by Kiki Swinson
It seemed like everything went in slow motion. As soon as Kanan reached his hand behind his back, I knew he was reaching for his gun so I held up my pistol and started busting one shot after another at him. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! He returned gunshots.
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!
“Aggh! Shit!” I screamed as the sound of shattering glass cut through the car. Glass splintered all over the front seat and rained down on my head and hands. I could feel it cutting the skin on the top of my hands as I shielded my head. I was very lucky that the bullets hadn’t ripped through my fucking skull.
Suddenly Kanan’s gunshots stopped and when I looked up, he was trying to make a run for the house, but I got a clear shot and let off three rounds. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The last shot put Kanan down flat on his face. I watched his body for any movement, but when he didn’t move for the first thirty seconds, I knew he was dead.
As soon as I tried to recover from the gunshots Kanan had fired at me, more gunshots started coming from the corner window of the house. POP! POP! POP! POP! POP! I immediately dove back down on the floor of the car for cover. I could barely control my breathing. My legs shook uncontrollably and burned like hell as I crouched with my knees bent. Sweat dripped from my forehead into my eyes, but I didn’t dare move to wipe it away. I said a silent prayer for my soul and for my mother. All kinds of thoughts ran through my mind. I knew had to come up with a plan to deal with this situation or else.
Finally, once again the gunshots stopped. Then I heard Matt’s voice coming from the window at the corner of the house. I couldn’t see him, but I heard his voice clearly. “Bitch, if you don’t get out of that motherfucking car right now and bring me my fucking money, I’m gonna kill your fucking baby!” Matt said with evil finality.
I was feeling a mixture of anger and fear. How dare that motherfucker threaten to kill my fucking baby when Kanan started busting his gun at me first? I cringed at the idea of him hurting my son. My jaw rocked so feverishly I was giving myself a migraine.
I swore if he hurt my baby, I wasn’t going to have any mercy on his ass once everything was said and done.
My heart thumped painfully against my chest as I tried to figure out my next move. I wasn’t about to just get out of that car and leave myself wide open to be shot down like a dog, but at the same time, I wanted to let Matt know I could be trusted. At this point, he had the upper hand whether I liked it or not. My baby was in the house with him, so what was I to do?
“Are you gonna bring me my money or not?” he roared. I could hear the anger in his voice. I could tell that he was on the verge of unleashing his wrath if I didn’t hurry up and get out of this car.
“Okay, I’m coming out. But please don’t shoot. All I want is my baby. You can have all of this money,” I bargained.
“Throw your gun on the ground,” Matt instructed me.
“There’s no more bullets inside of it,” I yelled from the car.
“It doesn’t matter. Throw it on the fucking ground so I can see it.”
“Okay. I’m doing it now,” I assured him, and then I tossed my gun out on the ground. The gun was the one Preech gave me at the bank, not the one I took from Juice. So I was still armed.
“Now get the fuck out the car so I can see you,” Matt barked.
I gave myself a pep talk. Okay, Lauren, you can do this. Remember, this is for your son.
I let out a long sigh while I started to sweat so badly I felt the beads rolling down the center of my back. I tried calming my nerves while my teeth were chattering. It didn’t work. So I said fuck it and got up the gumption to get out of the car. I took all the money I had inside of my pants and stuck it inside of the glove compartment. Then I stuffed one of the backpacks in the backseat. I made sure my gun was tightly secured in the back of my pants and then I grabbed the other backpack in my hand and exited the car slowly. “I’m getting out, so don’t shoot,” I announced while I exited the car.
I walked around the car door and was fully exposed. I just knew that Matt was going to shoot me dead on the spot, but he didn’t. I walked very slowly toward the house while he watched me from the window. As soon as I got within a few feet of the side door to the house, he opened it. “Throw the bag in here first,” he instructed me.
I stood there on the bottom step and threw the bag into the entryway. The backpack hit the floor hard. “Where is the other fucking bag?” he hissed.
“Preech had it with him when the cop shot him leaving the bank,” I lied.
