by Keta Kendric
Tash was a good girl when it came to men and boys, but she was petite and cute, so she often attracted unwanted attention. The Haitians were ruthless enough to take from her what didn’t belong to them. The thought alone had me plotting how many of them I wanted to kill.
“There’s your precious little gem,” Trench stated before groping his dick, answering the question that I prayed was speculation. The arrogance in his tone had my trigger finger itching. The notion that he had forced himself on her had just increased the number I had in my head.
“What the fuck do you want, Trench?” I spit my question through clenched teeth, fighting to contain my rage.
“In exchange for your little jewel, I’d like to expand our territory to Leven street, as well as you becoming our supplier.”
I failed to suppress my laugh, and the sound caused Trench to turn up his nose and bite into his weed-pinked ashy ass lips.
“Have you lost your weed-soaked mind?” I asked him. “There’s no way in an infinite number of fucks am I supplying you. It’s because of the treaty your uncle had with mine that you have the territory you already have.”
Pointing, I shook one of my manicured fingers in his direction. The nails were blood red, an accurate representation of the blood I wanted to spill.
“I’m an ass scratch away from taking what you already have, Trench. Don’t insult me by asking for more.”
“They said you were a bossy bitch. A mouthy one too.”
He turned to his men that had Tash. “String that little bitch up. Let’s see how much negotiating, Mrs. Boss Bitch is willing to do.”
At those words, his men put a fucking noose around Tash’s neck and led her to a nearby pipe fitted between two poles.
“Don’t do this shit, Trench. She has nothing to do with the decisions I make.”
A pair of old black tennis shoes swung from the rusted pipe above, showing me what they were planning to do to Tash. One of the men tossed the long end of the rope they had around Tash’s neck up, and across the pole and pulled it taut enough to lift her up onto the balls of her feet as she clawed at her neck.
How the fuck was I going to save Tash without killing half the hood?
24
Arjen
My wife was at it again. I couldn’t keep up with the woman, not even with guards trailing her twenty-four-seven. How she kept getting away from them was beyond me because they were all former military.
“I’m sorry, Loud. She’s good. She set up a decoy so that I was following the wrong SUV for a few miles before I realized it wasn’t her.”
Mecca had no idea how overprotective I had become of her. The four guards I’d had keeping an eye out for her had multiplied to ten. I had one in every place she frequented. If shit went down and she needed me, I would be there to help her, whether she wanted me to or not.
I couldn’t hop into my clothes fast enough. She had crept into her closet this morning after her burner had gone off. I sensed something was going down and wasn’t going to sit back and wait for it to happen.
“If my wife comes home tonight with so much as a hair out of place, I’m going to soak that whole fucking neighborhood in gas and turn it into a topside hell. And all of you, who are supposed to be for her protection, are going to be burning with it if you let her slip through your fingers again.”
I clicked off and dialed Khane.
“I think some shit is going down with Mecca. How soon can you get here?”
“Twenty minutes. I’m in town.”
“I’ll meet you. The guards I hired to protect and keep an eye on her, lost her. This is the third time she’s gone off the grid with eyes on her. It took one of her men, Marshawn, to call me and warn me about the danger she’s about to put her life in. He said she is about to drive into Overtown to face the Haitians who took one of her workers; a young female. From what I know of the Haitian’s, they are the types that will cut their own mother’s throat to get what they want.”
The magazine I slapped into the AR-15 in my hands sounded off. “They are going to get more than they bargained for today if they lay a hand on my wife.”
I hung up and dialed for more reinforcements, my mind shifting from Arjen, to the name Khane and my men had given me, Loud.
We were a convoy of three, four in each vehicle, all armed and ready for combat. I was in the middle vehicle, and Khane was in the rear. We were on the stretch of road with mountains to our left, and a cliff to our right as crowds of trees stood tall on the rise of more mountains ahead.
“Did you see that?” I asked Cass, who was driving. Since everyone could hear me through their earpieces, their bodies stiffened with alert.
“What?”
“That,” I pointed as the stand of rock formations up ahead of us.
“Slow down,” I ordered.
Our Jeeps slowed, their engines idling down. The vehicles were all up-armored, and battle-tested. I’d seen a flash of something reflected against the sun, up ahead. It could have been nothing, but I was filled with a stirring anxiousness all day and wasn’t taking any chances.
The burning flare of the tracer round caught my eye as it zeroed in on the lead vehicle just as the vehicle swerved erratically to the left and screeched to a halt. My vehicle took a sharp right, and Khane’s followed, taking a left. We were out of the vehicles, aiming and firing at an enemy we hadn’t been expecting, nor could identify. It wasn’t ten a.m. yet, and we were at war.
“Khane,” I called.
“Already on it,” he returned as he paired up with Walt from his truck and began heading for the mountains. I joined with Hunter from my truck and headed towards the cliffs. We had sprayed on special paint to mark ourselves so our men wouldn’t accidentally shoot us.
We kept ourselves as invisible as possible, using the cover of the staggered vehicles to crawl onto the mountain and cliff areas as the rest of the men kept our adversaries busy with suppressive fire.
