung the window. One stupid fuckin’ drive-by, and I gotta do it all over again. I got money. It’s just…it’s just the fact of having to do it all over again. Na’mean?” He tosses the stack of cash back at me, and I catch it, put it in my bag.
Headlights approach, but no squealing tires. Rhino feels for the huge pistol at the back of his waistband, but doesn’t seem worried. The headlights broaden until the front of a rusted 1970s Pontiac GTO slides into view. The engine rumbles nice and loud, but it’s got a catch in the burble, a piston gone bad. Needs a tune-up.
The headlights stay on, the engine keeps rumbling, but the driver’s door opens, and Split steps out, stretchy red do-rag tied at the back of his head. He eyes the pools of blood in the street, the window frame, the bullet holes in the desk and wall and cabinet. The passenger door opens, and another brother steps out. Shorter, stocky, black do-rag, baggy jeans hanging way low, white T-shirt hem hanging around his thighs. Walks with a deep swagger, doesn’t say anything, just stands next to Split.
“Lemme guess…Trey-Nines?” Split says, stepping through the window frame.
“You got it,” Rhino answers, glancing up and then returning his attention to piling the drywall in a corner.
“Think they know who they started beef with?”
Rhino shrugs. “They sure as hell gonna find out.”
“Want me to take the boys for a ride?” Split asks, and the question is fraught.
“Nah. I got this. Pull the Bishops into it, we’ll have us a four-way problem. Bishops, the Eighty-Eights, the Trey-Nines, and their boys the 113 Posse. Just take Colt and let me handle it.”
Split nods, then looks to me. “What about it, Colt?”
I let out a breath. “That, or try the streets again on my own. I guess I’m in.”
Split straightens, and faces me. “Naw, see, you got two problems. One, now that the Trey-Nines are after you, you won’t last an hour out there by yourself. Two, you can’t guess. You’re in, or you’re not.”
“It was a two-on-one fight that I won! How can they be after me?”
“You weren’t supposed to win. And then you went and helped them up. They gotta save face.”
“And if I go with you?”
“The Trey-Nines don’t dare start anything with us. We got twice the numbers, way more turf, and way more alliances. They start beef with the Bishops, they done. We’ll clean ’em up. Won’t be no one left.”
“And you’ll take me in, just because I won that fight?”
“You gotta earn your place, but yeah.”
“Hate to point out the obvious, here, but…I’m white, you’re black. I’m not from here. I don’t know you, or your friends. And you’d let me into a black street gang?”
“‘Black street gang.’” He laughs. “You funny. You wouldn’t be ‘in the gang’.” He emphasizes the phrase with a mocking tone of voice. “You’d be with me. Maybe in time I’d get the others to accept you, but that’d take a while.”
“Why?”
He frowns at me. “Why are you questioning this?”
I shrug. “Nothing is easy. Nothing is free.”
“Got that right.”
“I just don’t get it. I don’t know much about how all this shit works, but I do know that it doesn’t work like this.”
“Smart. It don’t, usually.” He leans close. “But I got a problem, and I think you can help me solve it. In return, you’ll have protection. And as a white guy in this hood, you need it.”
How did I get here? What am I doing? How is this my life?
“I’m in.” I don’t see much choice. Rhino wants me gone. Eli’ll drop me the second I lose a fight. But the sad thing is, despite the fact that I’ve got a good bit of cash saved, I have nowhere else to go. What would I do? Flip burgers at McDonald’s? I don’t know Split at all, really, but it seems like a way out of the endless cycle I’ve gotten myself stuck in, where I don’t dare lose, don’t dare mess up, don’t dare trust anyone. I want to trust Split, I want to feel like I’ve got someone to count on. Not much to ask, I don’t think.
Another pair of headlights appears, coming from the other direction. Then another, and a third set. Three black SUVs slide up, driving nose-to-tail, stopping in unison right in front of Rhino’s gym, less than three feet from Split’s car. Fifteen men clamber out of the SUVs, all of them dressed in black denim jackets, baggy black jeans, boots, and Yankees hats like Rhino frequently wears. They’re all carrying shotguns and handguns, and a couple of them have assault rifles slung over their shoulders. They don’t spare a single glance for Split or me, they don’t speak a word. They push past us, into the gym. Surround Rhino, who hasn’t bothered to even staunch the bleeding from the graze wound in his bicep. Low murmurs.
Rhino pushes through the crowd. “Time for y’all to go.”
He’s got a sawed-off, pistol-grip shotgun in his hand. His demeanor is utterly changed from the quiet, easygoing person I’ve come to know. Cold, hard, huge, and scary as fuck. Not someone I want to be in the way of.
Yet another pair of headlights appears, this time a box truck. It squeals to a stop, two young black guys hop out and open the back roller door. Construction equipment, buckets of drywall plaster, ladders, a huge sheet of glass secured against one wall framed off with two-by-fours, a new desk, a new filing cabinet. Brooms, trashcans, shovels, toolboxes.