“You’re a motherfucking liar! I know you, Lauren. You got that money stashed somewhere,” Matt barked.
“I’m not lying, Matt. I swear, Preech had it when he got caught.”
Matt rushed down the steps, grabbed me by the collar of my shirt, and tossed me inside the house. He slammed the door immediately after he manhandled me and threw me against the wall. I let out another half scream. I heard my handgun skitter to the floor. All hope of protecting myself was gone now. My screams were all for nothing because no one on the outside would be able to hear. “You slick-ass bitch!” Matt growled at me after he saw my gun slide across the floor. He smacked me so hard across my face I saw stars. Wham!
Between the force and the fear, I could not collect my thoughts. I was hyperventilating. I just knew I was going into shock from being so scared. I was being held like a rag doll. I tried to scream help, but he muffled my words with his right hand. “Shut up, bitch!” he huffed through clenched teeth.
Suddenly, I felt his muscular arm closing around my neck. He grabbed me so tight, my eyes popped wide open as I gagged. Matt squeezed with intensity. He was like a possessed demon. I had never seen him like that at all.
I gagged from being put in a chokehold. I tried to claw at his arm that was causing me to suffocate, but I could hardly muster enough strength to make any leeway. I immediately felt my air supply being cut off. “I’ma kill you for sure this time, you fucking bitch!” he growled once more.
I knew I was going to die at any moment but before that happened I vowed that I wasn’t going to go out without a struggle. I began to flail and kick. But that didn’t work for me. It actually tired me out because I wasn’t making any headway with this fucking maniac. It seemed like the more I scratched and clawed at Matt’s arm around my neck, the tighter it got.
“Matt, please stop!” I murmured, but my words were barely audible. He made it crystal clear that I was staring in the devilish eyes of my ex. My stomach muscle clenched and I balled my toes up in my shoes. He spat as he tightened his grip around my neck. But when he saw that I was losing consciousness, he loosened his grip and grabbed a chunk of my hair with the same hand. Tears were running down my face like a faucet. My body ached everywhere but nothing compared to the thoughts I was having about not ever leaving this house alive.
I couldn’t believe it. Matt was finally getting his wish to kill me. And what was so frightening about this was that I once loved this man. His face was filled with hate. I could tell that he really wanted me dead. There was no more love for me.
“You think I’m gonna let you off that easy? I’m gonna torture your ass and let you die slow,” he hissed like venom was spewing from his mouth.
Suddenly I felt a sharp pain penetrate the side of my face. “Ugh,” I grunted from the pain after he hit me a second time. I didn’t have enough energy to scream.
“Shut the fuck up, bitch!” Matt’s gruff voice boomed.
“Please,” I rasped, flinching. My throat felt like someone had shoved a flaming pole down it. I was hit across the face again. This time the metallic taste of blood filled my mouth. Tears immediately sprang to my eyes. “Please,” I pleaded again through tears.
“Oh, now you want to say please,” Matt said to me as he grabbed a handful of my hair with his other hand and yanked my downturned head up so that my battered eyes met his gaze.
“Can we please work this out?” I begged him.
“What the fuck can we work out? Bitch, I don’t
trust you. You’re a fucking sheisty-ass ho!” Matt spat, tightening his grip on my hair.
“I’m . . . I’m . . . sorry, I’m sorry for everything. I really am,” I gasped through tears.
Matt finally let my hair go with a shove. The force was so great I collapsed onto the floor. He walked away from me and scooped up the gun I dropped from the floor and shoved it down into his back pocket. “You thought you were coming in here to pump me up with a couple rounds of lead, huh?” he gritted at me.
“No, I wasn’t going to use it on you,” I lied.
“Well, you sure had different plans for Kanan, huh? ’Cause you sho’ took his ass out with no problems,” Matt pointed out.
“He shot at me first,” I explained.
“Shut the fuck up! I ain’t trying to hear that shit you’re talking. You killed my right-hand man and you probably killed Juice and Preech too.”