“Who the fuck could this be?” I asked, knowing my crew knew as much as I did. No one answered. They just continued to lay down fire while we set out to flank the crew on the attack.
“There are about ten of them, spread into the mountains and wood-lined areas. They have the high-ground advantage.” Cass’s voice sounded, giving us an update on what we were facing.
“We’ll find them,” was my reply. This group of soon-to-be dead assholes was in my way, keeping me away from Mecca. She was in danger, and I was crawling along the lumpy terrain of a sloping cliff to put an end to an ambush that had popped up out of the blue. This was not a fucking coincidence.
The enemy was too close for me to risk making a call, but I had to know what was happening with Mecca. I paused long enough to send a text.
“Update on wife.”
I tucked my phone away and continued to crawl towards the unsuspecting man who aimed and continued to fire at our crew on the highway. He was concentrating so hard on the group before him that he never saw me coming.
“Psst,” I called to the man to get his attention. The top of his head was flying through the air as soon as his gaze met mine. The sound of his body hitting the ground called attention to his position. I felt nothing for taking his life. All I wanted to do, was kill them so I could check on Mecca.
“What’s going on over there?” His buddy called into their listening device that I was now listening in on. Come and see, motherfucker.
Like a fool, he ran up to check on his lifeless friend. Aim. Fire. Gone. Two to the face had taken him out. He didn’t even know what hit him.
Khane and Walt weren’t saying anything, nor did I hear any background on them, which meant that the rocks were more than likely blocking the signal.
The men below continued to fire, but not as frequently, which hopefully meant that we were decreasing the numbers that had spread through the mountains.
Despite the signal-blocking rocks, my phone buzzed, and I yanked it free and swiped my frantic fingers over the surface to read the message.
“No visuals. Ten minutes out.”
Fuck! I had sent in a team of guys to Mecca’s location before me, but they hadn’t arrived yet. Their negative update on her status scratched up my insides like broken glass. The notion that Mecca was in danger was ripping me apart piece by piece. She could be dead in ten minutes. I had my fingers poised to send a reply text, but the click of a weapon at my ear stopped me.
“Drop the fucking weapon!” a deadly voice ordered.
I opened my fingers, and my phone and weapon dropped, but I followed up the action with a swift spin, sending my foot connecting with the man’s weapon, knocking it from his hand. Just as quickly, I drew my hunting knife and sent it slashing across his abdominal area.
The sloping terrain made it difficult to stand as fast as I was able to spin, so I let him make the hard moves. The result was him bending as he attempted to draw his backup weapon.
The heel of my boot came down on the back of his head, bringing him down to my level before I climbed and positioned myself atop him. I sent my knife into his side twice before I aimed for his head. He blocked the headshot, but the wounds I had inflicted had his movements sluggish and sloppy.
The stabs were what he got for assuming I needed my gun. The slash fest I inflicted was finished off by me planting the knife deep in his chest, the tip of a rib cracking on impact.
I’d had to go in through the side of his left pec, since he was wearing body armor. I didn’t retract the knife while I sat watching him struggle to take it out.
“You’re dying. I’d say you have two minutes left, so you may as well tell me who you’re working for.”
He coughed, blood spurting from his mouth. His bulging eyes rolled frantically left and right, glaring at me like the devil I knew I was. I sat on his chest, staring down on him, smiling as he lived his worst nightmare.
“90 seconds. Tell me who hired you.”
“Black Saints,” the man sputtered before a hacking cough sent more blood gushing from his mouth.
I edged my fingers around the grip of my knife before I jerked it out of his chest.
“I lied. You actually could have lived if I hadn’t taken the knife out.”
At the sight of his wide eyes, I sent the knife through the soft, pallid skin under his chin until it vibrated, chipping across his jawbone before it slid inside to the hilt.
His eyes glazed at the exact moment the sharp metal connected with his brain and short-circuited the network of neurons firing off there. He froze, his eyes wide, pupils dilating and seeing something I couldn’t as life drained from them.
The Black Saints. Why? Was it possible that Mecca’s own people were setting her up to die? The shit made no sense, which was why I wasn’t going to believe it until I got to the bottom of the situation. After a quick glance around, I picked up my phone to finish my text.
“Under fire, backway, Green Mountain Pass, take care of Mecca.”
There was no reply or return calls from Mecca. At thirty, she was sending me into an early mid-life crisis, and there wasn’t shit I could do about it but let the stress and worry consume me.
The ping of a return text had me snatching my phone from my pocket.
“Two minutes out.”
Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! I had killed three men, and they still didn’t have eyes on Mecca. This was a reminder of how fast she could lose her life. I needed to hear her voice. I needed to know if she was okay.
Had my wife fearlessly walked into a trap set by her own crew?
25
Mecca
“Stop this shit, Trench! She’s an innocent girl that has nothing to do with business between you and me. Let her down. You don’t want me to make a decision, I can’t take back.”
