“Why?”
“Why?” Tari forgot that the woman was holding a gun and looked at her like she was off. “What do you mean why? Isn’t it obvious? I had to help her with bills and hospital expenses.”
“Is that something that you wanted to do?”
“No,” Tari answered honestly. “But there is so much that I do want to do, and it won’t be worth doing if my mama ain’t here to see it. She’s at home now. I promised that I’d be there in the morning. I have to make sure she takes her medicine. She’s been having one of her sick bouts again.”
“What were you doing here tonight if your mother is at home sick?” Honey’s question must have struck a nerve because Tari averted her gaze instantly. When she didn’t answer right away, Honey placed her gun on Tari’s chin and forced their eyes to meet again. “You didn’t hear the question or something?”
“Mama’s cancer has been really aggressive. The shit the doctors are giving her isn’t working, and the radiation is causing too much stress on her body. At the rate they’re going, they’re killing her more than the cancer is. I’ve been doing research, and there is this man in Africa, he’s an herbalist. He uses nothing but natural compounds, and he has documented where he has cured multiple cases of cancer completely. It’s expensive, though. Very, very expensive and—”
“You thought that if you went to the club and bagged a baller, then you could get the money for her treatment?” Honey removed the gun from Tari’s chin and shook her head.
“Yea. Stupid, right?”
“Stupid as hell.” Honey’s response was harsh, but her tone was softer than it had been before. “This nigga wasn’t going to do nothing but fuck you and call an Uber to take your ass back to the hood. You thought you could woo him with some pussy? This greedy pig?”
“Look,” Tari whispered and closed her eyes tight, “I’ve seen a lot of shit where I live at, so a piece of me knows I ain’t getting out of here alive. Mama and I live in a house in Riverdale, on Union Avenue. You can’t miss it. We painted it light pink last year because Mama always wanted a pink house. Please make sure she gets the $20,000 for the treatment.” She opened her eyes and pointed down the hallway to the bedroom in the suite. “His wallet is back there. He has a card connected to a bank account with $300,000.”
“She lyin’!” Breezy piped up. “How this bitch know that shit? She just tryin’a buy time before we pop her ass.”
“I know because his drunk ass sent me to the ATM at the club.” Tari shot him a dirty look.
“Yeah, whatever. Even if he do got a card with the money on it, we don’t have the bank account info to make a transfer. And while you two were having a powwow, these other niggas done beat our real mark to a coma.”
He pointed to the men standing around DeAngelo’s limp body with sheepish expressions on their faces. DeAngelo’s chin was touching his chest. He didn’t move. Blood trickled down the center of his nose, dripping off the tip of it, and he looked dead.
“We don’t need him.”
“How? You gon’ rob the bank?”
“No, stupid.” Tari rolled her eyes. “I see why you were put on babysitting duty now.”
“You real lippy for a bitch that’s just about to be eating dirt.”
“Breezy, shut the fuck up and let her talk!” Honey yelled motioning for Tari to continue.
“You don’t need his bank information if you make a transaction. I’m not just a secretary. When my mother got sick and began losing her hair, I started making wigs for her. When I got really good at it, I actually started an online store called Beauty’s Calling where I make quality wigs for women. I can create you an invoice for all of the money in his account, and you can pay it. When it’s in my account, you can just transfer it all in your account. All you need is a phone and his card.”
The room was silent for a minute before Honey nodded her head at Breezy.
“Go get his wallet and her clutch,” she instructed and pulled out Tari’s cell phone.
She didn’t have to ask for the Web site information because it pulled up as soon as she clicked on the Internet app. Scrolling through the information on it, she saw that Tari had been telling the truth. Still, she didn’t trust that Tari wouldn’t try to run if she was cut free. When Breezy brought the card and the receipt to her, Honey created an invoice for the balance in the account and sent it to Tari’s e-mail. She then used the card to make the payment. When the page on the screen told her the transaction was successful, the phone made a pinging noise. The notification bar of the phone read something that gave Honey a huge wave of relief.
