by D. L. Sparks
“He seems happy, though, and he looks good.”
“I don’t think Trip could look bad if he tried.”
I laughed. “True. I didn’t realize how much I missed him until I saw him.”
“You think he misses it here?”
I shook my head. “No. He seems like he’s content with where he is.”
“Did you ask him?”
“Ask him what? If he wanted to move back?”
She scooped up a piece of my carrot cake. “Yeah.”
“Why would I do that?”
“Because that’s what you want. And the way he left was kind of messed up.”
I shoved a forkful of cake into my mouth. “No, it’s not. And you need to mind your business.”
She gave me a look that let me know she didn’t believe me. And I gave her a look that let her know I didn’t care what she thought.
Her expression changed from playful to serious. “You know if—”
I cut her off. “I know, Twin, I know.”
I drank some of my water and wiped my mouth. India started shredding her napkin and tossing it onto the table, a sign that something was on her mind.
Now it was my turn to grill her.
“What’s up with you? Why are you making a mess?”
She leaned back in the booth. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”
“What’s up?”
Her chest rose and fell with a huge sigh. “Well, you know I’m supposed to graduate in the fall.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, I was thinking about—”
I cut her off. “I swear, India, if you mention another degree, I’m gonna fight you.”
She balled up what was left of the napkin and threw it at me.
“No! Damn. Shut up and let me finish,” she fussed. “There’s a company that I’ve been talking to, and they might be interested in me.”
“That’s good!”
I jumped up, ran around the table, and climbed into the booth next to her. I hugged her, but she didn’t seem as excited as I was.
I stopped my solo celebration and looked at her. “What? What’s the problem?”
“The company is out in San Francisco.”
I slid to the edge of the booth like she was contagious. “That better be the new nickname for downtown Atlanta.”
She just sat there with this stupid look on her face, shaking her head.
“Oh hell no!” I got up and moved back to my side of the table and starting digging around in my purse.
“Where are you going?”
I pulled a twenty out of my purse and tossed it on the table. “I’m going to 404.”
She looked up at me, almost pleading. “Come on, Idalis. Don’t be like that.”
“Love you. Bye, India. Text me when you get to my house and before you put Cameron to bed.”
“Twin!” she called to me.
“I gotta go. I’ll be home as soon as I get off.”
I made my way toward the club without even turning on the radio. I let the window down a little and inhaled the fresh air. Again I found myself trying to clear my head.
California. California?
I couldn’t believe that heifer was really trying to move 3,000 miles away. That was the last thing I wanted to hear.
Tension rode my back as I clutched my phone, scrolling through the contacts until I found the number I was looking for. The jury in my mind deliberated for a few moments before coming back with a verdict.
I hit send.
Chapter Five
Trip
My phone rang, but I silenced it without even looking at the display. We were standing in the middle of what could only be described as a massacre. The young lady’s throat had been cut so deep that her head was almost severed.
I looked around the upscale home in Cobb County and couldn’t help but shake my head. I wondered if these refined neighbors knew that they were living in the midst of a well-thought-out, well-orchestrated drug ring, right in their own backyards.
Just when I didn’t think that things could get any worse, I noticed Lincoln Briscoe walking out of the kitchen. He was on his cell phone, which gave me a chance to go the other way.
I found Phil standing over the body, which was now covered with a white sheet. My partner was talking to one of the APD officers. There were a few agents there taking notes and gathering evidence.
“They found the knife. It’s already been bagged,” the officer said.
“Cool. She got a name?”
The officer answered, “Monique Lewis. Stabbed fifteen times, throat slashed. Apparently, she was running more than drugs out of this nice house.”
Again I couldn’t help but think about my sister.
Phil looked at me. “You a’ight?”
“Yeah, I’m good.”
“Of course, he’s good. You don’t know? That’s Supercop,” Linc taunted. “Special Agent Orlando Spencer.”
Phil looked over at him like he was crazy then looked back to me.
Linc walked up with a sly grin on his face that I wanted to slap off.
The sound of his voice made me wanna punch a hole in the wall. But instead, I turned around and growled, “Listen here, I’m an agent, not a cop. Matter of fact, why are you even here? Don’t you have a speeding-ticket quota to meet?”
“I see they called in the Top Cop, all the way from New Orleans.”
I laughed. “As long as you notice.”
It was no secret that Lincoln and I didn’t get along, but we had managed to find a way to coexist back in college for Idalis’ sake. We’d both known, since the day we met in Idalis’s dorm room, we were oil and water. We didn’t mix. And I was sure he hated me being back in Atlanta, almost as much as I hated being there. I knew me being DEA and digging up dirt in APD’s backyard, his stomping ground, was pissing him off even more, but I didn’t give a fuck.
“Well, I for one am glad to have you back in town,” he said, sarcasm hanging on every word. “Does Idalis know you’re here?”
With the mention of her name, my body got tense. “Why don’t you ask her?” I shot back.
“I’ll do that, Trip, when I get home. Right before bed.”
Our eyes locked in a hate-filled stare until someone called him name getting his attention.