“No . . . I swear . . .” I began to say, but he cut me off.
“I ain’t gonna believe a motherfucking thing that comes out of your mouth. So save it for someone else,” he said as he paced in front of me.
A few minutes later Matt was back in my face. I started trembling uncontrollably with fear. He grabbed my face, his strong hand gripping both sides of my cheeks. He squeezed my face so hard I could feel my teeth making an impression on the inside of my cheeks. He forced me to look him in the eyes. “Answer this question,” he started off. “What do you think I should do with you?” It sounded like a trick question so I was leery as to how to answer it.
“Huh? What do you mean?” I asked him while he still had my lips pushed out together, so my words sounded foreign.
“Do you think I should let you go?” he asked in an almost cynical fashion.
I was afraid to say yes, but I got up the gumption to say it anyway. “Yes, please. I promise you’ll never see my face again,” I swore.
Matt let out a sinister, maniacal laugh. “Bitch, whatcha think, I’m fucking stupid? I ought to smack the shit out of you again, for giving me that ridiculous answer,” he said as he shoved me backward, then he lunged at me. I jumped, thinking he was going to swing at me again. But he did something far worse. I couldn’t believe that he hawked a wad of spit on me, then turned and walked away from me. I felt so cheap and dirty after his spit landed on my face and chest. I used my shirt to wipe it off. But for some reason, I could still smell his spit on my face. It was disgusting. I thought I had hit rock bottom after Matt beat me up, damn near killing me. But nothing could compare to him spitting on me. That was the last straw for me.
23
A MILLION THOUGHTS
I couldn’t believe I was still alive. The mere fact that Matt hadn’t just killed me with his bare hands gave me hope. I sat alone on the floor of the entryway to the side door. I looked at it for a second getting the urge to make a run for it. But I knew it would be impossible. There was no way Matt was going to let me out of this house. Being within a few feet of this door seemed odd to me. It seemed too easy a way of escape. I knew Matt. He left me here for a reason. He was testing me. So I knew it would be a bad idea to run. And besides, my son was still here. I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving him here with this fucking monster. No way.
I sat in this same spot for what seemed like the next five minutes. My hair had been pulled, my lips, my eyes were swollen, and my neck was aching really badly from the pressure Matt applied to it while he was choking the life out of me. I felt like I couldn’t move. Then suddenly Matt reappeared with the backpack of money. The bag was slightly unzipped, exposing some of the stacks of one-hundred-dollar bills. “Yo, this shit ain’t nothing but $270,000. Where the fuck is the rest of the money?” Matt roared as he threw the bag onto the floor in front of me.
“I told you Preech got caught with the other bag,” I lied once more. I knew I had to stick to my story or Matt would crucify me for real this time around.
“You better not be fucking lying, bitch! Or I’m gonna make you pay,” he warned me. He snatched the bag back up from the floor and marched out of the room.
About ten minutes later, I heard my baby cry from the other side of the house. My heart started aching. “What’s wrong with my baby?” I cried out.
Seconds later, Matt walked back into the room with Lil Derek cradled in his arms. “He’s fine. All he wanted was a bottle. And he’s with his daddy now.” Matt said it to taunt me as he held up Lil Derek’s bottle to his mouth to feed him.
Tears leaked out of the sides of my eyes. “Will . . . you . . . please . . . ,” I started, but I let the sobs flow freely.
“What? Let you go?” he barked. “Bitch, you are out of your damn mind. You ain’t never going nowhere. You gon’ be with me until I get tired of your motherfucking ass! Me, you, and this lil nigga right here in my arms is gon’ be a family whether you like it or not,” he continued as he paced back in forth in front of me. He was rocking Lil Derek back and forth in his arms to console him.
“But you have Lisa. She’s a nice girl. So why don’t you settle down and have a family of your own with her? She loves you. She probably loves you more than I ever had,” I mentioned. I made sure I said it loud enough that Lisa could hear me. I wanted her to know that I was on her side and that I didn’t want anything to do with Matt’s ass. I wanted him to be her problem and not mine.
