by Keisha Ervin
Prologue
“Agggh!” Autumn belched out a short-lived scream in response to the noise as her eyes were forced to pop open, jumping her out of her sleep and sending a searing pain through her cranium.
Being snatched out of her sleep in response to the door of the dirty motel room crashing in almost gave her a heart attack. With her mind still fuzzy with sleep, Autumn was still on her feet within seconds. Instinctively her hand went under the pillow and searched around. After years of training at the hands of her big brother Dayvid and eldest sister Rain had made Autumn’s instincts razor sharp. Even when she was resting, Autumn was never really sleeping. With the swiftness of a magician, Autumn slid her hand under the pillow that lay next to the one she had been lying on. She locked her left hand around her weapon and took a deep breath.
Autumn could hear her big brother Dayvid and big sister Rain’s voices ringing in her head “always be ready for anything. Porters don’t get caught slipping. Catch a motherfucker before he can catch you.”
“Grab that bitch!” one of the goons growled as three men barged into Autumn’s room. The other two men lunged and came at Autumn from around the bed.
“She got a gun!” one of them screeched as the light was flicked on. The lead goon’s eyes went wide and his jaw dropped.
“I told you we needed to have our guns out…shoot the bitch and let’s go,” one of the men complained.
“I thought boss man said she was a little girl…no need to attract attention to us with guns out coming up in here!” the lead goon gasped as he locked eyes with Autumn. Fear flashed in his eyes, but fire flashed in hers.
“Nah partner, I’m a fuckin’ Porter,” Autumn gritted. “No little girls here.”
BOOM! Without hesitation one shot from Autumn’s .380 dropped the leader of the goons.
“Who the fuck sent ya’ll?” Autumn growled, leveling her gun at the other two cowering flunkies as they tried to fumble for their guns.
“Don’t fucking make another move! Now…who the fuck sent ya’ll?!” Autumn said through her teeth. Neither goon said anything, but the one standing to the left released his bladder all over himself. When Autumn saw that his fear overcame him, she knew that he was the one she had to leave for last. The Porters always knew how to exploit another person’s fear. It was a skill they’d learned early on in life.
“I said who the fuck sent ya’ll here!” Autumn barked, trying her best to keep her galloping heart and the fire raging inside of her under control.
“A’ight…ya’ll don’t wanna say?” Autumn said through clenched teeth. She stormed closer to the man on the right. “I guess ya’ll bitch ass niggas don’t wanna live either.”
“Fuck y…” the man on the right started. BOOM!
A point blank shot to the temple sent the man’s brain bursting out of the back of his skull. The piss stained coward that was on the left fell to his knees and began gagging like he was going to throw up.
“Please…please don’t kill me. I’ll tell you who…who…sent us,” he begged, tears falling from his eyes like a woman.
“I’m listening,” Autumn gritted, her gun dangling at her side. She smelled so much fear on the fake goon that she didn’t even feel the need to keep her gun trained on him.
“It…it was…Loe,” the man stammered. Autumn squinted her eyes trying to recall the name. Then it hit her, Loe was the man that Quinton worked with in the drug business. An exclusive supplier is what Quinton had called Loe.
Why the fuck would he be after me? Did Quinton betray me? All sorts of thoughts ran through Autumn’s mind.
“What does Loe want with me?” she finally asked the terrified man.
“You…you…hurt his family. You crossed him,” the man stammered. It finally hit Autumn like a ton of bricks what the man was referring to.
“Well guess after they find ya’ll Loe will get the message,” Autumn said with finality. “Don’t fuck with a Porter.” One last shot and she was done.
With her nerves on edge and the police surely on their way, Autumn contemplated her next move, but she couldn’t help but to think back to how she’d ended up in that seedy hotel room, on the run and now a murderer.
Chapter 1 The Aftermath
One Month Earlier
Autumn could feel hot tears welling up in her eyes as her big sister Rain spoke to her in that stern, authoritative, yet loving tone that only Rain could pull off.