Rhino doesn’t wait for acknowledgment, just slides into the front passenger seat of the foremost SUV, and the rest of the armed gang members pile in after him. Within seconds, the three trucks are gone, and the two left to handle the rebuild are busily removing debris.
“Time to go,” Split says. “I’ll explain what I need from you on the way.”
I slide in the back, a guy I don’t know sits in the passenger seat beside Split.
He turns around and simply says, “T-Shawn.” He extends his fist, and we bump knuckles.
“Colt.”
“Welcome to the Bishops.”
Somehow, I don’t think it’ll be as easy as all that—a brief hey how are you welcome. You always gotta prove yourself and, in this world, that ain’t always easy. But I’m about to find out.
As we drive off into the night cold reality sets in—I’m starting over.
Again.
Chapter 8: A Girl Named India
Being allied with the Bishops is not what I thought it would be. In th
e end it’s just…living: working, eating, smoking, getting paid, the occasional tumble with one of the always-willing girls that hang around the Bishops. And, sure, there was some minor physical intimidation and bullying, fights over turf, moving bags of pot, minor shit like that. Split usually just wanted a way to get people who owed him money to pay up without having to resort to actually shooting them. Getting people to pay attention, know what I mean? So he went old school: intimidation. Rough ’em up. Show them he meant business. Which is where I came in. I was big, ripped, and willing to slug a few stomachs if that’s what it took to get ’em to understand. And, for me, it meant not having to fight in the ring anymore. My main job was to scare people into paying up.
Sometimes they held out.
And that never, ever worked very well for them.
I’d be brought in; I’d throw them around. Loosen some teeth, bloody some noses, bruise a few ribs. These guys were often young thugs who thought they were hard. They’d owe Split money for drugs, or owe Split loyalty they wouldn’t show. My job was to convince them otherwise without Split having to play his hand.
The first time somebody refused, Split—who normally stays back by the door and keeps quiet—stepped forward and stood in front of the stubborn asshole and just stared him down. The poor scared guy caved in a heartbeat. Clearly he knew something about Split that I didn’t.
Then a few months later, somebody else decided to snitch, got one of the Bishops arrested for possession of narcotics and illegal firearms. Thing about this world is, loyalty is king. You do not ever talk to cops. Not ever. They tended to stay clear of our turf for the most part, except the occasional patrol, or if someone pulled out a gun and started shooting. So if someone snitches, especially to the fucking narcs, it doesn’t end well.
Split told me to be rough and show no mercy. So I played hard-ass and left the snitch on the ground, a bloody mess. When it was done Split ambled over, slow, like a snake slithering through the grass toward its prey.
He knelt down and whispered something in the snitch’s ear.
Immediately, I smelled urine—the snitch was pissing himself in fear.
Next day, that same guy was carried out of his house in a body bag. No one knew who killed him, but it wasn’t me, and it wasn’t Split. Apparently, the snitch had tried to barter with his guy on the other side of the badge for safety from Split.
Didn’t work out too well for him, apparently.
A few more times, but not very often, somebody either snitched or held out. If they were just holding out, they got hurt and were convinced to pay up and play along. If they were a snitch…they vanished. Or were found dead. Messily.
I didn’t care much for any of it, but what could I do? I’d allied myself to the Bishops. I had to pay attention to which side of the street I walked on, what color clothing I wore, who I spoke to. If I stepped wrong, spoke wrong, wore the wrong color, I’d end up dead or I’d start a turf war. Everybody knew I was with Split, which made me a de facto member of the Bishops.
Then one day things change.
I’m with Split and T-Shawn in Split’s GTO—which I’d tuned up for him properly, of course—and we’re cruising the Bishops’ turf, cruising slow, slapping palms through the open car windows and exchanging greetings, waving, smoking, bass thudding low. And then, at the intersection just ahead of us, hell breaks loose in a fraction of a moment.
A young kid, new to the hood and trying to get the respect of the older G’s, is just walking across the street. On his side of the turf. A car slides by, swerves hard, clips the kid with the front left quarter panel, sends him flying. His head cracks open against the curb, blood pooling out of his broken skull..
Split floors the gas pedal, and the old muscle car spools up and jolts forward in pursuit. We howl round the corner, tires screaming. The other car is a few dozen feet ahead when Split hauls out his piece from under his seat, a small black nine. He pops off a few slugs and nails the back tire and the back windshield. T-Shawn is popping off rounds as well, doing some serious damage.
I’m sitting in the back, frozen with fear; this is new. There have been lots of rumbles and beefs before this, bats, chains, some knives drawn, and some blood spilled. But nobody has died, aside from the snitches. No guns have been hauled out and fired, not in front of me, at least. Maybe the established Bishops took care of that shit without me because, even now, I’m the outsider, the new guy, the white guy, the unknown.
The car ahead swerves, tires smoking, rims sparking on the pavement, and then spins to a stop.
Split halts the GTO, reaches in front of me and opens the glove box and hands me a pistol like his.
