by Anna J.
Scared and confused, Simone still realized there was no use in screaming for help. After driving for what appeared to be an hour, the van stopped. The back door opened, and one of the masked men placed a black bandanna over her eyes and tied it. Her captors then led her into a building that resembled a large, empty factory.
When they removed the blindfold, Simone studied her surroundings more. With the ceiling reaching at least three stories and thick, cubed windows at the top of the linoleum walls, the large space looked to her like some type of hangar, except there were no planes in sight.
They were tying her to a thick, chipped painted pipe when one of the hangar doors opened and a pistachio green BMW 750il entered. Two men wearing black ski hats at the top of their heads came out of the door and walked toward the car. Simone figured those were her captors. Why did they now feel it was okay to reveal their faces to her?
They were evil-looking men. Both dark skinned, with a red, blank, evil glare in their eyes. One was bowlegged, and Simone, despite her circumstances, found his walk sexy. Both had long, shaggy beards.
The occupants of the Beemer emerged. This took Simone by surprise. The driver was one of the prettiest women she’d ever laid eyes on, and the other woman, with long dreadlocks, reminded her of Erykah Badu. But the real pretty one, her eyes were like crystal balls, with a grayish silver gleam. It was like you could almost see through them. To her, she didn’t look like the type of woman that would be involved with these dangerous-looking men. There was a kind of aura to her face that spelled innocence. As the women approached, they were followed by the men. Simone’s heart began to pound.
“Are you hungry or thirsty? Anything you need, you let us know,” the pretty one said. “You will not be harmed, I assure you.” She smiled.
Simone swallowed. “Why am I here? Who are you people?” Her voice cracked as she looked at the woman with the pretty eyes up and down, surveying her fashion. She concluded that not only was she pretty, but she also had style.
“Collateral.” Simone watched the pretty girl reach for her Gucci purse and remove a cell phone. “Call your mom. Tell her some friends of her friend want their money back. Drop it off at Franklin and Fulton, on the steps of the train station. Tell her if the cops are called, she knows what to expect. Just remember Breeze.”
The pretty-eyed girl’s voice was filled with threats, even though she was smiling. Simone did what she was told. Her hands shook as she pressed the buttons on the cell phone. Tashy picked up on the first ring.
“Tashy?”
“Simone? Where the hell are you? Your grandfather is looking for you. The lady, Lillian, called here—”
Lillian hadn’t informed Tashy about Wayne’s murder; she’d just asked if she knew where Simone was, ’cause she wasn’t home when Scooter got home. Simone cut her off and spoke in a low, cracked voice.
“Listen! Some friends of your friend want their money. They said to drop it off—”
“Simone, what are you—”
“Tashy, this is serious. I’ve been kidnapped. They said for your friend to drop the money that’s theirs at the train station.” She looked at the pretty woman and mouthed, “Where?”
“The steps of the Franklin and Fulton train station,” the pretty woman answered into the phone for Simone, with the smile still plastered on her face. Afterward, she gave the phone back to Simone.
“Tashy, they said if the cops get involved, you know what to expect. Remember Breeze.”
The pretty-eyed woman snatched the phone from her and ended the call. Tears began to fall down Simone’s face.
“You’re talking about Ruby, aren’t you?”
“You’re a smart girl. Hopefully, your mother and Ruby are just as smart.” The pretty-eyed girl walked back to her BMW with her female friend, leaving Simone with the two goons.
“Please don’t kill me or my mom! I hate Ruby!” Simone yelled. The pretty-eyed woman was halfway in the car when she looked back at Simone and smiled. “Then we have a lot in common. Hopefully, no one else will end up like your boyfriend.”
She got in the Beemer and pulled out of the hangar.
When the call ended, Tashy quickly placed a call to Ruby.
“Yo,” Ruby grunted after answering the phone on the second ring.
“Ruby, they snatched Simone!”
“What? What the hell are you talking about?”
“That bitch kidnapped my daughter. She said to drop the money you owe her at Franklin and Fulton train station.” Tashy’s voice was filled with rage. “Ruby, I don’t give a fuck who or what happened between ya’ll, but the bitch involved me and mines. Make it right, Ruby, ’cuz if something happens to my daughter, I’m gonna blame you.” Tashy ended the call.