Tari Knowles. A deposit of $346,869 has been made to your account. If you have any questions, please contact us at the telephone number listed below.
Opening the e-mail, Honey clicked on the link to take her to Tari’s online banking. Tari didn’t hesitate to give her the log-in information, and Honey transferred the money to her own account. There was a two-day wait for the transfer to be completed, but she wasn’t expected back home in LA for three.
“That was easy,” Honey said and stood to her feet. She turned to the goons and said, “I don’t want the body found. And get somebody up here to clean this room up.”
With that, she made her way to the door but stopped when she was in front of Tari again. She reached into her own clutch and threw an object down on the ground right beside the bound girl.
“You have five minutes to gather all your things and wash that smeared makeup off of your face,” Honey said smoothly. “My car leaves in five minutes. Be in it by then or join DeAngelo.”
She exited the room with Breezy and Dank behind her, leaving Tari scrambling to cut herself free with the switchblade.
Chapter 2
Days Gone By . . . April 2011
“Lisa!”
Seventeen-year-old Honey Broadway stood in the doorway of her foster mother’s room. It was seven in the morning on Friday, and her ride to school would be there within the next fifteen minutes. The check Lisa got for keeping Honey had come in the previous week, and she knew Honey needed the remainder of what she owed for her cap and gown. Lisa lay unmoving in her queen-sized bed, intertwined in the covers. Honey turned her nose up as she looked around the room. Trash and clothes were strewn everywhere on the ground and on the mahogany-colored dressers. There was always a lingering sex smell inside, and the musk danced disgustingly at the tip of Honey’s nose. Reluctantly, she stepped foot inside because it was apparent that her voice would not be enough to wake Lisa up from her slumber.
“Lisa,” Honey said in a softer voice and shook the sleeping woman by the shoulder. “Lisa!”
“Hmmm,” Lisa groaned and tried to tuck herself deeper under her burgundy comforter. When the cover was snatched away and the cold air hit her face, she sprang up. “What the hell do you want? What! What is it?”
Lisa blinked her puffy eyes and tried to focus on the pretty young lady before her. She saw that Honey was fully dressed in a tight pair of skinny jeans, a red zip up hoodie with a camisole underneath, and a pair of fresh white Air Force Ones. The gold chain that Honey never took off dangled slightly because of the way she was bent over Lisa. She stood up when Lisa, furrowing her brow and scratching her disheveled hair, sat up.
“Where are you going this early in the morning? It’s Saturday!”
Her voice was shaky, and Honey studied her bright yellow face. There were bags under her eyes, and not the ones that came from being tired. There was a point in time where Honey was sure Lisa was the finest girl on the block, but now, she just looked burnt out and frail.
“It’s Friday, Lisa,” Honey said looking at her like she was crazy. “And you said you would give me the rest of the money for my graduation stuff.”
“Money?” Lisa stared blankly at Honey and licked her dull, black lips.
“Yeah,” Honey told her and stepped away from the bed. She began rummaging through all of Lisa’s drawers to find the cash. “I need some of the $400 you got last week.�
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“Oh!” Lisa answered moving her hair from her face. “That money.”
Getting up on wobbly legs wearing nothing but a blue Texas Cowboys T-shirt and a pair of red panties, she began helping Honey look through her things to find where she put the money. She knew that she had cashed it as soon as she got it, but she didn’t know where she’d put it afterward.
Honey began to grow frustrated. If Lisa wouldn’t have been so busy smoking all night, then she could have remembered where the money was. Honey was on her knees looking under the bed when she heard the distant sound of a horn being blasted outside.
“Shit,” she said getting up from the floor. “My ride is here. Lisa, today is the last day to make my payment! If I don’t get my cap and gown, then I can’t walk with my class!”
“I’m sorry,” Lisa said and sat back down on her bed. She put her hand to her forehead and looked at Honey, genuinely distraught. “I don’t know what I did with the money. When I find it I’ll bring it up to the school, OK?”