“They need you in the back, Lieutenant Briscoe.” An APD officer came up and said.
“Duty calls. It was good seein’ you,” he taunted, as he walked away.
“Yeah, give Idalis my best when you see her,” I said, cracking a smile. “If you can.”
I was about to head for the door when I got a call from Clayton County.
“Spencer,” I answered.
“Hey, this is Morgan. We’re following a lead on the stabbing out here in College Park. Some girl named Santee Mitchell.”
“A’ight, keep me posted.”
I went and found Phil in the kitchen. “They got a lead. Some chick in College Park.”
“Cool, they don’t need us then. Let’s be out then.”
We were about to head out, when an officer came in and stopped us. “Hold up. We found a girl hiding in a closet downstairs.”
We watched as a female officer led a thin, terrified girl into the crowded room. Her wide-eyed expression let me know that she’d seen way more than she ever wanted to see in her lifetime. Someone had covered her scantily clad body with an over-sized blanket. The room was silent as she sank down on the couch. I walked over to her and crouched down and got eye level with her.
“Hi, I’m Agent Spencer. I’m with the DEA. What’s your name?”
She opened her mouth to speak but nothing came out at first. So she tried again. “Mya Delowe.”
I looked back at the officers in the room. “Did you see what happened here tonight?”
This time she didn’t even try to speak she just nodded.
“We’re gonna need you to give a statement, can you do that?”
Tears welled in her eyes as sh
e nodded again.
I tapped her lightly on her leg and thanked her before standing up and making my way back to the door.
Just then Lincoln stepped in the room.
“There you go, Lieutenant Briscoe, handle that.” I cracked a sinister smile.
Hatred flashed in his eyes, letting me know that if there hadn’t been a house full of law enforcement, things would be going a lot differently now.
I gave him a wink before heading out the door behind Phil.
We got into the truck, and Phil pulled a Hostess cake out of nowhere and opened it up.
“Don’t get crumbs everywhere,” I said.
He held out the chocolate cake. “Want one?”
I just shook my head and cranked up the truck.
Once we were back downtown, we sat in the conference room and scoured stacks of paperwork for hours, trying to piece them together like a puzzle. Trying to find a pattern, a slipup, anything that would give us a clue on what the connection was between all of this and how it tied in with the jail.
“There’s a lot of money and drugs being moved in and out of there for nobody not to know anything,” Phil mumbled while studying files. “There has to be something we’re missing.”
“Not to mention this phantom dealer who’s taking over territory under the radar. Atlanta got more problems than they realize.”
“Shit, I know,” Phil agreed.
I stood up and tried to walk off the tension in my back. I stretched a little and peered out the window. “We’ve been over this stuff a million times. Ever since the trail pointed in this direction, we’ve been on top of everything. We may never plug this hole.”
“Maybe you not as good as they thought, pot’na.”
I turned around and saw Lincoln walking in the room, followed by two city cops. A few seconds later, Lenny appeared in the door.
“What are you doing here?”
Lincoln sat down at the end of the table farthest from me. “Now, I know you didn’t think we were gon’ let you ride in town on your white horse without letting us play, did you?”
I looked at Lenny. “What is he doing here?”
“Lieutenant Briscoe is supervising the UC’s over in Zone One and has a good bit of information on some dealers and their runners. It couldn’t hurt to let him know what you’ve collected so far.”
Phil stood up. “Why don’t you have Lieutenant Bankhead here just give us his list of names and let us do what we came here to do?”
Linc mean-mugged Phil. Part of me wanted him to at least try to go after him to justify the ass kicking I’ve wanted to give him for years.
“Once this case crossed state lines, technically, it became our jurisdiction, Lenny,” I countered. “We don’t have to share lunch with this cop.”
I heard Lincoln let out a disgusted sound. “Hey, we can do this the easy way or we can do this my way, don’t matter to me, ya dig.”
Lenny let out a sigh. “Look, don’t turn this into a cockfight. This case is starting to take on a life of its own, and you two know it. So, Spencer and Porter knock off the Crockett-and-Tubbs act and close this case so I can get the hell out of Georgia.”
With that, Lenny turned and walked out of the room.
“So, fellas, what you got so far?” Lincoln asked, leaning back in his chair.
“You can read, right, Briscoe?” I started.
Phil tossed the folder he was holding in his direction, causing the contents to fly out and scatter across the tabletop. The two city cops that were with Linc started picking up the scattered papers.
“Figure it out,” Phil finished.
Phil walked out and I started to follow, when Lincoln stopped me.
He let out a slight laugh. “Yo, I ain’t goin’ nowhere, dog. You might as well get used to seein’ me. Fed may trump city, but this is still my backyard, pot’na.”
Fire rose in my chest and lapped around my neck and ears. I saw out of the corner of my eye that Phil had reappeared in the doorway to the conference room.
“Yo, Trip, he ain’t worth it, man. Let’s go.”
I looked from Phil back to Lincoln. He had a smug look on his face that made it damn hard not to fire off a round in his chest. I turned and headed out the door and I heard him call out to me.