Chapter Seventeen
In the measure that she glorified herself and lived luxuriously, in the same measure give her torment and sorrow.
—Revelations 18:7
Temperatures in New York were just above freezing the morning Ruby and Mecca walked the empty bike path of Brooklyn’s largest park. Ruby hung on every word Mecca said while at the same time thinking how the Italian sun had given her a golden hue. Mecca looked good and healthy. Her once thin face, from lying in a coma for months, was now full, and Ruby could tell that she had put back on a healthy weight. Mecca filled her blue denim jeans by Citizens of Humanity nicely. Ruby noticed how her hair, which was without extensions or a weave, had grown a few inches past her shoulders. Both women walked with their hands in their coats. Mecca preferred for them to meet at a warm spot, but Ruby felt the park at the time was a suitable place to talk and be out of sight.
“So how’d you know that was Wise’s sister?” Ruby asked.
“When I first saw her, I felt she looked familiar,” Mecca reported, looking straight ahead as a group of pigeons flew off in fear of their approach. “Then, while I was in Italy, I had this dream. I saw her in my dream. It was a while back, but it made me remember.”
“A dream?” Ruby asked skeptically. Mecca glared at her aunt, as if she was insulted.
“Yeah, a dream! The dream just helped me remember. Is that hard to believe?”
Ruby, sensing her frustration, changed her tone. “I’m not saying it like I don’t believe you. I just wanna be sure.”
“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out. You know she’s behind what happened to Breeze and his family. You said it yourself. She just bounced without a trace.”
“Yeah, I ...” Ruby’s response was interrupted by the ringing of her cell phone in her leather bomber jacket pocket. “Yo,” Ruby answered, annoyed that her conversation with Mecca had been interrupted. Mecca watched Ruby’s facial expression change from a calm one to one that was shocked at the news she received from her caller. “What are you talking about?”
Ruby listened attentively as Tashy revealed the news about Simone’s kidnapping and issued a threat. A threat Ruby didn’t appreciate. Before she got a chance to respond, Tashy ended the call.
“Who was that?” Mecca asked.
“They kidnapped my girlfriend’s daughter. They want me to pay the ransom they said I owe.” Ruby had a fearful look in her eyes. A look Mecca couldn’t remember ever seeing on her aunt’s face.
Mecca sighed. She knew just as well as Ruby that Daphne was responsible for the kidnapping. Only Mecca knew why it was said that the ransom was what Ruby owed. Still, Mecca held her tongue.
“What are you gonna do?”
Ruby stared off into the distance. Unsure of her plan, she answered just the same. “What can I do? I don’t know what I owe or where Daphne is.”
“I can help you find her. Me and her got pretty close. Give me a day or two. I’ll let you know what I find out.”
“I don’t have a day or two. They want the money tonight,” Ruby said.
Mecca paused to think. “Give me your phone,” she said. “When they call back, I’ll tell them that you’re scraping it up. She’ll talk to me. Meet me at your crib tonight.”
“A’ight,” Ruby answered.
Just before they exited the park and walked to their own vehicles, Ruby turned and spoke. “I just wanna know where she’s at. I don’t owe the bitch shit but a bullet in her skull.”
Mecca watched her get inside her truck and entered her own rented car, welcoming the warmth. She removed Ruby’s phone and smiled to herself. When she started the car up, she mumbled, “Much smarter than you think I am, Lou.”
The Honorable Francis Nicoletti sat behind his mahogany desk in a snow-white shirt with red suspenders and a matching bow tie, reading a sworn affidavit given to him by Detective Levy and Agent Doyle, who sat in chairs, anxiously waiting for him to sign it.
Both Levy and Doyle couldn’t read the judge’s expression as he stared down at the file of papers they’d both spent long hours preparing. He nodded sometimes, raised an eyebrow, and grunted for what seemed like a lifetime to them. Levy fidgeted uncomfortably, while Doyle stared at the top of the bowed head of Judge Nicoletti.