“What do you me—”
“Money? What money?”
Honey’s statement was cut short by the sound of a deep baritone voice.
She turned toward the doorway and saw Lamont, Lisa’s on-again, off-again boyfriend, standing there. Lamont was a little taller than six foot and was blacker than a panther. The hair on top of his head was scraggly, as was his beard. He was wearing nothing but a pair of blue boxers and a white Hanes T-shirt showing his beer belly, letting Honey know that he must have stayed the night.
“The money from the state,” Honey answered because Lisa was too spaced out to.
“Aw, that money,” he said and gave a sly smile. “She cashed that yesterday to pay my car note. Then we got something to sip and smoke on.”
“What?” Honey asked and felt her chest tighten. She faced Lisa again, and that time, she had fire in her light brown eyes. “Is he telling the truth?”
“Oh, yea. That’s what I did with it.” Lisa shrugged her shoulders and let her head roll to the side. “I need Lamont to take me to work.”
“Stupid bitch!”
The frustration in Honey’s chest built quickly, and it took everything in her not to slap the high out of Lisa. A year ago, the only reason she accepted living with an addict was because she was able to come and go as she pleased. Now, she regretted not running away a long time ago.
“Hey, you watch your mouth when you’re talking to me!” Lisa jumped up and tried her hardest to stand still. “You’ve been living in my house rent free, you little bitch! That’s my money! Be lucky I didn’t sell your pretty ass to the niggas poking around on the streets. They would’a loved your pretty pussy!”
“Fuck you! Fucking junky.” Honey turned her back on Lisa and started for the door. Lamont was still standing there leering down at her. His eyes traveled every curve on the young girl’s body, and Honey sneered at him. “Get out of my way. My ride is here.”
“You know if you need the money . . .” He licked his dry lips at her and grabbed at his crotch. “I just got some last night. You just gotta do a little something, something for me too.”
“I ain’t never gon’ be hurting that bad for a dollar,” Honey said wanting to throw up at the fact that he would even think that was an option.
She pushed past him without another word to either one of them and went back to her room to grab her backpack. While there, she also threw a couple of outfits in the bag because she had no plans on coming home that evening. After tossing the bag over her shoulder, Honey briskly left the small one-story house, ignoring Lisa’s calls behind her.
“Fuck that bitch! You need to get the fuck up so we can go to my house before—”
Honey slammed the door before she could hear the rest of Lamont’s statement. She was tired of them both already, and the day had just started.
“Honeyyyyyy!”
Parked outside next to Lisa’s beat down green Grand Am was a light blue 2011 Chevy Cruze that had its darkly tinted windows rolled all the way down. Hanging out the passenger’s side was Honey’s best friend Lanai with a big smile on her pretty brown face. Her hair was braided neatly back into two long Cherokee braids, and the pink gloss on her lips made them pop fiercely in the sunlight. In response to her hearty welcome, Honey gave a head nod and grunt when she got in the passenger’s seat.
“Uh, when is Lisa gon’ get that door fixed? That one white door looks a mess!” Lanai raised her perfectly arched eyebrow when Honey didn’t speak. “Why yo’ shit stink so bad already?”
“Because it’s early as fuck, and you’re too damn happy for me.”
Lanai pulled away from the curb and drove in the direction of their high school. Honey was quiet with her head turned to the window most of the ride, and Lanai knew what that meant.
“What did Lisa do this time?”
Her question made Honey’s jaw clench, and for a second, Lanai thought she pissed her friend off even more.
“She spent all the money,” Honey finally answered.
“Are you serious, Honey? Didn’t she know you gotta get your shit for graduation by today?”
“Yup, she figured paying that nigga’s car note was more important, though.” Honey put her head back on the headrest on her seat. “I ain’t gon’ be able to walk with y’all. . . . After all of this, I ain’t gon’ be able to walk!”