“I’m lookin’ forward to workin’ with you, Special Agent Spencer.”
“Fuck you, Lieutenant Briscoe,” I shot back.
Chapter Six
Idalis
Club 404 was packed to capacity. I knew we had to be violating some sort of fire code tonight. The DJ had the whole club jumping. His mix had everyone cramming onto what little bit of dance floor there was left. Customers were screaming their orders out to the waitresses over the loud music and bartenders were happily filling orders and collecting tips. After their confusing, shouting exchanges, the servers could barely maneuver through the crowds, back to the bar with their orders.
Before I had Cameron, I worked as a manager and an event planner for the Four Seasons, which kept me pretty busy. But once I got pregnant, Lincoln felt I shouldn’t be working. He encouraged me to slow down—more like insisted on me slowing down. I didn’t start working again until Cameron was almost two, when Linc surprised me by buying this spot. He was co-owner, but he always said that it was just on paper, that this was my project to do whatever I wanted to do with. And I had a lot of ideas for this spot. It took a little over a year but the word got out quick and Club 404 was on the map and I was making my own hours and home with my son whenever I wanted to be, making both Linc and me happy.
The black T-shirt and skinny jeans from bebe I had on were a good choice. I was comfortable but had dressed up my outfit with some accessories for the pictures that people always wanted to take with me since I was the owner.
My hair was pulled back in the front and hung straight down my back. I hated having hair in my face when I was sweaty and with all the running around I was doing tonight, I was definitely working up a sweat.
If I wasn’t running around and pulling money from the bartenders’ drawers, then taking it back to the office, I was taking pictures or networking with radio stations or local magazines trying to get ad space and more exposure. Tonight my good friend Si-Man Baby hosting on the mic and he was working the crowd. He came over and gave me a quick squeeze.
“You looking good in them jeans girl.”
I smiled. “Thank you. I appreciate you coming out tonight.”
“Anything for you, you know that.”
A few patrons walked up, asked if they could snap a few pictures. Si-Man and I obliged and then he disappeared into the sea of people and started hyping the crowd.
“When I say Si-Man you say Baby!” he called in the mic, voice booming through the club. “Si-Man!”
“Baaaaaby!” the crowd responded.
I made my way to Dionne’s station, and instinctively she placed a bottle of water in front of me. We’d been tag teaming at this for almost two years, it was like we read each others minds. I popped the top on the water and let its coolness hit the back of my throat and cool my insides.
I pulled my phone out of my back pocket and checked my messages. India texted me and let me know that she’d picked Cameron up from my mom’s and was on her way to my house. She also let me know that she didn’t appreciate me leaving her at Applebee’s. I responded and thanked her for picking him up and told her I wasn’t thinking about her or her trip to California.
Just when I was about to head to the back office, I felt an arm snake its way around my waist and a pair of lips brushed my neck.
I inhaled his scent and smiled. God he smells good, I thought.
“I wondered if you were coming,” I said over the loud music.
Linc turned me around and I looked up into his brown eyes before planting a kiss on his lips.
“I told you I was, didn’t I?”
“Yeah, but it was getting late. I didn’t think you were gonna make it.”
I cut my eyes for a se
cond and I saw Dionne placing drinks on a tray in front of me. She hollered across the bar and asked me if I could run them to a table because apparently Marissa put the order in and had forgotten about them. I nodded before I turned my attention back to Lincoln.
He tilted his head and smiled. “So you got me punchin’ a clock?”
I wrapped my arms around his neck and squeezed. “I didn’t mean it like that. How was your day?”
He leaned back onto one of the empty stools. “Man, it’s been a crazy day. Did you hear about them findin’ that chick with her throat cut?”
I picked up the tray off the counter. “Yeah, we were talking about it earlier. Does it have anything to do with your case?”
Before he could answer, his phone lit up on his hip. His hand instinctively went to grab it. He nodded toward the crowd. “Go ’head and handle yo business. Let me get this. We’ll talk when you get back.”
I grabbed the tray off the counter and waded my way through the dense crowd of drunks and half-naked women gyrating to yet another song with a long list of promises of satisfaction in bed.
As I set the drinks in front of the customers, I looked up at the bar where Linc was standing covering one ear with his free hand and using the other to hold his phone. He was having what appeared to be an intense conversation. I watched his lips moving as he pressed his phone against his ear. His goatee was perfectly manicured against his chocolate skin. He had just got a fresh cut, his line-up was sharp, and he looked damn good. The lights from the bar bounced off his Breil Milano watch, drawing attention to the tattoo on his forearm. That watch was my Christmas gift to him last year.
A voice snapped me out of my peep session. I looked at the table of people, reacting as if they had just appeared out of nowhere.
“Huh? I’m sorry. What did you say?”
The female sitting directly across from me had attitude written all over her overdone face. Her fake lashes were so long and thick; honestly, I was surprised she could even see the drink to pick it up. She slid her martini glass back across the round table toward me.
“I said, I asked for a Cotton Candy martini. That’s not what this is,” she snapped.