Doyle had known him for years; from the time the veteran judge was a federal prosecutor, he was a no-nonsense-type guy who fought every case vigorously. He was a firm believer in the law and the Constitution of this country, and he followed it to a T. He had made a lot of enemies in legal circles due to his stand on justice. If the FBI brought him a case that he felt wasn’t convincing of the offender’s guilt, he wouldn’t hesitate to dismiss it. Agents would storm his office, preaching about how the alleged criminal was a killer, a kingpin who had kids sell drugs out of the school yard, a menace to society, only to hear an even-toned Nicoletti say, “I could have told you about President Reagan, but it would have just been my word. Where’s the proof?”
Judge Nicoletti finally looked up at Doyle and Levy with his blue eyes behind rimmed glasses. His pale skin had deep lines, and the double chin jiggled when he spoke.
“The Davidson phone, I’ll authorize the wiretap. There’s probable cause, but Williams and Carter, I’m denying. Being friends with a target of an investigation is not probable cause, gentlemen. I need more. You got your wire for thirty days. Hopefully, that wire will give you PC on the other ladies. You gentlemen, have a nice day. This meeting is adjourned.”
A bulimic, reddish-brown-haired female stenographer packed up her equipment and left the office. Judge Nicoletti removed his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. When the stenographer was gone, the judge smiled at Doyle.
“You owe me a lunch, Phil. I’m starving.” The judge gave a sly grin, then continued, “You never know. The right restaurant may get you more wires.”
Doyle and Levy stood up, prepared to leave. It was Doyle who spoke first, with a grin. “Never knew you could be bribed.”
Nicoletti put on a black blazer, then patted Doyle on his back as they walked toward the office door. “For a plate of lasagna or veal Parmesan, I would have authorized wiretaps to be placed on the Oval Office.”
“I knew that dame was bad news. You sure know how to pick ’em.” Scooter and Tashy sat in the office of Scooter’s bar and grill on the Queens–Long Island border. Tashy raised a disappointing eyebrow at her father’s comment. She knew he was exhausted and stressed.
“Don’t start,” Tashy said vaguely, sitting on a leather sectional, rocking back and forth nervously. Every time her phone rang, she would get jumpy and answer it quickly. A knock at the door interrupted their conversation.
“Come in,” Scooter ordered.
The man who entered was someone Scooter was expecting. He stood up to shake the man’s hand, which always reminded him of frog’s legs. The guy’s thin frame and college professor look were a deceptive contradiction to what he was really about.
“Glad you could come at such an early hour, Sonny, but this is one of those ‘desperate times calling for desperate measures’ situations,” Scooter said, gesturing for Sonny to take a seat in front of the mahogany desk.
“I kind of figured it was something that was extremely important for you to call at such a time,” Sonny said softly.
Behind the humble, intelligent demeanor, Sonny was one of the most, if not the most, dangerous men Scooter had ever met. He was handsome, in a Babyface sort of way, and his brown eyes were direct. He had even features and curly hair that was graying at the temples. His athletically slim body made him look ten years younger than his fifty-three years. Besides him being a stone-cold killer, what made him more dangerous was that he was an ex-marine honorably discharged after serving his country for twenty years. Ten in Special Forces and another ten in the NYPD, which he’d retired from. He was a trained killer who knew powerful people and could get information on any person he wanted. That helped when he was looking for someone, because even if you were hiding in an igloo on the frozen tundra, Sonny would find you.
“You want a drink, Sonny?” Scooter walked over to his personally carved black marble bar and poured himself a glass of Grand Marnier. Sonny waived it off.
“No thanks. Liquor was never a choice breakfast for me.” Scooter half smiled at his humor.
“I called you here because some people have kidnapped my granddaughter,” Scooter said without hesitation. “This is my daughter, Tashy.” As Scooter gestured to Tashy, Sonny nodded.
“I assume it’s your daughter Scooter is talking about,” Sonny said with a serious expression as he looked at her.