“But, Rain, I don’t…”
“Autumn…” Rain snapped, cutting her words short. “We are hot right now and from this point on you have to learn to take care of yourself, make decisions on your own and live with them. The life that you’ve know is over and will never be the same again. You have to get that through your head.” Rain hated to be so blunt when she knew her sister was nervous and stressed, but it was the only way to drive home her point.
It had been a few days since Rain had boldly and daringly busted her baby sister off of a prison bus and left several dead law enforcement officers in their wake. They both had been on edge since.
Autumn turned her face away and bit down into her jaw trying to keep it together. Her brother Dayvid and sisters Rain and Fallon were all she had in the world. She was the baby of the notorious Porter clan and she was used to being taken care of as such.
The Porters were career criminals that reigned terror over Baltimore and other cities for years. Unless something was nailed down with kryptonite bolts, the Porters could steal it. Nothing and no one were off limits. However, they preferred big paying heists like banks, jewelry vaults, and occasional drug dealers that had risen to million dollar status. If the Porters wanted it, the Porters would find a way to take it.
The Porter children—Rain, Dayvid, Fallon, and Autumn—hadn’t had it easy in life. They’d lost both of their parents in the same car accident and had been raised by their Aunt Rachel, who they called Nanny. They all had different strengths. Rain, their eldest sister was the brain. Rain was always thinking three steps ahead of everyone else and she was really good with planning. Rain was extremely meticulous, sometimes to a fault. Rain always took care of Autumn like she was her own child. Autumn had a special bond with Rain that Rain didn’t exactly have with Fallon.
Dayvid, their brother and Rain’s twin, was the brawn. Dayvid was left to be the man of their house after their father died and Dayvid would do anything to protect his family, even if it meant committing a murder. Dayvid was protective of his sisters; sometimes so overprotective he caused his sisters to hide a lot of things from him, especially Autumn and Fallon’s love lives.
Fallon was the beauty and the beast at the same time. Fallon was strikingly beautiful, which she used to her and her siblings’ advantage. Fallon could talk the most dangerous hustler into a brown paper bag or out of their stacks in no time. Most of the time during the Porter’s heists, Fallon held the very important job of being the distraction. She was damned good at it too. God hadn’t given her that Coca-Cola bottle shape, huge tits, and gorgeous face for nothing. Fallon was very into using what she had to get what she wanted. Fallon and Autumn were closest in age and were practically inseparable most of the time.
Autumn was thought of by everyone else as the heart of the Porter clan, but she liked to think of herself as a little of all of her siblings’ best attributes. Like Rain, Autumn was a thinker and planner, like Dayvid, Autumn was sometimes hard and down for whatever and like Fallon, Autumn knew she was beautiful and had learned how to use that to her advantage. Autumn wasn’t really afraid of anything, but in the same token she cared the most about everybody. Autumn always made contingency plans for every heist so that no one would get killed. However, if it came down to one of her siblings, she would take a nigga’s head off without blin
king. Autumn was Fallon’s best friend. When you have sisters you really didn’t need to make outside friends their Nanny used to tell them.
Now, the thought of being away from her siblings was sending surf sized waves of nausea through Autumn’s gut. She thought Rain would just take her wherever she went after the escape, but that wasn’t the case.
“The truth of the matter is you may never see me, Fallon, or Dayvid ever again,” Rain said solemnly, trying to give her youngest sister the worst case scenario. Rain was always that type, think the worst and if the best happened it was a plus. Autumn shook her head left to right.
“Don’t say that,” she whispered breathlessly. “Don’t fucking say that Rain!” Now, Autumn was growing angry. “I don’t want to fucking live if I can’t see ya’ll again…what would be the point?” Autumn gritted. Her siblings are all she knows in life. Their lifestyle of heists and high-risk robberies are all that she knows.
“Don’t fucking talk like this Rain! Stop!” Autumn growled, her chest heaving up and down fiercely.
That’s what Rain wanted to see—the Porter blood and temper coming out of her little sister enough that Autumn would think like a ruthless criminal that would survive on her own.