“Shut the fuck up! I don’t need you to tell me what the fuck I have. I know what Lisa is to me. I had her here to do the shit you were supposed to be here doing. But nah, you took my motherfucking money and ran off to be with the next nigga,” Matt pointed out. He was getting agitated with each word he uttered.
“Matt, please, just listen to me,” I begged him.
“Fuck you! I don’t wanna listen to shit you gotta say! Everything that comes out of your mouth are lies and pure nonsense. And do you think I wanna hear about you leaving me again? You took away my chances of ever having a life with you when you left with my money. And then to go off and start another life with a fucking FBI cop and then have his fucking baby? Do you know how fucked up that made me feel when I found out about that shit? That shit fucked my head up. Men can’t take hearing about their woman going off to be with another nigga. And then to have a baby by him was damaging in itself. Yo, you fucked my heart up, Lauren, when you had this little nigga right here with that fucking cop. You can’t fuck with a nigga’s heart like that. You just don’t know how you fucked me up forever. And that’s the reason why I can’t let you go. Do you think I can let you go off and be with another nigga? The thought of you being happy with someone else makes me sick to my stomach. So that’s why I gotta keep you here with me. I’ll die first before I let you get away again.” I could see the sincerity in his eyes while he poured his heart out to me. And from there, I knew my chances of ever leaving this guy were very bleak.
“Let’s be honest here,” I began to sob uncontrollably, “our relationship will never be the same. You don’t trust me. And you know you never will.”
“Oh, so now you’re a fucking relationship specialist?” he spat.
“I just know that this right here will never work because all you’re gonna do is try to keep me locked up in this house. You and I are both wanted, so how will we ever live happily ever after?” I asked him. I wanted him to finally listen to me. Our situation was really fucked up. So he needed to be rational about the decisions he was going to make from this point forward.
“Look, I know what the fuck I’m doing. So you let me run this shit here,” he replied, avoiding the questions. He was good at that. But he and I both knew that this little fairy tale he had concocted in his mind was going to fall apart quicker than he could put it together. There was no happily ever after for us. So the sooner he figured that out the better we’d both be. “Get the fuck up and take your ass into this next room,” he instructed me as he jerked his head in the direction he wanted me to go.
He ended up taking me back in the bedroom that he and I had slept in the night before. He gave me Lil De
rek, and then closed the door on me and locked it from the outside. I took a seat on the bed and began to wipe my tears away from my ears. I wanted to get a clear look at my baby boy while I held him in my arms. It was good to have him with me again. Having him gave me a sense of hope even if I would never ever got a chance to leave out of here alive.
While I cradled Lil Derek in my arms and rocked him back and forth, I heard an argument start between Matt and Lisa. I could barely hear Lisa, but I heard Matt clearly. “What the fuck do you mean, do I love you?” his voice boomed. “We ain’t married so don’t be asking me no questions like that,” he continued with finality. I knew this cut Lisa deep. To hear a man avoid the question if he loved you or not was damaging to the heart. But then for him to pour salt in the wound and make it known that you two weren’t married was a clear indication that y’all’s relationship didn’t mean shit to him. Lisa had to see that this relationship between her and Matt wasn’t going anywhere.
“So this is how you treat me after all I’ve done for you?” I heard her say.
“What the fuck did you do for me?” he huffed. He sounded like a raging bull. I knew that in any moment he was going to be attacking Lisa.
“I risked having my freedom taken away by helping you break out of jail. I even helped get you this fucking spot we’re in right now. And I’ve done shit for you that no other bitch has. I put my life on the line for you, Matt, and this is how you repay me?” she expressed. I could tell she was crying because her voice cracked a few times while she vented.
“Bitch, please! Get the fuck out of my face with that bullshit! You ain’t did a motherfucking thing for me! My nigga put that shit together. All you did was drive me away from the fucking jail. Speaking of which, you almost fucked that up,” Matt spat, minimizing her role in his escape.