Pissed wasn’t the word to describe what she was feeling. For the last five months, Honey had been meeting with tutors and doing tons of extra assignments just to make sure she had all of the credits needed to graduate. After her mother was killed, she bounced around a lot. Out of all the homes that she had been to, Lisa’s was the best, and that wasn’t saying much. If it did anything, it gave her the gumption to want to get out of the system with her feet on the ground, running. Now, all of the effort she’d made had been thrown back fiercely in her face with a nice “fuck you.”
“How much do you owe?”
“I only needed a hundred.” Honey shook her head and clenched her fists. “That dopehead couldn’t even give me one hundred stinking dollars, Ny!”
Lanai didn’t say anything else for a while, she just turned the last few corners to get to on their school. When they got to the student parking lot of Jefferson High School ten minutes before the bell, running inside with the big group of students was the last thing on Lanai’s mind. She sighed and had an inward battle with herself on what she was about to offer her friend. Once that door was open, there was no way of shutting it and nowhere to run after having passed through it. Facing Honey, she saw that her head was still toward the window and the stony expression on her face hadn’t changed in the slightest.
“Yo,” she said, but Honey didn’t budge. “Look, what Lisa did is fucked up, and there ain’t no way of getting around that. I could give you the hundred for the rest of your graduation gear. That little hundred dollars ain’t shit to me.”
That got Honey’s attention. She turned to face Lanai, expecting to see her hand outstretched with the money, but all she saw was a determined face.
“I could give you the money but—”
“But what? You don’t want to?”
“Nah, that ain’t it. I’ma give it to you, but what’s gon’ happen when you need some more money? You turn eighteen in two weeks, girl. You already know Lisa ain’t gon’ let you live there once that check stops coming.”
“I’ma have to get a job.” Honey shrugged it off. “They had a hiring sign on that new burger joint around the corner from the house. I’ll probably try to fuck with that.”
Lanai laughed like Honey had just told the funniest joke of the century. A burger joint was the last place that she could see Honey working . . . herself too, for that matter.
“Girl, bye,” Lanai said, still giggling. “You ain’t finna be putting fries in nobody’s grease, stop it! Plus, everybody knows ain’t no real bread in that. But I feel you. You are going to have to get a job. If you want, I can put you on with something, and yo
u’d be getting hella cash too.”
“How do you know?”
“What do you mean? Have you seen my clothes? My car?” She pointed at the light blue Ralph Lauren sweat suit she had on and the all-white Jordan 12s on her feet. “How do you think I was getting all this shit?”
To be honest, Honey always thought Lanai was spoiled. The two became close at the beginning of the school year, and Honey always wondered why somebody as cool as Ny wanted to be friends with somebody like her. Back then, Honey’s clothes were shabby, and the shoes on her feet usually came from a Payless or a Walmart. Kids in the high school always made fun of her, so she was always fighting. After Lanai took Honey under her wing, she gave her clothes and shoes so nobody would ever tease her again. Honey thought it was because she felt sorry for her, but nonetheless, she was thankful for the friendship.
“Do you ever wonder why out of all these bitches in this school, you’re the only one I really fuck with?”
“Yeah,” Honey answered looking at her hands. “I always wondered that.”
“It’s because you remind me of myself.”
“How I remind you of yourself? You ain’t never been in foster care or had to jump house to house.”
“Nah, I haven’t, but I might as well have been.” Lanai’s eyes got glossy, and she avoided Honey’s eyes. By then, the sounds of the kids yelling and running into the school had come and gone. It was just them outside in the parking lot. “My mom ain’t shit, Honey. In some ways, her and Lisa are identical.”
“W-wait.” Honey put her hands up. “I thought she was some big-time lawyer or some shit.”
“Nah,” Lanai shook her head. “Maybe some years ago, but not anymore. Not since she met this man named James. He was supposedly this big-time contractor. At first, they used to just smoke weed and drink, normal shit. Then he got her into popping pills, and that was enough for her for a while. She was still able to go to work like a normal person, but then . . .” Her voice trailed off.
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