“Hell, no. I’ve never shot a gun.” I shake my head.
“They killed a Bishop,” T-Shawn murmurs. He doesn’t say much, but when he does, you listen. “On our turf. For no fuckin’ reason. Just a damn kid.”
I take the piece. It’s cold and heavy. It feels foreign in my hand.
Split steps out, and I follow a few seconds later, heart hammering. T-Shawn swings wide, his gun leveled. The car ahead is quiet and completely still. There’s no sound. No cars anywhere.
The car is only twenty feet away at most, but it feels like a mile with that small cold heavy pistol in my hand.
My heart is in my throat, thick and bitter.
Adrenaline thunders in my veins.
Split heads toward the driver’s side and gestures for me to go around to the passenger side. Gun up, held in both hands. I move forward slowly and carefully.
BANGBANGBANG!
I feel something hot and hard bite into my shoulder, and then everything goes hazy. My shoulder is hotter than hell, so hot it’s numb, and I feel a throbbing ache. Pounding agony. I feel myself moving forward, see a face and a Mets logo, a sliver gun, the barrel a wide black hole. I see it buck. BANG! Something snaps past my face. I feel my hands jolt up involuntarily, and then I hear something crack.
Suddenly all I can see is red.
And then silence. Profound, vibrating silence.
Split is in front of me. I can’t hear him but I can see his mouth moving, but I hear nothing. There’s a thunder in my ears that drowns out everything. Split is pulling me toward the GTO and shoving me into the backseat, where I slump against the window.
Something wet trickles down my arm.
And it hurts like hell.
Split is silent now, and the GTO is hauling ass. He pulls out an old, blocky cell phone, flips it open and dials a number with his thumb. I hear him spitting out a few terse words to the person on the other end and then he disconnects the call. He’s barreling way too fast around corners, zigzagging, squealing to slow for a corner and then hitting the gas. After a few blocks he finally slows to a normal driving speed.
T-Shawn glances at me. “You straight?”
I shake my head and twist to show him my shoulder. “I’m getting blood on your seat.”
“Fuck, man,” Split says. “Why didn’t you say something?”
“Something?” I’m woozy, numb inside from the pain.
“Smart-ass.” He spins the wheel and cuts across three lanes of traffic to make a sudden left. Split jerks his bandana off and hands it to me. “Put some pressure on that shit. Hold it tight.”
“I killed him, didn’t I?”
Split doesn’t answer right away. “Unless that fucker can survive a hole in the face, yeah, you did.”
“Goddamn it.”
Split finally looks at me in the rearview mirror. “He shot first.” He points to my face. “Nearly got you, too.”
“He did get me.”
“Naw, man. Check your shit.” T-Shawn pulls open the visor, angles the mirror so I can see myself in it. There’s a red line oozing blood across my temple. That last shot was millimeters from burying itself in my skull.
“Holy shit.”
“You a G for real now, dog. Had our back. We won’t forget that.” He stops the GTO in front of an apartment building in the heart of Bishop territ
ory.
We go in, up to the fourth floor. One of the doors flies open, and a young black woman runs out, hair in narrow braids hanging down to mid-back, gold hoops lining her ears. She’s wearing skin-tight dark blue jeans and a white crop top. She jumps on Split and wraps her arms and legs around him. T-Shawn is there, but silent, as always.
“I heard,” she says. “You okay?”
“I’m fine.” Split gestures at me without putting her down. “He ain’t fine. He needs his shoulder looked at.”
“Mama’s home.”
Split gestures at the door, looking at me. “Come on in. You’re safe here.” He addresses his girlfriend. “Callie, this is my boy Colt. Colt, this is my girlfriend, Callie.”
“Hi, Callie.”
She smiles at me. She’s short, curvy, beautiful, a vibrant white smile in a light brown face. “Heard you backed up my man today. Thanks.”
“He’s taken care of me, so…” I shrug, figuring the rest is self-evident.
“Split’s got a good heart, he just hides it.” Callie leads the way into the apartment unit.
It smells like food and cigarettes. Low ceilings, peeling paint, scuffed, scratched hardwood floor with a threadbare knitted oval rug in the middle of the floor. A twenty-year-old big-screen TV, massive speakers, a coffee table and ashtrays and cartons of Newports complete the decor. The kitchen is just off the living room, and Callie leads us there. A woman who could be Callie’s twin except twenty years older stands at the stove, stirring something in a pot. A big square table takes up most of the kitchen, and my attention is immediately seized by the young woman sitting at the table.
I forget my name. I forget my wounded shoulder.
She’s…stunningly beautiful. Breathtaking.
Even sitting down I can tell she’s tall, maybe close to six feet, and close to my own age, early twenties. She has long curly hair hanging in tight spirals exploding in a halo around her thin, sharp-featured face. Her dark eyes are deep set between high angular cheekbones. She looks like she’s part Asian, part black, all beautiful. God, so beautiful. Her eyes meet mine, and I swear the air sparks between us.
Falling for Colton (Falling #5) Page 12