Scooter had used Sonny for many different “services” in the last decade, after he was introduced to him at a campaign fund-raising event for a friend who was running for the state senate. The introduction was short and to the point when one of Scooter’s associate mumbled in his ear, “I want you to meet Sonny Brown. Anything you need taken care of, he can do it. And I mean anything or anybody, you dig?” Afterward, anytime Scooter needed Sonny’s “assistance” in dealing with a problem that was considered “expendable” or a “potential threat,” Sonny handled it efficiently.
“Do we know who is responsible?”
“Her name is Daphne Carter. She’s from Brooklyn. She’s affiliated with the Shower,” Tashy answered.
“You mean the Shower Posse?” Sonny’s eyebrows rose in surprise.
Tashy nodded.
“How did you all get into a run-in with the likes of the Shower Posse?” Sonny inquired.
Sonny remembered that when he worked as an NYPD detective while on leave from the service a case involving the Shower Posse came in. In the eighties, Jamaican posses reeked murderous havoc on many U.S. cities, especially New York, Miami, and places like D.C. Sonny recalled the brutality and savagery of the Shower Posse’s murders. They loved to dismember their victims.
“Long story,” Tashy said abruptly.
Sonny looked at his Patek Philippe watch. “Long morning. I got time. Need to know what I’m getting into and where to start.”
After Tashy gave Sonny the rundown, he simply stated, “We need to talk to your friend Ruby.”
Scooter reached in his desk and pulled out a stuffed envelope and handed it to Sonny, who stood up, straightening his Ralph Lauren Purple Label suit. He grabbed the envelope and placed it in his inside pocket.
“Always a pleasure,” Sonny commented before exiting the office.
“You sure he can get Simone back?” Tashy fretted.
“He’s the best, Tashy. No one can hide from Sonny Brown. That man is probably the only person in this world who could find Osama bin Laden.”
“Why doesn’t he?” she asked.
“’Cause nobody is really looking for him.”
The FBI technicians finished installing the wiretap and electronic listening devices in Ruby’s brownstone right before she pulled up in front of her home. Agents sitting in a van with a telephone company logo watched Ruby from the corner of the block. She looked nervous as she exited her Jeep cautiously, looking up and down the block as the sun began to rise. The chilly morning left dew on cars and patches of grass that surrounded small trees enclosed behind small black wrought-iron gates. The temperature got a little
warmer as the sun began to rise, promising, at the very least, a sunny day.
When she entered the brownstone, she went directly to the first-floor kitchen to fix a much-needed cup of coffee. When she turned the lights on, she was momentarily startled by the person sitting at the kitchen table.
“What are you doing here, and how the fuck did you get in?” Ruby asked with force.
“I really need to talk to you.”
“Listen, Mona, enough is enough,” Ruby sighed.
Chapter Eighteen
The suspicion of an ulterior motive is anti-seductive. Never let anything break the illusion.
—Robert Greene, The Art of Seduction
Junior McLeod exited the terminal at Miami International Airport and put a pair of shades on over his piercing gray eyes. An aqua blue Nautica deck shirt, white cotton Nautica short pants, and white track sneakers gave him the typical Miami everyday look. He wore his long dreadlocks neatly packed in a red, yellow, and green knitted cap.
Whenever Junior visited the States, Miami was the place he enjoyed time in, as it was with many Jamaicans who came to the United States. After hailing a taxi and telling the driver that the Setai Hotel was his destination, Junior stared out at the familiar landscape of the city. It’d been a few years since he’d been back in the United States, as he’d been uninterested in traveling ever since the September 11 attacks, and there probably wasn’t a place on the globe he hadn’t visited, anyway.
However, this visit was urgent. Urgent enough that the person he was there to see had booked him a room at what was now considered one of Miami’s best hotels on Collins Avenue. The Setai Hotel was an oceanfront spot in the center of South Beach, among tropical gardens and pools. The place was top-of-the-line luxury, and Junior’s suite put the l in luxury. Setting down his Tumi luggage, Junior took in the view of the crystal blue ocean from the deck of his room. The ocean smell reminded him of Jamaica. Getting comfortable, he removed his cell phone from its case on his waist and dialed a number. The person picked up on the second ring.