“You have to accept this fact and get it into your head now, so you don’t fall to pieces when and if it does happen, because we are going to need you on the outside. Just remember that you are a Porter, and Porters have to take care of each other like we’ve done our whole lives, and right now we need you Autumn. We need you to be the strongest one now and we need you to live for us. Do you understand that?” Rain said firmly. It took all the strength she could muster as Rain watched her baby sister inhale a deep breath, wipe her eyes roughly, and then shake her head in the affirmative. Rain gave Autumn an assured smile and said, “Good, good.” Rain looked up at her watch and realized that she only had twenty minutes left until her sister’s bus arrived.
“Now listen, I don’t care what happens and under any circumstances do you go back to Baltimore. Not now or ever…even for me,” Rain emphasized, staring deeply into Autumn’s eyes ensuring she got the message loud and clear. Autumn nodded. “I won’t,” she said weakly, with her fingers and toes secretly crossed like she always did as a kid when she was lying. The truth was, Autumn would go any place and do anything necessary to save her siblings so that she they could all be together again. And as long as Dayvid was still locked up in B’more, Autumn knew she couldn’t really swear not to return there.
“Good,” Rain smiled at her. “You always was the prettiest and luckiest one in the family,” Rain joked. Autumn gave her a light smile.
“You would probably tell Fallon that same shit if she was standing here,” Autumn joked halfheartedly. The sisters needed a light moment amid all of the stress and heavy gloom they had been under in the days since Rain had left a trail of dead cops.
The announcement came over the P.A speaker that the bus for St. Louis had just arrived and passengers could get in line to board. Suddenly the bus station bathroom stall seemed so cramped with the two sisters standing together inside. Autumn looked down at the fake identification, burner phone, and burned out credit card Rain had given her. It made things seem so final to her.
“I don’t want no long goodbye, Rain. Leave or else I won’t be able to get on that bus,” Autumn said, her jet black Chinese bang wig swaying as she moved nervously on her feet.
“Aight,” Rain replied feeling a choke-up coming on. She couldn’t afford to get weak now either. As they got ready to part, Rain touched Autumn’s disguised butt-length wig and pulled her sunglasses down so they could gaze into each other’s eyes. The green contacts lenses that obscured Autumn’s naturally chestnut brown eyes moved a little as the tears started welling up once again.
“Baby sis, I promise that I will do whatever it takes to see you again in Mexico…just like we planned…promise,” Rain said, grabbing her sister in a bear hug. Autumn couldn’t control the flow of tears now.
“Take this and use it wisely. Watch your back with Erin too…nobody but another Porter can really be trusted,” Rain lectured, stuffing a rubber banded stack of cash into the front of Autumn’s pants.
“Keep your eyes and ears open. Porter style,” Rain warned.
“Porter style,” Autumn repeated with a weak smile, salty tears on her lips. They rushed out of the bathroom and towards the bus to St. Louis. Erin was already in line with her disguise on too.
Rain watched Autumn through the window as she walked towards the back of the bus, finding a seat next to Erin. Rain watched the bus pull off and Autumn watched Rain turn and rush away. As the bus inched slowly towards the bus depot exit gates, Autumn got to her feet.
“Driver! Driver!” Autumn jumped up screaming like a mad woman. “Wait! Don’t leave!”
The bus driver slammed on the brakes jerking Autumn onto the lap of an old man as she tried to run towards the front.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Erin whispered harshly, standing up slightly. Autumn shot her a look that said, “bitch sit the fuck down or else.”
“I forgot something! I need to get off!” Autumn screamed.
“I can let you off but I can’t wait,” the bus driver growled. “We on time constraints here.”
“Nah…don’t wait,” Autumn said and she raced down the aisle of the bus towards the exit door.
“Wait! What about my money?!” Erin screamed at Autumn’s back. She immediately fell back when she noticed all of the people on the bus turning to stare at her. Erin had to quickly remember she was a fugitive just like Autumn.
“Fuckin’ bitch,” Erin huffed, slumping back into her chair. Seething, she pulled her disguise hat lower over her face. “You ain’t seen the last of me,” Erin mumbled.