He laughed and pointed at his men before he twirled his finger, signaling the one who had the end of the rope to pull it tighter. Tash was lifted off her feet, the tips of her toes was the only thing touching the ground as she convulsed and fought to keep from choking.
HB was out and aimed at Trench’s head so fast that his wide eyes flashed his surprise. Weapons came out from every direction at my action. The sound of metal clicking against the cloudy morning sky rang loud, like the drumbeats signifying the start of a battle.
“Let her down, now!”
Tash was dying, and I couldn’t let that happen. My three guys and I were severely outnumbered, but we all aimed, ready to die if need be. I kept my aim on Trench. Shockey and Torch aimed at the ones standing next to Trench, and Marshawn aimed at the one pulling the rope that was sucking the life from Tash.
“Tell me what I want to hear, Queen Mecca, or she will die,” he taunted. “It doesn’t appear she has much life left in her, so you need to hurry up with your decision.”
I lifted my gun so that he could see what I was doing before I shoved it down the back of my pants. My men kept their weapons aimed and ready. Trench’s face grew tense, puzzled by my action, likely thinking I was about to give him what he wanted.
I could sense death peeking through the glare I cast at Trench, the feeling so strong, it kept his full attention.
“Angel, light this motherfucker’s world on fire. Devil, take out the one holding the rope.”
Trench frowned, and although he couldn’t hear the commands I had just given, my behavior appeared to be settling into his brain. The frown on his face had set in and realization flashed in his eyes a second before his head exploded.
The sound that followed my command was a resounding splat, the inside of his head hitting the ground. The impact of the bullet strike had ripped apart that nest of tarantulas atop his head, leaving them soaked with blood, brain matter, and pieces of his skull.
Since a gun blast hadn’t sounded and no one had seen where it had come from, the collective gasp of his men sounded a second after his body hit the ground.
The one that held the rope fell as dramatically as Trench had, the rope slipping from his hand and releasing Tash, who was thankfully alive. She clutched her throat, gasping for air on the ground.
All of the background noise had ceased. The curtains in nearby apartments were thrown back and moving, people getting their eyewitness account of the hood drama for the day.
Fingers sat heavy and anxious against triggers, but some were too stunned to shoot, and others were smart enough to know that they could be next to die.
They had seen me put my gun away, so their bucking eyes roamed in every direction searching for where the shots that took out Trench and the rope holder had come from.
Trench’s men remained standing, stuck in indecision, not knowing what to do since their leader was gone, and they had no way of knowing which of their heads was next to get blown off. Men often underestimated me because I was a woman. They assumed my soft features and appearance couldn’t hold the kind of chaos the men usually brought. They were wrong to believe that way because I was their fucking worst nightmare in heels.
The sight of all the weapons aimed in my direction struck the flaming cords of my fear, but I refused to let it surface. Any one of Trench’s men could have squeezed their triggers and ended my life, but I was confident in the team I had watching my back. Red dots danced over the anxious bodies of Trench’s men, sending a message of warning that was decreasing their willingness to take a shot at me.
Even my team stood stunned.
“Mecca, who the fuck’s got our backs?” Shockey whispered, his steady aim holding strong.
“My guardian Angels,” I answered, confusing him more. His face frowned at my answer, but he didn’t break his aim or eye contact with his target.
I wasn’t naïve enough to think they wouldn’t notice I was wearing a vest or that some were stupid enough to take a shot at me the first chance they got. I stepped away from my spot anyway, aiming a finger at Tash so they would know my intentions.
The warning sounds of clinking metal alerted me that I was about to walk through a minefield, hundreds of bullets aimed, and ready to eat into me. I had allowed myself
to go into the quiet as I prepared to take my walk through the valley of the shadow of death. I prayed that the cold, heartless bastard waiting on the other end wasn’t ready to take me today. Cautious steps and eagle-eyed glares eased me closer until I was kneeling next to Tash, helping her up.
“Thank you for coming to get me. I’m so sorry I let them take me,” she whispered, her voice barely sounding from the strain of the rope biting into her windpipe.
“You have nothing to be sorry about. I’m the one that’s sorry. I shouldn’t have let you anywhere near this shit.”
She attempted a smile. “I’d have done it anyway. I want to be like you. Fearless. Pretty. A boss.”
“Sweet, Tash. You can be all of that outside the drug game. This is not the only way. I’m not the woman you should be using as a role model.”
The pot was calling the kettle black because my role model was Silvia Cardenas, but Tash didn’t need to know that.
Tash shook her head. “In this world, you’re the perfect woman I should be looking up to.”
There was no time to reason with her. Even when faced with death, the girl was determined to be like me. I didn’t understand why she had passed up an opportunity to get away from this shit.
Her mother was a desperate crack addict, abusing the drug for over a decade. Her brothers were in jail, one for murder and the other for robbing a convenience store and shooting a cop. Drugs had found a way to take away her entire family, yet she still wanted in the game.
She clung to me, limping while I led her through that deathly valley towards my SUV. She was raped, beaten, and more than likely tortured, but a weak smile was poised on her lips as I led her to the back of the vehicle.