Autumn ignored Erin’s outburst as she planted her feet on the ground, took in a lung full of fresh air and made her way back into the bus station. She needed to pull out the burner phone Rain had given her and formulate her own plan to get to Mexico. Autumn had never trusted Erin and still didn’t so she wasn’t about to go to Erin’s hometown with her and not know what she was walking into. Autumn knew that if she had told Rain she wasn’t going to St. Louis, Rain would’ve been worried about her, but she never planned to ride out with Erin.
“I’m doing this shit my way. Fuck going to St. Louis with that chick,” Autumn grumbled under her breath. “I’m getting to that border to see my brother and sisters or I’ma die trying.”
***
Autumn frantically dialed the number of the person she had been thinking about on and off for years. Quinton Driggs was a big time coke dealer that conducted a lot of business in B’more that Autumn had once cased for a lick, but she became so enamored with him that she never presented the research to her siblings. He was actually the first man aside from Dayvid that Autumn had loved.
Autumn’s heart throttled up when Quinton’s smooth voice filtered through the phone. She could picture his handsome face as her eyes closed involuntarily.
“Quint?” Autumn breathed, all of a sudden she had lost her voice and her courage.
“Who this?” Quinton snapped. “I don’t play these fuckin’ phone games.”
“W…wait…Quinton…it’s me…Baby Girl,” Autumn rushed her words out, referring to herself with the nickname he had created for her years ago. “Before you hang up…I’m on a burner and I need your help. I’m in a little bit of trouble,” she managed to say all in one breath.
“Shit, I’m hip. You a star right now Baby Girl,” Quinton replied, sounding like he was smiling on the other end of the phone. “All over the news, every hour,” he continued.
Quinton always knew Autumn was a pit of fire and that she and her infamous siblings were into getting money. He just never really knew exactly how or what. But after seeing the escape on the national news, he was even more impressed and intrigued with the mysterious girl who floated in and out of his life at her whim.
“Tell me how I can help,” Qui
nton said. He liked danger and adventure, although it was a bad combination in his line of work. The love he had developed for Autumn over the years would’ve led him to do anything for her. She was different from all of the girls he’d tried to deal with over the years. Autumn never stressed him and she kept so much of a mysterious aura about herself that Quinton found her to be a constant challenge. A challenge is what most men really wanted, but simple minded chicks just wouldn’t understand that; however, Autumn was one of the rare ones that played the mystery game really well.
Autumn closed her eyes and slumped down onto the toilet seat of the bus station bathroom. Knowing that Quinton was willing to help her caused a sense of relief to wash over her like a warm blanket on a cold winter’s night.
“Come get me,” she finally croaked out, right before the tears of joy and relief slid down her face. “You know my family will hit you off lovely for the help. I really need to get the fuck out of dodge, but I have no one else to turn to right now.”
“Nah, I ain’t looking for nothing in return Baby Girl. You got it. You got me so don’t ever think you ain’t got nobody,” Quinton said sincerely. “Just tell me when and where and I’ll send for you.” Quinton hadn’t even taken a minute to contemplate Autumn’s request. He had fallen in love with Autumn during their time too, he just never knew that she started out their relationship trying to set him up to get robbed.
An hour and a half later, Autumn was climbing into an old beat down pickup truck with so many rust stains on the paint she could barely tell that the original color of the vehicle was white.
“You the gal Q tol’ me to get? Code name Baby Girl?” an old white man with a Santa Clause beard and huge round beer belly wheezed before Autumn climbed up into his pickup. Autumn coughed because the man smelled like mixture of animal manure, musty armpits, and cheap cigars.
“That would be me,” Autumn managed, wanting so badly to cover her nose with her sleeve.
“Alrighty then we on our way,” the old white man huffed pulling out of the bus station. Autumn immediately thought about how smooth, well dressed, and clean Quinton carried himself and couldn’t for the life of her put together how this smelly, fat, nasty looking white man could have any connection to the Quinton she knew.